Describe your business.
Dan Pettit: Azzurre Spirits is a unique ultra-premium vodka and gin brand made with no artificial ingredients. Typically, vodkas and gins are distilled from grains or potatoes and therefore require multiple distillations or filtrations, whereas Azzurre is minimally distilled to preserve the true character of the spirit.
Who are your customers?
Angela Pettit: We feel like Azzurre’s customers are fit, fun and full of life. Our customers care about quality. We’re also popular among bartenders and mixologists; the flavor of the spirit they choose affects the quality of their drinks.
What’s it like being business partners with family?
DP: Being business partners with my daughter is special, and I love having Angela there for support and to lean on when making business decisions. It is exciting to see her grow in her career and be able to share this with her.
AP: Being business partners with my dad is fun, easy and rewarding. I’m lucky to be able to learn from such a successful businessman.
Why did you decide to use fruits and sugar cane in your product instead of wheat or grains?
DP: After researching the different methods involved in making vodka, and trying to figure out why new companies are doing more distillations or more filtering, a solution dawned on us. Other brands were distilling and filtering their spirits more to remove something they didn’t want. Our research demonstrated that a blend of apples, grapes and sugar cane would yield a smooth, and also gluten-free, product. We also use Alembic stills to finish the product, which yields a higher quality than can be achieved with large-volume column stills.
AP: My background is in fitness, and I care a great deal, like many others, about what I put into my body. Fruits are a cleaner core ingredient and by not using corn, we are staying away from GMOs.
Do you plan to open physical store in the future?
DP: Yes, that is in the works.
What’s the most important part of your job?
DP: The most important part of our job is to keep everything moving in the right direction. This entails coordinating the sales, legal and production efforts, and making sure we are proactively looking for new outlets and ways to get our product placed.
AP: It’s important to convey to customers that vodka and gin don’t have to be so rough. There is a way to enjoy a clean, smooth spirit that you don’t have to cover up with juices and syrups.
What is the hardest part about doing business in Las Vegas?
DP: Trying to get Azzurre into the largest stores, restaurants, hotels, etc., is not impossible, but very difficult to do when up against larger producers and products.
What is the best part about doing business here?
AP: We are able to connect with our local market and promote within the community, which makes it great to have our business based here. We like to support local businesses, events and mixologists.