Splashing out on a R600,000 bottle of whisky

Och aye, the silly season is here and could make you a mint

● The Christmas season has arrived, with scant regard for South Africa’s cost-of-living crisis.

Big-budget booze with sobering price tags is back on the shelves, with a collector’s bottle of whisky selling for R600,000 and a limited-edition cognac for R500,000.

But who, if anyone, would buy them? “The stuff’s definitely not selling like hot cakes, but there’s a lot of money to be made if you’re in it for investment,” said Neil Paterson, co-owner of specialist dealers WhiskyBrother&Co in Hyde Park, Johannesburg.

He sold a rare bottle of Macallan for about R350,000 almost a decade ago. “The guy sat on it for about seven years and then he brought it back to us. We put it on our website, where it was spotted by an international buyer and snatched up for R1.2m, which was our most expensive bottle ever and an absolute outlier.”

Generally, collectors are unlikely to ever sell their stashes, said Paterson.

“Their biggest fear is that their children will inherit the precious bottles and just drink them all with Sprite.”

The R600,000 whisky, a Glenfiddich 50year-old single malt in a gift box, is selling at Makro.

Kristin Dry, Makro’s national spirits buyer, said: “We’re often amazed by the unpredictability of the customers who purchase our high-end products. However, the most likely candidates are collectors and customers who recognise the investment opportunity whisky offers.

“We are aware of customers who have purchased premium whiskies from us in the past and then sold them after a few years for double or even triple the original price.”

Premium bottles of whisky may be pricey, but there’s definitely a market for them. However, buyers are unlikely to be South African.

Paterson said it’s “highly unusual for South Africans to fork out more than R200,000 for a bottle”. They are more in the “R50,000- R100,000 range”.

Passionate about the whisky business and an ardent collector, Paterson said it is common for lovers of the spirit to buy an “entry-level bottle for about R5,000, pop it in the cupboard for about a decade and then discover it’s worth R60,000”.

Whisky collectors tend to hoard their bottles, don’t often sell their favourites, “and it’s even less common that they drink them”, he said.

“A few years back we had worldrenowned whisky writer Dave Broom out here and we shared a drink that had been bottled in the 1950s. I’d bought it long ago for R3,000 and it was worth R100,000. But in that moment, when you enjoy it and reflect on the complexities of the taste and the fact that it was created before you were born, you just think of it as the R3,000 you spent.”

There is “lots of movement on the whisky investment platform”, he added, and an analysis of tracked prices shows “you are much better off spending on a bottle of whisky and waiting four years than you are putting your money in the bank”.

“The whole world is in turmoil and prices all over are volatile, but investing in whisky is a good idea. The market is brand loyal, so you’re unlikely to lose on a wise decision, and when the rand drops, your whisky goes up,” Paterson said, adding that prices are internationally based.

“We’re a tiny market and we drink a lot.” Lawyer and passionate whisky collector Doug Smart of Sandton, Johannesburg, said he developed an interest many years ago and viewed whisky as art.

“It’s an investment, I agree, certainly not a depreciating asset, because the popularity and price increase exponentially.”

When asked his opinion on the R600,000 Glenfiddich, he said: “I wish I could taste it.”

“I reckon there’s only a handful of people in the world who know what it’s like to taste something so old,” Smart added, saying the oldest whisky he’d had was 30 years.

“When I sip something special, I think about the complexities and the deep flavours that come from the interaction with the wood. You think about the master distillers who were involved in blending it so many years ago and it becomes a very deep and emotional experience.”

Experts agree that whisky is a good investment because, with its evaporating nature, it’s classified as a depreciating asset and therefore exempt from capital gains tax. It does carry South Africa’s “sin tax”, but “if you gift it to yourself in a family trust, you don’t get hit with death duties”.