When you first walk through the doors at 20 Reilly Road you are greeted with a handshake and a hug.
“Then we ask where you’re from and if you’re looking for a unique experience and to create your own bottle,” Jeff Mattingly, CEO and founder of J. Mattingly 1845 Distillery, said.
The distillery opened its new Frankfort location in November 2023. Jeff started the company in 2010 after retiring from Toyota in 2009.
“I was sitting in the garage after retiring, thinking about what’s next?” Jeff said.
He recalled helping his father work while growing up in Mattingly, an unincorporated town in Breckenridge County, with his brothers.
“My brothers and I would take turns taking shots of his whiskey,” Jeff said about the breaks they would take while working with their dad. “We called it ‘bourbon 30.’”
That was his “ah-ha moment,” Jeff said. He did research to see if there was a company using the name “Bourbon 30,” and there wasn’t, so he secured the name and began marketing his new company with the slogan, “It’s that time” — time to relax and have fun, he said.
He started a clothing line and marketed his soon-to-hit-the-shelf bourbon at different events such as black-tie affairs and flea markets.
“It allowed me to pre-market and get my name out there,” Jeff said. “In 2016, Bourbon 30 hit the shelf.”
The next year, he started to research his family name and found a rich history of the Mattingly’s involvement in the bourbon industry.
“You can’t talk about the industry without the Mattinglys,” he said. “My (ancestors) John and Ben started Mattingly and Sons Distillery in 1845. There are references that say we are the first distillery, and other references say we are the second. We go with second.”
The family also has connections to some of the most prolific bourbon barons in the industry, including George Garvin Brown of Brown Forman, the Willett family and the Samuels family, with Margie Mattingly Samuels creating the iconic Maker’s Mark packaging, label, bottle shape and famous red wax, according to a press release.
Jeff operated his business out of Georgetown for a little bit, but eventually decided to market the business under the name J. Mattingly 1845 Distillery, and purchase the Frankfort property. The “J” in the business name, stands for his name, Jeff, and the 1845 “represents family heritage,” he said.
When developing his business plan, he called a variety of distilleries and discovered that by April of every year they were booked for barrel picks.
“When you do a barrel pick, you get three or four barrels to choose from,” Jeff said. “Another issue is that you had to purchase the entire barrel and it was limited to certain groups. People weren’t getting their bottles until six months or up to six years later.
“Why can’t anyone off the street come in and be their own blender and then walk out with their bottle?”
Guests have three different tasting opportunities when visiting J. Mattingly 1845, according to the distillery website. They are:
• Heritage Tasting Experience — Taste up to six different whiskies from J. Mattingly 1845, including the 90-proof and 100-proof bourbons that started it all, and the latest proprietary blends. But if you like something, you better grab a bottle of it, as the proprietary blends are made in very small batches and are custom creations by the in-house blending experts, never to be repeated. The cost of the Heritage Tasting Experience is $20 and it lasts about 20 minutes.
• Single Barrel Tasting Experience — This is the newest addition to the J. Mattingly 1845 Distillery guest adventure and it allows visitors to taste straight from seven barrels. Each barrel selected for the tasting has been carefully vetted by the expert blenders at J. Mattingly 1845, and has undergone the proprietary double-staving process, which adds charred staves to aging bourbon barrels twice during the blending process to create unmatched flavors. The cost of the Barrel Tasting Experience is $55 and it lasts 30 minutes.
• VIP Custom Bourbon Blending Experience — A bourbon connoisseur’s dream, this experience allows you to become a master blender for a day, choosing your own blend, bottle shape, custom label and even the wax color on the top. Starting with four pre-selected barrels, you will mix and blend the flavors under the expert guidance of the J. Mattingly 1845 Distillery team, then choose the other elements in the packaging and leave that day with your unique creation. No two bottles will ever be the same. The VIP Custom Blending Experience is $175 and takes approximately one hour. Additional bottles of your custom blend may be purchased for $120. Reservations are recommended for this experience.
“When we do a blend, we will not duplicate it or replicate it,” Jeff said. “Once a blend is done, it’s done.”
Helping to create the distilleries signature and proprietary blends is Jeff’s son, Cameron Mattingly, who also serves as vice president of the company.
“We understand each other’s pallets,” Jeff said. “If he comes up with a blend, I can understand where he’s coming from.”
Jeff said not all of Cameron’s blends are blends that he would necessarily create, but that Cameron has the ability to reach the pallets of other generations.
“Younger generations like grainy and sweet blends, where my generation wants to chew on it for a bit,” he said.
Cameron is a 2018 graduate of Martha Layne Collins High School. He played baseball at Spaulding University. While in high school, he took culinary classes, which was the start of his love for cooking.
“Then, I fell in love with blending with dad in Georgetown,” Cameron said. “And, I made a connection between food and bourbon. There is a lot of blending with bourbon. It’s a mental connection — the texture mixed with the nose and the pallet. It takes you on a journey.”
Jeff said their bourbon tells a story.
“It coincides with the names on the bottle like Hayride and Cherry Popper,” Jeff said. “We smell it, taste it and tell a story with it.”
They also create blends to raise money for charities. Earlier this year they created Combat Infantry Badge (CIB) Bourbon. Combat Infantry Badges are awarded to Army enlisted infantry, or special forces officers, in the grade of Colonel or below who were engaged in active ground combat, according to a press release. Each year J. Mattingly 1845 Distillery donates a portion of the sales of the CIB bottles to a military-related nonprofit. This year’s recipient is Forgotten Coast K9, a nonprofit organization that helps provide service dogs to veterans and first responders with the mission to stop suicide in those communities by getting them the service dogs they need.
“The 2024 CIB bourbon was aged for 6½ years and bottled at 116-proof. It has a smokey, brown sugar and banana nose with hints of sweet tobacco and baking spices. On the palate, expect banana, oak and brown sugar forward, with leathery oak on the mid palate and a finish of sweet tobacco and baking spices,” according to the press release.
They have also given back to humane societies, breast cancer research, cerebral palsy research, Ronald McDonald House, local police departments, Kentucky State Police and more.
“For a company of this size, we have been blessed to give back to those organizations,” Jeff said. “We appreciate the fact that people buy these bottles. Not everyone has the money for these bottles. When we write a check for these organizations, if we could write everyone’s name on that check, we would. We are honored that people trust us enough to buy a bottle that we created.”
As for the future of the company, Jeff has plans for growth. He has purchased 122 acres in Bagdad where he plans to build a distillery, rick houses and gift shops. And, he knows Cameron is on board for the long haul.
“Once I’m done and gone, I know Cameron is going to take it to a different level,” Jeff said.
As for when your experience at the distillery ends for the day, Jeff hopes that you don’t leave as a guest, but that you leave as family who he will see again.
“Bourbon brought us together, but it’s no longer about the bourbon,” Jeff said. “It’s about getting to know you and building a relationship.”
J. Mattingly 1845 Distillery’s operating hours are Monday–Saturday 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday noon–6 p.m. Walk-ins are welcome for the tasting experiences, but reservations are suggested for the VIP Custom Bourbon Blending Experience. The distillery is located at 20 Reilly Road. For more information, visit jmattingly1845.com.
