Rum Trends: Are we losing interest?

[Capn Jimbo]

Rum: RIP?


When the only really active rum website on the net is The Rum Project, something is really wrong. Let's examine this...

1. The Shillery, despite boasting of thousands of members, has become dominated by a literal handful of them. The same four or five appear in thread after thread with cameos by the Wolfboy, the Tree and other promoters hoping to keep their name alive and to promote their own faltering sites. When things devolve to "What Rum I Just Bought" or "What Rum did you drink last night?" things are really bad.

You know it's dead when the Preacher is forced to post repeatedly to stir up the monkeys. Dead.

2. The Wolf Den is dominated by, who else, the Wolfboy - an amateur reviewer who has declared his own "methodologies", who seems to have a genetic trait I call bittermouth (wherein a study showed "bitterness" found in over half the rums reviewed), who ascribes imagined aromas and flavors to wood tannins (a mouthfeel only), and who brags that his site has had about 530,000 visitors in over two years.

That's a crummy 22,000 hits per month. Compare to The Rum Project at about 160,000 monthly visits. Sad.

3. Bilgemunkey: last rum review over two months ago. Dying.

4. Rum Dood: last review over a month ago. Dying.

5. RnD: three reviews in November, good on them. Alive and well.

6. Chris Carlsson's Spirits Reviews: three months ago. Dying.

7. Scotte's: a couple years. Dead.

8. Count Silvio's: one month ago, a post by me. Otherwise dead.

9. Liquorature and Lance: a handful of comments on old reviews. Wiggling but not hopeful.


If I've left anything out, it's understandable. For example the Burr Brothers and The Rum Queen are totally commercial and post only their own events. Burr simply regurgitates distiller ad copy.


Bottom Line:

It's pretty sad when a website run by a Compleat Idiot posts more and/or better copy than the rest of the websites combined. Honestly, aren't you bored? I sure am.

To be fair, the industry is no help with production now focused on the extremes: cheap and altered column stilled rums aimed at the 99% (and which have taken over the shelves) - and a literal handful of super-mega expensive, pure and unadulterated rums like Panamonte XXV Preciosa and Diplomatico Ambassador aimed at the 1% who can spend three or four hundred dollars a bottle!

The websites have literally run out of rum freebies to review, and you can be sure they won't be spending their own money to review the few worthy and pure super rums.

Ergo... rum is indeed dying. Keep in mind that when you read of rum sales, most of those are of the Batshit Dingleberry genre. These have literally taken over the shelves and prime real estate, while a very few good sipping rums are pushed to the side. Literally!

Thus any sales increases you may hear about actually represent the death or at best, the stagnation of fine and worthy rums. The few new mega-rums are hopeful, particularly as they actually promote their purity, free of additives, coloring, caramel or flavorings of any kind - and - in at least one case unchillfiltered and sold at cask strength.

But in the end too little, too expensive, too late. RIP