DenverDistiller

I have a much more detailed analysis available, but am trying to give you all the bullet points... feel free to ask questions or poke holes.

We have $100k in the bank ready to dedicate to a distillery in Denver. (Brother & I) I currently own a business that is successful, and my brother has a good full time job. We plan on keeping them for the time being, and are willing to invest more but ideally won't have to. We won't take any money out of the business unless we begin working full time. We have been pre-approved for additional loans and lines of credit, but haven't taken any out. We have quite a few people who are interested in investing but for now we've said no thanks. The hardest thing about this industry is that the more I learn, the more I realize I don't know. We're at the point where we feel like we just need to jump in and stop endlessly planning, we've been working on our business since November 2014. We both can brew beer and neither have run a still so there will be a learning curve with that. Our plan is to buy whiskey/vodka in bulk for our tasting room to sell while we perfect our recipe. We expect to spend: Equipment - 15k Bottles/Bottling - 3k Tasting Room - 10k Build Out - 20k (includes lic, architect) Initial run & NGS - 7k Total - 55k Operating Capital - 45k Here's the punchline/big question. We have the opportunity to get a prime location in Denver - 2000 sq feet (20 ft ceilings) with high foot traffic and what is becoming a big drinking location. The rent would be $4000/month, which if our start-up is anything like most distillers experience, we will likely have much less than 45k in operating capital by the time we get our doors open. I'm of the opinion that because we can sell booze day 1 and will have walk-in customers day 1, I think generating the sales # won't be out of the ballpark to achieve. Am I nuts? The other option is to open in a garage / warehouse and get our products in line, then make the leap in a few years. Thanks

Good luck - I'll be interested to hear how the restaurant goes as well - that's a big operation.

Awesome - this is exactly what I've been looking for!

Hey Y'all - I'm Denver Distiller, real estate's been good to my brother & I, and we're looking to cash out and open a distillery & tasting room here in Denver. I've been reading the forums for a while and I'm looking forward to getting to know y'all.