“My wife Nancy runs the merchandise in the gift shops, and our two kids – a son who is a sophomore in college, and daughter who is a junior in high school – both work in our distillery over the summer.” ![]() area, Tennessee, and Georgia,” Garrison said. “My dad is 84 and is our bourbon salesman in the D.C. Credit: Iris Gonzalez for the San Antonio Report Garrison Brothers is a family business, with Garrison’s parents, brother, and children all working for the distillery.Įither Dan Garrison (pictured) or Donnis Todd hand sign every Garrison Brothers bottle. In 2006, founder Dan Garrison started producing bourbon at the distillery after a career in software marketing. How Texas Got Its First Bourbon Distillery There’s incentive for those who complete both volunteer days: After completing the second day, volunteers receive a goody bag that includes a bottle of bourbon as thanks. If for some reason I can’t make my second day, there’s a wait list 8,000 long. After 90 minutes and multiple server crashes, all 700 slots were taken. ![]() As soon as I received the volunteer signup email in February, I selected two separate days to help bottle bourbon. On my first visit to the distillery, I heard about the volunteer experience and signed up for Garrison Brothers’ electronic newsletter. “It’s a great place to work, it’s lots of fun, and you meet interesting people, plus it’s an educational experience,” Track said. She winters in Kingsland, Texas, and returned to Garrison Brothers this year to volunteer for her second time. The oldest volunteer there on my first day was 79-year-old Jean Track who lives in Ontario, Canada. “It’s an experience we plan for every year, and it has become an annual event for us,” Jim said. Veteran volunteers Jim Ezell of Wichita Falls and his son James from Austin have been helping since the distillery started bottling in 2010. The ritual of repeatedly passing around samples was part of the day’s work. The volunteers were indeed enthusiastic supporters of Garrison Brothers, taking pains to follow the bottling steps carefully, while sampling bourbon throughout the day.Īfter I recovered from my wake up slug of John Daly, I was presented with my first sample cup of bourbon. “We find that all these volunteers turn into brand ambassadors for us.” “We typically use 400-500 volunteers per year,” Todd said. Working with fine bourbon, I learned, makes for a memorable experience. “It would be really difficult to package all the bourbon in a timely manner, so our volunteers allow us handle anywhere from 1,000 to 1,500 bottles per day.”įor 2017, Todd expects to bottle anywhere from 60,000-75,000 bottles, and volunteers are crucial to getting those bottles out into the market. “We have only seven full-time employees,” Master Distiller Donnis Todd said. ![]() Garrison Brothers uses 74% organic Texas grown corn, with the remaining 26% comprised of wheat and barley. Bourbon must be distilled from 51% or more corn. The extra ‘e’ is used to describe American-made bourbon. Bourbon is whiskey made in the U.S., typically in Kentucky. There’s no automation – and after a day of manually bottling and packaging bourbon, it’s clear why Garrison Brothers relies on its dedicated corps of volunteers. Industry-mandated regulations translate into an expensive and time consuming process to make bourbon, especially when it’s a small batch distillery like Garrison Brothers. Once distilled, bourbon must age in new, charred white American oak barrels for at least two years. ![]() My day bottling bourbon at the first legal whiskey distillery in Texas was off to a promising start. “It’s made with one-third iced tea, one-third lemonade, and one-third bourbon. Canada and Japan both produce whisky, while Scotch is whisky made in Scotland. The differences among whiskey, scotch, and bourbon boil down to spelling, place of origin, and ingredients.
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