You're hitting on the main point of the article. It has been historically niche (limited supply, specialized use, intense/complex flavor) and recently expanded in popularity to transcend that niche status.

I don't think that's quite it. Chartreuse had its big moment more than a decade ago, and the big story since then was the allocation program the supplier did, which made it scarce. It really was hard to get for a little while.

Bad title I guess.