Importance of Bottle

@PMessinger very true, not only the beauty of the bottle, but the sheer logistics. I need bottles I can stack on top of each other for my cramped cupboard to hold anymore.

Interesting thing I discovered last night: Had some drinks with a mate, and he by chance had Talisker 18 followed by Caol ila Cask Strength. The bottles were standing there on the bar right next to each other and it strikes me, they were identical! Apart from the light green colour of the glass of the Caol Ila bottle, the shape AND the even the cork were exactly the same. Anyone who can give me some clarity on the reason behind these peculiar "doppelganger" bottles?

Personally I don't let the bottle influence the ultimate decision to buy or not, but I do appreciate a good bottle. Aberlour, Bruichladdich and the SMWS bottles are some favourites. However, from a PRACTICAL standpoint my favourite has to be the Balvenie bottles as they don't dribble when I pour a dram!

@NilsG Well the only thing I can say is that there are so many whiskys and so few bottle designs that they must run out of shapes, sizes, and corks to choose from. :)

Corks! Now there's a good point. As much as I like the shape of a Jura bottle, I'm wary as every one I've had has had a cork that has very quickly become loose in the neck. Anyone else had this problem?

@CJV8 I have been fortunate so far as to not have cork problems with whisky bottles, however I have had more than one bottle of wine that I've had to push the cork into the bottle because it broke or split. That doesn't look very good but I drank the stuff anyway. :)

@NilsG the shape you are noticing is what I call the "standard Diageo" bottle. Many of the distilleries owned by Diageo use this bottle shape (and cork) for their official bottlings including: Talisker, Caol Ila, Lagavulin, Port Ellen, Cragganmore, Rosebank, Royal Lochnagar, Mortlach, Mannochmore, and the infamous Loch Dhu. They also used this bottle for the Flora & Fauna bottlings, the Manager's Choice range, and all the Rare Malts line. I am sure there are some I have missed.

Needless to say it is a very common bottle shape . . . from Diageo. I personally like the shape and am very happy they don't keep revamping it every few years. Many other companies will change the bottle shape and the label (Glenmorangie, Highland Park, Macallan). The Talisker label has changed several times since I started drinking it . . . but the bottle is still the same. Now, as long as the Lagavulin 16yo design isn't messed with I won't totally boycott Diageo . . .

@CJV8 Yeah, there doesn't seem to be many bottles that are easy to pour from, without having that wasted drop making its way down the neck after you put the bottle back on the table. Or maybe I just don't have the right technique yet. I have found Glenfiddich to have a mouth (or what you should call it) that is good to pour from though.

@Nock Thanks! That explains why. Apart from the two I mentioned I haven't tried the other whiskies you listed. It's not a bad shape though I must say, so I won't mind encounter it many many times again.

Nice topic, I enjoyed reading all of your postings and lots of true points were already mentioned. For my part I ofc don't actually WANT to buy a whisky only because of the nice marketing/style aspect. But to be honest I like beautiful bottles a lot and I guess this influences my decicions. For example I like the Dalmore 3D-deer (as you can see by my avatar) but I don't own a bottle yet. I am definitely going to buy one but ofc not only of the design. Liked the 12yo and 15yo, so let's see...

The pouring aspect is interesting too, I always think "am I really THAT unhandy?"

@CJV8 Interesting point! I've only had one cork come loose from the top and get stuck in the neck of the bottle, and it was a red colored stopper with the island embossed on the top of an older bottling of Jura 10 year old. A more recent bottling of Jura Superstition with the same black topped plain cork now used in Dalmore bottles, that worked just fine, so that issue seems to have been addressed.

I enjoy the aesthetics of the various bottle designs, though from a purchase-influence standpoint the greatest effect on me would be to catch my attention enough from the shelf to research the bottle further (but even this is a stretch on the 'importance of bottle design' concept).

Within my cabinet, one of my favourite bottle designs is the very 60's/70's looking Grand Old Parr 12 yo dumpy brown bottle with the 'crackle' style texture. Very unique, and one I hope does not get changed.

@NilsG, great thread! I was considering posting a discussion about this topic actually. I didn't realize you already had, I'm glad it came up again.

To me the bottle is very important. Having lived in Japan for so long there is one thing that gets ingrained in you when approaching food and drink... presentation is almost as important as the dish/beverage itself.

Of course no bottle can make a bad whisky good and I certainly purchase whisky based on taste not packaging. However I have great appreciation for an attractive bottle and/or box.

Some of the most beautiful bottles can be found here in Japan.

The whisky is most important but presentation is part of the experience.

@CanadianNinja Thanks, good to hear. Yeah it may make more sense to a somewhat Japanified mind. As you say, a bad whisky doesn't become better with a nice bottle, and a good whisky does not get tainted by an ugly bottle. But if I sit there with wonderful dram in one hand, it sure adds to the overall pleasure having a nice bottle of it in the other (especially if there's a lot left in it).

Wiser's Legacy has a great bottle that possesses a heavy base, square shoulders, and a perfectly sized neck - it makes a bold statement before the cork is pulled and lives up to the boast; the whisky is as sturdy as the bottle.

I've never bought a bottle because of how it looked.

But I have been turned off by cheezy packaging (ie. did not purchase). For example, for a long time the Big Peat look turned me off although now that I have tried it, I really like it.

I gotta be honest here.....

Just last night I was at the local grocery store, and went into their meager liquor dept (their top line single malt was the Glenlivet 12 yr for $43 - blech) to grab some beer when I noticed they had the Tomatin 12 yr for $25.

I figured for that price - what the hell?....As always - I pull open the box to inspect the bottle; it reminded me of something you'd see at the discount shelf of a "legit" liquor store, and therefore I didn't buy the whisky.

I know it's a rather ignorant move on my behalf, but I didn't buy the Tomatin 12 yr due to the bottle appearance.

Where do you think Independent Bottlers fit into this discussion? The big-shouldered Signatory Cask Strength bottles and a few others aside, their bottles are rather Diageo-esque, but some of the labels are rather elaborate. Many offer a ton of information about the whisky inside (i.e., distillation and bottling date, type of cask, number of bottles); is that important?

@two-bit-cowboy Awesome place to bring up the Signatory bottles. I like the looks of those bottles but have not found any with an expression that I'm interested in. Those that I do find are rare in my area but I don't want to purchase because the bottles have good look and stopper. :)

Great point @two-bit-cowboy! Especially regarding the information they offer about the whisky. I wish more OBs would provide some of the info that IBs do.

Been nursing a bottle of Ardbeg 10 yr for 4 months now; looking at the packaging/bottle I see a neat combo of what appears to be Gaelic/Celtic, and Nordic/Viking styling on the boxe, and bottle...

It makes me think of Led Zepplin's "Immigrant Song", and then that makes me think of the movie "Girl With The Dragon Tattoo", and it makes me think of Cragganmore 14 yr since it was the scotch whisky that was consumed in the little guest house...

What I'm getting at is they should've been drinking Ardbeg instead of Cragganmore...What were those daft producers thinking??!!

@FMichael hahaha... Very good point! It's funny, I was watching "Valhalla Rising", a scary trippy extremely violent Viking mess. Whatever you think if the movie, it grabs you by the balls and leaves an imprint that lasts for a while. I just knew I had to drink Corryvreckan while watching it, and I did. Never have a dram matched a movie so perfectly before! The vikingesque design of the bottle fits just right in, the movie's story and brutality delivered with well raw powerful beauty is absolutely paralleled by the nose and flavours of the dram. And all the actors who ever said anything in the movie sounded Scottish too.

@FMichael Somewhat off topic, but on the mention of the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, when I first saw it on the big screen, I thought it was Bruichladdich they were pouring near the end of the movie, but turns out it is in fact Mackmyra who use a very similar bottle. But yeah.. Mackmyra.. makes sense given the movie setting.

In my opinion, at first impact, the aspect of bottle is fundamental in our mind. It's a psicologic aspect.

I have to admit that a nice bottle will enhance my enjoyment as well. I know a lot of people claim to be immune to marketing and packaging, and I bet serious scotch nerds that care about phenols, batch numbers and the like are more immune than most... But I think it affects everyone at least a little. For me, I just try not to let things like that get in the way. I don't think it's really influenced my buying that much... But I did recently buy a bottle of American corn whiskey partially because it had a nice package. I'd been meaning to try that sort of stuff for a while, but the wooden top on the cork and the handwritten batch number on the side made me think that the distillery at least cared about what they were doing, and to me that was a good sign. (As it happens, I'm not the hugest fan of what I'd bought, but it's not horrible or anything.)

Speaking of bottle appearance, I was wondering what people thought of That Boutique-y Whisky Company in particular. It's a moot point for me as I'm unable to order them, but if nothing else those bottles sure look interesting. Thoughts?

You can find the range here, by the way: masterofmalt.com/that-boutique-y-whisky-co…

The one problem I see with the Boutique-y Whisky Company releases is that those bottles are 50cl as compared to the normal 70cl size. The prices are also quite high for the amount of whisky you are getting. I can't comment on the quality of the whisky. I wouldn't mind trying a bottle or two except for that size difference.

I'd like to say I'm part of the crowd who's impervious to bottle appeal, but I've often thought about how the bottle makes the liquid inside more of a "thing." ("Did I just pay $50 for 30 future ephemeral drinking experiences? No -- I paid $50 for that badass bottle of Ardbeg 10!") I think the bottle's mere existence -- separate from whatever design qualities it might have -- makes the purchase more justifiable in the buyer's mind.

Think about the language people use when they buy a bottle. Did they just add gain control of 750 ML of liquid that they get to consume in the future? No -- they "added a bottle to their cabinet."

Try this one: Assuming you could dole out the exact same 750 ML of a whisky to achieve the exact same drinking experiences, would you prefer a glass bottle or big Ziploc freezer bag full of the stuff? I'd want the bottle and bet most others would too. (I know there are clear practical reasons to prefer the bottle, but I hope that won't obscure my point.)

As a last riff on my point here, I'll compare a whisky purchase to a clothing purchase. When you buy a bottle, you're really exchanging your money for X number of future drams that you get to smell and swallow. When you buy a shirt, you're really exchanging your money for X number of times you get to wear it. Despite both of these items having zero practical value while in storage and only manifesting value while being consumed, we still just like to own them, don't we? I nurse the last fingers of each bottle because I don't want to see my cabinet lessened. I think my wife "enjoys" (on some level) her drawer full of good blue jeans even when she's not wearing them.

OK, I gotta stop before I go completely off into a critique of materialism, but the bottle question got me going. :) I'll end by echoing whoever said "It's what's inside that counts!"

@OlJas Insightful contribution! Thanks. From consumer point of view (as opposed to collector) one would logically only be concerned with the experience nosing/drinking, and not the ownership and pure logistics of keeping a bottle in your possession. If you were only interested in the whisky itself you would ideally just have the dram appear magically in your glass before consumption. Or in a more realistic world, a container that colapsed when pouring and never letting any air in (like bag-in-box wine), that would prevent oxidation and reduce storing space (a half bottle takes up the same space as a full). But how many would actually prefer magically appearing drams or bag-in-boxes over a proper bottle? The bottle is definitely a part if the experience.

Wait, magically appearing drams would be absolutely AWESOME! I take back what I said above, I'd chose magic drams over bottles every time!

@OlJas Well said. It's about the experience, and many things contribute to that -- including packaging. I can vouch for the clothes thing, too... I'm a bit of a clothes horse myself. I have items that I seldom wear, but the very act of having them gives me some satisfaction in and of itself.

Now, what that says about me..? I don't know. :)