Tucked away on 2 acres in Northwest Jacksonville, the city’s next hard-liquor craft distillery is beginning to take shape.
Partners Tim Daniels and Dan Jones are completing the details on their 8,000-square-foot facility at 2917 Borden St. as they prepare to open Four Fathers Distillery.
Daniels is retiring from Bacardi USA Inc. at the end of the month after 24 years at the spirit maker.
With a background in chemistry, Daniels specialized in research and development and “working with fermentation and raw materials to craft a finished product.”
With his wife, Sandi, Daniels started LiquidProof LLC in 2013.
Jones is relatively new to the business, saying only that he comes from the financial world.
“Dan’s son and mine have been going to the same school since they were 3 years old, so we’ve known each other for years,” Daniels said. The boys are 14 now.
Jones said he began experimenting with brewing beer after taking an interest in what Daniels was doing with spirits.
Talk of a partnership took a more serious turn at a backyard barbecue where Daniels said Jones showed him “an entire building in his backyard full of beer equipment and beer he kegged.”
“That got us rolling on him becoming a partner in what my wife and I had already started,” said Daniels. “From then on it was full steam ahead.”
In the search for a location, Daniels said they had plenty of options to rent or buy in Jacksonville, but thought the Northwest Jacksonville property would accomplish two goals.
“For one, it’s a part of town we thought could use some attention with the establishment of a strong business,” Daniels said.
“It’s also pretty quiet out here,” Jones said. “We figured it was a perfect place to get started without a lot of attention.”
The property is north of New Kings Road near Westside Boulevard.
Daniels and his wife bought the property in May 2015 for $80,000.
He said they have invested nearly $350,000 into the facility, which needed a new roof as well as upgrades to the electrical and plumbing systems. It was built in 1963, property records show.
The group is asking the city for a grant to complete the project.
Daniels said they began running into issues when the fire marshal said they needed to install an indoor sprinkler system.
“That’s when we started reaching out to see if there was any way the city could help us out financially,” Daniels said.
Daniels said the sprinkler system requires a 6-inch water line and the site needs to be connected to the JEA sewer system.
“Right now, we’ve only got a 1-inch line coming in, and a septic system,” Daniels said. “It’s an expensive detour.”
To help solve the issues, they met with City Council members Samuel Newby and Reggie Brown.
“They immediately got on the phone with the right people and now we’re working on getting some of that work taken care of,” he said.
The group began talking with the Office of Economic Development and is seeking $86,000 to help offset the cost of those repairs.
The package includes a $25,000 Northwest Jacksonville Business Infrastructure Grant for installation of a new water line and a $61,000 loan from the Northwest Jacksonville Economic Development Fund to pay for the sprinkler system.
The request was approved by the Mayor’s Budget Review Committee on June 2 and ordinance 2017-448 was introduced to council this week.
In exchange for the grant, Four Fathers will add at least five full-time jobs.
Newby said he put the group in touch with OED after he saw their efforts. He said he was confident they could find help from the city since they were investing in Northwest Jacksonville, “an area that needs more attention from the business community.”
“If we can help, that’s what we’re here for,” Newby said. “Eventually I think this is going to be an attraction for visitors looking for local spirits.”
With a tasting room, Four Fathers can sell a limited amount of their products for off-site consumption.
Daniels said they’ll produce three craft vodka flavors and one rum recipe under the Four Fathers brand to start, but that’s only a small part of their overall strategy.
“Most of what we’ll focus on will be contract work for other brands looking to produce small batches,” Daniels said.
According to the legislative fact sheet from OED, the company plans to provide private-label production and barrel-aging.
“Sometimes these companies just want to make a limited supply of something new so they can send it out to test markets,” Daniels said. “That’s a lot better for them especially since they don’t know how the market will react.”
The facility includes a large on-site lab “where we can look at these spirts from a molecular level through a variety of instruments,” Daniels said.
From there, he said they can create what he called “target distillations” to create a benchmark for their clients.
“If I want to look at four, five, even up to six different yeast strains, or adjust different parameters, we can do it,” he said. “We believe that’s going to be unique to us.”
Educating visitors about the science of spirit-making will be part of the experience.
In addition to the lab, the facility will have tasting room, a conference room and an assembly line where the group will bottle every batch by hand.
The tasting room will include beer on tap, an electronic dart board, restrooms, prototypes of their liquor bottles and artwork for labels.
Jones said they replaced the shag carpet with concrete floors, painted the walls, and “made some other minor repairs.”
He said the project has been in the works for nearly a decade, with the two getting serious over the last few years.
“We’re both nearing retirement with our current jobs, and this is a way for us to continue to do what we love, and give our kids a business for the future,” Jones said.
“My idea of retirement will be me in the back by the still, telling our boys what to do,” Daniels said.
Between the two families, they have four sons, all eager to learn the new family business, “hence the name.”
“My son Matthew has taken a real interest in it,” said Daniels.
“I’m training him now on the process of spirit making as well as all of the aspects that come with operating a business like this,” he said.
One of their goals is to set up a business that will last for multiple generations in Jacksonville.
“They’re the future,” he said. “Those are the guys you’ll be interviewing in a few years.”