1/The blended-Scotch shelf offers no bargains this week, only well-known names at full price. It's the catch-all for blends from across Scotland, in no single region. Twenty-seven bottles, each priced live at Dan Murphy's. Cheap end, big-format; dear end, prestige.
2/I last covered this shelf a fortnight back. Since then, seventeen of the twenty-seven have a different price or have swapped the zone they fall in against their own jury — call it sixty-three per cent. That earns a fresh look rather than a rerun.
3/The method: hold each ticket up to the fair value set by its own ten-seat jury, measured as how far above that mark it sits. Every bottle lands at or above its mean, none beneath it, so "closest" here means the smallest overshoot — still no discount.
4/Bottle size carries a lot here. Ballantine's Finest litre at $69 lands exactly on its mean, nothing over. Cutty Sark 700mL $59 is next. Then Johnnie Walker Red, 1.125L at $79 and litre at $69, and McAllister 1.5L at $97, furthest out at +1.12%. None of the five clears that.
5/Pool the shelf's own reviews and most of it is filler: "many", "leading", "impressive" — none telling you how a dram tastes. Scrape that off and caramel and a peppery edge remain. Read it as a faint signal across the whole shelf, never a verdict on any single bottle above.
6/Dear end, the prestige tier. Compass Box Peat Monster $102, roughly 18% over its mean. Johnnie Walker Blue litre $366, near 17%, the 700 at $242. Then Monkey Shoulder 1L $115, Green Label $107. Most honest buy looks like the $59 Cutty Sark — unless your local beats it. Tell me.
| End | Item | Price | Gap % | Priced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hot 1 | Ballantine's Finest Blended Scotch Whisky 1L | $69 | +0.00% | observed 2026-10-15 |
| Hot 2 | Cutty Sark Original Blended Scotch Whisky 700mL | $59 | +0.14% | observed 2026-10-15 |
| Hot 3 | Johnnie Walker Red Label Blended Scotch Whisky 1.125L | $79 | +0.56% | observed 2026-10-15 |
| (hot) | Johnnie Walker Red Label Blended Scotch Whisky 1L | $69 | +0.60% | observed 2026-10-15 |
| (hot) | McAllister Blended Scotch Whisky 1.5L | $97 | +1.12% | observed 2026-10-15 |
| Cold 1 | Compass Box The Peat Monster Blended Malt Scotch Whisky 700mL | $102 | +17.78% | observed 2026-10-15 |
| Cold 2 | Johnnie Walker Blue Label Blended Scotch Whisky 1L | $366 | +16.79% | observed 2026-10-15 |
| Cold 3 | Monkey Shoulder Blended Malt Scotch Whisky 1L | $115 | +16.54% | observed 2026-10-15 |
| (cold) | Johnnie Walker Blue Label Blended Scotch Whisky 700mL | $242 | +16.24% | observed 2026-10-15 |
| (cold) | Johnnie Walker Green Label Blended Scotch Whisky 700mL | $107 | +8.67% | observed 2026-10-15 |
None recorded.
Whole Shelf, scope Multi-Regional Blend (region), vintage 2026-10-15.1, pack region-multi-regional-blend-aggregate.json. This is the non-geographic catch-all: blends drawn from across Scotland that belong to no single region, not a place on the map. 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 27 of 27 priced live in the 2026-10-15 harvest (100%). Several members are headlined in non-700mL sizes (1L, 1.125L, 1.5L); sizes are named where quoted. Repeat scope: last led 2026-10-01-whole-shelf-multi-regional-blend.md 14 days earlier — CHANGED (17 of 27 bottles moved price or 360° zone, 63%, 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 27-bottle ranking.
{
"date": "2026-10-15T00:00:00.000Z",
"title": "Blends shelf: the value end is litre-bottle Johnnie and Ballantine's",
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"derives_from": "none — standalone whole-shelf roundup; no long-form article backs it this cycle",
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"format_note": "Whole Shelf, scope Multi-Regional Blend (region), vintage 2026-10-15.1, pack region-multi-regional-blend-aggregate.json. This is the non-geographic catch-all: blends drawn from across Scotland that belong to no single region, not a place on the map. 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 27 of 27 priced live in the 2026-10-15 harvest (100%). Several members are headlined in non-700mL sizes (1L, 1.125L, 1.5L); sizes are named where quoted. Repeat scope: last led 2026-10-01-whole-shelf-multi-regional-blend.md 14 days earlier — CHANGED (17 of 27 bottles moved price or 360° zone, 63%, 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 27-bottle ranking.",
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{
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{
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{
"item": "Johnnie Walker Blue Label Blended Scotch Whisky 1L",
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{
"item": "Johnnie Walker Blue Label Blended Scotch Whisky 1L",
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{
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{
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{
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{
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{
"item": "Johnnie Walker Green Label Blended Scotch Whisky 700mL",
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"83449": 96.99,
"93472": 241.9,
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