Introduction to ThePrivateBarrel.com

Welcome to The Private Barrel

         

The Private Barrel was created in order to fulfill the need to find information about single barrel picks of whisk(e)y.

In the early 2000's whiskey, and bourbon in particular, began to spike in popularity among consumers of liquor. This was largely driven by the rising popularity of Stitzel-Weller's Pappy Van Winkle line of products. In 1996 the 20 year old expression of pappy was given the highest rating ever given out by the Beverage Testing Institute; a score of 99. Stitzel-Weller was subsequently sold to Buffalo Trace distillery in 2002.

Bourbon took off and never looked back. Since then, good bourbon, would prove to become more and more difficult to obtain.

Today, the Pappy Van Winkle Lineup, as well as many of its relatives within the Buffalo Trace family, are but a myth. A unicorn crossed with a Pegasus if you will. Obtaining such a bottle is nearly impossible and takes patience and dedication; building relationships with store owners and alike.

To fill the overwhelming demand, the bourbon industry began to pivot to a program that would, in it's own right, become very popular. A single barrel program.

There are hundreds of distilleries that offer such a program. Essentially it gives the consumer a very unique, and therefore, desirable offering. It allows for stores, clubs, individuals, and other organizations a chance to try several aged whiskies and select one single barrel to be distributed to their organization. A whiskey nerd's dream.

The purpose of this page is to explore this phenomenon by providing reviews of private barrel whiskies, conducting interviews with distilleries, pickers, stores, distributors, designers and more.

If you happen to fall within one or more of these categories and would like to be featured on our website, please contact us at:

ThePrivateBarrel@gmail.com