HISTORY OF THE NAME "PRIVATE STOCK"
In 1918, as Prohibition loomed, J. Rieger & Co. held a vast stock of whiskey that was about to become illegal to sell. Jacob Rieger's son, Alexander, petitioned the courts for the right to move every bottle to his private residence. In 1927, Federal Judge Faris ruled in his favor. Alexander could keep it all as his "Private Stock." Today, we honor that defiance by reserving the name for our boldest, most intentional bottlings.
A COMPANY BUILT BEFORE THE LAW CHANGED
Before Prohibition, J. Rieger & Co. wasn't just a Kansas City distillery. It was one of the largest mail-order whiskey houses in the country, shipping bottles to customers across the nation from its downtown headquarters. Jacob Rieger had built something rare: a whiskey business with national reach, a loyal following, and a warehouse full of aging, valuable stock.
Then came 1918. The wheels of Prohibition were already turning, and it was only a matter of time before every bottle Jacob had built his business on would become illegal to sell, ship, or even possess for commercial purposes. For a company built on its inventory, this wasn't just an inconvenience. It was existential.
A Son's Petition
Jacob's son, Alexander Rieger, wasn't willing to watch the family's whiskey seized or destroyed. He took a different approach: if the company couldn't legally sell it, perhaps a private citizen could legally own it. Alexander petitioned the federal courts for the right to transport the entirety of J. Rieger & Co.'s remaining whiskey stock out of the company's warehouses and into his own private residence, not as inventory for sale, but as his own personal property.
It was an audacious claim, and the courts didn't rule quickly. Alexander's case moved through the federal system for years while Prohibition took hold across the country and distilleries around him shuttered or dumped their stock.
The Ruling
In 1927, nearly a decade after he first filed, Federal Judge Faris issued the order Alexander had been waiting for: he was granted the legal right to take every remaining bottle home. It would no longer belong to the company. It was, in the judge's own terms, his "Private Stock."
"His Private Stock."
— Federal Judge Faris, 1927
Not a marketing term.
A name won after
9 years in federal court.
The ruling preserved not just whiskey, but a piece of the family's legacy. Bottles that would have otherwise been destroyed under federal order survived because one man was willing to fight for them, bottle by bottle, for the better part of a decade.
WHY THE NAME STILL MATTERS
Nearly a century later, we borrow Alexander's defiance every time we put the words "Private Stock" on a label. It's not a tier or a marketing term to us. It's a name earned in federal court by a Rieger who refused to let Prohibition win. That's why we only use it for the bottlings we believe are worth fighting for: the boldest, most deeply intentional whiskeys we make.
Today, Private Stock lives on, not as a legal loophole, but as the name for our boldest, most deeply intentional bottlings.