The long-lost whiskeys of the Canadian Club’s “Hide a Case” campaign

A good marketing campaign can leave a brand in the minds of many people for decades. Think of the “Budweiser Frogs” or “The Most Interesting Man in the World” ads from Dos Equis. Then there’s the Canadian Club’s “Hide a Case” whiskey campaign, which is still in the press almost 60 years after its launch.

Not only was it a stroke of marketing genius, it also posed a mystery that remains unsolved. And if there’s anything we can take away from the continued popularity of true crime documentaries, it’s that people love an unsolved mystery.

Hide the loot

The year was 1967. The Canadian Club whiskey brand was owned by spirits company Hiram Walker & Sons, who decided to promote the brand with a whiskey treasure hunt called “Hide a Case.”

Representatives of Canadian clubs traveled to remote corners of the world and began hiding 12-bottle boxes of whiskey in secret locations. Spots included the Great Barrier Reef, the slopes of Mount Kilimanjaro, a waterfall in Venezuela, the North Pole and the roof of a Manhattan skyscraper. Between 1967 and 1991 – when the campaign ended – a total of 25 cases were hidden.

During these 24 years, the brand regularly published print advertisements that provided clues to the whereabouts of individual cases. One read: “Devil’s Backbone Reef hides the world’s strangest shipwreck… and a case of Canadian Club.” “We left a great gift idea near the North Pole. A case of Canadian Club,” read another.

In the 1970s, the value of each case was about $125 (or $740 in 2024), but the price—or the quality of the liquid—didn’t matter. The hunt captured the wanderlust of masses far and wide and inspired travel to remote parts of the world to find the hidden whiskeys. For example, in 1968, a couple moved their planned honeymoon in Acapulco to Venezuela during the monsoon season. According to the Washington Post, they found one of the coveted falls beneath Angel Falls, the highest continuous waterfall in the world. In 1978, two friends reportedly roamed the Big Apple for 13 weeks trying to find a suitcase before discovering the treasure on a Manhattan skyscraper. Many others were uncovered, but the tracks eventually grew cold.

The campaign, revived

By 1980, nine cases remained at large. By this point, much of the hype surrounding the campaign had died down and even die-hard treasure hunters of previous decades had generally lost interest. In 2010, the Canadian Club reinvigorated the “Hide a Case” campaign by offering a $100,000 cash prize for a still-secret case in the island nation of Tonga.

The brand coordinated a funded expedition to locate the Tonga whiskeys. Those interested in participating submitted videos explaining why they should be chosen for the trip, and the Canadian Club launched a poll on its website for the public to vote on who should win. In the end, four Americans and four Canadians were flown to Tonga. Within days, American contestant Kristina Beall had found the case, earning her the $100,000 prize.

The saga continues

This means there are still eight cases in the wild. Based on clues from the old advertisements, they are believed to be hidden in the Yukon, Loch Ness, Robinson Crusoe Island, Lake Tanganyika in Tanzania, the North Pole, Lake Placid, and two unknown locations.

Since 2011, the Canadian Club has been owned by Suntory Global Spirits, which does not officially support the campaign and could not provide any clues as to where the cases might be located. To the conglomerate’s credit, encouraging Indiana Jones types to head to the North Pole or the depths of Loch Ness to find old whiskey is probably not the best idea. Plus, there’s always the possibility that some of the whiskeys were found and never reported. Regardless, the search is still technically ongoing.

*Image retrieved from Canadian Club.