Its more than a year now since Whiskystats.net went online. The database keeps on growing, a mobile app was released and more and more people become aware of what is happening here. Hence, it is about time to lose some words about this project, why it exists, how it evolved and who is behind it.
As some may know, Whiskystats is a private hobby project of mine. In my day-job I work as a data-scientist too. So in fact, the Whiskystats project is the bridge between my profession and my appreciation for single malt whisky. In early 2015 I started wondering what the whisky bottles in my shelf could be worth, so I began to collect some auction results. Out of curiosity I analyzed this data and decided to build some kind of blog around my database. Today it is (at least to my knowledge) the biggest public accessible whisky auction price database in the world 🙂
We at Whiskystats
You may noticed that the Whiskystats articles always use the plural form. This is actually not because there are multiple people in the background which are involved in the writing process or doing all the analysis. The term “we” shall stand for the author of the text and you, the reader and user of Whiskystats. Just in case you ever wondered…
Whiskywhat?
So there it is, Whiskystats. But what is it? To some degree it is a single man´s approach to offer a new point-of-view to the whisky community. I read many posts and comments which discussed overall price developments or market behaviours without any profound fact basis. And even the ones who supported their arguments did not (or did not want to) state their data-sources or how they calculated the results. So yes, increasing transparency is one reason why Whiskystats exists.
And then its simply fun to host a website and to release an app. People start recognizing the site, sign up or share the contents and new contacts and side-projects evolve. And there is of course always the hope that the project keeps on growing and generating attention. But what is the current state of Whiskystats? How many people know about it?
Whiskystats Stats
The key figures of my database are of course no secret to all members since I display them in the Database Overview. Therefor you know that by December 2016 there are 19.000 single malt whiskies with corresponding 230.000 price observations in my database. But what you probably don’t know is how many people visit this website, use the Android App or registered as a Member.
According to my records, each day more than 100 different people visit Whiskystats.net. The origin of these visitors spreads from Norway in the north to New Zealand in the south and from California in the west to Indonesia in the east (from the Austrian point-of-view of course). And while I appreciate all visitors no matter from where they come from, it is awesome to know that the Whiskystats word spreads as far as Chile, Kazachstan, Tanzania and Saudi Arabia (only to name a view).
The main hub of the visitors is of course Central Europe and the United States and especially whisky loving Germany and of course the whisky producing United Kingdom. I even observe many visitors from France which crossed the language barrier, Bonjour! But I also have to mention Ireland from where I only observe very few visits. This has to be because I only cover scotch and japanese whiskies. And because I keep on spelling “whisky” wrong. I am sorry about that!
The one central key figure I am most interested in is the number of people who registered to Whiskystats. By the end of 2016 there are more than 1.200 Members which is nothing but awesome! These members created 900 personal collections in which they track the prices of almost 10.000 bottles of whisky!
And then there is of course the Whiskystats Android App. By December 2016 more than 700 people downloaded it. From this 700 people around 400 used the App within the last 30 days, which sounds pretty good to me.
The Future of Whiskystats
Until now I created Whiskystats to my own liking. It may appear technical and sterile, but in my opinion this helps to focus on the relevant information. I also created the Support Whiskystats site where I listed some options on how you can support this project. You could, for example, spread the word about Whiskystats among your whisky community. And while the hosting costs are not terrible high, it would be nice to have them covered. So there is a Donation Form which you can use to financially support Whiskystats and additionally motivate me 😉
So I definitely plan to keep Whiskystats going. More than that, I really hope to find the time to expand the functionalities and insights I can derive from the data. There are dozens of ideas which I would love to implement. So I am excited to see where the Whiskystats project will be in one year from now. And I hope you too!