From merchant to distiller
Brown, a drug salesman, started the firm with his half-brother, J.T.S. Brown Jr.1,2 Old Forester's seal guarded against tampering, and pharmacies first sold it as a medicine.3,4 In 1890 Brown took his accountant, George Forman, as a partner, and the firm took the Brown-Forman name.1,2 The firm was formally incorporated in 1901, the year Forman died, and his name stayed on.1,2 Brown had bought whiskey from distillers such as Ben Mattingly and blended it.1,3 In 1902 the firm bought the B.F. Mattingly Distillery in St Mary's, Kentucky, its first distillery.1,3 Brown's son Owsley joined in 1904 and became president when his father died in 1917.1,2,8
Through Prohibition
When Prohibition began in 1920, Brown-Forman won one of a few national licenses for medicinal whiskey, which kept it running.1,3,8 Under that license Old Forester became a 100-proof straight bourbon; before, it had been a blend.1,3,8 In 1923 it bought Early Times and its whole stock of whiskey, the first brand it purchased.3,5,9 In 1929 it was one of a handful of firms allowed to distil whiskey to refill medicinal stocks.1 Brown-Forman says this makes it the only US spirits firm still in business that bottled, aged and distilled whiskey before, during and after Prohibition.1 After Repeal in 1933, it made a public stock issue.1
New distilleries and the war
In 1940 it bought the Labrot & Graham Distillery, one of Kentucky's most historic distilling sites.1,5,10 Some sources date the purchase to 1941; the site was later renamed Woodford Reserve.1,5,10 Days after Pearl Harbor in 1941, it made industrial alcohol for the war at a converted Old Forester plant, and later turned all its distilleries to it.1 In 1945 it bought the Wood Mosaic Company and made it the Bluegrass Cooperage, giving it control of its own barrel making.1 In 1956 it bought the distillery in Lynchburg, Tennessee, that makes Jack Daniel's.1,5,6
Canadian Mist and new leaders
In 1966 Daniel L. Street became the first president from outside the Brown family.11 In 1971 the firm bought the Canadian Mist distillery and brand, its first production site outside the United States.1,9 In 1975 W.L. Lyons Brown, Jr., a great-grandson of the founder, became chief executive and president.11,12 In 1993 his younger brother, Owsley Brown II, took over as chief executive.11,12
Woodford Reserve and Glenmorangie
In 1992 Brown-Forman began distributing Glenmorangie in the US.11,13,14 It had run Labrot & Graham until the late 1960s, then sold it to a local farmer; in 1994 it bought the run-down distillery back.10,15 It restored the site, and Woodford Reserve bourbon went on sale there in 1996.1,10,15 In 2000 it bought slightly less than 3 million shares in Glenmorangie plc and began marketing the brand in Continental Europe and parts of Asia.13 Under an agreement dated 20 October 2004, it sold those shares to Moet Hennessy, part of LVMH, which was buying the whole company.13,14 It then agreed to end its contracts to import and market Glenmorangie from 29 July 2005, with LVMH paying about $13.5 million.5,13
Sources disagree: the date. This page uses 1992.
New leaders, Slane and three Scotch distilleries
Paul Varga succeeded Owsley Brown II as chief executive in 2005, and George Garvin Brown IV became chairman in 2007.16 In 2015 Brown-Forman bought Slane Castle Irish Whiskey Ltd., which was building a distillery in County Meath, Ireland.1,5 In June 2016 it completed its £281 million purchase of The BenRiach Distillery Company, with 3 malt distilleries, a bottling plant and an Edinburgh head office.1,5,17 BenRiach, The GlenDronach and Glenglassaugh became the first Scotch whisky brands Brown-Forman fully owned.1,5,17
Whiskey Row and new leaders
In May 2018 Brown-Forman named Lawson Whiting to take over from Paul Varga as chief executive on 1 January 2019, its tenth leader since 1870.16 In June 2018 it opened Old Forester Distilling Co. on Louisville's Whiskey Row, in the building the brand used before Prohibition.4,5,18 In July 2020 it sold Early Times, Canadian Mist, Collingwood and the Canadian Mist distillery to the Sazerac Company.1,8,19 In January 2025 it said it would close its Louisville cooperage, where it made oak barrels, by 25 April.20 In July 2025 Marshall B. Farrer took over as chairman from Campbell P. Brown.7 In July 2026 Whiting said he would retire as chief executive once a successor is appointed.21