You know how it is. You’re chatting one sunny August afternoon and you decide to found a distillery. That’s pretty much what happened to Michael and Jenny Griffo in 2008. The husband and wife were tired of long international work trips and hours spent in a lab. Michael wanted to be able to utilize his PhD in physics, Jenny wanted to finally work locally and develop a business that was a part of the community. Then Jenny came to a realisation:
"A distillery. It's a distillery," Jenny said.
But it’s not that simple to found a distillery, we’d all have one if it was. It took five years of penny-pinching, business plan writing, distilling in their home and interning at distilleries before they were able to get a small business loan and create Griffo Distillery. What followed was another two years of full-time construction, recipe testing and brand development until the doors finally opened in Petaluma, California in April 2015.
The family-run operation places on emphasis on California-grown ingredients in order to distil small-batch spirits that “showcase the beauty and bounty of Sonoma County”, as well as a meticulous production process. We’re talking formal analysis and custom still controls of their own design. Speaking of which, the custom-designed, 250-gallon copper pot still, Betty, was handcrafted by fourth-generation craftsmen in Kentucky, Vendome Copper and Brass Works.
Griffo Distillery also offers services for custom distillation projects of all sizes, assisting with fermentation, maceration and infusions, professional bottling, recipe development, bonded barrel storage and supplying spirits for blending.