Distillery switches from spirits to sanitizer
ELVERSON » With state liquor stores and dining areas in bars and restaurants shut down due to the coronavirus pandemic, a local distillery is replenishing an extreme shortage of hand sanitizer.
Scott and Don Avellino of Revivalist Spirits said it was an easy fix to convert 5,000 square feet of their gin and bourbon distillery to make hand sanitizer. Ten of 20 staffers are still employed.
The brothers are even developing a botanical hand sanitizer that will have an aroma similar to that of the 8,000 cases of gin produced yearly.
“We saw the opportunity early on that the business was probably going to be shut down, with the liquor stores closing,” Don Avellino said. “We produce alcohol, so we can produce hand sanitizer and donate a lot of it to first responders.”
Much of the sanitizer produced so far was distributed for free or at cost to Newtown Square police, Paoli firefighters, Tredyffrin Easttown police, EMTs for Elverson and Honey Brook, Twin Valley firefighters and the Chester County Department of Aging Services.
Revivalist Spirits sells gin and whiskey at more than 150 Pennsylvania state stores and in several states. The Alcohol and Tobacco and Tax Trade Bureau, as well as the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board, informed the
brothers that they would not tax spirits producers making sanitizer during this crisis, as long as the Avellinos follow the recipe recommended by the World Health Organization.
That recipe includes mostly alcohol, distilled water, hydrogen peroxide and glycerin.
“The federal and local government agencies that regulate us really stepped up and made it easy for us to do this,” Scott Avellino said. “We are taking care of the heroes on the front lines and the hospitals first, but we hope to be able to produce enough sanitizer to help as many others as possible in the coming weeks.”
“It’s very simple to make,” Scott Avellino said. “The hardest part is sourcing the availability of bottles.”
The distillery can fill every size container from 2-ounces to 55-gallon drums. Five-gallon buckets are very easy to distribute to first responders, but “they will take it any way they can get it,” Don Avellino said. “We’re getting barraged with requests and can’t keep up with the demand.
“We hate to say ‘no’ — we don’t want to say no to anybody, but we can only make so much.”
The distillery is still selling online for home delivery. For more information, visit www.revivalistspirits. com.