Louisville’s Distilled Spirits Epicenter has joined the Kentucky Distillers’ Association as its first-ever Educational Distillery member. The KDA’s board of directors had to approve that category specifically for the Epicenter, which didn’t fit into the association’s existing categories of founding distillers and craft distillers. Those categories are based on number of barrels in inventory – and the Epicenter doesn’t have any inventory.
Instead, the Epicenter is designed to educate aspiring craft distillers in the time-honored craft of distilling. Located in a beautifully renovated former auto-repair shop at 801 S. Eighth St. in downtown Louisville, this sister company to the Flavorman beverage lab does this through three main resources:
Grease Monkey Distillery, an artisan distillery furnished with state-of-the-art Vendome equipment that may be rented for full-scale spirits production or to run small test batches (see photo below); Challenge Bottling, an on-site bottling line designed to accommodate smaller production runs and various packaging requirements; and Moonshine University, a training facility that provides expert instruction on everything from technical operations to business planning.
By affiliating itself with the KDA, the Epicenter can access the resources of other distillery association members. For instance, several master distillers will teach courses at Moonshine University’s first distilling course, scheduled for Jan. 14-18. (See details here.)
This has been a year of tremendous growth for the KDA. The Distilled Spirits Epicenter is its sixth new member in 2012 and brings the total number of members to 15.
