By Jon Beckhardt
A couple Thursdays ago I went on the Johnnie Walker Journey - a traveling tasting show of Johnnie Walker's five blended whiskies. Only now can I process this odd event.
First a quick note, I am often fairly cynical about these tasting events -- whether they are put on by a liquor company, or whether they’re part of festivals that bring together a number of companies. I can think of a few at bars that have been joyous events (see: those held at Elixir), but often they take place in sterile rooms, and completely reduce the enjoyment of a liquor.
While The Johnnie Walker Journey, which took place at Fort Mason, fell into the latter category, it was so over the top it may have shot the moon. How do you turn the tasting of five liquors into something special? You build it into an overhyped multimedia event that is far bigger than it deserves to be.
The evening started off pretty lackluster. First we waited in line to "donate" five dollars to charity -- which one they didn't say. Then we waited in line to fill out a survey with one of the Johnny Walker Girls (much more wholesome than you’re picturing).
After a half hour, an announcer intoned that the time for the tasting was now. Again we waited in line, this time like we were entering Universal Studios. The email I had gotten about the event described it as a multimedia event. When I asked Travis Rexroad, the marketing guy who was helping organize this, what could be multimedia about a tasting event, he wasn't much help with details.
After herding us together once again, we filed into the back room. Four groups of five rows of long white, soft benches faced the center, turning the normally dingy Fort Mason into something resembling a futuristic gathering of the elders.
Then came out the emcee. This guy, who looked like Richard Karn, had the job of stretching out the drinking of a total of 2 oz of liquor over an hour and a half. But his first job was to tell us where the exits were in case, in the middle of the show, we had to use the bathroom.
After describing each liquor, he disappeared, and up the came the video interludes on a big, cheesy screen. These looked liked someone had ripped out all the photos of extreme sports and extremer carsfrom Maxim, done a bunch Ken Burns pans over them, and added a techno bed. After that, the emcee came back, we lifted out glasses and finally drank.
The emcee was full of the typical platitutdes desgned to sell. The Yellow Johnny Walker: "I always think of this whiskey as a celebration whiskey." So after he asked if any one was celebrating we all lifted our 5 deciliters of liquor to Ronnie's 23rd Birthday.
This went on through all the liquors. The only major exception was that for the Green label, they went heavy on green nature imagery -- because, as the emcee said, its an earthy blend.
I would like liquor tastings to become more social events, that are essentially drinking in a bar with a rep from the company. If Madison Avenue is going ot push them in the complete opposite direction to over-hyped glossy multimedia affairs, well, I won’t say no, but I’m not sure it works.
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