#73 Bringing Bourbon Back to Bourbon County: Jeremy Buchanan of Hartfield & Co.

Send us Fan Mail This week Aram and Yemi sit down with Jeremy Buchanan of Hartfield & Co., the Paris, Kentucky distillery that brought bourbon-making back to Bourbon County for the first time since Prohibition. Jeremy opens with a history lesson you won’t get from a Google search 🥃. Bourbon County predates Kentucky itself, its whiskey traveled out along the river and the frontier highway until “whiskey from Bourbon County” became simply *bourbon*, and when Prohibition hit, the county’s 26 distilleries closed and never came back. Decades later, Jeremy grew up in the county without anyone mentioning that connection, until he and his brother Andrew decided to bring it back. Then, after a cease-and-desist forced a name change, an aunt’s genealogy research turned up a surprise: their ancestors Isaac and Leopold Hartfield had run their own Kentucky distillery in 1865. From there it’s a candid look at building a tiny distillery in a giant’s industry. Jeremy says Hartfield was “chronically underfunded” at the start and paid the bills by selling T-shirts and clear spirits while the first bourbon aged. He explains the pre-Prohibition style they pioneered: a high-malt mash bill, a single pass through a batch still, and six-gallon barrels, an idea that came from a staircase too narrow for anything bigger. The result matures in 18 to 24 months. He also takes on the age-statement crowd and the “hazmat” proof craze, and points out the scale gap: Hartfield fills roughly one barrel a day, while some of the big houses fill 10,000 🛢️. Then the bust. Jeremy gives a clear-eyed read on the downturn: the COVID drinking surge, the overbuilt contract distilleries, a generation that never started drinking, and tariffs that shut Hartfield out of Canada and raised the price of its French glass and Portuguese cork. There’s an upside, though. Investors are dumping barrels, and Hartfield is buying them up at prices he calls unheard of in a hundred years. He breaks down Kentucky’s barrel tax, explains why tours and tastings bring in about a quarter of revenue at the best margins, and shares plans for a satellite tasting room in 2027. His answer to what the little guy has going for him is short: “Staying nimble.” 🥃 **Come tour Hartfield & Co. with us!** The Coffee, Chaos, & Cashflow crew is heading to Hartfield & Co. in Paris on **Saturday, November 7 at 3 p.m.** Grab a spot and join us: https://www.hartfieldandcompany.com/hartfield-tours#id=hartfield-tour **In this episode:** - How Bourbon County gave bourbon its name, and why it went 95 years without a distillery - Discovering the family’s 1865 Hartfield distillery after a cease-and-desist - Why starting a distillery is a cash-intensive grind, not a get-rich-quick scheme - The pre-Prohibition style: high malt, a single pass, and six-gallon barrels - Age statements, the “hazmat” proof craze, and selling a two-year bourbon - Distilling beyond bourbon: rum, agave, and the joy of the craft - The bourbon bust: COVID’s hangover, overbuilding, and tariffs - Why collapsing barrel prices are an opportunity for a nimble buyer - Kentucky’s barrel tax and how it hits a small distiller - Tours as a profit center, and a satellite tasting room coming in 2027 - Hyper-premiumization and the launch of the Hartfield Family Reserve line **Find Hartfield & Co.:** - Website: hartfieldandcompany.com - Tours & tastings: https://www.hartfieldandcompany.com/hartfield-tours#id=hartfield-tour - Downtown Paris, KY, about 20 minutes from Lexington via Paris Pike (Jeremy says it’s the best drive in the area) **Keywords:** bourbon, Kentucky bourbon, craft distillery, Bourbon County, Paris Kentucky, Hartfield & Co., pre-Prohibition bourbon, small barrel aging, Bourbon Trail, bourbon tariffs, barrel tax, distillery tours, family business, entrepreneurship, small business, Kentucky history, Lexington Kentucky **#Bourbon #KentuckyBourbon #CraftDistillery #BourbonCounty #HartfieldAndCo #BourbonTrail #PreProhibition #ParisKY #SmallBusiness #FamilyBusiness #Entrepreneurship #CoffeeChaosAndCashflow #Podcast #OneHundredPercent** Support the show