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It is that time of the year and my thoughts turn to the holiday whiskey promotions. This starts the time when distilleries promote their whiskey with holiday packaging and other such items. It has not always been so and I thought I would look at these promotions.

For most of the 19th century, whiskey distillers did not promote their whiskey with special advertising. This is because the distillers sold their whiskey in the barrel. It would be hard to promote a whole barrel to a consumer. It did happen occasionally, but it was rare for a consumer to purchase a whole barrel to take home with them. When bottling became the standard for selling whiskey to consumers in the 1890s, there was still not the holiday advertising that we see today. I have yet to find a holiday advertisement for whiskey before Prohibition. I think this is because of the Prohibition movement that distillers were reluctant to use the holidays to promote whiskey sales.

After Prohibition, distillers had some self-imposed restrictions on whiskey advertising such as not using women in advertising and anything that would promote underage drinking such as using Santa Claus in advertising. In the late 1930s however, Glenmore introduced a holiday packaging for Kentucky Tavern Bourbon. It was a paper mache’ snowman that fit over a 4/5 quart bottle of Kentucky Tavern. You also start seeing magazine advertising with a holiday theme. Christmas had become very commercial by this time and distillers were quick to take advantage of this commercialization. Besides magazine advertising, they started releasing special bottles in holiday cartons that were a gift box that did not need to be wrapped.

By the 1950s, whiskey distillers started making special decanters to place in these holiday boxes. They also started printing holiday recipe booklets that could be attached to the boxes. Magazine and newspaper advertisements would promote these special bottles. By the 1960s, other items would often be included in the holiday packaging such as shot glasses or rocks glasses. These were very common from the 1960s through the 1990s as the distillers were working hard to sell their whiskey during a time of declining sales.

Now in the 21st century, we still see holiday promotions for whiskey. Magazine and newspaper advertising is not as common today in the world of social media, but distillers do still invest in these media, but only a fraction of what there used to be. Special decanters or bottles are still very common today during the holiday season. These often include glassware as part of the packaging. The holidays are a big time for whiskey sales as consumers purchase more whiskey during this time of the year to give as gifts or to take a bottle to a holiday party. A bottle of whiskey and the holidays are a tradition today.

Photos Courtesy of Rosemary Miller and Unsplash