The American Whiskey Industry Brief is a daily record of the American whiskey business — corporate moves, new releases, regulatory filings, craft news, and the secondary market. It publishes every weekday morning. This page sets out how it is put together and what a reader is entitled to expect from it.

The core principle

The raw input belongs to its source. The editorial assessment is ours.

When the Brief cites tasting notes, scores, prices, or factual data from a third party, that source is credited and the reader can follow it back to verify or read further. When the Brief delivers a verdict, a value call, or a judgement about why something matters, that is our editorial work and it is not attributed to anyone else.

The reader should always be able to tell which is which. That is the whole point of the standard.

What is always credited

• Tasting notes from a published review — the reviewer did the sensory work.
• Scores from a rating system — the publication's methodology, not ours.
• Quotes — attributed to the person and the place they said it.
• Distillery technical specifications — proof, age, batch size, bottle counts.
• Secondary market prices — the marketplace data belongs to whoever tracked it.
• Regulatory documents — TTB circulars, CFR sections, label approvals.
• Production and sales figures — trade organisations and research firms.
• Historical claims — the authors who did the research.

What is our own editorial judgement

• The verdict on whether a bottle is worth its price.
• The assessment of value relative to what else is on the shelf.
• The framing of why a story matters to the industry or the reader.

These are positions, not reporting. They are ours to defend and ours to be wrong about.

Prices, availability and allocation

Prices move and allocations close. Figures are accurate as at the date of the issue in which they appear, and issues are not retrospectively edited to reflect later movement — the archive is a record of what was true that morning. Where a price is a secondary-market observation rather than a retail price, it is labelled as such.

Independence

The Brief is free to read and is not sponsored by any distillery, importer, retailer or marketplace. No brand pays for coverage, placement, or a verdict. Where a bottle has been provided as a sample, that is stated in the issue.

Who writes it

The Brief is edited and published by John Schuster II, a retired U.S. Army Major and Executive Bourbon Steward, with Shauna Hann as editor and contributor. Both are named on every issue.

When we get it wrong

Corrections are published openly and permanently. The policy, and the full record, are on the corrections page.