High West Leverages Innovation To Stand Out In Crowded Whiskey Category
October 14, 2024High West, the Utah-based whiskey player that’s been part of the Constellation Brands portfolio since 2016, has been on a long-term growth run, with U.S. volume increasing from about 100,000 cases in 2018 to 170,000 cases last year. Innovation has played a key role in distinguishing the brand within the marketplace, with signature offerings including Campfire, the distillery’s blend of Bourbon, rye, and Scotch, and Bourye, a blend of rye and Bourbon.
One of High West’s sought-after whiskies is its annual Midwinter Night’s Dram bottling, which was released last week. The 12th edition in the series, this year’s expression of the Tawny and Ruby Port cask-finished whiskey was bottled at 49.3% abv and retails at $150.
In distillery manager Isaac Winter’s view, the most successful innovations come from finding an honest connection between the distillery or brand and the new release. An example of this is Campfire, which blends American and Scotch whiskies. Multi-nation blends remain a novelty in the industry, and Winter says the concept fits with High West’s DNA since blends have been in the brand’s portfolio from the early days, such as through High West Double Rye, a blend of younger and older whiskies.
“I think innovation becomes ever more important when you get a more and more crowded marketplace,” said Winter. “But there has to be some sort of story along with it. What’s the connection with the distiller to the product? Whiskey with a really good story can catch the consumer’s attention.”
In addition to this year’s Midwinter release, High West will be launching an Oloroso Sherry Finish whiskey later this month. The whiskey adds a new innovation to the High West Cask Finished series but also serves as an introduction to the distillery’s less commonly used high-wheat mashbill. “It’s 70% corn, 16% wheat, and 14% malted barley. So it’s softer, it’s rounder, it’s more supple. Then to add a little bit of structure to that, we’ve added some MGP rye to it dating as old as 2012,” Winter said, adding that this is the first time the high-wheat whiskey is the majority of a blend. Winter also hinted that High West has one more innovation hitting shelves before the end of the year.
High West sees its single barrel program serving as both an innovation pipeline and a way give fans of the distillery something unique. “Some of our most sought-after whiskies—think Midwinter Night’s Dram, think Yippie Ki-Yay—those came out of our single barrel program,” said Winter, adding that Port was chosen for Midwinter to complement the fruity component of the MGP-sourced whiskey High West was using for Rendezvous Rye.
Winter explains that High West’s early innovations were born out of necessity—their own distillate was too young to release—but that the brand’s early releases shaped the distillery’s DNA. “We’re always going to go out to the market and source whiskies that we find interesting and beautiful and provide either a fun accent or a really useful base to blend on top of,” he said. “We’ve got a 6,000-liter, four-size copper pot still from Scotland, and we’ve been making rye whiskey, malt whiskey, and Bourbon ever since.”—Shane English
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