I’ve been asked for a follow up on my article of
“Hunting The Elusive Pappy Van Winkle: The Bigfoot of Bourbon” from August 2013 a bunch of times.
So what and how many did I get I’m asked? 
Well there is no good way to answer the question. If I got one more than the next guy/gal I’m a hoarder. Each one more than two I make more and more enemies. By the time I get over 30 I wouldn’t be believed so there is no sense in telling the truth so I’ll recap past present and future.

I discovered Van Winkle bourbon in the late 1990’s while doing some business in KY. Back then getting it was a problem due to lack of interest and no one outside of a few states wanting more dust magnets of American Whiskey on their shelves. Watch an old Western when Clint Eastwood rides into a tumbleweed infested Main Street and that’s the Bourbon/Rye aisle at “Any Liquor store USA” when Pappy wasn’t wanted. My go to places became a great liquor store in Jersey, one in Maryland and a few others here and there that had it or would order what I wanted as I passed through. It was Lawrenceberg Pappy too! If you don’t know what this is its the place the Van Winkles owned to do their own bottling before BT started.
I recall just two years ago it was still on the shelves in a New Jersey Total Wine and at a few places in Florida. Last year a guy with 3 bottles of 23 in his store had no idea what it was.
I give client’s good booze as gifts and they developed a taste for good Bourbon as a result. After a couple years, their bosses, their clients, friends and friends of friends “knew this guy” that could get Pappy —Me!!
“Hey Lloyd, so nice to hear from you, I just finished the last glass of the Pappy 23, good thing Christmas is coming.”
“My Bosses daughter is getting Married and if he could get a bottle it would really make the wedding special”.
“We have this big firm business lunch to talk about your services, why don’t you come by and by the way they love bourbon”.
I’ve dug me a good deep effing hole at this point so “It’s Planes, Trains and Pappy” every year now. Forget me and my friends, forget some wheeling and dealing and trading up, I need Pappy to survive to some extent. My business could do fine without ever seeing another bottle but much better with a trunk full. I’ve created a monster, a following that makes an abandoned bus full of hungry crackheads easy to deal with.
So my guy in NJ still hooks me up as he remembers and respects I was the guy way back when that wanted it. A new guy I met in the boondocks of Maryland. A few guys in KY. A couple guys around my state. The state where no one knows what it is or cares I mentioned in August is a thing of the past. They now know! Two bottles of 12 year and a long drive now. The guy that didn’t know what 23 was last year now knows and wants $600 each for two bottles which is sort of a lucky thing for me. Getting VW Rye used to be rare but easier as people didn’t know about it or want it but not now, it’s like a healthy Kidney for sale.
So I send a guy a bottle of 12 thanking him for his business and he replies with “thanks so much, this will certainly tide me over until you get the 23 year old.” Well, Ho Ho Ho to you too!
If that weren’t bad enough he continues—“we just got bought out by a German company and the CEO loves Bourbon, saw my bottle of 23 and I told him you’d get him one.”
So there’s this place in New Mexico a spy said his sister saw and says they have two bottles of 23 behind the counter and they won’t ship. I called and they really have them. I start checking Expedia for flights and costs and any reason in the world I can justify a trip to New Mexico other than for Pappy.

I’ve learned my lesson like a child with a hot stove, dog sticking it’s nose in a beehive. If I find out a new client likes Whiskey I never mention it. I get Jack and Coke at dinner with them. If Whisky comes up (and it has) I mention that I heard all bourbon comes from Kentucky they get off the subject FAST.
So now it’s a double life and I’m cheating on my clients about Whisky.
It’s out there folks. It’s a lot of time and work but it’s there. I feel like an Elf in Santa’s Toy factory in January or the GM of the World Series Winner in November. Take a few weeks off and start all over again for next year. Did I mention this is a sick hobby or whatever I call it now?
My buddy comes over last week and I send him to the “bar” aka basement to pour us a drink while I get cigars. He sees the “client gift” storage area and comes up with this shocked look. He starts pleading. “Pappy please, please, pappy please, I’ll write you a check”.
I do the only think I can at this point, I look him dead in the eye with a very serious voice and ask, “Have you ever been to New Mexico”?