Re: Mike Veach's Book: Repeal and After
Posted: Sat Jan 30, 2010 11:21 pm
John,
You missed the point in that Schenley did lighten the flavor of I W Harper by raising the barrel proof. This also made a cheaper product by saving 5% on barrels, but I don't think money was the sole motivation here. Also don't under estimate Knebel Kamp's experience with marketing since he did go on to be the President of Churchill Downs - a position that needs a strong marketeer.
I think there was a change in taste in America at the time. I think the over aged, woody whiskey of the end of prohibition gave the public a mental impression of all rye and bourbons being that way and by comparison Scotch and Canadian were very light. The question I have is this: Blends were sold during the times of shortage of age whiskey, but if the public wanted only a light flavorless whiskey, then why did the category shrink as aged straight whiskey became available? In the 40s blends were very much part of the market. In the 50s they became less so and in the 60s only Seagram was making blended whiskey in lieu of straight whiskey. By the 1990s blended whiskey became a very small share of the American whiskey market, yet blended whiskey is "lighter" and "cheaper to make" than straights.
John's refernce to Frost 8/80 is really nonsense to the question of what was happening at the end of prohibition. Those products (8/80 etc.) were in response to the growing light beer/vodka/wine cooler market and not the change in tastes in whiskey. Whiskey drinkers never cared for those products and they were not designed to attract whiskey drinkers. They were designed to get those people who were not drinking whiskey to drink a whiskey.
You missed the point in that Schenley did lighten the flavor of I W Harper by raising the barrel proof. This also made a cheaper product by saving 5% on barrels, but I don't think money was the sole motivation here. Also don't under estimate Knebel Kamp's experience with marketing since he did go on to be the President of Churchill Downs - a position that needs a strong marketeer.
I think there was a change in taste in America at the time. I think the over aged, woody whiskey of the end of prohibition gave the public a mental impression of all rye and bourbons being that way and by comparison Scotch and Canadian were very light. The question I have is this: Blends were sold during the times of shortage of age whiskey, but if the public wanted only a light flavorless whiskey, then why did the category shrink as aged straight whiskey became available? In the 40s blends were very much part of the market. In the 50s they became less so and in the 60s only Seagram was making blended whiskey in lieu of straight whiskey. By the 1990s blended whiskey became a very small share of the American whiskey market, yet blended whiskey is "lighter" and "cheaper to make" than straights.
John's refernce to Frost 8/80 is really nonsense to the question of what was happening at the end of prohibition. Those products (8/80 etc.) were in response to the growing light beer/vodka/wine cooler market and not the change in tastes in whiskey. Whiskey drinkers never cared for those products and they were not designed to attract whiskey drinkers. They were designed to get those people who were not drinking whiskey to drink a whiskey.