144. Sean Josephs - Pinhook Founder

Pinhook founder Sean Josephs sits down with us to explain how he’s building a whiskey brand influenced from wine. Sean details his blending process and how he curates single barrels to develop Pinhook’s yearly vintages and vertical series releases. He also shares how he and his team stay curious and authentic while being playful and having fun with creating a brand from scratch.

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143. Nigal Vann - The Berkshire Room

From The Berkshire Room in Chicago, bartender Nigal Vann of The Berkshire Room and Vannity Cocktails joins us to chat about bartending for 15 years, starting an at-home cocktail experience during the pandemic and traveling across the world to create drinks.

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142. Brooke Burton - The People's Club

Live from Callum’s terrace, Brooke Burton of People’s Club joins us. Brooke is on a mission “To make Chicago smaller,” by creating events based around alcohol, art and food. Brooke shares how her background in sociology and business school molded her task to build community through personal and online interactions.

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136. World Whisk(e)y Day Part 1

Ian Hosack of Uncle Nearest joins us to announce our World Whisk(e)y Day event with Aberlour, Dancing Goat, J. Henry & Sons, Redbreast, Starward and Uncle Nearest. We discuss the rollout of the May 15th event, along with how we plan on adapting our online experiences of the past year to future in-person whiskey events/tastings.

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135. Matt Brown of Blaum Bros. Distilling Co.

Our dearest Matthew Brown of Blaum Bros returns. We discuss how their craft distillery is building their brand after being praised for their allocated whiskeys—that were originally sourced—and how they assemble/sustain integrity through barrel finishes, vatting and handling allocated expressions with care and precision. We also chat about the subsequent rise of craft distilleries and knowledge base of consumers; the secondary market losing their gusto of being the whiskey tastemakers; and how we the consumers are being priced out of own collections as everything is becoming a commodity these days.

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134. UrbanBourbonist - Chris Blatner

Chris Blatner returns to the show to chat about the beginning of 2021. We discuss the blurred lines of being an online whiskey personality while representing a distillery, hate mail online from whiskey community and the rampant hostility that’s developed over the past year. We also enjoy the finer things in life by sipping on pours of Nulu, Kooper Family and Barrel Craft Spirits while discussing transparency of distilleries.

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133. Sunday Night Fights After Dark

After an epic @SundayNightFights between Sagamore Spirit and Union Horse Distilling Co., we jumped on Instagram Live with Chris and Mikey to record an After Dark edition. Yes, Mikey Pinstripes finally makes his debut to the podcast. This wide-ranging conversation includes; building a brand on the virtual platform, the advantages of relying on whiskey influencers versus retailers, and how sustainable single barrel programs can be to build a brand.

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132. Dancing Goat Distillery

Dudes and babes, please buckle up for this one. Dancing Goat Distillery founder Nick Brady Maas brings humor, education and so much energy to this magnetic conversation. Nick comes from a whiskey pedigree, and breathes life into the titans of the past by running his distillery and sharing his knowledge and love for whiskey.

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131. One Year later

Jake, Wilson and Callum look back on one full year of pandemic and how it affected the whiskey industry. A positive conversation includes; the development of cocktails-to-go, how brands financially supported their accounts and the discovery of the virtual experience—and its capability of allowing brands to stay in touch with friends and to grow brands beyond borders.

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130. Virtual Whiskey Tasting Etiquette

Jake and Callum discuss the how to build virtual whiskey tasting etiquette from the brand and consumer perspective. We share personal stories of hosting virtual tastings and provide feedback and ideas on how to build a pleasurable, entertaining and educational experience for all.

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129. Two-Year Anniversary Special part 2

In the second part of our Two-Year Anniversary Special, the guys play host to frequent guests and friends Brett Bauer, Jamie Duffy, Ian Stewart and Bob Zacharias. The conversation is driven by stories of favorite bars, cocktails and the places we’ve missed over the last year. Then we dive deep into industry discussions around the adaption of moving all whiskey forums to online, the sustainability of single barrel programs, world single malts and how we’d invidiualy invest $10 million to start a brand. Oh, we also drink… a lot.

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127. Ian Hosack - Uncle Nearest Premium Whiskey

Ian Hosack of Uncle Nearest returns to have a few laughs with Wilson and Jake about working together and growing into their individual roles in the industry. We also discuss Ian’s personal experience with contracting Covid-19, how Uncle Nearest has implemented new online/virtual strategies, and how they’ve created an entirely new businesses structure to adapt to the new online premise.

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126. Ian Stewart of The Beer Cellar

Ian Stewart an experienced enthusiast turned purveyor of The Beer Cellar’s whiskey curation takes us through his personal journey and love for whiskey and single malts across the world. We also discuss how the last year has impacted retailers from hand selling to customers and why virtual events are supplanting the personal interaction they’ve somewhat lost. Ian, too, shares his passion to build relationships with distilleries to continue his education of whiskey—that can be relayed to the customers of their stores.

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