Does a more expensive bottle necessarily taste better?

Price reflects a mix of things: production cost, age, how limited the release is, packaging, brand reputation, and plain demand relative to supply. Taste is only loosely connected to most of those. A bourbon can command a high price mostly because it's hard to find, not because a panel of tasters rated it higher than a $30 bottle sitting next to it on the shelf.

Blind tastings; where price and label are hidden; repeatedly show this gap: tasters don't reliably rank the more expensive bottle higher once they can't see what it costs. That doesn't mean expensive bourbon is never good, or that cheap bourbon is always a bargain; it means price alone isn't a reliable predictor of what you'll taste in the glass.