Barrel shortage coming soon?

Sounds like Big Al might be behind this. Time to open a joint cooperage and hop farm.

 

I wonder if what you are experiencing isn't a side effect of the 'craft' and 'local' movements gaining momentum.

As a resident in the heart of bourbon country, I can report there is a rapidly growing craft brew movement, and it is sucking up empty barrels faster than people can load them on trucks to ship them out of state. There's still a lot of barrels, they're just being used right here in Kentucky. And since the local breweries are paying between $100-$150 a barrel, the distilleries have no incentive to search for additional buyers. (When one local brewery finishes with barrels, they resell them again for use as furniture and rain collectors and planters for $100, and they don't last long.)

This is also why so many breweries outside of Kentucky are starting their own distilleries, and why so many craft distilleries are starting with non-bourbon liquors, and then collaborating with local craft breweries to make new beers aged in all sorts of barrels.

 

Prices of new French oak cognac barrels have increased close to x3 last I looked. I got 2 about 10 -11 years ago for funky sour homebrews. One 5, one 7.5 gallons.

 

American Rye Whiskey has the same standards as Bourbon, in regards to new, charred american oak.

 

I find it to be interesting that Jack Daniels chooses to not label their whiskey as being a Bourbon.

Cheers!

 

I think they chose not to call it Bourbon, because they include an extra step that isn't done to legitimate bourbon. They filter it through a charcoal before barreling it. Bourbon doesn't get filtered. Perhaps that extra step excludes them, I'm not sure.

However, I have seen beers sold as bourbon barrel aged, and then barrel aged, that were in JD barrels. Perhaps the beer industry doesn't care enough to correctly identify the barrel spirit, while some breweries know the difference and then call it barrel aged, to still get people intrested in buying it due to the trend of BA beers.

 

Ive done it with home brew . works well

 

It is perfectly acceptable to charcoal filter Bourbon. In fact Heaven Hill Distillery does this: “Heaven Hill Distilleries charcoal filter all of their bourbon prior to bottling; this process purifies the product and “mellows” the flavour making Heaven Hill Bourbons uniquely easy to drink either straight or with your favourite mixer.”

Since I brought up the topic of Heaven Hill Distillery, it might be worthwhile to know that John Laffler (former barrel guy at Goose Island) told me that Goose Island would only use barrels from Heaven Hill Distillery for their Bourbon Barrel aging program.

Cheers!

 

Yes this is it, exactly.

The charcoal filtering actually does let them be excuded from being called Bourbon even though all other things are pretty much equal. And apparently they actually choose and prefer to be called "Tennesee Whiskey." Many people in popular usage say they are a Bourbon though. Hence the problem for the Brewers. It’s a somewhat esoteric differentiation betweem Bourbon and Tennessee whiskey which the brewers don't appreciate but then there are lots of other people outside of Tennessee understand the difference. And all things considered most folks wouldn't be able to taste the difference between a Bourbon Barrel Aged stout and a Tennessee Whiskey Barrel aged stout that used the same base beer.

 

Jack,

Two different procedures for "charcoal filtering." The one used in Tennessee Whiskey is different than the one that is sometimes used with some Bourbons. Whether the difference makes a difference is debatable. But the critical issue is that Tennessee Whiskeys choose to differentiate themselves from Bourbons based on that difference.

(And I doubt anyone has been to Court to settle the difference. So for NAFTA purposes they all seem to be called Bourbon--which I'm sure irritates the Jack Daniels and Geroge Dickel folks considerably. )

 

“What you could ask is: Can Jack Daniels rightly be called bourbon?

And the answer is: yes, it can. It meets all points to be even a Straight Bourbon [however please note the differentiation to Kentucky Straight Bourbon - as this is again a regional denomination, which Jack Daniels obviously doesn't meet].

The video is explaining exactly the laws. Before Jack Daniels also stated very proud, that they are sour mash. This was a bit... misleading, as most American Straight Whiskeys are sour mash - it seems, that Jack Daniels dropped this differentiation.

However can Bourbon also be filtered through charcoal. Again, yes! Some distilleries like Heaven hill are filtering their spirits through charcoal - and there is no law, which would prohibit this. The Tennessee whiskeys are a bit unique, as they are using sugar maple wood for the charcoal, but this is just their choice - there is no law, which would prevent other "Bourbon" producer to do so as well.”

From: http://opinionated-alchemist.blogspot.com/2013/12/is-jack-daniels-bourbon-whiskey.html

Cheers!

 

@honkey what happens to your bourbon barrels after you use them for beer? are they useless for distilling/beer afterwards? Do they get recharred for whiskey? Something else?

 

Interesting. Thanks for the video. But I don't remember saying there was a law that prevented Jack Daniels from calling themselves Bourbon, rather what I intended to say is that they chose to differentiate themselves from calling themselves Bourbon on the basis of two different filtration processes.

 

This is interesting, but it is on the other end of the barrel supply chain. Your info means the distillers will likely have issues getting new charred barrels (due to increased demand), but since barrels are only used once for bourbon it shouldn't impact the number of barrels coming on the market for brewers... until they finally start dumping the bourbon, at which point the supply situation will improve for breweries. Now, this does highlight the fact that growing the used barrel supply for breweries is a many-years task, and is highly dependent on the demand for bourbon. So drink some bourbon along with your beer and help increase demand!

 

Incorrect. The issue isn't the supply of new barrels to the bourbon distilleries - there isn't a shortage of oak. The issue is the shortage of bourbon that is ready to bottle at this very minute. Those barrels that are racked in the warehouses haven't aged long enough, and until they hit the distilleries aging requirements, they aren't going anywhere. Generally speaking, the legal requirements for bourbon require a minimum of 2 years aging for "straight" bourbon whiskey, but in practice it ages much longer than this (typically more than 4 years because any straight bourbon aged under 4 years has to indicate the age on the label). For the full law, see the Code of Federal Regulations @ 25 C.F.R. 5 http://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/27/part-5.

Simply put - there may be 5 million barrels in Kentucky, but a vast majority of them cannot be touched at present. So it is a very real impact on the number of barrels coming onto the market at this time. The bourbon isn't finished aging, and therefore the barrels can't be dumped. With no barrels to dump, that means a shortage of used barrels that the breweries need for making BA beers. The shortage of bourbon cannot be cured overnight simply by distilling more bourbon because of the long time schedule of production - the bourbon that any distillery in Kentucky distills today won't see the market for at least 4-5 years at the very "bare minimum" earliest, which means those barrels will be tied up at least that long. And the barrels that are currently ready to be dumped (that have completed their aging - meaning distilled years ago) aren't sufficient to meet the demand of all the breweries wanting barrels. In a few years, the shortage will ease and the barrels will be more readily available.

 

My point was that it isn't like a bulge in bourbon production that has just started is materially affecting the supply of barrels to breweries today--because for almost all beers the barrels need to be used for likker before they are used for beer. To your point, it doesn't matter what is currently happening with bourbon production changes (up or down) as to what happens to the current supply of barrels to breweries--any changes take years to affect that supply because of the fact that those barrels are sitting in warehouses for years after the decision to ramp up is made (and a decision to ramp down would likewise take years to ripple through the system). Thus while your bourbon production point is interesting, it is mostly interesting because in a few years there will be more barrels available.

 

I don't see a barrel shortage coming in the foreseeable future given how much more whiskey is consumed than ba beers

 

It depends on the barrel. I just started a sour program. Some of the barrels work well for sours, some get sold as furniture items. We typically use Buffalo trace barrels twice for beer (first Wee Heavy, second stout) and then they either get used for sours or for furniture.

 

There are huge whiskey factories out there that most beer folks aren't even aware of. They send thousands and thousands and thousands of barrels of whiskey out into the marketplace and turn those barrels around to the beer & cider industry. I'm not overly concerned.

Ever wonder why so many breweries don't tell you whose barrels they are using? Because a lot of the time they don't know- they know it's a bourbon, rye, or sour mash whiskey barrel, but if they bought it from a factory distillery, there's a chance they have no idea where that whiskey ended up.

 

The fad will pass, just as super hoppy IPA's and sours have risen and fallen in their popularity.