It wasn’t that long ago when pre-mixed cocktails were something to be avoided, ranked among the least desirable alcoholic beverage options available in the beer cooler at your local gas station or bodega. But a funny thing happened in recent years: Ready-to-drink (RTD) cocktails have advanced upmarket with better ingredients, more prestigious brands and an improved image making them some of the hottest beverages available.
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The Glenlivet Twist & Mix Read More -
Handy & Schiller Read More
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High West Barrel Finished Cocktail Read More
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Sunday's Finest Gold Fashioned Read More
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Jefferson's The Manhattan Barrel Finished Cocktail Read More
Alcoholic beverage research firm IWSR expects spirits-based RTDs like pre-mixed cocktails to overtake hard seltzers as the largest shareholder of the RTD market by 2025, and this growth is largely due to customers’ demand for more premium offerings. Nowhere is this premium shift more evident than in the whiskey-based sub-category of RTDs. These days it’s entirely possible to purchase a bottled old fashioned or Manhattan that’s every bit as good as one you would make yourself … or perhaps better ... thanks to the brands below.
The Glenlivet Twist & Mix
- ABV: 40%
- Size: 375ml
- Flavors: Old Fashioned, Manhattan
The Glenlivet is one of the world’s most preeminent single malt Scotch brands and is one of the last names you’d expect to see entering the RTD space, which may be why the premium brand found a loophole.
Glenlivet’s unique bottled cocktails are described by the brand as "ready to serve": Instead of being mixed on the shelf, the single malt remains untouched in the bottle until you twist open the cap, which then releases a torrent of flavor (orange, nutmeg and cinnamon in the old fashioned, ginger and cherry in the Manhattan) into the bottle to make a fresh, premium Scotch cocktail.
Handy & Schiller
- ABV: 35% – 42%
- Size: 750ml
- Flavors: Old Fashioned, Manhattan
From Sazerac, the parent company of Buffalo Trace, comes this premium label of barrel-aged bottled cocktails. Available in both an old fashioned made with Buffalo Trace Bourbon and Peychaud’s Bitters and a Manhattan containing Sazerac Rye and Peychaud’s Bitters, the cocktails are produced, aged and bottled at the Buffalo Trace Distillery in Kentucky ... you know, the same place where they make Pappy Van Winkle.
High West Barrel-Finished Cocktails
- ABV: 37% – 43%
- Size: 750ml
- Flavors: Old Fashioned, Manhattan
While lacking the name recognition of Buffalo Trace, High West still makes a damn good whiskey. The Utah-based distillery has been bottling some of its award-winning whiskey in a pair of bottled cocktails. High West’s spins on the old fashioned and Manhattan are both crafted with the distillery’s own straight bourbon and straight rye (they even go so far as to tell you the mashbills) along with bitters and, in the Manhattan, vermouth.
Sunday's Finest The Gold Fashioned
- ABV: 42.4%
- Size: 750ml
- Flavors: Old Fashioned
Robert Haynes, a former bartender at Chicago’s acclaimed cocktail bar The Violet Hour, started Sunday’s Finest in 2020 with the goal of creating the best bottled old fashioned on the planet. Each year, he crafts a new version in a limited run using the best ingredients he can find, with his latest concoction featuring a blend of 15- and 9-year Kentucky straight bourbons, 6-year Indiana straight rye, Malawian demerara sugar and homemade bitters containing a blend of Afghan saffron, Tahitian vanilla, Ecuadorian cacao, Seville orange peel and French gentian. To top it off, an atomizer full of orange zest finishing spray is included with the bottle.
Jefferson's The Manhattan Barrel Finished Cocktail
- ABV: 34%
- Size: 750ml
- Flavors: Manhattan
Jefferson's is one of the more creative whiskey brands in the market today, often experimenting with unique aging processes like setting their barrels adrift at sea or shipping them halfway around the world to spend time in different environments. So it makes sense that the brand's bottled cocktail would also stand out in a crowd. Envisioned as the perfect bottled Manhattan, this barrel-finished cocktail is made with Jefferson's bourbon, both sweet and dry vermouth and, the secret weapon: barrel-aged spiced cherry bitters.
Old Forester Mint Julep
- ABV: 30%
- Size: 750ml
- Flavors: Mint Julep
Not all premium bottled whiskey cocktails have to be some variation of a Manhattan or old fashioned. Case in point, Old Forester's convenient take on the mint julep. The official drink of the Kentucky Derby gets special treatment here from the Birthday Bourbon brand, as sweet mint flavors mingle with Old Forester's straight Kentucky bourbon. The drink is similar (and in some cases, probably identical) to the pre-mixed juleps you'll get in Louisville at the actual Derby.
Bulleit Crafted Cocktails
- ABV: 37.5%
- Size: 375ml, 750ml
- Flavors: Old Fashioned, Manhattan
Bulleit's rye and high-rye bourbon are staples behind any bar thanks to their easy mixability, so it makes sense that the brand collaborated with bartenders to develop a pair of bottled cocktails. Sold in striking full-color bottles (orange for bourbon, green for rye, just like their spirituous counterparts), the old fashioned mixes Bulleit bourbon with orange bitters for a citrusy twist, while the Manhattan keeps things classic with Bulleit's spicy straight rye whiskey, bitters and sweet vermouth.
Starward Bottled Cocktails
- ABV: 32%
- Size: 500ml
- Flavors: (New) Old Fashioned, Coffee Old Fashioned, Whisky Negroni
Nothing about Starward is ordinary, from the fact that it's an Austrailian whisky distillery that's an awards darling to its propensity for aging whisky in red wine barrels, so why would its cocktails be the same as other brands? Starward recently came out of the gate with three bottled cocktails — a Coffee Old Fashioned that mixes Starward whisky with Mr. Black Cold Brew Coffee Liqueur, a Whisky Negroni that swaps out gin for Australian whisky in the classic cocktail, and a unique old fashioned made with the distillery's own orange bitters and Demerara syrup infused with local wattleseed.
