Brick by brick
The future of Louisiana rum
In this life, you must be willing to trade in all “progress” if pivoting is worth it. When you have conviction about a path forward, and your “passion is greater than the sum of [your] fear of failure plus the alternative cost,” you must take that leap. Go back to catapult forward.
That path forward for me is Louisiana Cane Spirits. For the last ~2 years, I have painstakingly read, researched, and written about the economic, political & social history of rum/sugarcane broadly, and its impact in Louisiana specifically. No shortcuts; many early mornings and late nights combing through thousands of pages.
The question I sought to answer: is it possible that a place that has crushed sugarcane for so long (1700s) would not also have a rich cane spirits (rum) history? Is it possible that the state with the largest sugarcane acreage (400,000+ football fields worth) completely ignored rum making? My Caribbean sensibilities led me to conclude that there is no chance a cane spirit heritage hasn’t coursed through the state in some consequential proportion.
Thankfully, I have evidence to prove that rum importing, distilling, and consumption occurred in Louisiana (heavily) throughout the 18th century. Given this, rum is the state’s native spirit that has fallen under the radar. As a country, we should be thankful to have the example of what a heritage spirit can do for a state: ~$11B Bourbon impact on the state of Kentucky (alone). For context, ~$11B is reportedly more than 50% of the value of the GLOBAL rum market.
So I ask: is it not possible for Louisiana’s native spirit to stand out in the same way? How many jobs will be created, when thousands are being lost daily, if the place blessed with the source material can also convert the plant into a cane-to-glass product for state, country, and world to consume? How many Louisiana rum-making families can we create? How much pride and dignity would that enable for generations to come? A Louisiana cane spirits (rum) trail is not far out of sight when you begin putting the puzzle pieces together.
I am not naive. There are regulatory and commercial realities governing how all of this works. Furthermore, I understand that people’s lives aren’t academic subjects. Human beings do what is socially acceptable and economically practical. And people can’t make sense of that which they’ve not been given the language and context to understand. But I feel passionately that we cannot let this go, even if it takes a lifetime to achieve.
This is what Louisiana Cane Spirits will work toward. Thank you to the handful of rum producers in the Pelican State who have kept this history alive through producing amazing liquid. I look forward to working alongside each of you, as well as all constituents across the state, to reclaim what will be transformational for the lives of every Louisianan. I accept that there is simple but hard work to accomplish, like building the nation’s rum vocabulary to understand the basics: rum comes from sugarcane, the purest of cane spirit is unadulterated, etc. Today, cane spirit has to be understood before it can be appreciated.
Louisiana can lift the entire American rum boat. I acknowledge and tip my hat to the many producers - Georgia, Colorado, New England (the 13 Continental Colonies’ rum stomping ground pre-Independence), and others - who continue to raise the rum flag high. Ultimately, a nation with a rich alcohol vocabulary and appreciation is a net opportunity generator at home and globally. And we’re fortunate to be agriculturally resource-rich and of scale. The future is bright. However, those in the industry know all too well that time is of the essence.
Cheers and #rumresponsibly
