Valley's vodka king wins high honor
By Kenneth L. Ross, Business Editor
The rebirth of the spirit world makes Paul J. Kozub a renaissance man.
The Hadley man's V-One Vodka has been on the market for less than two years, but it already has won a top prize in an international competition and distribution is expanding into Connecticut.
Kozub's creation won one of only about 10 gold medals at a blind taste test conducted last month at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition.
It was the second year in the competition, for V-One, a product of Valley Vodka Inc. His first entry, submitted only a few months after the vodka was introduced won a silver medal.
"There were 700 different spirits entered in all categories of the competition," Kozub said. "V-One was one of just a few of the 200 vodkas to win a top prize."
He notes that in the world of unflavored vodkas, there were 50 or so brands on the market 10 years ago - and about 500 today.
In fact, vodka dominates the spirits industry, according to the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States, accounting for almost 27 percent of distilled spirits sold in the the country. That's more than 45,000 nine-liter cases and more than $3.5 billion in gross revenues.
The ultra-premium category, into which V-One falls, is growing in double-digit percentages each year. V-One competes with such brands as Grey Goose, Belvedere and Chopin. V-One retails for $22 to $28 for a 750 milliliter bottle.
"It's the rise of the cocktail culture," Kozub says. "Some local restaurants and bars offer more than 50 kinds of martinis."
He said 95 percent of V-One sales are in Western Massachusetts at the moment, although it is sold in 10 locations on Cape Cod and in five package stores in Boston.
It is just now entering the Connecticut market through a distribution arrangement with Berkshire Brewing Co. in Northampton.
For those who are not familiar with the V-One story, Kozub developed his voda recipe in the basement of his Hadley home. It is made in small batches by Polmos Lublin in Lublin, Poland.
It was introduced on Sept. 1, 2005, in 10 liquor stores and five restaurants in Western Massachusetts. Its coming out party was at Max's Tavern in the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield. Max's still is a major customer.
Kozub, who had been with TD Banknorth, started the vodka business in honor of his father, Edward F. Kozub, who died in 1998, shortly after Paul graduated from college, and of his grandfather, Stanley Kozub, who made vodka that was sold throughout Massachusetts in the 1930s. In 1979, Ed Kozub founded craft supplier Janlynn Corp., which now is Chicopee.
He said V-One's output is limited by the production of organic wheat grown in Poland to make the vodka.
At the moment, Kozub delivers most of his product himself to V-One's customers, so buyers don't have to get lost in a bureaucratic maze to talk to the owner of the company.
In fact, he's the only full-time employee, a situation that will change next month when he adds a full-time sales person.
He does, however, get part-time help from two others - Dennis Wilcox of Cummington, his best friend and former basketball teammate at Skidmore College, and Melissa Young, Kozub's fiancee. Their wedding is set for May 5. (Wilcox was the center on the team. Kozub played small forward.)
Wilcox helps with deliveries. Young does the bookkeeping.
Kozub spends a lot of his time promoting his vodka, including tastings in liquor stores, which consumes a lot of his weekend time. He said the state allows quarter-ounce samples at tastings.
"I also speak at Lions Clubs or Rotary Clubs, anywhere I can tell my story," he said. "I'm not an Absolut or Stolichnaya with millions of dollars to promote my product."
©2007 The Republican
