Sunday, August 10, 2008
Food, Wine, Beer & Spirits, "Behind the Bar"

Family ties

A fifth-generation distiller carries on a tradition

By Hope S. Philbrick

Atlanta-based J. D’Anna Distilling Company is an importer, distiller and marketer of distilled spirits and liqueurs with a product portfolio that includes premium Brazilian cachaça and French XO cognac. A recent chat with CEO Scott J. Schiller revealed the company’s unique blend of tradition and innovation.

Q Cachaça is produced in Brazil and cognac in France. How did your company wind up in Atlanta?
A I’m originally from Chicago, but Atlanta is a great city to work in. It’s an entrepreneurial city and people have an open mind, so it’s a great environment in which to introduce a new company. Atlanta felt like home. I’ve always considered myself a Southern gentleman at heart, so I fit right in. The best feeling here is the sense that it’s very pro-business and friendly. The company is based here in Atlanta, but we actually physically produce the cachaça in Brazil and the cognac in France. Basically, I try to do every aspect of the industry, working at all levels from distributor to retailer, bartender to supplier.

    Maybe it’s a unique thing, but I’ve always known what I’ve wanted to do, and I’ve been very fortunate in that aspect in that at a young age I not only knew my career choice but was able to do it. It’s not work, it’s a hobby—I love doing it every day. Kind of another unique background thing is that I try and do things in a very classy, respectful manner. I’m a big person of faith and some people may see that as controversial in the alcohol business, but I take great pride in what we do and great responsibility in how we do it.

You’re the young founder of a company that was established in 1933. How does that math work?
I’m a fifth-generation distiller. My great-great-great grandparents were fruit farmers in Italy. Essentially they’d distill excess fruit to make limoncellos and different types of liqueurs. The other side of the family was tailors and actually provided clothes for the King’s Court in Naples. When these two families combined they ended up becoming distillers for the court and making liquor for the king. My great-grandpa came to the United States around 1901, and ended up in Chicago. He had a distillery and a brewery, but got out of the business during Prohibition and opened a pizza house. When Prohibition was repealed, my grandfather got into the business and became the first distiller in Chicago after Prohibition in 1933. In 1951, he created Bucket O’ Suds, a micro-distillery that made 80 different types of liquor and alcoholic beverages. This was combined with the pizza house.

I started learning about distilling when I was 15, staring with selection of ingredients and the uniqueness and beauty of each spirit category. In the early ’90s, I became old enough to drive and would sneak down to Bucket O’ Suds and learn to distill from my grandpa. In 2006, Bucket O’ Suds closed and I decided to go out and carry on the family name and heritage.

What about your cachaça and cognac?
You can’t use the same principles for distilling one as the other; you really have to respect the classification of each product. A lot of heart goes into it.

    Cachaça is made directly from sugar cane juice; rum is made from sugar cane molasses. Our Rio D is incredibly smooth and refined for the American palate. We created the first flavored cachaça in the world so we have original, lime and passion fruit-mango. Creating flavors is a blend of the extraordinary fruit supply in Brazil and my family’s distilling heritage that began with fruit liqueurs.

    You can find our cachaças at any major liquor store here in Atlanta as well as throughout the east and Midwest. Our Georgia distributor is National Distributing.
   
We’re just about to launch our Arnage XO cognac. It’s made with my grandfather’s formula.
Quality is important, and we take a lot of pride in the production process because it carries on our legacy. SP
To learn more, visit www.j-danna.com.