MLCC On The Road
The MLCC On The Road podcast is brought to you by the Michigan Liquor Control Commission (MLCC). The MLCC On The Road podcast will provide helpful information for businesses, licensees, local governmental units, and anyone interested in the alcoholic beverage industry in Michigan.
The mission of the Michigan Liquor Control Commission is to make alcoholic beverages available for consumption while protecting the consumer and the general public through regulation of those involved in the sale and distribution of these alcohol beverage products.
For more information on the MLCC, please visit our website at www.michigan.gov/lcc. To submit a question or idea for a podcast topic, please email mlccinfo2@michigan.gov.
MLCC On The Road
Taste the History, Toast to Revival - Detroit City Distillery
Join hosts Sara Weber and David Marvin at 100 Proof, Detroit City Distillery's new event space, as they sit down with Sales Manager Jamie Wright and Brand Development Manager Dante Desaro to uncork the fascinating journey behind this Michigan success story. The conversation flows from amusing beginnings—a bachelor party where the wedding never happened but a distillery was born—to the thoughtful business strategy that guided their expansion from Eastern Market to the historic Stroh's Ice Cream factory.
At the heart of Detroit City Distillery's philosophy is an unwavering commitment to Michigan-grown ingredients. The team reveals how they source 97% of their products from local grain, including a special strain of Michigan rye grown exclusively for them. This dedication to local sourcing doesn't just support Michigan agriculture—it creates spirits with distinctive flavor profiles that have earned loyal fans across the state.
The podcast delves into the creative process behind innovative products like their viral Paczki Vodka (distilled from actual Polish pastries) and their artful label designs that tell stories of Detroit's rich history. Each bottle serves as a canvas for storytelling, from the image of founder JP Jerome's bootlegger grandfather on their flagship Butcher's Cut Bourbon to the Michigan Central Station depicted on Railroad Gin.
Perhaps most compelling is how Detroit City Distillery demonstrated resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic, pivoting within hours to produce hand sanitizer and creating their special release "Shutdown Bourbon" as a symbol of Detroit's ability to rise from adversity. The team shares valuable insights for aspiring distillers: stay flexible, chase quality over trends, and above all, remain authentic to your vision.
Whether you're a spirits enthusiast, an entrepreneur, or simply someone who appreciates a great Michigan success story, this episode offers a fascinating glimpse into the craft, creativity, and community behind every bottle of Detroit City Distillery spirits.
The MLCC On The Road podcast is brought to you by the Michigan Liquor Control Commission (MLCC). For more information on the MLCC, please visit our website at www.michigan.gov/lcc. To submit a question or idea for a podcast topic, please email mlccinfo2@michigan.gov.
The mission of the Michigan Liquor Control Commission is to make alcoholic beverages available for consumption while protecting the consumer and the general public through regulation of those involved in the sale and distribution of these alcohol beverage products.
You're listening to the MLCC On The Road podcast, brought to you by the Michigan Liquor Control Commission, with hosts Sara Weber and David Marvin. Welcome back to the MLCC On The Road podcast. I'm David Marvin, and with me today is Sara Weber. And we are at 100 Proof, which is a event space at Detroit City Distillery. And with us today, we have a couple special guests. We have Jamie Wright, the sales manager, and Dante Desaro, the brand development manager. And we're going to ask them some interesting questions about Detroit City Distillery and how it came to be and what some of their plans are in the future. Jamie and Dante, welcome to the MLCC On The Road podcast.
Speaker 03:Thank you so much. Thank
Speaker 01:Thanks for having us. We appreciate
Speaker 03:it. Thank you for having us here today. Obviously, it's I've been here a couple of times. It's always interesting to me to hear about the history of your building and how you guys came to be. So can you go over how the Detroit City Distillery came to be?
Speaker 04:Absolutely. Yeah. So that's actually one of the funnest stories or most fun, I guess I should say, stories that we have when we're telling people about Detroit City Distillery. So this the company was founded by eight friends who all grew up together in a little city called Bath, which is just outside of Lansing. And as they were growing up, they, you know, I don't know if you're familiar with Bath at all. And, you know, if you know it, it's a one stoplight, one convenience store town. And so when they were, it was like in the mid 90s, the internet had just become a thing and their beer buyer, unfortunately, moved out of town. Now being a, you know, there's only one convenience store in the city. They couldn't just pick up another one. So JP Jerome, who is one of the founding members and our head distiller had the brilliant idea. Well, why can't we just start making our own? So they go online, you know, the dial up and they literally just, it probably wasn't Google at the time, but whatever it was, they searched, how do I make our own, our own beer or wine? At the time, they actually were going to try to make cider because they found out that apples were very easy to ferment. So he did the process of what he found online. They got it to the fermenting stage and then they put it into a container, put a lid on it and put it underneath their bed and went to school. so they quickly learned that when you're fermenting something you do not put a lid on it because it will eventually explode so they got a very um heated phone call from their mom and we just we still joke around about that jp is still grounded so actually if you get here really early in the morning you can see jp's mom still dropping him off because he still doesn't have car privileges because of the mess he made in his bedroom um but that's kind of what the idea was born. And so then fast forward a couple of years, the guys have all graduated. They've all gone to college. JP is still pursuing this. He does get his master's in microbiology from University of Michigan, eventually heads over to Michigan State and goes into the distilling course. And they all ate friends again. So they go away for a bachelor party. They're out in the or a lot drinks into it, someone says, we should open up our own brewery.
Speaker 01:Because you know all the greatest ideas come from drinking in a group around a bonfire. Yes. Remember that? Of course they
Speaker 04:do. So they're like, yeah, this is great. You know, like that's it. And then they're like, you know what? There's a brewery on every corner right now. At this point, I think, I'm not sure if JP was working for Bells yet, but he's like, you know, everyone's kind of doing beer. Let's open up a distillery and let's open it up in Detroit. At that time, nobody else was doing it. And, you know, I mean, obviously they went to bed. They woke up. What did we do? And it was kind of like it was never thought about again. And then another one of the founding partners was doing work in Detroit with the Small Business Administration. And he all of a sudden calls, you know, whether it was a group call or what, calls the guys. And he's like, hey, guys, I got the space.
Speaker 01:I signed the lease.
Speaker 04:I signed the lease. Right. And they're like, for
Speaker 01:what? For what?
Speaker 04:They're like, for the distillery
Speaker 01:in Detroit. There was alcohol involved. So he must have been the sober one. There was one responsible. He was
Speaker 04:the minute
Speaker 01:taker for the evening. Exactly.
Speaker 04:And so they started to look at it and they're like, all right, you know, what is it about? And then the biggest joke is from that bachelor party, the wedding never happened, but the distillery did. So something good came
Speaker 01:from it. That's one of the greatest origin stories ever. That is a really good origin story. Wow.
Speaker 03:So how did this space develop over time? And, you know, there's a lot of history here. And, you know, so how, you know, when you go back to the story of, I found this space, you know, how did you discover everything that has happened in this building along the way
Speaker 01:you know it started with the original space in eastern market uh where um the sober one signed the lease and here they were off right uh they got their hands on their first still 50 gallons still um and it was um The wives of the friends kind of called it their men's club at the time. But they were stilling out of there. And, you know, with stilling comes with a 50 gallon still, it'll take you 10 processes to fill one barrel. The really neat thing about JP, not only did he go on to Michigan State for continued education, but he got his he got his doctorate in biochemistry. So he's very he's the type of person that if you give him a challenge, he does not fail. He wants to complete that challenge. He was making great stuff right away. And they knew it. It was still young. And a lot of bourbon and whiskey people were like, this is young. It's got to take time. That was the original space. And then came the distribution. And Jamie, you can kind of pop in here on with me on that. They had to figure out how to distribute because now people wanted it. And that was the growth process that brought us at one point to... the historic Strauss ice cream factory with being able to sign that lease, bumping up to a 500 gallon still. I guess strategically, it's 11 years now. We're in our 11th year. It was planned strategically with growth and it was done very calculated. And so the Stroh's facility came about eight years, seven years now.
Speaker 04:For the whiskey factory?
Speaker 01:For the whiskey
Speaker 04:factory. We signed in 2016, officially got the keys in 2017, officially opened in 2018.
Speaker 01:Okay, so 2018. They started
Speaker 04:looking pretty quickly. They opened up the tasting room in 2014. Right. And then pretty quickly realized, we've got something here. We've got something here. We're either going to move quick and capitalize on it, or it's going to lose momentum. And they moved quick.
Speaker 01:And JP, being the master distiller, stuck to his guns. And it... We have to make it. It has to come from, you know, as much Michigan source product as possible. And we have to still it. We have to we have to cook it. We have to ferment it. Got to still it, barrel it, bottle it all in one place. And the factory came about. And then my story came into about. It was funny. My wife is was in business with these guys on financial end of things. It was a Thursday night. And she's getting all dolled up. And she's like, hey, you want to go to me? I go, your events are boring. I don't want to go. She's like, you sure you don't want to go? I'm like, do I need to go? I don't need to go. She goes, they're opening an event space. I'm like, boring. And she's like, it's a whiskey factory. I go, give me 10 minutes. I'll be ready in 10 minutes. And that's when I met JP. And that's when they opened the whiskey factory event space that's on the second floor. And then... This spot we're sitting in now used to be the Detroit Winery. And unfortunately, their business did not last. And it was closed up for a while. And the landlord was like, hey, we've got this space. Do you guys need to expand? As
Speaker 04:a matter of fact, yes, we do.
Speaker 01:Very much so. So that's, in a nutshell, kind of the evolve from building to building as we move through in our 11th year.
Speaker 00:Dante, you talked about a quality product and doing business here in the State of Michigan. And Detroit City Distillery is what we call a qualified small distiller. And we have a program in Michigan that allows a reduced markup, and we can go into all how that works in another episode, but a reduced markup on the taxes for distillers that use at least 40% of Michigan-grown grain in distilling their spirits. How much of your product that you're doing today is made with Michigan grain? And what are some stories behind that? There's probably some farms that you work with and the source of those. I've read a couple of the stories on your website and they sound fascinating. It sounds like there's a lot of background there. What are those partnerships looking like for that grain and those farmers that are contributing to your product?
Speaker 04:Yeah, no, and thank you again. And I know, JP, would say it if he was here too, for that program. That program has been huge in terms of our growth. It's what was able to get us from a one-person sales team to a four-person sales team because we needed that initial push to get more people on the road to sell more product. So that was really big for us. What was great when you guys actually implemented that is it was something we were already doing. We were already using majority Michigan grain. So for us it was almost like a thank you you know it was like a thank you for already doing this now go sell more and that's what we did I would say 97% of our products are made with majority Michigan grain the rye so we work with Dexter mill that's where all of our grains are milled and that's where they're brought over to us they source the majority of the grains except for the rye so our rye grain is actually grown there specifically for us on a farm right next door to Dexter Mill. We use a very particular strain of Michigan rye called the Bono strain. And that was just something that JP, he was very adamant in. But rye is a weird grain. It's not something that's grown year over year in the same farms. So we were having a hard time getting that same strain. So he talked to the family that owns Dexter Mill and was like, hey, can we just get this grown for us? We need this, you know, however it is you need to do it to rotate it or, you know, because I know they have to do different crops every year. Um, but we need this particular strain and we need it to be available. So that's what they did for us. So that, that was a big thing for us too. Um, because we use a lot of rye. So even the punch key vodka, um, which is one of our innovative brands uses 50% Michigan potatoes. So that is a 50, 50 split of Polish potato and Michigan potato in that not technically a grain, but, um, you know, the source of the neutral spirit. Um, um, Yeah, all of our whiskeys, all of our bourbons. You know, we have a blended bourbon, which is one of the only items that we do source any whiskey for, which is our two-faced. That's still 50-50. So we are still making sure that we're staying above that 40%. One, because it does affect the flavor. Michigan grain is superior. And don't tell everybody that, please, because we don't want them... We don't want it to be harder than it already is to get it or more expensive. But it's just true. I mean, if you taste something that's made out of Michigan grain versus... whoever knows wherever the rest comes from, ours will always taste better. The only item that is 100% that we don't use is our rum, but we don't pretend to. Michigan doesn't grow sugar cane. We don't grow molasses, so
Speaker 01:we don't make rum. Don't think they didn't try to take Michigan sugar beets and make a rum. That was in the lab. It didn't work out well, so we stuck with the Caribbean. It
Speaker 04:was cost-effective, time-effective, and flavor-effective to just source it from the people who actually But other than that, we are sticking to that with all of our mash bills. We always have and we always will. That's been a big part of my story since I've been here. When I started here, we were only 18 months old in the bottle. And everybody, you know, the fights I've had, you know, the tables flipped over. Why don't you just source? Why don't you just buy it from somewhere else and it's already four years old or it's already six years old? Because then it's not ours. And I could have worked anywhere. And I always said I wanted to work somewhere that I could get $100. percent behind and them having it as part of their story is what really got me excited to sell it. So it's grown and now we're over four years old and I've had to stop flipping so many tables.
Speaker 01:And I'm right there with her with the loyalty to the craft of what they decided to do here. I came from the salsa industry. I worked at Garden Fresh Salsa. Same dynamic. Michigan made, Michigan sourced and I tell people, not too many people can say in their career they went from selling salsa to selling whiskey. So, but with that said, it really, it's not a hard pitch for us. Like in the beginning, because we were young, You know, most connoisseurs and during the bourbon boom, a lot of people said we were young and we've turned that corner now. And within the last 24 months, our products are being noticed. Although we do sell it just in Michigan, people travel here and then they leave and they're like, I got this at home. And we're like, how can we get it? We'd be remiss if we didn't. Both Jamie and I and I know she speaks for me a lot. I speak for her. It's really easy to sell such a product that JP made sure was true to the craft outside of where bourbon and whiskey was born. And it shows. I have an 85% success rate at a sampling that people walk away with a bottle. And that's pretty impressive.
Speaker 00:And it's impressive that you have that large of a number of products that are have that high of a percentage of Michigan grown grain. I mean, that's great, not just for you guys, but I mean, the farmers out there that are growing that and just keeping it in the family, essentially the Michigan family. And that is that's a fantastic story. And Jamie, you mentioned the Punschke vodka. Yes. You guys have some really cool products. I particularly like the horseradish vodka. There's a couple of other items that you have out there. What are some of the, what's your creative process when you guys decide how you're going to do a Punschke vodka or a horseradish vodka? Or I think, don't you have one that you do special for Flower Day at the Eastern Market? Yeah, we just did the Flower Day. Yeah. How do you go about deciding what that next item is? them that next product is and the development of that.
Speaker 04:Yeah. I mean, obviously, to a degree, we will watch trends just like everybody else. But I'm constantly telling the guys, by the time it's a trend, it's over. If you don't get ahead of something. So we have two taglines at DCD. Our most forward-facing is the Taste the History, Toast the Revival. You're going to see that on all of our brands, our merch, our neon sign. But we also have another tagline, which is... We make what we want to drink. So a lot of the items, especially the innovative items, came from somebody here, Steve. I'm not even going to try it. Ostrowski. Nope. Okay. I'm glad you said it. Steve is our distillery manager, and he's who came up with the Punschke vodka. And it was just a what if. And a lot of our best items come from the what if. So the Punschke vodka story is one of my favorites to tell. So as they were opening up the whiskey factory, he came over with JP, and he started working on production and distilling. And as the lore goes... one weekend, JP and the other owners were going out of town, and Steve had said to him, what would happen if we put Poonshki in the still? And JP's like, well, we're not going to find out, so it doesn't matter. And he's like, okay, cool. So then they go out of town, and he goes down to New Palace and Hamtramck and says, you know, I need a dozen Poonshki, don't ask why, but I think it's going to be good. And I think he actually called you, right? He called you while they were out of town and says, you got to come try this.
Speaker 01:I come down to the tasting room and the distillate's coming out. He's running it. He goes, put your head in that bucket. I go, what are you doing? He goes, don't look in the still yet. Just put your head in that bucket and smell it. I put my nose in there. I smelled pastry. I smelled beans. Raspberry. I smelled donut. I smelled the oil that was in there. I'm like, bro, is that punch? I knew right away. Is that raspberry? Is that a raspberry donut? He was looking the still. I look in the still. I'm like, oh, JP is going to kill you. But, you know, no great idea is never gone without a risk. Right. And Steve just knew it. I guess he just knew it. First year we did it, we had one hundred and forty five bottles. It was a special release. And I have a picture. How old is Steve's oldest daughter now?
Speaker 02:Nine.
Speaker 01:Nine. I have a picture of her, me, Steve, and her. And she's a baby in his hands. And we're behind the bar. And that day we sold the 145 original Punschke bottles. Well, the first run was for in-house for us. Yeah. The first time we did it.
Speaker 04:We sold 90 cases.
Speaker 01:90 cases.
Speaker 04:That's it. And then last year we sold 2,500. 2,500. So it's, and so that just lends
Speaker 01:to, with no risk doesn't come reward and it's been rewarding.
Speaker 04:And that just lends to the question of how do we come up with, it's, it's, what do we want to drink? I mean, generally it's somebody's board, you know, they're like, Hey, I don't, you know, I'm, I've been drinking bourbon for a while. What if I drank a brandy? What if I, you know, drank, um, a vodka that has lavender in it? What if I drank a vodka that has horseradish in it? You know, obviously that was born in the same way as Poonshki and it was Poonshki that kind of led us, um, Um... or I think should say, let JP know that, hey, it's worth trying it out. I mean, the rest they say is history with that one. And it really did lend to the rest of the innovation items and they don't always work. There are some where it comes off the still and we're just like, maybe that wasn't it. Just kidding. And then another way that I have noticed that we do things is if something is a trend and it remains a trend, we will hop on eventually, but our will always end up being just a little bit better than what's already out there because we took our time and we waited and we saw what worked and we saw what didn't. Our honey old-fashioned cocktail is a perfect example of that. Cocktails aren't new. They've been out for a while. But we were able to look at the data and see what were people actually buying, what was starting to fall, what was starting to grow. And it was the high-proof cocktails, but that still tastes good. And
Speaker 03:isn't it true that you have your own honey that you make?
Speaker 04:We do, yes. So we actually don't make it. We work with Bees in the D, which is a honeybee conservancy nonprofit in Detroit. So, yeah. You have to be able to have a very good core brand if you want to have innovative items. And I think that's another thing that we did really well was we focused on making sure we had a core lineup. If you need a bourbon, we've got one. If you need a rye, we've got one. If you need a gin, we've got one. As opposed to just trying to ride the next innovative wave because eventually that wave will crash and then you're going to run the risk of your entire brand crashing with it. We We know when Poochki season's over, you're still just gonna buy our regular vodka. We know that when you run out of that honey bourbon old fashioned, maybe you're gonna go buy the honey bourbon because you wanna make your own old fashioned with it. And you have that option. So
Speaker 01:make what you wanna drink. Yeah, I think another advantage too we have is the distribution line and being able to release things, factory releases only. It's like an incubator. You do not have to invest. If you have an idea, Ideas are expensive. And an idea, you're only going to know if it's going to hit when you put it out into the real world. Right. But with the being able to do a special edition bottle or a special release factory only, you know, tasting room only, we can see how something hits. That's
Speaker 04:what
Speaker 01:we did with Flower Day. They'll see the ad on social media. Are we getting that? No. I always got to explain to them, this is incubator. If it hits next year, you'll see it. That's a real great advantage because you do not have to have a lot of capital behind the product and hope when it gets in distribution that it works. You almost have like on the tour when we showed you the Stroh's old tasting room. The name of our bar is the tasting room because people can taste innovation there and if a large percentage likes it, then JP, the partners and Steve, they can say, all right, we may have something here. Let's give it a shot. So that's an advantage for sure. So
Speaker 03:what I love about about your products, too, is not only the I'm going to say the work of art and love that goes into them, but everything from the bottling down to the product in it and the labeling itself are all just works of art. Going into that and talking about your labels a little bit more, I mean, they are literal works of art. So can you give us a little bit of backstory on how that came about?
Speaker 04:Yeah, our labels are just as much of a part of our product as the product that's inside of it. Like what I spoke about, that I didn't want to work for a brand, that I couldn't fill get behind you generally only have like one or two of the three main things that you need and that's a great package a great story and great juice so I the minute I actually tasted the products after I saw them and after I heard about them I was like wow like we've actually got three out of three I mean the label is the first thing that you see when you when somebody presents you with the bottle you the label is the first thing that's going to attract you to it or not I mean you drink it with your eyes basically and every single label that we have has a story, has a reason. The core lineup was all designed by a local Detroit designer, you know, 14 years ago. 12 years ago when they started thinking about labels. Um, but now more recently they are made by, uh, Ryan Koslowski and he is our marketing director. So he works on all the labeling now. Um, but yeah, it is one of those things where, I mean, I've got so many items for me to go through them, but like butchers cut bourbon, that's the one that I always talk about when I talk about our labeling. Um, it's our flagship item anyway. It's our number one seller. It's the, it's the home base for the majority of all of our bourbon, um, innovations is usually starts with butchers and then turns into something else. So on the front label of that is a very surly looking gentleman. And that is JP Jerome's grandfather, Yogi. One thing to note about all of our labels is usually the story for each one of those labels is actually on the back label too. So if you do have a chance to get the bottle in hand, turn it over and you'll probably have a lot of your questions answered right there. But so if you see the label with the butcher's cut, it has butcher tools in there. Yogi was a prohibition, he became a bootlegger. And that was how Detroit and Michigan was still making money. So he actually cut off one of his thumbs making a whiskey barrel. So that was where the butcher's cut homage came in. And one of my favorite parts of the story is his butcher shop was right next door to where our tasting room is located. Our tasting room used to be a slaughterhouse. And so the slaughterhouse would actually feed the butcher shop that his grandfather worked at. So all great things easily made up. You know, everybody has to have a story, right? But when you do come visit us at the Whiskey Factory, his butcher tools are hanging right in a glass case right next to the tour bar. You'll see his ID card with his picture and everything we do here is genuine, authentic, has a story. And that's one of my favorite ones. Railroad Gin is my second favorite. So if you look at the front label, you'll actually see Michigan Central Station is on there. um and then there's a train on the front so back in the day it was cool to ride the train from Detroit to Chicago and people would actually bring their own coupe glasses martini glasses and they would drink gin martinis on the way to Chicago so that is what that the railroad gin came from um I mean I could go on and on and on you know the peacemaker gin has got the white pine and the blue spruce in it and that's the the tree of peace you know the Michigan State tree um Bye. Gilded Age Vodka has the Guardian Building built into the design on the front.
Speaker 03:And one of yours actually has an homage to some of the cats as well.
Speaker 04:Yeah, so we have a program, one of our tour programs here is called the BYOB, the Blend Your Own Bourbon. So when you come in, you'll get to sample through four different barrels and you'll get the beaker, you'll get the whole science experiment kit in front of you and you'll decide which percentage of each barrel you want to go into your 750 bottle and you get to come over here and actually bottle it yourself and then the front label of that is the factory select bourbon on the back you get to number it and write your tasting notes and yeah on the front label it is it's a graphic of the entranceway to the whiskey factory and if you look real close you do see a silhouette of a little black cat so distillery cats are are a thing you don't know you need one until you have one and then you realize how did I ever not have one they actually have an Instagram dedicated to distillery cats and That was our cat, Corn Cob. That was our original, you know, rat catcher for us. And yeah, so when he unfortunately passed, we, you know, we had to homage him as well. So he is in the Factory Select label.
Speaker 03:Well, and that's where I'm sitting at right now in 100 Proof, where I'm looking at the wall of your history. And it's so cool and overwhelming. And I can only imagine just how many stories you have. I could sit here all day listening to you guys talk just so
Speaker 01:you know. You specifically talk about the wall. It was a good sight to see. Jamie said that Steve has been around since bartending at the original and it took him a few days and I have a vault at home. I have a I have a a Husky brand new toolbox that only has bottles in it. Every shelf I have, I call it the vault at home, pretty much everything we have. And Steve's like, what do you got in the vault? I don't have, cause all these guys have special bottles. And Steve took about three, four days to build that wall. And I caught him sometimes like in awe, he was sitting there reminiscing, like, but feeling really good that like, it was good to see Steve go through that. And that's, the core of the people here is the commitment to the craft. And, um, you know, you just mentioned that while every time I look at it, I just, I wasn't part of all of that, but a lot of it. And you know, it feels really good. It feels really good.
Speaker 03:Is your hand sanitizer up there too?
Speaker 04:It's not, no. Um, I, I think we have some in the basement. We should definitely put that. Cause that was a, that was a very traumatic, eye-opening, but also huge moment of coming together for us as a company that we should be commemorating that just as much as the bottles of booze that are out there because that was definitely a time to be alive.
Speaker 03:Well, and it was a huge segue for you, too. I mean, you talked about you're in the process of expanding at this point, and then this pandemic comes on, and it's like, what do you do?
Speaker 01:That happened really fast, too. I have friends in the farming industry. And when Jamie told me what was going on and I go, Jamie, because I was just sampling for you guys at the time. And I was still working. I was working in sales. And I go, Jamie, what's going on? She goes, I don't know. I'll let you know. I'll keep you posted. And a friend, excuse me, call me and he says, hey, you work with the distillery, right? I'm like, yeah. He goes, I got three trucks, three semis of ethanol. You got to let me know in the next half hour if they want them. Do you guys want to pivot? I called JP right away. I'm not a partner. I'm not anything. But I said, JP, this may sound like some backdoor Italian stuff, like I got a truck full of stuff. But I had a friend in the farming industry say he's got three trucks of ethanol. And he called the partners and they said, let's do it. And that was a decision that was made within an hour. And that's when the pivot happened. And Jamie was part of that whole pivot here from going from liquor sales right to hand sanitizer.
Speaker 04:Yeah. And we were fortunate in that we were able to keep the majority of our salary Yeah. employees on the books because of hand sanitizer, which is such a wild thing. Um, I remember the first week or so just sitting at home, you know, and the guys are telling me about what they're doing. And I'm like, and I, I, I'm not a sit on my hands girl. So it was driving me nuts. Cause I was like, let me come in and let me come help, you know? And, and they're sending me pictures and they're masked up, you know, and, and they're, nobody knows what exactly it is we're about to enter. Um, and so I'm sending them food. I'm sending and I'm like, I'm like, what can I do to contribute? And then finally they call me and they're like, okay, we have it ready. I'm like, you have what ready? Like, what are we doing? He's like, we're making hand sanitizer. I'm like, okay. can sell anything so tell me what it is I have to do and what I have to say and I'm going to make it happen so then my station after that became sitting at the tasting room and handling online pickups and we were really fortunate again that we had some contracts with government agencies you know MLCC was one of them we had post offices we had fire stations from across all around Lansing I mean a lot of people that were coming to us and just bringing trucks and we were just loading up we had the gallons and And then we had small bottles like we never had anything bigger. I mean, you couldn't get bottles. You couldn't get everybody was doing the same thing. So we got what we were able to use. And I can remember just pallets of four packs of hand sanitizer going out. And it was it was a moment where I was, you know, somebody said to me, like, you're not on unemployment.
Unknown:Right.
Speaker 04:You know, and I said, no, I said, that's, you know, and I had, you know, we all had days where we were like, what, what is the uncertainty? Like, okay, so sanitizer is eventually going to end. What does the industry look like? You know, there's, there's record spirit sales happening right now. They weren't buying DCD. They were buying handles of, you know, whatever the largest volume item they could buy because you weren't going to the store often. So it wasn't, we don't sell anything in a handle. I mean, our handle would be a hundred dollars, you know, that wasn't Thank you. And then it was like a month or two into it. And I mean, fortunately, stimulus checks started coming out. And then all of a sudden, my sales start going up. I was like, what's happening? And well, they had they had expendable, you know, we were an expendable item at that time. And I was like, this is great. So then all of a sudden, I'm selling hand sanitizer, but I'm back, I'm on the phones again. And I'm selling and I was like, you guys, we're gonna make it through this, like, this is going to be something that we're gonna we're gonna talk about in a podcast, you know, in five years, but we're actually going to make it through this. Um, a lot of great things came from it. One of which was our street bar over at the tasting room. Um, that was something that the city was like, Hey, if you have an outdoor space, why can't you still, if, as long as you're social distancing, why can't you still remain operational? And we're like, this is, so that is something that we still do every summer. We still, we have to apply for our, you know, our yearly permit to do outside sales and shut the street down. But that was revenue that, you know, we had to start thinking outside the box and outside the tasting room. We learned about to-go cocktails. That was when to-go cocktails. So that was something that helped the industry for everybody. And that remains in place. Frozen cocktail, you know, like we just started experimenting. And that's, again, innovation, pivoting. If you can't do that, this industry will completely swallow you alive. And COVID was a big test for us. So...
Speaker 01:The greatest bourbons we created came out of COVID. I know, but I had to get in there, sorry. The shutdown. So Jamie, give a little backstory why the guys wanted to do Shutdown because you were here with the factory with
Speaker 04:them. Yeah. So obviously during COVID, during the shutdown, we were like, let's release something that can bring people together and find some hope and find something to really look forward to. And so Shutdown Bourbon was our first venture into a four grain bourbon. And we did four barrels. So every single one was different. So if you were lucky enough to get, it was one, two, three, four. If you're lucky enough to get, um, all four of them, you could actually taste just the little nuance differences. It was 125 proof at the time. It was four years old.
Speaker 01:The first one was two years, four months, two years, four months at the first barrel. And then the evolution, uh, came from there every year. And, um, it was incredible and there was a message.
Speaker 04:Yeah. So, um, I would have to, I'd have to look it up. Highly recommend if you're listening to this, please look it up. Um, shut down bourbon. You can find there was, um, one of our, uh, former owners had written a really beautiful message about the city of Detroit and rising through the ashes and just very perfectly Stated. We will get through this. And this is, you know, this is what Detroit does and this is what Detroit city does and this is what bourbon does is it brings people together so we then handled um so it was all online sales people had to come here and pick it up we were doing you know had masks on you know six feet away grab your bag and we did um a virtual toast once everybody picked up their bottles and we had over a hundred people that actually got online on zoom and we did a virtual cheers um to making it through it and yeah and then we brought back shut down bourbon for our 10 year anniversary last year. It
Speaker 01:was six years, four months.
Speaker 04:And it was incredible. And that's, yeah, that's 100% one of my favorite items. But that's, you know, I mean, that was, it's just a testament to believing in what you do and but also believing why you do it. I
Speaker 01:have a t shirt I pull out every once in a while. And people just don't get the point. It's three words, change, evolve, or die. And I think that's a huge thing in this industry. You can change could be adjectived out with pivot, whatever you want to do. But if you are not slowly tweaking the machine and strategically, because I look up to JP a lot, I'm the, for the record, I'm the old man around here. I'm the oldest guy at the company, but I love it. But I look up to people younger than me in age because I get inspiration from them, from Jamie, from Steve, from JP. I am very blessed to be part of this and to go what we went through with COVID. And I was just a small part at the time, but everybody has their part here. And the big picture is just, it's awesome to do this. It's awesome, so.
Speaker 03:For anyone listening, what is the biggest takeaway that you would like to give anybody who's looking to break into this industry?
Speaker 04:I think I'll take that on two sides. One, for sales. because I'm coming up on my 20th year in sales next year, and then two on the distillery side. But I feel like they both have the same thread between them, and that is stay open. Stay open. Stay flexible. Understand you don't know everything. Continue to learn because the industry around you is constantly changing. And like I said before about the trends, by the time something's a trend, it's over. So don't chase trends. Chase quality. Chase something you want to drink. And if you go into this business just to make money, you will eventually fail. That is, I think, something that we've seen with, I don't want to say other brands, but just, I think that goes for any business also. But in this one in particular, if you don't truly feel it, People are going to feel that if you don't truly believe in it. You know, if I if I went home every day and I didn't actually drink Detroit, you know, city distillery spirits, you're going to figure that out pretty quickly. Be authentic. It was like seven things, right? Be authentic. Be true. Be open. Stay, you know, and yeah, stay true to yourself. Don't let anybody else change the way you do things, because if it ain't broken, who are they to fix it?
Speaker 01:Great bullet points. I agree with every one of them. But yeah, authenticity. Do what you say, say as you do. The craft, I think staying true to the craft is huge. Whether you're going into neutral spirits with vodkas and gins or you want to dabble into, you know, people ask us, ask me on the street, you know, who's your biggest competitor here in Michigan? I go, nobody. I said, do you know all these Michigan distillers have each other on speed dial? They all know each other. Our biggest competitor always will be Kentucky, the birthplace of whiskey and bourbon. But with that said, everybody always comes up to me and says, are you an owner? I said, no. They go, you talk like you're an owner. I said, that's why I do good in this business. It's not mine to say it's mine, but I deliver it like it's mine because I have a commitment to the brand and I have a commitment to the craft. I get other bottles of whiskey and bourbon as gifts, and they sit and collect dust on my bar. But the bottles that are emptied and go in the recycle bin or turned into candles, for me, are the Detroit City Distillery bottles because I drink it. People say I'm a little biased, but you know what? I'm a chef. I'm selling my own knives. I'm selling my own stuff. But stay authentic, be true, and do as you say. Do as you say. And that's what this brand has done since day one.
Speaker 00:Jamie and Dante, thank you for spending this time with us to talk about Detroit City Distillery and your success over the past decade. We wish you all the best for future success. We hope that you have a great rest of the summer. And we look forward to having a conversation like this again someday and hearing where you are in another decade. And thank you for hosting us here at 100 Proof and have a wonderful day. Thank you so much. Cheers. The MLCC On The Road podcast is brought to you by the Michigan Liquor Control Commission. For more information on the Michigan Liquor Control Commission, please visit our website at www.michigan.gov. Thank you for listening.
