Heaven Hill’s Bernheim Distillery Grows Really, Really Big

Heaven Hill Distillery is known to bourbon and whiskey lovers for its range of expressions, including Elijah Craig Bourbon, Larceny Bourbon, Evan Williams Bourbon, Pikesville Rye Whiskey, Rittenhouse Rye Whisky and Parker’s Heritage Collection. Some of these brands are produced at the Bernheim facility,  D.S.P. -KY 1, that was acquired by them back in 1999. A massive expansion has now been completed there, making it the largest, single site bourbon distillery currently in operation.

The Bernheim facility, according to those behind it, is the home for Evan Williams Bourbon, Larceny, Elijah Craig, and Henry McKenna, among others. The completed $25 million expansion now allows Heaven Hill to produce much more of these, with capacity now for 400,000 barrels per year.

Major components of the current expansion included four additional fermenters, another distillation set of a thumper and 66-inch beer column, a drop tub to increase number of mashes per day, a 50,000 pph boiler, a new grain handling and storage upgrade, a cooling capacity upgrade, and an operations software upgrade. Two prior expansions were completed at Bernheim since 2006, with the first bringing capacity to 200,000 barrels per year in 2007 and the second to 300,000 barrels per year in 2014.

Since 2016, Heaven Hill has opened four warehouses at the new Cox’s Creek barrel warehouse location, where each warehouse holds almost 57,000 barrels of the more than 1.3 million barrels (approximately 25% of the world’s Bourbon supply) aging across Jefferson and Nelson Counties.

“As an American-owned and operated company, Heaven Hill Distillery is proud to be on the forefront of the American Whiskey movement and embark on the latest iteration of distillery technology and innovation,” said Heaven Hill President Max L. Shapira  in a prepared statement. “The Bourbon distillation project combines the latest of distilling techniques with the ability to produce our brands using traditional methods as we have for more than 80 years.”