I work in spirits production.

Gin is literally just vodka with some juniper berries and other aromatics on a couple of evaporation a trays inside this distillation column. As in like, a few tablespoons of dried juniper berries to provide aromatics to thousands of litres of gin.

There's no aging process for vodka, which by definition is supposed to be colorless, odorless and "tasteless". (as possible)

Whisky on the other hand, you've got different grains (primarily rye, wheat, barley and corn) fermenting, and then aged to finish in barrels of various wood types for a minimum of three years but often much longer in warehouses that usually aren't climate controlled eventually to be drained, filtered, colored (color isn't a reflection of anything but how dark the marketers decided it should be), and blended at different ratios for different flavor profiles.

I'm unfamiliar with the production of nonalcoholic spirits, but I'm pretty confident if there was some cheap easy way to arrive at complex whisky flavor profiles, we wouldn't be leaving barrels in warehouses for decades to age.

Also, secondary point, the reason why the gin aisle at your local alcohol store is filled with exuberant flamboyant bottles is because gin is just so easy to make that they need frill it up with bells and whistles to make it seem elegant or justify some top shelf price. Whereas when you go to the whisky aisle, a top shelf whisky is usually a simple bottle with a simple label, because the actual product is what's inside the bottle, not the bottle itself.

In a lot of ways, gin and whisky is like Proof of Stake vs Proof of Work

Hope this helps :)