In this episode of the Distillery Nation Podcast, I had the absolute pleasure of talking with Sean Anger. Sean is the co-founder and distiller behind Fox & Seeker, a craft distillery specializing in Vodka and Gin from Houston Texas. And what a great interview, I've known Sean for a few years and have been following their journey since the beginning. We chatted about best practices when dealing with wholesaling accounts, the ability to get feedback right away, how grains affect the flavor profile of vodka production, the concept of liquid to lips and so much more!

A very special podcast to wrap up the end of the year. For the second year I decided to go back, listen and re-listen to all the great interviews that happened in the last year and pick some of my favorite pieces and add commentary on why that piece was important and how in most cases it helped with the direction for my business.

From best accounting principles to the importance of the email list, aha moments that led to award-winning spirits, starting a distillery staying small, working hard and stop being romantic about the business, the importance of a break-even analysis, focusing on what you do best, accepting money, diversifying your income streams and the concept of a core occasion for your spirits' brand.

In this episode of the Distillery Nation Podcast, I had the absolute pleasure of talking with Chris Maffeo. Chris is a drinks industry adviser and founder of Maffeo Drinks. Chris has vast experience and knowledge on how to build brands from the bottom up and in this episode, we did just that. Chris went deep into sales, building demand, how to target and filter on-premise accounts and how important is to focus on the essentials and so much more!

In this episode of the Distillery Nation Podcast, I had the absolute pleasure of talking with Jeff Wuslich. Jeff is the co-founder of Cardinal Spirits from Bloomington Indiana, a craft distillery known best for its line of vodkas, gin, and whiskey! We chatted about Jeff's origin story and how he went about changing the laws in Indiana to support craft distilling. How Cardinal Spirits focus on diversification for their income streams and how contract distilling plays a big role in their operation, and so much more!

In this episode of the Distillery Nation Podcast, I had the absolute pleasure of talking with Jackie Summers. Jackie is a James Beard Finalist, speaker, and creator of the award-winning Sorel Liqueur! And what an interview, we talked about the multiple roadblocks Jackie had to overcome, including a terminal prognosis, a hurricane, and multiple NOs. We also talked about his favorite books, advice for investing, Sorel and its production and so much more!

In this special episode of the Distillery Nation Podcast, Ilias is sitting down and unpacking some of the lessons learned over the last seven years running the podcast and being a distiller and business owner. 

From how word of mouth drives business, focusing on product over process, the value of networking and why you should focus on your email list.

In this episode of the Distillery Nation Podcast, I had the absolute pleasure of talking with Alex Myers. Alex is the distiller behind Big Gin, and what a better way for episode 99 of the podcast than to go back and check on Big Gin, which was our very first distillery podcast.

And it was during those early visits at the original Big Gin (Captive Spirits) distillery, that gave me enough confidence that I could start small. So, we brought Alex to talk about the last 7 years, what has changed, how he stays focused on producing Gin and only Gin, new expressions, how they keep consistency over batches and so much more!

In this episode of the Distillery Nation Podcast, I had the absolute pleasure of talking with Maria Pearman. Maria is a CPA with over 15 years of deep operational accounting experience.

She recently published Distillery Finance, so this was a great opportunity to have her talk about some of the foundational concepts, like good debt, bad debt, line of credits, most common finance mistakes distilleries make, the importance of building a cash flow forecast and so much more, a full packed podcast with a lot of information for running a successful distillery.

In this episode of the Distillery Nation Podcast, I had the absolute pleasure of talking with Becky and Scott Harris. Becky and Scott are owners and distillers behind Catoctin Creek, a craft Rye whiskey distillery located in Purcellville Virginia, and what an episode. Full of practical advice, from their humble beginning to why they decided to focus on Rye whiskey, work ethic, distribution, scaling, working together and so much more!

In this episode of the Distillery Nation Podcast, I had the absolute pleasure of talking with Amy and Steve Bohner. Amy and Steve are the owners and distillers behind Alchemy Distillery a craft distillery located in Arcata California and best known for the grain-to-glass whiskey and gin. We chatted about their trip across the US and how it helped them kickstart their distillery, how being a contractor and the customer helped them save a lot of headaches, their decision to source locally and so much more!