Willett (whiskey)
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Willett is a whiskey distillery based in Bardstown , Kentucky . It belongs to the Willett / Kulsveen family who have been based in Bardstown for several centuries. The first Willett distillery opened in 1936 after the end of Prohibition and had to cease operations in the 1980s. The Willett / Kulsveen family worked as Kentucky Bourbon Distillers in whiskey wholesaling until they reopened a new distillery for bourbon whiskey and rye whiskey in 2012 and renamed the Willett Distilling Company again.
The old Willett Distillery
Lambert Willett, who worked at the Bernheim Distillery in Louisville, bought the land on top of a hill in Bardstown. His sons Thompson and John T. built the Willett Distillery in 1936, with John designing and designing the production facilities and Thompson serving as president of the new company. Lambert's daughter Mary T. worked there as a vice president. Among other things, Thompson was director of the Kentucky Distillers Association for several years .
Kentucky Bourbon Distillers
In the 1970s, bourbon sales plunged into a crisis, while at the same time the oil crisis signaled a great need for fuels that could not be made from petroleum. Willetts switched their business from whiskey to bioethanol to produce a substitute fuel for cars. However, this did not allow them to establish themselves on the market. Triggered by the bourbon crisis in the 1970s / 1980s, they completely stopped the distillation operations.
In the 1970s, Martha Willett, the daughter of Thompson Willett, married Even Kulsveen from Norway, who was determined to restart the whiskey business. He founded the Kentucky Bourbon Distillers company and began selling the whiskeys still in stock at Willett. Here, in particular, he supplied the emerging market for premium whiskeys in Japan and also delivered to Europe. To this day, Kentucky Bourbon Distillers is much more present in Asia and Europe than in the USA itself. After the Willett stocks were exhausted, Kentucky Bourbon Distillers worked in particular with Heaven Hill , whose headquarters are only a few hundred meters away from the Willetts. Kentucky Bourbon Distillers produced its own brands, matured whiskey in its own warehouses, exported whiskey worldwide and acted as a wholesaler for large quantities of unfilled whiskey between distilleries and processors.
The new Willett Distillery
Kulsveen bought the distillery building from other family members in 1984. The company is owned and operated by Kulsveen, his wife and children. The Willett Distillery resumed operations in 2012 in downtown Bardstown, the self-proclaimed Whiskey Capital of the World . The first barrel of bourbon whiskey was produced on January 27, 2012. The distillery works with both a pot still and a column still. The mash consists of 72% corn, 13% rye and 15% barley. The water for the whiskey processing comes from a spring-fed lake on the distillery site.
The distillery has eight warehouses, a visitor center and a bar. Apart from the new building in which the whiskey is distilled, the remaining buildings are still from the first distillery built in 1937. The whole area gives the impression of a whiskey distillery as it looked right after the end of Prohibition.
Products
The distillery started operations in 2012, so the first straight bourbon whiskey and rye whiskey will not go on sale until 2016 at the earliest. Kentucky Bourbon Distillers has been trading its own brands, which are produced in Bardstown, for 30 years. Willett's most expensive brand is Willett Pot Still Reserve, other varieties are Willett Family Estate Bottled Bourbon and Rye, Noah's Mill, Rowan's Creek, Johnny Drum, Old Bardstown, Pure Kentucky and "Kentucky Vintage".
Remarks
- ^ Dixie Hibbs: Bardstown: Hospitality, History, and Bourbon. Arcadia Publishing, 2002, ISBN 0-7385-2391-7 , p. 135.
- ↑ a b c Kentucky Distillers Association: WILLETT DISTILLERY JOINS KENTUCKY DISTILLERS 'ASSOCIATION ( Memento of the original from December 15, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . 4th October 2012.
- ^ A b Kentucky Bourbon Distillers: The Willett Distillery. In: American Whiskey. February 22, 2001.
- ↑ a b c Chuck Cowdery : The Willetts Are Back . the Chuck Cowdery Blog February 27, 2013.
- ↑ a b Jay Erisman: Willett's making whiskey. Again. ( Memento of the original from December 16, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Whiskey Advocate March 30, 2012.
