NFL great Terry Bradshaw makes stop in east Cobb to promote bourbon business

MARIETTA - Terry Bradshaw has been many things over the course of his life.

The 77-year-old Pro Football Hall of Famer won four Super Bowls as quarterback of the Pittsburgh Steelers. Since the mid-1980s, he has been a fixture on CBS and then Fox as an analyst, for which he has won three sports Emmys.

Bradshaw has also been an actor, written five books, recorded six country and gospel albums, been part-owner of a NASCAR team and he has owned and worked a 744-acre cattle ranch in Oklahoma for more than 23 years.

However, as Bradshaw has gotten older, he got out of racing, sold the ranch and is no longer actively searching out acting or singing roles. To pass the time, he has instead followed another long-time passion and turned it into another lucrative business opportunity - bourbon.

Over the last few years, Bradshaw has created his own brand of whiskeys, and he appeared at Sprayberry Bottle Shop on Tuesday in east Cobb to not only promote and sell his new libations - which seemed to be flying off the shelves - but to also meet and greet his fans.

"I've been a bourbon drinker all my life," Bradshaw said, "so we got started about eight years ago."

While the idea had always been in the back of his mind, it was his wife, Tammy, who finally got him to get it off the ground. A long-time drinker of Four Roses, a friend offered to send Terry Bradshaw a barrel of the bourbon.

"We figured out we could get 128 bottles out of a barrel," Bradshaw said. "I said, ‘Let's bottle ‘em up, I'll autograph them, we'll sell them for $100 apiece and we'll send all the money to the Wounded Warriors to help the veterans.

"The next year, Four Roses sent me two barrels. We bottled them up, signed them and sent the money to Wounded Warriors. That's when my wife said, ‘You know, you are giving Four Roses a lot publicity and making them a lot of money. Why don't you do your own?'"

Bradshaw took the advice to heart, teaming with Green River Distillery - the 10th-oldest distillery in Kentucky - to create his own brand.

While he may not be able to identify every aspect in the bottle, Bradshaw said he knows what he likes. It took 15 months for the distillers to hit on the what he considers to be the perfect blend.

"It's 70% corn, 21% rye and 9% malted barley," he said. "When I first tasted it, all I could say is, ‘That's it!"

The bourbon is 51.9% alcohol by volume, which makes it 103.8-proof. He jokes about the alcohol, because when he was first informed of that number, he thought 51.9 sounded familiar.

"It was my completion percentage over the course of my career," said Bradshaw, who prefers to sip his bourbon neat, or straight into a glass without any ice or combinations.

Bradshaw's bourbon has been favorably compared to Knob Creek, Bulleit and Marker's Mark, and it has won numerous awards, including gold, double gold and best in show from the Wine & Spirits Tasting Competition. It was given a score of 91 by Wine Enthusiast, gold at the San Francisco World Sprits Competition and found a spot on the top 100 of the Fred Minnick American Whiskey Ranking.

The label on the bottles of Bradshaw's products not only highlights his name, but it has a sticker on the front with the Roman numerals IX, X, XIII and XIV - representing the Super Bowls in which he led the Steelers to wins. On the side of the bottle are the years of those Super Bowl victories - 1974, 1975, 1978 and 1979.

To this day, Bradshaw quarterbacked the only team to win four Super Bowls in six seasons.

"It's a little vain," he said, "but it's OK."

As the meet-and-greet started Tuesday, there were people who braved the heat to wrap around the package store, with many dressed in black and gold Steelers jerseys to have a moment with Bradshaw, who relished in getting to meet as many folks and take pictures with as many as he possibly could.

"Let's get this thing going," Bradshaw said shortly after he arrived. "Let's meet the people. It's hot outside."

It was obvious Bradshaw was enjoying himself, as well as store owner Brij Patel, who had been patiently trying to arrange to get Bradshaw to visit.

"We had been trying to get him to come down for more than six months," said Patel, who is also a social media influencer. "This kind of experience is where it's at. We have become a destination."

Patel said he has previously worked Ed Bolian, a car enthusiast and YouTuber known as "VINwiki" who created VINWhiskey as part of the Fiddler family from ASW Distillery in Atlanta, along with Curtis Jackson - aka rapper 50 Cent.

Jackson, who founded Sire Spirits, has a premium line of cognacs, including the Branson 505 Edition (Lalique), which can retail upwards of $30,000 a bottle.

Bradshaw stayed at the Sprayberry Bottle Shop until he had a chance to meet with everyone who came in. They left happy, Bradshaw left happy and Patel was happy, too.

"We sold 515 bottles (of Bradshaw's bourbon) in 1½ hours," Patel said.

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