Soon-to-be-inducted Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback. Two-time Super Bowl champion. Insurance company endorser. Philanthropist. Bourbon pitch-man?
Welcome to the latest project for Peyton Manning: Sweetens Cove Tennessee Bourbon, a result of the vision of real estate developer Mark Rivers and former tennis player Andy Roddick, who bought a golf club of the same name two years ago where it is tradition to take a shot of bourbon on the first tee.
The premium bourbon brand followed last year and was launched in Colorado last week.
“I’m probably an authentic, social beer drinker, but I’ve learned a lot about bourbon,” Manning said in a phone interview with The Denver Post to promote the area launch of 6,000 bottles at $200 apiece. “I’m really honored it’s here in Colorado, where we live, and I don’t take that lightly. I’ve been calling my friends with restaurants here to spread the world. I’ve done cold calls and cold emails to let people know about it. People seem excited about it.”
People seem excited about it because Manning is excited about it.
“The two things I learned about bourbon: It better taste good; if it doesn’t, people will move on, and all the people I’ve talked to that like and know bourbon say it tastes great,,” he said. “And it has to have a story behind it and we feel it has a great story.”
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The Sweetens Cove Tennessee Bourbon story starts in 2018 when Rivers first visited Sweetens Cove Golf Club. The nine-hole track is located in South Pittsburg, Tenn., 30 miles west of Chattanooga and just a few miles from the Alabama border.
“I’ve described it as ‘Field of Dreams’ meets ‘Tin Cup,’” Rivers said. “If golf had national parks, this would be one of them and I needed to put together a group to preserve this place, protect this place and celebrate this place as an icon of golf.”
The first-tee tradition served as the foundation for their bourbon adventure.
“They would leave the bottle (on the tee box) for the grounds crew or for their next time through — the (maintenance) shed had more empty whiskey bottles than golf balls,” Rivers said. “We thought that would be a really great way of kick-starting our brand.”
In 2019, Rivers and 38 investors bought the club and mostly left the place as is save for a building a bathroom to replace a port-a-potty.
Manning’s entrance to the business was through Roddick, who told Manning the club owners wanted a “Tennessee presence,” involved and invited him to play the course.
Manning, who called the club “cool and different,” joined as one of the bourbon brand’s founders and owners, joining a group that included brothers Eli and Cooper, Rivers, Roddick, CBS Sports’ Jim Nantz, pro golfer Brad Faxon and singer Drew Holcomb.
Sweetens Cove Spirits Co. was born.
“For me going back to my days playing with the Colts, I’ve always enjoyed being in at the beginning of something, either a turnaround or starting it up and building it and getting it going in the right direction,” Manning said. “When I got here to Denver, John (Elway) had incredible success as a player, (coach) Mike Shanahan carried that on and then there was kind of a lull and then we go it back going again. This is what it is for me in a different way.”
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The goal of the group was to create a premium brand of bourbon in an ultra-competitive space. Rivers said a “treasure hunt for great Tennessee bourbon,” led them to … Kentucky. In 2020, they discovered and purchased 100 13-year-old barrels in a warehouse.
Rivers, Manning and Co., needed to hire an expert blender and were recommended to Marianne Eaves, the first female bourbon master distiller since prohibition.
“Mark was explaining their grand vision and the brands they were building with the golf course and the cult following of it and they were not trying to be mass-market (distribution), but keep it small in quality and that really spoke to me,” Eaves said in a phone interview.
Eaves began her work by tasting samples from all 100 barrels; the current offering in Colorado included juices taken from 250 barrels.
“The blending process is intense and uncommon to put that much effort into hand-selecting barrels to create these unique profiles,” she said. “They wanted to invest in making sure the liquid lived up to the brand.”
Said Manning: “We hired an all-star quarterback in Marianne. She’s the captain of our team and we follow her lead. The first time I met her, she did a presentation: This is what the plan is. This is what she was going to do and took us through what her play was and how much time it would take. All of us were in awe and shock.”
The company launched last year in Tennessee and the first batch sold out and a second release went to Tennessee and Georgia. Last month, it debuted in Texas, followed by Colorado and Manning hopes the next stops are Louisiana (his home state) and Indiana (where he played for the Colts).
Sweetens Cove Spirits Company is aware of the competition but believes offering a premium product with its age profile will an impact. And the goal?
“Does world domination sound like a bad plan?” Eaves said with a laugh.
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Since he entered the NFL in 1998, Manning has received an untold number of product pitches and “I like to listen to all of them because you never know.” When he opts into a project, he’s all in.
“Peyton Manning as a business partner is everything you would expect him to be,” Rivers said. “Engaged. Detailed. Prepared. Communicative. Enthusiastic. Competitive. … I can’t speak highly enough of his work ethic and just his drive in this.”
Manning has embraced the “team” aspect of the bourbon company.
“You can certainly relate to a lot of the football experiences — teamwork, communication and following through on a game plan,” he said. “I miss being part of an NFL team. I miss my teammates. There are 53 guys on a team and you do everything together. You see them, the support staff and coaches every day and it’s hard to replicate that in this second chapter. What I’ve found is these different teams I’m a part of (currently) have filled in for those (teammates) every single day.”
