Cost: Is Rum really expensive?

[Capn Jimbo]

Nope!


The next time you bellyache about the cost of rum, consider these...

Average rum at $25/bottle, $1.00 per drink,
Average single malt at $60, $2.35 per drink,
Average beer at $2.50, $2.50 per drink, and
Average wine at $17, $3.50 per drink.

Let's face it, the economy sucks and it really shows. I have reported how the cheap, altered, flavored and spiced rums have been crowding out the ever fewer quality rums.

I had no idea.

Sue Sea and I visited a very large retailer called ABC Spirits, second only to the Total Wine emporium. For those of you who don't enjoy our easy and broad access to alcoholic beverage, these superstores are huge! Total wine carries - literally - thousands of wines, hundreds of beers, and almost any spirit you'd care to buy.

ABC currently had 5 very long shelves of rum. In the not so distant past perhaps the bottom three would be taken over by the rum mafia at Bacardi, Malibu, Morgan and the usual made-up, bottled-in-Minnesota crap, with the better rums holding forth on the top two shelves.

That's changed.

Now the cheap, altered, flavored stuff owns about 4-1/2 shelves, with a shockingly anemic selection of sipping rums - and half of these were some of the altered sweeties (think Pyrat, Diplomatico or Zaya). Here's the rundown....

Cheap shit: 112 feet of shelf space.
Sipping rums: 12 feet.
Great rums: 3 feet at most!

Is it any wonder rum is a rogue and deteriorating spirit? Is it any wonder that the new releases are dominated by flavored crap? And it's not all about the economy. Fine single malts distillers continue to release almost countless new bottlings - all pure and unaltered, all worthy. Wines and beers? Can't even count them. Craft offerings? Up and up.

But not rum. After all, why bother as long as the buying public remains stupid, trusting and following the lead of the "...it's all good" Shillery and legions of sycophantic, quasi-commercial wannabees?

It doesn't have to be this way.

If you - like me - want rum to succeed and prosper you have to speak out, long and loud, in favor of quality, pure and unadulterated rums. Retailers need to clearly separate flavored and rotgut products from the good stuff by placing the quality rums in their own section, clearly separated from the rest.

Otherwise, it's more Batshit Dingleberry...