A LETTER FROM THE EDITOR: Legacy. When you are dealing with products that demand years of time and patience before coming to fruition, the topic of legacy feels obvious. Yet, sometimes it takes something more personal, like the loss of a friend, to really contemplate the issue. Professionally, it has been an incredibly successful year, but personally speaking, well, people just need to stop dying. The loss of childhood heroes (dammit Stan Lee), suicide, and the death of close friends touched us all in some way this year. The most recent being master distiller and industry consultant Dave Pickerell. Dave could be contentious, and not without controversy, but the man nailed legacy. Few other individuals have taken part in so many distilling operations and his mark will be felt for generations to come. However, we don’t need a resume as long as Dave’s to start thinking about our impact on the industry and what we will leave behind.
When it comes to legacy, not everyone can establish a fivegeneration trust to protect their company and family history. But that doesn’t mean we can’t leave a lasting mark. Transparency, honesty, quality products, charity, local initiates, employee benefits, the list goes on. We can all do a little something to help cement our own, and our industry’s, positive legacy. Perhaps most importantly we can continue to share and educate. We are six years into this adventure of creating a trade publication, and I will never stop being amazed at the sense of comradery and family within the distilling community. Cherish those opportunities to teach a little something when a new distiller walks in your door with an endless font of questions, or when you get a chance to sit down with a distilling legend at dinner and learn just a bit of what makes them great. Those are the moments that make our community stand out, and can create a lasting legacy for us all.
Brian Christensen (509) 944-5919 /// brian@artisanspiritmag.com /// PO Box 31494, Spokane, WA 99223
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