399 - Do Spirits Competitions Matter?

Bourbon Pursuit

Hobbies, Food, Arts, Leisure

4.9 • 866 Ratings

🗓️ 2 March 2023

⏱️ 63 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Love it or hate it, spirit competitions are here to stay. They have such an important impact on marketing and can put a small shimmer of light on a new and upcoming brand, or it changes the course and turns a brand such as Henry McKenna into an unobtainable. In this episode, Fred Minnick and Kenny Coleman talk about multiple facets of spirits competitions because we have now lived it. We're both enthusiasts like you so we care what bourbons come out on top, Fred has been a judge forever and now has his own competition called the ASCOTs, and we have our own brand with Pursuit United that has been entered and done favorably in many competitions. Fred and I analyze all these angle about talk about the "pay to play" scenario and how people are selected to be judges along with the best way to enter a competition as a brand owner. Show Notes: Above the Char with Fred Minnick (@fredminnick) talks about the meaning of allocation. Fred, how long have you been a part of spirit competitions? Why weren't media members typically invited to be judges? Why is this considered "pay to play"? Why is there so much confusion based on what category to submit when it's straight bourbon vs small batch? Why would a bourbon society enter a spirits competition? What makes someone worthy enough to be a judge at a competition? Should you put batch numbers on your competition entry or just the brand? Why does MGP always perform well in competitions? Support this podcast on Patreon

Transcript

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0:00.0	Yeah, we, we don't get a lot of vodka entries in the ascots, and I still don't know why.
0:05.0	You can't figure out why, huh?
0:06.4	Can't figure out why.
0:07.6	Hopefully next year will be better.
0:33.8	This is Bourbon Pursuit, the official podcast of Bourbon, bringing to you the best in news, reviews, and interviews with people making the bourbon whiskey industry happen, and I'm one of your host, Kenny Coleman.
0:38.9	Love it or hate it, spirit competitions, they're here to stay. And they play an important role because they have an important impact on marketing and they can put a small
0:43.6	shimmer light on new and upcoming brands, or it could possibly change the course and turn brands
0:49.4	such as Henry McKenna into unobtainables. And in this episode, Fred Minnick and myself, we talk about the
0:55.2	multiple facets of spirits competitions because, well, we've now lived it. We're both enthusiasts
1:00.2	just like you, so we care about what bourbons come out on top. And Fred, he's been a judge
1:05.2	forever and now has his own competition called the Ascots. Plus, we have her own brand with
1:10.6	Pursuit United,
1:11.6	and it's been entered and done favorably well in many competitions.
1:15.4	So Fred and I, we analyze all these angles and talk about the pay-to-play scenario,
1:20.0	how people are selected to be judges,
1:21.9	along with the best way to enter a competition as a brand owner.
1:26.0	But with that, I hope you enjoy this week's episode.
1:28.5	And now here's Fred Minnick with Above the Char.
1:32.5	I'm Fred Minnick, and this is Above the Char.
1:38.0	This week's idea comes from Blake Overbay, who writes me on fredminic.com.
1:47.8	The word allocated is used all the time in the world of bourbon.
1:49.9	But what does it really mean?
	...

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