Chris Fletcher On Inside Jack Daniel’s
Chris Fletcher, Master Distiller at Jack Daniels, joins Signature Required for a fascinating and deeply personal conversation about legacy, tradition, and what it really takes to make the world's best-selling American whiskey from the smallest town you've never thought twice about.
Jack Daniels is not just a whiskey brand. Operating from Lynchburg, Tennessee, a dry county with a population of under 7,000, the distillery takes a full craft approach to every bottle it produces, sourcing its water from a cave spring, charcoal mellowing every drop through the Lincoln County Process, and aging over 3 million barrels within a six-mile radius of the same ground where Jack Daniel himself built the operation over 150 years ago.
About Chris Fletcher
Chris shares how growing up watching his grandfather Frank Bobo work as Master Distiller at Jack Daniels created an unlikely but perfectly inevitable path to sitting in that same office today. He walks through what makes Tennessee whiskey distinct from bourbon, why the Lincoln County Process is both the most debated and most defining step in their production, and why the Old Number Seven label carries a mystery that even the company itself cannot fully explain.
Legacy, Tradition and Doing Things Right
Chris reflects on what it means to carry a family legacy at global scale, how he approaches innovation without compromising the tradition that built the brand, and why Lynchburg and Moore County remain the irreplaceable heart of everything Jack Daniels is. He talks about the community of families who have worked at the distillery for generations, the unique relationship between a dry county and the world's most recognized whiskey, and why being associated with Tennessee means everything to him.
Since this episode was recorded, Chris has continued to make history in Lynchburg. At Whisky Magazine's 2026 Icons of Whisky and World Whiskies Awards America, Chris was named Master Distiller and Master Blender of the Year, recognized for both the consistency of Jack Daniels production and a rapid period of innovation that has produced some of the most celebrated releases in the brand's history.
Resources
Nashville Scene: Jack Daniels 14 Year Old Whiskey Wins World's Best Tennessee Whiskey
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Spencer: [00:00:00] Welcome to Signature Required. It is intended for Tennesseans by Tennessean.
Chris Fletcher, vice President, master Distiller, and Director of Distillery operations for Jack Daniels Distillery. Welcome to Signature Required.
Chris: Thank you. I appreciate it. Well, welcome to Lynchburg. Welcome to Jack Daniels.
Spencer: That's a long title. Like could you not decide between Master Distiller and director of Distillery?
Like you do a lot of things here?
Chris: Yeah, nobody asked me really. I think it's just whatever HR comes up with, that's what they throw on the business card. But yeah, master Distillery is the one that probably gets the most attention, I'd say.
Spencer: So most people that are listening don't have the visual aid of seeing where we're seated right now.
So for those that are just listening, tell them where we are.
Chris: Well, we're here in the Bethel House right at the entrance of the Jack Daniel Distillery here in Lynchburg, Tennessee. Every drop of Jack Daniels in the, those all over the world is made right over our shoulder here, about three buildings down.
Then we have a second smaller distillery on the other side of the hill back there. But every [00:01:00] drop of Jack Daniels is sourced right here in Lynchburg, here in Moore County. Second smallest county in the state, by the way. Fun facts. It's pretty remarkable that we're able to supply the world out of this little town in Tennessee.
Spencer: It's amazing the history. That Jack Daniels has, and also just the level of international presence. Like Carli and I have taken a couple trips where we tell people that we're from Tennessee and. It's usually one of a couple things. What do they get?
Carli: It's either Jack Daniels or Dolly Parton.
Yeah. Anywhere you go. It seems like they're like, oh, you're from Tennessee. Do you drink whiskey and sing Dolly Parton songs? I was like, yes, I do both actually. But yeah, you're synonymous with what it means to be a Tennessean around the world. It's fascinating. Yeah.
Chris: Well, I think if you can be associated with Dolly you're doing something right.
That's for sure.
Spencer: Chris, before we get into. Jack Daniels, I wanna make sure that we get to learn about you some. So your family has a legacy here and you've got a lot of responsibility being only the eight. Distiller since this place has opened. Right?
Chris: Yeah. Master [00:02:00] distiller is actually more of a recent term.
So my grandfather was a, what we would say now, master distiller, but when he worked here, nobody called him a master distiller. That title didn't even exist. It's I think it's a little more of a romantic title of about the person that's in charge of making the whiskey, but
Spencer: maybe nobody was as good at it as you are.
Chris: Well, I don't know about that. No, I would, let's
Carli: lean into it. The
Chris: romance of it. My granddad will always be the vision of a distiller, to me. So a distiller is the person, in charge of distilling the whiskey and that title now across our industry with, distilleries all over the country.
And I think it means probably a little bit something different in every distillery. But here traditionally, what we would say now is a master distillery was the person in charge of, the distillery operations, right. The making of the whiskey. Once the whiskey gets into the barrel, there's nothing we can do to it anyway.
So that's another department. We have our warehousing team and people that are in charge of kind of the aging barrels and stuff. Not that I'm uninvolved with that. There are certainly times where I'm very involved, but by and large, as a [00:03:00] distiller, it's about getting the spirit that goes into the barrel.
Correct. So the whiskey is still clear at that point. There's no color. There is flavor, but the barrel is also gonna pro provide a lot of that flavor in the finished product as well. It depends on, how each individual distillery, I guess actually defines master distiller now.
Carli: I happen to be a pretty big whiskey fan, but for those that are listening or watching that don't drink a lot of whiskey, what makes whiskey special compared to other spirits like a rum or a vodka? What is the mash that you are overseeing that creates this Sure. Elixir?
Chris: Yeah, great question. Whiskey's a global spirit.
It could be made anywhere in the world. Just has to be made from cereal grain. And then is exposed to oak or a barrel, right? And so when you come into, American whiskeys, most of the time they're corn based. And our Tennessee whiskey which is very closely associated with bourbon whiskey is a corn based whiskey.
So American Bourbon whiskey and American Tennessee whiskey have to be a minimum 51% corn. They can't be [00:04:00] distilled over 80% strength. Have to be aged in a brand new charred oak container every time you can never reuse a barrel. So a lot of those quick and dirty regulations vary from country to country.
Certainly would be different in Canada, making Canadian whiskey and certainly in over in Scotland or Ireland. The European style whiskeys would be more typically barley based whiskeys. And so it really depends on geography. What grains you use and then the kind of the process details, what kind of barrel?
Is it a new barrel? Is it a used barrel? Some distillers, especially over in Europe, are using, wine barrels and stuff coming from Europe. So it all depends on what you wanna do to manipulate that process, to create the finished product flavor that you want. And yeah, I think whiskey's the, as you can probably tell it's my favorite spirit in the world.
Carli: It's by far the best.
Spencer: When you are thinking about your responsibilities, the things that you do, what are the top three to five things that you do with this brand?
Chris: Oh, wow. Top three or five things with this brand. It's different every day, [00:05:00] really. The most important thing you know are, the production team in the distillery.
It's my team and we've got a great group of people. It's a 24 7 operation. Basically we will shut down typically for about, four to, to six weeks a year and do a kind of a distillery shutdown, cleaning capital projects, maintenance and things like that. But other than that, day in and day out, we're taking just roughly very rough number for you.
A little over a million pounds of grain a day. And can make, close to 2000 barrels of whiskey a day out of that. And so you know that in every 24 hour cycle it is a big distillery. I would say probably, right underneath that though are one b in, in the top three is the process behind it and how traditional it is.
How we are turning those grains into liquid whiskey. I think it's our biggest advantage in what we do. Our distillery is super traditional. And how that operation still works. We don't cut any corners. I think we uphold the most traditional distillery process in the industry, and I'm very proud of that.
Being able to say, we make whiskey the same way [00:06:00] my grandfather did. That's one of the most important things to me.
Carli: I actually wanted to ask about that because there's been so much innovation in spirits, in wine, and all in this whole industry, right? How do you balance this idea of.
Staying true to what it means to be Jack Daniels. Right. A name known all over the world. At the same time, there are modern techniques, there's new equipment coming in. Like how do you balance that tug to be modern yet stay true?
Chris: Yeah. It's, on, on one side of the thing, if you, if we can leverage technology to help us.
With consistency and help us maintain that, that old traditional process, we will. So if you can automate a valve or a temperature probe and things to know that we can hit a process at exactly, to the 10th of a degree where we want, in my grandfather's day in 1957. They're just looking at an analog dial, just hoping that they're close.
Right. And so in some ways, it's such an advantage. My, my granddad, when he was still living would say, I only [00:07:00] wish we had. The tools that you have now to control the consistency and making it all the same. And then, how do we look at innovation, which is one of the most fun part of my jobs, is the innovation and doing the different things and the new things.
It's really a lot of it is inspired by our past and we've got a history of doing a lot of different things here. Age stated whiskeys that hadn't been done since Jack Daniel was still alive, which has been what, the most fun projects I've ever worked on in my career. But we've done, we've made corn whiskey here, we've made brandies here.
We've done so many different things other than just that classic old number seven, which we all love, right? And we're not, we're gonna, that is still our laser focus, but there's all this wealth of history and diversity and what we've offered over a hundred and almost 60 years now that, that's a lot to draw on.
Spencer: While we're talking about some of the history, the number seven is a big feature in the brand, the logo, and. I don't know that I have the answer or the story behind what is in that. I can tell you a little bit of the Hines 57. I think there's some [00:08:00] good stories on like sometimes when the number's in the name, like there's something behind it.
So what's the story behind it?
Chris: Yeah. There's a lot of different stories behind that one. I, probably the best one I could give would be my grandfather's story. And I mentioned my granddad. He started working here on January 2nd, 1957. He was hired by the Motlow family, which was Jack's family that he had kinda left the distillery to.
And it was actually one of Jack's, great nephews that hired my granddad. And his story was that the family told him Jack was shipping a barrel of whiskey. And that sort of makes sense because we know Jack was very reluctant to use bottles. Of course in his beginning days, glass bottles were not the easiest thing to get, so everybody got a barrel and he thought, glass bottles were, not necessary, not needed.
If you wanted some of his whiskey, you'd get a whole barrel of his whiskey. So long story short, he was shipping a barrel to a bar out in the western part of the US, or a saloon or something. And so it went to Nashville to be put on a train. It went to St. Louis where it had to transfer to the number seven train and the barrel was [00:09:00] misplaced.
So Jack had to end up sending a second barrel again from Nashville to St. Louis to catch the number seven train to go west to like Oklahoma, Texas, somewhere like that. And the railroad workers found the old barrel, and now they've got the new barrel. And of course it's, they're both marked with a seven to put them on the seven train.
And they just said, well, this was the old one and this was the new one. And a few months passed and the person that owned the bar, I guess the bartender, wrote a letter back to Jack and said, Hey, I want to buy a third barrel of your whiskey now. But from now on, I only want old number seven becuase it's better than new.
Number seven. And so Jack decided to make it all old number seven, if that was so good. So that was the story that Papa would say and he, he said that was from the family. But, people will laugh and say, Jack had seven girlfriends. Some people say becuase we know he never married.
He died a bachelor. But even some people will say, well, he was in the number seven tax district when he started the distillery, and I think that's boring to name it after your tax district, but I don't know. So whichever one you like best, you can just pick and choose that one.
Carli: The girlfriends and the [00:10:00] trains are much more entertaining than a tax bracket or district, so for sure we'll take that.
Spencer: You dropped in a little earlier that we're in one of the smallest of Tennessee's 95 counties, and you all create a lot of jobs here. So talk a little bit about some of the business and some of the impact upon the community.
And also I think it's a dry community, is that right? It
Chris: is, yeah.
Spencer: Okay. So give us some of the story there.
Chris: Yep. So we've only since prohibition of course, have we been dry. J Jack actually operated two saloons when he was alive he had the White rabbit and the red dog saloon. He would hold big parties in town.
He would hire bands to come and play live. He was, famous, music lover, had a big ballroom in his home with a grand piano and supplied musicians with instruments. But once prohibition hit, and then of course subsequently we came out of prohibition. Way back in the 1930s, Moore County remained dry.
So there's no spirit sales or wine sales. You can get beer. And I, I don't know any state law and all, how all that works. I don't know. I don't pretend to know that. But you can buy beer [00:11:00] in Moore County, but no spirits and no wine. And so the only place you can get any spirits is here onsite. At our distillery, we have a bottle shop, not a liquor store, but just a bottle shop.
Carli: I was gonna say, can you not sell old number seven where you make it because you're in the county?
Chris: We can, but only recently. So the state, distilling. Has a wonderful history across the state of Tennessee, not just here in Lynchburg. A lot of that, has been lost since prohibition and because of the old prohibition laws and that many of them still are somewhat in place still today.
And so it was only in the late 1990s I think we could start to sell bottles here at the distillery. I think it's, it is shocking. Somebody told me one time, it's like going to Disney World, but you can't buy like a Mickey Mouse shirt or something if you can't buy a bottle. So I guess that kind of makes sense.
That kind of correlates, but you can buy a bottle now.
Spencer: Yeah. And talk about some of the community impact that, that you all have here too.
Chris: Yeah, well you mentioned earlier, we are the major employer in not only the county, I would say in the area in, in all around a [00:12:00] thousand people.
About 700 or so full-time employees and some seasonal and temporary employment as well. So a big impact on the local area. I think we always, strive to be conscious of that, to be a good local citizen for sure. Support, multiple charities, school systems, in, in the community.
If you don't. If you live in Moore County and you don't work at Jack Daniels, I promise you, or are related to somebody that is, and that's that's another thing. I think a about two thirds of our employment are related to another employee here. So nepotism is just something that you alive and well, you learn to live with.
Yeah, and I have tons of family that work here as well. So it's just the way we do it in Lynchburg,
Carli: yeah, we met your beautiful wife. You guys actually work together. From time to time here, she's a consultant. How is it from one couple that works together to another? I know a lot of people think that's impossible.
How has that been?
Chris: Yeah, I won't say impossible. Sure. It's tough because sometimes you find yourself only talking about work. Yeah. And. At some point that gets really old and you just have to make a [00:13:00] point to move on and go to another topic. But my, my wife does work here.
My sister works here. I have cousins that work here. Grandparents worked here. It's a very normal thing for people that grow up in Lynchburg. It's if, even if you don't work at the distillery. It's almost certainly something that the distillery touches or another family member that does work here that connects you to this place in some way.
Carli: Kind of sounds like there's whiskey in your veins. Like did you always know that you were gonna come back and work at Jack or did you just watch your grandpa and think that was great and then go off and try other things and then find your way back? How was that story for you,
Chris: In between those two scenarios?
So my granddad, he started working here in 57. He retired in 1989. I was eight years old when he retired. And so there was, there were times when I was here with him when I was a kid, maybe five or six years old. I would run around and play, there's a lot of great green space here.
And and I would walk through the distillery with him, but I didn't know, what a distillery did. I didn't know what whiskey was, when you're a kid. And really when you grow up in a town so [00:14:00] small and you go outta college. To be honest with you, the last thing in on my mind was moving back home.
Sure. I thought maybe I would go to a bigger town and do different things and it was about halfway through college I was studying chemistry. I was unsure what I wanted to do and I came home for the summer and my parents wanted me to get a job to make some money before I went back to school in the fall.
And just coincidentally, I got a job here at the distillery and so that's where I started to. I guess more appreciate what my grandfather had done, what the brand is, how the whiskey's made. It really intrigued me. I got very curious. And so that's when I started to think, okay, well maybe I could do that, for a living.
So that's where it all started. And then as soon as I graduated from college in 2003, I started working at our corporate headquarters in Kentucky, in Louisville, Kentucky, at Brown Foreman as a chemist in our r and d lab. And that's, it's all done ever since is make whiskey.
Carli: Yeah, tell me about what it is like being an r and d.
At the corporate level, like I would imagine you worked on some really interesting stuff while you were there.
Chris: It is a great place because, research and development could [00:15:00] touch any process in the company. And being part, American based, still family controlled, the Brown family based in Louisville, Kentucky.
But we have tequilas, we, we've had Canadian whiskeys, we have scotch whiskeys. We used to own and operate our own. Cooperages barrel making manufacturing facilities. And so I got to work on projects on all of that stuff. A lot of projects here at Jack Daniels as well. And so it gives you the ability then to really dive in and learn at a very small, detailed level, so many different processes.
So looking back on it. It couldn't have been a better place to start than r and d because, you were able to, look at, the effects of white oak on the chemistry and the flavor of the product, or even, fermentation of agave based spirit in Mexico, making tequila and the uniqueness and difference of that versus, grain-based fermentation here.
All those different things. Looking back couldn't have been any better to prepare me for now and the master distiller role now which you know, I was saying is it can be quite diverse. Yes. We're laser [00:16:00] focused on the consistency and the quality of making our whiskey.
But also it's a big world out there. And Jack Daniels is going all over the world, 170, 80 different countries. I'm not even sure exactly how many. And so there's all different types of spirits and all different types of spirits, consumers, and how do we relate to each of them? All over the globe.
It's important. And so to have that background and that knowledge of spirits in general is really helpful.
Spencer: When I think about a brand as big as Jack Daniels and how much it's grown, I imagine that there's this tension between wanting people to experience. Something that is unique and special and novel, but at the same time, the brand is so big and so pervasive.
How do you position yourself in a spot where sometimes it might be cool and sexy to have, very small batch stuff that's really local and people want to have that. Versus something that I think people would say, all [00:17:00] right, this is a much bigger product and brand and established, and you could lose some of that novelty to it.
How? How do you position yourself that way when you think about the brand?
Chris: Yeah, well, certainly we want to have a whiskey for everybody. And we've got whiskeys that are very approachable, very mixable, easy to drink, and we have whiskeys that are really big and bold and complex and dense.
So that, I think that's the first thing. And, I like to talk about being a complete distillery. We want to. Offer the most complete whiskey lineup in American whiskey that there is. And with that though, I think there's a lot of misconceptions out there. We've done some of these limited things and want accolades and wards and best.
Whiskey of the year and all of these things. And so many of them are based on that classic old number seven or recipes. P 80% corn, 12%, mal barley, 80% rye, made the same way, in the same process. And so the backbone or the DNA of that flavor profile is classic Jack Daniels old number seven.
And in [00:18:00] fact we, we did a release a couple years ago as an example. We did some single barrel releases off of Quay Hill, which is the kind of the highest point at the distillery. And we have a handful of barrel houses up there and we just, peeled back some barrels and bottled them all up separately at barrel string.
So it, it was a high proof and, high A BV. And so the flavor profile, but, because of that. Was shifted quite a bit differently, but I was talking to someone one day about it and they just, yep. Can't believe how amazing this Coi Hill whiskey is. It's just unbelievable how in the world could you ever do it?
And I said, you realize every one of those barrels would've gone straight into a bottle of old number seven had we not set them aside and decided to release it as a separate, offering kind of a separate batch or limited edition. And so I think that's what people sometimes don't realize the quality of old number seven, the consistency of it for sure.
Which, which I think, they, it's gonna be the same whether you're in Tennessee, whether you're, all the way across the world. It will be the same. And then of course, I think the versatility and the [00:19:00] mixability of it is also part of its success. And but at the same time, because it is so available and it's so popular, I think people a lot of times take it for granted the quality behind it, the flavor that's in it.
And all it takes is a tiny tweak here or there. And then suddenly, it's winning best whiskey in the world again, just like it would've done a hundred years ago when Jack was still running around.
Spencer: Chris, I have a friend that. Invests in warehouses near distilleries for the sole purpose of providing space to age barrels.
It's a really fascinating investment that pays out like a bond because you have to leave these barrels, which are not small, like we're surrounded by barrels here. It takes up a lot of space. Can you talk some about. The Jack Daniels barrel, and there's a mystique around it. I feel like that even once you're done with it, it's not trash like it is used in so many different ways.
And so maybe for those that aren't from Tennessee, help us understand the special [00:20:00] sauce that goes into barrels and the life that they have beyond their time here.
Chris: Yeah, absolutely. We typically use a barrel here on average between four and seven or eight years. Sometimes much longer than that.
But that's the average. We can only use the barrel one time. So once, once we've used it, it's outta here. And it's actually one of the, one of the most important kind of functions of our company is what we do with those used barrels. And so they actually supply many other parts of the world for spirits making.
I talked earlier about our friends over in Scotland and Ireland, making their whiskeys. A lot of our barrels, the majority of our barrels make their way there. To age their whiskeys, but also they go to the Caribbean for rums, tequilas in Mexico. Tabasco hot sauce ages their hot sauce in our used barrels.
So they, they have a life that's gonna extend much longer than that four to eight year average. And in fact, just take Scotland for example, they're gonna age the whiskey much longer there because they're using a used barrel, so there's not as much readily available flavor to [00:21:00] extract in that first aging process.
And then of course, the climate. It's so much colder in Scotland than it is here in Mill, Tennessee. A barrel, even though we may use it between four and eight years, it could be in use for 30, 40, 50 years. If it gets used two or three times, then over when it makes its way to that second facility.
Spencer: Do y'all store all of your stuff here? That seems like you all are. Man, how many barrels do you have at any given time?
Carli: It's like a logistics puzzle. Yeah,
Spencer: I know. Yes.
Carli: No wonder your brain's exploding. Spencer, you're talking to, this is your, let me say it this way. This is so your wheelhouse to ask that question.
Spencer: Yeah,
Chris: It is a little bit complicated. Thankfully we had databases, computer systems, and a great team. Getting our barrels in and out of these barrel houses every single day. But right now a little over 3 million barrels aging within about a six mile radius from right here where we're sitting.
Carli: Wait, say that one more time because my brain's exploding. How many, was it
Chris: 3 million.
Carli: 3 million barrels Within six miles of here?
Chris: Yes. It's a lot
Carli: of
Chris: whiskey. Mostly all in Moore County. A little bit in the edge of Lincoln County as well okay.
Carli: Okay. I have a question to read the news. Right now, we have a dear friend that owns a liquor store [00:22:00] near where we live, and we talk to him about business, entrepreneur to entrepreneur.
All the data showing that Americans, particularly younger Americans, are drinking less than they ever have before. Are you seeing that at Jack Daniels, or is Jack Daniels such a big international company that isn't really hitting your bottom line at all?
Chris: It I think the industry is. Is shifting pretty considerably for probably a lot of reasons.
And, our, and our leadership corporately has their finger on that pulse as well as anybody can. I don't know, particulars and I don't really, study the consumer or trends for me. The most important thing is making whiskey and making whiskey.
In a very traditional way. And I've got a great team here that, that does that. Is the whiskey market more challenging right now than it was coming right out of COVID? Absolutely. It is shifting. There's no question. Yes, we do feel it. That's no secret. And a lot of the statements from our leadership here corporately reflect all of that, but our focus here in Lynchburg will continue to be on making whiskey the way we know how.
And that's what the [00:23:00] families of Lynchburg do. And so that's what we'll continue to do. And thankfully we have friends now all over the world and they're gonna be able to continue to rely on the consistency and the quality of Jack Daniels.
Spencer: So we're sitting here on the grounds, and this is a location that's like a top tourist destination for all of Tennessee.
So for those that haven't had the opportunity to come out here. If they were to put this on their list, what are they gonna experience? What's the, what's it like?
Chris: Yeah. Well I think it, it's small town USA in a lot of ways. Some people I think, refer to it as the Real Life Mayberry, Andy Griffith show.
They see ads and commercials and historical pictures in old ads that we've done. And, they think it's like a movie set, but it's not. This is really our town, again, second smallest county in the state of Tennessee. The population of Moore County, the entire county is, I think about 5,800 in the county.
Really small town, the distillery itself, we give tours almost every single day. Just the major holidays. We don't do tours, but we're open pretty much other than that. And you get to go right [00:24:00] through the distillery. There's not like a separate tour area.
You get to see the real thing, you get to walk right through the heart of it and see exactly how Jack Daniels is made. So we're only about an hour south of Nashville, well, depending on traffic, about an hour south of Nashville. And so it's a great day trip and anybody coming in, we would love to have them come and see firsthand because I think that's where there's so many.
Perce or, misconceptions of the brand. And people have so many thoughts around Jack Daniels because they've seen it with, on a Guitar Amp with the Rolling Stones or whether, or country music or even like Western lifestyle. There's so many different ways that people connect to the brand.
But then when they come here and then they can literally touch it and experience it and get a taste of it now that we can, offer tastings at the distillery. I think once people experience it in that way, that's where they really get it.
Spencer: Do you do a lot of events here? It seems like it would be really.
Situated for that. Do you all have, is that, it's maybe it's bachelor, bachelorette parties, but like do you have event venues or anything that you do here?
Chris: We have a few things that we do. We have [00:25:00] a pretty famous venue up on top of the hill called Barbecue Hill is a big open air pavilion. We've had different musicians play and and we do have, yes, bachelor.
Bachelorette parties absolutely. Come down and have a good time. But, because of the proximity to Nashville, I'm sure that, that helps. It's amazing, some of the visitors that we get and the people that I've been able to meet because of this brand and this whiskey and because, so many people, love our product and it's an amazing thing.
So it's really special and it's something that I do not take for granted to be able to work for a brand that's so well loved around the world.
Carli: So I grew up in a family that made a lot of pizza. That was just, we worked in pizza shops and I was around so much pizza. And to tell you, I never got sick of it.
Everyone says when you're around it too much, you inevitably can't eat it anymore. And I'll tell you what, we order it every week. We are what you would call a heavy consumer, goes great with whiskey. I have never had that problem. But for you being around whiskey all day, every day, maybe your whole life is, do you ever think, I'm gonna have a glass of wine tonight that's not for me.
Or use. Still [00:26:00] whiskey in your veins, loving it as much as you always have.
Chris: I do. Especially in cocktails. Most of the time it's a whiskey cocktail, a Jack Daniels cocktail. But sure, yeah, sometimes, you're having a glass of wine with dinner or something like that, and I love to try new things as well whether it be wine, beer, different spirits.
I feel like I'm an equal opportunist in a lot of ways, but I do like, my classic. Jack Daniels on the rocks is what I'm gonna go to more times than not. I was
Carli: gonna say, is it Jack Daniels on the rocks? Is it a jacking coke? Which is like. Peanut butter and jelly in the spirit's world, right?
Like it's the perfect combo.
Chris: It's funny, I never saw Jack Daniels put into a coke until I went to college. So never.
Carli: That may be sacrilege around here. I may have like broken a cardinal rule.
Chris: No. We love it. And of course now we have a wonderful relationship with Coca-Cola. And now you can buy the pre-mix cans.
Real Jack Daniels, real Coca-Cola going all over the world now. So it's a wonderful thing and partnership. And, you think about two brands founded around the same time period, both in the south, of course Atlanta, and then, three hours away [00:27:00] from Atlanta here in Lynchburg.
It's amazing what that call by far and away the number one branded bar call out there, Jack and Coke. So we love Jack and Coke. It's just, I like it just on the rocks. That's the way my granddad did it. That's the way, my dad always did it. So that's the only way. Saw how to drink it.
And so that was, how I was taught to sip slowly, enjoy it responsibly and just, two or three ice cubes, nice pour of old number seven. And now I do like to let the ice melt for about two minutes. Right. And that's just enough water. To make it perfect.
Spencer: I can imagine, Chris, like when you show up to a restaurant or an experience, like there's gotta be a little bit of undercover boss moment for you.
Where like, do you wanna flex on the bartender to be like, I'm a master distiller. So like, how do you navigate that dynamic? Because I imagine when you go into a bar, your work brain could almost turn on that. You're looking at, stuff behind the bar and looking at inventory levels and all these things.
I, we've interviewed some other people that have come on the podcast [00:28:00] and, whether they're, museum curators, like museums are largely ruined for them as a result of just, it's what they do, it's what they see. So what's that experience like for you when you're out in the wild?
Chris: Yeah, it's different.
You don't just casually walk in and not pay attention. I guess I, I will admit that you're certainly looking on the shelves and, where's our bottle and, but thankfully. Most bars in the world, thankfully, have a bottle of Jack Daniels on there, I hope. Or they should.
I'm always, close by to a poorer of back home, whether I'm in New Delhi or Nashville, it doesn't matter. And so that's great. I've, I don't like to do, ask for any kind of like special cocktail or anything, I'm a Jack on the Rocks guy.
I think it's a pretty easy bar. Call The Bartender doesn't get too frustrated with, some kind of crazy cocktail request. I have been, I, I certainly have been Miss Port, in the past. There you go. But typically I just let it go, if I know that it's. If it's not our brand, maybe I'll just ask a question, but it's not, it's not anything that probably doesn't happen, with any other brand at some point.
Spencer: Because I can imagine like, you go into a [00:29:00] bar and Jack Daniels classic there, but I would also imagine there's a temptation because you all have so many different product offerings. Now, some of which people will say, I've never even thought that could possibly be a combination. Like, do you have.
Some level of like, Hey, have you tried this? Or would you ever do this? Or is it just like, that's just not your space and you're just gonna make sure that you make a good product and let the marketers do the marketing?
Chris: Yeah, exactly. Yes, exactly. Okay. Exactly. I don't wanna, I don't wanna wade into the waters of marketing.
That's not my forte. I don't pretend I'm a chemist. That makes whiskey that's where I like to keep it. And I'll, I will stay in that lane.
Spencer: Chris, I'm always fascinated with the process of how something gets done. Carli and I are. Logistics background through and through, and so you're talking about a million pounds of grain arriving, and I can't help but wonder how all of those things work.
But one of the trademarks that I've heard from Jack Daniels is the source of water. And as I've walked the grounds I've seen that source. So what's unique about the water that [00:30:00] you use here?
Chris: Absolutely. So we source all of our water from a Cape Spring. It's just at the end of this road, at the kind of on the other side of the still house, the distillery.
And so this water is the only water we use for the mashing and the fermentation of the grain. So the literal creation of the whiskey. And Jack back in the 18 hundreds, around 1880, he re relocated the distillery from an old farm about five miles south of town. With it had a very small spring.
Hardly a trickle to get his hands on this water source here. And there had been people here even before Jack, that had made whiskey with this water. So he knew about this cave and the source. And today it's still, it can put out well over 400 gallons a minute. Wow of water that bubbles from probably many underground springs and it floods this cave right here.
So the cave system goes two miles deep back underground. So there's this huge reservoir of water, plus we keep in tanks over 10 million gallons of this water. So if we ever have a really bad drought or something, don't worry. We've got plenty of water to back up on it and use in that tank. [00:31:00] That water is really the perfect water to make whiskey.
Now, obviously with technology today, you can clean up almost any water to the point where it's good quality water, but in the 18 hundreds there was no city water even so Jack had to find this source, and that's why he relocated here. And so we're very proud that we still make every drop of Jack Daniels.
It starts with that ca spring water right here in Lynchburg.
Spencer: Did y'all have some close call moments when water was scarce and droughts, like to build those sized tanks? Was there ever a season where y'all ran out
Chris: There's never been a, a time when we've been close. Thankfully that water, because we do shut down, at least for four to six weeks every year that gives us ample time to get that 10 million gallons all the way back up to the very top.
There was years ago, there's a kind of a famous. It's folklore Now in Lynchburg, one of our former distillery employees a reporter I think happened to be on a tour and just quip to this, production person. Like, what would happen if the cave ever went dry?
And he said, well, I guess we would be out of Jack Tangles just off the cuff. And that has [00:32:00] never happened, never been close to happening. But let's just say there, there was a lot of attention very quickly as that spread rumors around. So thankfully we go to great links to protect all the land around this cave.
And we, we actually have over 2000 acres here in the county. And so there's no industry that sits up above the cave. There's, it's just open fields and, wooded forest. And so that cave is very well protected. Do not worry. We will not run outta water.
Spencer: And one other thing that I noticed just in going through the tour was I never expected the spirit to be clear.
I al I just immediately assumed it would have the color that it has as a finished product. And can you talk a little bit about what. Is involved in that process just for those that are not whiskey connoisseurs or haven't done the tour?
Chris: Absolutely. So all spirits start clear when you're distilling alcohol of any type.
It starts clear off of the still, so ethanol and then there's other forms of alcohols that provide flavor and things. All clear is water. And after we distill our whiskey, it will be [00:33:00] slowly filtered through Maple charcoal that we produce here onsite. We make it ourselves. And so this is an extra filtration.
So you think of it like a water filter at home and it takes out a lot of the grainy character. So our recipe is 80% corn, so that newly distilled clear spirit smells and tastes a lot like corn. You've enjoyed a glass of Jack Daniels. Number seven, you don't get a lot of corn flavor, right? You get a lot of sweet fruit notes.
Then you start to get the caramels and the vanillas from the oak barrel which is where it gets all the color. But this charcoal mellowing process reduces the amount of graininess in a young spirit. And so it does soften or mellow the mouth feel as well, we like to say. But then after it goes through the charcoal, it takes about 24 hours.
A whole day for the whiskey to slowly filter through. Then it will go into the barrel, brand new toasted and charred on the inside. So think of it like a marshmallow, first thing you do you toast that marshmallow brown it. That's the way we do the inside of the barrel first.
Then we char it very quickly for about 25 seconds to just get that, blackened char on the inside. So when the whiskey goes [00:34:00] in clear, it can soak into those layers of the oak barrel, and that's where it will pull all the color and the flavor. So the only thing that's gonna add flavor to our whiskey is the barrel itself, the grains, and the yeast that's gonna ferment those grains.
Right. And I guess you could say water, even though that's not adding very much flavor at all. But that's it. There's no sugars, there's no flavorings, there's nothing artificial. And so when you get into different types of spirits all over the world, even some that are aged in barrels, they can also add additional coloring or additional flavorings in things.
And so Tennessee whiskey, that sound allowed, you're not making Tennessee whiskey if you're adding things to it to flavor it or color.
Carli: Jack Daniels is so iconic. It's a privilege to be here and to see what you do and to walk around the property and taste your product, of course. But what's next? Is there anything you guys are really excited about that you're working on right now, or do you get up every day so excited to make old number seven and make it the best that it is?
I know that's true. But are there any projects on the horizon that you can't [00:35:00] wait to start or finish? Yeah,
Chris: absolutely. Yeah, I mentioned quickly earlier our age stated products that we started. We do that to honor Mr. Jack when he was alive. We either have pictures of bottles or actually have old bottles that have a 10-year-old age statement, a 12, a 14, 18, and 21 year.
And so we're working to recreate that whole lineup. We hope we've made it all the way to 14 and we have barrels here that are older than 14 years. But it's all in a process to honor Mr. Jack. So that's. That's a project that you just have to pinch yourself, that you're able to do. To pay tribute to Mr.
Jack and what he did back in his life and in establishing this brand and this whiskey. But there, there's some other limited edition things that we love to work on and it's just fun as a distiller to try to push different buttons and see if you can create different flavors. We do some limited single barrel things.
A lot of people love. Barrel strength single barrel because it's coming right out of the barrel into the bottle. But then again, it all gets back to that old number seven recipe that's over 90% of what we make is that classic old number seven. It works [00:36:00] perfect on the rocks or mix in a Coke or in any kind of whiskey cocktail that you like.
And so that's always our laser focus is to make sure the consistency and the quality of old number seven stays the same. And then, that same quality and flavor. We can. Push those buttons and do a little one-off and unique things as well. But without that old number seven and that recipe and that consistency, none of the other stuff would be possible.
Carli: So is your little guy, I know you have a five-year-old son. Is he gonna be a master distiller after you? What do you think?
Chris: I, right now he wants to be a policeman. That is the thing
Carli: That is a noble cause.
Chris: Yes. Yes. He has like three or four different police costumes and the hat. And the whole thing, the badge and you name it.
He's laser focused on that right now, so we'll see at five years old. That's where he, it is somewhere between that and Rockstar is where he's at right now. Oh. And guitars. And guitars and drums. And he loves music, which is awesome. So both
Carli: great pursuits.
Chris: Exactly, yes. Yeah. So we'll see Whiskey maker.
It's not looking good so far.
Spencer: [00:37:00] Chris, the way we wrap up each podcast is I've got three short fill in the blank sentences for you to finish with a word or a short phrase that you think completes the thought. I'll read to you and then if you'll just read me back the prompt and then finish with the word or the phrase.
Read the whole thing
Chris: back.
Spencer: Yeah.
Chris: Alright.
Spencer: That's right. Okay. Ready? Okay.
Chris: I'll try
Spencer: number one. What most people don't realize about Jack Daniels is blank.
Chris: What most people don't realize about Jack Daniels is the level of quality and tradition that goes into all of our products. From an old number seven to a limited edition, the quality is the same in both of those.
That's more than one word. Sorry.
Spencer: No, that's good. Okay. That's fine. That's good. Number two, the reason Tennessee whiskey is so exceptional is blank.
Chris: The reason Tennessee whiskey is so exceptional is that it's the families of this state and this town that make it that way, and the [00:38:00] pride that they have to continue.
That tradition.
Spencer: I like that answer a lot because you talked about earlier how most everybody here is either related to one another or is just one generation away from having a cousin or a mother or a father that works here and. The upside of that is you can't get away with anything,
Chris: well, true.
Spencer: Yes. You step outta line, people are like, Hey, you're not cool enough or big enough to step outta line. They'll call you out on it.
Chris: No doubt about it. But yeah, I think, Tennessee is known for a couple of things. Music. And whiskey.
Spencer: Yeah.
Chris: And and I think, those two worlds collide here at Jack Daniels Music and Whiskey for sure.
Spencer: And the last one, the most rewarding part of carrying on my grandfather's legacy. Is blank.
Chris: The most rewarding part of carrying on my grandfather's legacy is knowing that we're doing things the same way he would do if he were sitting in the office. Now I get to sit in his old office every day, and so it's the most important thing for me is that we are honoring the tradition and what he [00:39:00] and the team.
That helped him do it. Back in a time where Jack Daniels was allocated and hard to get, up until the 1980s we were allocated in every state in the us. And so it was all about rinse and repeat the same way. Don't change anything. And that's the same approach that we take today. Today.
Spencer: Chris, it's been really fun to have you on. I feel like this has been a podcast of equal parts chemistry as logistics and a little bit of undercover boss that we've mixed in here. Like we've had some good stuff and it's good that you're in the seat and not me, because I think I would have. What I call shiny syndrome, which is like a
Carli: hundred percent.
Yeah,
Spencer: I see something shiny and I want to chase that. So I would come up with the types of flavor combinations that would be illegal in all 50 states and would definitely get me in trouble and bring great shame upon my grandfather. I'm sure if he was a master distiller, but I can really appreciate what is obvious.
In the importance and the [00:40:00] pride that you carry in getting to hold this seat. And and what an important seat it is for the state of Tennessee not only for this county, but for a lot of people whose jobs and livelihoods are impacted by the decisions you make and this brand.
And it's a real treat to get to be here. And thank you for being such a great host.
Chris: Well, thank you. Thanks for coming down. It was very nice to meet both of you and, well, don't worry, we'll let you walk through, take a tour, but we're not gonna let you push any buttons.
Carli: Okay? Definitely don't do that.
Spencer: Chris Fletcher, master distiller at Jack Daniels, along with a number of other titles, it's a really neat opportunity to talk to somebody that has a big responsibility in the legacy of the brand. And. He stepped away from it a little bit, but being only the eighth master distiller since the founding of this place back in the.
Mid to late 18 hundreds. That's a big responsibility.
Carli: I know. I was really impressed. He was very disciplined in all of his answers. Like, he wants to make good whiskey the same way his granddad did. And I really love that. It does give you an [00:41:00] appreciation for like why you and I shouldn't be allowed to push the buttons.
Like some things don't need to be overly innovated. You can always try new and richer processes, but. A good thing is a good thing. And we were talking about Jack and Coke and those two brands, but Jack Daniels, it's in one of the smallest counties in Tennessee, is one of the biggest brands in the whole world.
Spencer: Entrepreneurial stories that end up transforming communities like this one has are some of my very favorites. You have massive job creation, like one in every six people in this county. Either are employed or are related to someone employed by Jack Daniels. And you've heard me say often that entrepreneurship is the most powerful form of economic change available.
And this is just an incredible story of it. And I think it's also fascinating because so rarely do you see a business survive. Through three and four and five [00:42:00] generations. And obviously Jack Daniels is part of a broader portfolio of brands, but it has stood the test of time and there are very few businesses that can say the same.
And I think it's awesome that the state of Tennessee. Gets to have that, which everybody already knows. Tennessee is a state that is so pro small business and entrepreneurship and low taxes and all the types of things that you generally see as very fostering environments for entrepreneurship.
Carli: I really liked his story about how they moved here to be near the cave.
Spencer: Yeah.
Carli: And the water and the sources and. Whiskey added space is a few simple things done really well, and that just makes me think about our state. Like you go north, south, east, west, people here have legacy. They have lived here for generations. And even the new people that are coming like hand up like me in the last 20 years.
It's because you want part of that, you [00:43:00] wanna put down your roots and be part of something that your kids and their kids will be able to tell stories about. And so the story of Jack Daniels feels a lot like the story of Tennessee. It's simple, hardworking, and knows where the quality is, and then protects it with all they got.
And I just felt like that really came out and I really enjoyed it.
Spencer: I loved all the logistics stuff that I, of
Carli: course you did. Yeah.
Spencer: I could have had a whole podcast talking about a million pounds of grain a day coming in 10 million gallons of water that they have stored. 3 million barrels within six miles of their footprint.
Those are enormous logistical tasks that, there's not a lot of margin for error. And the product is expensive. So you mess up one of these barrels and you're messing up. Thousands or tens of thousands worth of dollars.
Carli: Well, and then disposing of the barrels. becuase you can only use them once and all the rest.
It's what goes into it. But then when it comes out of it I can't wait. We were talking about some of the products in their [00:44:00] store, like I can't wait to go see all the bottle shops. So Yeah.
