***5/13 UPDATE***
This is just an update to brag a little bit. Last night at the Colin County event we donated a few of our bottles and they were signed by Joey and Grant. They ended up bringing in $7,000 for The Matador Club. That money goes directly to them and obviously the signatures were the big draw, but I'm really happy and proud about what we've been able to do with what was mostly just an excuse to pick out some whiskey and hope we could do a little good at the same time. Add that $7,000 to the $10,000 we've raised from all the donations for bottles from you guys here on RRS, your friends, your family, and we've raised over ... carry the 1.... $17,000.
I'll be chatting with the group this week about some ideas for the next pick and hopefully we'll have a direction planned out by the end of the month. Be on the lookout for a thread or 2 seeking the ever important opinons of the RRS collective. Guns Up!!
***5/10 Update. Next DFW pickup planned***
We only had a handful of folks show up for the pickup last night. Hoping it was due to semi-late notice. An email with another date and time was sent last night, May 24, 6:30-8:30pm. Check for that if you weren't able to make it yesterday.
If you're in DFW, ordered bottles and haven't seen an email, send me a DM or email me at rrsbarrelclub@gmail.com and I'll get you on the list.
***5/6 Update*** Over $10,000 raised and DFW pick up party scheduled***
DFW Raiders, check your email for info about a pick up party this week. If you can't make it out see if someone can grab your bottles for you. If you don't get the email or need to make other arrangements get in touch with @LondonRedRaider
For those keeping track, we've now raised over $10,000.
Sometime later thos month I'm going to get a conversation started about the next pick. I have some interesting ideas, but we'll have to make sure everyone is on board and it can all be done intime for football season.
***4/26 Update*** Stickers on the way!
After like 4 months of getting brushed aside by our first graphic designer and not really having the time to sort things out with our new volunteer, we went with some AI images for these bottles. They should be delivered to DFW in about a week or so and once those bottles are labeled we'll get the rest sent to their appropriate cities or mailed directly to you.
Also, for those keeping track, we're up to $8,569 (nice...) raised so far. I'm betting we see a significant jump after the Colin County event in a couple weeks. When people see the bottles and realize the benefit they should move pretty fast. If that happens I'll start working on another barrel pick by the end of the month.
***4/18 General Update***
We have bottles in or scheduled to be in all the distribution points by next week I believe, with pick-up's already happening or to be scheduled fairly soon. Midland bottles will be at the spring game, Houston bottles are being picked up this weekend (check your email Houston Red Raiders and all out of towners, something was sent out this morning). DFW is taking a little longer because it was more whiskey than we anticipated and our guy there has been out of town for a while. Just be on the lookout for an email with pick-up details. If you have paid and don't get an email, don't worry. We have everyone accounted for and we will reach out via text to make sure you get your stuff.
Currently we have had 264 of 396 bottles paid for. We've donated several to have coaches sign for auction purposes and a few to our volunteers who are driving this stuff all over the state and setting up pick-ups. As it stands now we have just over $6,000 raised for TMC with only stickers and a little bit of shipping left to pay out.
I'm roughly estimating that we have about 100 bottles left to sell. When it's all said and done we ought to be hovering right around $17,000 raised from bottles alone. That doesn't include any money raised from auctioned bottels, which should be another couple thousand at least. However, we could use a little help moving those 100 bottles. Share the link below with any Red Raider friends and family who enjoy good whiskey, want to support the Matador Club or just want something cool to put on their shelf. If you haven't picked up yet and want to add an extra bottle to your order, go ahead. We've sent extra bottles to every location for this purpose.
If we can get the majority of these bottles paid for in the next month or so I'm going to get to work on setting up another pick to be ready and available by football season so we can just have one big pick-up weekend at a home football game to streamline the delivery process a bit. I'd love to keep the momentum up and keep generating money for TMC while providing Tech fans with a unique bottle and a cool experience.
venmo.com
4/6 Update *** VENMO ACTIVE!!
Got Venmo up and running finally! for anyone who has been waiting, feel free to donate here VENMO LINK. $115 and be sure to add which kind you want, rye or wheat.
Also, got stuff headed out to LBK, DFW and Midland this morning. I sent a few extra bottles to each location so if you're wanting more or wanting to get involved for the first time you should be covered. Click the link, donate the money and I'll get you on the appropriate list.
*** 4/4 Minor Update ***
I'm coordinating mule pickups this weekend to get bottles moved to Austin, LBK, DFW and Midland. Houston will follow soon, I have a mule, but not a set date yet. Yall be on the lookout for an email with details on your local pickup.
I'm also sending a few extras to each location so if anyone wants an exta bottle at pick up or if we have some new orders we will ahve a bit of a buffer.
Speaking of new orders... Donation Link. Remember to donate $115 per bottle and put the amount of each bottle you want in the note when you pay. Thanks!
***3/29 UPDATE*** Pick-Up Party in San Antonio
4/1 at LOL Liquors at 12107 Toepperwein Rd #6, Live Oak, TX 78233
"Party" may be a bit of a stretch. Nothing is going on at all, just picking up bottles. I'm planning to be there around 4:00-4:30 the afternoon of 4/1 to load up the majority of cases that are headed out of town. If anyone in SA can meet there to get their bottle and bottles for friends/family who may have ordered I'm willing to stay until 6:00 or so.
Only hiccup we have right now is stickers. They're in the works but we won't have them by Monday so anyone who gets bottles before stickers arrive will be mailed a sticker to apply yourself. Not ideal, but I've learned a lot and am working on a plan to have this much more streamlined for the next one... and some really cool ideas to sort out for a third one if we can maintain momentum.
As usual, we're still sitting on plenty of unclaimed bottles, so if you want extras or know someone who may be interested don't hesitate to donate or share the link. If you didn't see the post from yesterday, the IRS letter finally came and I got it submitted to PayPal. They should have us approved early next week and then I can get Venmo set up for anyone still waiting on that.
***3/25 UPDATE*** Whiskey Incoming!!!
Our barrels have finally arrived in the Katy warehouse where they should have been all along. They're set for delivery in San Antonio Monday, April 1. I just realized that's April fools day, but I swear this is really happening. I'll be picking up the cases that afternoon and bringing them home to Kerrville. We may try to have a pickup party if enough SA people can manage to make it. If that's you, let me kow! I'll continue to update the thread as needed, as usual. And I'll be adding more information about obtaining your bottles once they're in hand.
Couple things we need in the meantime....
1) We need people to help distribute to major metros and Lubbock so if anyone is willing to volunteer for transportation services that would be awesome. Just need a car and the ability to make it to Kerrville or San Antonio and allow people to pick up from you.
2) We need stickers!! I won't mention names but our sticker volunteer never followed through and I haven't been able to get ahold of him now for 2 months. It wasn't a big deal until a couple weeks ago, but now it's basically an emergency. The whiskey tastes the same either way, but a marker showing it's a unique barrel pick really does make a difference. If anyone could provide a contact that would be appreciated.
3) We still have plenty of bottles to move. There is no Venmo still, but we may try to find a workaround so that people can gift money to an individual (me for example) and I can then send it to the club's paypal. I would receive the whiskey and then re-gift it to the original donor. Not 100% sure on the logistics of that and I'm sure not everyone would be comfortable with it so that's a maybe for now.
4) DONATE!!!! If you or someone you know is interested in donating to the RRS Barrel Club on PayPal in order to receive a bottle(s) of whiskey in return as a free gift please do so. Everything is still the same. Each $115 donated equals 1 free bottle gifted to the donor. Please leave your requested quantity and which whiskey you prefer (wheat, rye, or a combo).
***12/20 UPDATE*** free booze is all gone. Thanks to everyone who purchased and huge thanks to @mhunter12 for his generosity.
***12/18 UPDATE*** Free Booze, I Repeat... FREE BOOZE!!
In celebration of our bowl victory @mhunter12 has generously offered to cover 1 free bottle for the next 8 people who get 2 on their own. SO a buy 2 get one free offer. If you want to take advantage of his generosity shot me a DM and I'll send you the details and instructions. Anyone ordering without sending a DM may not be elligible for their 3rd bottle free.
***11/7 Update***
Finally have everything set up to take payment. Please read the instructions before you start sending money. If you do not follow the instructions I cannot guarantee your gift. There is a link below....
This is going to be set up so that we're offering memberships to the RRS Barrel Club. Each membership is $115 and each membership comes with 1 free gift. As we've discussed, currently the gifts will be a bottle of Wilderness Trail barrel pick wheated bourbon or rye whiskey. You choose what you want. You can buy 1 membership or 100, up to you. We will run out of gifts at some point and I'll cut off the link, so please keep that in mind, though current pre-orders look to be just barely within our supply. We will be running it as first come first served, but once we're getting close to selling out I'll do my best to contact any early pre-order folks who haven't paid before it's too late. Feel free to share this with friends and family who may be interested. The pre-order was more to judge how much whiskey we would be able to move than it was to officially reserve bottles, so if you didn't pre-order or want to order more than you pre-ordered, that's totally fine.
INSTRUCTIONS:
When you donate, be sure to donate in increments of $115. Please specify how many of which gift you would prefer, rye or wheated. Depending on how you're paying, also include your name so I can cross reference the pre-orders. For example: Donate $345. Joe Smith. 2 Rye. 1 Wheated. That's it, you're done and your bottles will be reserved.
Support the RRS Barrel Club here via PayPal. Once we're officially verified as a charity (2-3 business days) we can add Venmo and I'll update the thread. IF YOU DO NOT FOLLOW THESE DIRECTIONS I CANNOT GUARANTEE YOUR GIFT!!!
Quick refresher on some details...
1) We have a barrel pick of Wheated and a barrel pick of Rye, both from Wilderness Trail. Both very good whiskeys but the Rye is particularly special and I'm not even that much of a rye guy. Seriously, it's good. @jblidell can attest to that, as he helped with the picks.
2) We're making custom labels and each bottle will be numbered. This is not something you'll ever be able to pick up at any liquor store. When they're gone they're gone.
3) Delivery is currently set for Christmas day. I don't think that will hold true, but just so we're clear, payment today is to officially reserve your bottle(s). They may not make their way to you for another month or 2 depending on how soon they ship out and how well the distributor's warehouse does their job... and of course, how we can schedule pick up.
4) couple other cool things. We're hoping to get Joey to sign a couple bottles so that other organizations can use them to raise some money. We're planning to work with @Taft33 and 2 Docs to make some barrel aged beers for them to serve and donate proceeds. We still have the sample bottles and may see about raffling those off if there's interest. And maybe most importantly, all these things excluded, we're projecting to be able to donate $20,000 to The Matador Club.
If all goes as expected, after the holidays we'll get to work on putting together another pick. With any luck we can organize something where we go to the actual distillery, maybe raffle off a spot or 2 on the pick team, etc. Lots of potential here toraise a ton of money and have a great time while doing it. So again, tell your friends and family!
***10/27 Update***
First of all, we have hit a road block with label design choice. The Rye was easy with "Masked Ryeder". The Wheat, not so much. We're letting the people decide, so pick your favorite and we'll get it done barring any alleged election rigging, voter fraud and the like. FYI, I think there may be some issue with the "eggs" because the graphic resolution is not great and it may be a lot of work (read: $$) to clean it up enough to use it, but if it's what the people want we'll try to make it happen.
Regarding the whiskey itself, we're seeing a delivery date of 12/25. Not ideal, and my guess is that it's a placeholder date that will be updated when it actually ships out. I'll update everyone as we get more info on the timing of arrival, but it's very likely that we won't know with 100% certainty until very close to arrival.
With the non-profit we're just waiting on some stuff with the IRS so we can open a bank account and start taking donations. It would be done already but we're having it set up so that we can issue charitable donation reciepts and apparently that takes slightly more work, but I checked with the lawyer earlier this morning and it should be done today or first thing next week.
*** 9/26 Update ***
I'm officially asking anyone who is willing AND able to do something for our "labels" to shoot me a DM. WT will label our picks with their standard label, but, as is currently trendy with barrel picks, we're wanting to have our own secondary label made to add some uniqueness to the bottle and make it a little more interesting. There are people who do this for around $200 and we'll need 2 different labels so it would be great if an RRSer or Tech fan could be a part of this and save us some $$ as well, but we can get it done outside pretty easily if necessary. Here's what they typically look like, for example:
In case you missed it, we made selections on 9/13. We have one Rye and one Wheated Bourbon barel headed our way. We were told we should have them in about a month, but it's kind of a crap shoot until they're in hand. The nonprofit should be filled this week and hopefully we'll have everything setup for official payment another week or 2 after that. Myself and one other member have for sure set up to be in Lubbock the weekend of Nov 18 for the UCF game and, assuming we have everything in hand, we'll deliver the barrel(s) to Two Docs for their barrel bock as well as however many bottles we can for distribution. Those who won't be in Lubbock that weekend, we'll be in touch to set something up as soon as they're all in hand.
*** 8/31 *** Update
Samples of WT are set to arrive tomorrow. I wanted to double check to see if anyone was interested in being a part of the selection group. I think I've messaged everyone who previously expressed interest, but if you didn't get a DM and are interested please message me.
Pertinent info: While we expect to be able to accomodate 1 additional taster, we aren't 100% sure on the sample bottle sizes so we may not be able to have anyone extra. Tasting is going to happen around 11am on Wednesday Sept 13 in San Antonio at a location TBD. I know that's not super convenient, but it is what it is for this first pick.
*** 8/22 *** Update.
After talking with the group who are putting this together with me we're going to change things up a bit. Demand far exceeded expectations and supply isn't exact when ordering a single barrel so it was difficult to know exactly how to proceed initially. Since it looks like we have a significant wait list already, I'm going to reopen the PRE-ORDER FORM. So if you havent put in, go ahead and do so. If we can get enough demand for a second barrel we'll get one. If not then we may limit bottles per person, do a randomized selection process, or something else. Just keep in mind that, while we're going to try our best to avoid it, we may have more demand than supply when all is said and done and it's possible some of you will have to wait until the next barrel pick. I know this has been a bit of a cluster, I'm learning as I go here... but let's keep the momentum, raise some money and drink some whiskey! We're looking at upwards of $10,000 per barrel for the Matador Club on bottles alone!
*** 8/21 *** update
Every bottle is spoken for at this point. Orders are closed. Once we can take payment and other info is more definite I’ll reach out to finalize payment and allocations. If we end up with any extra bottles I’ll reopen for anyone interested.
This is turning out to be a hell of a deal for the MC. @Taft33 has agreed to use the barrel to make a barrel aged bock with proceeds going to the MC. The barrel will be raffled or auctioned off. We have people interested in doing the tasting. @GCRRFan is going to see if Joey will sign a couple bottles for auction. On and on it goes. RRS never ceases to amaze me. I’ll be back with more updates as they happen.
*** 8/20 *** Update
I've had multiple DM's asking to get bottles and we haven't even made the pick yet. I appreciate all the support. Seems like this is going to be pretty successful. RRS is awesome!
So with that in mind I'm going to start working on a list for anyone who wants to commit to If you already emailed your info in I'll get it entered, you're good. This'll just be a placeholder list and not an official order. I'll reach out when we have a set price and a way to accept money and we'll get official orders then.
FWIW, (some of this is already mentioned below) it's going to be Wilderness Trail, either the wheated bourbon, high rye bourbon or rye whiskey. It'll be cask strenght at around 110 proof and I'm thinking it'll be around $125, maybe less. Hoping to have it by mid November if everyone involved does their job, but it's possible that it doesn't come in until January or February if the distributor drops the ball or something.
*** 8/18 *** - I have a couple threads going already and they're a bit messy so I decided to make a new one to post updates and ask questions in now that this thing is actuallymoving forward. I'll try to keep everything in here from now on.
Generally speaking, we're making progress on this endeavour. We're getting the non profit set up and waiting on samples from Wilderness Trail to do the actual barrel pick. It'll be a cask strenght whiskey around 110 proof. I'm hopeful we'll take delivery of the bottles before Thanksgiving, which means they'll be good Christmas gifts. A couple of the guys helping out made me aware that there are often warehouse delays though, so we'll see how it plays out. I *think* we'll be around the $100-125/bottle price range and could generate $10,000-15,000 for the MC on bottles alone as well as get lots of folks a cool (and pretty damn good) bottle of whiskey.
Couple things I'd like some feedback on from the fine folks at RRS:
1) Is there any interest in getting a spot in the tasting group? There will be some expense involved, whether we do a raffle or auction, but it will go to the MC.
It's not going to be done at the distillery, so not super exciting, but fun none the less. You'll get to do the tasting, have some say in the pick and get your name on the sticker that goes on the bottles. We have Woodland Trail samples coming to San Antonio sometime in September and I believe they're sending some from their rye whiskey, wheated bourbon and high rye bourbon lines. We'll meet with the rep in San Antonio, taste the samples, settle on one and order the barrel. I don't have an exact date yet, but it's going to be a weekday. I'm hoping we can push for a Friday so if someone from out of town wants to come then you can make a weekend out of it, but that's not guarnteed so keep that in mind if you're not local to SA. If you're interested just comment in the thread. If we have enough for a raffle we may do that. If it's only a few we may auction it off.
2) Does anyone have the ability to create a GOOD design for a sticker to put on the bottles? Should we have an MS Paint competition? What's @HaysCounty up to these days? We can always stick something very generic on there, but if any of you are willing or know someone who is willing to be a little more creative I think it would be a cool addition to the whole deal.
Edit: for those who missed out on previous info… we have a small group of guys working to get a barrel pick of whiskey, have Tech fans (RRS first, but all are welcome) donate to our non profit, receive a bottle of whiskey in return and have the proceeds go to the matador club. Lots of small off shoots will happen to maximize the coolness and $$ going to the MC.
Once we have the barrel ordered more info will be available and I’ll set something up to accept donations and get names down for who wants bottles and how many. Lots of little things to take care of to make sure we’re not stepping on any toes, breaking any laws, burning bridges etc… but the wheels are in motion.
@Taft33 check your PM's please.
This is just an update to brag a little bit. Last night at the Colin County event we donated a few of our bottles and they were signed by Joey and Grant. They ended up bringing in $7,000 for The Matador Club. That money goes directly to them and obviously the signatures were the big draw, but I'm really happy and proud about what we've been able to do with what was mostly just an excuse to pick out some whiskey and hope we could do a little good at the same time. Add that $7,000 to the $10,000 we've raised from all the donations for bottles from you guys here on RRS, your friends, your family, and we've raised over ... carry the 1.... $17,000.
I'll be chatting with the group this week about some ideas for the next pick and hopefully we'll have a direction planned out by the end of the month. Be on the lookout for a thread or 2 seeking the ever important opinons of the RRS collective. Guns Up!!
***5/10 Update. Next DFW pickup planned***
We only had a handful of folks show up for the pickup last night. Hoping it was due to semi-late notice. An email with another date and time was sent last night, May 24, 6:30-8:30pm. Check for that if you weren't able to make it yesterday.
If you're in DFW, ordered bottles and haven't seen an email, send me a DM or email me at rrsbarrelclub@gmail.com and I'll get you on the list.
***5/6 Update*** Over $10,000 raised and DFW pick up party scheduled***
DFW Raiders, check your email for info about a pick up party this week. If you can't make it out see if someone can grab your bottles for you. If you don't get the email or need to make other arrangements get in touch with @LondonRedRaider
For those keeping track, we've now raised over $10,000.
Sometime later thos month I'm going to get a conversation started about the next pick. I have some interesting ideas, but we'll have to make sure everyone is on board and it can all be done intime for football season.
***4/26 Update*** Stickers on the way!
After like 4 months of getting brushed aside by our first graphic designer and not really having the time to sort things out with our new volunteer, we went with some AI images for these bottles. They should be delivered to DFW in about a week or so and once those bottles are labeled we'll get the rest sent to their appropriate cities or mailed directly to you.
Also, for those keeping track, we're up to $8,569 (nice...) raised so far. I'm betting we see a significant jump after the Colin County event in a couple weeks. When people see the bottles and realize the benefit they should move pretty fast. If that happens I'll start working on another barrel pick by the end of the month.
***4/18 General Update***
We have bottles in or scheduled to be in all the distribution points by next week I believe, with pick-up's already happening or to be scheduled fairly soon. Midland bottles will be at the spring game, Houston bottles are being picked up this weekend (check your email Houston Red Raiders and all out of towners, something was sent out this morning). DFW is taking a little longer because it was more whiskey than we anticipated and our guy there has been out of town for a while. Just be on the lookout for an email with pick-up details. If you have paid and don't get an email, don't worry. We have everyone accounted for and we will reach out via text to make sure you get your stuff.
Currently we have had 264 of 396 bottles paid for. We've donated several to have coaches sign for auction purposes and a few to our volunteers who are driving this stuff all over the state and setting up pick-ups. As it stands now we have just over $6,000 raised for TMC with only stickers and a little bit of shipping left to pay out.
I'm roughly estimating that we have about 100 bottles left to sell. When it's all said and done we ought to be hovering right around $17,000 raised from bottles alone. That doesn't include any money raised from auctioned bottels, which should be another couple thousand at least. However, we could use a little help moving those 100 bottles. Share the link below with any Red Raider friends and family who enjoy good whiskey, want to support the Matador Club or just want something cool to put on their shelf. If you haven't picked up yet and want to add an extra bottle to your order, go ahead. We've sent extra bottles to every location for this purpose.
If we can get the majority of these bottles paid for in the next month or so I'm going to get to work on setting up another pick to be ready and available by football season so we can just have one big pick-up weekend at a home football game to streamline the delivery process a bit. I'd love to keep the momentum up and keep generating money for TMC while providing Tech fans with a unique bottle and a cool experience.
Venmo | RRS Barrel Club
Use Venmo to connect with RRS Barrel Club (@RRSBarrelClub) - Collecting funds for the Matador Club
venmo.com
4/6 Update *** VENMO ACTIVE!!
Got Venmo up and running finally! for anyone who has been waiting, feel free to donate here VENMO LINK. $115 and be sure to add which kind you want, rye or wheat.
Also, got stuff headed out to LBK, DFW and Midland this morning. I sent a few extra bottles to each location so if you're wanting more or wanting to get involved for the first time you should be covered. Click the link, donate the money and I'll get you on the appropriate list.
*** 4/4 Minor Update ***
I'm coordinating mule pickups this weekend to get bottles moved to Austin, LBK, DFW and Midland. Houston will follow soon, I have a mule, but not a set date yet. Yall be on the lookout for an email with details on your local pickup.
I'm also sending a few extras to each location so if anyone wants an exta bottle at pick up or if we have some new orders we will ahve a bit of a buffer.
Speaking of new orders... Donation Link. Remember to donate $115 per bottle and put the amount of each bottle you want in the note when you pay. Thanks!
***3/29 UPDATE*** Pick-Up Party in San Antonio
4/1 at LOL Liquors at 12107 Toepperwein Rd #6, Live Oak, TX 78233
"Party" may be a bit of a stretch. Nothing is going on at all, just picking up bottles. I'm planning to be there around 4:00-4:30 the afternoon of 4/1 to load up the majority of cases that are headed out of town. If anyone in SA can meet there to get their bottle and bottles for friends/family who may have ordered I'm willing to stay until 6:00 or so.
Only hiccup we have right now is stickers. They're in the works but we won't have them by Monday so anyone who gets bottles before stickers arrive will be mailed a sticker to apply yourself. Not ideal, but I've learned a lot and am working on a plan to have this much more streamlined for the next one... and some really cool ideas to sort out for a third one if we can maintain momentum.
As usual, we're still sitting on plenty of unclaimed bottles, so if you want extras or know someone who may be interested don't hesitate to donate or share the link. If you didn't see the post from yesterday, the IRS letter finally came and I got it submitted to PayPal. They should have us approved early next week and then I can get Venmo set up for anyone still waiting on that.
***3/25 UPDATE*** Whiskey Incoming!!!
Our barrels have finally arrived in the Katy warehouse where they should have been all along. They're set for delivery in San Antonio Monday, April 1. I just realized that's April fools day, but I swear this is really happening. I'll be picking up the cases that afternoon and bringing them home to Kerrville. We may try to have a pickup party if enough SA people can manage to make it. If that's you, let me kow! I'll continue to update the thread as needed, as usual. And I'll be adding more information about obtaining your bottles once they're in hand.
Couple things we need in the meantime....
1) We need people to help distribute to major metros and Lubbock so if anyone is willing to volunteer for transportation services that would be awesome. Just need a car and the ability to make it to Kerrville or San Antonio and allow people to pick up from you.
2) We need stickers!! I won't mention names but our sticker volunteer never followed through and I haven't been able to get ahold of him now for 2 months. It wasn't a big deal until a couple weeks ago, but now it's basically an emergency. The whiskey tastes the same either way, but a marker showing it's a unique barrel pick really does make a difference. If anyone could provide a contact that would be appreciated.
3) We still have plenty of bottles to move. There is no Venmo still, but we may try to find a workaround so that people can gift money to an individual (me for example) and I can then send it to the club's paypal. I would receive the whiskey and then re-gift it to the original donor. Not 100% sure on the logistics of that and I'm sure not everyone would be comfortable with it so that's a maybe for now.
4) DONATE!!!! If you or someone you know is interested in donating to the RRS Barrel Club on PayPal in order to receive a bottle(s) of whiskey in return as a free gift please do so. Everything is still the same. Each $115 donated equals 1 free bottle gifted to the donor. Please leave your requested quantity and which whiskey you prefer (wheat, rye, or a combo).
***12/20 UPDATE*** free booze is all gone. Thanks to everyone who purchased and huge thanks to @mhunter12 for his generosity.
***12/18 UPDATE*** Free Booze, I Repeat... FREE BOOZE!!
In celebration of our bowl victory @mhunter12 has generously offered to cover 1 free bottle for the next 8 people who get 2 on their own. SO a buy 2 get one free offer. If you want to take advantage of his generosity shot me a DM and I'll send you the details and instructions. Anyone ordering without sending a DM may not be elligible for their 3rd bottle free.
***11/7 Update***
Finally have everything set up to take payment. Please read the instructions before you start sending money. If you do not follow the instructions I cannot guarantee your gift. There is a link below....
This is going to be set up so that we're offering memberships to the RRS Barrel Club. Each membership is $115 and each membership comes with 1 free gift. As we've discussed, currently the gifts will be a bottle of Wilderness Trail barrel pick wheated bourbon or rye whiskey. You choose what you want. You can buy 1 membership or 100, up to you. We will run out of gifts at some point and I'll cut off the link, so please keep that in mind, though current pre-orders look to be just barely within our supply. We will be running it as first come first served, but once we're getting close to selling out I'll do my best to contact any early pre-order folks who haven't paid before it's too late. Feel free to share this with friends and family who may be interested. The pre-order was more to judge how much whiskey we would be able to move than it was to officially reserve bottles, so if you didn't pre-order or want to order more than you pre-ordered, that's totally fine.
INSTRUCTIONS:
When you donate, be sure to donate in increments of $115. Please specify how many of which gift you would prefer, rye or wheated. Depending on how you're paying, also include your name so I can cross reference the pre-orders. For example: Donate $345. Joe Smith. 2 Rye. 1 Wheated. That's it, you're done and your bottles will be reserved.
Support the RRS Barrel Club here via PayPal. Once we're officially verified as a charity (2-3 business days) we can add Venmo and I'll update the thread. IF YOU DO NOT FOLLOW THESE DIRECTIONS I CANNOT GUARANTEE YOUR GIFT!!!
Quick refresher on some details...
1) We have a barrel pick of Wheated and a barrel pick of Rye, both from Wilderness Trail. Both very good whiskeys but the Rye is particularly special and I'm not even that much of a rye guy. Seriously, it's good. @jblidell can attest to that, as he helped with the picks.
2) We're making custom labels and each bottle will be numbered. This is not something you'll ever be able to pick up at any liquor store. When they're gone they're gone.
3) Delivery is currently set for Christmas day. I don't think that will hold true, but just so we're clear, payment today is to officially reserve your bottle(s). They may not make their way to you for another month or 2 depending on how soon they ship out and how well the distributor's warehouse does their job... and of course, how we can schedule pick up.
4) couple other cool things. We're hoping to get Joey to sign a couple bottles so that other organizations can use them to raise some money. We're planning to work with @Taft33 and 2 Docs to make some barrel aged beers for them to serve and donate proceeds. We still have the sample bottles and may see about raffling those off if there's interest. And maybe most importantly, all these things excluded, we're projecting to be able to donate $20,000 to The Matador Club.
If all goes as expected, after the holidays we'll get to work on putting together another pick. With any luck we can organize something where we go to the actual distillery, maybe raffle off a spot or 2 on the pick team, etc. Lots of potential here toraise a ton of money and have a great time while doing it. So again, tell your friends and family!
***10/27 Update***
First of all, we have hit a road block with label design choice. The Rye was easy with "Masked Ryeder". The Wheat, not so much. We're letting the people decide, so pick your favorite and we'll get it done barring any alleged election rigging, voter fraud and the like. FYI, I think there may be some issue with the "eggs" because the graphic resolution is not great and it may be a lot of work (read: $$) to clean it up enough to use it, but if it's what the people want we'll try to make it happen.
Regarding the whiskey itself, we're seeing a delivery date of 12/25. Not ideal, and my guess is that it's a placeholder date that will be updated when it actually ships out. I'll update everyone as we get more info on the timing of arrival, but it's very likely that we won't know with 100% certainty until very close to arrival.
With the non-profit we're just waiting on some stuff with the IRS so we can open a bank account and start taking donations. It would be done already but we're having it set up so that we can issue charitable donation reciepts and apparently that takes slightly more work, but I checked with the lawyer earlier this morning and it should be done today or first thing next week.
*** 9/26 Update ***
I'm officially asking anyone who is willing AND able to do something for our "labels" to shoot me a DM. WT will label our picks with their standard label, but, as is currently trendy with barrel picks, we're wanting to have our own secondary label made to add some uniqueness to the bottle and make it a little more interesting. There are people who do this for around $200 and we'll need 2 different labels so it would be great if an RRSer or Tech fan could be a part of this and save us some $$ as well, but we can get it done outside pretty easily if necessary. Here's what they typically look like, for example:
In case you missed it, we made selections on 9/13. We have one Rye and one Wheated Bourbon barel headed our way. We were told we should have them in about a month, but it's kind of a crap shoot until they're in hand. The nonprofit should be filled this week and hopefully we'll have everything setup for official payment another week or 2 after that. Myself and one other member have for sure set up to be in Lubbock the weekend of Nov 18 for the UCF game and, assuming we have everything in hand, we'll deliver the barrel(s) to Two Docs for their barrel bock as well as however many bottles we can for distribution. Those who won't be in Lubbock that weekend, we'll be in touch to set something up as soon as they're all in hand.
*** 8/31 *** Update
Samples of WT are set to arrive tomorrow. I wanted to double check to see if anyone was interested in being a part of the selection group. I think I've messaged everyone who previously expressed interest, but if you didn't get a DM and are interested please message me.
Pertinent info: While we expect to be able to accomodate 1 additional taster, we aren't 100% sure on the sample bottle sizes so we may not be able to have anyone extra. Tasting is going to happen around 11am on Wednesday Sept 13 in San Antonio at a location TBD. I know that's not super convenient, but it is what it is for this first pick.
*** 8/22 *** Update.
After talking with the group who are putting this together with me we're going to change things up a bit. Demand far exceeded expectations and supply isn't exact when ordering a single barrel so it was difficult to know exactly how to proceed initially. Since it looks like we have a significant wait list already, I'm going to reopen the PRE-ORDER FORM. So if you havent put in, go ahead and do so. If we can get enough demand for a second barrel we'll get one. If not then we may limit bottles per person, do a randomized selection process, or something else. Just keep in mind that, while we're going to try our best to avoid it, we may have more demand than supply when all is said and done and it's possible some of you will have to wait until the next barrel pick. I know this has been a bit of a cluster, I'm learning as I go here... but let's keep the momentum, raise some money and drink some whiskey! We're looking at upwards of $10,000 per barrel for the Matador Club on bottles alone!
*** 8/21 *** update
Every bottle is spoken for at this point. Orders are closed. Once we can take payment and other info is more definite I’ll reach out to finalize payment and allocations. If we end up with any extra bottles I’ll reopen for anyone interested.
This is turning out to be a hell of a deal for the MC. @Taft33 has agreed to use the barrel to make a barrel aged bock with proceeds going to the MC. The barrel will be raffled or auctioned off. We have people interested in doing the tasting. @GCRRFan is going to see if Joey will sign a couple bottles for auction. On and on it goes. RRS never ceases to amaze me. I’ll be back with more updates as they happen.
*** 8/20 *** Update
I've had multiple DM's asking to get bottles and we haven't even made the pick yet. I appreciate all the support. Seems like this is going to be pretty successful. RRS is awesome!
So with that in mind I'm going to start working on a list for anyone who wants to commit to If you already emailed your info in I'll get it entered, you're good. This'll just be a placeholder list and not an official order. I'll reach out when we have a set price and a way to accept money and we'll get official orders then.
FWIW, (some of this is already mentioned below) it's going to be Wilderness Trail, either the wheated bourbon, high rye bourbon or rye whiskey. It'll be cask strenght at around 110 proof and I'm thinking it'll be around $125, maybe less. Hoping to have it by mid November if everyone involved does their job, but it's possible that it doesn't come in until January or February if the distributor drops the ball or something.
*** 8/18 *** - I have a couple threads going already and they're a bit messy so I decided to make a new one to post updates and ask questions in now that this thing is actuallymoving forward. I'll try to keep everything in here from now on.
Generally speaking, we're making progress on this endeavour. We're getting the non profit set up and waiting on samples from Wilderness Trail to do the actual barrel pick. It'll be a cask strenght whiskey around 110 proof. I'm hopeful we'll take delivery of the bottles before Thanksgiving, which means they'll be good Christmas gifts. A couple of the guys helping out made me aware that there are often warehouse delays though, so we'll see how it plays out. I *think* we'll be around the $100-125/bottle price range and could generate $10,000-15,000 for the MC on bottles alone as well as get lots of folks a cool (and pretty damn good) bottle of whiskey.
Couple things I'd like some feedback on from the fine folks at RRS:
1) Is there any interest in getting a spot in the tasting group? There will be some expense involved, whether we do a raffle or auction, but it will go to the MC.
It's not going to be done at the distillery, so not super exciting, but fun none the less. You'll get to do the tasting, have some say in the pick and get your name on the sticker that goes on the bottles. We have Woodland Trail samples coming to San Antonio sometime in September and I believe they're sending some from their rye whiskey, wheated bourbon and high rye bourbon lines. We'll meet with the rep in San Antonio, taste the samples, settle on one and order the barrel. I don't have an exact date yet, but it's going to be a weekday. I'm hoping we can push for a Friday so if someone from out of town wants to come then you can make a weekend out of it, but that's not guarnteed so keep that in mind if you're not local to SA. If you're interested just comment in the thread. If we have enough for a raffle we may do that. If it's only a few we may auction it off.
2) Does anyone have the ability to create a GOOD design for a sticker to put on the bottles? Should we have an MS Paint competition? What's @HaysCounty up to these days? We can always stick something very generic on there, but if any of you are willing or know someone who is willing to be a little more creative I think it would be a cool addition to the whole deal.
Edit: for those who missed out on previous info… we have a small group of guys working to get a barrel pick of whiskey, have Tech fans (RRS first, but all are welcome) donate to our non profit, receive a bottle of whiskey in return and have the proceeds go to the matador club. Lots of small off shoots will happen to maximize the coolness and $$ going to the MC.
Once we have the barrel ordered more info will be available and I’ll set something up to accept donations and get names down for who wants bottles and how many. Lots of little things to take care of to make sure we’re not stepping on any toes, breaking any laws, burning bridges etc… but the wheels are in motion.
@Taft33 check your PM's please.
Last edited:
