Spotlight: West Branch Distillery

West Branch Distillery:

The palette, finish and nose of great spirits

By Richard L. Gaw Staff Writer

By their very nature, entrepreneurs seek to marry their passion with opportunity and location, and when Kevin Roberts of West Branch Distillery first retro-fitted his four-year-old company into a 120-year-old abandoned warehouse on Birch Street in Kennett Square in 2020, it was an immediate and matrimonial bliss.

It’s remained like that ever since.

Following on the heels of the Kennett Creamery and the Braeloch Brewing Company, West Branch Distillery – named for a section of the Brandywine Creek where Roberts used to play as a child -- is continuing to transform Birch Street in Kennett Square from an underutilized lane into one of the borough’s prize social hotspots. On an even larger scale, its the latest installation of what has made southern Chester County one of the mid-Atlantic region’s fastest-growing destination for the handcrafted beer, wine and spirits industry.

Born and raised in nearby Embreeville, Roberts – now married with three children -- graduated from Unionville High School in 1995 and attended Penn State, where he received a degree in environmental resource management. It’s a major – and now a career -- that regularly pulls Roberts into the world of science, chemistry, engineering and biology and eventually a career as an environmentalist, where the company he is with develops natural gas solutions. Beginning a dozen years ago, Roberts began to see the explosion of the home-brewing industry, when suddenly, that which once served as a pipedream for many weekend dreamers became a reality, and basements once reserved for discarded kiddie toys were now being converted into homemade experimental stations. “All of my friends were either making their own beer or their own wine and I thought that it wasn’t challenging enough, so I started to distill,” Roberts said. “Truth is, even though I enjoyed an occasional bourbon or gin and tonic, I wasn’t much of a spirits guy. But I saw the trend happening and knew that craft spirits would follow beer and wine.” For the next ten years at his home in Pocopson Township, using some of the same skills he used at his job, Roberts began to tinker in a makeshift factory of his own, and in 2016, he Courtesy photos In addition to its pre-advertised hours of operation, began West Branch Distillery, LLC. “The fractionation is the separation West Branch Distilling is also open for special events of one thing from another, and in oil and private tastings. and gas, we separate hydrocarbons

from one another in order to get purity product to market. During the distillation process, we’re doing the same thing, but with alcohol,” he said. “We run the still to keep those products coming out by temperature, the amount of heat and cooling.

“It’s very similar to how an oil refinery works.”

Location, location, location

Roberts began conceiving the idea for what became the West Branch Distillery at about the same time the Kennett Creamery was becoming the new talk of the Kennett Square social scene back in 2016. In his mind, he saw his distillery down the block from the popular beer garden, and began to look at available spaces on Birch Street.

He found the perfect location – at the same spot where his distiller now sits – but at the time, he didn’t think it would work. The company tested and rolled out their first batches of spirits at a temporary facility on Cypress Street in the Kennett Borough, but still, Birch Street beckoned when the developer Don Robitzer purchased the property.

“Don was starting to help get Braeloch off the ground at the facility right next door, and from the time he gave me the tour, I knew that this was where we needed to be,” Roberts said.

In May 2020 – just as the COVID-19 pandemic was ramping up into overdrive -- West Branch Distillery opened on Birch Street. Although the doors to the new location were closed to the public, it gave Roberts and his team the valuable time to test and develop their bourbons, gins, rums and vodkas.

Today, the West Branch Distillery not only serves as the location for Roberts’ small-batch company, it has quickly become known for its inviting, comfortable and oversized couches, its handmade bar, its private tours, tastings, and private parties -- often in collaboration with other local partners – and the cozy vibes it sends off to those who stop by for a cocktail and conversation.

Photo by Richard L. Gaw

Embreeville native Kevin Roberts began West Branch Distilling in 2016, and moved his company into its current location on Birch Street in Kennett Square in 2020.

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100 percent local

In every handcrafted batch, Roberts uses only the finest ingredients to create West Branch’s exceptional quality of grain to glass spirits. The result is quickly becoming a formerly well-kept secret, and creating a reputation that has drawn the praise of those who judge competitions. West Branch’s handcrafted vodka has won local and national awards including a Gold Medal for Best Domestic Vodka from The Fifty Best and a Best of the Main Line 2021 Readers Choice Award for best local vodka.

Just recently, the company’s bourbon whiskey was awarded a Silver Medal in a national bourbon tasting by The Fifty Best in New York City, who complimented the bourbon for its fragrance, its palate and its finish.

Similar praise has also hit the street. In preparation for the distillery’s appearance at Summerfest on June 12 on Broad Street in Kennett Square, Roberts made more than 900 one-ounce samples for four different spirits. He distributed every sample, and some of the faces he saw that day are the same he sees enjoy the distillery on Birch Street.

“Over the past decade or so, from produce to dairy, Chester County has been experiencing a local food movement,” Roberts said. “Now, you can buy something that was grown or made or handcrafted right down the street, and beer and wine has followed suit, and we’re beginning to see handcrafted spirits join that movement.

“To me, making everything we produce by hand, sourcing nearly all of our grain from local mills and distilling everything on site follows the premise of ‘100 percent local.’

They have been the same people who have flocked to our great local breweries and wineries, and they are also the people who are becoming our customers.”

The West Branch Distillery is located at 227 Birch Street in Kennett Square. To learn more and link to its online store -- visit www.westbranchdistilling.com. For hours of operation, call 484-734-0162 or visit West Branch Distillery on Facebook.

Courtesy photos

West Branch spirits are all handcrafted at the distillery’s location on Birch Street in Kennett Square.

West Branch Distillery has earned several awards that include best domestic vodka and best local vodka.