AUSTIN, Texas — If you were stocking up for your New Year's Eve celebration this week, you probably saw tents outside of Spec's.
That's because bourbon lovers across Texas were camping out for the chance to buy rare and highly coveted bottles.
The Spec's store in South Austin along Highway 290 was just one of three locations in the Lone Star State taking part in the In-Store Bourbon Drop on Thursday. The annual bourbon drop had people from all across Texas braving the cold temperatures to buy their favorite special bourbon at retail prices.
Even Austinites spent the day after Christmas driving to Houston for a taste.
"Houston, the drop is way better," Taylor Welden told KVUE's sister station KHOU. "There are more bottles. There is a better selection."
The store says customers were allowed to buy one bottle at each different station set up inside Spec's once they opened.
"The bourbon that Spec's is dropping ... Is extremely hard to find as it's allocated to only a certain number of bottles per state per year," Sterling DeMasters, a bourbon consultant who drove from San Antonio to Austin told KVUE. "Spec's has their own picks of some of these hard-to-find bourbons, which are even more rare ... The combination of availability and price makes it hard to pass up."
And don't forget, if you need to stock up the liquor cabinet ahead of 2024, you only have a few days to do so. Liquor stores in Texas liquor stores will be closed Sunday and Monday.