The Whiskey Ventures of Viyas Sundaram
In the True Spirit of Georgetown
I recently had the pleasure of sitting down with Viyas Sundaram, founder of The Bourbon Concierge and The Fountain Inn to learn more about his latest passion projects.
When he retired from the tech industry, this collector of rare bourbon wanted to flex his muscle in digital strategy space by reselling bottles in the area through liquor stores. His online business boomed and that e-commerce success led to opening The Bourbon Concierge. “As we scaled up, Viyas explained, “we found we needed market resources and business acumen and we parlayed ourselves into opening The Fountain Inn in 2022.”
A historic-inspired rare spirits tasting room and cocktail bar, The Fountain Inn revives the spirit of the original 1783 Suter’s Tavern, famously patronized by George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.
The ethos behind his whiskey ventures, Viyas shared, “is to create experiences that tantalize the senses and foster meaningful connection.”
To that end, Viyas purchased a 121-acre horse farm in Middleburg, Virginia in 2022, reimagined it as a whiskey distillery and called it Provenance Estate. On the property is a seven bedroom manor home that people can rent for special events. “What occurs,” he says, “is the primary demand is the people who come in are restaurateurs, retailers, corporate groups, and families that want to pick their own barrel of whiskey like Georgetown Heritage did last year. Through our Middleburg Barrel Company, we’re relaunching the Georgetown-only Heritage edition in time for the holidays.” The very special, limited-edition bottles will be offered to local restaurants and available for purchase at Potomac Wines & Spirits.
Another piece of iconic Georgetown real estate, the old Patagonia building at 1048 Wisconsin Avenue, was purchased by Viyas in 2025. Currently the e-commerce housing operations for The Bourbon Concierge, he affectionately calls it the most expensive warehouse in DC.
“We have lots of interest from a lease standpoint, Viyas explains, “but we are adamant that we want to have experiential retail there. I love Georgetown, especially that area with all the amazing work the Glasses have done revitalizing Grace Street.
Georgetown has become the new frontier of digital warfare. When you think of the cost of the real estate and because of the lack of curation of more local concepts, the concepts that are coming in are just looking at the cost of the lease and comparing it to how much they’re spending in Google advertising. While we are excited to welcome more large brands and more visitors, we need to find a balance. It’s marginalizing our local entrepreneurs, where we need more partnership between local developers and entrepreneurs. M Street is all national brands now.
We have a gem of a community here in Georgetown. As I travel throughout the world with my wife and daughters, there’s a constant reminder we have this amazing neighborhood right here on our doorstep.
I welcome guidance and suggestions from The Georgetown Dish readers to create more experiential retail in ways that connect back to our historic roots. It’s one thing to advocate for conservation which I do and others do but I want to educate through experience about the value of conservation. People may not be as excited as I am about Georgetown Heritage and its mission but getting a bottle of whiskey that has Georgetown heritage is their way of participating in conservation.
Finding new ways of getting local residents and visitors to incubate and promote experiential retail hospitality here is something I’m excited to continue to do since founding Bourbon Concierge and The Fountain Inn.”