Mudslide put Arlington distillery on hold — but not forever

ARLINGTON — Hank’s not always a bad dog. The 5-year-old Labrador retriever just has a mind of his own, a tendency to do things his way.

Dave and Shelly McGlothern think he’s a fitting mascot for Bad Dog Distillery, their new business.

The couple put their dream of opening a distillery on hold earlier this year to help with recovery efforts after the Oso mudslide, which claimed 43 lives and buried a neighborhood less than 20 miles from their business.

The McGlotherns live in Bryant, a small community north of Arlington, and worked with others around the Stillaguamish Valley to help in the weeks and months following the slide.

The distillery celebrates those hard-working, do-it-yourself friends and neighbors.

Dave and Shelly aim to open the distillery, at 19109 63rd Ave., by the end of the year for tours and tastings of their first liquors, including Bad Dog vodka, whiskey and Grandpa’s Likker.

A grand opening celebration is tentatively planned for spring, once more labels are approved for sale, Shelly said. The U.S. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau reviews the design and information on alcohol labels. Approved labels show that the distiller meets legal requirements to bottle and sell their recipes

Dave and Shelly McGlothern started planning their business about two years ago. They took classes to learn how to start and run a distillery. Dave also works as a full-time horseshoer — when he’s not assembling stills, making light fixtures out of scrap metal or finding local sources for the ingredients his recipes require.

The couple remodeled the distillery space using mostly recycled material, creating a counter out of pallets and an old door and buying windows that were reclaimed from other buildings during demolition or renovations. Dave built two of the three stills himself, and the other came from a friend who planned to open a distillery but never did.

The McGlotherns plan to use local ingredients as much as possible, including grain, honey, coffee and cider, as they delve into recipes for flavored liqueurs.

“We’re going all-natural, all-local,” Dave said. “Even the honey in our liquors will be local. Nothing about this is not neighborly.”

With the mudslide in mind, supporting their neighbors is as important as ever.

Before the counter, lights, stills or even walls had been put in at Bad Dog Distillery, the place was crammed with food, water and equipment gathered by the community. While Dave took rented machinery up to help search for survivors or bodies in the debris, Shelly helped her Arlington employer, Aerospace Manufacturing Technologies, gather donations and shuttle them to the slide zone. AMT stored things like water bottles, food, hard hats, shovels, picks, boots, gloves, chain saws, flashlights, duct tape and blankets on pallets in the distillery.

Shelly has photos of the room piled high with boxes and crates. Searchers in Oso relayed what was needed, and volunteers loaded their vehicles and delivered them by way of a lengthy detour while Highway 530 was buried in mud.

The McGlotherns, like many in the Stillaguamish Valley, felt the devastation keenly. Friends lost houses. Friends of friends lost loved ones.

“All of our lives stopped for two weeks solid,” Shelly said. “Doing all of this was just a healing process for us.”

After the donation drive, they spent months renovating the space for Bad Dog Distillery and making sure the stills were ready. As they get closer to opening, more people have been stopping by to learn about the business or how they can help.

“We couldn’t have done this without the friends and family,” Shelly said. “We’re the tools and we’re the drivers, but we really didn’t do this.”

Curtis Hecla, who owns the building where the McGlotherns are leasing space, is excited to see the business come together. He’s known Dave for years and used to tease him, asking him what he wanted to be when he grew up. Finally, Dave said he wanted to open a distillery. Hecla had a place available.

The distillery has two rooms — a plant where the alcohol is processed and a tasting room. The McGlotherns plan to distill vodka, gin and whiskey at first, Shelly said.

“I think the specialty will be the whiskey that comes out of Dave’s handcrafted copper still,” she said.

Kari Bray: kbray@heraldnet.com; 425-339-3439.