Created by Margie Samuels, the wax that drips down the bourbon's neck beat a Cuervo tequila in court
Every bottle of Maker's Mark leaves the distillery in Loretto, Kentucky, hand-dipped in red wax that drips down the neck. The wax has no technical function: it serves to identify the bourbon, as the Associated Press noted in 2011. That is exactly what the brand defended in a nine-year legal fight with José Cuervo's tequila.
According to Maker's Mark, Bill Samuels Sr. started the new distillery in 1952, at the site where it still stands, with the idea of making a whisky he himself would like. In 1953, he burned the old family recipe, and his wife, Margie Samuels, created the Maker's Mark name and the bottle design. The bourbon uses soft red winter wheat in place of the rye that usually goes into the recipe. The first bottle was finished, hand-dipped in wax, in 1958. The brand credits Margie with inventing bourbon tourism and says she was the first woman directly involved with a distillery.
According to the AP, Cuervo put a dripping wax seal on its Reserva de la Familia tequila in 1997, for an artisanal look. The bottles reached the United States in 2001, in a run of 3,000 to 4,000 units, at about US$100 each; Maker's Mark cost around US$25. Maker's Mark sued Cuervo in 2003. The tequila dropped the wax, but Cuervo asked the court to void the bourbon's trademark.
In 2010, federal judge John G. Heyburn II, in Louisville, ruled that the red wax was a valid trademark and barred other companies from using a similar seal. On appeal, Cuervo's lawyers argued that no one would confuse the two bottles: the bourbon's is square with large black letters, the tequila's is tall and cylindrical. In May 2012, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the ban, according to The Spirits Business. The court found that Cuervo had not diluted the trademark and denied the damages claim from Beam, then the owner of Maker's Mark.
Rob Samuels, then chief operating officer, called the decision a resounding confirmation that the dripping red wax is a trademark. In 2010, the family had already launched Maker's Mark 46, and in 2025 the distillery released Star Hill Farm, according to the brand its first American wheat whisky.
Sources: Maker's Mark (accessed October 19, 2026), Associated Press (December 2, 2011), The Spirits Business (May 10, 2012).
