Fred Minnick details the Ultimate Bourbon Raffle to benefit the West End School

"Bourbon King" Fred Minnick details the Ultimate Bourbon Raffle to benefit the West End School...

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Yeah. So I have a YouTubechannel. You can search for fred Minnick
where I interview celebrities and I tastebourbon and stuff. The Fred Minnick Show
is where I interview celebrities. Youcan find that on Spirits Network, which
is on Apple TV. And basicallyI just sit down and I drink bourbon
with with celebrities. We're filming.We're filming again in la in uh in

(00:22):
June. Uh. Right now.I got I got Andy Richter, Yellow
Wolf, Glenn Howardton of It's AlwaysSunday in Philadelphia in Summer Holder from Vampire
Diaries, and a few others thatI'm really excited to talk to. And
then on the hardcore bourbon side,I've got the number one I'm a part
of the number one bourbon podcast calledBourbon Pursuit, which of course you can

(00:45):
find on the Heart iHeartRadio app.Boom boom boom, you are everywhere.
Ian Summer Holder, by the way, was delightful when he was here.
I guess it was last year,weren't he and his part of Yeah there,
they were here because they were scopingout of their own They have their
own label now, so they havetheir own They have their own Bourbon called
Brother's Bond, which it actually didreally well in my Spirits competition, uh,

(01:07):
the Ascot Awards. But they theyI think they were here for Bourbon
and Beyond and and they were theywere promoting their brand. But they've just
they they are real people and they'reactually really engaged. A lot of these
celebrities come into the bourbon game andthey're just using their name and their platform
and they're ready to you know,pull a George Clooney and sell and get

(01:29):
their billion and get out, youknow. But these guys like Ian,
especially the real blenders, like they'rereal whiskey people. He loves that he
talked to Mary and me for anhour about what he was doing about the
process, and he's so excited,so you know, worked up about it.
I just loved that this guy.And of course people were walking by
like that's the guy from Vampire Diaries. Yeah. I didn't realize what a

(01:49):
star he is. Oh, he'shuge. Especially if if there's a young
woman under thirty five years old,they will stop in their tracks because he's
just he's just one of those peoplethat they remember they probably hadn't pinned up
on their wall at some point whenthey were teenagers. My daughter was nineteen
when she met him at one ofthe signings, and he graciously handed my

(02:10):
wife the bottle. But he wrotehappy twenty first birthday. That a pretty
smart play. It's very good.He was able to show all her little
girlfriends. Oh of like long wame. Yeah, that's right. So she'll
be twenty one next year and that'llbe hers. Yes, for now,
it just stays locked up in thecabinet here. Yeah, you are a

(02:30):
guy though, that knows about allthe different things that go on in the
bourbon realm. Let's talk about thehealth of Kentucky's bourbonism. Yeah, are
we still growing? Is it flat? Well? Now, what's happening?
Yeah? So there I've been somesigns that would, you know, bring
caution to you, like Brown Foremanhas reported like you know, downward forecasts

(02:53):
a time or two. Diagio hasdone the same thing. But if you
look at you know, these arecompanies that are conglomerates and they have entire
portfolios, and if you look atit, you know there's being very specific
about certain markets, like with DyagioLatin America. I fell flat for them.
With Jack Daniels, you know,for them Jack, Sorry for Brown
Foreman. Everything is black label JackDaniels, and so you know, we

(03:15):
don't really those those things are importantfor Kentucky bourbon, but those things do
not define Kentucky bourbon obviously, andthey do not define the market. So
Kentucky bourbon itself is very healthy.The tourism side is extremely healthy. The
one thing that is something that I'mwatching very closely right now is we have

(03:35):
so many new brands on the shelf. A new consumer can come in to
the store and want to find abottle of bourbon. I mean, there's
eighty bottles that are new in thelast two years that are on that shelf,
and liquor stores are beginning beginning tosay no to a lot of the
new bottles because there's not enough consumerknowledge about those particular products. So we

(03:58):
are kind of at a at alittle bit of a tipping point where we
might have hit the ceiling for theactual number of skews a number of brands,
but the category itself is still doingvery well. You have brands like
wood Ford, Reserve, Maker's Mark, and I would presume someone like you
know, Micker's and Buffalo Trace,which they don't report their numbers, they're

(04:18):
all in double digit sales increases yearover years. So they're doing great,
and it's a really it's a matterof how much more can the consumer take
on. And you look at fromthe generations gen z. You know,
when they drink, they are drinkinghigh end stuff. At my blind bourbon

(04:39):
tastings that I do across the country, when there is someone in there as
twenty one to twenty four years old, they're paying the one hundred to three
hundred dollars ticket price to sit downand have a really rare poor They're not
you know, toting up Jim Beamon the fraternity balcony like I was when
I was in college. You know, they're they're enjoying their whiskey versus you

(05:00):
know, drinking it too intoxication.Yeah, they're very serious about it.
I've seen that same thing play out. And so as far as these bourbon
stops in Louisville and in Kentucky,as you move down the bourbon trail,
I don't hear anybody singing the blues. It looks like everybody seems to be
happy. Like there's there We're stillbringing in busloads. Yeah, there's still
busloads a couple of million a yearcoming here just for the Kentucky bourbon experience.

(05:25):
And you know, outside of peoplenot getting the bottle they want,
no one's really going home unhappy,right, Yeah, Like Woodford Reserve has
so many different offerings, but likedouble oaked is something that's just magical.
I love double oak. I dotoo. That's a great pore. That's

(05:45):
just one of my favorites. SoI've ever tasted just I don't know what.
It has some kind of a textureto it. Woodford's fantastic, but
it's that double oaked. And thenChris Morris is telling me, I think
they did a special thing where itwas like it was it a triple Yeah,
they'll call it double double oak.Where all waiting for the double double
double oak. You know, Sowe facetiously bring that up oerfect time we
have a conversation. You have somemictors here, I have one in hand

(06:10):
here. Yeah, yeah, no, magnificent till I have a mictor's ten
year old here. And this isyou know, there's a lot of incredible
products in the Ultimate Bourbon Raffle,and that's the Ultimate Bourbon Raffle dot org.
And we have twenty two lots thatare Yeah, you can get a
bottle from nineteen thirteen, a bottleof nineteen thirteen early times. You can

(06:31):
get a lot of Pappy Van Winkle. There's the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary
Brown Foreman decanter, which sold atthe Speed auction a couple of years ago
for over ten grand. You canget a Mictor's twenty five year old which
this is what that's the descendant ofa twenty five year old Micktors which sold
at auction in Europe for over sixtythousand. So you have you have an

(06:56):
opportunity to get some of the actuallythe rarest in Kentucky. But more importantly,
I think the odds of you beingable to get it is better than
most charity raffles. And I supporta lot of charities, as you know,
as a volunteer, and and Iget behind things that I'm really passionate
about, and I'm really passionate aboutmy community. And this all the proceeds

(07:18):
go to the West End School andthey're basically building a girls portion of it
now and the West End School,you know, you want to talk about
something that's magical that that place,you know, what it's doing for our
community is I would put it upagainst anything, and they are. They
are giving, and they're bringing kidsout of bad situations, putting them up

(07:42):
and putting them in school up untileighth grade. Coming out of that,
they get into they get into aprivate high school, they get a free
education. If they go all theway through to Kentucky State, they get
special opportunities at Bellerman U of L. I mean, if you are connected
to West End, the west EndSchool, I mean, and you come
out of that with the you know, you can go all the way and

(08:03):
you are really fit for life.It's a special place in a part of
town that we need. We needto focus a lot more in our community.
And the Bourbon Raffle, the ultimatebourbon raffle. You know, when
they brought me in, they're like, hey, we need help. We
want to do this bourbon thing toget people's attention because everyone's doing something.
I'm bourbon, right, it's it'sit's hot, it's people. Everybody wants
to do something bourbon. And they'lloften call me. And Sherry White's one

(08:28):
of my best friends in the inthe in the industry, and she's a
part of it, and she says, we've got to have you, We
want you to be a part ofthis. I said, whatever, whatever
I need to do, I'm in. And she said, well, is
there any media that you want todo And I was like, well,
the only one I really care aboutit is Terry Miners. There you go,
Fred, Yeah, the West EndSchool. Each time I've done a
segment with them, those kids areyoung men, are so impressive. Yeah,

(08:52):
you know. They they look inthe eye, they shake your hand,
yes sir, here we go,and they're just they're that school is
doing wonderful things. I'm so gladto hear that they're pairing up now with
to get a girls school for thesame purpose. And when when we did,
when we did the groundbreaking, Isaid, it was the first time
I had brought Bourbon to a schoolwithout fear of detention. So, uh,

(09:16):
you know what, that's one ofthe things that we in in Kentucky,
we are very much of the understandingthat Bourbon is not just an intoxicant,
right. This is this is buildingroads and quite literally schools in our
state through taxes but also through charitablemeans. And this what Bourbon has done

(09:37):
for uh, for the Commonwealth ofKentucky is beyond any other industry, and
I would put I would put ourthe bourbon fans up there against any other
group of fanatics when it comes tohelping charities. Incredible bourbons twenty two of
them, and the website is UltimateBourbon Wraffle dot Org. Proceeds benefit West
End School. So how long doesthe raffle run? It closes June twentieth.

(10:05):
And if I'm wrong on that,you can go to Ultimate Bourbon Raffle
dot org. So you have theinside a month, Yeah, you have,
you have some time, You havesome time. But it is it
is interesting. We've got twenty twolots, but there are a couple of
key bottles that people are really interestedin. One of them is one hundred
and fiftieth anniversary the Brown form ofdecanter. There were only one hundred and

(10:26):
fifty of those made available to thepublic. Another one hundred and fifty were
given to causes like this, andthe remainder of the of the lot,
which was five hundred of that decanter, went to the Brown family. So
members of the Brown family are sittingon all these like really super rare decanters.
And so you do not this bottledoes not come up. You can't

(10:48):
go to a liquor store and findit. Now, people outside of like
the Bourbon Commuity always get really excitedabout Pappy, and they should. Yeah,
it's incredible story. It's got somegreat history than the Whiskey's is often
very very incredible. But those inthe know look at that that bottle from
Brown Foreman, they look at thenineteen thirteen early times. To think about

(11:09):
having something in your home that wasmade more than one hundred years ago,
that's insane. Just you don't getthat opportunity. You can if you want
to write a big check. Buthere at the Raffle, tickets are only
one hundred dollars and if you winthat, I mean that's yours. And
the other big bottle that people,there's a lot of big bottles in there.
But another one is is a KingKentucky and there's a Mixer's twenty five

(11:33):
year old. And one of myone of my favorites that was donated was
by Watchhout Proper, which is abar out in my neighborhood in Orton Commons.
They donated every single barrel pick they'veever done, and so that's I
think eighteen bottles. And that's likeI mean, if you're needing a starter
collection, there you go go tothe website Ultimatebourbon Raffle dot org and learn

(11:56):
more help the West End School.And again you have about a month to
do this, but you got togo and see what's available because this is
a rare opportunity. And thanks forthe mixer's that's absolutely I gotta we gotta
leave a little bit for Paul though. Yeah, Paul Miles is out there
like his face pressed up against thewindow. I appreciate that. Salivating Fred
Minnick, keep up the great work. By the way, over the holidays,

(12:18):
we finally drank my Frank Sinatra allright, Jack Dan, Yeah that
was good. That's good whiskey.That is good. Yeah. They weren't
messing around when they were making onefor the chairman of the board. No,
And you know, we were justlooking. We were just watching the
Elvis debacle unfolding on TV earlier.That's in a state that's really always been

(12:39):
about business and taking care of FrankSinatra's legacy. Yeah, indeed, all
right, brother, it's great tosee you again too. Fredminnick dot com
is his website. But for thisraffle. It's the ultimate bourbon raffle dot
org. Thank you for helping theWest End school, coming right back on
news radio. Wait forty wha s