How To Spot Fake Bourbon And Not Get Fooled

To ensure you're getting the best bang for your buck, it's important to know what you're looking for when buying bourbon, especially if you're a collector. Once you stray outside the typical liquor-purchasing channels, such as reliable brick-and-mortar storefronts and reputable online sellers, there's a higher chance of getting scammed. This most often looks like replacing a high-quality or historically significant bourbon with a shoddy knock-off product inside the real (or sometimes even imitation) bottle. Owner of the NEAT blog, Robyn Smith, shared some knowledge with Chowhound to help you avoid these dupes.

"In the rare cases where fakes pop up — usually in private sales — collectors will look at very specific things: label fonts, seal integrity, tax strips on older bottles, laser codes, cork style, even the type of glue under the capsule. It's very detail-oriented, and the people dealing in that space know what to look for," she says. Smith believes it's best to trust your gut if you're familiar with the brand and the suspicious bottle's taste doesn't match what you remember. While selling fake whiskey was common right after the Civil War, it's much less common to purchase a fake today.

"Fakes are mostly something that show up in the secondary market — think collectors trading rare bottles or vintage 'dusties' through unofficial channels," she explains. "So it's more of a concern for collectors chasing unicorn bottles, not everyday drinkers shopping at the liquor store."

Thankfully, fake bourbon isn't all that common a problem. "If you're buying from a licensed liquor store or trusted retailer, the chances of running into a fake bourbon bottle are basically zero," says Robyn Smith. "The U.S. has a strict three-tier system (producers, distributors, retailers), which makes it really hard for counterfeit products to slip through."

She assures us that there's not much of a reason to doubt bourbon from a legitimate retailer. Brick-and-mortar liquor stores must adhere to all sorts of state and federal business regulations, and nothing would be worse for business than word of selling counterfeit liquor. Where things start to get messy is shopping via the secondary liquor market, which is one bourbon trend to avoid for sure.

If you somehow come across a bottle that doesn't seem legit for whatever reason, her advice is to check that the cork matches the brand and that there aren't any signs of tampering with the seal. Not that you should drink anything you think has been tampered with, but if you've already opened the bottle, try to identify anything that could be described as "unusually sweet, overly thin, one-dimensional, watered down, artificial, or just kind of wrong."