“This was going to be my retirement project, but it’s gotten out of hand,” David said.
“Now there’s no more retirement, but we really enjoy it.”
During the pandemic, the distillery was forced to diversify, and now that diversity is one of its core strengths.
“We’re really proud of the business, especially when we didn’t even reach our first birthday before COVID hit,” David said.
Originally making eight types of gin—including a Navy-strength variety and stunning purple Butterfly Pea and Passionfruit variety—the Echuca Distillery has released a locally made hand sanitiser to assist with shortages local first responders experienced.
“COVID brought lots of new challenges for us, and made us look at the whole business,” David said.
“We made hand sanitiser for the local ambos and fireys at no charge to them, because we just wanted to contribute.
“We bought 5000 litres of old wine from St Anne’s to make the hand sanitiser.”
Echuca Distillery has also expanded to different types of liquor, with a range of vodkas featuring Australian native botanicals, and even into agave spirits.
Agave spirits have the same components as tequila, with the caveat that all spirits called ‘tequila’ must be made in Mexico—like ‘champagne’ for French product and ‘sparkling wine’ for everyone else.
Echuca Distillery produces three types of agave: Gold, Silver and Bronze.
Tequila and agave spirit aficionados may be familiar with gold and silver varieties, but Echuca Distillery’s bronze is a special concoction that is unique to this powerhouse local producer.
The bronze variety is unaged, much like the silver variety, but is infused with native botanicals wattleseed, pepperberry and saltbush, producing an unmatched and unique depth of flavour.
The distillery has also expanded its customer base, capitalising on the online shopping surge during the pandemic.
Gin, vodka and agave ‘flights’ were available for purchase online to reflect their in-house menu of spirit ‘flights’, which includes three smaller bottles of liquor and a tonic water or light soda specifically designed pairing.
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