Stocking the shelves in gin bars across the country are a growing number of craft gins, laced with a range of flavours to satisfy every palate.

Gin is the new kid on the boutique spirits block and in South Australia only a handful of distillers are making the juniper-infused spirit.

Sacha La Forgia is one of them.

Passionate about gin, the 27-year-old has created the Adelaide Hills' first, and is already having some success since embarking on his new business venture in November.

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Listen Duration: 4 minutes 25 seconds 4 m 25 s Gin maker Sacha La Forgia talks about his love of the spirit and launching his own craft gin 78 degrees ( Caroline Winter ) Download 8.1 MB

"I've made four batches for sale, I'm in four bottle shops and I've just been picked up by a distributor in Sydney," he said.

"So I'll be distributed across the east coast soon."

Mr La Forgia has established his micro-distilling operation in a small, concrete room, attached to a winery on the Onkaparinga Valley Road, between Lobethal and Mount Torrens.

If all goes to plan, it is a place he will be spending a whole lot more time.

Mr La Forgia's love for distilling began in his high school chemistry class.

After studying winemaking at University he spent six years working vintage across the globe.

He returned home to Adelaide last year and has set his sights on the emerging craft gin industry, looking to break in before the market is flooded with new start-ups.

"It's been taking off overseas for quite some time now and Australia's not far behind,' he said.

"There's few distilleries, particularly in gin, that's taken over the country and there's room for many more as the category grows."

Some of the special spices Sacha La Forgia's uses in his craft gin 78 degrees in the Adelaide Hills ( Caroline Winter )

Mr La Forgia uses a juniper and coriander base similar to a London Dry Gin, but with his own twist, infusing other spices or botanicals to make something more complex.

"I find that everyone sees different things in each gin, because there's so many flavours and aromas in a gin, you know up to 15 or 20, mine and most others have 12 or 13."

He describes his gin as spicy-savoury and uses a range of herbs to achieve that.

Despite his background in distilling, Mr La Forgia said crossing over from winemaking to gin has not been simple.

He said the industry is highly regulated and there are major barriers to entry.

"The biggest barriers are the set up costs for a distillery, just a still can cost 10s to 100s of thousands of dollars and then it can take quite a while to get licensed and you can't produce anything until you're licensed," he said.

"So it can be quite a large investment to get you through the start up phase before you make anything back."