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Homegrown distillery is on the move in Lewisville

Uncategorized
By ADAM SCHRADER
Published in The Dallas Morning News on Sept. 17, 2015

If you’ve driven around Old Town Lewisville in recent months, you may wonder what’s happening where the abandoned Piggly Wiggly once stood at 225 S. Charles St.

It’s the start of a move city officials are excited about. The homegrown Witherspoon Distillery is expanding its operations from its previous location at 545 N. Cowan Ave.

James Kunke, a spokesman for the city, said he’s also excited to see the work being done at the new location.

“They are giving a beautiful facelift to a building that has sat vacant for many years, and they will serve as another draw for visitors to historic Old Town Lewisville,” he said. “Witherspoon is a sponsor of Western Days and we all hope they will be able to open in time for the festival, but whenever they open it will be a great addition for the area.”

The 15,300-square-feet building was constructed in 1988. It’s divided almost equally in thirds for liquor production, barrel storage and the bar and retail area — with an additional outside sitting area of 4,000 square feet.

Construction is slated for completion by the Lewisville Western Days festival, Sept. 25- 26, said Quentin D. Witherspoon, master distiller and the namesake founder.

Natasha Dehart, head of sales and marketing and a founder, said the business partners looked at multiple locations all over Lewisville.

“The city has been so supportive so we really wanted to stay here. But there were a couple other locations that just ended up not being feasible cost-wise or that things just didn’t work out,” she said. “This property presented itself just kind of out of the blue.”

Dehart said that if the distillery opens by the festival, she will consider it a soft opening with an individual grand opening “about a month after the craziness from the festival dies down.”

“The city is very supportive of us going in here,” Dehart said. “We plan to be a part of pretty much every festival that happens in Old Town Lewisville.”

The company is scaling up significantly with new, customized equipment, Witherspoon said. While the new location is only about a mile from where the distillery currently stands, it will be closer to downtown Lewisville. To commemorate the upcoming move, the distillery is selling new T-shirts.

Witherspoon, a former Marine, founded the distillery with his business partners Laurent Spamer and Ryan and Natasha Dehart in 2011. He developed a passion for distilling spirits while in Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic where he was one of five tasked with protecting American diplomats.

The Marines formed relationships with international diplomats who shared specialty beverages from across Europe with them, not anticipating the lack of refrigeration. At the time, Witherspoon was in charge of filtering drinking water from the Congo River. As the goods spoiled, Witherspoon decided to distill the wine into brandy and the beer into whiskey.

The business became licensed as a distillery in 2012 and has been pumping out whiskey and rum since. It is Witherspoon’s second attempt in the area; he tried to start a wine vineyard in Flower Mound in 1995.

In 2013, the Denton Record-Chronicle reported that founders were already working on plans for expansion, “looking at historic spaces in Lewisville to convert into a destination distillery, where the company will be able to provide tours, serve drinks and sell bottles — thanks to new legislation passed this session in the state Legislature.”

Witherspoon partnered with Glazer’s, an alcohol distribution company, and asked for its input on what customers wanted in a product instead of waiting to see if anyone would buy the final version.

“We’re throughout the state of Texas now and our expectation is that sometime in 2016, we should be able to bounce out of the state into a couple other states,” Witherspoon said. “We’re currently doing our first ever single-barrel project with Total Wine [liquor retailer] and we’re really excited about that, and we’re going to continue to experiment.”

The founders hope to experiment with brewing beer and are already looking at candidates to hire for helping with the brewing side, they said.

“Quentin’s passion has always been on the spirit side,” Natasha Dehart said. “Me and my husband have been home brewers. Our plan is to very soon acquire a brewer’s permit and start serving beer out of the bar. We’re hoping to offer our first beers later this fall.”

Distilling equipment also functions as brewing equipment. As a regular part of making whiskey, distillers essentially start making beer, adapting the process along the way. So the equipment setup can easily be modified for beer production.

“These guys are making beer all day long; it just doesn’t have hops and they end up distilling it,” Natasha Dehart said.

Right now, the company sells whiskey and rum in Goody Goody Liquor, Total Wine, Spec’s, Fossil Creek and to several independent clients in the D/FW area. The spirits are Witherspoon’s River Rum (a white rum), Bonfire (a cinnamon-infused rum), The Cross Timbers Single Malt Whiskey, and Witherspoon’s Texas Straight Bourbon and River Rum Reserve (an aged rum only sold out of the distillery).

After the expansion, Natasha Dehart said they plan to make and sell brandy, vodka and an agave spirit similar to tequila.

“Basically, we’ll be making any liquor type you’d find at a fully stocked bar only for sale in cocktails and stuff at our bar,” she said. “It will allow us to test the market and see if these are things we’d eventually want to take to a wider distribution.”

Dehart said that the Cowan distillery had about 200 visitors for tours a week, which offered quite the testing setup for what to take to the market.

“Our goal is to hold as many tours a week as we can accommodate,” she said. “We’ll probably start off with just a few days a week and then we will also have a fully stocked bar which will be open a few days a week and extend hours as demand grows.”

Witherspoon’s new location will also serve as an event venue, such as concerts, birthdays and weddings. The founders are already booking events as early as October, Dehart said.

“We actually designed this outdoor space to accommodate live acts both inside and outside,” she said. “We changed design about halfway through the process because we didn’t have any space for live acts in the original plans.”

The new location will have a shuffleboard table in the bar area, and a cornhole beanbag game setup for play outside. It may also offer a regulation-sized bocce ball court. Founders have also been in touch with multiple caterers, all within a ten-mile radius of the new location.

“Also, next to the beer garden is going to be an electrical box and paved area where we can fit two food trucks that can serve right over the fence,” Dehart said.

The old property was a lease and will be turned back over to the leaseholder. Some of the equipment won’t be put into use.

“We’re surprised by how much growth we’ve seen in the last few years,” Natasha Dehart said. “We hoped for it and planned for it, but when it actually happens, it’s exciting.”

Jenna Duncan contributed to this report.

The man behind Hat Tricks joins Lava Cantina

Uncategorized
By ADAM SCHRADER
Published in The Lewisville Texan Journal on Feb. 4, 2016

In the early 2000s, Dallas Cowboys special teams coach Joe Avezzano bought a mom-and-pop dart bar to turn into the concert venue of his dreams. Coach Joe’s Hat Tricks, a 300-person bar and restaurant, officially opened its doors Dec. 3, 2003.

Over the 12 years Tony Avezzano, his son, owned and operated the venue, Hat Tricks booked musical acts that rivaled Dallas County clubs like Bomb Factory, Trees and the Verizon Theater. Hat Tricks was featured in an article in Rolling Stone magazine, made multiple Dallas-centric “best of” lists, and won awards for its food.

Last year, Avezzano sold his obsession to local entrepreneur Jason McDermott. He said he has mixed emotions about leaving Hat Tricks behind.

“We worked really hard to establish it as a live music venue and a credible place to eat good food,” he said. “I’m proud of what we did. But I’m just as excited to move on to a new chapter and a different direction.”

Avezzano said he did everything from managing the bar and staff to bar-tending and cooking himself.

“It was a full-time, 7 days a week and 365 days a year obsession,” he said. “My mom and I even had our Thanksgiving dinner there with customers who had no other place to go.”

He was also responsible for bringing in all of the venue’s musical acts, he said.

“We consistently booked shows that were probably too big for that little place over the years and were fortunate to have artists visit us more than once,” Avezzano said. “That’s what we built our reputation on.”

Hat Tricks also made a name for itself hosting premier acts in the Red Dirt music scene including Cross Canadian Ragweed’s Cody Canada, Jason Isbell, Dean Dillion and Courtney Patton.

“We housed more than 30 high-profile musicians and garnered acclaim from local food blogs,” Avezzano said. “It just felt like we made it to our peak.”

He said even he’s surprised by the acts he was able to land at Hat Tricks.

“The artists and bands that were loyal to use make me look a lot smarter than I am,” he said. “It’s just about treating people right the first time and then treating them just as well when they came back around.”

Avezzano said that, over the years, brokers would reach out to him by email and offer to buy the place. He decided to answer an email from McDermott on a whim last fall.

“We weren’t looking to sell it, but three days later, we were already negotiating a deal,” he said. “It was time for fresh eyes, ideas and energy in Hat Tricks. I know Jason will do that.”

McDermott and Avezzano are different managers, each said, but Avezzano isn’t worried that McDermott will make “wholesale changes” that cause Hat Tricks to become unrecognizable.

“I’m anxious to see the changes he makes and how the staff and customers react to it,” Avezzano said. “They are needed and will help the business carry on for another 20 to 30 years.”

McDermott told The Lewisville Texan Journal that his operation will “keep the high standard and well-respected systems that have made Hat Tricks what is become over the years.”

Avezzano said farewell with a bang on Jan. 26, hosting Fort Worth country favorite Josh Weathers and singer-songwriter Mike Ryan from San Antonio. The show filled the club.

Coincidentally, Avezzano was offered a position at the new Lava Cantina that recently broke ground in The Colony. The 28,000-square-foot live music venue, which is expected to open in October, also brings high quality Mexican and Creole Fusion and live music.

“It’s going to be fantastic to have Lava Cantina in The Colony,” Avezzano said. “The venue caters to people north of Interstate 635 and all of us who drive 45 minutes to see shows in Dallas. It gives Denton County a spot of its own.”

The company also owns and operates Rock 101 Grill in Frisco and a Lava Cantina location in Baton Rouge. Avezzano will be responsible for booking all the concerts and events at the venue in The Colony. He will also focus on booking the larger touring bands and headliners for the other locations.

Avezzano said he’ll try to book everything from country, bluegrass and blues to rock and roll, rap and pop. Over time, it may gravitate towards specific genres as they analyze ticket sales and customer feedback.

Ian Vaughn, the owner and founding partner of Lava Cantina, said his father, Steve Vaughn, will book the local musicians and smaller acts for the other venues.

“My dad has been in the music industry for more than 50 years and is widely connected,” he said. “They will divide and conquer to a full schedule of quality entertainment.”

Lava Cantina will offer 20-25 large concerts on an outdoor stage, with a retractable roof, and an occupancy of 1,800. An indoor stage will hold smaller shows with a capacity of 500.

“The only thing that will stop shows outside will be absolute electrical [lightning] downpour or a freeze of some sort,” Avezzano said. “And food will be available all through concerts and events.”

Lava Cantina also boasts Patrick Stark of Suede and Sundown at Granada as head chef, House of Blues general manager Marc Mann, and Chris Harman, a general manager with On the Border, as front house manager. Ian Vaughn is the former COO of Cane’s Chicken Fingers.

“I’m almost more excited to work with and learn from this unbelievably experienced group than anything else,” Avezzano said. “I have my work cut out to keep up with them.”

Vaughn said he’s thrilled that Avezzano agreed to join his team.

“It’s mind boggling who he’s had play at a smaller place like Hat Tricks. He’s been a massive competitor to the entire D/FW music scene,” Vaughn said. “To take that talent and give him a venue he can spread his wings in, with the amenities he’s always wanted in an amazing location with high traffic counts, is the perfect cocktail for success.”

Staff writer Philip Moulard contributed to this report.