
Single malt whisky and wine are both alternative assets. Often, because they have similarities, potential investors believe that the way they work as investments is also the same. However whisky investments are fundamentally different to wine.
For wine there is an aspect of a particular Chateau’s renown generating value, but vintage and reviews are also drivers of value. For whisky the opposite is true. The specific distillation vintage plays no part part in value for whisky—other than older generally being better—and a review, even by a respected reviewer, does not increase the value of a particular release. Instead the value of a whisky investment, whether it is a bottle or a cask, is driven predominantly by branding, and specifically the brand of the distillery.
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Working Out The Value Of Whisky
When we look at a specific bottle of whisky then age and the level in the bottleneck will impact value between bottles from the same distillery. Similarly with casks, the age, fill levels and cask type will impact the value per litre of alcohol between two similar casks. Often, unless you are part of the industry (and sometimes not even then) the values assigned to particular releases makes no sense in terms of age or quality. There is no universal expected price for a ten or thirty year old whisky.
We can clearly see the power of branding on whisky when we compare similar whiskies from different distilleries. On the secondary market a bottle of 12-year-old Macallan from the 1980s is worth around £800, whereas a bottle of The Glenlivet 12-year-old from the same decade is only worth £80. You can buy the no age statement Macallan Time:Space Mastery for £1,100, or the award-winning, no age statement Glenglassaugh Sandend for £80.
The same disparity can be seen for casks too. If you bought a cask of Arran when they opened in the late 1990s then your would likely be very pleased with a £20,000 to £30,000 valuation for your cask. However for those fortunate enough to purchase a cask of Springbank in the 1990s then their comparable 30 year old cask is worth over £100,000. The difference in value between the examples above is not proportional to the difference in quality, instead it is the brand status of the associated distillery.
Whether you are looking a bottles or casks, the dominance of brand as a driver of value for whisky is a key point for potential whisky investors to understand.
Branding And The Value Of Whisky
We are seeing increasing levels of premiumisation within the whisky market from blends to single malts. The Macallan is a standout example in scotch whisky because they have successfully positioned themselves as a luxury brand. Owning a bottle of Macallan grants implied status in the same way as owning a Patek Philippe or driving a Bentley.
The Macallan whisky is made in the same way as every other single malt whisky in Scotland. Yes, they may have expert craftsmen, but so do other distilleries. Instead their brand position and renown is the result of decades of marketing and careful protection of their exceptional older casks in order to portray themselves as something more than standard scotch. That means that their bottles command a premium compared to what is technically a similar product – such as the two 1980s 12-year-olds discussed above.
The Macallan may be the obvious example as they are arguably at the pinnacle of value within the scotch market. However, brands do not need to be ultra-premium in order to entice customers to buy their product over similar options. Nor are market positions fixed. As such by understanding how brand drives value in the whisky market we can make better decisions on potential whisky investments.
For example, Bruichladdich is another distillery who have used successful marketing and clever use of existing stock to advance their market position. The Bruichladdich distillery was silent from 1993 until it was bought by a consortium in 2001. Since 2001 Bruichladdich has successfully positioned itself as a leading innovator in the whisky industry and in 2012 it became part of the Rémy Cointreau group. In 2024 it released a 30 year old as part of its core range and has cemented its position as a historic but innovative distillery.
Brand And Bottling A Cask Of Whisky
The implications of branding are important when considering the value of a cask of whisky as an investment. The effects of branding have a clear effect on independent bottlers. Bottles of Macallan released by independent bottlers command as little as 10% of the price of official distillery releases of a similar age and distillation year, even from established independent bottlers.
A distillery’s name is usually trademarked, but if a cask has naming rights then you can still label bottles from that cask as “distilled at the xx distillery.” This is how many independent bottlers still benefit from a distillery’s brand. It is similar when looking at casks of whisky.
If you are looking at bottle prices as a way to establish a cask’s value then it is important to understand that bottles from your cask are worth less than official bottles. If you are going to compare prices then you will get a better comparison from independent bottlings. As we saw from the Springbank versus Arran examples above, casks from more premium distilleries are worth more than the equivalent from less premium brands. By extension, if you buy a cask of whisky without naming rights (and therefore no associated brand) then that cask cannot benefit from the branding of the distillery it was produced by. Casks without naming rights are therefore worth less in terms of current and potential future value.
If you are looking at bottles of whisky as an investment then the effect of branding on official versus independent bottlings also becomes important. Generally speaking independent bottlings are worth proportionally less than official bottling, they can be a cheaper way to buy in, but that difference in price is likely to maintain throughout your investment. It means that largely speaking whisky bottle investors tend to focus on official bottlings. Although there are some exceptions where the independent bottler is a sought after brand in its own right, which I’ll touch upon below.
Does Vintage Effect Whisky’s Value Like Wine?
With wine we expect a correlation between value and the reviewed quality of an actual vintage. Specifically, if a particular vintage is deemed above average then the value will go up proportionally because of an increased demand. The same is not true of whisky.
The value of whisky generally goes up with age; the older the whisky or earlier the vintage the more valuable. This is broadly true of both bottles and casks. If you look within a specific bottle series (with vintages) from a specific whisky distillery you will generally see value increasing as the vintage gets earlier. So if you look at the average auction price for the Macallan 18 year olds for example, it is generally the earliest vintages that are the most expensive. Where there are slight exceptions it is usually because of scarcity of that particular year rather than the quality being higher.
There are some exceptions to this disconnect between reviewed quality and value in whisky. The standout example, for me, is bottles from the independent bottler Samaroli. As a bottler Samaroli became renowned for the high quality whiskies he selected for bottling. Where independent bottlings are usually worth less than their officially bottled counterparts, some early Samaroli bottles are as, or more, expensive than official bottlings from the same distillery. However again, this is the knock on impact of the Samaroli brand driving sales and value, and is not specific to certain vintages or releases.
Branding and status
Marxist theory defines a commodity’s value as the product of the labour used to produce it. By this measure two bottles of whisky produced in the same way, with the same three ingredients should cost roughly the same. You can argue that some value is added by the skill or expertise of the creator, but it is not enough to explain the real world difference we see across the whisky industry.
Arguably a difference in craftmanship and by extension quality may have historically been where the widening of the price difference started with premium brands like Macallan, Rolex etc. However at some point the increase in price disconnects from an increase in quality.
When you buy a bottle of Macallan (or a Rolex or a Bentley or any premium or luxury brand) you are buying into that brand; you are using the brand’s implicit history, standards and value to tell the world about your own values and standing. The object becomes a status symbol. This is not just true for high value items; even your choice between brands in the supermarket is down to an unconscious social desire to portray your own values through the things you have around you.
This is the core difference between the generator of value between whisky and wine. For wine, brand matters but quality can drive significant additional value for specific vintages. For whisky, age and vintage matter but it is how the whisky’s brand is perceived by the multi-billion pound global market for scotch that is going to generate the most value. As such, understanding how distilleries build and maintain their brands can aid in making sound whisky cask and bottle investments.