How to bottle and send bourbon to friends and colleagues
LEXINGTON Sending a holiday or year-end gift to a business associate is a long-held tradition. For years Pathology & Cytology Labs, Inc., has sent a gift bottle of a premium bourbon to its business partners. The bottles were engraved and had custom personalized labels. “It’s definitely a time when the hospital CEO is happy to see me,” said Dr. Rick Lozano, president of P&C labs.
This year Lozano and P&C Labs decided to change it up a little bit. In addition to sending the customized bourbon, P&C Labs held a smallbatch bourbon barrel tasting to choose which one of the Barrel House bourbons they would bottle.
A random drawing of administrators from the hospitals and physician practices that P&C Labs serves brought eight of them to The Barrel House in the Manchester Street Bourbon District in Lexington on Wednesday, October 22, 2025, to taste bourbons from barrels that had won double gold medals at the San Francisco bourbon competition, a prestigious annual bourbon tasting competition.
The Barrel House Distillery is on the site of one of the original bourbon distilleries in Lexington, founded by the James Pepper family in the pre-Civil War era. Jeff Wiseman, founder of The Barrel House, opened the distillery complete with the Elkhorn Tavern, a gift shop, a visitor center, and tasting room in 2008.
The venture was one the first to open and is now a local hotspot and tourist destination. “Bourbon brings people together,” said Wiseman. P&C Labs, founded in 1967, is locally owned and operated by Kentucky physicians with 19 board-certified pathologists. It provides pathology and cytology services to over 40 hospitals and medical clinics from Pikeville to Paducah. “We wanted to do something for our customers that would be memorable and fun and also be extremely local,” said Lozano. “You can’t get any more local than giving a bottle of bourbon that was distilled, barreled, tasted, and bottled right here in Lexington.”
“Barrel House Distillery has an exceptional operation. From their water source to final bottling, they have stayed true to Kentucky bourbon heritage,” said Brad Gibson, MD, pathologist at P&C.
“It’s like Christmas in October” said Tommy Haggard, CEO of Bourbon Community Hospital.
