What will 2024 bring? Plans and Predictions

The New Year is always full of hope and promise. It is where my best laid plans go to die…

Last year I had limited success in my whisky plans:

• I opened only 3 of the possible 9 bottles I had earmarked for opening

• I finished only 3 of the 16 bottles I thought I had a chance to finish

• I had hoped to end the year with as many sealed bottles as I started, but barring a miracle I will be 5 over. And only 3 of those can be blamed on gifts (one of which I opened).

• I thought my intake would go up a bit but consumption seems to have been stagnant.

For 2024 I would like to balance my ideal wishes with pragmatic attainable goals.

In terms of consumption, I don’t plan on making any predictions. There are too many variables. Will I get sick and lose my sense of taste and smell? Will the kids need help studying? How many times will I be able to share a dram with someone else? How many tastings can organize? I will monitor my consumption to ensure it doesn’t go too high, but I have no specific goals.

What I do hope is that I will have more opportunities to share my collection with others, whether at planned tastings or as guests in my home.

In terms of purchases, my ideal would be to end the year with as many bottles as I started. I realize I am starting from a disadvantage. I am committed to at least 2 bottles from North of 7, and possibly a spare bottle of the 2023 APCS. I will still look to pick up special bottles that come my way (Amrut, Caol Ila, Milk & Honey). Toward the end of 2023, I relaxed my price ceiling significantly. If I have any real resolution for 2024, it is to focus on quality and reduce quantity. The prospect that AP not be releasing another CS, and the increasing likelihood of nothing I will want from Hiram Walker may decrease FOMO. The prospect of needing to buy a new home to store any more bottles I buy will hopefully decrease FORO. Opening shortly after purchasing and eschewing back up bottles may be my salvation.

I hope to balance every purchase by either opening or gifting a bottle from my collection. Let’s see how that goes.

I do have a number of bottles I would like to open.

This year I will list the ones that I have a reasonable chance of success with:

• Amrut Port Cask (KWM exclusive)

• Amrut Portonova batch 6

• Amrut Intermediate Sherry batch 20

• Caol Ila Peated Cask Strength (one of several OB/IB)

• Milk and Honey Belgian ale cask-matured whisky

• Compass Box Orchard House

• North of 7 cask 69

And here are a few I would LIKE to open:

• Bowmore Laimrig or Tempest

• Glenfarclas 105 NAS

• Ardbeg Uigeadail

• Dillon’s Rye 1 Cask Strength (500 cc and/or 2 cc release)

• Glendronach CS batch 2

• Macallan 18 YO CS Signatory bottling

Open bottle cabinet management is going to be key. I can’t keep opening new bottles and not finishing any bottles. While I am being more judicious in my choices so that I am less likely to be left with orphan bottles, I still have many that need to be culled. Some are heels, others may be decent but I never reach for them.

Bottles I think I have a chance to finally finish this year:

• Bladnoch 12 YO Sherry-matiured 55%

• Bruichladdich Peat

• Bruichladdich “the Laddie Classic”

• Octomore 9.3

• Caol Ila 17 YO unpeated CS

• Forty Creek Portwood Reserve

• Highwood 90/20 Burgundy label

• Springbank 12 YO CS batch 11

• Stagg Jr. batch 8

• Talisker 57º N

Open bottles I would like to give away if someone will take them:

• Adelphi Glenborrodale batch 2

• Teeling Poitín

• Kirkwall Bay single malt

• Buffalo Trace Old Weller Antique 107

• Compass Box The Peat Monster

• Lot 40 Peated Quarter Cask

• Forty Creek Evolution

• Forty Creek Master’s Cut

• Forty Creek 3-Grain Harmony

• Forty Creek Founder’s Reserve

• Gooderham and Worts 4-grain

• Ileach Peated CS Islay whisky

• Last Straw Whisky in the 6

• Old Scout Smooth Ambler 10 YO CS

• Solan Number 1 Malt whisky (Blended malt)

I know that (especially in the first 5 years of my hobby) I was a bit overenthusiastic in my purchases, and overestimated my ability to get through whiskies. Now that I know what I like, I have a number of bottles that I am unlikely to ever open voluntarily. I have about a dozen bottles I would love to trade or transfer at original cost if there was someone interested in acquiring them. There are also a few that I like but have too many multiples of that, should I find the proper recipient, would make excellent gifts.

To summarize, few hard predictions, a lot of wishes, and a hope that my whisky journey will be filled with enjoyment.

@Nozinan I would take that Old Scout 10 off your hands in a blink.

@Astroke Hopefully we will have a chance to get that done in 2024...

My plan, as always, is to buy less whisky, due to storage space issues. At the moment I have my eye on the JW Year of the Dragon Blue Label, but only because I have some LCBO gift cards to use (and yes, I know it probably won't sell out and will likely get heavily discounted in Dec 2024, like last year's Chinese New Year edition, but that's not a chance I want to take, given I was born in the Year of the Dragon, oh so many years ago...).