This interview is from our sister site, The Lane Report and was conducted by Mark Green, Editor.
Mark Green: You’re nearly 30 years into what’s been a transformative time at Buffalo Trace. What are you still learning about bourbon distilling nowadays?
Harlen Wheatley: Transforming is the right word. I’ve seen the bourbon industry at the low point of commodity-style products to super-premium products that compete with whiskeys across the world. It’s been fun to watch. It’s continuing to transform because we’re reaching new people and new trends with drinking habits. The reason I think bourbon is successful is because bourbon is pretty flexible: You can make awesome cocktails or enjoy it neat or on the rocks. There are a lot of different ways to enjoy it and it goes hand-in-hand with those transformations.
MG: Back in the ‘80s and ‘90s bourbon was not very popular; clear liquors were in style. But bourbon is in a boom and it seems like there’s no ceiling to it.
HW: The way we see it, the ceiling is set based on us. There are 8 billion people in the world and there are ways of reaching everybody. As long as you’re willing to put in the work and figure out the customer base and what people are interested in, I think there’s no ceiling.
MG: Master distillers have to both keep established products essentially the same while simultaneously trying to be experimental and create new products. How do you balance that?
HW: That depends on the company because there are distilleries that make one product and focus on that. We were in that boat 50 years ago. What we figured out is, it’s an awesome thing to have that one product, but you need to match whiskey taste to consumers and consumers vary so much that you better have a variety of whiskies. We learned early on that you have to try new things and experiment, but our motto is “honor tradition and embrace change.” We live by that.
You can take those learnings from new technology and innovation and apply it to make your existing products more consistent, which we do. But you have to work to make that legacy brand and keep it consistent and also explore and be independent. That’s an important thing for us. We’re privately held and we’re able to be independent and do things for the purpose of just learning—not just for a shareholder price. That gives us the ability to try new recipes and create new things.
MG: As you’re creating these new products, is it a goal to be recognizable as part of the Buffalo Trace family?
HW: Yes. As we try new things, people will say, ‘This product tastes like it comes from Buffalo Trace.’ They associate things like quality and age, because most of our bourbons are older than our competition. We don’t talk a lot about it, but we have won a few awards and we’re proud of that. When we release something, we want it to be the best we can put out there for people to enjoy —and maybe win an award or two.
MG: How do you describe the characteristics of a Buffalo Trace product?
HW: Generally, it’s cleaner. We use our own yeast for all of our whiskeys, and that yeast delivers a cleaner product and allows us to make sure we focus on the important things: the taste of the barrels, the tannins, the wood sugars. It does not put in things that are unfavorable.
And then we’re known to have the oldest inventory in the business. Our standard for Buffalo Trace is 8 years old. Most standard whiskeys or bourbons for other distilleries are a lot less—4 or 5 years old. That would be an easy thing for us to fix on our shortages; we could just make Buffalo Trace 4 years old and solve the whole problem. But we would not have the quality. We’re not going to compromise on any of that, ever.
MG: If you have an idea and start working on a new product, how long does it take to release it?
HW: That depends totally on the product. A good example is our Single Oak project: That was a 20-year program to put that on the market. It took us eight years to do the experiment. It took us four years to release it and get the feedback. Once we got the feedback, it took eight more years to reproduce it.
Some things are quicker, like finishes. We have a lot of finishes at 1792. We don’t do finishes at Buffalo Trace. But on a finish, it might be one year.
MG: What role does customer feedback play in your ongoing evolution of the product?
HW: We do a lot of consumer research on trends and flavors and it’s extremely important. We get feedback through our over 600,000 visitors a year.
We believe there should be zero complaints—and this is hard to do with millions of cases going out the door. We review on a monthly basis every single complaint and take every one seriously. We look for trends and issues and whatever else is going on.
Most of it is, ‘We can’t find the product.’ We’re expanding the distillery as fast as we can to make more whiskey but it just takes time. That feedback is meaningful to the success of the future.
MG: A growing community of experts tells people about new releases and their intricate characteristics, so expertise in the marketplace is broadening and deepening. How do you advise bourbon fans to develop their ability to recognize flavors and characteristics?
HW: We try to explain to people that there’s no wrong way to do it if you enjoy bourbon—neat or in a cocktail or however you like it. I don’t recommend Pappy Van Winkle 23-year-old in Jello shots. But if you like to drink bourbon in a Manhattan, there’s nothing wrong with that. I enjoy it myself. There’s no wrong way to enjoy it. It’s up to the individual.
We also explain to people how to taste, physically—how to nose the whiskey and appreciate the aromas, and then how to taste it with your tongue. The type of glassware makes a big difference. A big brandy glass is made for brandy. It makes a difference. There’s lots to know and it takes time to learn. You don’t want to overpower people, especially if they’ve never had a whiskey. You want to introduce people gently on what it is about whiskey to appreciate. There is an education piece to it and we have ambassadors all over the country. We opened a London, England, storefront solely for the purpose of educating people on Buffalo Trace bourbon.
MG: Does Harlen Wheatley have a personal approach to tasting and assessing?
HW: If you’re tasting a whiskey straight out of the barrel, I like to taste with no water and nose it straight out of the barrel—poured out of the barrel into a certain type of glassware. And then cut it to about 60 proof and nose and taste it again. Ninety proof is OK too because that’s what we do in a bottle. That allows me to see both sides. I want to be able to appreciate both ways because it does make a little bit of difference. If you have it straight out of the barrel, it should smell and taste a certain way versus having it with a little water.
Of course, you have to have clean water and clean ice and clean glasses. I’m particular when it comes to that stuff. Making sure you don’t have contaminants is pretty important if you’re trying to assess it. There’s nothing worse than stale ice when you go into a bar and they grab an ice cube that’s been sitting there for about a week.
MG: How much do you taste other spirits and products? Do you regularly try rum and tequila and maybe European spirits?
HW: I enjoy seeing what people are up to. People bring me bottles all the time at the distillery and I want to know. It’s a never-ending educational, learning process. When I’m out, I might order competitors’ bourbon or whiskey to see how it’s tasting and see if I can pick apart what they’re up to. Rums I try in cocktails, not too much straight. Vodkas I taste straight.
At Buffalo Trace, vodka is the thing we focus on besides on whiskey. Buffalo Trace’s flagship is bourbon and some of the whiskeys, like rye.
We also make a little vodka and got into that kind of by accident. We had time, we had the equipment and the people and ability to do it. Our theory was we could make it at the same time, so we might as well make a good vodka because 33% of the people drink vodka. If you don’t have it, you’re going to lose out on that sale. So, we got into it pretty heavy and we have a lot of different offerings.
MG: A lot of people think vodka doesn’t have much taste. How do you describe the taste?
HW: It’s kind of like water. If you have sampled different bottled waters, they’re all a little different. Vodkas are the same way. There are little nuances on each one of those vodkas. Ours, just like just like on bourbons and whiskeys, we use the same yeast. And we use our equipment, which makes different quality vodkas.
It’s going to vary depending on the distillery. Ours is a sweet, smooth, delicate-finish clean vodka, and that’s by design. When you taste it and compare it to others, you’re going to be pretty satisfied.
MG: In your 30 years of doing this, what are the techniques and characteristics you look for to get high-quality results?
HW: We have the benefit of a lot of history; 240 years of making whiskey at this site. And we have standards on aging that are 100 years old and all this data on corn and rye and malted barley and wheat.
The consistency of the grains is critically important to make the rest of the process consistent: the starch content, the fat, the fiber and the size of the kernels, the health of the kernels, no foreign materials. We have probably the most stringent testing in the business and make sure that those grains are all the highest quality you can get. We also require non-GMO grain; that’s a little different than most because we pay a premium, but that achieves consistency. If you have a grain that’s been treated and modified, you don’t really know what that’s going to do for you. Probably nothing, but why take the chance?
MG: Kentuckians are in the bourbon epicenter but the vast majority of Kentucky bourbon is made for and sold in foreign markets. What should we know about the marketplace for bourbon outside of Kentucky?
HW: The biggest thing for us is the volume (of bourbon) it takes to reach the globe and all those 8 billion people. We’re just now getting started. It is work. When we were starting, we focused on English-speaking countries like Australia and the UK, and we’re doing some things in Europe.
Other competitors have been doing it for years. If you go to Shanghai and order a bourbon, you’re probably going to get one of our competitors. They may have Buffalo Trace, particularly in Shanghai, because we have started to sell a little bit there. But you’re not going to have the local bourbons we have here. In Kentucky you’re going to have 15 bottles behind the bar; they might have three or four.
In Australia, they want more bourbon. Everywhere you go it’s the same story. They want more bourbon and they enjoy the bourbons.
We have a lot of work to do. We have to make more. We cannot compromise on quality because that doesn’t do you any good; you have to continue to focus on the quality. There’s lots of marketing work to do because in the early ’90s you could take a survey of 100 people and 80 people out of 100 didn’t even know what bourbon was. Now, I would say if you surveyed a random 100 people it’s more like 60 people could tell you what it is. In the U.S. we’ve made a lot of progress, but there are still a lot of people to reach. If you (survey 100) in other countries, it might be 20% (know bourbon)—like it was here 30 years ago.
MG: What markets around the world are most significant for Buffalo Trace now and longer term? What is the strategy to approach that?
HW: Our markets are European and the UK is extremely important to us. That’s why we opened that (London) storefront to educate people about Buffalo Trace and bourbons in general and how that compares to what they’re drinking.
Australia is big for us; we invested in distribution there, and there are a lot of opportunities there.
There have been opportunities for us in Japan and China and India. We have a distillery now in India where we are working to create some Indian whiskeys. When you look at that population in India and China and all the traditional spots, there are a lot of opportunities.
MG: What do Harlen Wheatley and Buffalo Trace foresee the market to be in 20 years? Up 10%, up 50%, up 80%?
HW: We see our product continuing to grow, continuing the demand. We’re planning for it with all this expansion work we are doing, spending hundreds of millions of dollars on expanding. We have no plans of slowing down.
MG: Kentucky is a global logistics center with skills and a lot of resources here. Is that significant for the bourbon sector?
HW: That does that help with our process growing this all over the world. A lot of reason that we chose Kentucky when we consolidated our operations from New Orleans to Kentucky is because of the centrally located logistics side of it.
Also, some of our biggest ship freight lanes come out of Owensboro, Ky. We bottle a lot of cases in Owensboro; it’s our biggest smaller facility. We’ve invested a lot in Kentucky.
MG: Sazerac is in the process of investing more than $1 billion in Buffalo Trace’s operations. What changes and impacts will Kentuckians see over the next several years?
HW: The biggest thing will probably be the business and tax revenue to Kentucky. There’s huge tax revenue on all the production we have.
The other thing is, we’ve created all these jobs that just didn’t exist 25 years ago in Kentucky. At Buffalo Trace, we had a total of about 60 people when I started in 1995 and now we have 770 at our (Frankfort) site. We’ve created a lot of good jobs for people to raise their families and make something to be proud of that goes all over the globe.
We talk about the awards; that bring a focus on Frankfort. And we bring in 600,000-plus visitors to Frankfort. They find hotels and restaurants and do things, so in my opinion it’s nothing but good.
