Striding and whiskey-drinking man: Who is John Walker?

John Walker, who gave his name to the Johnnie Walker brand, was born on July 25, 1805, on the Todriggs farm in Kilmarnock, Scotland. In 1819, John loses his father at a very young age, and his family puts their farm up for sale. With the money obtained from the sale of the farm, they bought a small grocery store in Kilmarnock.

Despite his young age, John quickly increases his knowledge about both products and trade and takes on the entire workload of the shop. In addition to groceries, the shop also sells alcoholic beverages such as wine, rum, brandy, gin, and whiskey. In addition to these, there are also different spices and teas from exotic countries on the shelves of the shop.

John (Johnnie) Walker (born 1805, Kilmarnock–1857) was a Scottish grocer, who originated what would become one of the world's most famous whisky brand names, Johnnie Walker, despite the fact he was himself a teetotaler. John Walker was born in 1805 near Kilmarnock in East Ayrshire. When his father Alexander died in 1820, he was left £417 in trust. In 1820, the trustees invested in an Italian warehouse, grocery, and wine and spirits shop on the High Street in Kilmarnock.

Here we need to open a semi-parenthesis for “tea”. Teas from different countries, especially China, are mixed in the shop and offered to customers in different blends. John undertakes this blending operation and improves himself in this regard over time.

John does a similar blending operation for whiskey. In the early days, he made the blends he created upon order. After receiving orders from customers, John tries to create a balanced blend by mixing the different whiskeys in his stock in certain proportions with the experience he has gained from tea blending. And it is successful.

The popularity of these blends, which were not sold under a specific brand name in the beginning, is gradually increasing. After a while, John's blends began to be sold under the name "Walker's Kilmarnock Whiskey".

I must point out that the Single Malt category was very different at that time than it is now. Malt whiskeys, which had a rather extreme character, were seen as difficult drinks that were not suitable for everyone's taste. However, since the production techniques of the period did not meet a certain standard, there could be great differences even in whiskeys produced under the same roof. John's blending efforts aimed to present these whiskeys, which are difficult to drink and do not appeal to everyone's taste, by making them a little more balanced.

After John Walker's death in 1857, his son Alexander Walker took over. Alexander focused on further expanding his whiskey business, which started to grow slowly after he took over the business.

Alexander does very serious work on branding and is actually the person who takes many of the steps that make Johnnie Walker what it is today. External factors such as England being the center of the industrial revolution, the increase in trade, and the spread of railways also help Alexander to make Johnnie Walker a world brand.

It is said that Alexander Walker constantly gifted whiskey to ship captains at that time. The captains, who loved whiskey very much, would offer Walker's whiskey to everyone wherever they went. In this way, we can say that Alexander increased brand awareness by applying the first example of word-of-mouth marketing.

In 1865, the Walker family's first blended whiskey officially hit the shelves under the name "Old Highland Whiskey". In the following years, this blend first received its name "Extra Special Old Highland" and then its current name, Black Label.

We also see that Johnnie Walker's iconic bottle design emerged in the 1860s. Under the conditions of the period, there were a lot of breakages while the bottles were being transported from one place to another by ships, horse carriages and trains. For this reason, Alexander thought of producing square bottles. In addition to reducing bottle breakage, square bottles also provide a great advantage to Johnnie Walker in that they take up less space in logistics and distinguish the brand from other whiskeys on the shelves.

The 24-degree inclined label design, which is still one of the most distinctive features of the brand today, also emerged under these branding efforts (1877). The slanted design not only makes it possible to write more text on the label but also becomes another eye-catching element on the shelves for the consumer.

Birth of Labels

By the early 1900s, the brand had three whiskeys on the market. These are 5-year Old Highland, 9-year Special Old Highland, and 12-year Extra Special Old Highland.

As you can see, Johnnie Walker's "Label" phrase that we are used to has not entered our lives yet. In the following years, when customers ordered in markets, instead of saying the long names of the whiskeys, they asked, "Can you give me that black label one?" Over time, long names are replaced by colors, as people place orders with sentences like these. Old Highland, Special Old Highland, and Extra Special Old Highland are named White, Red, and Black Label respectively.

Iconic “Striding Man” Logo

In the early 1900s, George Paterson and Alexander Walker, who managed the Johnnie Walker brand, searched for an interesting logo for their brand within the scope of branding. After a long search, they finally meet the right person, Tom Browne...

Tom Browne, a young cartoonist, starts scribbling something on the back of the menu during lunch. These doodles of Tom are the first drawings of the "Striding Man" logo, which has survived to this day and is one of the most iconic logos in history.

A growing family

The Walker family acquired the first distillery in 1893 by purchasing the Cardhu distillery in Speyside, which was at the center of Johnnie Walker blends, in other words, the heart of the blends. With the distillery purchased from the Cumming family for £20,500, the Walker family has secured the base malt supply needed to create their blends.

In the following years, Johnnie Walker expanded its distillery portfolio with the purchases of Clynelish (1915), Dailuaine-Talisker (1916), and Mortlach (1923).

And Today

Johnnie Walker, whose foundations were laid in a small grocery store in Scotland, is now one of the first brands that come to mind when whiskey is mentioned. Johnnie Walker has a place at the top of the best-selling Scotch, best-selling Blended, and best-selling whiskey rankings every year.

Johnnie Walker, who has appeared in many films and TV series, has recently made a tremendous impact with his collaborations with Formula 1 and Game of Thrones.