Innovation has been a hallmark of Jefferson’s Bourbon from its very beginning. When Trey Zoeller and his father founded the brand 23 years ago, they were focused on understanding how far they could push the boundaries of bourbon. Zoeller first experimented with blending finished bourbons he bought from other distillers. “Nobody was blending bourbon at the time,” he says. “That was kind of the first realm of taking it outside of the traditional ways of maturing and bottling bourbon.” It wasn’t until a decade or so later, while sharing a drink with a friend aboard an Ocearch shark tagging research vessel, […]
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Since people first started making bourbon, arguably the easiest part of the whole production process has been selecting the type of barrel used for aging the whiskey. As decreed by the United States Congress in 1954, bourbon must be aged in a new, charred American oak container. Most distillers opt for the standard 53-gallon American white oak barrel, add their spirit to it and, after a few years, bottle the whiskey. However, as Jefferson’s Bourbon founder Trey Zoeller discovered not long after launching the brand with his father in 1997, sticking only to this traditional aging method doesn’t allow for much […]
When Trey Zoeller founded Jefferson’s Bourbon with his father in 1997, he knew it was time to try something new. There were only eight bourbon distilleries operating in Kentucky at the time—10 total in the U.S.—and the industry was looking for a way to pull itself out of a nearly 30-year decline. To Zoeller, the way forward wasn’t found in the spirit’s history but in its future. “I like to say that we push the boundaries of what bourbon is without bastardizing it,” says Zoeller, whose 8th generation grandmother was a moonshiner. “When you find something that’s really remarkable and different, […]