A recent Bucks County bankruptcy has taken on all the intrigue of a prime-time soap opera. Quakertown’s Midnight Madness Distilling LLC, producer of the popular Faber liquor line, filed for Chapter 11. Laura Smythe describes the aftermath for the Philadelphia Business Journal. 

Midnight Madness Distilling was founded in 2012 by two Carnegie Mellon students, Anthony Lorubbio and Casey Parzych. It produces its own liquor and provides co-op canning, bottling, and other services from a 160,000-square-foot warehouse in Trumbauersville. 

COVID-19 was not kind to the business. The product shortages related to supply-chain slowdowns had a devastating economic impact.  

A bankruptcy filing illustrated the dire financial condition. Records show substantial outstandings to 50-99 creditors. 

The bankruptcy proceedings come just over two months after Lorubbio initiated a civil complaint against Parzych, alleging breaches of contract and fiduciary duty. 

In his complaint, Lorubbio states that Parzych funneled Midnight Madness funds and resources to his wife Ashleigh Baldwin, supporting her CBD product manufacturing business. 

Retaliating, Parzych blamed Lorubbio for the defaults and removed him as CEO of Midnight Madness Distilling. 

In response, Lorubbio “threw a tantrum,” locking himself in his office, writing a $10,000 check to himself for “unauthorized expenses,” and fleeing in a company car, which was later found trashed.

A timetable is in place for putting the business’s August sale in motion in bankruptcy court. 

More on Midnight Madness Distilling and their liquor liquidation is in the Philadelphia Business Journal.