Chinese tourist lavishes £7k on single shot of Scotch

A Chinese tourist has spent 9,999 Swiss francs (£7,810) on a single 20ml shot of The Macallan 1878 Special Reserve from a bottle that had remained unopened for 139 years at a Swiss hotel.

The unnamed Chinese buyer of the £7,810 shot of whisky

The bottle was opened at the Waldhaus Hotel in St. Moritz. The hotel’s Devil’s Place whisky bar is said to have more than 2,500 varieties with The Macallan 1878 Special Reserve being the most expensive drink on the menu, according to a report by Business Insider.

However, this is not the most expensive shot ever paid for a taste of ultra-premium tipple. A Los Angeles entrepreneur bought a $64,000 shot of Macallan 64 Year Old single-malt whisky in 2014. Last year in Hong Kong, furthermore, a Chinese buyer spent HK$68,000 for a shot of Croizet Cognac’s ‘Cuvee Leonie’ 1858.

When asked by BI if the bar ever expected anyone to order that bottle, its manager Sandro Bernasconi said, “No way, I never thought that someone would drink that.”

The Macallan is highly sought-after among whisky collectors. Last year at a Sotheby’s Hong Kong auction, The Macallan Six Pillars series in Lalique decanters, was bought by an Asian private collector for more than HK$7.7 million (US$990,000), setting a new world record for any lot of whisky ever sold at auction.

“It’s wonderful to see the lengths some people go to fulfil their personal passion for single malt, and The Macallan in particular,” a Macallan spokeswoman told BI.