Is Bourbon Getting BETTER or WORSE? 

I worked in a distillery in Louisville in the very early 90s and we had tons of 15 yr bourbon to get rid of. We mixed it with 4yr and bottled it in our low end brands. So in the 90s we had older bourbon that was cheap. I’m down to 3 bottles from back then and I have 40+ open bottles trying to fine something similar. Bourbon is a lot worse than it use to be and us old guys know that. Our hope is that with all the expansion the distilleries are going thru we may have great bourbon again in 10 to 20 years. I hope I’m still around for that. But I must say that with blending and finishing there is some good bourbons out there. Just not great ones 😢

It has to be hard to come up with ideas for episodes week after week. This was one of the best in quite some time. Love watching you guys and your reviews. Keep it up. Newer isn’t always better.

“Batches be batching” 😂 21:03 Would love to see a round two of this experiment if possible. Great channel you two!

I'm sure this is why the wood finishing craze is taking off adding staves to try to impart more flavor and mimic age due to the explosion in demand. We will probably see more and more of that as it gets more perfected. MAKERS is doing amazing things with that

I mean, batches vary slightly from year to year as you know. Distillers do their best to create a consistent taste profile, but there are only so many things they can control. The quality of the corn crop year to year for example, or the weather from year to year.

This is a great show. Thanks. I think Chad is right on the vintage of the Knob Creek. They dropped the cork closure and briefly went to a plastic screw cap in the very early 2000s. Not long after, they went to the rubber cork. And, if the WT101 is from 2013, it should have a LL/C prefix in the laser code which should be just underneath the rear label. Cheers!

Quite possibly the best Bourbon video I have ever watched. And I watch them ALL! Well done guys.

Great discussion you two. This is what I’ve noticed as well with Jack Daniels Sib’s, Wild Turkey 101’s, and ECBP’s, which is why I mostly buy older batches, older bottle types, or discontinued products of everything whenever I can. I also mostly avoid buying most craft whiskey. You don’t have to go that far back to notice the quality difference on some. ECBP quality dropped off ever since A121.

This was a great episode! My favorite of the year so far. Only 3 years in our bourbon journey so guess I'm glad that I don't know what I'm missing. Stealing that line... Batches be batches

So this both makes me happy and bums me out. Bums me out because it seems like the quality *may* be diminishing. However...it makes me happy because I've doubted my palette at times. What I mean is, several years ago I had ECBP and LOVED it. Since then I've had 3-5 more ECBP and every time thought, "This is great....but not as great as I remember." So I wondered if I overrated it or was losing my mind or whatever. Finally...Stagg (Jr) (I've had 3-4 different pours) has consistently been my favorite...and it seems like Stagg has remained the most consistent. (Granted, with a VERY small sample size here.) 🙂 Great episode...I love you both...keep up the great work

Brian's comment was illuminating, so thank you for that. Chad and Sara have done it again, offering comparisons you won't find elsewhere. Fascinating study by the reigning king and yasss queen of bourbon podcasting.,

I have wanted someone to do this for a very long time. Amazing video. Also…it makes me sad. 😂 The Wild Turkey one is the most sad to me. It absolutely is different than it used to be. I suspect a lot of this is distillers trying to cash in their higher aged barrels and sell them as new products; e.g. Hardin’s Creek or Russell’s 13, instead of mixing that old stock into their regular offerings in order to add richness and complexity. The consistent theme here is that the newer products are less rich and less complex, which would support my thesis. Knob Creek Single Barrel (not the store picks) has always been my favorite bourbon, and has been less susceptible to these issues, (since it is a single barrel), and has seemed to be a very consistently good product for as long as I have been drinking it.

Y'all are making me wish I'd started drinking whiskey 30 years ago. It's not that what I have now is bad, but that it seems like things were even better back then.

Now this was a great idea for a video. I really enjoyed it. Is there any place that a person can experience vintage pours? I also would love to be able to find an Elijah Craig vintage pirate bottle some day. Especially a barrel proof bottle. You guys are putting out some really good content. Keep it up IBN.

Incredible video. I’ve always theorized this was happening. I wish you all would have included a weller product. Maybe another video for a later date.

I feel that very much, and your selection of bottles for the video was excellent! I did countless comparisons of the Elijah, Knob and Turkey myself and I think that the Elijah Small Batch and Knob considerably changed - and not for the better in my book. But I'm positive again concerning the Turkey 101, the last two bottles I bought were better again than the first new one I had. On the other side, I plead that the modern day Rare Breed is superior to those of ten years ago. So there is hope .. I guess 🥃 Go Turkey 😉

I think this is a great video trying to compare old to new. This is very educational too. Thank you guys, the oldest bourbon I ever had was 1971 E H Taylor

I had a feeling this was the case. Over the years I felt that my more recent bottles of small batch products were getting worse. Thought maybe my palate was changing. I would crack some older bottles I had laying around and remember what attracted me to them in the first place. Even a 10 year old KCSiB from 2018 is better than a 10 year pick today. They are keeping the honey barrels for more expensive products now. Ie: Jacob Well & KC18. It made me change my hunting to 2019 and earlier bottles now. After trying a Wild Turkey 12 year that Japan gets its even more obvious that they are just putting young juice in these bottles for us. 10 years ago 15 year + aged bourbon wasn’t that popular so it would only make sense that they were blending some super old stuff with the younger stuff. Now theres a market for that old stuff and they can charge a premium on top so no need to blend with young juice anymore.

Interesting experiment. And a well-stated conclusion. Very much respect the recognition that, "Yeah, it would appear this is the case... but just too many variables to say for certain." It may sound like lawyering to some. It sounds like wisdom to me. (Oh God, what have I done equating the two?) A couple batch, neck pour, or oxidation variances could quickly make things start to at least look more even. That said - I do suspect we're probably losing a little something overall to younger product, younger wood, maybe even changes in agriculture affecting the grains themselves.

Great video idea! I do think to make it fair, there should be no neck pours. I've noticed a huge change with some bottles after a month or 2 of airing.

Thanks for the blind on this. Also as a Turkey fan, and good to hear it is not just me!

This was a great video! Kind of depressing though because I just got into bourbon in the last year and I love it, but man what did I miss out on😰😰

Elijah Craig 12yr was a pretty regular pour for me and a bartender I worked with back around 2014/15. We had cases of the stuff because we’d gotten an awesome deal on it from a rep trying to make a sales quota and a large portion of them were essentially free. We’d drink that every Friday and Saturday night on the house (a practice I neither condone or suggest) and it informed my whiskey tastes. At that time Henry McKenna 10yr was my favorite and was easily acquired. From my point of view Bourbon may have changed, but awareness and variety have gotten better. There are a lot of really incredible products on the market and if people are willing to give everything a chance (within reason), they’re sure to find something that they love or that has a specific application that works for them. Availability of some products clearly have gotten more extreme but there are so many alternatives out there it’s hard to be too mad. Love the videos by the way guys, keep it up!

This was dope! Was thinking the exact thing Sara said towards the end of the video about average age being batched now vs 8-10 years ago.

I def would like to explore the thought on different variables. I say that cause even the same age stated bottles taste vastly different. I'm sure some are using younger whiskey on non age stated, but to see this with age stated bottles... wonder if they were using older whiskey ie 14/15 yr going into 12 yr bottles. Back then the 15+ yr bottles were not as common as they are now. I'd also think the grains might have something to do with it. But overall I think they are not putting the older whiskey into those bottles anymore and saving them for their higher priced and new products.. ie Knob Creek 18, Elijah Criag 18 etc...

Thank you both for the comparison video 🥃

It makes sense that as any craft product type blows up there are going to be growing pains in production. Barrels have to be sourced from the right trees, grains procured, etc. In time the original quality can be achieved, but it will take time. Plus the incentive to use younger product to rush to market for the boom is irresistible. It makes sense.

Would be curious to see this again with rye 🤔

Old time distillers emphasized yeasty Whiskey. Cultivating robust strains, an artform that has diminished to this day.

This makes sense. When you have plenty of older stuff you mix a little more of it in. When you don't you lower that over time. Bourbon is super popular right now and the past 5 years so older stuff runs out.

Great video, as always. I really enjoy Knob Creek 9, and it’s nice to know that I’m not missing too much when buying the present day bottle.

Gonna take exception to something you said near the end. There is 100% a difference between a bottle opened a few weeks (months, years) and a bottle just opened. Just look at how much a pour will change if left sitting in a glass for 30 minutes. Unless you let it sit in the glass for weeks you won't get the same flavors from a new bottle. To do a real test, open the new bottle, pour out 2 oz and enjoy it, then put a stopper on it and let it sit for a few weeks. From there until about 3-5 years later is peak flavor. (That range of peak is just my opinion). Bourbon doesn't "age" in the bottle the way it does in a barrel, but it does change. Oxidation will change the taste (sometimes for the good, sometimes for the bad). Exposure to sunlight, heat, your saliva if you take a swig, cork decomposition, all kinds of things. Thus the notion of a "neck pour". Comparing a bottle that has been opened for 10 years to one just opened is going to be different because the opened bottle has been exposed to different environmental factors for those 10 years. So while it isn't "older" as defined by aging in a barrel, it has changed over time. I have bottles that got better (I had a Blantons that took on this amazing citrus note), and bottles that turned cloudy and became virtually undrinkable (lost the last 1/4 of a bottle of EC 18 that I had held onto for years when they stopped releasing it). Having said ALL of that, some bourbon is younger in the bottle than it used to be. They've sold most of their old stock or started releasing older whiskey as a special release, so yeah. It's definitely different. Better, worse? Hard to say, and unless you have a completely unopened, saved in a cool dark place, 10 year old bottle of something, a comparison is difficult if not impossible to do. Finally, that EC BP... those change release to release, year to year. The two you have are the same mash bill, same age, same still, aged in the same warehouses. A123 is fine. It's not even the best release of the last 12 months, much less the last 8 years. Hell, the proof isn't even the same on those. Not sure that tells us anything about older vs newer or just something about release to release. B523 might be the best one of all time. Who knows.

I've had very few experiences with older bourbon offerings as obviously they are hard to come by. The two most notable for me were an Austin Nichols wild turkey 101 and a rear age stated Elijah Craig small batch. Both of them tasted 10 times better than the modern day versions. Bourbon was made differently back then and even if it was minor variations I believe there was a bourbon butterfly effect.

Interesting to see your old KC have the cork issue. I just moved an older bottle from around 2004 with the same label and the cork had dropped down into the bottle. I guess it is time to open and enjoy.

Thanks for doing this comparison. Great fun and really appreciate the thoughts and opinions here.

I really enjoyed this video. I think you're spot on with the changes that have happened with the bourbon industry.

You may not hold grudges, but I do. I hate how Heaven Hill handled the 12 year statement removal on EC, and I did indeed do a blind b/w modern day EC and 12 Year EC. EC 12 year is much better. And replacing my beloved 6-year Heaven Hill with a 7 year version for 4X+ the price? "Sometimes I see red" And now back to enjoying some Wilderness Trail Yellow Label. Cheers :) 🥃

GMO corn variant perhaps? The thought crosses my mind anyway.

I feel like most of the change is just in the age. The older products carried a higher age statement than their newer counterparts. With the huge boom in demand the number of older aged barrels is getting less and less. The prices also rose to reflect the rarity of these older barrels.

Great idea and fun to watch. Informetive.

Please make this a series.

Absolutely loved this video. Happy that I can walk to McCormack’s Whiskey Grill on Robinson in Richmond to taste different expressions.

Wow! Loved this content! This was awesome! Great job, Chad & Sara! 🥰

What a great episode! I was hoping ECBP would be tighter, but very interesting

Damn!! This was excellent! Thoroughly enjoyed. Had wondered about this myself. The market for older bottles is sure to explode after this. Thanks for giving us such wonderful content.

Late in 2022, after doing online research (yes, I know I know, risky move), I bought about 12 batches of different brands of bourbons. Now I don't know what I was missing from 5+ years ago, but I have to say, most of the 12 batches are best described as "meh" IMO. I will now go look for your videos of each one of those, and hopefully I'll find out what connoisseurs like yourselves think of the 12 that I picked randomly. BTW, this video was great!

Great video… made me sad that I’m newer to bourbon and missed some of the great ones of the past.

Really good concept that you could repeat with other bottlings. It seemed to me from your comments that the bottlings that still have age statements were closer to the old bottlings than the NAS expressions. Do you concur?

What a fantastic idea for a video. As always, great work!

I think they do age in the bottle and I have seen no definitive proof that they don't. There's no real way to even compare that without a time machine, how can they say they don't?

You're both Great! love the channel!

Would like to see you do a lineup of some of the bottles you have had open in your collection the longest...Like do you guys still have any bottles open from when you first got into bourbon?

Love this episode. Very interesting!

Unfortunately, I don't have much to compare. Would love to try EC small batch 12 yr someday. That said, I did recently get to try a 1985 bottling of WT 101 8 years old and I don't think I would have known it was WT 101 if it were given to me blind. It had so much more depth, it was amazing and I love current day 101 but this 1985 bottle was on another level. Great video. Cheers!

god thought I was nuts being (sorta) disappointed with each new stagg jr release when everyone says “best one yet” to every batch haha

Damn, this makes me want to find some dusty bottles. Great stuff!

That was so interesting!!

Can you guys suggest some bars or establishments that still pour “vintage” bourbons? Some of us only recently got into bourbon so we never had the privilege of owning/experiencing those older versions. Thanks for the valuable episode!

I love bourbon, but nothing beats the stellar Pappy 20 I had in 2012 during my bachelor party. Had pappy 20 since then but not the same. Same with Bookers. Bourbon is just not as good as it used to be.

My favorite WT 101 isn't as good as it once was. Less spice, more sweet IMO.

what a fun episode. things change dramatically after the Stagg. Music references, karoke, stealing sips, jeering. great job kids.

This episode causes me depression. I wasn’t into bourbon during the quality years…and now I feel I’m buying an inferior product at higher costs. I’m glad you both did this but, I’m still sad. 😢

I am thinking it may be the bottles aging nicely.

I have some 2008-2011-ish 101's and RB's, and a red 12 EC, if you plan to do this again lmk for samples. I suspect wood is as much of an influence as the downward creeping ages, especially following the NAS jump at the beginning of the modern bourbon boom.

Sara, keep guessing please. Love it when you nail it.

Great content! Very interesting! Thanks

Great episode!!

Nice video. I think your premise is correct.

I’d be curious with more of the lower cost buffalo trace products

Super thanks for this blind taste testing. I suspect popularity of bourbon has contributed to the difference in flavor profile. Hopefully the brands of bourbon will consider comparing from previous releases. That said I find the bourbon brands you selected to be some of the best for daily consumption. Again thanks for the inciteful review.

Do you think when supply meets demand, quality and taste will gradually improve? Could it be that we are at the bottom of the curve and things are "lookin' up?" Thanks for a great video- I'm kinda glad I don't know what I was missing as I will never get to taste older bottles of bourbon.

I had once been given a bottle of Jim beam extra age that had been sitting at about 2/3rds full for close to 10 years. The JB extra age of today doesn't hold a candle to the old one. I don't think this is the only factor, but there is something to be said about some of these sitting with a decent amount of air for such a long time. Maybe.

A few years ago I went to a bar in Chicagoland that, at the time, had some vintage whiskies. No clue how they came by them. I had a couple pours (and was out a significant amount of money heh); they were bottled in the mid-to-late-50s. One was a Heaven Hill Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey and the second was 8-year stated 'Old Stagg' (I kept a couple pictures of the bottles for record). They both just hit so much better than anything I have had since; though I want to be clear that I have not had that much experience. If you two ever have a chance to find true 'vintage' pours at a bar or event; I would be very interested in your thoughts. But they just seemed to be more complex, have more body. Like the difference between movies filmed on, well, film vs digital. Digital is more "clear" but film just has a depth/quality/character that is non-replicable. At this point I'm rambling. Like this topic, and highly recommend finding some pours of pre-turn of the century. PS it should be noted, lots of scotch folks have a similar "back in my day, whiskey was better" experience (so they say)

Well done!

I have an unopened bottle of Crown Royal that’s 52 years old, should I open it?

Great episode you two!!! Makes me wish I would've started drinking bourbon younger lmao!!!

Not just bourbon but all whiskey is getting worse. I remember Johnnie Walker Black in the 70s,80s, and 90s was superior to today's version. The same for Glenlivet single malt and all the rest.

I believe that since whiskey in general is so popular nowadays they don’t let it age as much as they used to. Plus they are making 5-10x’s more so maybe it that has something to do with it also.

I would have thought that at least one of the newer versions might have gotten your votes. The fact you seemed to prefer all 5 older versions cannot be argued away. In other words, there seems to be something to it. What exactly that is, is the question. I wonder what representatives of the makers would have to say about it? Maybe you could reach out to them and ask?

Most distilleries are running out of older whisky due to the bourbon boom in recent years and due to special older age releases (with a higher price tag). The same bottle of whisky from years ago 100% tastes better than the current versions, sad but true.

Any single whiskey (single meaning coming from one distillery) will change over time. This is why it’s important to stock up on whiskeys when they are good. I’m buying the hell out of Wild Turkey 101 right now cause it’s fantastic and still relatively inexpensive. The Knob Creek’s are fantastic now as well. But the prices are little higher.

Great episode: blending in the olden days was an art, full of blemishes and variants and variations. . . . today's stocks are consistent and sanitized ... to death !

Perhaps they aged a bit in the bottle which improved the flavor?

I've been enjoying bourbon for forty years. What I've noticed is that, overall, quality has gone way down. Sure, you can find some fantastic bourbons that weren't even around back then but with so many labels to choose from now, quality as a whole has diminished. In fact, what's sad to me is that so many of the bourbons I enjoyed decades ago are now gone forever 😢. We need more, better bourbon at lower prices! Things have gotten ridiculous...

Glad i have a lot of old bottle's stored away

Well hey, thanks guys... now I"m depressed.

WHISKEY CHEERS 😎

Open it up and challenge Whiskey Tube and get everyone else opinons... I think this needs to be said across the board.

Whiskey is made from grain and varies from year to year does not mean things have changed just different batches barrels place in the rackhouse

It was the best of times. It was the worst of times

Since you both seem to prefer the older version, that leads to the question: is it an inside variable change or an outside variable change. Example of inside variable would include was the corn from the same farm? Outside variable would be did the farmer use the same seed company, or even the same seed designation? Same fertilizer as seven years ago? To misquote Professor Owl, the world my never know.

Great Video! Very interesting. Are we sure the bourbon doesn't improve while it's in the bottle?

As a relatively new bourbon drinker, these tests and the higher prices is rather depressing. Any thoughts on what is better, or at least as good as, today, as compared to years ago?

Awesome episode!

That's a shame. This was a great experiment and I think proves on a smaller scale that older juice compared to newer juice from the same distillery just tastes better.

I didn't read all of the comments and I just started watching the video. My thoughts are that the older bottles will taste better because they've been open longer. Unless you're giving a 10 year old bottle a fresh crack, then it's not really a fair comparison.

Great video and an awesome idea!!!!!!

😂 Yes Sara, we want to see you guess!

Wonder if you open bottles from today in 10 years, if they’ll be better than future bottles?

What did the jr in Stagg originally signify?