8. Mark & Sherri Carter - Old Carter Whiskey Company, Tasting Includes Bourbon #2, Rye #3 and #4, VOC American 27 Year #9 and #6

But bourbon, on the other hand, has a longer shelf life. And even if you open it, it improves for quite a while. So how long do you think that is? You know, months, I think. I think months.

So do you think people that have open bottles for a year or more are taking a chance? No, not with bourbon.

Ours just don't last that long, Jim. So we haven't been able to do that part of the experiment yet.

I would agree. Those old, those old, uh, Stissele Wellers in the fifties that we have in our house, they hang around for about, you know, maybe, maybe I'm lucky with six months to a year.

Yeah. That would be pushing it. I think at my house.

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

We would like to thank Tommy and Gwen Mitchell from Log Heads Home Center for supporting this episode of the Bourbon Road. Find out more about their fine rustic furniture at logheadshomecenter.com. Well, Randy, we had a really great day down at the Sealbach Hotel in Louisville, Kentucky, didn't we?

Oh, yeah. The Oak Room was really great and very relaxing to sit around in the chairs and have a little conversation with the Carters. We kind of threw the rule book out the window that day, though, didn't we, Jim?

We did, we did. Normally we do first pour, second pour, but there were just pour after pour today.

Man. Yeah, and when if they're bringing samples, I mean, who am I to refuse, right? That's right.

You know that Seelbach Hotel has got a great history, doesn't it?

Yes. Sometimes I want to go back and actually kind of see if I can't get a special tour to where I can go through all the tunnels, the Al Capone tunnels in that place. That would be awesome.

There's a lot of history there and it's a beautiful place and they really provided us a nice spot there where we could sit down with Mark and Sherry Carter and talk about their company and their products and what a relaxing atmosphere and great drinks and great people. A lot of fun.

Yes, and we got to try some stuff that's about to come out, has not come out yet. So you'll have to listen in to find out about that. And then of course, you also have to listen in. I'm not tooting my own horn by any means, but I was right about something and you'll have to listen in to find out what it was.

Randy wants to make sure you know that he knows that we all know.

I was right for once.

Absolutely. All right, Randy. Well, let's get on to the episode and let's move on. All right. Sounds good. Okay, so we are here at the Seelbach Hotel in the Oak Room, and we're here with Mark and Sherry Carter of the Oak Carter Whiskey Company. And welcome. It's good to have you here. It's our pleasure.

Thank you guys for having us. Yeah, it's really nice.

So we're going to get right into the first pour. Normally, we don't waste a whole lot of time getting to the whiskey. So what have you got for us today, Sherry?

Well, we have got a little bit of our old Carter bourbon batch two for you to taste.

Now I've had the batch one. When did batch two come out?

Well, it hasn't.

So you're getting a little sneak peek. So there's going to be a lot of people just licking their lips right now listening to this podcast. So I'm ready. Let's take a nose on this. Cheers, everybody. Cheers. I like that. It has a little bit more of a nose than number one, I think. Number one was a little kind of, it was a good nose, but it was a little subtle. This one's a little more pronounced.

I would definitely agree with that. I like that. Still a good finish like number one was though.

Yeah. Oh, you're already on the finish. I'm still on the nose. I had to get to it, man.

One of the things that we always try, we love the aromatics and I think that's the first spot you always go to when you taste as you smell. And you get all these fabulous aromatics out of these bourbons and ryes that we do. And that's, we wouldn't turn one out if we didn't. And Sherry's has a, well hers, one of her big things is really going into the aromatics. And I like that richness and deepness, so.

Yeah, so that's really, it really has a rich, deep flavor. I mean, very rounded. It's a little bolder, I think, than the first bourbon. Definitely stands out.

Yes, definitely.

Thank you. Did you mention the proof on this?

Yeah, this proof is 106.9.

Oh, that's a good proof point. That's really, really good. It's kind of fun because that is actually everything we do is cast strength. And this is actually the lowest cast strength we've ever produced is 106.

Yeah, so I don't remember exactly what batch one bourbon was, but it was around 112. Is that right? Yes. OK. Yeah, so this has a mouth feel that's really kind of creamy. It kind of sticks everywhere. Yes. And very, very oily. Very nice. Legs on the glass, just still there.

But that 106 is not too much of a hug. It's really nice. I like that. Nice little Kentucky hug.

Yeah. It's a wonderful bourbon. Very delicious.

Thank you.

So what does the bourbon culture mean to you guys? Let me ask you Sherry, what does the bourbon culture mean to you?

I guess what we're doing right here. Sharing good whiskey with good people.

Yeah, it's really fun to actually meet more people all the time that love bourbons, rye, whiskeys, and we all have that in common. And when you get together, it's like just friends getting around a table and talking and sharing an interest. Do you guys have a lot of bourbon nights at your house? Sort of. Yeah, we have our own little bar in the basement, you know, with lots of people's products on there. We're always tasting everything we can find.

It's a very dangerous room. We've dedicated half of our living space to a bar.

Don't feel bad. I think there's a lot of people listening to this right now that probably have the same little problem there.

So where are you guys from originally? Well, I was actually born in Eureka, California, but my grandmother was from Somerset, Kentucky, so I have some bourbon DNA in me.

Somerset is down near Lake Cumberland. That is correct.

On the eastern end of Lake Cumberland. That is correct. So they came out to California when prohibition started because there were no jobs. So they went to work in the oil fields in Bakersfield, California. You guys are not in Bakersfield now. No, we got to move up to Eureka, California. My dad met my mom up there and that's where I was born. And that's kind of where we got started with the hospitality business. I had a little hotel and restaurant there and started tasting wines and being the wine purchaser for the restaurant. And then started making wine in 98. Wow.

Okay. So you've been doing it a while.

Yes.

Yes.

We'll get to the wine here in a little bit. Yeah. A little bit. Where are you from, Cheri? I am from Northeastern Ohio. Northeastern Ohio?

Specifically? Right in the snow belt. Is that? Shardin, Ohio. Shardin? So it's about 15 minutes from the lake and an hour east of Cleveland.

Oh, okay, so you're right up there in the corner.

Right up there, yeah.

That air is beautiful up there.

It really is. The seasons are beautiful. I was kind of done with the snow though, so I moved to California actually right when Mark started making wine in 98.

So you've been there for 20? 20 years or so.

21 years?

Yeah.

So when did you first get into bourbon? So we know you're wine 98. When did you first really start getting into bourbon?

This is really crazy because it was Sherry that really got me back into my DNA and bourbon. She started drinking Manhattans. And it was Maker's Mark. I tasted my first Manhattan with Sherry and I said, this is really good. And I started graduating up from Makers for those Manhattans up to Bookers. There you go.

There's not much place to go after that. I was going to say, get the octane in there.

My old Carter 12 year American whiskey gets you there too.

That's right. Well, then I guess we should ask you how you first got into bourbon then.

You know, I just always enjoyed it. I had worked for a photographer in Ohio and he and his wife would always have one Manhattan when we go out to dinner. They became very good friends of mine and they would always have one Manhattan and then we'd drink wine or whatever with whatever we were having and I thought that was pretty neat. And I just, I loved them. And so then Mark was on a quest to produce a Sazerac for me. I wanted the Sazerac cocktail. And it was kind of a long story, but anyway. So what's in a Sazerac? It's rye whiskey. Let's see. It's got Pernod.

It's got Herb Saint. Herb Saint. Yeah. And it's got little bitters in there and sugar.

Yes. Now I like Boulevardier's if I'm doing a ride drink.

Now that's with Campari?

I like it with Aperol.

Aperol. Yeah. OK. I'm kind of an old-fashioned guy. I mean, I'm old-fashioned, but I like the great old-fashioned stuff.

I like old-fashions, too. So it was kind of when we really started coming out to Kentucky. I started doing more old-fashions instead of Manhattans.

Well, somewhere along the way, you moved from cocktails to drinking straight bourbon. Yes. And how did that go? How did that go?

Well, you say you have a collection. We do have quite the collection. So what are you drinking when you're not drinking old Carter?

Anything that's new.

Yeah. We don't have... We'll see something on a back bar and we'll say, well, we got to try that. We haven't tried that yet.

Yeah, we really do try to taste everything out there that we haven't had. At least taste it once.

So you'll try them at the bar and then you'll say, yeah, that was really good. We need a bottle of that for home. Exactly.

See, our problem is that happens every time we get one. You can only afford so many bottles.

Well, at least we can write it off as research. A lot of research.

That's right. That's what I keep telling Randy. I think this is tax deductible. This is research, yeah. It's part of your show that you have to have these. I know. I don't think the IRS listens to podcasts, do they?

No. Probably not this one.

So do you guys have like a daily drink or you know something that I mean Obviously you guys have a Carter around but when you're not drinking old Carter, what's your daily drink?

Well, we have us we have a little stash of you know, we do a lot of sampling Of our own but barrels sure and so we end up with all of these 200 ml half empty samples.

I start blending those together. I have maybe one bottle instead of a single barrel. We have single bottles of just certain batches that we put up and we'll drink those because we're not going to sell them. We'll just enjoy them.

And they're very good. We have the unicorn-unicorn collection, I guess.

I guess that's great. That would be amazing to have that problem, you know, to be able to just co-pull from a library of barrels. So that's pretty awesome.

There's so many great products coming out today, you know, and then so we'll get a bottle and kind of work on, you know, the Old Forester, you know, that whole kind of prohibition series.

The Whiskey Row series. Whiskey Row is really good right now.

Yeah, I mean all the distilleries are starting to do some really amazing stuff and there's always something on the shelf out there. Even if you can't find what you would really like to find out there, there's always something great to grab and there's always some amazing pick or something. So yeah, it's great. So I know we're here to talk about whiskey, but I would like to talk a little bit about, you know, Carter Sellers and what you have going on there.

My love for wine, being the wine buyer for the restaurant, restaurant 301, my goal when we opened up the restaurant was to have a grand award restaurant from Wine Spectator, which is basically has 88 grand awards. wine restaurants in the world and we're one of them today. But when we started it took us about 15 years to build a list that was big enough and deep enough and broad enough to actually get the award which we got in 98. That was a good year. In 98 we also made our first wine. After a while, buying everybody's wine, you eventually want to make your own wine. I had a really great guy, Nils Venge. He was the first guy to get the perfect score from Robert Parker in America for the Groth 85 Reserve. I became friends with Nils when that wine came out in 1987. And from 87 all the way to 98, I every year would ask him to make wine for me. And eventually he caved in and actually said he'd make make wine for me. And so that year he goes, then he asked me this one question. I thought I didn't know much about winemaking at the time. He says, now, where are the grapes coming from, Mark? And I said, grapes? I thought you provided the grapes. He says, no, Mark, it doesn't work like that. You go find some grapes. You come back with the grapes. Then I'll make wine out of that. I go, oh, jeez, I got to go find some grapes now. It took me 10 years to convince them to make wine for me. I hope it doesn't take 10 years to find a great contract. I got really lucky that year. I went back to the restaurant that month and there was a guy sitting in my restaurant. He was buying these really great bottles of Burgundies and Bordeauxs and made our night, small little restaurant, 30-seat restaurant we've got, and went over because our dining room manager said Fred at Table 5's made our night. And I said, well, I probably should go see Fred. So I went over and said hello. And he says, oh my god, this is an amazing wine list. I said, well, thank you. I'm really working on getting this grand award from Wine Spectator. And he says, you have my wine on this list. And I said, well, which wine's yours? And he says, well, it's the Colgan Schrader wine. I'm Fred Schrader. I go, oh, geez, Fred, it's so nice to meet you. I've been buying your wine since, you know, 92. Here it is, 98. And he goes, I go, well, I just got a letter in the mail from an allocation for the wine. I used to get two cases. Now I'm only going to get six bottles. And Fred said, well, you don't have to talk to my ex-wife about that. I don't have anything to do with that brand anymore. I'm going to start my own called Schrader. And I said, well, send me two cases of that. And so he took a liking to me and I said, well, how's the wine? He says, pretty good. Why don't you get a glass? So I get a glass and I started drinking with Fred till about four in the morning. And he finally says, you ever think about making wine, Mark? I said, yeah, I got nils. He said he makes some wine for me this year. I only have one problem. I don't have any grapes. And Fred says to me, well, I have some grapes that my wine maker doesn't want to use. you can have my contract. Wow. So he put me in business. Now, Fred went on to make the most hundred point wines of any ventner in Napa and before he sold the brand to Constellation. Wow. And we've been friends ever since. Wow. What a great story. Crazy. Yeah.

Well, what are the similarities of starting making wine and then starting bourbon and whiskey?

Well, I think it's about palette. You know, it's about enjoying flavors. And, you know, with wine, I love wine and you get to make it one day a year. And so it's everything has to be just perfect to make wine. Bourbon we get to make every day. We can make it instead of one day a year. The only problem you have to wait about three times as long to have bourbon is wines every 18 months. Both the wine and the bourbon. A lot of it depends on the barrel and that's the real similarity.

It was kind of cute actually when we first started the former brand. Mark looked at me one day and he said, damn, you know, the only thing that takes longer than making red wine is bourbon. I said, you're just figuring this out now? It was pretty funny.

What caused you to make that transition? What event happened that took you guys down the Bourbon Road? I hate to say that.

The Bourbon Road is a journey.

What took you down that road? I love it. I'm going to have Sherry actually tell this part of it, I think.

Let's see. Well, it was one fateful night in Austin, Texas.

It all begins in Texas.

It sure does. And so we had just got the winery. So we had the winery up and running and Mark was looking for people to make wine there. We're licensed for a whole bunch more than we actually make. And so we had room to grow and we were at a conference in Austin and a friend of ours was there. This is a hospitality conference and he was interested in producing some wine but was looking for something very inexpensive. And we were already making premium wines. So Mark said, you know, we could do that, but there's something a little more intriguing than this inexpensive bottle that I think your family had something to do with back before prohibition. And so that was basically how we got into the bourbon business.

And this person you were talking to?

I think you might know him. Chuck Dedman was my contemporary in running the inn. We're roughly the same size inn, restaurant, bar, the whole thing. We were on a board together many years ago in the 90s. went to Kentucky here, went to the Beaumont Inn and had a conference there. And Chuck told me a story that they used to have tobacco and they used to also have a distillery. And that really kind of interested me, that whole story. And so after we bought the winery in 06, we were looking for Custom Crush clients. And so I went to all my friends that had inns and said, hey, I can make a little wine for you. But I didn't think they wanted just a red and white wine by the glass program. I thought they might want to make a, you know, really top, you know, ultra premium wine. And so that's when, you know, they said, well, I think we should probably bring your brand back. I'm sure you can make the labels. And yeah, I got a guy at the winery can do the, do the actual the compliance and I've got a little bit of money and you're right here and I think it's going to work out just great.

So that's kind of how the Kentucky Owl was born. Yes. Oh, that's interesting. And you made the labels.

Yes.

So you have a background in...

I'm an artist. I'm a designer.

You're an artist designer. Wow, that's interesting.

We did all our stuff too.

Oh, that's amazing. Those are beautiful labels. Thank you. Yeah, great job. So have you always been a graphic designer or is there other art that you're involved in?

I'm a painter.

You're a painter as well?

The horse on these labels is actually a woodcut that I did when I first moved to California.

It's the first piece of art I ever bought from Sheri, in fact. I was really drawn to this horse, this woodcut she did. That was a fortuitous purchase. I know. I met Shuri at table 5-2 after Fred.

It's a good table.

So if you ever come to the hotel in Eureka, California, come see us and have a little drink. Table five. Table five. Table five.

Just be ready to have a life-changing experience.

Oh, yeah. So you guys, so, you know, the Kentucky Owl brand has moved on. And, you know, Dixon's still involved at some point with that. And I'm assuming you guys are all still grand friends and get together once in a while. Yeah.

How often do you get to the Beaumont Inn?

Well, this last year has been really very busy for us with the new brand. We've been running around pretty hectic. I can imagine. We reached out on May 21st because we're both born on the same day. So we shared the birthday. That's interesting. So how did you figure that out? One day, you know, when we were, we'd go to the Beaumont Inn and I'd drop off some wine and the Carter Sellers wine. And one night, just on the 21st, he was going to open a bottle of that because it was a special occasion. He said, I said, well, what special occasion is it? He said, well, it's my birthday. I said, when's your birthday? And he said May 21st. And I said, oh, gosh, that's the same. That's my birthday.

Let's share a bottle. Five bottles later.

I tell you what, this was a delicious pour. I really enjoyed this bourbon. I think it is time for us now to move on to something else. I'd really like to try something else here. So let's try another pour and see what we got. Sounds great. So Sherry, what do we have in our next glass here?

Okay, so next up we have got the Old Carter Rye, batch three.

Batch three. Now this is your newest release. Correct, yes. And when did this release? It was April.

Yeah, about two months ago, a month and a half.

About two months ago, okay. All right. So we've got some listeners out there that have had this, but we've probably got some that haven't had it as well. So let's try it. All right. I'm excited. I haven't had it. Oh yeah. What am I smelling? That is a rye. That is a really nice nose on it. Definitely different from what I remember before. You know, it's been a few months, but I definitely pick up a different nose on this than something I've had in the past. This is good. I agree.

What are you picking up?

I'm getting a little bit of juniper, a little juniper maybe.

It was something different.

I couldn't put my finger on it. Some might say pine or something like I'm getting a little bit of juniper. I'm definitely getting the rice by, so I'm getting a little bit of citrus.

I even get kind of a woodsy, like, cedar-y. Cedar.

That's it. That's it. Cedar.

And I don't get it until it turns the corner. You know what I mean?

When you first taste it and it turns the corner.

Smoke cedar plank. Yeah.

A lot of times. That's what it is. See, it takes somebody else just to let you know what you're smelling.

And you're afraid to say anything. I don't want to look stupid. Oh, cheers.

And I do get the citrus as well. I get that orange, kind of an orange peel.

Exactly. The zest. Oh, my goodness. The palate on that. What a flavor explosion. That is really good. I definitely get the citrus on the palate. The cedar plank, yeah, I mean, I get the, I don't know what you call them. I don't know about the plank part.

They use that sometimes when they're smoking things in the oven. Cedar plank salmon, right?

Is somebody getting hungry? But if somebody puts lemon or zest or orange zest on top of that. I get like a woodsy.

Now when you go back to the nose after taking a sip, a little more citrus on there. A lot of cinnamon too.

Yeah, definitely has spice.

That is like the other old Carter whiskies, very mouth coating, very creamy, very oily. That's absolutely delicious. That is a good rye whiskey.

That is, that is.

We really strive to produce that mouth feel as well.

They are 95%. These are 95% rye's all of them. Wow, okay.

I've never had a 95% rye. So this is real high. But for it to be this hot, it's really kind of smooth. That creamy he was talking about there, yeah. This is, yeah, 116.2. That's supposed to be pretty hot. It didn't seem that much to me.

So the amounts of each one of the barrel of the bottles that we did. They're small batches. They went down a little bit over last year. We didn't have quite as much. For how many bottles do we have? Batch 3 has 1,009 bottles in that release.

Last year's two rise were 1,269 and 1,289 respectively.

This was a little bit smaller than your rise of last year. Yes, and there's no increase in price and I think they were even a little higher in alcohol a little bit too.

What is suggested retail price on Rye number three? I think it's 179. So your products in particular, since we're talking about the Rye right now, these are typically going to be considered a premium bottle. Something you might find either on the top shelf or certainly on the back shelf of a liquor store or at a restaurant, is that correct?

That's what we've found. Except at the Liquor Barnum.

Well, that was funny. They left out 1-0, so I think they thought it was $17.95, and so it was way down low when we came in. So did you buy them? No, it was completely ridiculous.

We had stopped in. We were on our way to Bourbon Classic to pick up poor spouts, and we were rushing from Lexington over here, and we needed the poor spouts. So we stopped and I guess I won't I can say what the store was. Yeah Yeah, but it was a liquor barn over in Middletown. Is it Middletown? It was so cute. So I went in and Got our poor spouts and some salami because we hadn't eat breakfast that day either and I'm walking back towards the front of the store and a gentleman passes me by and said have you found everything? Okay, and I said I have thank you, but I do have a question. Do you have old Carter? And he said, well, it's funny you should ask me that because I'm on my way right now with the price tag for it. And he said, it had gotten into the wrong spot somehow. And he said, we just discovered it and we've got nine bottles of it. And so I said, oh, well, heck. I said, well, what are you charging for it? And he said, $179 or something. And I said, great. He's like, I'm going right back there now to put the tag on. And I find Mark and I said, come on, we're going to go see where it's headed up in the nice, you know, behind the glass case. And I said, well, that looks very nice. And he said, well, thank you. And I said, well, we're Mark and Sherri Carter. And he said, what? I said, we really appreciate your support. Yeah, that's awesome. It was funny.

That's great. Yeah, I've been to that liquor barn a few times. That's actually one of the newer ones in town, I think.

It is. And, you know, if it's a place you want to go actually get some bottles signed, it's usually a good place to hang out, get distillers. That's good.

He was certainly friendly.

Well, shout out to Liquor Barn.

Why not?

There you go.

So what have been some of the challenges with starting a bourbon company, a whiskey company?

Deciding what to create first.

Yeah, that was, and we actually with old Carter, we ended up doing rye first before the bourbon. Really?

Why was that?

I'm just a supply? It was ready to go. It was ready to go and we just really liked it and thought it would be something different to start with.

Plus we were doing it in the spring. And I always feel like Rye does, it feels like springtime to me. So that could be just complete hogwash, but I don't know. So we were trying to put together the first, this was probably the biggest, like most challenging

Well, if it isn't good, you know, and we put it out, they drink it once, they'll never buy it again. So we want to make sure we really wanted to make sure it was good so that we would have people come back and buy from us again. Well, I guess they all need to be good, but the first one especially.

Yeah, especially. And so we had these two ryes that we had come up with two blends, and I was very partial to one of the blends and Mark was very partial to one of the blends. So we couldn't decide which one to do first.

And we showed them to a lot of people with a lot of palettes, good palettes. Hoping that they would be a clear winner.

So you had one that you really liked, you had one that you really liked, and you said, come on friends, help us out here.

And every time we showed it. one person would like one of them and one would like the others. So they were not helping at all. It was still a split decision.

Until we got to our dear friends, the Justins over there in Lexington. Justins House of Bourbon. This was before Justins House of Bourbon existed. And we gave them to Justin Sloan and Justin Thompson. And JT had a brilliant moment. He tasted them both and he said,

you want the good news or the bad news? And I said, oh, I'm always about good news.

Well, he said, well guys, the good news is there's no bad news. And he goes, they're both delicious. And he said, can you put them both in the bottle? And we looked at each other and said, now why didn't we think of that? But we still didn't know which one was going to be batch one and which one was going to be batch two. And that just kind of happened in production, unbeknownst to us.

So when they came out in bottles, you honestly, the two of you didn't know whose was whose?

No, we knew. As soon as I got the production schedule and I could see the numbers, I knew whose was whose. And then they both went into the market last spring.

And we still always ask people, did you like one or two better? Which one did you like better?

It's our favorite game.

We're still keeping score.

I'm trying to remember who you're winning so far. It's still a split decision. As I told you before the show, I think I finished off my last of batch, I think it was batch two, I finished off the last of batch two probably a couple of months ago.

Well, we just so happened to have a little surprise today with batch four of the rye.

Oh my goodness. So is this a repeat of the story?

Perhaps.

So we've got two glasses poured for us here. The second one is your Rybatch 4.

Yes.

And what are the specs on that one?

Let's see. So that one, it's been a minute. That one is, I can't see that far. 114.1? 114 on that. And 942 bottles produced. Okay, so even fewer. Even fewer. Yeah.

Okay, so this batch four now is not released. So you're treating us really special today. We're kind of fortunate. We get to try this out. Would you like a little more there, Jim? So what's the expected release date on batch one?

We don't know. But the bourbon that we started with, that's coming.

It'll be definitely around to be purchased on the 14th of June.

for National Bourbon Day.

Oh, perfect. And Father's Day gifts.

And Father's Day is on Sunday.

Well, there you go.

I need to tell my children.

Yes. That's great.

But we don't, we're not sure on the rye four.

Okay. So I have a good, my palate has a good memory of that number three now. So are we going to try the number four?

Let's do it.

Let's do it. Again, a wonderful nose.

Similar.

Okay, so this one, this one to me, and I've gone ahead and taken a taste as well. This one to me has a little bit more, it's a little more mouth coating, just a little bit. But the, I'm not getting as much of the citrus on this one.

But I'm almost getting almost like a clove. Almost like a clove on this one as it rounds the corner there.

Yeah, actually somebody else, when we were tasting these yesterday, they got the clove also. Pick that up.

A little more pepper, a little less. I said juniper the last time, you said cedar, evergreen, whatever. Yeah. Little less on this one. This one's a little more rounded. I'm going to have to go back and try the other one. I don't want to compare just yet. We're going to have to go bounce back and forth.

We're not going to have to vote, are we? Of course you are. We're not going to have to vote and make one of y'all.

Well, you know, it's a matter of personal preference.

It's completely personal preference.

It always is, you know, and we find that with all of the products we do, even with the wine people, you do a lineup of six wines of the same vintage.

And it's never unanimous.

Never unanimous.

Which one they like. But you know, that first impression, the first one you try, how much of that carries over into second, third, fourth, fifth?

Right. Yeah. We're not really taking water in between, so.

And I like to do that. I like to try to cleanse it the best I can before I do the next one.

Start with a pure palette each time. So this one to me, number four, has a little more oak and leather. I'm going to go back to number three now. I'm going to bounce back and forth between the two.

Definitely got more spice with four for me.

So number three is a lot more aromatic. It's a little more upfront. I get it a little more upfront. It's kind of a bouquet upfront.

Yeah. I do get, you know, I'd say a little more wood, you know, on three. You know, you get that when you...

I feel like it's got a sweeter note. A little sweeter note. If I had to say one was more sweet, one was more savory.

I'm going to make a prediction right now. Jim's going to go with four and I'm going to go with three. I can almost see this happening.

It's a tough call because they're both delicious.

Then no one will get mad.

Yeah. I can almost see this happening. That's good.

So I would tend to lean towards number four personally.

And I would tend to lean towards number three personally.

And which one's number four? Is that you? Jerry's four, not three. Now, Mark, I would have thought that, you know, number one had kind of a bold up front, really got to you quick. And then it kind of had that juniper that transitioned a little bit into some citrus. This one's a little more rounded here. It's not quite in your face. I don't know.

That would be... That really is... I'm usually a little bit more in your face, I guess. Yeah.

He definitely is.

But it seems like the finish on four lasted a little longer for me. I don't know why.

Yeah, I'm going to keep sipping on number four. I'm going to go back to number three. I'm going to keep revisiting these because they're both absolutely delicious guys. Congratulations.

I think really good. Thank you.

And are your wines the same way? Exactly.

Yeah.

And so they're all different and they're all unique. And then we really, that's what we tried to bring is that each item we do should have its own personality.

Absolutely. We do a lot of vineyard designate wine. So they're coming from a specific location and we want those locations to really shine through. And I think that's what, that's what we.

Yeah. We don't even manipulate the wine very much a lot. You know, people went to Davis, they would always try to get these perfect numbers by acidifying and, you know, uh, to make it more like almost a French wine. We let the vineyard show really important, you know, it's to us, that's what, you know, if you can kind of tell the difference a little bit, it has its personality.

And that's exactly what we do with this, with the whiskeys. I feel like we're never going to make the same thing twice. And they may be similar, but they're different. And that's what we enjoy doing because it's a lot of fun. It's a lot of hard work. and a lot of sleepless nights leading up to solidifying the blends. More sleepless on this side of the room than that side of the room. Yeah, I just, I can't, I won't, I don't stop until whatever I'm doing next is like, no, I keep going back. I keep going back to something that I know.

Well, they and y'all did very well, I'll just say.

Oh yeah, is that how you say it? It is about blending it for us at the end of the day that makes it different. You can take the same exact product and if you just maybe divided that barrel and put it in different bottles, it'd be the same and call it different patches. You know, every time we do a 10, well, we'll take 50 barrels, we'll get down to 10 that we like, and we'll start blending. And most of these batches are five to seven batch blends for our small batches. Yeah, barrels, yeah. And they're always going to be a little different. And that's, like I said, that's what we love to do.

And this is the same mash bill. Exactly. 384 is the same stuff, same age, just a different combination of barrels.

Even the big distilleries, you know, are blending to make their releases, their small batch releases. So, I mean, blending is an art in itself, and it's very creative. It's very artistic. It's very creative. Yeah, it's very creative. And you're able to do so much with just a few barrels. And you guys have a little bit more flexibility than some of the distilleries have, right? Yeah, we do buy.

Meetings are very easy.

It's just the two of us. It's coffee in the morning usually. What we need to do for that day. And salami.

And salami. So how hard is it to find barrels now?

There's a lot more competition in the market looking for barrels, right? We've been putting them away for the last two years or so. We've also been making... And distilling for the last two years.

Distilling here in Kentucky.

Oh, so can we talk about that a little bit? So you don't have to tell us where you're distilling.

They are different match bills, too, than the people that actually distill, usually. So we're looking for them a little bit more unique match bills so that we can hang our hat on it, our name on it, and say it's not the same as what they do, which is great. Whatever they do is wonderful, too. But we are those kind of that one-off, something totally unique. That's what we're looking for.

So will you incorporate some younger whiskeys? Because normally your whiskeys have a lot of age. Will you incorporate some younger whiskeys in some future blends?

That's a really good question. I like old stuff.

I do too, but younger whiskeys do bring something to the table.

And a lot of people are looking at that because of the demand for bourbon internationally.

Well, we drink a lot of old, really, bottles, dusties, and, you know, a lot of those were like only six years to, you know, eight years, even some five. Name a couple of dusties that you had recently. Actually, a 1950. I.W. Harper.

Wow, really?

You know, a six-year-old, it was distilled in 36, bottled in 42. Yeah. Phenomenal stuff. And, you know, they're not that high of alcohol, 130, I mean, 93, you know, and those show pretty well. They're stunning. So we will probably, you know, like the ones we have put up that are two and a half years old or so now, we'll probably, you know, start trying things at about six. If it's a ride, maybe, maybe five.

Yeah.

That's good. Yeah. So no, I mean, five-year rite, you can have a delicious rite at five years. I agree. Absolutely. You can have a delicious bourbon at five years. So how often do you guys return to Kentucky? Every month. Every month? Yeah. We've been here almost every month and for a week.

Sometimes twice a month.

Yeah, sometimes twice.

Yeah.

What's your base of operation when you're here? I mean, do you come to Louisville? Do you come to Lexington? Do you do both?

Well, we bought a building in Lexington a year and a half ago now. Two years ago. A year and a half.

A year and a half.

And fixed that up a little bit. And so we actually have a three-bedroom Airbnb above. Justin's house at Bourbon is downstairs, so there are tenants there. And they're great. And we have the three-bedroom place upstairs, and we really haven't stayed in because it's always rented when we come to town.

We have a little showroom in the back that kind of shows our history of the Carter Seller's wines. Also, we have a couple of brands. Envy is the winery and Ancillary is another brand with our winemaker and our GM at the winery. And then we have our first brand of the first, you know, batch one to six. And then we have the old Carter's in there. So you can kind of see, you know, that's us.

It's a fun little spot. It's a nice place to do this kind of stuff.

Yeah, it's a great place, though. Randy and I have been there. We spent a little time there, and we both walked out with something.

Yeah, we spent a little time. You want to talk about spending a little money. Yeah, I'm going to leave my wallet in the car from now on because I might be staying in your bed.

We've been doing a lot of things over in Lexington over the last little while, but we just bought a building here in Louisville as well.

We love what's happening in Louisville here.

It's pretty exciting down here. Yeah, the downtown area in Louisville is really becoming bourbon-centric. Absolutely.

Bourbon trail, that whole massive whiskey row down there is just unbelievable. Absolutely.

The building we got is actually on the corner of First and Market. You're right there in it. Yeah. And the Justin's House of Bourbon is going to be our tenant there. Oh really? So they'll have one over here.

We'll talk about that a little bit more in the second half. I think this is as good a place as any for us to take our break and when we come back we'll find out what else you brought for us to drink today. We would like to thank Tommy and Gwen Mitchell from Loghead's Home Center for supporting this episode of the Bourbon Road. Loghead's Home Center, nestled in the hills of Kentucky, is an industry leader in building handcrafted rustic furniture. Family owned and operated, they take pride in offering only the very best for their customers. The Logheads, and that's what they like to call themselves, are skilled wood crafters who are passionate about creating rustic furniture for people who appreciate the beauty of natural wood. Owners Tommy and Gwen don't just sell the rustic lifestyle, they live it. And you can be sure that Loghead's furniture will always be handcrafted in Kentucky by artisans who embrace the simple way of life. Loghead's rustic furniture is made from northern white cedar, a sustainable wood that's naturally rotten termite resistant. Its beauty and quality will add warmth to your earthy lifestyle for generations to come. Be sure to check out everything they have to offer at LogHeadsHomeCenter.com. And while you're at it, give Tommy and Gwen a shout on Facebook or Instagram at LogHeads Home Center.

So we're back in the Oak Room at the Seal Block Hotel with Mark and Sherri Carter. Yeah, we were just sitting here talking about this ornate room and the wonderful woodwork and stuff here at the Seelbach. And we want to give a shout out, Jim.

Nadia Harris, who helped us to arrange this location for the recording today. And we really appreciate the Seelbach and them being so gracious to us.

It was really nice. It's been wonderful so far. And we've got another half coming up. So what do we have in our second half pours? Who's going first? Mark, Sherry, which one of y'all? I think Sherry can go first.

Well, we've got some exciting stuff here in this next pour. We have brought for you to try today, we've got some single barrels that we released, or one of the single barrels that we released last year in December of our 27-year-old American whiskey.

Wow. 27-year-old.

I'm so excited for this. I mean, I have not had one of your 27s before, so.

I've never had a 27, nothing.

We got very fortunate and found some barrels and I actually brought the sample over to show Sherry.

I was washing dishes.

I didn't tell her what it was. I just poured her a little glass and said, here, try this. And she tried it and she's, oh my God, what is it? It's amazing. We must have this.

Go get it. Go get it. Go get it, Carter. That's great. So this is an American whiskey, which basically means that it doesn't meet the criteria of a bourbon. That's correct. And we don't know exactly why it doesn't meet the criteria.

The only reason is because it was not put into a brand new barrel. Okay, great. It was put into a used barrel.

Okay. And we don't know what the char was on the barrel or anything like that there.

But we think, well, based on the flavor profile, I believe that they were used bourbon barrels.

Okay.

27 years. This is barrel number nine, and we did these, as crazy as it sounds, we still did these at barrel strength. So we didn't do any watering down of these whiskies.

But you guys don't do that to any of your products, right?

We do not. So what is the proof of this, the nine? These are like 120. This is 124.7. Okay. And this barrel produced 72 bottles.

So that was the most we ought to add to any of the barrels. Now, if a barrel is completely full, how many bottles do you get?

About 220 something.

And you've got 72. So about a third. So you've really lost about two thirds of this barrel to the angels.

That's the best the angels did for us. They even took more sometimes. We got down to 13 bottles in some of these.

And we haven't even factored in the IRS yet, have we? Yeah, they got to get their share. I forgot about that there.

Well, I'm excited to try this. And Randy, this is an epic moment for you.

Yes, it is. I've never tried anything 27. Well, let's try it.

Oh my goodness.

And you may want to, because I was so short on these pores, I like to roll it around a little bit to bring it up a little higher on the inside of that glass.

Oh, yeah. So the color on this is, honestly, for spending that much time in the barrel, I would expect it to be a lot darker. Now, this is a rich, dark color. There's no doubt about it. But you would think 27 years, that's going to be black.

No, you're right.

I would think that.

I think that is because we've got, again, we're using those used barrels.

So they don't have that initial char.

They've given up that. Yes. Okay, got it.

Aggressive.

Well, the legs definitely are sticking to the glass. I don't expect those to disappear anytime soon. That nose is tremendous. It's absolutely wonderful.

Can I just save it? Do I have to try it?

Randy, you're being so dramatic. Oh my goodness. That is amazing. That is so good. It's even beyond creme brulee. This is kind of... I don't know. Definitely burnt sugar.

Yes. Very caramelized.

But not over-oaked. No. Not at all. That's the one thing I liked about the American whiskey and these 27-year-olds. Going into that used barrel, the wood didn't break down and it didn't get too woody.

But you still get the wood. You get it. I get the wood on the round end of this. Yes. But as it rounds that corner, here I go again. I'm sorry. As it rounds the corner.

We feel that these are almost expressing a quality that's like a Cognac or an Armagnac.

Yes, I was just thinking that. I was thinking that exact thing. This reminds me of a very fine after-dinner drink, a Cognac or an Armagnac, and it's just absolutely, it just makes you pause and think as you're tasting it. This is a delicious whiskey, and those legs, If I left this glass to sit, I think those legs would just dry in place.

And you can see how thick this is in the glass as you rolled around. It's reduced down so much. It's just thick and coating and creamy.

Well, it's not every day you get to try a whiskey like this. This is definitely a gift to us. I appreciate it. Thank you very much.

I've never had anything aged this long. Well, except me, but...

But you're age so well, right? I know.

That's really good. It's fun to share it. We were very excited to get our hands on it, that's for sure. Kind of, you know, it'll be a while before we can get something like this again, I think.

You guys have got a number of expressions. You have a number of releases of each expression. Are there any that kind of are sentimental favorites?

They're all our babies. I understand, but you know, certain babies go to certain parents.

And I'm sorry that we don't have it. And had I known that you had not tried the 12-year, we would have brought the 12-year American whiskey, which is the sister to these guys. I really love that one because it is so

It was very surprising, you know, American whiskey that was 12 years old, that just kind of rocked us, you know, we got great bourbons, great rice, but this thing just came out of left field and you tasted it. It did. And it's 134.9 and it drinks like 110. We would take it around and show people out of the bag and say, hey, you taste this and they'd love it. And then we said, well, what do you think the proof is on it? And they'd all say 110. You have to do a little blind tasting on it. And it was, well, it's a little higher than that. 134.5. Wow. But it doesn't drink like that.

That's such a big spread. That's such a big spread.

But when it has all of the balance, that's the whole thing with wine or bourbons. It's like, you know, you get this great, you know, everything's in place. If it's just alcohol, it's thin and it's not tasty.

It has to fire on all cylinders for us.

I think you guys know Jason from The Mashin' Drum. He's actually in town this week. I actually bowed out to him as he bought a bottle of your 12-year American. And I'm hoping, yeah. We could win the lottery. You never know. We are having a blind bottle share. Do you think he might bring it?

As soon as you said that earlier, I thought maybe he's going to bring it.

I don't know. He does want to win. We've got a grand prize that's kind of sweet. Wouldn't it be great if we had grand prizes? Well, we've got a friend who makes fine art pieces out of bourbon barrels.

He's going to make bourbon barrel rehab over there, Jeff and Liz, and that's going to be the grand prize, I guess.

He's making a little trinket. The winner of the blind bourbon chair, this is who gets the most votes, right? As you pass the bottles around, who gets the most votes?

If you get to actually, you guys say, okay, this is this, because it's double blind is what you're doing.

There'll be six 375s with an ABCDE or FG, whatever, on them. And nobody knows if that one's the one they brought or the one the guy next to them brought. So there's no indication of what you have. So everything's blind. I would imagine that the person who tastes their own bottle will know, I would think. Yeah, let's hope.

Is there a prize for the person who can correctly guess any of these?

We're not doing that, but that's a good idea. I mean, we might do something like that just for like a bonus or something, right? So maybe the person who gets, who's able to guess. something gets that particular $3.75, whatever's left.

It would be like winning the lottery because there's hundreds of bourbons out there. I just picked this one out of that. Yeah, it's like odds are saying four.

Actually, you bring up something that reminds me of developing your palette of flavors and your memories of flavors and smells. I cut my teeth on a, in a blind tasting group for wine that met every Monday night during Monday night football. And it was very cutthroat and they were very mean. It was all guys. So it was, it was, it was anything went, I mean, it just had to be read. It was from all over the world. And I would go every week and take my notebooks and they like, they like straw a lot. They had deep cellars of Roman varietals. A lot of Bocastel and Gigandas.

Okay, so now they're getting into this foreign language that I don't understand. Those are the only two French words I know.

Oh, one more, champagne.

I'm pretty good with a Burgundy and a Merlot.

That was invaluable training because it was all blind and it was in carafe, so we didn't even know. There were no indicators whatsoever. and keeping those notebooks and every week taking the notebooks back and cross-referencing.

She says, I think I've smelled something like this before.

I did it for about four years. This must be a sarah. It was like going to school. It really was.

I remember we had David Jennings from Rare Bird 101 on a little while ago and he, you guys familiar with him? My gosh, I've been following him for a long time. He's doing a great job. He's got a great palette. Yes. But he was telling us, you know, he said, you know, you get a lot of people out there that know their whiskey and you get some who think they know their whiskey. He said, let me give them a blind and we'll see where they come out. Exactly. Because a blind is a great equalizer. It is.

Yeah, so definitely even he got the Rick House wrong. Even David. Sorry David. I'm sure he probably had everything else down. He probably did, yes. He was only a couple off if I remember right. Mark, he was only a couple off, man.

So can you guys just take us through the blending process and kind of let us know how do you put blend together. How do you do this?

And I've been curious about this ever since we found out you all were coming on. This is one of my big asks here.

It's very scientific.

It is tasting everything. It starts with, you know, Sherry, we get samples of every barrel that we have. and we taste those and we narrow it down to the ones that we really love. So we know it's going to be five to seven barrels at the most. Hopefully it's seven, but maybe it's only five because we may rule two of them out at the end.

It's amazing how much a different combination of barrels can produce a completely different flavor profile. And it's really amazing how you can take five barrels, love all of them, and when those are all added up and they become a blend, they're terrible. Or they're not terrible, but they're not to the standard that we want to be at.

They don't add anything to each other.

Or you can pull one out, and then it's singing again. Or you put one back in. So it's just tons of trial and error. And we usually do 30 or 40 combinations to get where we end up.

So are you trying to find like, OK, now this barrel here, provides a good base. Sometimes. And then maybe this one will bring a little special to the show. Yes. And then this one will round it out. Yes. Is that kind of how? Yeah, exactly.

In theory, yes.

Okay.

And then you sometimes put those barrels in. Then it doesn't work.

And it doesn't work. It's trial and error. Yeah. It really is. Each barrel. It really is. is so different. So as your inventories grow, you get more flexibility to do some more amazing things. That's what we like. It's kind of like, you know, kind of different colors of paint. And when you're trying to paint, you know, the more you have, the more chances you can pull off something really nice.

It's fun. So I'm curious. I'm back to the three and four on the rise here. Who has the better palate? Who gets to choose this? Is it both of you all in combination and it doesn't work until both of us agree?

If you ask Sherry who has, she'll say her. If you ask me, I'll say me. Well, what I can say is that

you know, we, we both really demand that luscious mouth feel. We want it to be robust. We want it to be, you know, this very, very lush experience. So I feel like for viscosity and for weight and for, um, overall like level of flavor, we're very similar. We have the, the, the ideas are very much the same, but then as far as flavors go, we, we do tend to like,

You know, it's great because both of us have something I think we bring to when we do blend. You like it out front. She likes that mid right there. Yeah. And when we do something together, it's usually pretty unique and wonderful.

I love this bourbon batch too that's going to be coming out because I feel like it's kind of the best of both worlds. And I like aromatics.

I like that richness and deepness.

So you guys kind of both agree on the blends, but you're like, I prefer this and I prefer this, but they're both really good.

You know, there is that time when we really come together on stuff and it's like, oh, yeah, we both didn't, you know, I know it's perfect to us when it starts raising the hair. It's the chill bumps. Yeah. When I go, ooh, yeah. The chill factor is what decides. On the back of my neck or back of my arm, I go, it's the same way with wine. When I get that, I go, yeah, that's singing. That's truly singing to me.

Yes.

Yeah. It's like a great music.

So how do you guys divide the, you know, the daily business? I mean, there's a lot to do when you own a whiskey company and a wine company.

There's a lot for Sherry to do it.

Sherry does all the work and I just try to, you know, look pretty.

And Mark's a drinking buddy. I'm just really good at taking notes.

But she does a lot of the work, she does the whole labels, and she's doing more and more all the time, like keeping inventories.

We do it all together. And it wouldn't be any fun if we did it separately.

So how do inventories work? So you guys work with a distributor. and you have inventories here in Kentucky. It's not the inventories so much.

The bottled material. Yeah, it's the barrels. We've got to keep track of the barrels. That's when you do the blending too, which is unique. Every barrel that we've just picked has different volumes in it, so it's not like just dumping barrels.

So when you guys decide on a blend, then those barrels go to a bottling house, whoever they might be, And they dump those barrels, and then they put them in bottles, and then the entire inventory goes to a distributor.

Correct.

Okay. Yeah. All right.

With the artwork done by Sherry, I might add.

Yes. Which means it's as hard for you guys to get a bottle of Old Carter as it is for us, right?

I think it's harder. Yeah. Really?

It's kind of nice, though, because then we don't have to say, you know, because they'll call us and want a bottle, and we'll say, well, we don't have any either.

And when you get one, send me one.

So when you go to a liquor store, you say, wait, I'm Sherri Carter. And I'm like, no. I think I'll buy these.

Well, I think we need to get down to this number nine, don't we?

Number nine and number six, right?

We just had the nine. We just had the nine. We need to get to the six. We need to get to barrel six. Six has not been released. This has not been released at all.

So this is also a 27-year American whiskey. Correct.

And this particular barrel, barrel number six, only had 30 bottles in it.

Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness, yeah. Really, 30. And you guys kept the price the same.

William, for the single barrels are more money. Okay. Because there's nothing there. And, you know, to be at 27, we figured that it should be somewhere around what, you know, the other people of their 27, like Heaven Hill or something like that would be.

No, I mean the barrel nine versus the barrel six.

They'll be the same price. They're the same price. Oh yes, sorry. Okay. We don't like to confuse and have people upset. We usually hold the price for years and stuff.

So we understand that the 27-year-old is, in fact, if you look at the label, it's very old Carter. It's not just old Carter. This is the VOC. VOC, baby.

VOC. And what proof is this?

This one is, if my eyes are not playing tricks on me, it looks like 129.

129.

This one I get a lot more orange on, like that candied in the nose.

This is definitely very candied. Yeah. Very candied. Syrupy. Definitely sweeter than the other one, I think a little bit.

Here I go again. Butterscotch?

Randy, you nailed it.

And I hate butterscotch. I used to not be a butterscotch fan, but if you're a musician, those butter rum lifesavers, and that's what I'm getting on this right here, is that butter rum lifesaver. Cool.

That is really, that is really good. And if anybody hears anything in the background, we're actually in the Oak Room at the Seelbach Hotel in Louisville, Kentucky. And this is an operating hotel, so there are people walking through and I think there's a wedding reception in the next room tomorrow and the bride's been through and so if you hear anything in the background, so be it. We're here.

No one's come over with a glass yet.

They haven't asked for a pour, have they?

I think Don, the bartender for tomorrow, was over there and he goes, Oh, Carter, what? Are you kidding me? So I'm surprised if he hasn't come over here with a good hearing yet.

So to this point, you guys have released a bourbon and a rye and American whiskey. These are your three expressions. Are there any more interesting releases that you have in the future that you're considering? We're considering a few things.

Anything you can talk about? Yeah. Since we own the barrels, it's just a matter of when we bottle. And so we have some 15-year-old bourbons and we have some 12-year-old Kentucky bourbon. And there'll be some small batches out of those and some single barrels out of those. So how many releases do you do a year? Last year was seven. If you count the three single barrels. With the single barrels. Okay. But we tried to do like four times a year a release of either if it was bourbon whiskey or American or Rise.

So any more 27 years?

Well, we're going to like every year for a few years if we can get by with about 10 years of releasing some of the 27.

Oh, you heard it here. We can expect a release of the 27, so you've got enough. Not much of it. Not much of it, but a few bottles.

A few bottles.

Staggered out over the next, and they're still in the barrel. They're continuing to age. Some are. Some are and some aren't. So some you've had to say, hey, those are ready. We need to pull them out and put them in a tank. Yes. Okay. Yeah.

When we'd like to get them all in bottle, frankly.

In the bottles. Right. Because those angles are... Expected retail price?

I think it's $5.50.

It's a special bottle. People understand they're not buying an everyday bourbon here. They're not even buying a top shelf bourbon.

They're buying something to have with dad on his 75th birthday.

Something very special. You think that that will continue on for another number of years. Yes. Well, that's great. That's great news. That really is good to hear. Can we expect, you know, additional extra aged products like that in addition to the 27?

Well, I hope. Yeah. You know, just a matter of somebody, you know, if we find some barrels and somebody.

We're always looking. We're always looking.

So if the barrels present themselves. Absolutely. Got it. Sure. They taste good. And somebody says, hey, I got some old barrels and you guys should have these. You know, that would be phenomenal.

Yeah, this number six, now you don't know when barrel number six of the 27 years is going to release. We don't. We don't.

We reached into our library for today.

Do you think it will be during 2019?

I don't know.

You don't know. So really you have no clue? We don't.

But we can assure you that all of these 27-year single barrels are as unique as these two. They're just something otherworldly for us.

So you've tried all the barrels now. Oh yeah. Are there any that we can look forward to that you think are really out of this world?

I just love them all. They're all good. They really are. I mean, it's just like a, you know, it just feels like it's something really special.

So when you guys buy these barrels, these 27-year-old barrels, you have no clue how much liquid's in them.

No, that's part of the process.

Some of them were empty. Yeah, two were empty. Two were empty. Completely empty.

Completely empty.

Yeah, they replaced those, so we were lucky.

Well, that was good of them.

That was very nice.

Very good of them, yeah.

Well, if you're ever looking for a mentee, Welcome back Carter. You can pick me. I would be fine with that.

So you guys mentioned earlier that you guys are in Louisville in support of a project, a building project. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

Well, we love Louisville. We love Lexington. When we were, when we started coming here, in fact, we couldn't make our mind up, which we love better. So, you know, again, it was like batch, you know, one and two rye, you know, you love them both. So we ended up like buying a place in Lexington and buying one place in Louisville. And so we've got the place. on a corner of First and Market, which is going to house the, you know, Justin's house of Bourbon. And we're going to probably have a little showroom there too.

So you guys have a good relationship with the Justins.

Yes, we do.

Yeah. So do you feel like that, you know, that when people come to Louisville, that'll be a place where they can learn more about the old Carter brand?

Yeah, you know, and we, again, we don't have a lot of product, you know, we keep, we want to have more, we want to be able to provide people with, you know, the chance to be able to buy a old car.

One thing I'll just jump in and say real briefly is that our distributor has done a really great job, we feel, of getting the bottles into the bars and around Louisville and Lexington and through the state. We've hit the road a few times and gone down to see people down in Bowling Green. We had a wonderful experience down there. So we're very happy that even though there's not a- Where did you go, in Bowling Green? Hickory and Oak.

Green Oak. Yeah, great place. Yes, yes.

Stopped at White Lightning Lakers on the way through in Owensboro. Yeah. So we just, it's just really, they've done a good job of sharing the love.

Now who is your distributor? Give them a shout out.

It's Heidelberg. Heidelberg.

Good job of Heidelberg. And we love them. You know, it's always, you know, old Carter's still just in Kentucky. It's Kentucky only release all of it, you know, and that's what we, this is where we, it seems like home for us. Yeah.

But we appreciate you guys worried more about quality than quantity. Absolutely. Because that's the big push nowadays is quantity so they can get it out everywhere. Right. And we appreciate good quality here in Kentucky at least.

One thing I've found as we traveled through your expressions today is that each one is different. It's definitely an experience. Each one is bold. It's creamy. It's oily. It's different. It's very... The bouquet is very good. Yeah. So I think that you're releasing bourbons and whiskeys and ryes that are different, but they're all very good in their own right. And they're definitely a treat. So when somebody picks up a bottle of Old Carter, I think they definitely end up with something they can treasure for a little while and go back and revisit. As we talked about before, go back and revisit over time.

Also, when we open bottles of wine, it has a very short life. After about three days, it's gone to speak of. We do have the Coravan today, which we can just take wine out and replace it with nitrogen. But bourbon, on the other hand, has a longer shelf life. And even if you open it, It improves for quite a while. So how long do you think that is? You know, months, I think. I think months.

So do you think people that have open bottles for a year or more are taking a chance? No, I think they can.

Ours just don't last that long, Jim. We haven't been able to do that part of the experiment yet.

I would agree. Those old, those old, uh, Stissele Wellers in the fifties that we have in our house, they hang around for about, you know, maybe, maybe I'm lucky with six months to a year.

That would be pushing it. I think at my house. So, um, if someone wanted to get in touch with you, How would they get in touch with you online, through social media, things like that there?

Well, we love hearing from folks and we really love it when they tell us how they've tasted something and how they've enjoyed it or what their opinions are on it. We love to hear from people. So our easiest way is probably through Instagram or Old Carter Whiskey Co. on Instagram and got a little Facebook page too. And what I love is when people reach out and through the messenger part of the app, And they're like, who do I need to get in touch with, you know, to whatever, fill in the blanks. And I'm like, present, you're looking at her.

Yeah, I know.

We're a huge company, you know. There's the two of us.

Well, I know, Mark, you had followed The Bourbon Road on Instagram. And I was like, oh, wait a minute, that's Mark Carter.

So I sent you a message.

I said, we'd love to have you on the show. And you said, well, you need to talk to Cher. Yeah. She's got the calendar.

So on Facebook, they were going to touch with you?

We're Ol' Carter WikiCo on Facebook too. And then we do have a website. I like the interactive aspect of the social stuff.

Yeah. So do you guys have like a website with merchandise and stuff like that on it?

You know, we do have some merchandise and our shop is down right now.

Oh, no.

Yes.

The artist has not been doing some things lately.

We have a helper on that one and he's getting married this weekend. So we gave him a pass. But yes, through the website, there's a shop so you could buy. We've got hats and t-shirts and and good stuff like that.

Well, it sounds like there's a lot of great things coming from old Carter Whiskey Company. Mark and Sherry, we really appreciate you taking time out of your trip here to Louisville to sit down with us.

Thank you for the 27. I've never had, like I said, I never had anything that old and awesome.

I'd say you make his day, but I think you've made his month. I love it. Definitely a week.

We really appreciate you guys taking the time out and meeting with us and having us on. And thank you for all the kind things that you said. And I like the way that you put it, that they are definitely all different.

They are. They're wonderful and we really enjoyed today. Thank you. Awesome. Good stuff. We do appreciate all of our listeners. We'd like to thank you for taking time out of your day to hang out with us here on the Bourbon Road. We hope you enjoyed today's show, and if so, we would appreciate if you'd subscribe and rate us a five star with a review on iTunes. Make sure you follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, at The Bourbon Road. That way you'll be kept in the loop on all the Bourbon Road happenings. You can also visit our website at thebourbonroad.com to read our blog, listen to the show, or reach out to us directly. We always welcome comments or suggestions, and if you have an idea for a particular guest or topic, be sure to let us know. And again, thanks for hanging out with us.