Exclusive Interview with Ian Justin Glomski, Ph.D., Founder & Head Distiller of Vitae Spirits Distillery

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Q: What is your full name, title, company name and company location?

Ian Justin Glomski, Ph.D.

Founder & Head Distiller

Vitae Spirits Distillery

715 Henry Ave

Charlottesville, VA 22903

Q: What made you decide to start your own distillery?

Starting a distillery was a long time coming. I’ve been making alcohol since I was 18 years old; when I went to college it was illegal for me to buy beer, but there were no laws against me buying malt, hops, and yeast! So, I simply cut out the middleman and started brewing beer in my dorm room and ultimately won a few amateur awards along the way as a little positive reinforcement. As time went by I ended up going to graduate school in Berkeley and fortuitously my brother became a winemaker just south of me in the Santa Cruz Mountains, so I’d often spent weekends helping him out with his personal wine side projects, getting one foot into the wine world. My brother, being an ambitious person, ultimately decided to start his own winery in Northern Arizona near Sedona, named Page Springs Cellars, and the project soon became a family business. It was his blood sweat and tears, but the rest of us all contributed a little something to the enterprise. My small contribution to the business has primarily been serving on the Board of Directors through the years, but I also spent a harvest season working in the winery and vineyards, and put in a good amount of effort setting up their enology lab. All these experiences, starting at beer, leading into wine, gave me a good feel for both the production and business side of the adult beverage industry; this awareness remained percolating in the back of my head for some time waiting to become something more than just a notion. 

I think it fair to say that the trigger to take action to build a distillery was a mid-life crisis. In 2012 a bunch of stressors converged. They are long stories unto themselves, but in short in 2012 I turned 40, I got my first cancer (minor), I served as a jurist on a murder trial (studying for days photos of a girl beaten to death), and I got caught in a 24,000 acre forest fire in the back country of Wyoming. All of these things added up to make me realize the value of the years that I had left and that I’d be making a serious mistake if I didn’t use those years properly. As it stood in 2012 I had a stable, respectable job as a professor at the University Of Virginia Medical School, but when I came up for tenure I realized using my remaining years doing the same things I’d been doing just wouldn’t be using those years to their fullest. This realization was ultimately the trigger that set me off down the road to building a distillery.

Q: Where did you gain your knowledge about the spirits industry, including fermentation and distillation?

In my early days of brewing I went through a phase of making crappy beer, as I am sure many newbies do. Instead of shrugging it off and just sterilizing all my equipment, I signed up for a Microbiology class in college and did an “extra credit” project of isolating and identifying all of the microbes that were growing in my beer (most were from my slobber, inoculated by unwisely mouth siphoning). This Microbiology class piqued my interest in the microscopic world so much that it soon evolved into a career in biomedical research that ran in parallel to what was, at the time, my alcohol production hobby. Ironically, as I became a microbiologist, biochemist, immunologist, geneticist, molecular biologist, and infectious disease specialist, I was also receiving the academic training I needed to become a distiller! 

Q:What was the process like, working with your state and local agencies to get your permit approved for the distillery and how long did it take?

In total, it took just over year to get our distillery licensed and running. There are three levels of regulatory agencies that one must work with sequentially to earn the right to produce distilled spirits. The first is the federal government’s Tobacco and Alcohol Taxation Board (TTB), the second is our state’s liquor control authority, the Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control Authority (ABC), and the third is our local city government. Personally, I found that the larger and more remote the entity, the easier it was to deal with. I have had lots of experience working with (and for) the federal government from my life as a biomedical researcher, so navigating the systems at the TTB had a certain level of familiarity that made things a tad bit less frustrating, albeit still overly convoluted. For the most part the TTB focuses on security and accountability at the level of taxation. Working with our state’s regulations were significantly more complex. Virginia is a “control” state in which all wholesale and retail sales of spirits is conducted by the state. As a manufacturer in Virginia, our only customer is the state; 100% of our bottles pass through the state to our customers. This means that there are significant controls on how we conduct our business on a daily basis. It is a constant challenge that always daylights new and unexpected regulations even when we try our best to follow the law. In many ways our local City of Charlottesville government was the most challenging among the agencies we needed to work with, though I must say that they had the best “can-do” attitude (which goes a long way). Charlottesville was primarily focused on issues of safety, primarily regarding flammable liquids, the environment, and urban development. This meant multiple visits by city inspectors to review our systems to make sure they were up to code, and then subsequent visits to make sure that our modifications brought our systems up to compliance. Overall, if I am honest, the process of getting the distillery properly licensed was a bit quicker and easier that I had expected, simply because I had heard so many horror stories that I had set my expectations up for something much worse. Really though, we might just have been lucky to not have hit any major snags in the process too. 

Q: What was the biggest challenge you faced during the process of opening your distillery and how did you overcome it?

I’d say raising capital was probably the biggest challenge. It wasn’t so much the availability of mechanisms to access funds, rather the seeking of a balance of what you need to sacrifice to obtain those funds. Most often you need to cede control of the distillery in exchange for funding. There are many public examples of how this has ended badly for all parties involved, and presumably many more that haven’t been day lighted to the outside world. I was lucky to have been able to build a workable budget from internal funding sources, i.e. savings and family. This level of capital was most certainly a limitation on the scale of what we could hope to achieve in the short term, but I was able to maintain a large amount of control over the operations and direction of Vitae Spirits. A relatively small budget suited me just fine. I wanted to keep Vitae Spirits small because I enjoy the daily operations of distilling and the larger the company gets, the farther I am pushed from the day to day operations I love. As is stands we only have two full-time employees and three part-time staff. I don’t want Vitae Spirits to grow all that much more from where we stand now.

Q: You have a beautiful copper pot still.  Can you tell us more about it and why you chose this particular design?  How long did it take to receive it once you placed the order?

Yes! Copper is a gorgeous metal! I love how it changes as it matures. Our still was built by Vendome Copper & Brass Works in Louisville, Kentucky. I worked with the Vendome engineers to achieve a few goals, based both on what spirits we wanted to produce as well as the physical limitations of our distillery. I like to play with lots of different types of spirits, so I wanted a still that had a high degree of flexibility. As a hybrid pot and 4-plate column still we can make just about any spirit with the exception of vodka, which I have little interest in making. Part of our design that differs from many other hybrid stills is that the rectifying column can be completely isolated from the copper pot, so we can perform classic pot-only distillations for heavier spirits if we so desire. Though Vitae Spirits focuses on sugar cane spirits, such as rum, we’ve also made fabulous whiskies, brandies, and flavored spirits with the still. Once we established the final design of the still it took about 18 months for it to arrive, which honestly was just fine because it took over a year to convert our building from a school into a distillery. 

Q: What rums are you currently producing? 

Right now we are producing six different kinds of rum:

  • Platinum Rum- This is rum at its most basic and pure. As for all our rums, we start off with evaporated sugar cane juice from Louisiana and then ferment it with a French Caribbean yeast strain before distilling in our pot & column still. Platinum is that simple; reflecting all of the character of classic fresh rum, with heavy vanilla crème brule character, tropical fruit, toast, and a bit of the greenness conveyed by a sugar source much closer to the cane than black strap molasses-based rums. 
  • Distiller’s Reserve Barrel Aged Rum- We are lucky to call Central Virginia our home because we are surrounded by wineries and bourbon distilleries that are all happy to provide us with second-use barrels that add complexity to our rum aging process. Barrel Aged Rum is a blend of rums aged in either bourbon or wine barrels. The current Batch #2 is a blend of three 2.5 year old barrels, two bourbon barrels from Ragged Branch Distillery, and one pinotage wine barrel from Lovingston Winery. Bottled at 90 proof Barrel Aged Rum is a surprisingly elegant rum that has a touch of dryness from the red wine tannins, while it maintains a rich toffee, burnt sugar, smokiness balanced with dark stone fruit aromas.
  • Golden Rum- Our bestselling rum overall reflects a guiding concept at Vitae Spirits that we call “Community Terroir”. We aim to reflect in our spirits the unique combination of people, businesses, and places in Central Virginia that make it special. Golden Rum is a collaboration with Ace Biscuit & Barbecue who grill fresh sugar cane on their house-made hickory and oak charcoal so that it becomes caramelized and smoky. This grilled sugar cane is then infused into rum with heavy toast American oak and a touch of evaporated cane juice to give it a deep golden color, butterscotch flavors, and a touch of pineapple fruitiness.
  • Distiller’s Reserve Smoked Rum- The smoky progeny of Golden Rum produced by using a modified Traeger Smoker to instill pecan wood smoke into the rum instead of the grilled sugar cane of Golden Rum. Filling a space somewhere between a peaty scotch and a biting mescal, this smoked rum has the smooth sweetness of pecan wood smoke balanced with a bit of American oak and sugar cane juice.
  • Distiller’s Reserve Spiced Rum- This is not your typical spiced rum. Vitae Spirits adds very little sugar to our spiced rum so that the warmth of elegant spices take center stage. Heavy on Madagascar vanilla beans, bright citrus, cloves and other exotic spices, with a bit of a zing from black peppercorns, this isn’t a spiced rum for kids. 
  • Distiller’s Reserve Maple Syrup Barrel Finished Rum- A fruitful collaboration with Back Creek Farm’s maple sugar shack in Highland County Virginia. Back Creek Farms ages maple syrup in ex-bourbon barrels and then passes them long to Vitae Spirits when they remove the maple syrup. What’s left behind becomes pure heaven once we add barrel-aged rum to the maple syrup barrels and let them mingle for 6 months to a year. The emerging rum picks up a bit of maple sweetness and expands its aroma profile to express snickerdoodles, toffee, and roasted tree nuts.  

Q: Are there plans to add new rums to your portfolio in the future?

Oh yes, that’s where the fun is! A few things that are coming down the line include an aged Queen’s Cut Rum (i.e. redistilled tails that yield an intensely flavored spirit), a Maple Butter Cream Rum, and a high-ester heavy-duty black strap pot distilled rum.

Q: Can you describe your rum fermentation?  Is it the same for all of your rums?

We have a single fermentation recipe that yields rum which is later adapted into other products. Our starting materials is evaporated sugar cane juice (a.k.a. sugar cane honey, high-test molasses, sugar cane syrup, or cane juice molasses) from Louisiana. In its initial state at about 85 brix the evaporated cane juice has too high a sugar concentration for yeast to readily grow, so we dilute the syrup with water. Then, to eliminate the influence of wild yeast and bacteria, the mixture is pasteurized. To this mixture we add vitamins along with a nitrogen and phosphorus source because yeast need more nutrients than those which are supplied by the evaporated cane juice alone. We also adjust the pH of the mixture to make it slightly acidic to promote yeast growth over any potential contaminating wild bacteria and yeast. Once the mixture is prepared and cooled we pitch our yeast. 

The yeast we selected was originally isolated on the island of Guadeloupe growing upon sugar cane and is very efficient at converting sucrose, the primary sugar in sugar cane juice, into ethanol. We ferment in temperature controlled closed stainless steel tanks for 5 days, yielding a ~9% ABV beer, and then it’s off to the still for distillation.

Q: Other than rum, what other spirits are you making?

GINS:

  • Modern Gin- a sugar cane spirit-based gin made with seventeen botanicals that is light on the juniper berry influence but heavy on floral and citrus notes.
  • Old Tom Gin- a barrel-aged (brown) gin that has spent six month to a year aging in bourbon barrels to give it a rounded mouth feel and a greater emphasis on resinous aspects of its botanical profile.
  • Damson Gin Liqueur- produced in the tradition of British sloe gins but made with damson plums instead of sloe plums, which can’t be grown in North America. Damson plums are grown at a local orchard and then infused into our gin to yield a gorgeously magenta sweet-tart herbaceous liquid.
  • Conifer- a collaboration with Bit O’ Honey organic Christmas tree farm. Each spring Bit O’ Honey prunes the fresh blue spruce and balsam fir tips. Vitae Spirits intercepts these conifer branch tips and distills them into an incredibly refreshing aromatic spirit that isn’t technically a gin because it has no juniper berries, but is reminiscent enough of gin to easily substitute it in cocktails that call for gin.

LIQUEURS:

  • Orange Liqueur- made in the classic triple sec tradition of balancing sweet and bitter oranges, but made with a sugar cane spirit base, sweet navel oranges, and bitter hardy oranges (Citrus trifoliata) collected semi-wild around Central Virginia. As with all of our liqueurs, Orange Liqueur is produced at relatively high 80 proof, but with the minimum sugar required by the TTB to avoid syrupy sweetness.
  • Anisette- an anise-flavored sugar cane based spirit leaning towards the French anise style rather than the heavier Italian and Greek styles. Made with anise seeds, rather than star anise, to emphasize its green herbaciousness, along with sweet fennel seeds, and a touch of lemon zest just before bottling.
  • Coffee Liqueur- a cold-brew coffee sugar cane spirit collaboration with local Mudhouse Coffee Roasters that brings out the nutty caramel berry flavors of a special roast and blend of Panamanian and Columbian coffee beans. Our Coffee Liqueur is produced under a blanket of argon gas to minimize coffee oxidation during the production process and minimally sweetened to highlight the earthy aromatics and minimize syrupiness.
  • Paw Paw Liqueur- a liqueur made with the largest native fruit and only member of the tropical soursop family in North America. Sometimes called the hillbilly banana, Indiana banana, or bandango, the paw paw has an amazing tropical fruit flavor but has proven difficult to market because its fragile skin is easily damaged, leading to rapid spoilage.

BRANDY:

  • Strawberry Eau de Vie- the long slow fermentation of fresh strawberries into an amazingly fruity wine distilled into a fresh unaged fruit brandy. A rare nano-distillation that produced just seventeen bottles.
  • Fruitiness- apply brandy made from Virginian cider apples aged for five years and then topped off with the essence of orange. 

BEER WHISKEY:

Champion Collab series distilled from Champion Brewery Beer;

  • Collab #1- distillation of Violator Dobbelbock beer- intensely malty
  • Collab #2- distillation of The Pils are Alive American pilsner beer- very citrusy hops and light malt
  • Collab #3- distillation of Malibu Nights Double IPA beer with tangerine and hibiscus- fruity resinous aromas with sweet malty grains

Q: Where are your products currently available for purchase?

  • Directly in-person at one of our two tasting rooms https://www.vitaespirits.com/
  •  In our online store for shipping within Virginia only https://vitaespirits.square.site/ 
  • Virginia ABC state liquor stores https://www.abc.virginia.gov/products/virginia-products 
  • Spirit Hub online in IL, NE, ND, and NH https://www.spirithub.com/shop/vitae-spirits
  • LibDib wholesale NY https://libdib.com/ 
  • Tipxy online to all states EXCEPT AL, AK, HI, IL, KY, ME, MA, NH, ND, SD, OR, UT, WA https://tipxy.com/ 
  • Page Springs Cellars Arizona tasting room and online https://shop.pagespringscellars.com/Shop/Vitae-Spirits

Q: When COVID-19 hit last year how did it affect your operation and how did you overcome those challenges?  You have also in the past few months experienced another bout with Covid-19 where you had to temporarily shut down due to one of your employees testing positive.  This is absolutely devastating news. How is your employee doing?  Everyone else okay?  What measures have you had to take to be able to reopen your distillery and tasting room?

The Covid-19 pandemic has not been good for business. After five years of operation we were hoping to become cash flow-positive in 2020. That didn’t happen, but I hesitate to complain because many others had it worse than we did. Overall it looks like we will survive, but it took a lot of resourcefulness and the helping hand of our government. Just on a cash basis we were lucky to receive Paycheck Protection Program assistance as well as an Economic Injury Disaster Loan from the federal government that helped us survive when our revenues plummeted. In the early days of the pandemic we made ends meet by producing and selling hand sanitizer. It broke my heart turning our rum into sanitizer, but our community needed it and we had the ability to help. As the pandemic eased we were slowly able to reopen the distillery tasting room incrementally and open a second tasting room in our downtown pedestrian area that gains a lot more foot traffic. Then for a short time when the CDC essentially opened everything up without restriction to the vaccinated our business went gangbusters for about two months. That was until Delta hit in August and our revenue once again dropped by 50% and a vaccinated staff member became sick and tested positive for Covid-19. They ended up not getting very sick, but we closed all retail operations until 10-days after exposure, while the rest of the staff got PCR tested and cleaned our facilities. We were lucky overall, no more positive tests and the one positive staff member that didn’t get very sick. Nonetheless, we have all gone back to wearing masks and all staff are required to be vaccinated. We’ll just cross our fingers that business comes roaring back once the Delta variant gets in control and that no one else among the staff catches the disease.

At Vitae Spirits we offer a number of levels of education, since indeed, I have been trained to be an educator in my former life as a professor. We offer short distillery tours that last about 45 minutes that can be reserved on a calendar at our website. In these short tours we briefly visit all steps in craft spirits production within our facility. We also offer two different AirBnB Experiences through the AirBnB website. The first is a 2-hour introductory craft distilling class that explores spirits as a general category and then reviews the rum production process step by step. The second AirBnB Experience is an introductory mixology/cocktail making course that takes place in our tasting room. The coup de grace is our 2-day Intro to Distilling Workshop where we spend a full weekend going through the details of the entire distillation process from fermentation to final product evaluation, along with theory and palate development. The workshop is not intended to be a guide to starting your own distillery, but would be a good foundation for those that would like to commit to larger aspirations. Interested parties can sign up for the 2-Day Workshop from our listing in Facebook Events or from a link found in our monthly newsletter. The next 2-Day Workshop is scheduled for Sept. 18th and 19th, and another workshop will take place Jan. 15th and 16th; a great holiday gift! All of these options can be arranged for private groups, or our facilities can be rented out for private events, such as holiday parties, wedding events, or birthday parties. 

Q: I understand you have two tasting rooms and they can also be used for private events.  Please tell us more about each one!

Vitae Spirits has two tasting rooms in Charlottesville, Virginia; one at the distillery at 715 Henry Ave, and one just off the Charlottesville downtown pedestrian mall at 101 E Water St. Both locations are available for private events and offer tastings, bottle sales, cocktails, sales of hard-to-find cocktail ingredients, and Vitae Spirits merchandise such as glasses, T-shirts, handbags and caps.

Q: If people want to contact you, how may they reach you? 

The easiest way to reach us is firstly through email info@vitaespirits.com, and secondly social media messaging. 

Q: Is there anything else you would like to share with our readers?

I would like to take a moment to expand on one of Vitae Spirits guiding principles.

OUR COMMUNITY = OUR TERROIR

At Vitae Spirits we aim to redefine “terroir”. What makes our products unique isn’t solely the influence of the region’s physical environment, but also their place within a community. In one way or another each liquor made by Vitae Spirits strives to reflect a unique combination of influences from those that call central Virginia their home. For examples, take a look at our Golden Rum or Coffee Liqueur, or Damson Gin, or even our collaboration with the award winning botanical artist Lara Call Gastinger. It is all of these small contributions from a community that added together make Vitae Spirits products unique, not just the physical makeup of the ingredients, and it is through this uniqueness that patrons are drawn to visit the community; the only way to begin to grasp what makes a community special is to bathe in it and absorb it first-hand.

Margaret: Again Ian, thank you so much for this opportunity and I wish you and your entire team all the best of luck.

Cheers!

Margaret Ayala,

Publisher