“When people walk in here, they’re stunned with how beautiful the place is.”
Those are the words of John Little, the co-owner and Master Distiller of Smooth Ambler Spirits, a distillery in the unincorporated community of Maxwelton, W.V.
Morton Buildings constructed their facility of more than 4,100 square feet in 2009 and also provided the facility’s expansion in 2015.
The operation became an award-winning distillery last March, receiving a pair of honors from the World Whiskies Awards. The Smooth Ambler Contradiction received a Gold Medal for bourbon in the American Whiskey category, while the Smooth Ambler Old Scout was chosen as the World's Best Single Barrel Bourbon Whiskey.
According to its website, the World Whiskies Awards are part of the prestigious World Drinks Awards programme, launched in 2007 with the World Whiskies Awards and World Beer Awards. The World Whiskies Awards select, reward and promote the best Whisky Taste and Design to consumers and trade across the globe.
Little’s building includes multiple areas that serve a variety of purposes, including retail space, office space, a production facility and a tasting room for customers. Morton’s construction model allowed the different areas to be constructed with varying ceiling heights, perfectly suiting the many different functions of the facility.
“What makes this building work … the best is the fact that we have all those varied uses in one location. That’s a complement to both our design and to the Morton Buildings team … Morton did a great job with making those spaces very different and very unique in their own way.”
The unique nature of the building has made a lasting impression on customers of the Greenbrier County business, a critical asset for Little.
“When people come in here, we want them to have an emotional connection to our brand,” Little continued. “And so when people come in here – they see the building and how wonderful it looks with the red siding and the wonderful gray roof. The building is pretty much meticulous. That’s important to someone’s initial impressions when they walk into our facility.”
The West Virginia distillery is a product of the designBUILD team at Morton Buildings. With a national reach and supported by the full resources of Morton Buildings, designBUILD has become one of the most efficient and reliable sources of custom commercial construction.
“From the time we contacted (the sales consultant) until the time the building was done, even past that time, pretty much everybody that we dealt with at Morton (was) just wonderful … you can trust them to not only do the job, but to make sure it’s 100 percent finished to your satisfaction. And for me, as a business owner, that’s the most important thing you can ask for. You know you make a relationship that somebody takes care of you.”
“We had just the best experience with Morton from the beginning to end.”
