Lolo Creek Distillery is closing without a final day on the calendar. Owners Matt and Kasie Grunow have announced that they will stop distilling and turn the Highway 12 property into a wedding and event center. The tasting room and online store stay open until the product runs out, and the owners have promised updates as stock gets low.
That means the distillery doesn't close all at once. Each bottle leaves on its own schedule, and some of them aren't really leaving. If you have a favorite pour, a gift card in a kitchen drawer, or a habit of stopping at 6610 Highway 12 W on the way home, your deadline depends on which of those you have.
No closing date, just less on the shelf
The Missoulian quoted the owners' social media post laying out the terms:
"For now, our tasting room and online store will remain open until we run out of product, and our Honey Huckleberry Vodka and Pink Lemonade Vodka will remain on liquor store shelves."
That sentence splits the lineup in two. Two vodkas will keep showing up at liquor stores. Everything else is sold where it's made, at the tasting room or through the online shop, and it's gone once the last case sells. The distillery's spirits page lists the full range.
| Spirit | What it is | After the sell-down |
|---|---|---|
| Honey Huckleberry Vodka | Huckleberry-flavored vodka | Stays on liquor store shelves |
| Pink Lemonade Vodka | Flavored vodka | Stays on liquor store shelves |
| Haunted Waters | Bourbon | Gone when tasting room and online stock runs out |
| Hucked | Huckleberry whiskey | Gone when tasting room and online stock runs out |
| Peached | Peach whiskey | Gone when tasting room and online stock runs out |
| Lolo Creek gin | Gin | Gone when tasting room and online stock runs out |
| Lolo Creek vodka | Unflavored vodka | Gone when tasting room and online stock runs out |
The online shop carries a Huckleberry Combo Pack alongside single bottles, and Pink Lemonade Vodka has already shown as sold out there. If a bottle matters to you, call before you drive out.
The newest gold medal is one of the bottles that goes
Hucked, the huckleberry whiskey, won a gold medal in The Fifty Best's 2025 flavored whiskey rankings. It's the distillery's most recent award, and it sits on the side of the list with no liquor store fallback.
Honey Huckleberry Vodka took gold in The Fifty Best's 2019 flavored vodka rankings, and it's one of the two that stay on store shelves. Haunted Waters, the bourbon, is the other spirit the distillery itself calls award-winning. It's a tasting-room bottle too.
So the 2019 medal winner stays easy to find for now. The 2025 winner and the bourbon have a limited window, and nobody knows how long it is. Anyone who wants a bottle of Hucked or Haunted Waters for a holiday table, a hunting camp, or a shelf of Montana-made spirits has to pick it up on Highway 12 or order it online before it's gone.
The spirits came out of a small operation. The distillery's own history dates the opening to April 2018. It describes the Grunows as a fourth-generation Lolo family in the liquor business and names Ryan Arthur as head distiller. The Missoulian describes the lineup as small-batch vodka, gin and whiskey made with Montana grains.
Gift cards only work in the tasting room
The distillery's homepage says its gift cards can be used only in the tasting room, for spirits, tastings and merchandise. They don't work at a liquor store, and nothing says they carry over to the steakhouse or the event center.
That gives gift cards the same deadline as the tasting-room-only bottles. The owners' post, as the Missoulian reported, asked customers to stop by the tasting room, stock up on favorite bottles and use their gift cards. A card that came in a stocking last December is worth the most this fall, while there's still plenty to spend it on.
Hours listed for the tasting room differ from one directory to the next, and the distillery's tasting room page doesn't list any. Call ahead before planning a stop around a specific time.
Where the Lolo Creek name stays
Three parts of the Lolo Creek name stay in town.
- Lolo Creek Steakhouse stays open. The Missoulian reports that the Grunow family owns it as well.
- Lolo Creek Event Center is what the distillery building becomes. The owners were booking weddings under that name a few weeks before the closing announcement, according to the Missoulian.
- Honey Huckleberry Vodka and Pink Lemonade Vodka stay on liquor store shelves.
What goes away is the room itself: a tasting room on Highway 12 where you could try a pour before buying a bottle. The building will still host celebrations, just a different kind.
The neighbor down the road
The distillery's closest partner in town has been the state park next door. Travelers' Rest State Park calls Lolo Creek Distillery a neighbor and says it mixed cocktails for a park event about the Lewis and Clark Expedition. The distillery is also on the park's list of 2026 sponsors. The distillery's own Find Us page points visitors to the Lewis and Clark Visitor Center nearby.
For anyone who paired a distillery stop with an afternoon at the park, the park's late-fall calendar still has two dates on it.
Saturday, October 31, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Travelers' Rest holds its 7th annual Corpse of Discovery Spooktacular on US 12. Entry is $5 per family or a nonperishable food donation for the local food bank. Activities include pumpkin bowling, a "post mortem petting zoo" and crafts, and costumes are encouraged. It's open to all ages.
November 1, 2026, through January 3, 2027. A Lewis and Clark history and art exhibit called The Grand Adventure Begins runs at the park. That covers the holidays, when out-of-town family arrives and needs somewhere to go on a gray afternoon.
Other evenings on the Lolo calendar
The distillery was one of several Lolo spots where you could spend an evening without driving into Missoula. The others have dates posted for November.
Lolo Peak Brewing Company at 6201 Brewery Way is hosting a Speed Puzzle Competition on Thursday, November 12, from 6 to 8 p.m. Teams of up to five pay $25 to enter.
Out Graves Creek Road, The Jack Saloon at 7000 Graves Creek Road has switched to winter hours. From Sunday through Thursday, the kitchen runs noon to 7 p.m. and the bar noon to 8 p.m. On Friday and Saturday, the kitchen runs noon to 9 p.m. and the bar stays open until midnight. Here's what's on its own calendar for the rest of the season:
- October 31: Chris Bohenek Duo and a Halloween party
- November 6: Karaoke
- November 7: The Benevolents
- November 14: Jeff Daniel's Band
- November 15: Louie Bond Duo
- November 20: Karaoke
- November 21: Cahoots
- November 25 and 26: Closed
- November 28: Northern Lights Band
Halloween is the busiest night of the stretch. You could start with pumpkin bowling at Travelers' Rest, take the kids trick-or-treating, then head to the Jack for the party. Before any of that, it's worth calling the distillery to see whether the bottle you want is still on the shelf.
Wanda Sumner at Bitterroot Valley Properties keeps track of changes like this one along the Highway 12 corridor. When a business becomes an event venue, the traffic, the weekends and the neighbors' schedules can all shift. If you own property near Lolo and want to know how changes like these affect its value, ask Wanda for a home valuation based on what's actually happening down the road.
