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“It was like a 10-run first inning, amazing and unprecedented,” says Amit Dhawan, comparing the 43-minute sellout of his November 22 Whiskey in the Winter event to post-season Cardinals baseball. “Completely nuts.”
Last year, the festival featured 473 different whiskies, a number that gave Dhawan legitimate bragging rights for hosting the biggest event of its kind in the country. “We went from selling out in two weeks two years ago to four days last year,” he says. “This year, I was thinking it might sell out in two.”
Just like yesterday’s first-inning antics, nobody saw it coming. “Our server was at capacity, but it didn’t crash,” says Jenn Schaefering, experiential director for Dhawan’s company, SYNERGY Productions LLC, counting her blessings. “Next year, though, we’ll need to be even better prepared.”
Asked why the event has become so popular, Dhawan says, “We predicted a whiskey boom. Then there was a boom. Now the suppliers are having a hard time keeping up,” in large part because whisky is made in small batches and takes years to age. “So a lot of it gets allocated, which makes events like ours that much more exclusive.”
After this year’s record-breaking sellout, Dhawan and Schaefering agree that a change is now mandatory, although switching venues was never an option. “The Hyatt [Regency St. Louis at the Arch] has been good to us,” Dhawan says. “Plus, they have the biggest ballroom space in the city.” Going anywhere else, such as a convention center, would mean changing the event’s vibe and personality, which Dhawan says he doesn’t want to do.
The alternate is spreading the event across two days, which can be accomplished in several ways. “We could do two nights, but a better alternative may be doing Friday night and then a second session Saturday during the day,” he says. “More industry people could come—more people in general could come.”
Dhawan says he needed “a gamechanger like this [sellout]” to legitimize the second day. "Last year, we had the most whiskies,” he says. “This year, we had the quickest sellout.” It should help the event gain even more traction in the future, he says, from the casual local whiskey fan to aficionados to vendors, suppliers, and brand ambassadors across the nation.
Sellout aside, St. Louis Magazine is giving away two tickets to the event (a $110 value per ticket). Enter to win them here.
