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Stoneyard Distillery opens tasting room in Glenwood Springs

Max Vogelman, Katie Durham and Jim Benson stand behind the bar at Stoneyard Distillery’s tasting room in Glenwood Springs. Shannon Marvel/Post Independent

Fans of Stoneyard Distillery’s beet sugar spirits will be able to taste the businesses products in their new tasting room in Glenwood Springs.

Stoneyard Distillery’s new tasting room had a soft opening Thursday. The plan is to have a grand opening May 15, distillery co-owner Jim Benson said.

Stoneyard’s master distiller and co-owner, Max Vogelman, said he’s always wanted to open a tasting room in Glenwood Springs.



Benson and Vogelman first opened the distillery in nearby Dotsero.

The new Stoneyard Distillery tasting room in downtown Glenwood.
Chelsea Self / Post Independent

“We wanted to be here because there’s a whole lot more people here than Dotsero, not a lot going on out there,” Vogelman said. “We started thinking about doing a site tasting room before COVID, then COVID hit so we just decided to table it. Then the writings on the wall came eventually that we’d get back to normal.”



“Luckily for us, this space opened up around the same time. This location opened up really as we started looking seriously. We wanted to be in Glenwood Springs because it’s closed.”

Vogelman grew up in the Roaring Fork Valley and always enjoyed being a patron of downtown Glenwood Springs.

“It just seemed like a really good place and we’ve always done really well in Glenwood with our products.The liquor stores around here and restaurants, at events like Strawberry Days, we’ve always done really well in general and figured we’d give it a shot down here,” Vogelman said.

A few examples of products available at the new Stoneyard Distilling tasting room in downtown Glenwood.
Chelsea Self / Post Independent

Benson said the pair began leasing the space in December 2020 and got a building permit to renovate it in January.

The products made at the distillery and sold at the tasting room are what Vogelman calls beet sugar spirits.

“We make everything from sugar beet sugar which is all grown in eastern Colorado. We take that to Dotsero and ferment and distill that sugar into something that doesn’t have a category so we just call it a beet sugar spirit,” Vogelman said.

“Then we make all of our products from that. We call it B.S. spirits.”

Right now the tasting room Wednesday through Saturday from 2-8 p.m.

“We could pretty quickly expand that out, we just want to be sure we know what we’re doing,” Vogelman said.

One of Stoneyard Distillery’s longtime customers and owner of Rhino Liquors in Glenwood Springs, Gabriel Rosalias, was there to support Benson and Vogelman during the soft opening on Thursday.

“I like it. I’m glad there’s one here because we don’t always get to go over to the other side of the canyon,” Rosalias said.”And It’s really nice to be able to try out their product, and convenient that it’s right on the main street. I love it. The horchata cocktail is one of my favorite things they have and one of the things that sell the most in our store.”

Stoneyard Distillery Tasting Room in Glenwood Springs

823 Grand Ave. Suite 100, Glenwood Springs, CO

Open Wednesday through Saturday, 2-8 p.m.

Reporter Shannon Marvel can be reached at 605-350-8355 or smarvel@postindependent.com.

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