"I paid my local distillery a visit today and got me a couple of rubber bungs that are pre-drilled for an airlock. I asked him about the VABC's approval rate for micro distillers and it wasn't pretty. He basically told me that they won't grant you a distiller's license for drinking alcohol unless they can make a minimum of $10,000 dollars in profit per year. He also said that if he knew how much crap he'd have to go through back then, he would've stayed where I am at now and got the fuel alcohol license from the VABC. Yes they do have one. My VABC agent said that you must put ""Fuel Alcohol"" on the application and there's no bond or sample required for it either. My VABC agent also left out some information to. He didn't tell me that I would have to do a presentation to get distribution in the state of VA. They're making it too hard for the little guy to get started basically. Now imo, he didn't spend his money too wisely on his distilling equipment either. He spent $7K on his 30 gallon pot still. It's a nice still mind you, but you can get a tower and a closed top stainless steel barrel for alot less than that just by going to Brewhaus and the following website:

http://www.bubbasbarrels.com/

So I'm going to get the fuel distiller's license from the VABC when I get enough money saved up."