174. Legends Distillery - Spirits USA

Welcome to another trip down the Bourbon Road with your hosts, Jim and Mike. So grab a glass of your favorite bourbon and kick back.

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Hey listeners, it's Big G from the Bourbon Road. We are here today with Legends Bourbon, Spirit USA, out of Cumming, Georgia, up there by Atlanta, just I guess northwest of Atlanta a little bit. We got Chris Green, the chief marketing officer, and Tyler Sandlin. He wanted to be called the head blender, but I'm going to tell all of our listeners right now, they got some spectacular bourbon that we reviewed. They're 115-weeded bourbon. If you haven't tried it and you can get a bottle, you better get your hands on a bottle. So to me, that right there wins you Master Blender. Because if you did that, was that your magic? That was my magic. Well guys, welcome to the bourbon road tonight. We're going to discuss, uh, we're going to be drinking two of your bourbons and discussing legends and how it came about and how it's going to grow and how everybody wants to get your whiskey in their hands. So, uh, you know, we'd like to get straight to the whiskey though. So the first whiskey we're going to drink tonight is your legends, 87 bourbon. Do you guys want to lead me through that?

Yeah, sure. Um, so our 87 bourbon is what Chris, our marketing guy dubbed the session bourbon. So it's a really easy drinking bourbon that's meant to just be simply enjoyed. It's great with a Coke or old fashioned or something like that. But when I think about it, I think about sitting around a campfire with your friends and you just get into it and it starts opening up more and more. And before you know it, the bottle is just about gone and you might be in trouble with your wife the next morning. But it's a good bourbon. It's sweet on the sweeter side, incredibly smooth. And just a simple, easy drinking bourbon that we've had a lot of success with. If you're into higher proofs, you know, I'll be honest, this might not be your jam because it is a very light, smooth bourbon. I don't know, smooth is one of those taboo words, but that's what comes to mind when people drink the 87.

I get some fresh pizzas on this.

Yeah, it's definitely got the floral and fruit in it.

As soon as you said the floral, I'm going to throw out my old country boy honeysuckle on that. You know, you walking down that country road a little bit, that honeysuckle, but still I still get that fresh peaches, you know, not peach pie, but like you cut open a fresh peach or your bombs can some peach out of that old Mason jar. I might even pour some of this on top of some peaches and drink it.

Yeah. My wife is a 87 for recipes. So every time I bring a bottle home, I never get to drink it because she's already started blending it with brownies and make an ice cream. I'm like, come on. But the sweetness in the urban, the honeysuckle, the vanilla, it blends so well as an easy drinker. But as a recipe, you can boil it just about damn near anything. And it's just beautiful. It just it accents it.

Now, Tyler, was that your mind behind that, that your thought process behind when you blended this?

Yeah, it was just, you know, kind of, this is our standard bourbon. It's our entry level bourbon just to make it a really just approachable and, uh, an easy drinker, you know, a little lighter on the, on the fruit side. So people who are coming into bourbon, you know, this isn't going to abuse them. You know, it's not going to tear the pallet. It's not going to be a flame throw or something like that. So that was kind of our process behind it. It's just making a really just high 80s, you know, at 87 proof and just making it a really approachable. solid bourbon that can be used. It's priced where you don't feel guilty if you put it in a cocktail and it's good enough to be drank neat. It kind of covers the spectrum.

And what's the price on this bottle?

Right now, we just actually lowered it down to $29.99. Uh, we were about 33, 34, and then we decided, um, we had a lot of push behind it and we were getting a lot of interest and, uh, sales were going well, but the number one thing we heard was it needs to be close to about 30 bucks. And so we made the decision 29.99 is where it needs to be. Um, and that's where it's at the market right now.

So that's super respectable out of a craft distillery. Um, and are you guys producing this yourselves or is this sourced?

This is MGP sourced. We proudly tell everybody where it comes from. We even put it on the bottle. It's one of the big taboos that distilleries, a lot of distilleries are being known for, which is they're hiding where their juice is being distilled. We literally put it on the side of the bottle. It says distilled in Indiana. And if anybody in the industry knows anything about Indiana, that is where MGP juice comes from. And they are one of the best master distillers out there. And we want the best use that we can get a hold of to quantum purify it with our technology.

Yeah, there's definitely nothing wrong with sourcing a lot of companies out there doing that. And I'm glad you guys are transparent about that. Now, what's the match bill on this?

It's 21% rye, 75% corn, 4% barley malt. It's considered a high rye. Anything above, I think, what, 18, 19% is considered high rye. But then we do it in small batches and then proof it down to 87%, which is why it's a super easy drinking bourbon. It doesn't have that bite, but it has all the sweetness. So a little bit of that caramel finish on the back, vanilla almost, a little honey. I dubbed it the session bourbon because 90% of our customers that buy this 87, the bottle doesn't last. They pop the cord, they throw it in the trash and they just kill the bottle. It is so easy to drink.

Well guys, I say cheers to you. Thank you so much for sharing your whiskey with me. I'm going to go ahead and taste some of this.

Cheers.

Very sweet on that front end.

Last night we were at dinner and my wife was eating a dessert and she said this has got a light spice on it and I get a little hint of ginger on this. Just a tad bit. The ginger can have a real light spice to it. I'd usually say white pepper, but after she said that, I was like, man, that is, that's spot on on some bourbon I drink. So I still get those fresh pizzas though. I love it. It's nice and light. I feel just a tad of a little Kentucky hug, but. Not a giant Kentucky hug.

No, this is a little bit of a warmth. Um, but it's not until you get to the hundred and especially the one 15 is where you get that, that true Kentucky hug.

Oh, that second sip of that is like just coating my mouth for 87 proofer. That's all drinking that, uh, peach, peach syrup a little bit. Um, that's how it, it's that sweet and that viscous for 87 proof. I'm so surprised that it's that viscous and oily.

I mean, if, yeah, if you, if you just swole the bourbon around the glass, the legs that are on this would be in an 87. It's impressive. It really does hug that at the inside of the glass.

And how can you beat that with the price? And we don't chill filter it. So that's one reason why you got, oh, Cause you know, it's eight at 87 proof is below the flock point. So, um, a lot of people chill filter at that point, but being where we are and just our capacity, we decide, and we just didn't want to strip it and make it a real thin whiskey. We wanted to keep. Oh, so, um, that was just the decision we made is like, let's keep the whiskey as natural as too close to what it should be as possible.

So let's, let's get into the story of legends. How did, how did legends start?

That's a long, but I'll make sure. So, um, so we're owned by spirit USA, right? That's the parent company, the LLC. And it's been around for, since 2007, it's had a few brands and lot legends launched. We launched legends in March of 2020 when we went public. So just in time to not do anything is really what happened because you know, as a, three tier state, Georgia. Um, we have to legally use a distributor to go to restaurants or package stores. And with March, with everything shutting down all around the world, our distributor said, listen, we just can't launch a new product. So we sat there for probably two and a half months with our stuff wrapped, ready to go sitting on the loading dog. So, uh, it's, it's been a, it's been a fun year and a half for sure. Getting out of that situation, but legends started really, um, for me, the way I get into it, my stepfather is Kenny May. And he actually started Connector Ridge Whiskey, the Clyde made whiskey in Alabama back in the late 90s. And I sold out his shares out of it probably by the mid to early 2000s. And he wanted to stay in the bourbon business and wanted to stay in the whiskey business. So he was kind of shopping around and he went up meeting Michael Girard, who is the CEO of the company now. in Cumming, Georgia, and they wanted to put together a partnership, kind of had this idea of some new ways to sort of finish whiskey. So an idea of blending the traditional ways, like we're aged in barrels, we don't take it out of the barrel and try to do any kind of bananching like that. And then finishing it with some newer technologies that are explored. And one of my stepfather's good friends back home is a food mechanical genius. He's got about 40 something patents in the food development industry. They put their heads together and that's what kind of come with quantum period. So quantum purity is sort of the nexus of what Spirits USA is. And from there, we are legends and we use that quantum purity by Spirits USA to finish it. So for us, again, we're not distilling on site as much as other people and all this stuff. So For us, really, it's the process. We can get juice from any good distiller and make it ours through the process that we use to finish it.

So you have that bourbon background with your stepdad, which is a well-known bourbon out there with that Clyde Mays name, right? Right. some people said has apple pills in it, but still a well-known Alabama style whiskey. But you brought that over. Take me through that, that quantum process of really what that does without giving away your trade secrets.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. So it is a patent process that we own. Um, and what it is, is so for instance, our bourbon, right? Our bourbon will go into a charred new oak barrel, just as regulations require, as we would do. And it'll sit there and age, right? So, Our bourbons are, you know, traditionally aged from two to four years. So they sit there just like any other bourbon in the world, right? We're not cheating that process. You can't legally and we wouldn't if we could. So we take it out of the barrel and then depending on if it's the 115 or the 100, you know, we'll add the water and blend it and then into the process it goes. And quantum purity is just a mechanical nonchemical operation that removes mostly methanol from the bourbon without stripping flavor or color or mouth fill. So, you know, when you got your runs and you're running your still, you get the four shots, which we know is the stuff that makes people go blind and sick and all that, you know, it's mostly methanol enough, but then you get your hearts, which is ethanol, but there's still methanol in it. There's legal limits, right? So if you're running a clean still, you're still getting some of that methanol in there. we're able to take that an additional down to about 50%. So we're able to remove what's left by about 50%. And what it does is it just makes a really smooth bourbon that brings the flavors forward and taps down a lot of that sort of burn, you know, the ethanol, like back of your throat on fire kind of stuff. So we're able to just basically, I call it like you got white noise. and we're able to just tap that down and let the flavor shine through. And that's without using traditional filters, without using any kind of chemical process, without really stripping color or flavor.

A lot of people out there might ask, hey, isn't that cheating and nobody else doing that? I'll tell you, I've been in, I don't know how many distilleries, I can't count them. And folks, unless they're pouring it straight in the bottle from the barrel, let's say mickters, they've got a monstrous filtration system before it ever gets in the bottle. So don't think that those giant distilleries aren't putting your whiskey through a giant, some type of a filter. Um, so this, this new process, if you're taking somewhat limited turns, you're taking the headache out of the bottle.

Yeah, that's the goal. Yeah. Yep. That's one of the things we're doing. So we're just making a cleaner process without having to really read the steel. And it really shows up in our vodka as well. We've got an incredible vodka that is, is good. I put it up there with any vodka on the, we call it the legends challenge and it really shines. It's a little easier to tell in the vodka because it's such a clean. We really, I mean, our vodka, there's hardly no nose and there's really hardly any taste. It's just a straight up vodka.

We don't say that already word on our podcast. I'm just messing with you. We do. Hey, in Mexico, that's what I drink is vodka. I mean, Sometimes it's too damn hot to drink bourbon. So you got to have a mixer drink. But so your bourbon and your vodka and your stuff, all of it goes through that process. And it really, in layman terms, it's taking that headache, taking that hangover out of it. It'd be even better for me because I don't get hangovers. I never have. I don't know why. I mean, I've had a couple of, had a couple rough days of my life, you know, I could probably count on my hand where I woke up and I was like, God almighty, I regret last night. Um, but I haven't had one of those a long time. Yeah.

And legally we can't say you don't get a hangover. We just say you can take back the morning.

Well, that's a beautiful.

And here's the thing that this is that the whole no hangover thing, that's an after effect of something that we were designing. We had no intention of that ever happening, right? The whole idea of the technology was to allow the flavor to come forward and take all that as white noise. It's the methanol, butanol, ethyl acetate is the main things that we take out. And by doing so, by removing all that high heat, Now what it's allowing is a young bourbon. So we're talking young bourbons here. We're not going to tell customers we've got a seven-year-old, eight-year-old, 10-year-old bourbon. We're working with two to four. So when most young bourbons have that high heat because the methanol hasn't had time to actually disperse naturally, there's a reason why a 15-year-old bourbon is smooth. that dreaded word that everybody hates, but it's because over time it's got is settled down. The methanol that butanol is actually dispersed out of the barrel. Believe it or not, there is actually gases that release out of the barrel. So we're taking a young bourbon and we're able to polish it and just allow that young flavor to come through, which is full of flavor when you remove that high heat. To go back on what you were just saying about every distillery has a gigantic filtration system, 100% true. What they also have, not all of them, but there's quite a few of them, they all have gimmicks, especially in the vodka world, where it's all passed over diamonds or through the butthole of a unicorn. There's some stupid gimmick out there that they use to say they filtered the product. Well, what we have is scientific facts. We don't have a gimmick. We actually back up what we created by sending it to a lab and it's on our website. We'll put it against Bullet, Maker's Mark, and Woodford Reserve. We actually show the results of the impurities that we remove. It is shocking. Absolutely shocking what is left over as far as the methanol and the butanol side of it. It's amazing. As you can tell from my accent, I am not from America. I'm English, right? Only in America would they approve methanol at high levels to consume. Nowhere else in the world would they allow it, what they do here.

But, you know, I thought, I thought you were saying, I'm going to say all in America where they allow bourbon to come out of unicorn's butthole. That's what I thought he was about to say. I just knew, Tyler, that's what he was going to say.

No, no, no. Well, you know, it's just the whole thing. If it's good enough to power NASCAR, then it must be good enough to drink. Right. And that's the whole thing. So we figured out a way with our technology to really tone down that methanol, that butanol, that ethyl acetate. And all that's left now is this beautiful, clean, pure bourbon and vodka that you get to enjoy the flavor without any of that burn.

Well, let's talk about you two guys for a second. Now, Tyler, you kind of hinted that you've got that background from your stepdad in Clyde, Clyde maze, right? Is that where you got your background and you learned your art of blending?

Yeah. Yeah. I was exposed to whiskey at a young age. Legally or maybe not, but, uh, yeah. So it's just been around for, it's been around my life for quite, quite a long time, you know, 20 plus years. So, uh, And, you know, just am I, unfortunately, my stepfather is not with us anymore. He passed in 16. And that's kind of where I really entered the story is I wanted to sort of do my part to bring it home for our family, for our, you know, our interest in this venture. I wanted to kind of see it home. So I was actually living in New Orleans for the last several years. So I would drive up to. my parents home in Troy, Alabama, spend the night and then come up to Georgia on Saturday mornings and we'd work on our process, work on our batches and all that. burn it back to New Orleans Sunday and be back in work on Monday morning. Well, that's tough right there. Did that for about four years.

Now, when you start blending something, you know, how many, let's say, how many barrels are you putting into this batch right here of like 87? How many barrels are you guys putting in something like this?

Small batch, the 87 it's 10 barrels.

So 10 barrels at a time, you probably cherry picking some barrels.

Yeah. I mean, there's a little bit there, you know, the longer we've been at it and the me being on site has helped out a lot. Me being in the, uh, in the place, uh, 40 hours a week plus, instead of driving up for the weekends has helped us get more consistent for sure. But yeah, there's a flavor profile we're going for. Um, we'll blend through it and, uh, Um, like we said, I know small batch is one of those words that can mean anything, but for us, small batches is 10 barrels. So we are truly. Thank you. I think that's pretty small for a small batch. So there is going to be a little bit of swing because 10 barrels, it's hard to be consistent with 10 barrels completely on point, you know, with, uh, I don't have racks and racks of barrels to cherry pick from, you know, we do have Linda because we're startup. So, but, uh, yeah. Oh, go ahead. Nope. Yeah. We just go through 10 barrels and then we add our water to make it 87 proof and blend it over several days.

Now, Chris, like you said, you got that, that accent. I don't, I can't say nothing cause I got an accent too. So everybody, I used to live up Maine. I was walking through the grocery store and this, this lady is like, you talk funny. And I was like, you think I talk funny? Imagine what I'm thinking. Everybody here talks funny. You could say the same thing to people down there. Um, but give me your background, Chris. What's, what's your background?

So my background actually, uh, I've been in marketing and design for most of my life right out of high school. Uh, I got into graphic design at a young age. I was a musician, professional musician for a while. And while I was on the road, I was doing graphic design to pay bills because music does not pay the bills. And then I got my degree in a Bachelor of Arts in marketing, and I actually worked for the PGA. So I was in the golf industry for actually 15 years doing the FedEx Cup and the Nationwide Tour. I was doing a lot of the marketing for that. I also did a lot of marketing in the marathon industry, designs for the Boston Marathon, New York, the Atlanta Peach Race. And then Spartan was one of my biggest clients that I worked for, Spartan Races. So my background is mostly design. About six years ago, I met Michael at one of his pubs. I also run soccer clubs here in Atlanta. And I was at his pub and he started teasing me about legends, about this new process he's got, this technology he's got, the people he's working with. And he said he's in dire need of marketing. And so I just told him, I was like, man, when you're ready to pull the trigger on this, I've done the same thing now for going on 15 years. I've, you know, being English, I've done my fair share of drinking. It's about time it started making me money. So I'd like to be a part of this. And he called me two and a half years ago and said, we're ready. Come on board. Let's get going. So I hung up my PGA I said, enough of that. I don't want the corporate world anymore. We became an owner, myself and Tyler are both owners into Legends Distillery also. We just hit the ground running. I redesigned all the labels. I didn't like what we had. Tyler can vouch for that. What we had originally, they were not good. We just started out really just redesigning everything that legends was and trying to build a brand around the word legends, which is amazing that we were able to trademark that. I couldn't believe that it wasn't taken by somebody.

I like your bottle. Um, but, but first I was thinking, you know, you, you talked about a unicorn. Did you, did you have a little unicorn that you showed him and like, man, I'm going to show you why you didn't hire me. I got this little unicorn. No. I've been thinking about that for a second now. Um, but in your label, I could tell that, that you're, this is your label because I hate to tell you, but there is no American guy out there. No American man or market is going to put share meat with meat on the rocks. Share with a mate.

So actually that isn't me. That is Michael. Uh, is from Sydney, Australia. So as legends, as spirits USA, we've got this melting pot of Australian, English, Irish, South African, good old Troy, Alabama and Connecticut. And so we got this really cool just melting pot of nationalities and, you know, and expats. Michael was insistent because of where he's from being from Australia that we put mates on the bottle. I didn't mind being English. It didn't bother me. Uh, I think it's kind of cool if you actually look at the bottle where it says that they're a hundred percent American owned because we are, we're all, uh, American citizens, but then it also says some with accents. And there's a reason for that, obviously, because we all, um, when you come visit legends distillery, there's only one American accent there pretty much all the time.

And that is Tyler. Tyler, what do you, what's your take on that?

Well, I can tell you, um, I'm a football guy. I grew up playing and watching football my whole life. I'm from Alabama, obviously. So you like Auburn? Uh, I actually went to Auburn. Yeah. Oh man. Yeah. And I used to work for Auburn. Um, but, uh, these guys get to talk about soccer and I just tell them, I say, I know you're speaking English, but I do not know what you're saying.

Hey, I'm there with you. We have a big soccer guy in our office and we have this debate all the time. And today he wanted to watch soccer. And I said, here's the thing. I was like, and Chris, you're just gonna have to bear with me for a second. I said, if we didn't have baseball, if we didn't have college sports, if we didn't have basketball, all the sports that America has, I was like, we would dominate the world in soccer. There's no doubt in my mind. We got this little thing called football that takes up a bunch of athletes. That's Mike Hyatt's take on it. Big Chiefs, you listeners out there, you can get mad at me saying that, but that's just how I feel. I live over here in Shelbyville, Kentucky. That's where I live at.

And there's something to our jobs, like Chris is the marketing guy and I'm the blender guy and all that. But that is our loose titles. We're a five man operation and two guys are on the road as salesmen. So like just last two weeks, we've been carpenters. We built our own bar for our tasting room. And I'm an excellent floor sweeper in the warehouse. Yep. which is great at breaking stuff.

So that's what it takes. Right. It's a team effort, team concept. Uh, most craft distilleries are like that. Uh, they're just helping each other out. They're trying to build the American dream. Um, and I think to me that even more American, if you got somebody from Austria, if somebody from England that came here, They found that American dream and latched onto it and have made something of themselves and show what an immigrant really can do. I mean, does it get any truer than that? And you're working and you got a good old boy from T. Roy, Alabama, with his Auburn education, leading the way with his blending and stuff, with his whiskey background. To me that, that is the American dream. That's what it's all about right there. You're producing America's native spirit there. Put some other stuff out there, but this is what we're here for is that, that bourbon whiskey and stuff. Now in the future, this is some great whiskey, but is there, are you guys going to start distilling yourself and laying down your own barrels?

We're, we're working on it. It's, it's really the finances. I mean, it's not, you know, let's deal with saying the way you make a small fortune in distilling is start with a large fortune. Uh, that's really, I mean, last year kicked our butts as far as the financial plans that we have. Uh, because I mean, we looked at half a year without really selling anything. So, um, And then we just been, we've been behind the eight ball since then. We have, uh, wasn't for bad time. We'd have no time at all in this company. It seems like sometimes, but, uh, we're working on it. We're, uh, you know, we're pricing, it's not going to be cheap. The facility we have is not really the best for, so. We've got a lot of hurdles to overcome. And we've had these conversations with supply chain and trying to source stuff. And there's a million other people out there trying to buy the same stuff you're doing. So the prices are going up and just the feasibility of the current where we're at. But it's all in the plans. And it's just really just building and getting on our... Getting on an even footing before we start the next venture for sure. That's definitely something we're pursuing.

Well, I agree. The thing is, we started outsourcing barrels, we started outsourcing GNS and we're turning it into world-class spirits. We won 27 awards in our first full calendar year. We became Georgia's most awarded distillery based on sourced barrels, sourced GNS. If we can, and now by winning, especially the Ascot Award, being the best weeded bourbon, being the tuck three, beating our well of foolproof and only losing to one vote to Stagg Junior, that just put us on the map. So now we're getting all these distilleries from North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, who are all wanting us to come fly out, meet with them to source barrels from them. So we could go down the road of distilling our own bourbon, but if we can go to multiple distilleries and source the best product that you can possibly find and then quantum purify it and then enhance it even more, We're going to take advantage of that. We've been begging for barrels. Now we have distilleries literally banging down our door saying, we have barrels for you. This technology is something special. It's put us on the map. It's put Georgia on the map as far as distilleries go. And we've got a lot of interest from some of the big names. I know Mike and I, we talked about it. I've dropped the name. I won't say it on the podcast. But we had secret shoppers that have come through, and they're very interested in the technology. So we're on the map right now. And I feel like what the business plan that we have, it's working, and we can only grow that. If we start distilling our own, I think it's going to slow down the progress that we may have already made. I'm not saying we won't do it in the future, but I think for right now, I think what we've got, the plan that we have is working perfectly.

If I can get paid to go crawl over barrel houses across the United States and pick out 10 or 20 barrels here and there, I'll be a pretty happy guy. Absolutely.

Well, that's the dream job, right? Well, on the second half, we'll talk about that. We'll get into your Legends 100 bourbon. I got some other questions for you about the future of Legends, about your labels, about all kinds of stuff. So listeners hang with us. Uh, we'll be right back with legends. Don't forget to check out our giveaway. Your last day is tomorrow. You want to check that out? That's what old salt coffee company, two pounds of their coffee, two of their coffee cups. And of course. the Bourbon Road is going to throw in some Buffalo Trace bourbon cream to put in that coffee. So check that out. Just all you got to do is go on Instagram, find that post, follow Old Salt Coffee Company, follow the Bourbon Road, That's pretty easy. Tag three of your friends. If you really want a second entry into that, all you got to do is join our private Facebook group, the bourbon roadies, leave us a review on Apple podcast. It'll get you an extra entry.

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All right, listeners, we are back with Legends Bourbon Spirit USA out of Cumming, Georgia. Now on a second half, Chris and Tyler, we're going to be drinking your Legends 100 Bourbon. So run me through this real fast. Smash bill price. Um, tell me all about it.

All right. So this is our Legends 100. Um, this is probably actually my favorite to make because what it is, is just a blend of two barrels. So it's a double barrel blend. And, uh, I get to go. through all of our barrels and pick out which to get splendid. So, so it's a hard day at the work when I go through and pull all my samples for that day. But, uh, so it's a hundred proof. It's, uh, it's again, that's a high ride. Uh, you get a little, it's, it's more of a mature bourbon. We call it our flagship bourbon. You're still want to start getting a little bit more of the rice spice in it, less sweetness on the pallet. It's still some sweeps from the corn there for sure. But you start picking up notes like kind of like that. uh, more of that finished leather smell that you can get with some bourbon or a little bit of tobacco, maybe, uh, definitely some more oak in there, a little bit more oak from the, uh, barrel. And it's just a really solid balanced bourbon kind of tastes really traditional when you think of a good bourbon. It's not going to be crazy tilted one way or the other. It should be really balanced and, and, uh, just delicious. And it's a fun process to make that.

So I'm getting that Oak on this. Um, I'm definitely getting some kettle corn or some, some, uh, deep caramel corn, like cracker Jack's little bit of nuttiness on it. Just a tad bit. I get the little bit of that pipe tobacco on this, just that tad bit.

It definitely a little bit like a brown sugar or toasted or, you know, kind of like, like you say, like kettle corn or cracker Jack, that caramel kind of flavor.

And I know I'm going to make my listeners happy right here. I get a little bit of fruit loop cereal on this. Let me give this sucker a taste.

All right, go at it. Cheers.

Cheers. Oh yeah, that is a bourbon right there. I get a little bit of that nuttiness on it. Definitely, maybe out of that cracker jacks, you know how that caramel corn will have some peanuts in it and stuff. I'm getting that right there, that caramel, that little bit of leather, like you said, that maybe a worn like saddle leather, you can smell that in a barn.

I love the spice, that high spice of the rye with the oak to me is what makes this my favorite.

Now I'm not getting a whole bunch of spice on this. I do get a little bit of just a tad bit of sweetness, but as it rolls back, it kind of opens up, starts popping. I mean, Jim always says pop rocks, you know, you put pop rocks in your mouth and it just doesn't go right away, but it takes a second.

I get the spice in the front, but not on the back. The spice is in that immediate sip. That's where I get that almost like a pepper. It hits me on the palate and then just then goes sweet on the back for me.

I don't see, I don't get that right there. I just get that it is just hit that mid pallet slides back less Kentucky hug on this one though, uh, than that first one. And maybe because that was my first bourbon of the day, I'm not positive. Uh, this is something a little bit easier. I get this as more traditional, a little bit higher proof at 100 proof. Um, the double barrel is kind of confusing. I think that would be confusing to a lot of people, right? Because you're talking about the marriage of just two barrels. You're not. taking bourbon and putting into a brand new barrel. I just wanted to point that out for our listeners. And you do make it clear on there, but it does say double barrel. And I would have thought that means it's been re-barreled. But I don't get that toasted. I don't get that toasted marshmallow on this, but you just took a two magic barrels, picked those out and married them together. Yep. A stool. So every, really every batch, this is a true small batch. Every batch of this is going to be totally different.

Yeah. I mean, I try to keep it in within the window of sort of our, the flavor profile that won, uh, at the big at the Sips Award last year, we had, uh, what was it? Best in Class? Best of Class Platinum. Yep. And, uh, so I try to keep it, but yeah, there's definitely going to be swing cause it's only two barrels. So there's definitely going to be a swing and I've done them. recently did a private blend off of that. It's out there. It's not like any other 100 we've put in. I really pulled 14 and I knocked it down to eight barrels and really married two really distinct barrels together. Two almost unicorns to be honest with you. That private blend we did was I just let it kind of let this one be a standalone. It's really kind of outside the box of our normal 100 profile.

Yeah. We, we did 36 blends of the, uh, the barrels. What was it? Five hours we spent.

It was eight barrels. They gave us two barrels. I gave us 36 combinations. And we went up with a two thirds blend of two barrels. It's beautiful.

So Chris, let me ask you, and you might've said this before, but maybe I didn't catch it. Legends, the name Legends, where did the name Legends come from exactly?

That is from our CEO, Michael. Both myself and him are huge. We call it football. You call it soccer. But we're both into the European Premier League. He was watching a television show about Arsenal, which is his team, right? And there was a player that came on the television that was considered a legend of Arsenal. And he was sitting there and he's got this quantum purity technology. He's got SpiritUSA. He's trying to bring out a new brand. I'm not on board yet. So he's trying to think of this idea for a name by himself. the name legend just seemed to just click. And so he went on his phone immediately. He was like, there's no way that can be available as a brand here in the US at legends brand. And he couldn't believe it. It was actually available. And so he snatched it up immediately, got it trademarked. And the goal is, it still is today, we want to create a legend for every state that we launch in. For instance, every single state in the United States has a legend from that state, a staple from that state. So we want to go, we want to have a Georgia legend. We want to have a Tennessee legend. We want to have a Kentucky legend. Um, it's something that we can brand is something we can grow with. We can have a lot of fun with it. And it's such a good name to put on a whiskey, a, you know, toast to a local legend, give a gift to a legend. It is so easy to market. It's not even funny. It just writes itself.

So this is the only thing I'll beat you up on your guys's entire bourbon bottle, which to me, it, you could, you could put pink roses all over the sucker and, uh, with the unicorn with flowers flying out of its butt and stuff. And all that would matter is, um, what's inside that bottle is the whiskey, right? To me, I've said that a hundred times over and over. Um, but marketing does work. This is the only thing I'm gonna beat you up on. I don't know why I can't stand this. I just, it bothers me. Um, but I don't like people when they put their horse on labels. I don't, I just, it's, uh, it's just something about me. I don't know. Um, I, I get the neck tags and stuff like that. Uh, but you left the legends there, your logo off this bottle right here. Um, you know, that's a, it's a beautiful logo. And you put your, you put your SIP awards on there and I get it. Hey, you're proud of it. You're proud of it. So next thing I'm going to see is the ask God award on there.

No, no, no, we're not going down that on the other one.

I see Tyler. He's trying to hide his smile.

So what it came down to is a no craft distillery puts awards on their labels, right? No major distillery puts their awards on the labels. It's something that is you go to the store, you look at every label, it's the same thing for the most part, the same kind of template. They vary it, but it's the same template. Michael, our CEO, is very proud of the awards. We spend a lot of money entering these awards. These are not cheap competitions to enter by any means. They're not free. You have to pay to get them to get into just being in the actual competition. So he wants to put it out there. I can see us down the road. Right now we're at 27 awards. We cannot display 27 awards on a label. There will be no room for even the word legends if we put every award that we've won. I see us down the road very shortly eliminating the awards. It's put us on the map. People know our name now. We don't need to put it out there. We are multi award winning. People already know we are multi award winning. So eventually everything will go back to legends or crests.

Oh, see that one has the legends thing, all that sip above it.

So no, this, this one, we, when we first released, we actually put the sip awards right on the top and we kept this, kept this original logo when we had to re re design the label for the bottle. So every time we do a bottle of the 100, we have to put the barrel numbers and the bottle number. So we get it printed rather than hand writing them because the printing process that we have, we can actually do that. And it's way more effective, way more cost effective. So When we reprinted the labels for the next barrels that Tyler picked, Michael then said, I want the sip awards put where the crest is. Because we do hand label everything. Yeah, we hand label it. And when the CEO says he wants the crest on there, you put the crest on there.

Well, I, I, I get it. I do get it, but then it, Hey, who am I? You know, I'm just a podcast guy that likes to drink whiskey. And I said, what's, but what's important to me is what's in the whiskey. But I would tell you, I standing in a whiskey store one day and the owners knew who I was and they, they're not big, uh, I wouldn't say they're giant bourbon people, but they were like, that guy standing in the aisle right there, he's got a bourbon podcast. He really knows his bourbon and telling his other customer. So I asked him and he said, Mike, would you mind talking to her? And I said, I don't mind. And she was like, what are all those little stickers all over the bottle? I said, well, that's awards they get. She was like, is it really that good? And I was like, I don't, I can't tell you that. I was like, I was like, but if they want all those awards, maybe it's good. Maybe it's not. I said, it depends on who the judges are there. I would tell you this, even if your Weider had award stickers all over it, I would tell people out there that it's damn good. And I would tell them face to face. And I'm not trying to pull your chain that this legends Berber 100. is pretty damn nice. I like it. It tastes good. It's a nice sipper at 100 proof. It drinks to me like a 100 proof or actually maybe a little bit lower than that, like 96 or something. A really nice sipper, a traditional bourbon. What did you say the price was on this?

On average, this is anywhere between 58 to 61. It depends on where you go. Obviously right now we're only sold in Georgia. But we just launched spirithub.com, which I don't know if you're familiar with that, but it's an online website where you can get home delivery. It's in Illinois, Nebraska, New Hampshire, and I think Connecticut, if I'm not mistaken. And basically, we're launching that now. So we'll be available, especially in Illinois, the Chicago area. We're starting to get Iowa is now coming to the table ever since we won with the 115. So I see us branching out very soon. But if you want the 100 right now, pretty much the only place you can get it is in Georgia. And it's anywhere between 58 to 61 bucks.

Now, Tyler, I saw you smiling the whole time after I asked that question. Do you have any thoughts on that at all about the awards being on label or do you not care about the, um, about the label itself? You really care about just the whiskey inside the bottle?

Yeah. I mean, my lane is, is making sure good stuff gets in the ball. And that's really what I care about at the end of the day. But, um, you know, and again, um, neck talkers is a good option, but we haven't had the necessary money to streamline our process and every label that we redo is another money that we spent. And, uh, it does take a long time to label those. So what's our average about two pallets a day? Probably maybe three, three if we hustle.

Yeah. And you're a new company and you're, you're still nothing against you guys, but you're still learning. the industry, even though you were in the industry, you're still really learning the industry when it comes down to it, right? Uh, you know, I don't think William Lou Weller had it figured out his first day. Um, the beams didn't have it figured out their first day. Uh, nobody did. So two years, two years into it, two years. Yeah, pretty much. Um, to get the accolades and the awards that you're getting and to be asked to be on a podcast for two years and saying, hey, we want to have you guys on. We're excited about your whiskey. We're excited about you guys. That's some, that's high praise right there. Fred Minnick, you know, I, I was joking about before saying, Hey, we said at first, but thing is that some high praise from Fred saying, Hey, this is the best we did and beat now the granddaddy of We did whiskey. Some listeners, if you didn't know that William Lou Weller is the granddaddy of weeded bourbon, not Pappy. Pappy actually worked for William Lou Weller. If you didn't know that out there, a little history fact for you.

So we lost by one vote, literally one vote to Stagg Jr. to Stagg Jr., which is there's nothing wrong with that either.

Hey, you guys, that's high praise. I think it is.

Yeah, I mean, when we're sitting there that taste off, you know, it's us and Buffalo Trace, you know, for us, that's a strange place to be, you know.

I'm sure that is. You know, I know other places like that, that feel like they're going up against the entire state of Kentucky and they're from out of state of Kentucky. And you've, you've, you've did everything right. You know, you're doing everything right. And the hard work you say, there's only five of you in the, uh, in the distillery itself, working from taking the unicorn out to go to the bathroom to sweeping up. You got to do a little bit of everything. And it does take that, right? It takes the hard work, takes that dedication. It takes even going on podcasts like this at, you know, at 6.30 on a Tuesday night, actually almost 7.30 now. You know putting that marketing into it I could see that you guys are tired and but I would just say just keep putting that hard effort into it and you know good things are gonna follow better even bigger things are gonna come to follow and stuff and We'll be glad to have you all on any time on the podcast and hopefully we get down there and actually meet you guys or if you come up to Kentucky and Absolutely. Come out here though, to the Jepto Bend farm and I'll feed you a little barbecue. I won't say no to that. Drink a little bit of whiskey. We have a tad bit of whiskey up here. Heck, we might even have some of your whiskey up here. And you know, the Weedy King of Kentucky will always be glad to take a bottle of your weeded bourbon. So what's next for legends? What's next?

Oh, well, I mean, we're getting our tasting room operational. That's been a big hurdle for us. Start having people. It's a lot easier to sell us as a new brand if folks can taste it. Because at the end of the day, you can do all the talk you want, but you got to let your products be for yourself. So getting that going, and we'll hopefully have it fully open. It's been one piece at a time. It's been a challenge turning a warehouse into a tasting room. It's been a fun challenge. I never thought I'd be demoing as many walls as I have as a stiller guy, but it's been good. But we're going to keep working on our special releases. Like I say, the wheat was a limited release. We put 10 barrels out of that blend. So we're going to keep trying to follow up. We hit a home run with this one. Now everyone's going to be watching, can we do it again? So we're going to keep practicing our craft and getting better at it and keep eating humble pie as we make mistakes.

Yep. Well, hopefully that FedEx guy or that UPS guy show up or knock on my door and be like, Hey, uh, legends sent you the Weedy King of Kentucky, a bottle of their new weeded bourbon to taste. They're hoping for great things. Yeah. We're working a little something, something, you know, we will send you a little something, something in the post. We're always grateful for whiskey companies to send us whiskey. We love to support the craft distilleries out there. The small guy that is competing with the big guy, it's that David versus Goliath kind of thing. Not that we don't love some Buffalo Trace, as you can see behind me, there's nothing wrong with that. Loving the big guys, loving the chase sometimes of getting a good bourbon. As you can see, I had a great bourbon show up in my house of the day and I've been looking up for it for quite a while now and I got a phone call and I got an MSRP and I'm so happy to get it. That little bottle right here, I'm sure any, both of you would probably like to have that bottle.

Me and Chris did a little dance with William and the reweller last week. Yeah.

So where can we find you guys on social media?

So our social media handle is legends underscore spirits. We're on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. We are launching a YouTube channel as soon as the distilleries open, and we're gonna start our own YouTube live, which is gonna be called Between the Barrels. It's gonna be Tyler and I actually interviewing local musicians, local celebrities, local radio media talent. One, my background, I've got a huge rolodex of people that I know in and around Atlanta, and they're all basically supporting legends right now. And I want to bring them on at the distillery, put them on the stage and let them tell their story about how they got where they are in the whatever industry they're in. So we're pretty heavy right now on social media. especially pushing the 115 currently mainly because we get about 20 to 50 phone calls a day asking where can people buy the 115 so we make sure that we we tell people go to our website at spiritsusa.com And I have it on the website where I actually have a list of every package store that carries the 115 currently. And as they sell out, I will be removing them from the list. There isn't much out there right now. It's become a little bit of a allocated, totally un... Yeah, we didn't see this come in. It was unplanned. But everybody's seeking this 115 right now. So the package stores are selling out quick. And then from there, we're trying to then grow our subscriber list to bring in what we call an ambassadors. These are people that want to come in and do private tastings. We're going to do special releases for our ambassadors, where Tyler comes up with some really beautiful signature release for him. And only the ambassadors are going to get a chance to actually sample it before anybody. So we're pushing people to the website heavily again at spiritsusa.com. But follow us on social media. We have a lot of fun. Tyler and I are goofballs. We put out a lot of stupid videos. We don't mind that. I mean, it's part of the fun. You know, me and him, we cut from the same cloth. He grew up in Troy, Alabama. I grew up in England, thousands of miles away, but we're basically the same person. Honestly, it's ridiculous. I mean, we have so much fun and he's shaking his head right now. Yeah, literally shaking his head like, oh, OK. But no, I mean, we have a lot of fun at Legends. We welcome everybody to the distillery. I mean, literally anybody. We're an open door, and we're literally transparent, as you mentioned earlier. We don't mind telling people about what we do, how we do it. The only thing we can't tell you is exactly how the quantum purity works. It's patented, it's protected. We have a lot of investors that will lose their minds if we told you exactly how it works. But come on by the distillery anytime. And Mike and Jim, we would love you guys to come down here. And if we're ever in Kentucky, we'll be calling you for sure.

Well, listeners, uh, Jim will be back on two weeks or a little bit of technical difficulty at his house. So just hang with us. Maybe if you guys get your YouTube channel started, um, maybe I can get my, uh, twin. He's a wrestler. Um, I'll get him on there. He is the big, bad booty daddy of bourbon. Maybe I'll bring him out and we'll see if he'll play. No, uh, I, you guys got my love. You got my praise, uh, for all three of your bourbons. Um, I think you guys doing the great things. Um, if you're listening, make sure you go, um, to spirits, USA to legends, bourbon, check them out. Um, when's your tasting room going to be open?

We're looking at less than a couple of months. We just built the bar. We already built the patio, the deck, everything that we need for that. We're currently open for what we call patio pours, so people can come in, enjoy all of our bourbon, all of our vodka, cocktails, and then we've got around 100-seater patio and deck. The tasting room itself will be fully open, say, in about two months.

All right. Well guys, we will see you guys on down the bourbon road. Um, like I said, I appreciate you sending us bourbon. I can't thank you enough for coming on and hanging with me. Um, I wish Jim could have been here with you and tasted your bourbon. He's tasted it. I guarantee you, uh, we fought over who is going to get the 115. I left it over his house and I said, Hey, I'm going to be over here anyways. And I'll get taste plenty of it. And it's almost all gone. But your guys is good friend. The bourbon whisperer said he was going to hook me up with a bottle of his barrel.

Uh, so he had a store pick that is absolutely delicious.

I'm pretty excited about that, that he thinks I'm the Weedy King of Kentucky is special enough to get a bottle of that. So I'm pretty excited about that, to be able to taste that.

I will tell you that one, that one's good. We had a lot of fun picking that one. It was a hard day at the office. Five hours of sampling wheat whiskey.

So yeah, that's a tough day, right?

Absolutely. He actually bought a bag full of, uh, comparables and we sat there. I won't, I won't say who he was comparing us against, but there was about what? Six or seven. And, uh, we, we sat there and stacking up pretty well against them. We stacked up really well against them and Rod was very happy at the end of it. Let's put it that way.

Nice. Nice. Well, listeners, you know, where you can find us, you can find us on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram. You can find us almost anywhere at the bourbon road. You can also find us on our private Facebook group, the bourbon roadies. You know us well. You got to answer three things to get in there. Are you 21? Do you like bourbon? Hell yes. Everybody likes bourbon. What's wrong with you? Just like it. And do you agree to play nice? Like we say, we don't tolerate any rudeness. I have to bring the old big bad booty daddy of bourbon out and we'll take care of that. So make sure you join that group. We give 10% off all of our gear. If you're a bourbon roadie for 2021, so you want to be a roadie, check that group out. There's about. 2,100 people in there right now of like-minded folks like Chris, like Tyler, industry folks in there, just regular old bourbon drinkers. What we want to do if you're drinking from the bottom of the shelf, we want you to post those photos and not feel any pain from anybody else. and beat you up so feel like that's the group you want to be in come in and join us if not hey that's fine we also ask that you would subscribe to our podcast whatever you're listening on what hit that subscribe button so you can be tailed next week hey these two jokers right here these two bourbon bullshitters They're on the air again with great guests doing a great review. So hit that subscribe button. We'd also ask that you do that five star review because yes, we're that good. Yes, we are. I know I'm a big, beautiful guy. That's why I'm on a podcast and not TV, but give us that five star review. We really appreciate those. It allows us to open the doors and have great guests on like legends, bourbons. We just love it. So do that for us. We got two shows a week. We got our craft distillery Mondays where we bring on small craft distilleries. We review their whiskey. We tell you whether we like it or not. And then we do a long guest episode about hour long. Keeps you that 30 minute drive to work, 30 minute drive back. You can listen to the bourbon bullshitters. We're not experts. We're just talking about it. Talk about it. Talk about it. Talk about it. Talk about bourbon. Talk about bourbon. Talk about bourbon on an episode. So listen to those interviews. Great listening. Also visit our website, thebourbonroad.com. You can go on there and find our gear, our bourbon bullshitter t-shirt, because everybody needs to have one of those, right? everybody. We hope to see all of America wearing those in the distilleries across America. You can find our glasses. You can find our hat on there, fixing to find our shirt, other shirt on there, the Bourbon Road shirt. You can find the articles, our reviews that are right. You can find Jim at JShannon63. You can find me at OneBigChief. We hope that you reach out to us and we'll see you on down the Bourbon Road.

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