It started when a leading liquor company found price a salvation for achieving volumes, ignorantly eroding equity and deliberately destroying their whisky brands as well as other brands ignorantly benchmarking & adopting their policy.
I imagine the marketing director alienated, fighting a losing battle with his leadership team. Any gender in the drinks industry worth their salt will quote multiple lessons in our drinks business history exposing this thinking as irresponsibly destructive.
Nevertheless, this leading liquor company successfully bluffed the copycats achieving the beginning of Scotch whiskies decline driving volume over value to a point that it made no sense to trade. The damage is done, and Scotch will be recovering for many years to come at great expense to rebuild its premium cues. The bigger picture is even deeper. It is the winner of white spirits that will conquer!
The nagging conspiracy theorist in me smells an alternative rat! Is there a tactical & devious plan that thinks a world where 'Brexit' allows for an independent Scotland is a direct threat to English dominance in Scotch whisky - the second largest revenue stream for the English economy? Will it make more sense to focus and invest instead in white spirits & especially Gins to diminish reliance on Scotch? Then there is the other great brown spirit to ward off. The Irish is coming!
This post is not sinister but cheeky as in tongue in cheek.
