This isn’t about the cable show (which I haven’t seen) but the ads for it did get me to wondering. What are the economics of making moonshine?
Okay, you’ve got a still and you’re making illegal alcohol. Where’s your market? Prohibition’s over so you’re competing against commercial alcohol. Is the selling point supposed to be that your product is cheaper than the commercial stuff? That may be true, but I’d think the quality is lower and commercial booze isn’t all that expensive. Are there really a bunch of people out there drinking moonshine just to save a couple of bucks over what they’d pay at the liquor store?
My, uh, friend has a little stove-top still. He uses it to make stuff for his own consumption (and visitors). It’s not an economic thing at all, it’s more like a hobby. You can play around and create things for fun.
As for real moonshiners, I’m sure they can make it a good bit cheaper than what’s commercially available since they don’t have liquor tax on it. Out in the boondocks where it might be a long drive to a store with cheap booze, there’s more of a market. You’re probably not going to get rich with a backyard still, but you can probably come out in the black.
And I wouldn’t say the homemade stuff is necessarily lower quality. If you put enough care into it, you can make some good stuff.
I suspect the attraction of moonshine lies mostly in the novelty factor. However, the expenses involved in making it aren’t really very much…grain, sugar, water, yeast, fruit (if you’re making brandy). Stills can be built pretty cheaply. Taking away the multiple taxes and the expense of meeting legal requirements for processing, the actual cost of producing a gallon of booze is pretty low. I suppose a moonshiner could sell for, say, 2/3 of retail price and still make a tidy profit.
SS
A good moonshiner makes his product smooth as a baby’s bottom. It’s really good stuff. However, it’s not what you’d call commercial, exactly. It’s made in small batches and doesn’t have mass-market appeal - not something you make a living on.
Back when I was 18 (10 years ago) I investigated making moonshine. In Australia making moonshine is illegal but apparently no one has been convicted for making it for their only use. You can legally buy a still of 5 litres or less, as long as it’s not for alcohol. A local “Home Brew Beer” shop sold these, along with everything else you’d need to distill alcohol. You could also buy a 25 litre boiling pot, which conveniently had the same size top as the still so you could switch tops and have a 25 litre still (if it wasn’t illegal). A total basic set up would probably cost you between $400-$800 depending on size.
You’d start with 8 kg of sugar ($8) mixed with water to make 25 litres. Then you’d add a packet of yeast with nutrients ($7-8). You mix it all up and wait for a few weeks. Once the yeast was finished, you’d put the stuff in a still. It would take most of a day to distill. It would normally come out around 80%. You’d cut it with water so it was 40% and then add liquid charcoal ($7). Then you’d run it through a filter of hard charcoal (less than $1) which would take another day or so. At the end you’d have a flavourless alcohol. Total cost would be around $22-23 and if everything went alright you’d make about 8 litres. At the time a 0.75 litre bottle of cheap vodka was around $22 on special.
At the time I was investigating it the only place you could legally distill at home was New Zealand.