Craft distillers in Northwest Montana still enjoy a steady stream of summertime visitors, but they are getting creative about how to stay on top of the market.  

Alcohol marketing agency OhBev listed “authentic innovation” as a strategic recommendation for brands in its 2025 Whiskey Market Forecasts and Trends report. Amid the uncertainty over imports caused by tariffs, it is good to bet on products that feature local ingredients or specialty kegs, barrels or stills, according to the agency. 

Glacier Distilling Co. is ahead of the curve in that regard. The Coram distillery has been operating for 15 years and produces 30 different spirits, largely made using ingredients sourced in Montana. 

“All our rye [whiskey] is produced from grain grown at the Lucas farms north of Conrad,” said founder and head distiller Nic Lee. “We get apples from Moss Farm in Rollins. We get cherries from Last Best Place Orchard outside of Bigfork.’

Glacier Distilling has four stills and operates seven days a week. To produce its wide range of products, the distillers focus on having a facility that has flexibility and allows for different distilling techniques. He said fruit-based spirits, for example, require a different type of fermentation and production process, as well as different batch sizes. 

“We’re able to produce in a small space quite a range of things. The expense of that is an efficiency that we don’t get, which would be using one larger piece of equipment. But we needed that flexibility to produce what we wanted to produce here with local ingredients,” Lee said.

The distillery recently launched a 12-year-old single malt whiskey, the first of its kind made in Montana. To pull off the endeavor, Glacier Distilling partnered with Flathead Lake Brewing Company to utilize its expertise and brewery equipment to start a process to create the mash bill for whiskey production.

The Montana Department of Revenue distributes all distilled spirits and fortified wines from a liquor warehouse. Unlike breweries, which work with distributors, distillers leave distribution up to the state, which Lee said works well in Montana. He said the state agency is supportive of the industry. 

Lee has held leadership positions in the Montana Distillers Guild and often aids in legislative efforts. The distribution system in Montana works well for the industry, but when it comes to shipping out of state, things get complicated. 

“Because they’re all different systems in all 50 states, navigating those as a small player gets very difficult and expensive,” Lee said. 

He said craft producers would love to see more options for direct access to customers, selling from home states online. It’s not a way to bypass regulation, he added, but those in the industry want a unified way to approach distribution out of state. 

Montana had a fairly late start in the craft distillery trend. A change in state legislation in 2005 changed Prohibition-era liquor laws to permit micro-distilleries to produce small batches of alcohol. The Montana Distillers Guild includes 18 distilleries from around the state.

The number of active craft distillers in the U.S. grew by 11.5% in 2024 to reach just over 3,000, according to a report by the American Craft Spirits Association. Employment numbers within the U.S. craft market continued to increase following the pandemic reaching nearly 30,000. 

As a whole craft spirit sales remain evenly split between the distilleries’ home states and other states, while producers seem to be focusing on sales in their respective home states, the American Craft Spirits Association notes. 

While a specific study of the economic impact of Montana distilleries is seemingly unavailable, distilleries create jobs, contribute to community revitalization by often repurposing historic buildings, support agriculture through purchasing Montana-grown ingredients and tasting rooms serve as a spot for locals but also tourists visiting the state. 

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JUST DOWN the road at Spotted Bear Spirits in Whitefish, making a product that can be found in Montana stores is important. But founder and managing partner Lauren Oscilowski would also like to see changes to make it easier to get Spotted Bear on shelves outside the Big Sky state.

“Distributing out of state can be really tricky, because when you’re not a large distillery and you don’t have the ability to really put big marketing dollars behind it in different states, it’s a challenge,” she said. “Because they’re so far removed from the source, and who the brand is, who it is for, especially in small craft.”

Spotted Bear relies on a boutique vendor to get its products attention and the right places as it has moved to outside Montana. 

Working as the first employee at Glacier Distilling Co., Oscilowski took her experience in working in all aspects of the small business when she opened her own in 2015. She also pulled from the mission to make Montana ingredients part of the production process. 

“We use Montana sugar beets — the northeast corner of the state has a lot of sugar beet farms, and they’re starting to process right now ... that is what we use for our vodka. We obviously use a lot of berries, mint — and grain in our whiskey,” she said. 

The production operation has outgrown the 1,000-square-foot downtown space occupied by Spotted Bear and since 2019 has been producing spirits from a 5,000-square-foot manufacturing site. 

Offering 14 different spirits of many different flavors and varieties, Spotted Bear is sticking with its product lineup this year as it watches potential impacts on the business, like tariffs and the economy. 

Tariffs have impacted the sourcing of the glass bottles but also ingredients in some of the spirits, ultimately impacting cash flow. 

Still looking to corner new markets even within Montana, has its challenges in a state that’s large geographically and has sparse population centers. Spotted Bear has been looking to cities like Bozeman, which provides the opportunity for a larger population for sales. 

“I think we’re trying to find little pockets that align with like mountain culture and that have more people in more concentrated areas,” she said. 

Reporter Taylor Inman may be reached at 758-4440 or [email protected].

    BoLars Matson, left, and Lauren Oscilowski at Spotted Bear Spirits. (Courtesy photo)
  

    Glacier Distilling Company's Josephine's Moonshine at Josephine's in Coram on Wednesday, June 7. (Casey Kreider/Daily Inter Lake)
  

    The Northern Lights from Glacier Distilling Company at Josephine's in Coram on Wednesday, June 7. Glacier Gin with a flash of Trail of the Cedars absinthe, a float of Little Cottonwood liquer, grapefruit soda and fresh lemon. (Casey Kreider/Daily Inter Lake)