Dalmore's older bottles behave exactly as their prices suggest. The 12 is the one that breaks ranks, priced well under its flavour-crowd while the rest run steeply over.
Walk the Dalmore range at Dan Murphy's and the prices run from solidly premium to eye-watering. The surprise is where the value lands. Set each bottle against its crowd, the ten whiskies the model rates nearest it on flavour, and the 12-year-old comes out cheap, not dear. The two bottles above it, and the one above those, tell the usual Dalmore story of a steep tariff. The brand's middle price this week is $384, which tells you most of the range sits in serious-money territory and only one bottle breaks the pattern in the buyer's favour.
The common thread is sherry. Dalmore is a Highland distillery built on oloroso casks, and the influence runs the whole way up: that dark, orange-edged, dried-fruit richness is the house signature, growing deeper and more concentrated with each older bottling. So the question across these bottles is not whether you like the style. It is how much of the same style you are willing to pay a premium for.
The Dalmore 12 is the one bottle in the range that costs less than the whiskies it tastes like. Climb past it and the price stops tracking the whisky and starts tracking the name on the box.
The Dalmore Cigar Malt Reserve is $231 this week. The whiskies the model lines up closest to it change hands at roughly half that. In the gap between is a name, a cigar on the box, and not a lot of extra liquid.
Every Dalmore on the shelf this week asks more than its rivals do. The only question is how much more, and the answer runs from a lot to an eye-watering amount.
| bottle | region | latest ticket | read | window price | CE 360° mean | premium | shelf rank | per std drink | drink rank | content |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dalmore 21 Year Old Malt Whisky | Highlands | $989.99 | observed | $989.99 | $678.28 | 31.5% | #37 of 38 | $42.68 | #36 of 36 | 0 |
| The Dalmore 12 Year Old Scotch Whisky | Highlands | $148.99 | observed | $148.99 | $121.32 | 18.6% | #27 of 38 | $6.74 | #25 of 36 | 0 |
| The Dalmore 18 Year Old Scotch Whisky | Highlands | $535.99 | observed | $535.99 | $398.74 | 25.6% | #34 of 38 | $22.57 | #34 of 36 | 0 |
| The Dalmore Cigar Malt Reserve Scotch Whisky | Highlands | $230.99 | observed | $230.99 | $174.26 | 24.6% | #33 of 38 | $9.51 | #29 of 36 | 0 |