Old Forester's Birthday Bourbon and Remus Series X

Bourbon Heritage Month opened with the fall release season's traditional starting gun. Old Forester dropped its Birthday Bourbon on September 2, Four Roses put a date on its Limited Edition Small Batch, and Remus turned ten years of Repeal Reserve into a two-bottle celebration. The same morning the Birthday Bourbon shipped, its parent company reported earnings that explain why every one of these bottles matters more to distillers than usual.

• Old Forester released its 26th Birthday Bourbon on September 2: an 11-year, 97-proof pull from 212 barrels in Warehouse B, at $199.99¹
• Brown-Forman reported flat whiskey sales for its first fiscal quarter, with revenue down 1% to $911 million and used-barrel income in freefall²
• Remus announced Repeal Reserve Series X at 107 proof plus the brand's first-ever rye, both $79.99, arriving this month³
• Four Roses dated its 2026 Limited Edition Small Batch for October 10: four batches aged 14 to 23 years at 109.2 proof, $249⁴
• Town Branch released Imperium MMXXVI, a 115.1-proof cask-strength blend built on a 50% wheated base, distillery-only at $119.99⁵

Old Forester released the 2026 Birthday Bourbon on September 2, the anniversary of founder George Garvin Brown's birth. The 26th edition runs 11 years old at 97 proof, drawn from 212 barrels that aged on the third floor of Warehouse B, the oldest warehouse at the Brown-Forman Distillery in Shively. Master distiller emeritus Chris Morris made the selection with assistant master distiller Caleb Trigo, and the suggested price is $199.99¹.

The proof will start arguments. Ninety-seven is genteel territory for a $200 annual release in a market where barrel-proof is the default flex, and Birthday Bourbon has always been graded on elegance rather than muscle. The age statement is the better story: 11 years from a brand whose flagship carries none, barreled back in 2015 when nobody was sure the boom would last. What an age statement does and doesn't tell you is ground our Bourbon 101 guide covers in detail. Finding one at $199.99 is its own project. Recent editions cleared retail through lotteries and vanished to the secondary market within days, so if a store near you runs an allocation list, this is the week to be on it. Log a sighting on Drops when a bottle surfaces.

The earnings print landed September 2, hours after the Birthday Bourbon. Brown-Forman's first-quarter revenue slipped 1% to $911 million, and whiskey net sales came in flat: Jack Daniel's Tennessee Whiskey level, Tennessee Honey and Gentleman Jack down, the Blackberry flavor extension and ready-to-drink cans doing the growing². Old Forester managed 1% growth, which counts as outperformance right now.

The bleakest line item never touches a bottle. Brown-Forman's bulk and used-barrel business has collapsed from over $130 million to roughly $30 million in two years, because the distillers and brokers who once bought its emptied casks are sitting on their own surplus⁶. CEO Lawson Whiting spent the analyst call arguing that reports of American whiskey's demise are "exaggerated," pointing to premium bourbon holding share while flavored line extensions sag⁶. The company reaffirmed its full-year outlook: flat organic sales, operating income down 3% to 5%².

Ross & Squibb announced Repeal Reserve Series X on September 2, and the anniversary edition earns the numeral. Master distiller Ian Stirsman blended batches distilled between 2008 and 2017 across three mash bills, folding in the distillery's rarely used LISV recipe for the first time in the series. It bottles at 107 proof for $79.99³. Alongside it comes the first-ever Remus Repeal Reserve Rye at the same price, a notable move from the Indiana distillery whose rye stocks quietly built half the craft whiskey category's reputation.

Series X is the sleeper value of the fall calendar. Bourbon distilled as far back as 2008 in an $80 bottle undercuts everything else on this page by a wide margin, and earlier Repeal Reserve editions have aged well on both merit and price.

Four Roses put a firm date on the season's most-chased small batch: October 10. The 19th Limited Edition blends a 14-year OBSK, a 14-year OESK, a 15-year OESV, and a 23-year OESK at 109.2 proof, non-chill filtered, with roughly 16,800 bottles at $249⁴. A 23-year component is rarefied air for Four Roses, which historically treats even 16 years as elderly⁷.

The smaller announcements stacked up behind it. Town Branch released Imperium MMXXVI on September 4, a third-annual cask-strength blend that marries a 50% wheated base (the softer grain style mapped in our wheated bourbon guide) with stock from the distillery's other mash bills, eight barrels aged 6 to 9-plus years at 115.1 proof and $119.99, sold at the Lexington distillery and poured at the Kentucky Bourbon Festival⁵. Bib & Tucker's first bottled-in-bond, an 8-year Tennessee high-rye at $64.99, begins its national rollout this month after a summer announcement⁸. None of these will trend. All three are more findable than the bottles that will, and for what's dependably on shelves at every price, our complete bourbon buying guide is the standing reference.

• September 11–13: Kentucky Bourbon Festival in Bardstown. Larrikin pours its Australia Series one expression per day, Town Branch brings Imperium, and the festival remains the best single weekend to taste distillery-only releases without buying them.
• September 12: Garrison Brothers Cowboy Bourbon hits the Hye, Texas distillery at 141 proof and $249.99, with nationwide bottles following October 1. Starlight's 10-Year Mizunara Reserve sells its 50 in-person bottles in Borden, Indiana the same day.
• October 10: Four Roses Limited Edition Small Batch. Sixteen thousand bottles sounds like a lot until the allocation math starts. Ask your store now, not in October.

Sources & methodology8 sources

Every claim in this issue links to its source. Reporting draws on distiller announcements, regulators and trade outlets, and prices are suggested retail at the time of publication.

Footnotes

1. Robb Report, "Old Forester's Annual Unicorn Birthday Bourbon Is Back for 2026," September 2026 ↩ ↩²

2. Brown-Forman, "Brown-Forman Reports First Quarter Fiscal 2027 Results; Reaffirms Full Year Outlook," September 2, 2026 ↩ ↩² ↩³

3. Breaking Bourbon, "Remus Bourbon Celebrates 10 Years of Repeal Reserve with Series X and its First-Ever Rye Whiskey," September 2, 2026 ↩ ↩²

4. Breaking Bourbon, "Four Roses Set to Launch 2026 Limited Edition Small Batch on October 10," September 2026 ↩ ↩²

5. Fred Minnick, "Town Branch Releases IMPERIUM MMXXVI Kentucky Straight Bourbon," September 4, 2026 ↩ ↩²

6. The Spirits Business, "Brown-Forman CEO: US whiskey demise 'exaggerated'," September 2026 ↩ ↩²

7. The Bourbon Flight, "Four Roses unveils 2026 Limited Edition Small Batch with bourbon up to 23 Years Old," September 2026 ↩

8. BevNET, "Bib & Tucker Releases Its First Bottled-in-Bond Bourbon, an 8-Year-Old Tennessee High-Rye Aged Twice the Required Minimum," July 28, 2026 ↩