BSoBR: A Year in Review
How is it possible that we have now completed a full year of the Bourbon Society? We are actually at 13 months now since we technically launched the last week of May 2019 but since we extended everyone’s membership to June 30, 2020 we’re just calling it 1 extra long year. Insert joke about Covid right here and honestly it has gone by way too quickly and equally not quickly enough. I wanted to talk a bit today on what all BSoBR has accomplished in its inaugural year as a 501c7. I want to first stress though that none of what we accomplished was possible without each of you. We are closing out our first year with 372 members. The money we raised, the bottles we drank, the friendships we all made wouldn’t have been possible without you. Thank you for helping me make my goofy dream of running an official bourbon society into a reality in 2019/2020!
If you would have asked me back in May 2019 before we launched the dues structure, I would have said I would be happy with 100 members in our first year. The fact that 372 people have signed up for BSoBR surprises me in ways I can’t even explain. I honestly still don’t believe it. Again I attribute our success to our early adopters who have had a great time and have gotten their friends to sign up.
It also cannot go unstated that the biggest part of our success goes to our partner organizations. The Lost Cove, Hayride Scandal, and Oak Point Fresh Market have been with us since day 1. I cannot thank each of you who work, bartend, or own these places for standing by us from the beginning. Nate & Clint, you have been amazing for our group. Not only have you let us do 4 barrel picks with y’all and 2 more on the way, you have shown the group nothing but love. Tom, Jeff, Ciara, Lewis and everyone else, you have been there with us since 2015 and supported us this whole time. Lance, Remi, Dan and co, y’all have been there for us and adapted with us through this pandemic in ways I didn’t even think would work. Since launching, we’ve brought on Three Roll Estate, Sugarfield Spirits, and Hokus Pokus! Thomas and Drew, the way you’ve brought us on and eagerly opened your doors to us has been wonderful. You let us pick our first barrel of bourbon straight from a distillery, something that I’ve gotten to check off my bucket list. Gus, Alex, and your fantastic team, you brought us in for game nights and have an enthusiasm to work with us that makes this job so damn much easier. I can’t thank each of you enough for all that you’ve done for our group. I hope you all have enjoyed working with us as much as we enjoy frequenting your establishments.
The year itself has been full of many ups and just a couple of downs. It truly sucks that we had to finish out our first year under the guise of this global pandemic that we are in. We had to postpone the Louisiana Bourbon Fest to 2021. That was particularly disappointing as our team had been working on the plan for it for almost a year. The ups though have been incredible! We did 4 barrel picks with 3 more on the way by the end of 2020! We were able to get a bottle of Four Roses! Our WhistlePig barrel that we just selected last week is 16 years old! (We will be paying for a 10 year old pick but it is actually 16 years old, that’s insane!) Speaking of insane, do you realize how many events we did? By my count, we had 15 private BSoBR events, 9 public events, 2 bottle shares, 1 Four Roses tasting and almost 20 Monday hangouts. We also hosted 15 Zoom hangouts & 7 trivia Zooms for almost 75 virtual hours of hanging out during this crisis. We raffled off 114 bottles of whiskey, plus a golf bag, glencairns, barrels, countless more items and $700 in gift cards. All of this fellowship and good times spent together has been great but our charity work has been even better.
The most impressive feat that BSoBR has accomplished in its first year is our charity work. BSoBR raised over $26,000 for charities in our first year! This includes $2,750 to the Dow Westside YMCA, $8,500 that went directly to the bartenders of our partner bars, and $15,000 for the Baton Rouge Marines Toys for Tots. This is what I still struggle to believe even now. The amount of money we raised far exceeded even our loftiest of ambitions. From the bottom of my heart: thank you all for your contributions. Thank you for helping us raise so much money and toys for those who truly needed it.
I know we are starting year 2 in the midst of a global pandemic, but I hope that you will stick around for another year. I know we definitely have had some growing pains in our first year. We never expected it to get this large, and we definitely weren’t prepared for it. We still have a list of ideas and events that we want to do and accomplish. We are looking for people to get more involved with assisting the group and if you’re interested, please let me know. If you have any ideas or concerns with this group, please come to me. I am always around to listen and grow. We really started to share the idea during COVID that this is one community, one giant family. I think of us as such and if you ever need anything, please don’t hesitate to reach out. I promise that I will always do whatever I can to help and serve every one of you. Thank you again for supporting us during Year 1 of BSoBR! I cannot wait to see what Year 2 brings us (here’s hoping we get out of 2020 with our boots on first, right?)!!
Cheers,
David Steele, President & Co-Founder