Scotch at Dan Murphy's, priced every Thursday. Lagavulin 16 and the ten bottles that define it.
Dan Murphy's · week of 2026-11-05

From the front page · Thread · The whole shelf · 2026-10-15

Bourbon's value end is two names, the dear end runs to $1000

1/The supermarket bourbons hold the value end; the Van Winkles sit furthest from fair. Forty-eight bottles, all priced live at Dan Murphy's today. Two names anchor the cheap side. The pricey side reaches a full thousand dollars.

2/I pulled the Bourbon shelf once more today. Against the read two weeks ago, 36 of 48 bottles sit at a new price or a new 360° zone — 75% of them. So this is current data, not a rerun of what I posted last time.

3/Here is the method. I compare each sticker price to the consensus its own ten-seat jury sets, written as the premium on top. Every bottle prices above its mean, so the "nearest" ones are simply the least inflated, not something cheap to grab.

4/Nearest to fair: Wild Turkey and Buffalo Trace. Wild Turkey 81p at $51, scarcely above its jury at well under 1%. Buffalo Trace at $58, the litre $90. Basil Hayden's $80 and High West American Prairie $50 fill out the honest group, all within roughly 2%.

5/Collect every review across this shelf and the vocabulary settles on rye, cornbread, leather, cherry, with a line of tobacco and baking spice running under it. That is the aggregate Bourbon signature across 37 reviews. It describes no individual bottle named above.

6/Pricey end: Whipper Snapper Upshot, Australian "whiskey", $100, near 50% over. Two Old Rip Van Winkles, $900 and the 12yo $1000, each near 43%. Blanton's SFTB $304. Gentleman Jack, Tennessee, $66. Soundest honest Bourbon looks like the $51 Wild Turkey. Miss one? Your local?

Sources

  • Coverage: 48 of 48 members priced live in the 2026-10-15 harvest (100%) — grounding.coverage (n_observed/n_members).
  • Price band $50.00–$1000.00, median $80.50; scope-average CE 360° mean ≈ $96.80 — grounding.price_band, grounding.ce_360_mean_avg.
  • Shelf character words (style-level, parent-relative, pooled over 37 reviews): rye, cornbread, proof, leather, balanced, cherry, bourbons, baking, tobacco — grounding.words (noise tokens "original" and the self-referential "proof"/"bourbons" set aside as non-descriptive or category-naming). No per-bottle tasting notes are asserted; the words describe the shelf, not any one bottle.
  • Scope mix: this is a whisky-style aggregate, so it carries some non-Kentucky entries classified as "bourbon-style" — the Whipper Snapper Upshot is an Australian whiskey and Jack Daniel's Gentleman Jack is a Tennessee whiskey. They are presented as the data classifies them, not re-labelled.
  • Cool-down (decision 15): Bourbon (whisky_style): led 2026-10-01-whole-shelf-bourbon.md 14 day(s) earlier — CHANGED, may lead again; the piece must say what changed: 36 of 48 bottles changed price or 360° zone (75%; the bar is 10%) (2026-10-01.1 to 2026-10-15.1). The "36 of 48" count is the cool-down change figure, not a claims entry; it is a count of how many bottles differ from the earlier build, stated as a plain observation, never a trend or repricing claim.
End Item Price Gap % Priced
Hot 1 Wild Turkey Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey 81p 700mL $51 +0.45% observed 2026-10-15
Hot 2 Buffalo Trace Bourbon 700mL $58 +0.56% observed 2026-10-15
Hot 3 Buffalo Trace Bourbon 1L $90 +0.65% observed 2026-10-15
(hot) Basil Hayden's Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey 700mL $80 +1.87% observed 2026-10-15
(hot) High West Distillery American Prairie Bourbon Whiskey 700mL $50 +2.15% observed 2026-10-15
Cold 1 Whipper Snapper Upshot Australian Whiskey 700mL $100 +50.12% observed 2026-10-15
Cold 2 Old Rip Van Winkle 10 Year Old 107 Proof Bourbon Whiskey 700mL $900 +43.67% observed 2026-10-15
Cold 3 Old Rip Van Winkle 12 Year Old Special Reserve 750mL $1000 +42.74% observed 2026-10-15
(cold) Blanton's Straight From The Barrel Bourbon 700mL $304 +34.90% observed 2026-10-15
(cold) Jack Daniel's Gentleman Jack Tennessee Whiskey 700mL $66 +22.56% observed 2026-10-15

Omissions

None recorded.

Notes for reviewer

  • Flagged: repeat scope. Bourbon last led a thread on 2026-10-01, which clears the 4-week cool-down only because its finding changed (36 of 48 bottles moved price or 360° zone since, 75%). The post states that change as a dated count, not as a trend or a market move; please confirm post 2 does not read as "prices are rising/falling".
  • "Hot"/"cold" are value labels only (premium over each bottle's own jury), never sales velocity or a trend; no bottle sits under its own mean, so nothing here is a discount.
  • The shelf is a whisky-style aggregate and includes non-Kentucky "bourbon-style" members (Whipper Snapper Upshot, Australian; Gentleman Jack, Tennessee). Posts present them as the data classifies them; please confirm this reads as a data note, not a quality judgement on those pours.

Format note

Whole Shelf, scope Bourbon (whisky_style), vintage 2026-10-15.1, pack whisky_style-bourbon-aggregate.json. Gap basis PERCENTAGE; ce_gap_pct=(price−CE 360° mean)/price×100, each bottle's premium over its own CE 360° consensus; 'hot'=smallest premium (least over fair value), 'cold'=largest. No bottle sits below its own mean, so 'hot' is not a bargain or a discount. 'Hot'/'cold' are value labels only, never velocity or trend. Coverage 48 of 48 priced live in the 2026-10-15 harvest (100%). The shelf is a whisky-style aggregate, so it carries some Australian and Tennessee 'bourbon-style' entries alongside the Kentucky straights; they are presented as the data classifies them. Repeat scope: last led 2026-10-01-whole-shelf-bourbon.md 14 days earlier — CHANGED (36 of 48 bottles moved price or 360° zone, 75%, bar 10%), so it may lead again and the post states what changed. Sources holds the stored top/bottom notable-mover cut, not the full 48-bottle ranking.

Frontmatter as merged
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source file: drafts/2026-10-15-whole-shelf-bourbon.md