Inspiring Conversations with Bill Welter of Journeyman Distillery

Today we’d like to introduce you to Bill Welter

Hi Bill, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
Entrepreneurship has always been a part of my life. On my mom’s side, my grandpa, Randy Faurot, was the chief designer at Studebaker before starting his own design business. On my dad’s side, my grandpa, William Welter, ran a bunch of car dealerships in Northern Indiana. In the early ’70s, he made a bold move—leaving the car business in his 50s to buy First National Bank of Valparaiso, even though he didn’t have any experience in banking. That leap turned into a multi-generational family business when my dad, Chuck, joined him and led the bank for over 25 years. I grew up around the business and even worked in it myself before it was sold in 2007. Following in my family’s footsteps, I decided to take my own leap of faith. I had been a D1 golf player and had spent time in St. Andrews, Scotland, which is considered the home of golf, but it was there where I really grew an appreciation for great whiskey. In 2010, my wife Johanna and I opened Journeyman Distillery. We wanted to create something special while staying true to the values and work ethic I learned growing up.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
It’s been anything but smooth. The challenges have been significant and quite the saga as I look back—great recessions, pandemics, record inflationary periods, forced business closures by the government, and significant changes in consumer habits, both good and bad. I couldn’t have imagined a more challenging time to open a distillery. In 2010, we started Journeyman on the tail end of the great recession in a town that had been struggling financially. There were very few distilleries, and distilling resources were limited. We were doing something very few people had ever done before. In other words, we had to figure it out for ourselves and learn along the way. This was compounded by the fact that craft distilling had not yet developed into a recognized or viable business category. In fact, the most common question we were asked by the few customers we had during the first few years of Journeyman Distillery was, “What kind of beer do you make?” This gave us the opportunity to educate consumers, build up the craft distillery market, and grow a loyal customer base one person at a time. And we had no other choice than to do it this way. That period was a lot of hard work but also incredibly fun because the possibilities seemed endless. While we had no idea the craft distilling market would grow and eventually take off, we initially found ourselves in a stagnant category—one that would suddenly experience rapid growth. We made it through the startup phase, although I’ve continually argued that the business has felt like it’s been in a startup phase since day one. After that initial period, we faced many of the same challenges any growing business encounters, especially as we tried to bootstrap our growth through retained earnings. Resources and capital were limited, and we self-funded our expansion while maintaining the ideals of creating a multigenerational, family-owned-and-operated business. Bootstrapping for us meant wearing many hats and working long hours to make it work. The next phase of growth coincided with one of the most challenging periods in modern history. We had decided to expand and open a second location in my hometown of Valparaiso with another significant historic factory renovation. We began work on what was forecast to be a three-year, $27 million renovation that would include a distillery, brewery, restaurants, and entertainment and event spaces. During the project, the world was hit with COVID-19, which caused significant disruption at our Three Oaks facility due to multiple state-mandated closures. Our events business went from having more than 90 weddings on the books to zero. We had to rebuild the wedding business from scratch and reopen the restaurant twice—all while trying to build the second location. On top of that, restaurants across the U.S. were closed, impacting our distribution. The construction project in Valparaiso faced significant challenges. The project was a 140,000-square-foot historic renovation of a severely dilapidated building that required extensive environmental remediation. In conjunction with COVID-19, the project timeline went from three years to five. Lead times for raw materials became unreasonable—or unavailable altogether—and we faced significant price escalations due to inflation. To make matters more challenging, we managed a number of complex financial instruments to fund the project, including New Market Tax Credits, TIF financing, Historic Tax Credits, and many other funding sources. These required a tremendous amount of time, acumen, and resources to execute, all while navigating a rising interest rate environment. In the end, we got it built, but it was by far the single most challenging thing we’ve ever accomplished. It required giving everything we had over a five-year period to get where we are today. The latest challenge in our ongoing journey is the shifting environment of whiskey overproduction and declining alcohol consumption. The industry is facing increased competition from too many distilleries, as well as the rise of cannabis, weight-loss drugs, improved nonalcoholic products, and a broader cultural shift away from alcohol.

As you know, we’re big fans of Journeyman Distillery . For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about the brand?
We opened our first distillery location in Three Oaks in 2010 during a period when very few distilleries existed and even fewer in the craft segment. and took a grassroots approach to build our organization from the ground up through grit, hard work, experimentation, and determination. We take a “grain-to-glass” approach to all of our spirits, distilling everything in-house using locally sourced Midwestern grains. Since the beginning, we have also produced exclusively kosher and organic spirits. Throughout the years, we have expanded our distribution to 35 states across the United States and earned prestigious honors from the American Spirits Council of Tasters, including Whiskey of the Year in both 2022 and 2023 and Craft Distiller of the Year in 2023. We also honor the history around us. Our first location in Three Oaks is housed inside an 1800s corset and buggy whip factory, where we have worked diligently to preserve many of the original features of the space. Similarly, our Valparaiso location was built inside a renovated 1860s manufacturing facility. Family has been at the forefront of everything we do. We created a place we call ‘whiskey hospitality’ a unique intersection of distilling, event spaces, and restaurants, with the backdrop of the living stories of the historic buildings and the people that once worked here.’ Our Three Oaks location has a putting green, a full-service restaurant, event spaces and more. In 2023, we opened our second location, The American Factory, in my hometown of Valparaiso. It’s been incredibly special to return to my hometown and continue my family’s business legacy. In addition to another full-service restaurant and distillery, we also tapped into craft beer for the first time with the launch of the brewery Sea of Monsters. Giving back to our community is also important to us at Journeyman. We established Islay’s Barrel Foundation, named after our daughter, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that raises funds for children in Southwest Michigan to attend summer camps.

If you had to, what characteristic of yours would you give the most credit to?
Probably never feeling like we’ve been a success and always pushing to get there—we call this core value “always a journeyman,” or, another way to say it, “never a master.” Of our four core values at Journeyman, grit has undoubtedly been the most important in surviving these challenging periods. We define this as not giving up on long-term goals or projects but instead sustaining and pushing forward against all odds. Having known the historic boom-and-bust cycle of the whiskey industry, we shaped our business model to hedge whiskey production with restaurants, retail, and events. The general belief is that the greatest challenge to sustaining a business is capital. We’ve continued to focus on maintaining an adequate amount of capital should challenges in the industry arise, allowing us to survive declines and various obstacles.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.journeyman.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/journeyman_distillery/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/journeyman.distillery
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/journeyman-distillery/