Chehalis tribe retools distillery to make hand sanitizer for Gig Harbor company
Gig Harbor’s Heritage Distilling Co. has a deal with a distillery owned by the Chehalis Tribe to make its signature craft bourbon and vodkas.
But not right away.
Instead, Heritage Distilling Co. at Talking Cedar will produce up to 600,000 gallons of hand sanitizer a month to support the reopening of the economy.
The distillery at Rochester, in Thurston County, was originally intended to be the largest craft brewery west of the Mississippi, with an opening date set for this month. It was made possible by the 2018 repeal of an 1834 law banning distilleries on tribal land.
Under construction since 2016, the 35,000 sq. ft. facility was also to have housed a 60-barrel brewery, tap room, event spaces and restaurant featuring craft beer and spirits with upscale pub food. It would have been the nation’s first legal distillery on tribal land.
“While we still plan on opening once it is safe to do so, we recognized the massive need for hand sanitizer and did everything in our power to temporarily change course,” said David Burnett, CEO of Chehalis Tribal Enterprises, in a press release distributed by Heritage.
Crash conversion
In a crash conversion over the last six weeks, the distillery has been refitted to make hand sanitizer, in great demand because of the coronavirus pandemic.
To retrofit the equipment, six 8,300-gallon fermenting tanks in the distillery were converted into mixing tanks, and two additional 8,300-gallon tanks were modified to feed ethanol, glycerin and hydrogen peroxide into the blending tanks. The facility is capable of blending at least 30,000 gallons of finished hand sanitizer per day.
“When we set out to plan a world-class craft distillery with them several years ago, none of us expected to be using the equipment to make hand sanitizer,” said Heritage Distilling Co. CEO, Justin Stiefel wrote in a company release. “But the team’s spirit and ingenuity in re-piping the facility to make this a reality is a testament to our team’s approach to problem solving.”
The retrofit was led by Korsmo Construction of Tacoma.
Heritage switched early
Heritage Distilling Co. has been producing hand sanitizer for consumer and business use in its Gig Harbor and Eugene, Oregon, production distilleries since mid-March. The bottled sanitizer is being sold in Costco and Safeway stores and in bulk — up to 7,000-gallon tankers at a time — to institutions such as hospitals and nursing homes, as well as Heritage tasting rooms.
The Talking Cedar facility was to have been the first legal alcohol distillery on tribal land in the history of the United States, thanks to Congressional repeal of an Andrew Jackson-era statute from 1834 prohibiting distilleries in Indian Country. Congress repealed the ban in late 2018 after successful lobbying efforts by the Chehalis Tribe and HDC.
The distillery is wholly owned by the Chehalis Tribe, which has about 660 members living on its 4,438 acre reservation in southwest Thurston County. Its headquarters are in Oakville.
The tribe also owns and operates Lucky Eagle Casino, Eagles Landing Hotel, Grand Buffet, Scatter Creek Grill, Prime Rib and Steakhouse, and Sidewalk Deli in Rochester, and the Great Wolf Lodge Resort in Grand Mound. It also owns three convenience stores, a fast food restaurant, two construction companies, and a cigarette stamping business. The tribe employs 1,498 people.
Heritage Distilling Company, Inc. (HDC), opened to the public in Gig Harbor in 2012. HDC produces a range of whiskeys, vodkas, gins, aquavit and rums and operates distilleries and and has tasting rooms in six locations in Washington and Oregon.
This story was originally published May 26, 2020 at 11:01 AM.