2024 A Lesson in Lemonade

Here we are, nearly complete with the first quarter and I am just now completing our end of year review. I have spent weeks trying to organize my thoughts, writing and rewriting in effort to capture the essence of the year’s experiences on paper. I am not going to be able to, it was too hard, and it’s not over yet. In running a small business I find myself in a constant battle between transparency (which feels good) and privacy (which feels necessary). It’s a delicate balance that I am not sure anyone can do perfectly, but I think it’s important to try.

Nick had the worst year of his life. It isn’t my story to tell, but as his partner in life and business I can say that whether the challenges were personal or professional, what we have increasingly found is that as a small business owner the dignity of separation in these areas is often denied.

I was really sick this fall.  I chose to have surgery to try to improve my quality of life, ended up getting sepsis, and spent more than 6 weeks in the hospital, with months of intensive recovery. If you are reading this as a friend and feeling affronted, please know that we told no one. Only a handful of family knew everything, and staff knew I was hospitalized ( a few of you extra astute folks who read between the lines of the Maneo release message also suspected). Looking back, not being more open was a mistake, but in the moment when there was so little we could control, privacy felt like the one thing we could. We truly didn’t know how things were going to shake out and my condition had a lot of back and forth; we didn’t want people to worry.

This was the unfortunate finale to a year of considerable hardships. It truly seemed like we were drowning in circumstances we couldn’t control.  Sometimes it felt like the very studs of the building were fighting against us. We are however, still here. Our smiles are strained, we are tired. But, we made it.
As has always been the case in this business, every hardship brought opportunity. Every lesson, though hard-won, was still something gained. I am grateful even for the hard times, because it certainly beats the alternative. Growth is hard personally and professionally, but the ultimate lesson derived from all of this is I can handle it, the other more important lesson is I can’t do it alone, and I don’t have to.

There are many people who have been integral to the wheels staying on this thing last year. My associate distiller Jake and assistant distiller Trey held down the fort entirely in production. Neither was fully trained to do the job, but they stepped up and nearly seamlessly got shit done, they were patient while I gave disjointed and scrambled direction from a hospital bed, and problem solved to keep my involvement to the bare minimum. The business would have been dead in the water without this. Katie, as usual, has been quietly indispensable. If you have had a smooth and pleasant experience in the last year at the business, it was due to her calculated efforts. She lifted weight from Nick’s shoulders professionally so he could help care for his family.  Corwin, an ace-in-the-hole so many times for us, stepped up and provided relief in many areas, always up for any job, and a friend during a time of isolation. Jamie and Mary Jeanne, thank you for the biggest contributions of all, likely no one will ever know what you have done, but I’ll never forget. Thank you to ALL of our staff members, it was a year of change and uncertainty and you handled it with grace and optimism. Thank you to all of our patrons who through supporting the business and simple normal kindness in this little community kept us focused on what really matters and gave us a reason to continue when things seemed too hard.

Despite all the adversity, 2024 held some significant wins. Production capability expanded and allowed us to hire Trey, our newest distiller. In summer we released the first product independent of me; Jake developed a beautiful herbal liqueur, Amara Pira. We began statewide distribution and will continue to expand this in the next 3-5 years. Fall also brought the release of our first distiller’s series product, Maneo Mel. Whiskey was also a winner this year, with two new product lines developed and in maturation, and even more in store for the next year.

2025 has started out with more challenges. We will face them, but this time I think we will share them.
 
Geri Lefebre