One of the most intimidating aspects of attending a whisky tasting as a novice is feeling like you’re doing everything ‘wrong’ — from swirling to nosing to sharing (out loud) any tasting notes. Even the most knowledgeable whisky whiz doesn’t know everything. Therein lies the inspiration behind Crowded Barrel Whiskey Co, an Austin, Texas-based distillery making award-winning crowdfunded whiskeys and involving its community in every decision. Since opening in August 2018, the distillery has become a whisky haven for locals and out-of-state tourists. Its co-founders Rex Williams and Daniel Whittington have mastered making people feel an emotion sometimes amiss in whisky: fun.
“When I got into whisky, it felt like there were two worlds: either you didn’t know much about whisky, or you were so obsessive and kind of a jerk about it. Sometimes, I felt like an outlier like, ‘I like whisky, but I don’t like it as much as some of these guys.’ Then, on the other end, it was like, ‘I like it way more than people who don’t want to sit there talking about whisky,’” says Whittington. “And we helped create this meeting place for people who were neither. They knew a lot, but they also weren’t jerks. They also wanted a place to talk about whisky where they didn’t feel ashamed to ask questions. So, we found a huge community of those people, and that’s been my favourite part of this whole thing.”
The two Austinites came up with the idea of opening Crowded Barrel after fostering a massive following through two of their hit whisky-centric YouTube channels, Whiskey Vault and Whiskey Tribe. The duo doubled down on those successes with the launch of the Whiskey Tribe Patreon to finance the distillery through subscriptions.
“The most fun part is the tribe part of Whiskey Tribe. It’s an excellent excuse to bring people together. There are a handful of tasting notes and a discussion about the distillery, but we stop talking about the whisky quickly. Then, we’re just living life, having fun, catching up with each other, and making those connections,” says Williams. “So, the whisky is the vehicle to bring humans together, facilitate good experiences, make fond memories, and reinforce those connections. It’s what life’s all about.”
Chatting with Williams and Whittington is refreshing; they have successfully balanced business with play while maintaining a friendship that stemmed from a serendipitous moment more than a decade ago.
In May 2000, Williams’ father Roy, a New York Times bestselling business author and consultant, founded Wizard Academy, an unconventional nonprofit business school. All the clients he helped turn into successful entrepreneurs and CEOs became the first investors to help fund and establish the school. After a few years, Roy and his wife Pennie sought to hire a vice chancellor to help facilitate the classes and be the consummate host, providing unique experiences for the busy professionals that attended the school from all over the US. Little did they know help would come by way of their son’s out-of-character acceptance of a house party invitation.
Williams’ oldest childhood friend invited him to his brother-in-law’s home for a St Patrick’s Day party. Williams mentions that to this day he does not know why he ended up there because he is “not a house party guy”, but the decision to attend would be rewarding for him and his parents. The brother-in-law and party host was Whittington.
Whittington’s hosting skills, which included presenting food and drinks while explaining their relevance to the holiday, caught Williams’ attention. “I was like, ‘Holy hell! This guy is very articulate and personable. That’s exactly the skill set my parents need at their school,’” he recalls. A few weeks later, Williams shared with his parents that he had found the best chancellor candidate. So, he invited Whittington to coffee to discuss the opportunity at Wizard Academy. Although they never spoke at the party, Williams felt confident Whittington was the ideal fit for the role.
The timing could not have been any more perfect. Whittington says, “I’d been on the road as a studio and touring musician for 15 years. I was watching my kids grow up via recorded video and text message — and I thought, ‘I think we need a new plan.’” So, between working in his recording studio in Austin and Nashville, he was determined to find stable roots requiring less travel. Whittington took Williams up on the coffee meet-up, secured an interview, and landed the job. After he quickly found his footing from diving into the business world of entrepreneurship and marketing, Williams wanted to find a niche topic Whittington felt proficient in to begin teaching courses at the school. Whittington had always had a keen interest in whisky. Subsequently, this passion and extensive knowledge led to the launch of the Wizard Academy’s whisky sommelier programme in September 2015, which was spearheaded by Whittington.
At the time, several programmes in the spirits and beer industry offered training in distilling, brewing, and the ins and outs of a distillery. However, there weren’t any classes geared toward educating people about the marketing and storytelling that draws whisky lovers. Since Whittington had what he calls a “tiptoed history” in the wine sommelier programme, he decided to combine his favourite components from that experience with his marketing training through the Wizard Academy to build its whisky marketing school.
Meanwhile, Williams shot videos for the school using a patented video production set-up he had created and used with business owners for about 20 years. Whittington also began utilising Williams’ system to shoot updates for students. Then, one day, during their lunch break, Williams asked Whittington why he wasn’t creating videos to draw attention to their whisky school; this enquiry sparked the idea for their YouTube channel, Whiskey Vault.
Business-savvy Williams figured that by hosting live whisky reviews on YouTube, they would be able to attract a target demographic inclined to join the sommelier programme. “Anybody who takes whisky so seriously that they’re willing to get on YouTube and watch somebody sip whisky, philosophise, and get tasting notes is a good target market for this educational programme,” Williams reasons.
This YouTube channel served a two-fold purpose. It first drew attention to the school’s new whisky sommelier course. Secondly, Williams’ video clients wanted his opinion on whether hosting their content on YouTube would be beneficial. Thus, by getting more involved with Whittington’s video whisky reviews, Williams could conduct a case study to present to his clients. Williams’ and Whittington’s reviews received resounding interest from whisky fans. Within a year and a half, the Whiskey Vault became the largest whisky review channel on YouTube.
Though Williams wasn’t making money from the reviews, he mentions he found the video-making process “a lot more interesting”. He saw the opportunity for them to leverage the channel’s momentum and generate financial yield. But there was a challenge: since the Wizard Academy owned Whiskey Vault as a section 501(c)(3) nonprofit organisation, there wasn’t an avenue for them to profit from that channel.
So, the duo had to start a new channel to become a money-making venture. Accordingly, Whiskey Tribe was born. “One of the reasons we were confident we could even pull off a second channel is that, by that time, people were flooding us with bottled donations — it ended up being a couple of thousand bottles. People wanted to see the bottle they sent get reviewed and get a shout-out,” says Williams.
The pair filled the Whiskey Vault with what they thought would only be eight months’ worth of reviews — just to release content and increase visibility. However, Williams says that the Whiskey Vault “took on a life of its own”. From the powerful traction, fervour, and rapt engagement already garnered from their community, it was no surprise that after Whiskey Tribe formally launched in October 2017, it swiftly gained momentum.
The buzz from their whisky channels inspired them to take on an even more ambitious goal. Williams states, “We thought, ‘If people are this interested in the reviews, tastings, experiences, and culture that we’ve put together with the Whiskey Tribe, would they be willing to financially back a crowdsourced whisky distillery?’” So, they posed this question to their community via the fundraising platform Patreon: do we want to start the world’s first ever crowdsourced whiskey distillery?
Williams and Whittington provided an overview of what a crowdsourced initiative would entail — and the fans voted with their dollars. “It was a tremendous confirmation that there was a lot of interest in us taking people on this journey of starting a distillery from scratch,” Williams says. “But the thing that was most interesting to us wasn’t just their money, but how do we get them into this conversation and process? How do we give them decision-making abilities into what we’re distilling, ageing, finishing, and sourcing?” While funding was integral to Crowded Barrel Whiskey Co, the team felt it was even more important to grant their members decision-making capacity.
At most distilleries, only a small group of individuals are responsible for sampling and quality control. However, Crowded Barrel has always striven to exist foremost for exploration and unearthing the nuances of whisky making. “From that idea of exploration, bringing people into the process, and giving them a voice through voting — versus limiting it to decisions typically made by a small group of people in a room with Glencairn[s] — is where we allow the people who are financially backing this to make decisions,” Williams explains.
The first 53-gallon barrel that Crowded Barrel filled was a single malt aptly named the Single Malt of Magnificence. The acronym became Single MOM. This single malt, aged for approximately three and a half years, was distilled by Deb Niemeyer, Crowded Barrel’s first distiller. It won Best Grain to Glass Malt Whiskey at last year’s Texas Whiskey Festival. Williams adds, “Winning that award right out the gate was like, ‘Wow! This is not only a fun thing to see what happens, but we can make truly legitimately good stuff whenever you have a giant collective of enthusiastic and engaged whisky nerds getting deep into this process, then parsing out options and figuring out what’s going to be the most interesting path for us to take.’”
Kyle Wells is Crowded Barrel’s current head distiller. He is responsible for keeping up with the ‘magnificent bastards’ (the endearing moniker given to members of the Whiskey Tribe) and the Whiskey Tribe Patreon. Wells also makes what Williams coined as “whisky quests”. First, they decide on what type of whisky they want to make, and then the quests are decision points in the linear order of what ingredients to decide on to create a new type of whisky. Wells is experimenting with oat whisky, which will be available later this year.
Moreover, the distilling team is developing a handful of expressions for Crowded Barrel’s core collection. Williams adds, “When somebody loves something, you can’t be like, ‘Yeah, that was a fun experiment, but now we’ve moved on to 100 different things.’” Thus, they have resolved to create a core portfolio with whiskies that can be consistently crafted and sold year-round. Currently, a single malt and a bourbon are in the works.
While keeping exploration as their DNA, the Crowded Barrel crew endeavour to continue empowering their community through the crowdsourcing model. Williams mentions how impactful their members’ input is in selecting grain blends, speciality barrels, and more. He adds, “The thing that’s always been interesting to me since the beginning is the role of whisky as a catalyst to bring people together. Crowdsourcing is a phenomenal resource for tapping into people who want to explore with you. It’s a fantastic way to make whisky.”
