This Kansas City distillery was named an international bucket list drinking spot

J. Rieger & Co. is an iconic spot in Kansas City, and now the distillery is reaching worldwide fame.

This month, Wine Enthusiast included it in its list of “8 Bucket List Drink Spots Around the World.” It’s featured on the list with other distilleries in Amsterdam, Las Vegas and Tel Aviv, Israel.

In a LinkedIn post acknowledging the list, owner Andy Rieger said before COVID, his group set out to do their own thing with the distillery campus.

“In not following a model that was proven, we knew it would take time to catch on,” Rieger said in the post. “2023 is our year to show the world, and they are already noticing just how incredible our city is.”

The magazine named the East Bottoms favorite “Most Young at Heart,” for its appeal to Kansas City’s younger community despite its roots in the Prohibition era in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The distillery came back in 2014 and underwent huge upgrades in 2019 to give the distillery a youthful taste.

Some of these upgrades to the 60,000-square-foot facility include a historical exhibit, a speakeasy called the Hey! Hey! Club and 40-foot-long spiral slide. One look at the slide and you can see why it’s young at heart.

The biggest upgrade — and what really brings out the young folks to the yard — is Electric Park. The outdoor bar opened in 2021 and was named after an amusement park that used to stand nearby the distillery’s current location.

When the amusement park was open, it also served as one of Walt Disney’s inspirations for his theme parks.

“Kansas City’s Coney Island” lives again through the upgraded J. Rieger & Co. distillery. It’s one of many Kansas Citians’ favorite outdoor patio bars for a reason.