Woody Creek Distillers was founded in 2012 in Basalt, Colorado, in the Roaring Fork Valley near Aspen, by engineers Pat Scanlan and Mark Kleckner; Scanlan co-owns it with his wife, Mary. The founders set out to make potato vodka from Rio Grande and Stobrawa potatoes grown on the Scanlan family farm near Woody Creek, the town the distillery is named for. They turned a former furniture store into the distillery and fitted it with custom stills built by CARL in Germany. The distillery went on to make rye whiskey and bourbon from Colorado-grown grain, and it says it never uses neutral grain spirits or blends in spirit from other distillers. The company is family-owned and led by CEO Mary Scanlan, with actor William H. Macy as a partner.