Wild Turkey has opened the Jimmy Russell Wild Turkey Experience, a newly remodeled visitor center, named for legendary master distiller Jimmy Russell. The 12,000-square-foot space features a new gift shop, tasting room, and bar, as well as an outdoor deck that offers views of the Kentucky River. A lounge called Generations, named for the three generations of the Russell family who work at Wild Turkey, is focused on mixology.
The new facility also includes a History Walk, where visitors stroll a video corridor showing the bourbon’s history and evolution, a look at how the whiskey is made, and key developments in the Wild Turkey story.
The Wild Turkey visitor center first opened in 2014 and marked the celebration of Jimmy’s 60th anniversary at the distillery. Before then, the visitor facility was just a 1,000-square-foot house, built in the 19th century. This current expansion and remodeling is part of an overall plan by Wild Turkey owner Campari to invest $160 million in a new distillery that will produce 5 million additional proof gallons, boosting Wild Turkey’s total capacity to 14 million proof gallons.
The visitor center revamp comes amid a continued boom in traffic along the Kentucky Bourbon Trail, which after a brief hiccup during Covid is now getting more than 2 million visitors annually. Jimmy Russell himself is a frequent presence at the Wild Turkey visitor center, so lucky visitors could get a chance to chat with him. In this video, Jimmy and Beam master distiller Fred Noe swap stories with Whisky Advocate about their experience in the business.
