Buffalo Trace

You can tell a lot about a person by what's in their glass. Sometimes it says, I appreciate true craftsmanship. And sometimes it says, I will definitely try to explain cryptocurrency to you at this party. I'm Tim Fulton, and this is Character Proof.

Every episode we pour a different whiskey, break down the actual tasting notes, and then vividly imagine the exact type of person who drinks it on purpose. So grab a glass, pull up a chair, and get ready for some tasting notes, and a whole lot of character flaws.

Let's get pouring. Let's start with the actual whiskey, because somewhere under all the noise there is one. And it's lovely. The nose is warm brown sugar and vanilla, a ribbon of toffee, a little mint, a little molasses,

soft oak underneath. Friendly, open, absolutely nothing to decode. The palate follows through, caramel and vanilla upfront, a gentle sweetness, a light peppery spice arriving late and politely, like it knocked first.

The finish is medium warm and smooth, brown sugar fading into oak. This is a genuinely well made, easy going, crowd pleasing bourbon. And for most of its life, it sat on shelves at around $25, minding its own business, being exactly that.

And then the internet found it. And now it lives behind the counter, and you cannot talk about this whiskey anymore. You can only talk about finding this whiskey, which is a different hobby entirely. And nothing in the bottle changed.

Same mash bill, same warehouses, same honest caramel and mint bourbon it always was. What changed is that scarcity became the flavor. And no one on earth savors that flavor more deeply than Craig. Because Craig does not really collect bourbon anymore.

Craig collects grievances. And this bottle is his reference vintage. Craig is 44, works in logistics, which is ironic, he will tell you given the state of bourbon distribution and he will tell you.

And Craig can recite the price history of this bottle the way other men recite their children's birthdays, which is to say more accurately, $24 in 2019. He was there. He bought two.

This is the founding document of Craig's entire personality, his Gettysburg. And every conversation with Craig is a commemorative reenactment. You mentioned you tried a nice bourbon. Craig's eyebrows begin to rise.

You have maybe four seconds. And then it comes the lecture, delivered in the weary tone of a man who has seen empires fall. The allocation, the secondary market, the flippers.

Craig pronounces flippers the way other people pronounce arsonists. The retail markup, the county by county drop schedules and the phrase always the phrase if you can find it. Craig knows a guy.

Craig knows several guys. There is a clerk named Dana at a store Craig calls my store who sees Craig's truck pull in on delivery day and feels her soul briefly leave her body. Craig does not scalp bottles.

He wants this on the record and there is apparently a record. Craig is a man of principle who simply believes the people deserve to know what he paid, what you paid, what the store two towns over is asking, and what it all means for America. He has a spreadsheet.

The spreadsheet has tabs. He is a member of four bourbon Facebook groups and a moderator of one, a position he describes without smiling as a responsibility. He has been to the distillery twice on the tour where he asked the guide a question that

was not a question. It was a filibuster with an upward inflection at the end. And he refers to both visits as research. His wife has stopped attending parties where Craig might encounter another bourbon

guy because two Craigs in one kitchen generate a feedback loop of grievance you can hear from the driveway. Each price point confirmed, each outrage seconded. A support group that only ever deepens the wound.

Here is the part Craig has lost track of, the part that has quietly slipped out the back door of the whole crusade. Craig has the bottle. Craig has, in fact, six of them standing in his dining room like a policy statement.

What Craig no longer has is the experience of drinking any of it. Because a bottle opened is an asset destroyed. And somewhere along the way, the $25 bourbon he genuinely loved became a $25 bourbon he genuinely guards.

The whiskey was the point once. He can almost remember it. Beautiful, easy, sweet. You drank it on the porch without checking what it was worth first.

Because it wasn't worth anything. It was just good. And here's the affectionate part, because there's always one. Craig is not wrong.

That's the maddening thing. The prices are silly. The flipping is real. And underneath the spreadsheet is a guy who fell hard for an honest bourbon and

then had to watch the world turn his easy pleasure into a scavenger hunt. The lecture is grief, if you listen to it right. So here is the prescription, Craig, and it's medical. Go home, take one of the six off the shelf, and open it tonight.

Pour it for somebody who doesn't know what it costs. Because the whiskey is still $25 worth of wonderful. And it always was. And the only person still charging you the markup, Craig, at this point, is you.

Well, the glass is empty, and the verdict is officially in. That's going to do it for this episode of Character Proof. If you enjoyed the show, please hit subscribe, leave us a five-star review, and share it with that one friend whose whiskey shelf costs more than their car.

You know exactly who I'm talking about. Want us to put your go-to bottle to the test? Drop your favorite pour in the reviews or hit us up on socials, and we might just profile you next.

Until next time, drink responsibly, pour generously, and always check your character flaws. Cheers.