A True Taste of Tennessee
Still Rising
One family name. Eleven generations. Four Tennessee locations. A year spent proving the bet — fast, loud, and full.
Tennessee Hills Distillery · Jonesborough · Johnson City · Bristol, TN
Chapter 01
A letter from Stephen Callahan
A year ago, Jessica and I weren’t sure what our first full calendar year in Bristol would look like.
Now we know.
It looked like 107,000 people walking through our doors across four locations. It looked like Gold and Double Gold medals from competitions that don’t hand them out easy. And it looked like November 22nd, when we threw a one-year anniversary party and ran out of ribs in under two hours (still not sure if that’s impressive or embarrassing). The Vols beat the hell out of Florida that day. Our garage door broke. Nobody seemed to mind. The place was packed from open to close, and Cam, Troy, and Sam ran every tour like their boots were on fire. Cass, Jenny, and Lauren ran up the score.
That’s what this year felt like. Fast, loud, and full.
The spirits world showed us some love in 2025, too. Our Cask Strength Bourbon took Gold at both the John Barleycorn Awards and the American Distilling Institute. Our Madeira Bourbon earned Double Gold. And the Lavender Lemon RTD, the one Jessica pushed us to make when I wasn’t sure about it, won Double Gold too. She was right. Again. And Jason brought his A-game like always.
Awards don’t define the work, but they validate the hours. And they say something about the people behind them: we make good spirits and craft beer because we care. Here’s to Danny and Jake.
What I’m most proud of, though, is what happened outside the still house. We partnered with over 12 organizations to benefit the community this year. Toy drives for kids at Niswonger Children’s Hospital. Adoption events with Sullivan County Animal Shelter. Fundraising for Hurricane Helene relief. Specialty cocktails to support Isaiah House children’s programs. In 2020, we bottled thousands of bottles of hand sanitizer during COVID, and that instinct never left us. We didn’t build this distillery to be separate from the community. We built it to be part of it.
Looking ahead, 2026 is already moving. Our TN250 Wheated Tennessee Whiskey, Tennessee’s only official distillery-produced spirit for the America 250th anniversary, launches this spring. The Helix Society membership is opened. A 12-night music series with the city of Bristol and ETSU starts building toward the 1927 centennial of the original Bristol Sessions, which made Bristol the Birthplace of Country Music. That kind of growth’s earned, not rushed.
Thanks for being part of what we’re building up here. It means more than you know.
Hope to see you on The Hill,
Stephen Callahan · Founder & President · Tennessee Hills Distillery
Chapter 02
By the Numbers
A snapshot of what Tennessee Hills built, poured, and gave back in 2025.
Scale & Impact
across all locations
across four Tennessee locations
in East Tennessee in 2025
in the new flagship Bristol campus
privately-owned brewstillery
over the next five years
Tennessee’s strong business climate and skilled workforce continue to ensure success among companies like Tennessee Hills Distillery.”— Gov. Bill Lee
Community & Experience
hosted in 2025
by our visitors in 2025
by our visitors in 2025
in state and local taxes
supported in 2025
for TN250 Whiskey
Chapter 03
Our First Year
in Bristol
On a Saturday in late November, with a busted garage door and the Vols beating Florida on every screen in the building, Tennessee Hills celebrated one year in Bristol the only way that made sense. Packed house. Free tours from open to close.
A crowd that was alive through cocktail specials, live music from Leana Carter, and a rack-of-ribs deal that sold out before most people finished their first pour. It was one day. But it told the whole story of a year spent proving that Bristol was the right bet.
Tennessee Hills opened its 55-acre Bristol campus off Highway 11 West in November 2024. By the end of 2025, more than 55,000 visitors had come through that single location. Over 160,000 walked through Tennessee Hills properties across East Tennessee. Governor Bill Lee and TNECD Commissioner Stuart McWhorter formally recognized the expansion and its promise of manufacturing jobs and experiential tourism in Sullivan County. State legislators from both chambers backed it publicly.
The year between opening and anniversary wasn’t quiet. Tennessee Hills partnered with Mitch Walters to give away a fully customized Tennessee Hills Indian Motorcycle in a campaign to raise support for Camp Friendship, turning a sweepstakes into a charitable engine. When Major League Baseball brought the Speedway Classic to Bristol Motor Speedway, Tennessee Hills hosted the pre-party, complete with custom Tennessee Hills baseball jerseys that turned the parking lot into a brand moment before the first pitch. And in December, the company launched its inaugural Christmas Market on the Hill — three days, 25-plus local vendors, fire pits, a Santa appearance, and enough foot traffic to earn coverage from regional news outlets. A new holiday tradition planted in year one.
But Bristol is only one corner of a four-location operation that stretches across the Appalachian Highlands. It started in Jonesborough, Tennessee’s oldest town, where Stephen and Jessica Callahan founded the original distillery in 2014 inside a 180-year-old Salt House. Twenty minutes east, the Tennessee Hills Brewstillery pours craft beers and spirits in the heart of a college town, steps from the ETSU campus and positioned at the center of the West Walnut Street Corridor Redevelopment Plan — a $33–41 million four-year project to revitalize the area connecting ETSU and downtown Johnson City.
And in May 2025, the company acquired Watauga Lake Winery, a property that sits on Copperhead Road, the stretch of pavement Steve Earle turned into one of Tennessee’s official state songs and a recognized state monument. The road that once ran moonshine will now display a Tennessee Hills sign.
Looking ahead, the Bristol campus is still growing. A 35,000-square-foot automated distilling and packaging facility is up and running, along with the 20,000-square-foot former National College building converted into corporate headquarters and event spaces. Forty-five new jobs committed over the next five years. Plans for a museum honoring the tangled histories of Tennessee whiskey, NASCAR, and the music born on State Street.
Now, the stills are lit. The doors are open. And Bristol is just getting started.
Chapter 04
Awards & Innovation
The Craft
Most distilleries that win Gold have been at it for decades. Tennessee Hills has been at it for eleven years.
Cask Strength Bourbon
Gold — John Barleycorn Awards & American Distilling Institute
Gold at two of the most respected competitions in American spirits, in the same cycle.
Madeira Bourbon
Double Gold — John Barleycorn Awards
A cask-finished expression aged in Portuguese wine barrels.
Lavender Lemon RTD
Double Gold — John Barleycorn Awards
The one Jessica pushed for. Proof Tennessee Hills competes across categories.
Wheated Vodka
ADI Shortlist — Best Vodka Martini Base
Shortlisted alongside nationally distributed brands whose budgets dwarf the entire operation.
Bottled Gold
Built to Grow
What makes the run notable isn’t the medal count. It’s the range. Cask strength bourbon. Cask-finished whiskey. A ready-to-drink cocktail. And a vodka, too. Four different product types, all recognized in the same competition cycle, all produced on the same East Tennessee campus by the same small crew. That doesn’t happen by accident. It happens when the people behind the still care more about what’s in the glass than what’s on the label.
The philosophy hasn’t changed since the Salt House: if it doesn’t belong in the glass, it doesn’t get a label. Seasonal and limited releases pushed that standard further — the Peppermint and Pumpkin Pie Cream Liqueurs sold out within weeks of hitting shelves, while Port and Sauternes cask finishes neared maturity and tested what a young East Tennessee distillery could attempt with barrel experimentation.
More than three hundred barrels sit aging in East Tennessee right now. What that means is that the best bottles from Tennessee Hills aren’t even behind the bar yet. They’re still in the wood.
The Team Behind It
The team grew sharper in 2025. Jake Terry, an experienced head brewer from Terrapin and White Labs, was promoted to Chief Operating Officer, bringing institutional production discipline to a company scaling fast. Cody Ryans joined as Chief Marketing Officer, charged with operationalizing the brand, building the digital infrastructure, and optimizing the experiential marketing engine that will carry Tennessee Hills beyond superregional status.
And in the Bristol kitchen, Jenny Cecunjanin and the BBQ program turned the Smokestillery into a culinary destination of its own, pairing spirits with house-smoked meats under the same roof. The campus in Bristol is more than a distillery with a restaurant attached — it’s a full craft beverage and culinary operation, built to grow.
Chapter 05
Building the
Next Generation
Most distilleries train their own people. Tennessee Hills is training the people of the region and beyond.
In partnership with East Tennessee State University, Tennessee Hills helped build a Brewing and Distillation Studies Minor that puts students inside a working commercial facility. Students learn grain-to-glass production in the same space where award-winning spirits are made. The curriculum connects academic science to craft application, and graduates walk out with skills the industry is actively hiring for.
The founders’ ties to higher education run personal, too. Stephen and Jessica Callahan are both alumni and active board members at Emory & Henry University, adding a second institutional relationship rooted in service, not sponsorship. This partnership will result in the first-ever E&H licensed spirits product: the Emory & Henry 1836 Founder’s Edition Single-Barrel Bourbon, in late summer 2026.
Looking ahead to 2026, that academic partnership will produce something the whole state will hear: a 12-night music series co-produced by the city of Bristol, ETSU’s Appalachian Music Collective, and Tennessee Hills — every third Friday from May 2026 through May 2027, building toward the centennial of the 1927 Bristol Sessions, the recordings that gave birth to country music on State Street.
Workforce. Scholarship. Cultural preservation. Two universities. One distillery that treats education like infrastructure, not a line item.
“Our mission is to shine a spotlight on East Tennessee. That starts with welcoming the next generation of entrepreneurs as they walk through our doors and learn the craft firsthand.”Stephen Callahan
Chapter 06
Roots Run Deep
In the spring of 2020, when hand sanitizer disappeared from every shelf in East Tennessee, Tennessee Hills shut down spirits production and bottled thousands of units for the community. No one asked them to. No contract. No reimbursement.
That instinct didn’t go away when the shelves restocked. It just found new directions. In 2025, Tennessee Hills supported more than a dozen organizations across the region. When Sullivan County Animal Shelter needed visibility for its adoption program, Tennessee Hills hosted an event at the Bristol campus that drew families and earned WJHL coverage. The Bridge Home Animal Shelter set up Christmas trees at all three locations, collecting supplies for their operations. Adoption days brought dogs and families together in tasting rooms instead of kennels.
The reach extended to kids, veterans, and families in crisis. A holiday toy drive for Niswonger Children’s Hospital collected gifts for children spending Christmas in hospital rooms. Camp Friendship and The Boys & Girls Club received direct support. Donations went to Purple Hearts and Combat Veterans organizations across the Tri-Cities. When Hurricane Helene tore through the region in October 2024, the team raised funds for affected families through the first half of 2025.
Tennessee Hills also worked to benefit Isaiah House, a non-profit providing a safe, comforting home for children removed from their families, donating a portion of every pour sold. For the PROTO Club, a foundation building college pathways for underserved families, the team showed up to bartend the fundraiser and donated all the product. No invoice. No branding. Just labor and love for a cause that needed both.
More than twelve organizations. One principle: the community that supports you deserves a distillery that shows up when it counts.
Chapter 07
A Community Gathers
in the Hills
Over one hundred and fifty. That’s how many events and activations Tennessee Hills hosted across its locations in 2025 — nearly one every other day for twelve straight months.
Tours, tastings, private parties, live music nights, Jeep Nights, car shows, competitions, festivals, fundraisers, community nights, and countless professional industry gatherings. Most craft distilleries run 20 or 30 events a year at most. The Tennessee Hills experience operates on a different clock. The signature moments tell a bigger story — the story of a once-small distillery that eventually became a gathering place for an entire region.
Reggae, Wine & Shine returned for its fourth year at the Johnson City Brewstillery, bringing authentic live reggae, craft spirits, wine tastings, food trucks, and a vendor marketplace to an outdoor crowd that continues to grow substantially year over year. What started as an experiment in blending Appalachian craft culture with Caribbean rhythm is becoming a regional summer tradition.
Inspired by German Christmas markets Stephen and Jessica attended in years past, the inaugural Christmas Market on the Hill ran three days at the Bristol campus in December. Twenty-five local vendors. Fire pits and heaters. Santa on Friday and Saturday nights. Hot chocolate and spiced cider outside, cocktails and tours inside. Regional news covered it. Families showed up in numbers that surprised even the team. A new holiday anchor, planted in year one.
The cultural footprint stretched further than that. Tennessee Hills was selected to host a qualifying round for Tennessee Songwriters Week, connecting the Bristol campus directly to Nashville’s music infrastructure through the Tennessee Entertainment Commission. The statewide Tennessee Distillers’ Guild held its August meeting at the Bristol facility — a nod to Tennessee Hills’ growing role as an industry convener. Legendary YouTube fishing creator Jon B. brought his audience to The Hill for a visit that signaled the brand’s crossover reach well beyond spirits circles. And in December, the campus hosted a major fundraising event, drawing decision-makers and regional leadership to a facility that had been open barely a year.
No two events looked the same, but the through line across all 150+ is that each participant was able to experience A True Taste of Tennessee.
Tennessee Hills doesn’t wait for people to find it. Rather, it gives them a reason to show up.
Chapter 08
Looking Ahead
The stills don’t stop. Neither does the plan.
Launched February 2026
Goo Goo Cluster Cream Liqueur
Two Tennessee heritage brands, one bottle. A collaboration with Standard Candy, the Nashville company that invented America’s first combination candy bar in 1912. Rum-based, made with real dairy, layered with caramel, marshmallow nougat, roasted peanut flavors, and milk chocolate. Tennessee Hills’ second permanent cream liqueur flavor offers, still, A True Taste of Tennessee.
Launched March 2026
TN250 Wheated Tennessee Whiskey
Tennessee Hills was selected as the only distillery in the state to produce an official spirits release for Tennessee’s American semiquincentennial celebration. The result is believed to be the first ever commercial Straight Wheated Tennessee Whiskey: grain-to-glass, 100% Tennessee sourced, charcoal-mellowed through sugar maple. One family name. Eleven generations. Their first Tennessee Whiskey.
Member launch party · May 9, 2026
The Helix Society
Tennessee Hills’ membership program opens. Exclusive quarterly releases hand-selected by Stephen. Private events. A dedicated member space in Bristol. Early access to everything before the public sees it.
May 2026 – May 2027
Bristol Sessions
A 12-night music series with the city of Bristol and ETSU’s Appalachian Music Collective. Every third Friday, building toward the centennial of the 1927 Bristol Sessions — the recordings that gave birth to country music. Heritage preserved through live music and storytelling, not just memory.
July 18, 2026
The Salt House Turns 10
A decade at the place where it all began. The Salt House in Jonesborough — Tennessee’s oldest town and first state capital — is where Stephen and Jessica Callahan founded Tennessee Hills at age 26, renovating a Civil War-era building that once guarded the region’s most precious commodity. Voted the region’s best distillery and the #1 tourist destination in Jonesborough, the Salt House has greeted hundreds of thousands of guests. The anniversary bash is held in partnership with Bridge Home Shelter, a local nonprofit rescuing homeless and owner-released cats and dogs.
If the year 2025 solidified the foundation, 2026 puts the name on the map.
