The Whiskypedia
Point a phone at a bottle and find out what is in it. Distillery, age, ABV, what it tastes like and what other people made of it, plus the bars near you that pour it.
Overview
There are a great many whisky drinkers and a great many whiskies, local and international, and until this there was no single place that would take someone from one to the other. Choosing a bottle was mostly guesswork.
With a vision of developing a rich repository app for whisky, The Whiskypedia approached Sphinx Solutions to be their technology partner.
We built the mobile and web applications, with the data stack behind them that a reference product of this kind lives or dies on. The point was not just to inform: it was to let people share their own stories and tastings and find other enthusiasts.
Rating, ingredients and age let a drinker work out what is actually worth buying near them, and the same information lets a shop take a booking for a specific bottle knowing the buyer will turn up for it.
This project is a good example of Sphinx Solutions’ ability to build an informational application from scratch with the user’s own journey at the centre of it.
The Whiskypedia brought a clear idea: a voluminous archive of whisky that guides someone to the good stuff, and tells them everything about a bottle from scanning it alone, from its origin to its taste and history.
Every piece of whisky knowledge in the world in one place: brands, types, folklore, and a glossary covering every term a newcomer will trip over.
A backend deep enough to hold that much information, and quick enough to answer from it, was the hard part, and the interface on top had to stay responsive and readable while doing it.
They wanted a Whisky Times section for the stories, because a spirit with this much history is as much read about as drunk.
They also wanted cocktail and food recipes built around whisky, and a way to find the bars and whisky-loving communities nearby.
They chose us as their technology partner on the strength of 16 years building mobile and web applications across a range of businesses.
Sphinx Solutions built a one-stop destination for whisky enthusiasts, on mobile and on the web.
We delivered the mobile and web applications with the complex backend integrations behind them, on time, responsive and secure. What it gave The Whiskypedia was higher customer satisfaction, a better average order value and drinkers who come back.
Tech stack
What people usually ask about The Whiskypedia and about building something like it.
Roughly $20,000 to $80,000 for a community and reference platform, though there is no fixed figure: it moves with complexity, the feature set, and where the development team is and what they charge.
The recognition is only half of it. A label has to be matched against a catalogue that is complete enough to contain the bottle in someone’s hand, and accurate enough that the answer is worth trusting. The data behind the camera is the product.
A catalogue with real depth, a way to scan or search into it, ratings and reviews from people who have actually drunk the thing, somewhere to keep a cellar and a wishlist, and something local: the bars near you, the tastings coming up, the people who are also interested.
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