The "What is Vodka?" question

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The "What is Vodka?" question

Unread postby bourbonv » Fri Jul 28, 2006 9:38 am

In today's Courier-Journal there is an article dealing with a new question that has been posed in Europe - "What is Vodka?". This question comes about because Finland, Poleland, Sweden and some other traditional Vodka producing nations want to define Vodka as to what it can be made from - particularly malted barley and potatoes. Other countries, with Diageo leading the fight, want to avoid such definitions.

I place this post here in Bourbon Lore because it is interesting that the whiskey industry had a similar conflict that started on 30 June 1906 when the Pure Food and Drug Act was passed and the industry had to decide "what is whiskey?". If the Finns and their allies win this, then a lot of Vodka made and sold in the U S (including Rain Vodka from Buffalo Trace) will have to be labeled "Immitation Vodka". I wonder if they will have a modern version of the Taft Decision to solve this conflict as well.

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Unread postby EllenJ » Sun Jul 30, 2006 12:15 am

So why don't they simply formulate (and legislate) a new beverage category, made from grain that is NOT potatoes or malted barley, and continue on with their lives as, say, Rain Potcheen or whatever... and watch as the world vodka market collapses into the little niche group of Scandinavian fruit-flavored specialty cordials it deserves to be? If folks like John Glaser of Compass Box would do something like that, it wouldn't be long before the almighty Scotch Whisky Association ended up where the Distilling Co. of America (also known as the Whiskey Trust) did.
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Unread postby bourbonv » Sun Jul 30, 2006 11:38 am

John,
I think the word "Vodka" has great sale value. Simply coming out with a new category would take years to build simply to get it to the point where vadka is today. Most people don't really want "vodka" to drink. If they did then they would not have all of these "Flavored" versions of spirit they call "Vodka", but by definition can not be "vodka".

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Unread postby EllenJ » Sun Jul 30, 2006 5:30 pm

Could be.
But vodka went from "whaaa?" to it's present state in less time than it takes to say "shaken, not stirred".
It can happen.
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Unread postby bourbonv » Sun Jul 30, 2006 6:32 pm

John,
There were vodka labels in the Schenley collection at U D going back to the late 30's. The style of spirit was around then, but did not becaome a recognized spirit with the government tracking its production/import until the late 50's. That is when it became a "over night success".

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Unread postby EllenJ » Mon Jul 31, 2006 1:13 am

Mike,
Like you said, vodka was around long before that, but no one really cared. It's true that it remained undefined by the Code of Regulations for many years, but it wasn't the U.S. Government's opinion that mattered; I believe it was Bond (James, that is, not Bottled-In). Ian Fleming's character was an anti-establishment rebel who disregarded regulations in much the same way that American cowboy movie heros did. In fact, the character allowed Fleming to offer a variety of unconventional values as seen by a heroic character the reader is encouraged to emulate. Eschewing such traditionalist bastians as Scotch (or even gin), for example. Sean Connery's screen interpretation added sophistication and glamour (not really present in the original novels), and set the character for all the Bonds to come. And then Hugh Hefner decided to select that character as the model for his Playboy Philosophy New Man. For those of us who occasionally read Playboy with both hands, Hugh Hefner (and to an extent his suitable-for-TV alter ego, Johnny Carson) pretty much defined what young men (and liberated young women) would grow to expect in the way of proper libations -- when we became old enough to buy them.

Also, I think another, not insignificant, factor might have result from the thrill of being "fashionably risque" being seen drinking a Russian spirit shortly after the reign of McCarthyist terrorism had subsided. I recall that you could find CCCP magazine in the public library, and it was considered "cool" to be seen reading it. Our younger readers probably find this such an alien idea as to be silly-sounding, but such was the culture we lived in back in those American Graffiti days.

By the way, both straight corn whiskey and straight wheat whiskey were defined by the Code of Regulations right from the get-go, and they've never been much of a threat to bourbon's (or even rye's) sales.
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Unread postby bourbonv » Mon Jul 31, 2006 7:10 pm

John,
Interesting points but don't forget the the sixties with the generation gap, don't trust anybody over 30 and I am not going to drink the spirits my parents drink. This attitude gave the rise not only to vodka, but also tequila.

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Unread postby gillmang » Mon Jul 31, 2006 7:47 pm

These are all excellent ideas but in the end, I don't know anyone can predict what will take off. Vodka was so against the (ahem) grain in many ways: culturally associated with a communist country with which America was in a tight struggle; without tradition or pedigree in America; a spirit denuded of taste (I know, but still..): basically the wallflower at the fancy ball - well, look who took the swains home.

Just as Jagermeister took off some years ago, just as, say, Imperial Stout aged in a bourbon barrel could be (who knows) the next big thing, vodka became popular.

The theories about James Bond, etc. are good but essentially these things can't be pinned down. This is good news for marketers and boosters of new drinks (e.g. Bailey Irish Cream in the 70's, coming out of a country not known for whiskey really or innovation and riven at the time by political and social difficulties of an extreme kind). You never know.

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Unread postby bourbonv » Tue Aug 01, 2006 6:15 pm

Gary,
This is classic: "Vodka was so against the (ahem) grain"! I love it!

Humor aside, you make some excellent points. There is more than one reason for the growth of Vodka as a category of spirits. I also have to wonder if vodka was the first spirit to really make it in the new global marketplace. I know Scotch was know around the world starting in the 19th century, but that was as much due to the colonial empire of Britain as marketing. Vodka grew not just in the United States, but around the world in the 1960's and 70's. In many ways it set the pattern for other gobal marketplace spirits such as single malts and super premium bourbons.

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Unread postby gillmang » Tue Aug 01, 2006 9:23 pm

That's true Mike. I think vodka's special appeal - exoticism at no cost (no taste) - was part of the story.

But part of its success was random, I think.

Why would Bailey's Irish Cream (still a huge seller) be almost an equal success? It is the opposite of vodka: well-flavoured, sweet, viscous, with some whiskey background.

Why Jagermeister? Strange (in America) name, unusual taste. I think the college crowd found it "different" and it took off against expectation, an anti-brand as it were.

You can't plan (fully) for these things. Yes, the late Sidney Frank created Grey Goose but that built on vodka's established reputation. He took it to a different level, but in its way too I think its success was unpredictable and partly lucky. (Not to take away from his achievement to build such a huge brand). Same thing initially with Corona beer in California.

Maybe Jack Daniels is one of the best examples. An iconic American drink that most bourbon connsoisseurs I know say is not the best-tasting whiskey around.

Gary
Last edited by gillmang on Wed Aug 02, 2006 9:37 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Unread postby bourbonv » Wed Aug 02, 2006 9:36 am

Gary,
I hate to correst you, but I think we are talking applws and oranges. Vodka is a category whereas Baily's is an individual product in the cordial category. Even so you bring some intersting thoughts to the table here. Have you seen a list of the worlld's best selling spirits for this year? I used yo see these list every year while at United Distillers, but I admit I have not looked at onr for several years. They are usually broken down by category and brands. If I get some time today, I will see if the list is on line.

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Unread postby gillmang » Wed Aug 02, 2006 9:38 am

That list would be interesting. My point though is to go across categories and show that often things just take off, for reasons that are not always evident and are, in part at least, random or unpredictable.


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Unread postby EllenJ » Wed Aug 02, 2006 5:52 pm

Neutral spirits has been around as long as distilling. And an east European unflavored version of it called "vodka" is nearly that old itself. But the liquor we call vodka today, which is as much a version of "grain spirits" as Irish Creme is a version of "cordials", is an entirely American product, a marketing invention created by a steak sauce peddler named John G. Martin in 1939 to fill a gaping need that whiskey and gin were completely inadequate to meet. It's phenominal success can be reduced to a single word (imagine that coming from either Gary or me!!)... Smirnoff
Well, okay, two words... Smirnoff and Heublein. That was Martin's steak sauce company. They made A-1 steak sauce. And Smirnoff vodka. No color. No Flavor. No Smell. And the ads (which even predated Playboy, by the way, appearing in its predecessor Esquire magazine years earlier) featured sophisticated models in gowns and tuxedos confidently sipping the spirit that "Leaves You Breathless"Anything and everything else about vodka (and really, about cocktails as we know them today) has been based on that success.
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Unread postby gillmang » Thu Aug 03, 2006 2:32 pm

This is my understanding, too, basically.

European vodka was of course the same GNS but most of it was flavoured. Little was drunk straight (unflavoured) in the Slavic lands whence it issued.

The American innovation was to convince people to drink it straight but also in cocktails that formed the analogue to the flavoured European vodkas (lemon, orange, spice, etc. etc. - the current rage for flavoured vodka is not new and is simply the European tradition being re-asserted here).

GNS was always around and some always was sold unflavoured in the market even in the 1800's. Numerous period ads attest to "double" or "extra" rectified spirits and equivalent names for same. George Washington's distillery made some of that too. M'Harry writes about it, but only as something to use to add to imported rum or brandy, to stretch it (beer too). But later in the 1800's it is clear some GNS was sold into the retail markets, probably for people who made cordials from it at home. (A close reading of Byrn's Practical Distilling supports the latter IMO).

The 1939 programme to sell Smirnoff as white whiskey that had no smell was a spin-off I think from the recent developments in whiskey blending and marketing. Since the market was confused about what whiskey was, why not offer the cleanest, lightest kind possible? In an older time, there was a better understanding in people's minds between whiskey and high-proof spirits. This got muddied with and in the aftermath of Volstead. (The resolution of the what is whiskey debate just before WW I didn't help of course). People took advantage of that including those who marketed the first post-Prohibition blends. The vodka appeal was too, I feel, an unconscious hearkening back by the consumer to the time when white spirits (young whiskey) was a common drink. People never lost the folk memory of that and when offered the chance to drink a cleaned-up version, lapped it up.

To summarise: vodka is old as the hills here and in Europe but the American innovation was to sell it as a category of drink to be mixed or not. Before that its use was restricted to a few immigrants and by industry for blending and making gin.

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Unread postby bourbonv » Fri Aug 04, 2006 10:02 am

Gary,
Some good food for thought. I like the idea about muddled memory during prohibition may have cause some people to equate vodka to unaged whiskey. Thirteen years is a long time and can cause some confusion of that nature.

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