Exclusive Interview November 2019
Q: What is your full name, title, company name and company location?
Dave McConnell, Co-Founder
Sam Pierce, Co-Founder
Graham Hamblett, Master Distiller
Three of Strong Spirits
35B Diamond Street, Portland, Maine 04101
Q: What inspired you and your business partner to get into the spirits industry and why rum?
Dave: I have been a lawyer for the past twenty-five years and many of my clients have been craft breweries and others connected with food and beverage businesses, so I knew something about the regulatory framework going in and I also really like the people working in this space. But the simple answer is just that I really love rum. When my youngest daughter went to college, it seemed like the right time to take the leap and I couldn’t think of a better person to jump into this than with my good friend, Sam, who shares my passion for rum. Sam’s family was actually making rum in Massachusetts in the 18th century and importing rum, through the S.S. Pierce Company, beginning in 1831.
Q: Where did you gain your knowledge about the spirits industry and in particular, rum?
Dave: Sam and I both have experience behind the bar, although that was a very long time ago. And as our wives pointed out to us early on, we know how to drink rum but we don’t know how to make rum. So some of the most important work that we did was to find and hire an outstanding distiller and bar manager. We also talked with many, many people in the industry who were very generous with their time. Last, but certainly not least, we did a lot of reading and I was lucky enough to experience Rum University – a fantastic week in Louisville that you and Luis run in connection with Moonshine U.
Three of Strong
Q: Your company has a very catchy name with an interesting story. What inspired you to call it “Three of Strong”?
Dave: The name is derived from a colonial-era rum punch recipe – “One of sour, two of sweet, three of strong and four of weak.” We wanted to call out to Maine’s long history of rum-making and to the spirit of gathering people around the punch bowl. Plus, that recipe makes a really good cocktail and we always have a daily punch on offer in the tasting room!
Q: Every distillery has its challenges, from sourcing goods, building/designing the distillery to the development of the tasting room. What has been your biggest challenge so far?
Sam: Even though it took fifteen months to go from concept to execution, we generally feel that the time of time spent researching and designing our concepts was well spent and not excessive. But you are absolutely right that there are challenges along the way. Most of ours originally came from the limited industry knowledge base that Dave and I had at the start. We were asked a number of questions during the build-out that we struggled to answer and that influenced our timeline in the beginning stages. However, those initial challenges were fixed almost immediately when we hired Graham to help consult with the build-out of the space, in advance of him starting full time in April. Even though Dave and I acknowledged that we had a lot to learn, there is a big difference between knowing that and finding the right answers.
Three Strong Distillery
Q: As we all know, water is extremely important in the spirits industry from fermentation to proofing down alcohol. Where are you sourcing your water and why did you choose this particular location?
Graham: We knew from the beginning that we’re lucky enough to have an excellent source for the water supply in our city, coming from the beautiful Sebago Lake. We did have a plan in place to install a Reverse Osmosis (RO) water treatment system, but we were able to determine that was un-necessary. There was the concern of removing the added Chlorine since it is a municipal water supply, so to mitigate that we ended up installing a carbon filtration unit and that was enough to make the perfect water for our spirits.
Q: What rums are you currently producing?
Sam: Our three starting spirits are Brightwater, Stone Pier and Parchando 12.
- Brightwater is our silver rum, which we released for the first time in August 2019. It is distilled using organic evaporated cane juice and organic fancy grade molasses. We are very pleased with this product being the first one that was exclusively distilled on Diamond Street in Portland.
- Stone Pier is a 50/50 blend of our Brightwater Rum and a five year aged rum from Casa Santana in Baranquilla, Colombia.
- Parchando 12 is the Colombian rum cousin of the Three of Strong family as it is a 12 year aged rum that was aged in ex-Bourbon barrels at Casa Santana and imported in bulk by Three of Strong.
Both Stone Pier and Parchando are products that use at least some rum that we sourced from Casa Santana in Barranquilla, Colombia which we imported as a result of our getting our tasting room license to operate the same day as our production license. We were thrilled with their offerings when we went down to visit them, but we also even more enthralled with their commitment to producing rum with “nothing between the cane and the glass.”
Three Strong Rums
Q: Your rum, Parchando 12, has a very interesting name. Can you tell us more about it?
Dave: On the Caribbean coast of Colombia, “parchando” is a slang term that means hanging out with family and close friends. Since that is exactly how we like to enjoy this rum, we thought it was the perfect name for this beautiful rum.
Three Strong Molasses
Q: You use molasses and evaporated cane syrup to ferment your rum. Why did you decide to combine the two?
Graham: For our Silver Rum (Brightwater), we collectively all wanted to create a Rhum Agricole style spirit, so to start we focused on using just Evaporated Cane Juice (ECJ), but after many small batch trials we found the addition of molasses not only made for a more dynamic rum, it also made for a healthier fermentation by adding micronutrients and stabilizing the pH. We wanted to create a spirit that showcased the base material and yeast selection… a sort of rum eau de vie. The blend of the two ingredients allowed us to build a rum that has the earthy, grassy notes of cane juice but also sweet, dark fruitiness of the molasses. I also prefer to avoid using carbon to finish spirit since it removes the desirable nuances along with the not-so-desirable, so to depend on aging in oak to then remove color (and flavor) by carbon treatment was out of the question. For our aged rum we opted for 100% Fancy Molasses as the base to create a spirit robust enough to balance with the oak.
Q: Where are your products currently available for purchase?
Sam: We are currently only offering our products in Maine, as we wanted to establish a strong home base for our products before going afield. That said, we are currently exploring distribution opportunities beyond our home state.
Q: Do you have plans to produce additional rums?
Sam: We do indeed! In the next two weeks, we will be offering our Merrymeeting Spiced Rum, which we expect will be a great product to offer when the weather turns cold here in Maine. Following that, we expect to fill out our rum portfolio with a few other spirits, while also experimenting with some exciting current R&D projects. We will eventually go beyond rum, but it will always be our core product.
One of Sour....
Q: Do you offer tours and tastings at your distillery? Are reservations recommended/required?
Dave: Yes, we do. Anyone interested in a tour can shoot us an email – info@threeofstrongspirits.com – to set up a time for a visit. We can also arrange private events. In fact, we have a purpose-built function room for just that purpose.
Q: Can you tell us a bit about what a customer will experience when they arrive at your distillery?
Dave: We have a really relaxed vibe at Three of Strong Spirits. People (and dogs) are often hanging out on our deck and it’s an outside/inside feeling with our glass overhead doors – most often in the open position when the weather is nice. We try to greet everyone personally and help them feel at home – whether they are already a rum fan or simply rum curious – and we also have a small kitchen cranking out upscale comfort food to complement our cocktail program.
Q: What are some of your most popular drinks you serve at the bar? And which one would you say is your favorite and why?
Dave: First-time visitors often start with a “known quantity” - the Old Fashioned or a classic Daiquiri, for example – before branching out into some of our other offerings. While it’s hard for me to pick a favorite, right now I am loving a sour that our Beverage Director, Crystal Pomerleau, created to showcase our Stone Pier blended rum. The silky texture of the egg white is such a fabulous counterpoint to the clean and bracing flavor profile of this cocktail!
Q: If people want to contact you, how may they reach you?
Dave: Email is the best way to reach us – info@threeofstrongspirits.com – but people should feel free to drop by anytime we are open. We love talking rum!
Q: Is there anything else you would like to share with our readers?
Dave: Anyone reading “Got Rum?” already likes rum, so I don’t have to make that argument. However, I would urge everyone to go beyond what you already know that you enjoy to try something new. If you love funky pot-stilled rum, try some clean, column-stilled rums. If you like your rums with some sugar added after distillation, try some drier rums without any dosage. Check out some aged rums with unique barrel profiles. The thing that I love most about rum is the wide range of expressions. There is always something new to discover!
Margaret: Again Dave, thank you so much for this interview and I wish you and your team much success.
Dave: Thank you, Margaret. It has been a real pleasure. If your travels ever take you to Maine, I hope that you and Luis will stop by for a drink and a chat!
Cheers!
Margaret Ayala, Publisher
