Why is Rum so expensive?

Why is it that a bottle of my favourite Christmas tipple, Jamaican red rum, costs around 1,500 yen and is hard to find, anyway, but the shelves are heaving with Whisky at only a few hundred yen? What's Japan got against rum?

Japan is not against rum at all. It's just that Japan loves whisky too much.

1500 yen for a bottle of hard liquor is not expensive at all either. If you can imagine how much fuel is spent to bring it all the way from Jamaica, you'd say it's even cheap.

Have you tried to buy sake or shochu in Jamaica?

While there are large domestic distiller companies such as Suntory or Nikka which make Whiskey,
only few small distiller company which make Rum in Japan.

So, most Rum you can find in Japan is imported one,
contrasted to those cheap Whiskey are distilled in Japan.

And for there are no large distiller of Rum in Japan,
Rum has not become popular in Japan, and mainly used for cocktails.

We are not against Rum. Just that we don't know it well.
Tell your Japanese friend the taste of Rum!

As above, it's obviously because whiskey is produced locally whereas rum is imported. I wouldn't call 1500 yen expensive either- decent wine costs a lot more.

I believe Suntory distributes, or at least used to distribute, a rum in Japan, and that tasted real awful compared to Jamaican products. Japanese who want cheap hard liquor drink not rum but ko-rui shochu, which is distilled from nobody knows what.