Barrel planning

[Bolverk]

Howdy all,

I'm hoping for some advice...

I know you want to be very deliberate in putting away product because there is a fine line of putting product away for maturation and tying up too much capital in barrels.

How did YOU create your barreling program and plan for future growth without having a solid baseline for sales? Were there market indicators or did you gamble and hope it payed off?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

[jocko]

I think you just have to go for it if you believe in your approach.   We have only recently begun putting things away, and are jumping all-in on putting away 53-gallon barrels as fast as we can (small team, so it's only about a barrel a week right now). We made trial batches and put in small (5G & 15G) barrels to see if we liked the direction of our mashbill.  We did and conducted a number of blind tastings with aficionados, with great feedback.  So, we are now spending massive $ on ingredients and barrels, using the techniques and recipes we've honed building up to the purchase of the production still. 

We are very fortunate to have a brewery to cashflow everything and don't require immediate return. 

[Bolverk]

Thanks Jacko,

How long were you distilling before you started filling 53g barrels? 

[jocko]

It was pretty short.  We want to focus on putting away spirits that required aging first, as we can produce un-aged spirits at any time. Our goal is to have about 30% of our barrel storage capacity full before announcing any other spirits. This has also given us ample time to scale non-aged recipes & techniques, get packaging designed labels approved, etc. 

[Bolverk]

Are you filling 15s or 30s as well?

[whiskeytango]

I agree you just have to go for it.  All the small scale testing / accelerated aging is fine but it's not the real thing.   We have been putting up barrels for Just over 2.5 years now and have around 200.    Hopefully it sells.  lol 

 

 

[Bolverk]

Thanks WT, how long after you got started did you start filling 53s?

[whiskeytango]

Just now, Bolverk said:

Thanks WT, how long after you got started did you start filling 53s?

We started out with white spirts then started doing barrels about 5 years into it.  Wanted to get a steady cash flow established before we started piling money into barrels 

 

[Bolverk]

I know it doesn't compare, but were you using smaller barrel formats along side your whites in the beginning? 

[jocko]

We will do some 5's just to test tweaks to the grainbill.  No intention of doing much in the way of bottling that. I've found 5's can give you a sense of where a 53 will end up but you can't get the breath of flavors from long storage in a 53.  It always tastes young, and if you let it go a bit too long, the oak is overpowering. We do have a couple of 15's for similar reasons.  

[Bolverk]

Thanks guys, I appreciate it

[whiskeytango]

5 hours ago, Bolverk said:

I know it doesn't compare, but were you using smaller barrel formats along side your whites in the beginning? 

If you’re asking me.  No we went straight into 53’s