OldSpye

There's a very strict legal definition of "hobby", largely as relates to tax code. Without surfacing all of the details, suffice to say that "hobby" = "no revenue".

I love the hobby distillers, but getting the federal excise tax reduced is probably higher on my priority list. I think legalization of hobby distilling faces a long road. Uphill. Through 10' of snow. The reason, as has been explained to me, is that hobby distilling differs from home brewing in the simple respect that a guy with a 30 gallon in his garage could conceivably produce salable quantities sufficient to deprive the government of considerable tax revenue. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to do the same by brewing beer.

So... Not that I don't 100% wholeheartedly approve of your efforts, but... Wouldn't somebody offering a testimonial with respect to previous conduct of an illegal activity amount to self-incrimination?

55 gal stainless barrels can be had pretty inexpensively from some of the cooperages that make that stuff.

We've zeroed that stuff out in Year 1, i.e. projected no income. The theory behind that assumption is that we'll be giving away as much as well sell, if not more - promotions, etc.

Unfortunately the answer to that question is "it depends". It depends on how effective your initial saccharification is (i.e. your starting SG). It depends on your yeast strain - some are more alcohol-tolerant than others. It depends on your yeast attenuation - the amount of sugar the yeast will convert before it just naturally "gives up" (which is somewhat, but not specifically, related to the point above). At a high level, I'd suggest that if you're trying to manage your wash ABV by managing your input grain, you're probably over-graining (I made that term up). It's possible to get a wash ABV of 8-9% using as little as 1.25 lbs/gallon, depending on the grain. I know, just from the little time that I've spent here, that the following is sort of a standard, cop-out response, but having done the research I can also tell you it's very sound advice - pay a visit to some of the home/amateur distilling forums. There's TONS of good information locked away in some of those good 'ol threads.

I popped this out of the White Laps Distilling Catalog. It's pretty useful.

Barton, just for example, sours their mash cookers (but wouldn't disclose the percentages). The bottom line on this is, I think, that there are virtually limitless variations that you can apply to the process. What works for you, in terms of flavor profile, is precisely what makes you unique. Put another way - there's nothing "bad" except that which doesn't taste good.

Follow up: I emailed my Congressman (Chris Smith, NJ-4th) and both Senators yesterday morning (Cory Booker, Robert Menendez). What's interesting about this bill is that the House legislation (H.R. 4083) was introduced by a Republican, Christopher Gibson of New York. The Senate bill (S. 2169) was introduced by Kirsten Gillibrand, who is a Democrat - ostensibly, there could be bi-partisan support of we could move this thing out of committees (Ways & Means in the House, Finance in the Senate) where it currently sits. This afternoon I called Chris Smith's legislative affairs office in D.C. to voice my support. The nice woman at the D.C. office was very interested and I got a much stronger response via phone than I did via email. I would encourage everyone to take the following actions: Send emails - 3 in total - to your Rep and Senators. You can do it from their official home pages on the Congressional web sites, it takes 5 minutes and you'll get a nice auto-reply for your troubles. Follow up with a phone call to the D.C. office of your Congressman. If you don't know the number, contact the local district office (which will be in the nice auto-reply) and they'll gladly give it to you. Be concise - say you're calling to ask the Congressman's support of HR 4083, which amends the federal tax code to reduce the excise tax on less than 100,000 gallons of distilled spirits. Say that you're a craft distiller and you have a vested interest in the Congressman's support of this legislation. Find your Congressman's Facebook page, "Like" it if you have to, then post a brief message asking that they support HR 4083. If you have Facebook pages of your own, post a message asking your friends to undertake as many of the previous 3 steps as they are willing. None of this takes a great deal of time. It absolutely HAS to be worth it, seeing that this bill (if enacted) would put considerable capital into our coffers - money that can be invested to grow our businesses. Cheers!

We're planning on doing something very similar. I'd thought about the necessity to age the wood, but honestly am not completely sold on the need. Some of the tannins will leach out into the wash, but given the low ABV I don't think it's going to be anything significant - and certainly there won't be anything residual, post-distillation. The overall aesthetic is totally cool.

Just this morning I sent letters to Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ) as well as Senators Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and Cory Booker (D-NJ). I also posted something about the bill on our Facebook page. I would encourage everyone here to do the same. Given the current low level of support in both the House and the Senate, the only chance this bill has is if we turn up the heat, considerably.

Just this morning I sent letters to Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ) as well as Senators Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and Cory Booker (D-NJ). I also posted something about the bill on our Facebook page. I would encourage everyone here to do the same. Given the current low level of support in both the House and the Senate, the only chance this bill has is if we turn up the heat, considerably.

+1. Some of those guys (not all, or even most, but definitely some) have crazy knowledge. It's pretty easy to figure out who knows what's going on, if you read the boards for a while.

I won't disagree with the notion that they may support it, because as I said, I was pretty much speculating. I'd be curious to know the answers to two questions, though: 1. Does roughly $1M in tax savings fully play out in their favor with all the other factors considered (given that they're producing millions of gallons a year), and, 2. If they're supportive of the legislation, they why has it gotten so little traction? I would think that they'd be able to glean some significant legislative support, particularly from their home state legislators.

It seems to me that the B-Fs and Diageos of the world are laying some serious money against this legislation. Their concern is that it creates an irregular playing field between the micro and macro industries and that we would simply use the $11/gal tax break to offset our prices. Of course, when a bottle of JD unaged Rye is pulling the better part of a $58 shelf price, I'd have to say they have a borderline legit concern, tax breaks notwithstanding. The truth, of course, is entirely different. The truth is that the intent of the excise tax reduction is to compensate for the lack of economies of scale in the micro industry and actually level the playing field. Which, of course, is great for us but... the big boys don't like that at all.

I actually agree with that. I've spoken to a number of erstwhile players in the burgeoning NJ market and I have to say that overall there's been a strong sense of camaraderie - with some very isolated exception. Here's the way I see it... (and I must apologize in advance and forever, because you'll find that I tend to not do a great job of keeping my opinions to myself) The requisite elements of this thing of ours (Jersey term!) aren't dissimilar from other business pursuits. You need talent, passion, creativity, ingenuity, integrity, drive, sacrifice, humility and, of course, some money to get yourself started and keep things bubbling along in the early days. It's inevitable that we're going to find in our peers limitless combinations of those qualities in varying degrees. It's similarly inevitable that, from time to time, we'll encounter some folks who possess all but the last of those things in... very limited quantities. But, as a wise man once said - in the end, the Universe tends to unfold as it should. I got into this because I've been waiting most of my life for an opportunity to do it. It's in my blood. I'm not looking to get rich, I'm looking to put forth a product that I'm proud of, that my grandfather and his grandfather would have been proud of. Meet some people. Have some fun. Drink some good whiskey. Tell a story or two. The definition of success is a highly personal thing. How to achieve it becomes, in effect, our own vision quest - it's illusory and tends to be relatively intangible. The only thing that's for certain is... you can't buy it.

Yep. I know who you're talking about - we've communicated a couple of times. So... Yeah, I don't really have anything more to say about that.

The guys down at CMY are probably just about as far off (although they say they've already gotten their DSP) because we have the same copper guy. Yeah, let's talk for sure. I've suggested the same sort of state organization to Jim Yoakum down at Cooper River. Competition is one thing, but there are definitely areas where we can work together, as well. I'll shoot you a PM with my number.

My wife / CPA calls this process "Crawl - Walk - Run". It's translated pretty well into our business plan. As James said, above, we intend to continue paying the bills from 9-5 and make our fortune from 5-12. The synergy for us is, as she just reminded me, the house will be paid off in 47 months, all the kids will be done with college at the same time and our bills will diminish to the point where I will be able to quit my day job by then, at the very latest. Of course, if we're enormously successful before then, that would be fine too.

Thanks, Mike - shot ya a PM.

Thanks, Mike! We have a pretty advanced (read: complex) 5 year business plan that ramps us up to a facility relocation in Year 4. For now we're "starting small" with a 100 gallon setup and plan on spending the first 3 years building inventory and brand recognition and squirreling away all of our cash. Since we want to be fairly "green" throughout the operation, recirculative cooling is definitely in the plan. I just need to make sure it fits the budget!

As some or most of you may know, NJ enacted its craft distillery legislation last August. There is currently one craft distillery operating under the new law, as of a few weeks ago (with apologies to the guys at Jersey Artisan, they don't count because they opened under a plenary license) and another operation is probably a few months away. We're right behind them, if our schedule holds to task. I'm looking forward to some great conversation here and I'm sure I'll have questions in the near future, although I've already had a number of those questions answered via previous lurking. Best to all! Old Spye Distillery www.oldspye.com www.facebook.com/oldspye