There's a bit of a renaissance going on in the world of libations, and we're loving it. What is most striking is the pure art that goes into bottling up the good stuff. When we came across a Chicago based distillery - the first since the mid-1800s - serving up organic liquor from scratch, we were intrigued. When we saw the beautifully designed packaging, we took a second look. And when we heard owners, Sonat and Robert, tell their story of leaving the comforts of tenure in D.C. to hunker down in a distillery, well, let's just say they had our full attention.
We visited KOVAL distillery to talk to Robert and Sonat Birnecker about being
Daring Creatives.
When and why did you decide to pursue your current career path?
In 2008, we were living in Washington, D.C. and working stable, comfortable jobs--I was a tenured professor, and Robert was the Deputy Press Secretary for the Austrian Embassy. We were at the point where we could continue our careers and buy a house, or we could move to the city we loved, live close to family, and start a business together. Needless to say, we packed up, moved to Chicago, and used the money we saved for a down payment on a house, to a buy a pot still instead.
Why did you choose Chicago as the headquarters for Koval?
Chicago is to me like Kansas is for Dorothy. I grew up in the city and knew that I always wanted to return to it eventually. When it came down to starting both a business and a family (which happened almost simultaneously for us), Chicago was the perfect place.
We really wanted our brand to be reflective of the city of Chicago’s rich history and representative of the city itself, which meant acquiring a production facility within the city limits—which was actually the first to manufacture distilled spirits since the mid-1800s.
What is your favorite thing about your distillery? For example, a special spot, an employee, a tool, etc.
What is not to love about something one builds from scratch with all one’s heart and soul? However, what stands out is how our distillery brought our family closer together: it created a way for us to work together, bring in the talents of our family toward a specific goal, while growing to include others who share our vision and goal, who have become a part of our KOVAL family. Having a business is am amazing opportunity on so many levels: we are able to support different charitable organizations, as well as provide for our own livelihood and that of those who work for us; all while doing something quite fun and rewarding.
How does the element of creativity influence your business?
Our creative process revolves around late-night conversations after the kids are asleep, a time when we are really able to focus on our plans and ideas. We then divide tasks: Robert follows up with everything production-related, as well as consulting, while I deal with the branding, marketing, sales, and distribution.
In the last few years, we’ve really started focusing on design, ensuring that our branding is representative of the spirits themselves. Luckily, we’re able to keep this part of the operation in the family as well: all of our packaging is designed by my sister, Oona Hart, of the design studio, Dando Projects.
We’re lucky to have a lot of family experience behind us. Robert comes from three generations of distillers. We know a lot about what works and what doesn’t with regard to distilling and mashing. And we’re also clear on our style with regard to the products we want to create. We consistently go for a clean, bright, grain-forward whiskey; we achieve this kind of clean spirit across the board, with gin or liqueurs as well. That’s part of our signature style and whatever we want to create has to be within that framework.
What difficulties did you face in the beginning of your career?
It’s tough to acquire the right facility for this kind of operation, especially in the city. Since I grew up in Chicago, I knew it would help to get local politicians on our side. I wrote to a number of aldermen, and Gene Schulter, the Alderman of the 47th Ward at the time we were founded, helped connect us to a landlord who happened to have the perfect space for our distillery – he also supported all of our efforts to change the laws to make our operation more successful. We were very lucky to have found a great neighborhood, with a supportive Alderman, and it was the right amount of space (at least in the beginning).
Are there any rules/habits/rituals that you have created to help you do your job more efficiently?
Robert and I both recently began a love affair with coffee. I do not know how we functioned before…
Fantasy dinner featuring 3 guests dead or alive, go! What is on the menu?
I had to answer this question once before, and I still feel the same:
My great grandfather Manik Loewenherz, who earned the soubriquet “Koval” (it means blacksmith, but in this case, it means the Yiddish slang, black sheep, as in black sheep in the family) after leaving beloved Vienna to start a business in Chicago in the early 1920s. Aside from the namesake connection to our company, he helped so many people in my family, as well as numerous unrelated children escape Vienna and certain death at the hands of the Nazis. He was, according to my great uncle Siegmund, “a rare kind of a gentleman, one who would without question take off his hat to greet someone passing by during an extraordinary blizzard.” Much of my academic work concerned Vienna from the turn of the century until 1938 and I would love to be able to speak with Manik about his experiences.
My aunt Susan Loewenherz: a sculptress, bon vivant, cosmopolitan ex-pat Italian from Winnetka, the life of the party, until she succumbed to complications of breast cancer in 2007; because I miss her dearly and she would have gotten a lot of pleasure out of me leaving academia to make whiskey and be a mom.
My great grandmother, Ida Ganzoff, who left Pinsk for America - all alone - at the age of 14 after going on a hunger strike to convince her parents to let her go. She worked day and night as a seamstress to put three children through college and graduate school, while taking care of a sick husband. She was wise and intuitive, she had sechel [smarts], an early advocate of organic food, and natural farming methods, and the strongest woman I have ever been lucky enough to meet. When asked in her mid-90s what she would have changed if she could, she stated, without missing a beat, “it would have been nice to own a factory.”
Finish this sentence:
The Koval theme song is: I think that everyone has their own…I cannot help but say that mine is “Whip It” because it was playing on the radio at the distillery when we started to package our first order ever.
Our biggest achievement to date is: This would be sticking to our values of creating amazing organic spirits from scratch. There are a lot of tricks in the industry and many brands just buy in product and package it. I am proud that we have done everything ourselves from start to finish, and helped to develop a new style of American whiskey, using the “heart cut” of the distillate.
We couldn’t live without our: Drive to learn, industrious dispositions, and of course, sense of humor.
For more on KOVAL Distillery and to get your hands on their spirits, head over to their website.
Photos courtesy of Koval Distillery.