The jacket of Bulleit Proof: How I Took a 150-Year-Old Family Recipe and a Revolver, and Disrupted the Entire Liquor Industry One Bottle, One Sip, One Handshake at a Time categorizes the book as “Business & Economics,” conjuring up thoughts of dry business statistics, number crunching and the like. But the story of Tom Bulleit, the founder of the now-world-famous Bulleit Bourbon, is anything but dry, to hear him tell it in the newly released book.
Bulleit’s life is distilled over 15 chapters and 30 so-called Bulleit Points. He covers serving as a United States Marine Corps medic in Vietnam, attending law school, bringing an old family bourbon recipe to life, navigating the corporate world, being diagnosed with cancer and meeting his birth mother.
“From a practical standpoint, it was to really set out the Bulleit Bourbon story,” Bulleit said. “I [also] wanted to talk about a couple of things I believe in.”
Bulleit Point No. 6: Go All In
By the time Bulleit officially launched the Bulleit Distilling Company in 1987, he already had solidified a career in business law. But his dream to revive his great-great-great-grandfather’s bourbon recipe led him to leave the law practice and start a new business from the ground up. Today, the bourbon garners top rankings in spirits competitions and liquor publications.
“If there’s a single business piece of advice, it would be patience … the power of patience,” Bulleit said. “But the rest of that [advice] is having the absolute conviction of ultimate success. You have to be all in.”
Bulleit Point No. 8: Make It Personal
Throughout the book, Bulleit names a number of people who have helped him navigate the corporate world, including those at Seagram, the now-defunct conglomerate that bought the Bulleit brand, as well as those he has met and worked with at Diageo, the London-based company that took over the Kentucky brand when it bought out Seagram.
“Nobody gets to where they are without an awful lot of help,” Bulleit said. “While I’ve been persistent and pushed, worked 10 hours a day and traveled 150 days a year, I have worked hard at it, but so have a whole lot of other people. Thousands of wonderful people and unbelievable people throughout the years have really created the brand. When you end up with a business at this scale, there’s no way I can pour every drink or sell every bottle.”
The book itself is a collaboration with Los Angeles-based author Alan Eisenstock.
“I went to LA a couple of times, and he came to Kentucky a couple of times, and [we also] spent endless hours on the phone,” Bulleit said. “I would tell stories, which he would record, and ask questions, which he would record, and then have them transcribed.”
Bulleit said 750 pages of transcripts resulted from those meetings, all condensed into 210 pages of the book.
Bulleit Point No. 28
You Can Live Lamenting the Past or Imagine a Bright Future by Simply Flipping the Switch in Your Head. Change the Channel
Just because he wrote a book about his life doesn’t mean Bulleit plans to retire into quiet solitude with his wife, Betsy. On the contrary, Bulleit said he fully plans to work at his Shelbyville distillery and continue his travels to international markets, always promoting the brand that bears his name.
“I’m not retired. I’m afraid of retirement,” he said.
Bulleit Point No. 29
I Have Been Extraordinarily Blessed in the Prayers God Has Answered and in Those Un-Answered
But it’s not all about the bourbon. Bulleit goes into emotional detail about meeting his birth mother and numerous newfound biological siblings. There is nothing businesslike in those pages, as he shares his emotions regarding the events as they unfolded.
He also holds little back as he shares his battle with cancer, his subsequent struggles with chemotherapy and surgeries, and his strong desire to get back to work.
“I thought it might be helpful for people who have cancer. Instead of sitting at home worried about what’s going to happen next, try to jump in and work,” he said. “Some of the best advice I got out of that was: ‘You may live; you may die; you won’t have much to do with that. But you’ll be a whole lot better off if you try to work.’ ”