Smooth Ambler | The Spirit Of Craft Distilling

Really the primary goal, initially was to create something here.
You know, as hokey as that might sound, we wanted to make something in West Virginia.
The more we explored the idea of a distillery, the more convinced we became that it was a good fit.
So TAG and I were in another business together.
We were really busy in our other business, until the crash of 2008.
Once September or October of 2008 hit, we basically went 100% on trying to make this a reality.
We just had always been passionate about having a good drink.
And then once we figured out that we could make it that passion turned into having and being able make one.
It was a pretty torrid pace. We broke ground in August and were actually up in production in March of 2010.
It started in a very grassroots kind of way, just going out and getting people to taste it.
One of the benefits of being a small guy and one of your strong points is when you talk to me and John and Nick, you're talking to the guys who actually make it.
We're not a big guy pretending to be a small guy and all this looks really quaint.
When you see Foster or JF on a bottle it's because I actually held that bottle in my hands, signed it, wiped it off, stuck it in a box and closed up the box.
One of the problems is people have been trained to like this non-flavored product.
They want their vodka to taste like nothing.
Wow, you paid $30 for a fifth of alcohol that tastes like nothing, you can do that for $7.
What we're trying to create is something that has character, that has flavor behind it.
I would say that the key to a good small guy is the quality of his ingredients and the talent and skill that they have for distilling and for making those heads, hearts, and tails cuts.
Because that is what you don't get from a lot of the larger guys.
That process is either skipped entirely or it's automated in some way.
We want you to know that you're drinking something that has really been tended over and shepherded from
the second the grain arrives from our farmer to when it goes into the bottle.
For us, that is what the premium cut is.
We are not going to be good for every single person, some people aren't going to like us - that's OK.
The majority of people are going to appreciate what we do and appreciate the character and flavor in our product and that's really what we're proud of.
There's no better response in the world to what you do that when somebody takes your product takes your product and tells you
This stuff is great! That never gets old.