Your Cheap Bourbon Just Got a Price Hike

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Your favorite cheap bourbon isn't cheap anymore. Heaven Hill just confirmed a wholesale increase on Elijah Craig and Larceny, six to eight percent, effective August first — the second hike on these two bottles in fourteen months.

I'm John from Chasing the Unicorn Podcast. Here's what moved today. July 22, 2026.

Let's start with the letter that landed Monday. Heaven Hill told its distributor network the wholesale price on Elijah Craig and Larceny is going up, effective August first. The increase averages six to eight percent across both lines. The company points to barrel costs and glass supply — the same explanation it's leaned on since 2023. Here's the part that actually matters: this is the second increase on these two specific bottles in fourteen months.

Elijah Craig Small Batch, usually around thirty dollars, is headed toward thirty-two or thirty-three once this works through to shelves. Larceny Small Batch, usually twenty-eight, is projected into the twenty-nine to thirty range. Retailers in Ohio and Kentucky say they'll hold current pricing through September before the new cost basis shows up at checkout.

Here's why I'm leading with this instead of some allocated unicorn. These aren't collector bottles. They're two of the most-recommended entry-tier bourbons on the shelf — the ones a lot of people point new drinkers toward first. And it's not just Heaven Hill moving. Sazerac quietly confirmed its own wholesale increase this week on the core Buffalo Trace line — the actual thirty-five-dollar bottle, not the allocated stuff. When the price of "the good cheap bottle" moves on two different fronts in the same week, that touches way more buyers than any lottery ever will. Nothing changes at the register today. But if either bottle is a regular buy for you, the clock just started.

Now — today's Chase. It isn't just the cheap stuff moving. There's a real one to act on this week, and it's not hiding behind a lottery.

Old Forester Birthday Bourbon's 2026 batch is already shipping to stores — weeks ahead of its usual September second release date. Brown-Forman confirmed the spec: eleven years old, a hundred proof, a hundred thirty-nine ninety-nine. Early tasters are calling out dense dried fig, orange peel, and a long cinnamon finish that tracks with that extended age.

Here's why the timing matters. Last year's bottle is already trading sixty to eighty-five percent over its own retail price on the secondary market. That's not some decade-old vintage — that's a bottle from twelve months ago. So if this year's batch is landing on shelves right now, ahead of the official release date, that's a live, buyable window most people don't know is open yet.

The move: if you see this year's Birthday Bourbon on a shelf this week, that's the moment — not the wait-list, not next month. Distributor shipments are already in stores across Kentucky and at select national accounts.

If you want more chances this week, there are two others worth knowing about. William Larue Weller's North Carolina lottery is open now through Sunday, no cost to enter, against a bottle that's holding fourteen hundred to sixteen hundred on the secondary — the strongest floor in its whole collection. And E.H. Taylor Single Barrel Bottled-in-Bond just opened a pre-allocation window through Sunday at eighty dollars, a hundred proof, one barrel, disclosed. If you want a lower-stakes way in on the same week's theme, Buffalo Trace's own gift shop in Frankfort has its weekly single-barrel walk-up running right now too — no lottery, fifty-five dollars, cherry and brown sugar, easy to get if you're anywhere near Frankfort. Different price points, same lesson: the bottles worth chasing this week are the ones you can actually walk up to or sign up for today, not the ones you're waiting years on.

Which brings me to today's First Sip — the secondary market, and why it's worth watching even if you never buy or sell there.

So here's what it is. The secondary market is private bourbon resale — Facebook groups, trading apps, auction sites — operating in a legal gray zone since most states require a license to sell alcohol. Prices there move on real scarcity and perceived scarcity both, and this week's numbers show the difference clearly. Eagle Rare Seventeen is trading around three hundred to three hundred forty dollars, down almost half from its 2023 peak near six-fifty. William Larue Weller, same collection, same distillery, is still trading fourteen hundred to sixteen hundred — basically flat. Same shelf, wildly different trajectories. The reason isn't mysterious — Weller carries a brand halo nothing else can touch, while Eagle Rare Seventeen is now competing head-on with cheaper long-aged bourbons hitting shelves this fall.

What this changes — when one allocated bottle's secondary price is falling while its sibling holds flat, that's not noise. That's the market telling you which scarcity is real and which was just hype catching up with itself. You don't have to trade secondary to use that lesson — it's the same test worth running on anything you're tempted to overpay for.

If you want to track that kind of thing on your own shelf, log a pour in the Perfect Pour app's Logbook — it's available now at theperfectpourapp.com — and watch how your own bottles' Pour Prints compare once you start tracking retail against real-world value over time.

So here's the one thing to take from today. Prices are moving on both ends right now — up on the everyday bottles, down on some of the allocated ones. That's not two separate stories. It's the same market finding its real level. The bottles worth grabbing this week aren't the ones with the biggest name. They're the ones priced honestly, right now, before that changes again.

That's The Cut. The full American Whiskey Industry Brief is free every morning at chasingtheunicornpodcast.com. I'm John Schuster. Thanks for joining me. Your unicorn is out there.