Early times

A man, pooch and hooch at young Palisade distillery

By Paul Shockley
December 19, 2006

    Hoover’s hound-dog bellow says customers are here.

    It’s noon, 31-year-old Rory Donovan has opened up shop Saturday at Peach Street Distillers’ Palisade tasting room, and a woman wants to buy six bottles of top-shelf vodka.

    Hoover bellows again.

    Sniffs a reporter’s camera bag.

    Belches one last long wail.

    Then like any fine distiller’s dog, he finds peace curled up on the floor where rays of sun have peaked through a window. Hoover and his owner take rest when they can get it these days.

    “I live in my truck, basically,” Donovan smiled. “And Hoover’s my co-pilot.”

    Donovan, co-founder of Peach Street Distillers, is living the life of a young entrepreneur whose fledgling but growing business doesn’t yet “have huge pockets to buy the back page of Rolling Stone.”

    Over the past year since Peach Street opened its tasting room at 144 S. Kluge, Donovan says he’s put 54,000 miles on his truck and the work week rarely dips below 70 hours. He’s on the road, wheeling and dealing at special promotions with liquor stores, restaurant owners, bars across Colorado and trying to keep the distillery’s word-of-mouth buzz buzzing.

    “It’s an easy sale really ... Palisade, peaches we talk about that and everybody’s familiar with the area,” Donovan said. “There’s just so many different vodkas on the shelf, you absolutely have to get the word out and pound the pavement.”

    That’s already paid off big time locally. At many Grand Valley liquor stores, Peach Street’s premium vodkas are found next to the likes of Poland’s world-renowned Belvedere and top-shelfers who routinely buy the back page of Rolling Stone.

‘A penchant for hooch’

    Not bad for “three good friends with a penchant for hooch ... ,” as Peach Street’s ownership is described online.

    Donovan says brewing/distilling wasn’t on his mind in 1991 when he moved to Durango from New Hampshire — he was 16. It was there he met Dave Thibodeau and Bill Graham, who’d eventually launch Durango’s Ska Brewery. Distillery dreams started out as small talk, he said.

    They talked about Donovan’s father, who ran a small distillery back in New Hampshire.

    “I figured if those guys could do it, it wasn’t rocket science,” he laughed.

    Donovan and Thibodeau yanked plans for their first still from the Internet. A lot of learning, and mountains of permits from various governmental bodies, later — Peach Street was taking shape around 2001. Distiller Davey Lindig was brought on board.

    “Our product license took well over a year, and by that time, we were operating well into our second year,” Donovan said.

    Peach Street’s flagship product is its “Goat’ brand vodkas and brandies — some five fruit-brand vodkas are made using wares from Palisade growers.

    “It’s the fastest growing market plus it doesn’t require aging (as opposed to bourbon),” Donovan explained why they launched with vodkas.

    While they’ve started making gin, Donovan says they don’t expect to start bottling it until February.

    “Bourbon’s a couple years out for us,” he said.

    Reach Paul Shockley at pshockley@gjfreepress.com