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Distilling with Spirit


((PKG)) COVID DISTILLERY DISINFECTANTS
((Banner: Distillers Change Course))
((Reporter: Ozlem Tinaz))
((Camera: Celal Cevirgen))
((Adapted by: Philip Alexiou))
((Map: Falls Church, Virginia))
((Main characters: 1 male))
((Sub characters: 1 female; 1 male))
((Popup Banner: During the COVID-19 pandemic, an
alcohol distillery lends a hand))
((NATS:
Michael Paluzzi, Founder, Falls Church Distillery
Whoop. We’re still pumping.
Kallie Stavros, Employee, Falls Church Distillery
Oh yeah. We were still filling this.
Michael Paluzzi, Founder, Falls Church Distillery
Okay. All right.))
((Michael Paluzzi, Founder, Falls Church Distillery))
We still produce our whiskeys and our vodkas and our
gins. We still have our alcohol or our spirits that we produce
but we’ve obviously pivoted. We’ve pivoted into making
sanitization. It's the same type of process. We're using the
same whiskeys, our base spirits that we would use to make a
lot of our other products.
((NATS))
((Michael Paluzzi, Founder, Falls Church Distillery))
Our plan was only to do this for today and help people out
like nursing homes and hospitals and first responders and
the elderly, you know, the hard targets of this whole nasty
thing. It’s blown up into being much more than that. It’s
blown up to be a business. I mean, I don’t know. We’ll see
how long it lasts, how long the need lasts.
((NATS))
((Michael Paluzzi, Founder, Falls Church Distillery))
When the governor issued their new regulations, it’s
maximum 10 patrons at a time. It is impossible for a
restaurant to staff the restaurant and a bar and make any
money that way. So, that effectively put us out of business at
the bar/restaurant. Luckily, we had the second business here
that we’re springing off of, which is the distillery. What we,
I’ve been able to do is re-employ all of those bar
personnel. So, all the kitchen and all the bar people will be
filling jugs and working full time. So, that’s another good side
benefit, right? That everybody gets a job still because all
those people I had to lay off last Sunday, on Tuesday I got to
rehire.
((NATS))
((Kallie Stavros, Employee, Falls Church Distillery))
It’s nice to be able to do something that is helping people.
Obviously, it’s really hard to find. I went on Amazon just to
look at what was available on Amazon and it looks like
people are ripping everyone off. So, it's nice to just kind of
help the local community and still have a job actually. I feel
really lucky right now.
((NATS))
((Michael Paluzzi, Founder, Falls Church Distillery))
Prices right now is important to us. I mean, that was a very,
very important thing to us, to not gouge, right? I mean,
because that’s what you're seeing now. You’re seeing
people buy up, whether it’s toilet paper or hand sanitizer and
then trying to charge exorbitant prices for that. That is part of
what we were battling here, plus the need and plus the
reasonableness of fulfilling that need.
((NATS))
((Matthew Quinn, Customer, Falls Church Distillery))
I have a company down the street and all of our, everything we’ve
used, is out. All of our containers are half-full and we’ve got to try
to fill them back up.
((NATS))
((Michael Paluzzi, Founder, Falls Church Distillery))
We're producing about 300 [1135 liters] gallons of sanitizer right
now. We could easily do that every day if we could get the
supplies, but we believe that we are on a plan to, at least, produce
another thousand gallons [3785 liters] next week and hopefully
continue to try to double that.
((Matthew Quinn, Customer, Falls Church Distillery))
I think all of us are trying to do what we can. I think seeing small
businesses step up and provide this type of service is fantastic.
((NATS))
((Popup Banner: In the days following filming, the distillery took
more stringent health safety measures both within the workforce
and with customers.))

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