In a recent tasting review writeup for Five Trail whisky, I mentioned that Coors is getting into the whisky game. I have a friend who works for Coors, and he’s been sending me samples of first the whisky Coors distilled itself and a sample of Blue Run High Rye Bourbon, which is a company Coors recently acquired. I’ll admit I was a little more excited by the Blue Run because I’ve seen decent reviews, and it’s a $100 bourbon, so getting a free sample to give my opinion makes me happy. Though he doesn’t actual work in the whisky division, so it’s really just curiosity. A chance to have a FaceTime call and taste together and share our opinions. But aside from seeing the butterfly bottle pop up here and there and looking at scores, I don’t have a lot of history with Blue Run, so we’re entering virgin territory here. How is it? The nose initially has a lot of heat coming off it, but if you let it sit in the glass 5-10 minutes, the heat tapers off, revealing a distinctly high rye aroma of spice and mint. There’s a sort of Colgate thing going on here that isn’t bad. It’s like an alcoholic toothpaste type thing, or maybe mouthwash. This will appear to you certainly if you’re one of those kids who snuck your bourbon into high school dances in Listerine bottles. There are some bourbon notes too, mainly sweet corn and vanilla, but it does feel like the rye notes take precedence over the bourbon notes here. There’s also some spice that makes me thing of red bell pepper here, and that’s actually welcome. Together it all seems to work to bring about a pleasurable scent that isn’t rocking my world but that I don’t mind drinking either. The palate is sweet, but also full of corn prominently, mainly corn syrup. The mint remains but because it’s mingled with a corn syrup sweetness it comes off like your just unwrapped a candy cane from your Christmas tree and stirred it in your bourbon just to see what would happen and found your bourbon subsumed with Christmas cheer. Honestly, this feels like a December drink to me. And what you get on the finish is mint and spice and a little bit of that feeling that you just finished rinsing with mouthwash. It’s unique and not at all bad. I’d say it’s an extremely interesting $50 bottle that just happens to SRP for $100, which would bring me to the question of, what exactly is Coors planning here? As my review of Five Trail pointed out, it’s a decent blended whisky at $30 that just happens to be sold for $55 dollars, so I’m noticing a trend of them now putting out decent whiskies that just sell for too much. Knowing that Coors flagship brand appeals to people who appreciate budget beer, I’m not sure their whisky strategy correlates. Price in whisky, we all know, doesn’t always equate with quality but rather equates with amount of stock available. Are they planning to expand warehousing space for Blue Run that would allow them to age higher end products that would be priced accordingly while making a lower-end product they could see more quickly for cheap? Or are they going to keep with the boutique high-end curiosity bottlings that seem to be the Blue Run bread and butter? I’d love to pick the brain of whomever is trying to work this out because I don’t foresee a winning strategy here. They’ve kept the Blue Run leadership in place which is a decent start because from what I’ve read, they are making interesting whiskies, but my real question goes beyond whether or not they’re making interesting whiskies into marketing strategy: how are you going to sell enough of this stuff to make it worth your while? Blue Run strikes me as having potential, but right now, they're operating by making whiskies that feel to me like a second rate Barrell. This whisky is priced at $100 but I'd much rather have Larceny Barrel Proof, or Elijah Craig Barrel Proof, or Wild Turkey Rare Breed, or Maker's Mark Cask Strength, all of which cost significantly less than this. So how are you going to convince me to buy your stuff when off the top of my head I just named four that are better and cheaper and could continue doing so (Old Forester 1920, New Riff Barrel Proof Bourbon, Knob Creek Single Barrel Barrel Proof)?