A Steal of a Deal ?!

Found a shop that has the Glenfarclas 105 1l for 41 € ( 57 dollars ) , should I go for it ? Sounds like a steal !

Just picked up my second bottle of Talisker 25 (2012) for 800 Dkr. Thats roughly the equivalent of 107,5€. The store have had a whole bunch of them for quite a while, but being relatively new to whisky, I thought it was an insane price for a bottle. Some weeks ago, I however picked up my first bottle, along with a Talisker 10 (1L for around 40€), with the intent of trying the 10 first, and then open the 25 if I liked the 10. Much to my surprise it turned out, that I actually like smoke, although I had thought I was strictly into speyside. Today I went with the íntent of getting a few more bottles of the 25, but the one I got was unfortunately the last. I did however also get 2 bottles of Bruichladdich 12 second edition for around 30€, which seems like a pretty good deal to me, as I think it should be rated in the low eighties (I strongly disagree with the only rating of it on this site). So all in all, a pretty good day.

@hunggar Sounds like you've got a big chance you can make a steal of deal there again. It might become your favorite shop if you don't follow your guilty feelings.

@hunggar also, you didn't hear about the actual retail price until after you got back home. So you no blame on you I guess.

My biggest steals have all been at auctions - bottles that cost me hundreds of dollars but are worth over a thousand. But generally speaking for regular drinkin' whiskies, here in Ontario thanks for the government monopoly on liquor retailers, we pay a premium for bottles so there are no deals to be had.

@talexander

That's why whenever I go out of province, everything seems like a steal of a deal...

Mind you, most of the stuff I get elsewhere isn't available in Ontario, thanks to the poor selection of higher quality stuff.

But I did get the Springbank 12 year old cask strength for about 25 dollars cheaper in Calgary than it was in Ontario when it was available.

@Nozinan Yes, when I can I get stuff in from Calgary but usually they're whiskies I would not be able to get here anyway (so I have no point of comparison). I wish I had more opportunities to get deals on whisky, but alas, that is not to be where I live. There are many great things about Toronto but getting reasonably priced whisky is not one of them...

@Nock called me from the liquor store floor in Knoxville Tennessee a few weeks ago asking about possible whiskies he might pick up for himself and for us. When he said they had a couple of bottles of Amrut Intermediate Sherry, batch # 2, at $ 62 plus tax, I told him I wanted one. He bought both the bottles they had remaining. He is visiting with me right now, and he just brought and sold me my new bottle of Amrut Intermediate Sherry which he purchased in for $ 67. His bottle of the Intermediate Sherry is now his wife's new favourite whisky.

The best deals I get is when I leave Ontario and go to Florida. Case in point, Cardhu here in Ontario is 74.95. Fort Myers at total wine it's 37.99. This is only one example. There are many, many more that are priced at half, if not more off Ontario prices.

@wtrstrnghlt: Thanks for making me feel a bit better about it. I'm not to blame, but it still sucks for them.

@Victor: Looking forward to both yours and @Nock's review of the Amrut Sherry. That one has been on the wishlist forever. Unfortunately it's a bit pricey in this part of the world.

man, ive got good luck this month. first the discontinued glenkinchie and now caol ila. i was checking out a new store yesterday that just opened a new larger location and while their prices seemed generally good the price on caol ila 12 was almost absurdly low - $30 as marked at the shelf. i dont know if that was a sale price or a mistake or what, but i picked up two bottles. i was half expecting them to be a different price when i got to the counter, but they rang up at 30.

they had a great price on uigedail also, $65, but ive already got a couple extra bottles of that so i didnt pick up any more. we'll see how long these prices keep...

I picked up 4 bottles of Ardbeg Lord of the Isles for $600 each here in Perth. Bottleshop had bought them like 7 years ago and never bothered to raise their prices to adjust for demand etc. Over here they sell for around $1800-$2000. The guys at the shop couldn't believe their eyes when I snapped them all up!

Picked up another bottle of Glenfiddich 15 yr Solera for $46...Very good whisky at a very good price.

@Emin, Found a store selling Port Charlotte 8 for $89. Should I go for it?

DevD, I would be all over that PC8 like stink on a monkey. Is it in CA?

@OlJas, No it's available at a duty free store in Dubai. Have a friend traveling over there, will ask her to pick it on her way back.

Lagavulin Distillers Edition 79.00 Fla 150.00 LCB0. Bought 2

@LarsA Even if they've run out of the Talisker 25, where did you find it?

Hi @Anxyous I got it at one of the larger Danish supermarket chains called Kvickly. Actually I´ve just checked their homepage, and it looks like some of their other shops still have it, as it´s still on their internet shop. I do not know if they´ll ship outside of Denmark though.

Just picked up a Port Ellen 8th Release for $600 at a local bottleshop!! They thought it was a really good deal as it was worth $700 or so dollars...I didn't bother telling them until after I purchased the bottle that it was worth almost $2000! So chuffed!

@SquidgyAsh which was the shop.. ;) and do they have more?

@TrailingTheMalt Hahaha it was a local bottleshop called La Vigna Cellars. They had an old malt cask Port Ellen, sherry cask, that I was eying, but it was really close to the official release in price and I knew I could only grab one so I grabbed the $2000 bottle instead.

However I let my whisky club know and they came through and cleaned the shop out of all their old and rare bottles. It was funny there cheaper whiskies were horribly overpriced, Knob Creek Single Barrel for $150, etc while there high end stuff was really cheap.....had been sitting there for years :D

And a 1984 Karuizawa that I picked up for $450 is now selling for $2000 or so 60 days later!

Springbank 12 CS #7 for €42,- While it should be a normal price, it almost feels like stealing ;)

@SquidgyAsh envy you.. :)

I just bought a 9.5 year Glenfarclas for 19.99 USD. It was called "The MacTarnahan Modern Spirit" because Glenfarclas will not put its name on anything under ten years. Last summer, I bought three bottles of Isle of Skye 12 for 19.95 USD per bottle. They worked extremely well in vattings that I used for a single malt scotch party that I threw outdoors on a warm summer's eve.

Reasonably price single malts (that I have favored of late) include the following: Old Pulteney 12, Glendronach 12, Highland Park 12, Ardmore Traditional Cask, Bunnahbhain 12, Clynelish 12.

I don't drink blends very often, so I can't help there.

I just purchased four bottles of 40+ year scotch in Oregon for under $100 a piece. It was a screaming good deal. The distilleries were Bunahabhain, Strathisla, Tomatin, and Glendronach. Three bottles were the Lonach label and one was a rare anniversary bottling.

@rigmorole, Were these from the Oregon lcb stores. If so are they listed on their website. Could you please indicate their exact names.

I'm afraid all of those deals are gone now. I was lucky to get what I did. Totally by chance, I happened to look up price changes two days before the first of the month on the OLCC website. When I saw them, my mouth literally fell open.

Some bottles had been reduced well over $100 in price and they were already quite low in price. That was literally the first time I learned that trick (price changes for the following month) by accident and it really paid off. What a stroke of luck, right? I was told by store managers that it was a very rare sale indeed that had to do with the new tax year or business year or something. Can't quite remember.

I went to the stores on Monday and Tuesday of the first and second of the April and had to pester the managers who were hoarding bottles for bars. In Oregon, stores are not allowed to hold a bottle longer than 24 hours. I know this, but it was hard to convince store managers of the law when the managers do business with big and powerful bars that were trying to suck up up the really old bottles all around town like Hoovers. This said, I quickly figured out the game and beat the big bars that weren't picking up their bottles on time. You snooze, you lose! It's very satisfying to beat a big bar at its own game that has enough clout to freeze dozens of valuable bottles around town like the waving of a magic wand.

Here is my advice if you live in Oregon, or near Oregon: Keep an eye on the OLCC website. Deals come along occasionally that will surprise you. Check price changes for the first of the next month. They usually go up a few weeks ahead of time.

Figuring out which store has what bottle is the trick. Think of it like a game of Monopoly. That's what I did. Some stores don't list their stock on the OLCC website. You learn little tricks to ferret out bottles as you go along. . . . Think of it like a game, or you will get frustrated and angry very quickly. The system is rigged in favor of the big bars. You have to learn how to use their weaknesses against them, fair and square, by learning the OLCC rules. . . .