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Bourbon, Community and Innovation: Inside the Kentucky Bourbon Festival with Randy Prasse · The Scotchy Bourbon Boys

• 0:58
  Speaker 1: What's up?
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Scotchy Bourbon Boys fans, this is Alan Bishop of.
• 1:03
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• 1:05
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• 1:18
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• 1:47
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• 2:21
  Speaker 3: Woo.
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: All right, there you go.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: That's a good technical problem to have right, I've been All right.
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: Welcome to another podcast of the Scotchy Bourbon Boys.
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: Tonight we have a very, very special guest, somebody who's been on the podcast many, many times, but every time it's just an honor to have him on.
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: Uh, sometimes I just pinch myself because I know him.
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: But uh, the president of the kentucky bourbon festival, randy prassy, everybody, yes, welcome, randy.
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: I'm always so humbled when you Randy Prassy, everybody.
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: Woo, yes, welcome, randy.
• 3:24
  Speaker 3: I'm always so humble when you say that kind of stuff, you big goof.
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: Well, I mean, it's just like you know what's so great.
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: And then we also let's just go, welcome Super Nash.
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: Super Nash is with us, but you know when we have El President.
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: Not quite as much of an honor as it is having uh randy here well, but we both are honored, right right, that's what it is he's, you know, he's el presidente of the scotchy bourbon boys.
• 3:53
  Speaker 4: It's just um thank you, thank you.
• 3:58
  Speaker 4: You know I love you guys, but and that's actually the only reason I come on this thing- Well, I mean, it's just kind of like your bourbon journey.
• 4:21
  Speaker 4: We were there kind of right at the start of it, you know, and and I was telling, I had a couple of meetings tonight and I was telling someone about you guys and I said everything that we've done with the media, the media row, how we're taking care of our media friends it all started, you know, even before our first festival together was based on your other experience with the festival and remember I said I want to do a media row, I want our media to know how important they are.
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: I want you to be able to do interviews and do your business.
• 4:43
  Speaker 4: And so that very first year we had a little row of tents along the fence line there next to the old main stage, and everything is kind of built off of that.
• 4:53
  Speaker 4: So I always keep that in mind when you and I are working together.
• 4:57
  Speaker 4: You guys were there and you kind of helped us form this new media environment that we offer, so thank you for that.
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: It has tremendously grown and I think it's brought in a lot more media attention, which helps spread the word.
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah.
• 5:18
  Speaker 4: Thank you for that.
• 5:18
  Speaker 4: I mean, you were there before day one, so thank you, I mean even that.
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: First, you know that first year that we, that we came down during the week that the festival was supposed to happen and really got to kind of know I mean also me and you grew up in in the Wisconsin area with very similar childhoods, up in in the wisconsin area with very similar, uh, childhoods, you know, we, you know when that was the same time period, uh, in york, we probably crossed paths at the state fair when if you were, you know, and so there was a lot of.
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: We have had a lot in common.
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: Um, mainly, if you wanted to uh, one big one is our packer love for packers.
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: You have a I.
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: I have a love for National League Baseball.
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: I tend more to the Milwaukee Brewers and you're more towards the Cubs, but I've always loved Wrigley and the Cubs and that's something that when you lived in that area, you went down to Wrigley and you saw baseball games and we kind of hit it off there.
• 6:18
  Speaker 3: But also, I mean, when I think about what's going to happen at the festival this year and what the festival was that first year that I was there in 2019, which you know, there was some really nice things about it because I was just getting into bourbon and so there was got to meet the nose.
• 6:40
  Speaker 3: They had a Jim Beam dinner and you kind of got the Bardstown experience.
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: But what it's evolved from that just like there was no media the first time, say, coordinated effort for anybody to be, you know, the whole festival was just kind of like you walked to the couple tents they had some stuff for tasting At the time.
• 7:15
  Speaker 3: You couldn't in 2019, you could carry around a mixed drink.
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: That was the first year that they could do it but the distilleries it had just changed and they weren't all participating in it.
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
• 7:29
  Speaker 4: We had nine distilleries on the lawn that year.
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and what do we got this year?
• 7:34
  Speaker 3: 63.
• 7:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, it's not the same festival.
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: And one thing, as we all know, if you've listened to you being on here before, we all know that's what you were, that's when they hired you and how you had run the Kentucky, you were with Kentucky Derby, you had done the Wisconsin State Fair and you also understand security.
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: So it's all part of just putting on the festival.
• 8:06
  Speaker 3: And I mean one of the things I'm most proud of you in on is the fact that you hold a whiskey festival which basically lasts for three.
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: What is it?
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: Three days and three nights, right the Thursday night, but then Friday and Saturday and Sunday in the day and you know so overall, but you don't have.
• 8:26
  Speaker 3: It's a whiskey festival where people drink, can be drinking a lot, but you don't have that unruly people going out into the streets getting there's.
• 8:35
  Speaker 3: No, the crowd that you've drawn and how you set up that festival really is quite phenomenal and thank you.
• 8:45
  Speaker 4: I mean that's a testament to the quality of urban enthusiasts that we attract and the serious approach that they have to being responsible and their enjoyment of the brown water.
• 9:01
  Speaker 4: I see all over the place there are always designated drivers, groups of people that are here Friday.
• 9:09
  Speaker 4: One of them draws the short straw and they're the DD and they take their turns to make sure everybody gets home safely and has a good time.
• 9:18
  Speaker 4: But even when we're standing there at the Whiskey Festival and I'm proud of this there have been no alcohol-related incidents arrests, according to the police department, thus far during the last couple of years of this new version, and I always knock on wood and I always pray that that continues because it's a safety issue.
• 9:40
  Speaker 4: But people know how to act and they're friends and they watch out for each other and they go have a good time and we close at 6 o'clock at night so people can go back to hotels and rest and shower up and freshen up and then go out and enjoy the community as a result, and so I mean that's something we take very seriously.
• 9:57
  Speaker 4: So thank you for bringing that up.
• 9:59
  Speaker 4: We're all proud of that.
• 10:00
  Speaker 4: It's a team effort which includes our people that come to the festival and buy the tickets.
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: They know all it takes is someone to do it wrong and it kind of makes it challenging for us to continue.
• 10:12
  Speaker 4: So thank you for that.
• 10:13
  Speaker 4: And when you have the police chief and the assistant chief coming to the city council meeting, when we're asking for all of our permits, the two top-ranking police officers on the force are there to stand up and advocate for us if needed.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: That doesn't happen a lot, you know.
• 10:33
  Speaker 4: so that is something that we take very proud of, too.
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: And you also got to give a good shout-out to your complete staff because, you know, got to give a good shout out to your complete staff because, you know, throughout the whole festival, your staff is constantly aware of what's going on during the festival, along with these people that are going throughout the festival and drinking and partaking, and if there's any kind of problem that arises, uh, you know, they're there right on the spot to help out or to alleviate the situation before it escalates, which I don't think there actually has been a situation like that.
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: This is a party.
• 11:16
  Speaker 4: Nash, this is a party.
• 11:17
  Speaker 4: It should be fun and we're starting this conversation kind of serious, but it is a lot of fun.
• 11:23
  Speaker 4: If you haven't been, it be fun, and we're starting this conversation kind of serious, but it is a lot of fun.
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: If you haven't been, it is fun.
• 11:28
  Speaker 4: It's not overbearing on the responsibility piece.
• 11:30
  Speaker 4: Everybody is told, from the distilleries to our staff, to the guests, be responsible.
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: Don't mess this up for everyone you know.
• 11:39
  Speaker 4: But it is a lot of fun.
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: And you walk through there.
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: There you see people having fun, but you also see the people that are responsible for making sure that they get home safely after they have fun, so um it's a bunch of grown-ups it's a bourbon family reunion.
• 11:54
  Speaker 4: It's like going to a family reunion you know what?
• 11:57
  Speaker 3: I mean and and or we could even go, you know, yeah, I mean that's, that's kind of what it is.
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: I mean everybody, even the, the, the people that are attending, look out for the other people that are attending, because we all, you know, we've all been over.
• 12:12
  Speaker 3: What would you say?
• 12:17
  Speaker 3: We've all overindulged a couple of times.
• 12:18
  Speaker 3: It happens to people.
• 12:18
  Speaker 3: But what?
• 12:18
  Speaker 3: But one of the great things I find that when you, if you, when you come down into bardstown area or whatever, if someone's doing that, uh, there's a lot of people and a lot of support to help them out, whether it be the people or the staff at the festival, or just the people in the festival, because everybody understands what you're there for.
• 13:23
  Speaker 3: You're there to party and have fun, but we're all there to drink responsibly and be able to do it.
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: I mean because it's a marathon.
• 13:32
  Speaker 3: I mean that's the one thing.
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: Other festivals that I've attended, you know they noon to six, just that's, or let's just say 11 am to 7 pm and it's over.
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: It's a one time shot.
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: But this festival, you know, starts Thursday night and finishes Sunday early afternoon, and when you think about that it's you have to pace yourself, otherwise you're going to miss out who wants to, who wants to, you know, overindulge on Friday night and Saturday you got a bunch of stuff planned and you feel like crap.
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: So I really think that's part of the fact that it's a marathon that people really, really enjoy it.
• 14:09
  Speaker 3: But let's get on to what is happening this year.
• 14:16
  Speaker 4: Yeah, and the timeliness of this is interesting because we have been pacing very well with our ticket sales and we're forecasting right now today's Thursday, that we'll probably be sold out again for the fourth consecutive year Sunday afternoon, maybe Monday morning, based on what our ticket allowances are.
• 14:41
  Speaker 4: Go get them.
• 14:42
  Speaker 4: If you have gotten your tickets, go get them, because we're down to 100, maybe give or take a few tickets.
• 14:50
  Speaker 4: And we've been selling about 20 to 25 a day throughout.
• 14:54
  Speaker 4: So it's very humbling to take an event that was free for 30 years and do what we've done, with the focus on distilleries, and then have this many people buying tickets and wanting to be there, and the social media buzz has been tremendous this year, and so I mean it.
• 15:13
  Speaker 4: Just if you haven't gotten your tickets and you're thinking about it, you better go look in the next day or so, because they probably will be gone by midday on Monday if we don't have a really strong week.
• 15:24
  Speaker 4: Otherwise, it could be Sunday when we're sold out and we're not overselling.
• 15:28
  Speaker 4: We're not going to create more tickets.
• 15:29
  Speaker 4: So, um, but, jeffrey, I think I've said on this before when I was with the wisconsin state fair and you can technically fill in any state fair, any these state fairs have been around for 100 and some years a lot of tradition, heritage.
• 15:43
  Speaker 4: People like to see the same things that they did when they were kids.
• 15:46
  Speaker 4: Now they're bringing their, their kids.
• 15:47
  Speaker 4: So when I took over this festival, you know there were some cool things that people are like right now, like you're not going to change anything, right?
• 15:55
  Speaker 4: I mean, you finally got it dialed in, but then they followed up with well, what's new this year?
• 16:00
  Speaker 4: So that's kind of our balance is how do we do what we did in 2021 and through, and so there's that you know what you're in.
• 16:09
  Speaker 4: You're going to get the distilleries, you're going to get the great tent, you're going to get the park-like setting and the shade and all that.
• 16:16
  Speaker 4: But what are we doing new?
• 16:18
  Speaker 4: We're on year four.
• 16:19
  Speaker 4: You know there are people that have been to the festival every year since we've done the new model.
• 16:24
  Speaker 4: There are people that were at the old festival and then gave us a chance and they fell in love with the new festival.
• 16:29
  Speaker 4: So we're always trying to keep it fresh.
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: We always know that someone's going to eventually these groups are going to go?
• 16:34
  Speaker 4: hey, you know what?
• 16:35
  Speaker 4: The boys' group this year let's go to Vegas.
• 16:39
  Speaker 4: Or the ladies let's go and do a golf outing or whatever.
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: So I know we're going to lose people eventually, but we're always trying to make sure that we're offering something new and exciting so that you can see that it's a different event.
• 16:51
  Speaker 4: And you guys have been there every day, every you know, 2019, 21, 22, 23, you know, this year, 24.
• 16:58
  Speaker 4: I love seeing your reaction when you walk in.
• 16:59
  Speaker 4: You know, you know what it's going to be something different and bigger but when you first see it, you're like, oh my gosh, this is crazy.
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: So when you first see it you're like, oh my gosh, this is crazy.
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: So I love that reaction.
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we go down there the whole week before and get to watch you start, you're assembling.
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: It's like, initially, the first year that you were assembling, compared to what you were doing last year.
• 17:23
  Speaker 3: Last year the tents were going up earlier and everything was you know, but I think for you, um, where people don't realize, but you know, when you first throw a festival in a space that you've never, that you personally never threw a festival.
• 17:44
  Speaker 3: And now we're four years into you throwing festivals.
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: You know your space and so you kind of knew where the nooks and the crannies, that you know the little areas that were being wasted or, um, maybe, uh, how just, let's just say, a distillery or a vendor wasted the space.
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: And you've you've fine-tuned that part.
• 18:07
  Speaker 3: You could see that last year how well you find fine-tuned, where everybody was, there wasn't, you know, a lot of there wasn't a lot of open space or there wasn't any empty spaces or whatever.
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: Everything was, you know, filled in.
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: And this year again, I mean, you're out of space but you were able to move into a couple different areas that you weren't using and rearrange the space.
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: But then let's talk about the space that basically is.
• 18:37
  Speaker 3: I mean you're building a double decker.
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: You know what's the square footage on that tent?
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: You know the first year we did this?
• 18:49
  Speaker 4: the craft distilleries in 2021, it was the first time the craft distilleries were included and there were 17 of them and that was half of our distilleries.
• 18:57
  Speaker 4: We had 34 total, up from nine in 2019, and half of them were craft.
• 19:03
  Speaker 4: So that whole area that used to be the spirit garden and everything that was our craft distiller's row, and now, since we've gotten some agreements with our neighbors the church saint joseph's and the city has been very supportive we've moved all the non-distillery the vendors, the food vendors, the great tent, the media tent they're all into a new and so now the main lawn and the craft area is all distilleries and you know.
• 19:31
  Speaker 4: So we are allowing craft distilleries to go in double their space.
• 19:35
  Speaker 4: So you've got a 10 by 10 tent Now we've got a bunch of them doing 10 by 20s.
• 19:38
  Speaker 4: We're telling all of the distilleries to really bring their A game when it comes to the presentation.
• 19:43
  Speaker 4: We're doing a People's Choice Award this year for the three different levels of distillery, so there's an incentive to really bring it.
• 19:52
  Speaker 4: All the decor and the lighting and all the interactive kind of stuff.
• 19:56
  Speaker 4: But to your point, we we took over the entire saint joseph's church parking lot next to us that my first two years I was parking.
• 20:04
  Speaker 4: I was literally parking a lot that church was charging a lot of money for people to park there.
• 20:09
  Speaker 4: And then you had the festival and our only logical expansion was there.
• 20:13
  Speaker 4: So we partnered with them.
• 20:15
  Speaker 4: So now we have the entire parking lot.
• 20:17
  Speaker 4: Last year we put food trucks, this year all of the vendors, soaps and syrups and honeys and candles and all the barrel furniture will be there.
• 20:27
  Speaker 4: The great tent that was normally on the main lawn for the last couple of years is out there.
• 20:32
  Speaker 4: The media hospitality that we started last year is moved out there and Fifth Street is closed the whole week of the festival for load in and set up for Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and then Friday, Saturday, Sunday that's where all of our food trucks are going to be and three or four big dining tents.
• 20:51
  Speaker 4: So as you walk along and enjoy your food truck experience, you've got a place to sit down and eat and get a break from whatever the weather might be, whether it be sunny and hot or rainy hopefully not, but what that did was allow us to bring all of the distilleries, space them out, let them increase.
• 21:07
  Speaker 4: I think we have three or four of the mid-level distilleries, like an Angel's Envy who's jumped up to the bigger size.
• 21:13
  Speaker 4: We've got Brown Foreman, who had one tent for Old Forrester and Woodford.
• 21:18
  Speaker 4: Well, now they have two tents.
• 21:19
  Speaker 4: So Woodford is in one, Old Forrester is in one.
• 21:22
  Speaker 4: And so, as we do this and I already have two distilleries for next year that are looking at doing a double decker, like we're doing with this, uh, this year, and these things are made in germany and engineered and brought over we literally have the president of the tent company coming this year to the festival.
• 21:41
  Speaker 4: See what we're doing with it.
• 21:42
  Speaker 3: so wow, and that and that double decker tent, it's double.
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: Okay, that double decker.
• 21:48
  Speaker 3: Okay, that double dedecker tent, it's double okay, that double-decker, double.
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: Okay, that double-decker tent is basically the bottom part is going to be merchandise, right, your store, and above is the cigar lounge, correct, right, which we've been trying to book that cigar lounge, nash, did you finally?
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: get it booked yet.
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: Not yet.
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: We're trying.
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: I just sent her another email just a few days ago actually on Sunday on my way back, and explaining that I still can't get in there with my code.
• 22:22
  Speaker 4: I wonder why.
• 22:23
  Speaker 4: We'll help you.
• 22:24
  Speaker 4: We will get that done After we sell out of tickets.
• 22:29
  Speaker 4: Literally the only thing, the only upgrade that people will have is a cigar lounge.
• 22:34
  Speaker 4: We will focus on that for a month Full transparency we're a non-profit.
• 22:42
  Speaker 4: You can go onto our website and find all of our paperwork that shows our revenues and expenses.
• 22:46
  Speaker 4: This year, I just signed a contract and paid a deposit to our big tent company that's doing this double-decker 2021, our entire tent budget, for all of the tents that you saw, was $46,000, which is a big number, right, yeah, this year, that double-decker alone is costing me $58,000 for one.
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: You said that picture, that picture, man, it's like, it's like a luxury house what's the square footage?
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: I mean, I'm just like looking at it and I'm thinking that that it's it.
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: It almost is a permanent structure.
• 23:25
  Speaker 3: That isn't permanent.
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: I mean, you just look at it, you call it a tent.
• 23:29
  Speaker 3: That's not a tent, that's a permanent structure with glass window or plexiglass windows.
• 23:35
  Speaker 4: I mean, it was just crazy our insurance purposes and for the state permitting it is a temporary structure.
• 23:42
  Speaker 4: So you're right, the word tent is not in the correct vernacular, but but it is.
• 23:48
  Speaker 4: But it's what people wanted.
• 23:49
  Speaker 4: It's a statement piece to show that we're continuing to grow and reinvest in the experience.
• 23:55
  Speaker 4: And again there are two or three distilleries that are going to.
• 23:59
  Speaker 4: It's like an open house for a model home.
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: You know Prada Homes.
• 24:03
  Speaker 4: We will have every distillery and sponsor of the festival go and visit that and see if they can do that.
• 24:09
  Speaker 4: I can't say who's going to do it next year, but one of them for sure is going to do it and it's going to blow your mind.
• 24:15
  Speaker 4: But we can do on ground level your traditional tastings that are going on now on the ground level.
• 24:21
  Speaker 4: And the second level.
• 24:22
  Speaker 4: The intention is to either allow that distillery to upgrade guests to go upstairs and have a different experience.
• 24:29
  Speaker 4: We're talking to one about doing barrel picks.
• 24:31
  Speaker 4: So you might have two people on Friday and two people on Saturday, two groups that will come up and do barrel picks at the bourbon festival and then so there's so many things we can do.
• 24:42
  Speaker 4: But the distilleries are understanding it.
• 24:44
  Speaker 4: They're seeing that we're putting them first and always focusing on what they can do and how.
• 24:54
  Speaker 4: Last year the bottle sales changed the game and they realize now the money that they can make selling bottles directly to our customers.
• 24:58
  Speaker 4: It all of a sudden justifies the investment that they can make on making the overall presentation that much stronger.
• 25:04
  Speaker 4: So right, new jeffrey nash.
• 25:07
  Speaker 4: We knew year one, remember we had those.
• 25:09
  Speaker 4: We're sitting in that old farmhouse thing doing one of these banging on a bongo or whatever.
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: Barrel bashing.
• 25:19
  Speaker 4: Yeah, but I said when the distilleries finally figure it out and they see the potential on what they can do.
• 25:25
  Speaker 4: And we're the only whiskey festival in the world where you can go and buy bottles directly from the distilleries and you can have masters sellers sign them, take them home.
• 25:34
  Speaker 4: You know the single barrels.
• 25:36
  Speaker 4: We can talk about that whenever, but we've got 45 or 46 single barrels with 38 different distilleries.
• 25:43
  Speaker 4: We had some that we couldn't decide between the two and they said, well, let's just bottle them both, both so we've got a few that are offering two.
• 25:51
  Speaker 4: Some is a high rye and some is a you know, a weeded bourbon.
• 25:54
  Speaker 4: But when I said you come to this bourbon festival, you're going to get an experience and buy bottles you can't get anywhere else in the world this year, it's true, you literally cannot go and buy these bottles.
• 26:05
  Speaker 4: You just showed, showed the chicken cock.
• 26:06
  Speaker 4: That was the first single barrel that chicken cock did in their history back to 1855.
• 26:13
  Speaker 4: If Greg's on here, thank you, brother, I've got a bottle of that, and there's one of them that I won't open, because that was that cool of an experience to have Greg Schneider sitting there doing that with us.
• 26:24
  Speaker 4: You can't even go down the street to Evergreen Liquors, our retail partner, and buy these 45 or 46 bottles.
• 26:33
  Speaker 4: You've got to buy them at the festival.
• 26:34
  Speaker 4: So I'm so geeked about being able to offer that this year.
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: Greg is here and he says many thanks to Randy, david Mandel and their entire team for taking the KBF a new and much improved direction.
• 26:49
  Speaker 4: Thanks.
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: Those are his words Exactly.
• 26:53
  Speaker 4: I mean, I mean Tyler Tyler, on the, on Greg's team.
• 26:54
  Speaker 4: You know we talk to him all the time.
• 26:57
  Speaker 4: These distilleries, they get it, they're reinvesting in it.
• 27:01
  Speaker 4: They enter and I tell you, after 35 years of doing events with sponsorships, including the Derby, this is the one and only experience that I've had where I'm walking through the lawn.
• 27:12
  Speaker 4: Last year at the festival, I had two different distilleries pull me aside and say our contract is up, we need to renew, we need to extend this.
• 27:20
  Speaker 4: You know, I had one distillery said if we did four of these a year, they do all four of them.
• 27:25
  Speaker 4: That doesn't get to that without us listening to the distilleries and giving them the experience that not that they want, they need.
• 27:32
  Speaker 4: They need to justify their involvement, and so this is serious business.
• 27:36
  Speaker 4: But we listen to the distilleries.
• 27:38
  Speaker 4: We always put them first.
• 27:39
  Speaker 4: Anybody listening that's a customer.
• 27:42
  Speaker 4: You're always going to be number two behind our distilleries.
• 27:44
  Speaker 4: Sorry, but in the end you win because, as long as the distilleries know that we're focusing on them, you will win because they, because these distilleries will bring their A games and then some Well, that's it.
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: Stacey did put a correction in there and said 45.
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: Okay, well, thank you, Stacey.
• 28:03
  Speaker 4: I said 45 and 46.
• 28:05
  Speaker 4: I was wrong again, yeah, yeah.
• 28:08
  Speaker 4: Stacey, she's watching, she's following along, yeah, and you guys and I'm not being a superhero but the first year or two it was me.
• 28:15
  Speaker 4: It was like I'm doing the distillery stuff, I'm doing the layouts, I'm deciding what catering is going to happen in VIP and whatever.
• 28:23
  Speaker 4: I can't do it anymore.
• 28:25
  Speaker 4: And Stacy came on two years ago as a volunteer and asked for that festival.
• 28:29
  Speaker 4: The people that knew Stacy said you, you got to bring Stacey on board.
• 28:33
  Speaker 4: The people that didn't know who she was said whoever that dynamo is needs to be on your team.
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 28:39
  Speaker 4: My number one recruiting push and she knows this was to get her on our team and we have 63 distilleries and I absolutely could not do it.
• 28:48
  Speaker 4: So, stacey, thank you.
• 28:50
  Speaker 4: I know the next 30 days there's a lot of tension and everything going on, but we have that thank you square going on, that we're always going to have each other's back, so you can't.
• 29:00
  Speaker 4: It is a team.
• 29:01
  Speaker 4: I've got six people that are on the top of their game public relations, creative marketing.
• 29:08
  Speaker 4: I've got merchandise, the same company that does all the Kentucky.
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: Bourbon Trail stuff and all the.
• 29:12
  Speaker 4: Bourbon Festival and Churchill Downs Derby stuff.
• 29:16
  Speaker 4: That's our retail partner.
• 29:17
  Speaker 3: And the board.
• 29:19
  Speaker 4: We have these partnerships and we assembled a team.
• 29:22
  Speaker 3: Now that we're really cranking so this year, and next year.
• 29:26
  Speaker 4: It's going to be amazing.
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: Well, just the evolution.
• 29:30
  Speaker 3: Like you said, the first couple years that we would attend the festival, I couldn't even get near you because you were everything.
• 29:39
  Speaker 3: If there was a problem in tickets, you were there.
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: If there was a problem here or there, and it was like we really when we went to the festival, you would give us a couple things just to make sure we were all right.
• 29:51
  Speaker 3: Give us a couple things just to make sure we were all right.
• 29:52
  Speaker 3: But other than that, last year at the festival you actually got to walk around and actually have people walk up to you and say, hey, let's renew the contract, that kind of thing.
• 30:07
  Speaker 4: This year is my focus.
• 30:08
  Speaker 4: The first year, I avoided you.
• 30:11
  Speaker 4: No, I avoided you.
• 30:14
  Speaker 4: The second year no, no, I'm kidding, but I mean this sincerely.
• 30:18
  Speaker 4: There are distilleries that I put everything into delivering that program.
• 30:23
  Speaker 4: But for those three days I've been so preoccupied with operational stuff but I haven't stopped and given that five minutes of face-to-face.
• 30:33
  Speaker 4: Thank you for being here.
• 30:34
  Speaker 4: That is my commitment this year.
• 30:37
  Speaker 4: I've got to do that.
• 30:38
  Speaker 4: I've got to get out of T-shirts and combat boots and radio hanging on my you know.
• 30:44
  Speaker 3: Well, just don't remove your face this year.
• 30:47
  Speaker 3: Keep your face on it healed.
• 30:51
  Speaker 3: Really nice.
• 30:52
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you were, you were, you were actually, even though you were out and about, you were in hiding mode because, you know, you just wanted to get your good side, you know, when you were out there.
• 31:01
  Speaker 4: But buddy listening watching that I had second degree burns the week before the festival on this half of my face and yes I was.
• 31:08
  Speaker 4: I was told by my doctor that I had to stay out of the sun for two to three weeks, which obviously the week before the bourbon festival.
• 31:15
  Speaker 4: That didn't happen, so I got the big hat and I got a bunch of shade trees.
• 31:18
  Speaker 4: So, no, I am bubble wrapped right now.
• 31:21
  Speaker 4: My construction and burning brush.
• 31:24
  Speaker 4: All that is done until the fourth quarter of the year after the festival.
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: I even remember during I think it was the second year that I was helping you run power cords and fix breaker boxes for one, I think for Justin's House of Bourbon that year.
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: A couple years ago.
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you were the man of many hats that year, and still are, but you've got a team working with you now I do, I do and you know you guys are part of that team.
• 31:57
  Speaker 4: I mean, you come in early and help Stacy with the setup.
• 31:59
  Speaker 4: And if anybody out there loves the bourbon and bourbon festival, we absolutely are taking volunteers.
• 32:05
  Speaker 4: You volunteer to work a day, you get tickets to the festivals.
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: I mean, we're really building our volunteer army up.
• 32:13
  Speaker 4: We once had a really strong local volunteer base and volunteerism in general is difficult these days, but we're really working.
• 32:23
  Speaker 4: We have a full-time volunteer coordinator.
• 32:26
  Speaker 4: I want to do something that's going to identify Bourbon Festival volunteers to where they're proud.
• 32:33
  Speaker 4: You know, last year we you know some jackets and whatever.
• 32:35
  Speaker 4: We want people to know that we love them and we cannot do a festival of this size on the backs of six people, right, so yeah, but it is very humbling and I I, every once in a while I've been forced into conversationally to think back about 2020 and 2021.
• 32:54
  Speaker 4: I've been forced into conversationally to think back about 2020 and 2021 and a lot of the chaos involving putting that first year on and the six inches of rain.
• 33:01
  Speaker 4: The day before we opened, we did a river running down through the main festival grounds and mud and and we pulled it off and just what we've done since then.
• 33:10
  Speaker 4: Um, it's just so mean.
• 33:13
  Speaker 4: We haven't talked a lot about the details, but I feel like people that are watching this at least are familiar with the festival, have been there KYBourbonFestivalcom you can go and check out who's going to be there for distilleries and the schedule and everything, but we're that close to selling out, which, again thinking of this festival being a free event that was family-friendly, like a town street fair nothing wrong with that but we took it from that to where we are now, where people are considering this to be the preeminent whiskey event in the world.
• 33:45
  Speaker 4: It's very humbling.
• 33:47
  Speaker 4: So the time that you give us to come on here and talk I mean beyond the friendship it's very humbling.
• 33:55
  Speaker 4: Sometimes I get emotional because I think about what we've done together and the risk that the board took and these distilleries.
• 34:03
  Speaker 4: I looked them in the eye.
• 34:05
  Speaker 4: I had not produced one thing yet 2020, 2021, masks on.
• 34:10
  Speaker 4: Sometimes I said this is what we're going to do and you can't be sponsors.
• 34:17
  Speaker 4: This isn't NASCAR, we're not slapping a logo on something.
• 34:19
  Speaker 4: I need you to be an investor in the future of this festival If we're going to build a festival that you've been telling us that we need to be.
• 34:27
  Speaker 4: So three-year commitment sight unseen, these major distilleries are signing three-year deals and investing in it, and I don't think we've let them down at all, and so that's very humbling, because we wouldn't have been able to do this If we just had some informal, casual sponsors, it never would have happened.
• 34:47
  Speaker 4: But we have investors that really wanted to make this thing work and it is that really wanted to make this thing work and it is so just when you were talking about your commitment is to the distilleries first.
• 34:58
  Speaker 3: but what makes this festival so phenomenal is, honestly, the distilleries' commitment is to the attendees.
• 35:06
  Speaker 3: So just because you're committing to those distilleries, that is the commitment so they can be there.
• 35:12
  Speaker 3: Now, what we've seen and I've always known, I mean that first year you could sell bottles and we were there and the law had changed like three months before the festival and none of them really realized.
• 35:27
  Speaker 3: And so that first year, they kind of got it.
• 35:32
  Speaker 4: They didn't know how to do it.
• 35:33
  Speaker 3: No no.
• 35:39
  Speaker 4: But like they didn't know how to take their bricks-and-mortar gift shop and do it in the middle of a festival, right, right.
• 35:47
  Speaker 3: And sell whiskey.
• 35:48
  Speaker 3: Now I have to admit, heaven Hill, that first year they had a lot of stuff that they had killed by COVID, you know what I mean.
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: So they released some bottles that nobody thought everybody.
• 36:01
  Speaker 3: And then the response from the people was so phenomenal People were just like, hey, it just was like a buzz on that first night at Bourbon on the Banks.
• 36:12
  Speaker 3: Now last year they kind of did figure it out.
• 36:16
  Speaker 3: And then you had the craft distilleries just basically doing everything and anything.
• 36:22
  Speaker 3: And then you know, if there's anything that they were unhappy was was that they couldn't figure out how to get their stuff sold.
• 36:28
  Speaker 3: Now you fixed that this year.
• 36:30
  Speaker 3: I mean we actually have what is it?
• 36:34
  Speaker 3: Oh my God, I'm always running into Green.
• 36:39
  Speaker 3: What's the liquor?
• 36:44
  Speaker 3: Your agency that's in town, what is it?
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: SSPR.
• 36:48
  Speaker 3: No, no, no, no For the selling bottles, for the craft distillers to be able to sell their bottles.
• 36:54
  Speaker 4: Evergreen's sorry yeah.
• 36:56
  Speaker 3: Evergreen's going to have a bottle shop there, correct?
• 37:00
  Speaker 4: Yes, and last year after the festival we found out that there were a few distilleries that didn't have the right licensing to properly participate and the options was going to be we tell those eight or nine distilleries sorry you can't be here or knowing me, and stacy rolls her eyes and gets mad at me.
• 37:20
  Speaker 4: But I'm competitive, I don't like to lose.
• 37:22
  Speaker 4: I don't like people to tell me that we can't do something.
• 37:25
  Speaker 4: So we went to mike fisk at evergreen liquors, at the bricks and mortars shop that opened last year the week of the festival, right down the street, a full-blown retail shop, and I said we've got eight distilleries that can't participate.
• 37:38
  Speaker 4: But what if we did this?
• 37:40
  Speaker 4: What if we did a bottle shop where they're under your roof and you coordinate all the sampling and bottle sales?
• 37:47
  Speaker 4: So the result is for our customers and for these distilleries.
• 37:50
  Speaker 4: We've got eight distilleries there Kentucky Owl, milam Green, ej Curley, three Ch.
• 37:54
  Speaker 4: Result is for our customers and for these distilleries.
• 37:55
  Speaker 4: We've got eight distilleries there kentucky, owl, milam and green aj, curly, three cord.
• 37:58
  Speaker 4: Uh, you know they're there being able to participate in the sampling and the selling legally because the way we've worked this out so it's a win-win.
• 38:05
  Speaker 4: So the old bottle shop, that justin's that you mentioned, that was our single barrel zone.
• 38:09
  Speaker 4: Right, we need.
• 38:10
  Speaker 4: The lot hadn't changed yet, so we wanted to do single barrels.
• 38:14
  Speaker 4: But the distilleries had to have a three-tier outlet or retail outlet.
• 38:18
  Speaker 4: Yeah, the laws changed.
• 38:19
  Speaker 4: The distilleries were allowed, through their gift shop provision, to offer single barrels, limited editions, exclusives, through their gift shop.
• 38:27
  Speaker 4: So what you're seeing at the bourbon festival is the distilleries selling them now.
• 38:32
  Speaker 4: So instead of going to one shop and standing in line and hoping what you want is going to be there, you now, if you want a Four Roses boom, go to Four Roses Maker's.
• 38:40
  Speaker 4: Mark, heaven Hill, elijah Craig, you know those things.
• 38:43
  Speaker 4: You can go to the craft distilleries directly and buy.
• 38:45
  Speaker 4: And it's just crazy.
• 38:49
  Speaker 4: And again, it wasn't.
• 38:51
  Speaker 4: I didn't do anything other than know how to exploit the law to our advantage.
• 38:56
  Speaker 4: Stacey and I have become.
• 38:58
  Speaker 4: I told her yesterday I had just passed the bar exam in Kentucky because we know so much about the spirits law.
• 39:04
  Speaker 4: Right, and Stacey, I'm right there.
• 39:05
  Speaker 4: Stacey's on point.
• 39:07
  Speaker 4: By going in, a distillery wants to be a part of the festival.
• 39:09
  Speaker 4: She knows before.
• 39:10
  Speaker 4: I can reply to an email if they can legally.
• 39:15
  Speaker 4: But yeah, net result is the distilleries get it.
• 39:18
  Speaker 4: And the last year you saw a little bit of it where they were bringing out, like being brought out, what was it?
• 39:24
  Speaker 4: Baker's 13?
• 39:25
  Speaker 4: And they said we're going to bring everything we have in our inventory and we're going to start it there and sell it, sell it, sell it and whatever's left we'll put back in the store.
• 39:35
  Speaker 4: And Heaven Hill did things.
• 39:38
  Speaker 4: And I know for a fact that Heaven Hill and Beam sold more bottles, product sales at those three days at the Kentucky Bourbon Festival than they did at their Bricks and Mortar after your distillery tours and things.
• 39:54
  Speaker 4: So if you sit back and think about that, this little three-day festival out in the middle of this little park is outperforming their permanent operation that's made to sell bottles.
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: But now there's a lot of people, you know, when you go to Jim Beam and you take their tour and everything, there's a lot of people that like bourbon but they're kind of on the bourbon trail and whatever.
• 40:16
  Speaker 3: But the people at the festival you are talking serious, serious bourbon collectors and people who just absolutely so.
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: When you're talking the festival, it's not like you said right now, there are still tickets available.
• 40:31
  Speaker 3: It's August, Within a month, going in, and that's tickets available.
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: It's august, within a month going in your what you should, and that's the way it's always been.
• 40:38
  Speaker 4: It's like a week earlier every year yeah like last year, I think we sold out august 22nd and then you know, now it's august.
• 40:46
  Speaker 4: I mean sold out.
• 40:49
  Speaker 3: The vip sells out in seconds or a minute or whatever it is.
• 40:55
  Speaker 3: It's just now this year, from everything I heard, the way it was set up on the website.
• 40:59
  Speaker 3: A lot of people were very happy with it.
• 41:02
  Speaker 3: How they were able to get, you know, a couple VIPs opposed to only one, and you know we learned last year we tripped on ourselves and you know we figured out.
• 41:13
  Speaker 4: But a brand new website this year.
• 41:15
  Speaker 4: You know a renewed partnership with our online box office and and they were uh humbled, I guess, by the volume that we put out for this little bitty festival.
• 41:26
  Speaker 4: I mean, they were doing like large music festivals were very complex.
• 41:30
  Speaker 4: I had an hour and a half conversation today, twice, with them.
• 41:33
  Speaker 4: We have so many different ticket levels and add-ons and things.
• 41:37
  Speaker 4: It's a very complex little city that we build, but yeah, so we sold out.
• 41:42
  Speaker 4: And, jeffrey, I just want to correct you on one thing, or add something to your first comment.
• 41:47
  Speaker 4: Urban enthusiasts the serious, the diehards.
• 41:50
  Speaker 4: You too, you know what you're doing, you know what you're looking for, you enjoy it, but we also get a lot of first-time novice and so when Stacey and I are planning this and we're talking to the distilleries, we want something that the diehard enthusiast is going to be like holy cow, this is it.
• 42:09
  Speaker 4: But we don't want to be intimidating to the people that are coming in.
• 42:12
  Speaker 4: But we don't want to be intimidating to the people that are coming in and people always say I don't like bourbon, I want to try what do you suggest?
• 42:18
  Speaker 4: And I'm always like well Maker's 46.
• 42:20
  Speaker 4: Or I try to give them something that they're going to enjoy, to kind of get them into it.
• 42:26
  Speaker 4: But I said, come to the festival.
• 42:27
  Speaker 4: You can take the most advanced person, enthusiast, and the most novice person, put them together and there's no shame.
• 42:35
  Speaker 3: It's like come on, let's go on this journey together.
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: Let's keep going.
• 42:38
  Speaker 4: Yeah, definitely One thing I love about this festival is that it's not just for the diehard.
• 42:45
  Speaker 4: We hope that there's enough there to keep people really engaged.
• 42:48
  Speaker 4: But I don't want to scare people off like oh, I'm not a bourbon guy or girl.
• 42:52
  Speaker 4: Danny Kahn, master distiller, buffalo Trace 1792.
• 42:59
  Speaker 4: You can nerd and geek out with that guy as long as you want but he also understands the basic.
• 43:08
  Speaker 4: Let's get people in and get them into the hobby and not scare them away.
• 43:10
  Speaker 4: So he'll sit and talk to somebody at this level until he realizes that, oh, this person's here.
• 43:17
  Speaker 4: All right, we'll go up and everyone.
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: Greg Snyder can do the same thing.
• 43:22
  Speaker 2: Now I can back you up on that Last year when totally did the festival media-wise different?
• 43:31
  Speaker 2: Because I actually went out and this was Jeff's idea or Tiny's idea that I went out and individually interviewed people.
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: That was my job mostly during the festival was to go out and interview people.
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: So I was going around the whole time, all three days, and just walking up to people and interviewing and find out where they were from, if it was their first time, their 10th time or you know, or how many times they've been there, what they liked about the festival, what they disliked about the festival and everything.
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: And now we've recorded it and so I've got all the answers and I met people that you know it was their first time.
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: I've got all the answers and I met people that you know it was their first time Some people they were there with their significant other that liked bourbon.
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: Some were there and they were just enjoying the artwork and the furniture and the other crafts that were there, you know, because their significant other loved the bourbon and the whiskey.
• 44:32
  Speaker 4: Thank, you for mentioning that nash um, nash on the street I can already see, yeah, see your own series.
• 44:39
  Speaker 4: But the the bourbon marketplace.
• 44:42
  Speaker 4: People do love to come and shop and and I always.
• 44:46
  Speaker 4: I just met with our entertainment director today and I said we have these little stages.
• 44:50
  Speaker 4: We're not a music festival but we have to have quality music as a layer of the experience.
• 44:55
  Speaker 4: And when I was in Gettysburg we did a.
• 44:58
  Speaker 4: It's called plein air, e-i-n.
• 45:00
  Speaker 4: Plein air, which means open space artists, so an artist would sit on the battlefield in Gettysburg with their easel and paint, and so we're doing more of that now, like this year.
• 45:11
  Speaker 4: So, as you're, walking through the festival.
• 45:16
  Speaker 4: You will see a number of artists that are sitting there painting Spalding Hall, or maybe they'll have a little photo clipped up on their easel and they're painting Heaven Hill Distillery or one of the Rick Houses or something.
• 45:23
  Speaker 4: But there's all these layers that add to that experience and people that aren't really into urban per se still enjoy a nice time at the event, the food trucks and the music and the art.
• 45:36
  Speaker 4: It's a tremendous environment.
• 45:40
  Speaker 3: Okay, that's too far, because you've got to Wait, wait you cannot.
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: We're just sitting there enjoying the music when the little bands were playing on the stage, and all that While there are others who are walking around and doing the tasting.
• 45:56
  Speaker 2: I agree.
• 46:02
  Speaker 3: But if you're the spouse that's there with your wife or your husband or whatever, I can see that there's stuff for somebody else.
• 46:09
  Speaker 3: But overall, I mean, if you want to learn about bourbon, this is a great place to come to, but you have to have some interest in bourbon to go, yeah right yeah, right, you're right, I mean, but it's, it is a bourbon festival, right I never want to fight the fact that we create this thing around bourbon.
• 46:34
  Speaker 4: It's Kentucky's number one ag export.
• 46:36
  Speaker 4: It's one of the top tourism drivers, if not the number one tourism driver.
• 46:40
  Speaker 4: Eighty-five percent of the people that come to this festival are coming from outside of Kentucky, so it is a major economic impact for the region, and so I never lose sight of that.
• 46:52
  Speaker 4: But it also can't just be about bourbon, bourbon, bourbon.
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: I mean to Jeffrey's point, it's a marathon.
• 47:00
  Speaker 4: You can't drink bourbon all day, so I mean we do have beer and I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that.
• 47:06
  Speaker 4: Scout and Scholar, we all know it a block away from the festival.
• 47:11
  Speaker 4: We're doing our first ever collaboration with them.
• 47:13
  Speaker 4: I was there a week ago, tuesday brewing.
• 47:18
  Speaker 4: I'm literally like I'm dumping ingredients in.
• 47:21
  Speaker 4: I'm brewing and we're doing a wheat beer.
• 47:23
  Speaker 4: That is going to be an old-fashioned theme.
• 47:27
  Speaker 4: So Jody Piliantro from Evan Williams brought a barrel over.
• 47:31
  Speaker 4: We're going to put staves in and we're going to age this wheat beer with some staves and then we're going to put a cherry puree and orange zest.
• 47:40
  Speaker 4: And I got Scrappy's bitters two gallons of Scrappy's bitters, $500 for these bitters.
• 47:46
  Speaker 4: And we're going to introduce that and we're going to can and or have on draft our first ever Kentucky bourbon festival.
• 47:52
  Speaker 4: Old fashioned weed collaboration.
• 47:57
  Speaker 3: So you were in heaven.
• 47:59
  Speaker 3: That's just heaven for you.
• 48:00
  Speaker 3: You're combining your love for for a good you know craft beer exactly with with the flavors you want to add in, and then you're dropping it into a Heaven Hill barrel and then adding staves.
• 48:19
  Speaker 3: I mean, that sounds like it's.
• 48:22
  Speaker 3: That day was just like.
• 48:24
  Speaker 3: You were just like wow, that's.
• 48:27
  Speaker 3: I never thought this would happen.
• 48:29
  Speaker 4: It was 98 degrees and muggier than hell in Barstown and I'm in, I'm in the brewery with all this steam going on and I mean it, it was, it was a brutal day, but oh, it is and and lee, who's the head brewer at scout and scholar.
• 48:46
  Speaker 4: I call him the evil genius.
• 48:48
  Speaker 4: I and you guys know me, I'm I'm as much of a craft beer guy, as I am a bourbon guy.
• 48:54
  Speaker 4: And I've had beer from all over the country.
• 48:56
  Speaker 4: I've never had a bad beer from this guy and I don't like sours.
• 48:59
  Speaker 4: He made me drink one of his sours last year and I liked it.
• 49:03
  Speaker 4: So the fact that we could collaborate on this and Scout and Scholar is such a good partner anyway and a friendly neighbor to what we're doing.
• 49:11
  Speaker 4: I'm jazzed about that.
• 49:13
  Speaker 4: I mean to have our own can with the bourbon festival wrapped on it, well yeah it's fun.
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: I cannot wait to reap the ice cold fruits of your uh steamed hard labor.
• 49:28
  Speaker 3: So so okay, so then, so we, then we've talked about the distillers and everything.
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: Cheers to that brother.
• 49:37
  Speaker 3: So the single barrel program Cheers yes, and I think that that's really cool that you did the brew yeah.
• 49:46
  Speaker 4: Okay, this will be on the neck of every single barrel, 7,000 of them roughly.
• 49:52
  Speaker 4: Stacy will correct me, no doubt there's last year's but instead of the sticker.
• 49:58
  Speaker 4: Alright now we're having the stickers are pain in the ass to deal with.
• 50:03
  Speaker 4: So the neck tag with the little QR code on the back.
• 50:08
  Speaker 4: But every one of the official bourbon festival and this is actually, I believe, one of our bourbon festival.
• 50:15
  Speaker 4: Maybe not, I love New Rev, so that's what I grabbed tonight, but yeah, so that you'll have.
• 50:21
  Speaker 4: And this year, jeffrey, I shared with you last night we're doing a T-shirt, so all of the single barrel distilleries will have this logo on the front and we'll have all of them on the back of the T-shirt.
• 50:33
  Speaker 4: So our little single barrel that I didn't know what a single barrel was five years ago it's now got its own little following and a t-shirt and everything to move well, but those single barrels this year, um, initially, uh, the single barrels.
• 50:49
  Speaker 3: When you released the single barrels the first year, which I think was like 12 or 13, and you guys went plus the bonus makers.
• 50:58
  Speaker 3: Mark barrel that we did yeah, and you went around and did those picks.
• 51:02
  Speaker 3: I was on that pick in 2021 for Nod Creek and the Luca Mariano and I've got both.
• 51:11
  Speaker 4: We don't talk about the Luca Mariano night.
• 51:14
  Speaker 3: Hey, we don't have to talk, but that was fun either way.
• 51:18
  Speaker 3: It's like it was legendary, legendary.
• 51:22
  Speaker 3: Either way, it's like it was um legendary, legendary.
• 51:23
  Speaker 3: You, you figured out different things to do with a thief.
• 51:26
  Speaker 3: That I've never thought of.
• 51:28
  Speaker 4: But yeah, just just to clarify for those that aren't familiar with the story.
• 51:34
  Speaker 4: We did a doubleheader that day.
• 51:36
  Speaker 4: We went to wilderness trail with macaulay there you go and if you haven't been on a wilderness trail pic, it's insane.
• 51:43
  Speaker 3: Yeah, but you put a wilderness trail with Macaulay.
• 51:46
  Speaker 3: That takes it to another level, right.
• 51:49
  Speaker 4: That was 10 o'clock on a Saturday morning, and then we had the Luca Mariano party and barrel pic at like 5 on Saturday night.
• 51:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah, a rainy, day.
• 52:00
  Speaker 4: And Randy was in bed at the hotel by 6.
• 52:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah, but we had fun.
• 52:06
  Speaker 3: I haven't had a base myself.
• 52:08
  Speaker 4: yet it was rude to leave If you had 12 of these from Wilderness.
• 52:13
  Speaker 4: I thought it was rude to leave liquid in them.
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: That's like spalding on Caddyshack.
• 52:19
  Speaker 4: It was like Spalding on Caddyshack.
• 52:21
  Speaker 3: I was like Well, we all like, just like on that pick that.
• 52:29
  Speaker 4: I did with you for Knob Creek up at the First ever one.
• 52:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, the offices, remember that.
• 52:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that was my first pick that I ever did.
• 52:35
  Speaker 4: That was amazing Freddie shows up in the old office on a folding table, which is now where our big bar is and Freddie shows up and he's mad because he wasn't happy with some of the stuff that the guys pulled for him.
• 52:47
  Speaker 4: But I mean, what a cool experience to have Freddie Nose sitting there talking us through this thing and we had somebody from.
• 52:55
  Speaker 4: Alaska.
• 52:56
  Speaker 4: We had you, we had Coombs.
• 52:58
  Speaker 4: You know that was Emma, who was my original employee.
• 53:03
  Speaker 4: That was her last barrel pick with us before she went on to Heaven Hill to manage their single barrel program.
• 53:08
  Speaker 3: Which this year, when we did our last year, when we did it, Emma was Emma and Bernie Lovers went on that pick.
• 53:16
  Speaker 3: Yeah, she's the nephew, the niece of Tully, right, yeah, Tani.
• 53:30
  Speaker 4: So this is where it all started.
• 53:31
  Speaker 4: This was the very first barrel pick we ever did.
• 53:37
  Speaker 2: It has.
• 53:37
  Speaker 4: Denny and Jane signed on it.
• 53:39
  Speaker 4: Wow.
• 53:40
  Speaker 4: So this was the one.
• 53:42
  Speaker 4: I told Bill Samuels what we were going to do with this bourbon festival during the COVID year and he is famous for going down to Barstown the mayor and the county judge and I mean David Mandel, kim Houston and he kicked them in the ass.
• 53:57
  Speaker 4: He said you guys are calling yourselves the bourbon capital world.
• 54:00
  Speaker 4: Well, by God, you better start acting like it, looking like it, because you don't.
• 54:04
  Speaker 4: And he lit a fire.
• 54:06
  Speaker 4: And so the fast forward a couple years and I come in and during the covid year we did the virtual bourbon festival and we had robin bill and kyle and wes henderson on a virtual and I I escorted robin bill from the parking lot down into barstown Bourbon Company, into the Pete's Place where we did their segment.
• 54:25
  Speaker 4: And I had three minutes of an elevator speech to tell them what we're going to do with this bourbon festival.
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: And the next day Thomas.
• 54:32
  Speaker 4: Bolton calls me and he said, quote, unquote I don't know what the hell you told the old man, but he's so excited he's donating a barrel for you.
• 54:42
  Speaker 4: I'm like, well, what the hell am told the old man, but he's so excited he's donating a barrel for you.
• 54:45
  Speaker 4: I'm like, what the hell am I gonna do with a barrel of bourbon?
• 54:46
  Speaker 4: He's like we bottle it and put your name on it and you sell it for a fundraiser.
• 54:49
  Speaker 4: I didn't know what a single barrel was, so this is it.
• 54:52
  Speaker 4: This is the absolute number one, 001 of of all of our and now we're up over 80 I think, think yeah.
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: That's got the bourbon capital of the world.
• 55:04
  Speaker 4: Stacy's been on all 45 of them.
• 55:06
  Speaker 4: That's crazy.
• 55:08
  Speaker 2: That's got the bourbon capital of the world on it.
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: I've got one of those bottles.
• 55:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, buddy, yeah me too, yeah.
• 55:13
  Speaker 3: I've got it.
• 55:13
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we bought that bottle Super Nash and that ornament.
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: I actually hang on my bourbon tree ornament.
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: It's the, and that ornament I actually hang on my bourbon tree ornament tree.
• 55:23
  Speaker 4: It's the first one and Maker Smart did.
• 55:26
  Speaker 4: They produced these as a hanger, yeah, and we sold and we paid $10,000 off that kind donation and they were actually the first one as the featured distillery.
• 55:40
  Speaker 4: So we had 34 distilleries.
• 55:41
  Speaker 4: We elevated makers the next year we had 48 distilleries and we elevated beam knob Creek.
• 55:50
  Speaker 4: Last year we had 52 distilleries and we elevated.
• 55:53
  Speaker 4: Bardstown bourbon company.
• 55:54
  Speaker 4: This year we've got 63 and we're elevating Kevin Hill, elijah Craig with their barrel pick and and next year I believe it's Four Roses.
• 56:03
  Speaker 4: So we take this very competitive market and we elevate one distillery and how they get to be.
• 56:09
  Speaker 4: that is, they donate a barrel that we can bottle and do something good as a fundraiser for us Awesome.
• 56:15
  Speaker 4: So the single barrel program is just such an amazing, amazing experience.
• 56:22
  Speaker 4: Barrel program is just such a uh, amazing, amazing experience.
• 56:27
  Speaker 4: So we get to sit and select these barrels and then the distillery sell them for us.
• 56:30
  Speaker 3: You know, yeah, well, but but you know it's like, and then you know, last year, that was the first year the distillery sold them.
• 56:37
  Speaker 3: But you know they didn't really know what was going to happen and they sold a lot of their, their own brands, like you said, what happened with um leg, the legacy uh bottle, with um jim beam?
• 56:51
  Speaker 3: You know they, they had the, and then they also had um bookers.
• 56:55
  Speaker 3: They had little book and they had bakers 13, so they had four bottles plus.
• 57:01
  Speaker 3: Then you've got their barrel pick that they can sell.
• 57:04
  Speaker 3: And now that they're all selling them out, you know when you even think about it, you can jeffrey.
• 57:11
  Speaker 4: So last year it was freddie's birthday.
• 57:14
  Speaker 4: Fred and freddie were sitting there in front of the beam tent carving ham.
• 57:18
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, I'm just trying to paint a picture for the people that haven't been there, the kind of interaction.
• 57:23
  Speaker 4: You're walking up on this Jim Beam tent and here's Fred and Freddie sitting in rocking chairs cutting ham and giving it to people and talking to them signing bottles.
• 57:31
  Speaker 4: But they all didn't figure it out, so one or two made it.
• 57:35
  Speaker 4: The other distilleries heard what sales were, so they're on.
• 57:41
  Speaker 4: So this year even more are doing it.
• 57:42
  Speaker 4: You know Mictors case in point.
• 57:43
  Speaker 4: Mictors wanted to do it but they didn't think they could.
• 57:47
  Speaker 4: So this year Mictors is selling.
• 57:49
  Speaker 4: So I think probably and Stacy's probably screaming at the screen but of the 63, not counting the single barrel partners who are all selling, obviously, I think there's probably another four or five that we didn't do a single barrel with that are also going to be selling bottles and so if you think about 50 of the 63 distilleries will be selling, hell, maybe all of them are, but I mean I know there's a few that aren't and can't and haven't figured it out 1792, we did a bottle in bond with ross and danny a week or two ago.
• 58:25
  Speaker 4: Um they, they will be selling these 1792 uh bottles there, so I mean just think about it you guys are super fans of these distilleries to be able to go in and buy an exclusive.
• 58:40
  Speaker 3: Well, but you even think.
• 58:41
  Speaker 4: The fact that they went for our name on it is an honor, but you can even take it further.
• 58:48
  Speaker 3: Let's just say, as you guys, this year it's 45, right, 45 single barrel picks and they're going to be there.
• 58:58
  Speaker 3: But it's not like if they don't sell out and I'm not saying they will or won't, but if they don't.
• 59:06
  Speaker 4: Well, some will in five minutes.
• 59:11
  Speaker 3: Yeah, but they can take it back to their gift shop or in the future I wouldn't even be surprised, because I really think the kentucky bourbon festival pick team that you guys put together, the people that are going with what stacy puts together between the different podcasts, the different media people, the people they're, they're all bourbon lovers.
• 59:34
  Speaker 3: Um, and you know you're talking about steve coombs, you know you're talking about the master distillers on the on.
• 59:40
  Speaker 3: It was great to be able to pick with Greg Schneider on the chicken cock pick with Steve Lisa Roper-Wicker, stacy myself, ct.
• 59:50
  Speaker 3: I mean it was just insane.
• 59:53
  Speaker 3: The pick team, and so you're picking, and you know it's funny because you know this is the premier festival.
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 3: And you know it's funny because you know this is the premier festival.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 3: This is where, just say, somebody comes and they get a barrel pick from the Kentucky Bourbon Festival and they go, holy crap, that's really really good.
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 3: And then they're going to be like I want to pick a barrel there.
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 3: It makes sense that the distilleries roll out their premier barrels for you to pick, because this is where they can showcase their programs and I mean, I've always gotten it.
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 3: You know what.
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 3: What can happen, Jeffrey?
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 4: I mean we have Brent Elliott.
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 4: Brent doesn't do these all the time.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 4: I forget that.
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 4: But Brent Elliott sees our name on the calendar for a barrel pick.
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 4: He's there.
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 4: You know Freddie takes time to come out.
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 4: It's just Greg.
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 4: Greg doesn't do as many barrel picks as he would like.
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 4: And then you start going through Chris Morris.
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 4: You know he's on our board, by the way.
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 4: Brom Foreman this is so huge.
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 4: Brom Foreman pulled out of the festival in 2015-2016 for the obvious reason we were not producing the event they needed.
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: So now they're back this is the third year Chris is back on our board, which is crazy.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 4: But to go to a barrel pick and to sit there and have the Masters still are taking time To have Danny, hahn and Ross at 1792.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 4: And I'm making good on something that happened years ago, before Danny was promoted to Buffalo Trace.
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 4: He was mad at us because we didn't include him in a barrel pick a couple years ago.
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 4: So this last year was a make it.
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 4: So we have master stillers that want to be a part of the the bourbon festival single barrel program.
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 4: And it's just again humbling, humbling, humbling.
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 3: It's just well, and I will say I saw it first year you guys saw it, 19.
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 4: And you saw what I, you heard what I was trying to build, and the vision team and the, and to see it coming together.
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: Well, yes, it's coming to fruition now.
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 2: It's amazing, yep.
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 4: And it's the team Absolutely, and the community is rallying behind us.
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 4: Finally, and board members have always said stay the course, randy, it's going to be ugly.
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 4: And when we do this initial change, stay the course, you know.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 4: Same thing.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 4: You would call Rob saying like stay the course, it's going to get rough, it's ugly.
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 4: I know you're getting beat up.
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 4: I was a pinata that first summer.
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 4: Yeah, well, I mean, I remember, but but picture of Spalding Hall in the green grass.
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 4: Like in 30 days, I can't wait to see y'all.
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 4: I posted it.
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I remember the oh my gosh, the firestorm that came out of that stupid little innocent post that was fun.
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 3: I had a blast.
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 3: I was just blasting everybody that was blasting the festival, I mean but honestly.
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 3: Randy.
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 3: So this year, this year, this is the first year that you could say that COVID doesn't have a say at all.
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 3: Everybody's kind of back when it comes to festivals and everything.
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 3: Nobody's worried about it.
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 3: Everybody knows that it's evolved into a cold, yeah, whatever, and so you don't got that looming over you at all.
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 3: So everybody's going to this festival Plus.
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 3: Then you've got the local aspect of it won over, or or you've, you've stayed the course, like you said, and and then now you're getting some local support.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 3: You know, for it you've always had local support.
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 3: It was just a select few people who want.
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 4: You know you're always going to get that there is a case in point and I told this story at lunch today donald blanco from music that makes all the big red houses, yeah at lunch he's my board treasurer going through the financials.
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 4: He was talking about how the locals have settled down.
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 4: I said I remember years ago I'm sitting at the bar Scout and Scholar watching a baseball game, by myself drinking a beer.
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 4: The bartender said hey.
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 4: Randy how's the festival planning going?
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 4: I'm like, oh, oh, I knew that the guy next to me, I could hear his head going.
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 4: He's like so you're the guy.
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 4: I'm like I'm the guy and I fast forward through.
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 4: I said what do you do?
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 4: I own this business.
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 4: How long you've been here?
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 4: 22 years.
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 4: I said during your time of business, have you ever had to change your plan based on what your customers are telling you?
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 4: I do it every quarter and every month.
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 4: And I said that's what we're doing.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 4: And the light bulb went off.
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 4: So six months later I saw him at Mr Tubbs, the little cocktail bar that we've all been to.
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 4: I I walk over and he's at the bar and he leans back and goes hey, randy, come here.
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 4: He goes.
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 4: I am your number one advocate.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 4: I'm telling all these morons what you're doing and why you're doing it, and that was super cool.
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 4: So I told Donald this story today at lunch.
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: Well, tonight I met Mr.
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 4: Tubbs doing a couple meetings.
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 4: He comes in in the same guy and I said well, I tell your story all the time because one by one, we will win the local community by being successful and and I said you have lifetime passes to the bourbon festival, not only for what you do, but for allowing me to tell the story of that night when you kind of like the light bulb went off and you're a smart business person and you get it.
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 4: And every year, more and more of the people who really matter get it.
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 4: The business owners get it, the bourbon enthusiasts get it and everybody else is gonna.
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 4: You know, the haters gonna hate, right that's not what they say.
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 4: Yeah, well, no longer the people we're trying to convert, but what we do and why we do it.
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 2: Get it well, you even think aaron harris is in the house yes, hey, aaron, and that I wanted to say that.
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 3: So I me and you were young, but when summerfest in was in milwaukee started, it was a.
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 3: It was similar to exactly what kentucky bourbon festival was forever, where there was a bunch of beer tents.
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 3: They got some names in and people went and then it just kept the way it kept evolving and evolving and evolving.
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 3: And now, if you go to Summerfest, there's permanent structures, there's.
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 3: Same thing with whatever, and you've evolved it.
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 3: But what I think this is is what's great about it and why people keep coming back year after year.
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 3: Where you don't lose a lot of people is because I can't wait to go see Aaron Harris.
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 3: Aaron is such a great guy.
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 3: He's out there in Owensboro, kentucky, which, no matter when you go out to see him, it's a drive for especially people in Ohio, but it's well worth it.
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 3: I mean, green River is doing some great things, but you get to see people that you don't always get to because they're all there Now.
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 3: I find that a lot of times.
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 3: What's sad is that you didn't get to spend.
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 3: There's not enough time to see everybody, but even the people coming back from Wisconsin or these groups that come down, you see them there.
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 3: So it's like I said, it's a big, huge reunion amongst the bourbon community.
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 3: But the bourbon community why I'm in this is because they're awesome, they think alike, they're into, they love life, they love having fun, but they're responsible and they work hard, you know, and that's kind of the base of what we deal with.
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 4: That is the industry.
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 4: So the enthusiasts and the industry match that right.
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 4: We're sociable, we love turning people on to what we love and the distillery side of things.
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 4: They compete for every little inch on a shelf.
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 4: You take the marketing people out of it and the legal teams that they these guys all have to have.
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 4: The people are making the whiskey.
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 4: They just love sitting back and drinking each other's stuff and enjoying it and talking to tell stories.
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 4: Well, but that's what the soul festival is about.
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 4: It's not just showing the people the whiskey that people will make it, but also how those people interact.
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 4: So I'll put a greg Snyder on a on a stage with Denny you know Denny Potter or Chris Morris on with Conor O'Driscoll and you know all these different things.
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 4: They compete.
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 4: They should hate each other, right?
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 4: No, they don't.
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 4: They love each other, right what they do, and that's kind of the spirit of what we're presenting.
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 3: Well, even even David Mandel Okay, that that man is.
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 3: You know what he did with Bardstown Bourbon Company and now he's at Kentucky, the Whiskey House of Kentucky.
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 3: It's like that.
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 3: He exists on a level financially than most.
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 3: Not a lot, but he will sit, he will give you, he will search you out and talk to you and he has.
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 3: He's at the same level as everybody else and that's something that I love about this industry.
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 3: Whether you know you've got Fred and Freddie no, I mean their family.
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 3: Is that seventh and eighth generation making whiskey?
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 4: These people are part of history, but they're people.
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 4: They will invite you to their kitchen table.
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 2: Yep, yep, that's right.
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 4: And sit in the living room and and tell stories and and they become friends and you know, you exchange christmas cards with them and if somebody in one of the families passes away, you're you send flowers.
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 4: I mean it's just, it becomes that really close-knit family and I love that and that's something you don't find, that no other industry.
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 2: Nope, it's like then, and then I've never found that any anywhere else that I've been and I've traveled all across the state and you know business and pleasure.
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 3: So never, ever.
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 3: So then you take randy, who?
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 2: knit community.
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 2: Who comes in?
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 3: with that close-knit community.
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 3: And then he turns it into um, still the essence.
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 3: You haven't eliminated the essence of bourbon and all that, and it's still everybody getting together and seeing each other.
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 3: But then you put it in an nfl package.
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 3: You know all that's.
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 3: All that's left is just to have that whole weekend.
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 3: You know kind of like hall of fame.
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 3: You just have it all on TV Like the Derby.
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 4: But I can't do it.
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 4: You know you mentioned the Derby and I always tell this story.
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 4: All the stuff that happens about Derby, the sponsorships and the tickets and all the fancy hats and all it doesn't matter if you don't have the 20 horses in the starting gate, and in our case, the 20 horses are the distilleries and we never lose focus of that and uh.
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 4: But.
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 4: But I love the fact that they love and when we closed at six instead of staying up like till 10, I I told them I said the reason we're doing it at six, is so you?
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 4: can do your thing and get people back.
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 4: So bar, some bourbon company does their friday night thing.
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 4: You know, friend.
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 4: You know, friend, sandy are hosting this legends thing at their house.
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 4: Heaven hill is bringing back an event.
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 4: Preservation is looking at, I mean kitchen table, jim bean, they do a special event out there, uh, on some years.
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 4: So the distilleries are taking that chance.
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 4: I don't, I don't want to monopolize.
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 1: I don't want people staying at our place until 10, 11 o'clock at night.
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 4: That's when you get into those problems.
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 4: Give them a cool, unique experience they can't get anywhere else.
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 3: Let them go home the hotel shower, freshen up and then go out and enjoy the distilleries again but out there, not here, or the bars, Like you just want to pass the problems off to the Volstead.
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: No, no no, I'm kidding.
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 3: I'm kidding completely.
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 3: That is a great place to go afterwards.
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 4: No, but it is not about handing, you know, getting people off our grounds and someone else's problem.
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 4: I mean we want to hand off our into into bartistown and the surrounding area.
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 4: Well, I think also, you know we have eight hotels in downtown louisville that are partnering with us, so people stay a little, they have free shuttles all day back and forth and and those can go home into louisville and have that experience.
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 4: You know which is huge and buzzards roost and what Mictors is doing and all up and down Evan Williams experience.
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 4: It's so cool that we can give an experience and I learned this from Denver, colorado, 25 years ago Taste of Colorado Labor Day weekend.
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 4: This festival would bring people in and they would actually close the main stage down and people would leave the festival grounds and go out into Denver and then at 7 o'clock at night they'd reopen and put the stage up and the music would come on and the food's gone.
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 4: You can breathe people in and out of that community without monopolizing them, and that was kind of my inspiration for what we do at the festival unlimited come and go.
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 4: Come in right away, go on tours, go eat, go shop, come back in, leave again, come back.
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 4: We never want to have those where people are in the festival and, oh sorry, no reentries.
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 4: You're here.
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 4: We want to share our guests with the community.
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 2: This is another cool thing that I found out too, talking with the people last year, is that some of the people when they leave the festival, they do go back to the hotels and all that and they actually get together at the hotels and they actually have their own little get togethers and meet other people from all over the states that come there and have their own little bottle shares and parties there at the hotels.
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 1: Oh, my God.
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 4: I'm laughing because I got sucked into the St Louis Bourbon Society.
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 4: It does that at the Fairfield.
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I walked in dead-ass tired one night.
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 4: I did not even want to make eye contact, I wanted to take a shower and go to bed.
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 4: And I walk in and there's this woo, and next thing you know it's two and a half hours later.
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 4: But they had 50 bottles last year and there was this party and what a camaraderie.
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 4: I mean.
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 4: You're right, it's pretty cool to see all that.
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 3: Well, last year the young distillers you know the people they got together at the Bardstown Motor Lodge and had a bottle share.
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 3: That the next, I think it was Sunday morning, they all were.
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 3: They were where's the where.
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, they said that went to like four.
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 3: So yeah, that's just part of it.
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 3: It's just kind of there's a lot of fun that happens and you know, I just think that you've, I think.
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 3: The last thing I want to say is last year the town itself.
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 3: I didn't get the feeling quite that they were getting everything because of the six o'clock and whatever.
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 3: But I'm thinking this year they pretty much are ready for when you release everybody out into the.
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, we talk all year round the chamber of commerce and the downtown main street program, like a lot of the retailers are staying open later.
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 4: They know it's.
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 4: It's like black friday in a traditional retail setting.
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 4: There you go, there's a big opportunity and our consumers are very good consumers outside of the bourbon industry.
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 4: They're good restaurateurs, foodies, they love shopping, they love taking home souvenirs and little pieces of Kentucky with them.
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 4: Yep, but it's taken a while.
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 4: I mean, there are times that the downtown merchants and again fill in the blank, any town USA some downtown merchants are a little different class of people that are wired differently.
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 4: So there are people Barstown is picked up to, where February used to kind of be slow and now it's busy every single weekend.
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 4: So the merchants are figuring it out to be slow.
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 4: And now it's busy every single weekend.
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 4: So the merchants are figuring it out.
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 4: But, um for sure, during bourbon festival weekend we I've been telling them stock up on your inventory, make sure you got staffing, you button it up because they're coming.
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 4: We're going to send them to you.
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 4: That's all you have to do.
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 4: We don't want your money, we're not trying to get you to be a sponsor.
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 4: We want you to take care of our shared guests.
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 3: So yeah, I mean mean last year, I think, scout and Scholar, it was like 9 o'clock and I thought you know whatever, but they were in shutdown mode.
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 3: But I think this year they're going to.
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 3: You know they got the feel for what people are wanting to do.
• 1:16:16
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 3: I think that's another thing.
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 3: Plus, you know you always had the competing.
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 3: You know that competing, what would you say?
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 3: Push against the festival, like they still wanted that little separate thing.
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 3: And I think this year it's gone away.
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 4: To be fair, this festival was free for so many years that people would just kind of descend on Barnstown and we wanted to make sure that they weren't turned away from any kind of festivity.
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 4: So the first year of the cheers to Barnstown started off as the alternative.
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 4: It got spun incorrectly and and I quite frankly misunderstood it they weren't trying to compete.
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 4: They're trying to offer a fallback to make sure people have got something, so now it's evolved into the local folks have a, and I went up last year.
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 4: I walked up there and had a beer and listened to the band and they had a really good time.
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 4: I think it's cool when a town can figure out different ways to celebrate and welcome visitors.
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, the local residents saw the way to engage in the fun.
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 4: We took away that fun.
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 4: I mean, I get that.
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 4: I'm never ignorant to the fact that we took a lot of people's annual party away right.
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 4: We had to.
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 4: We had to, I mean, we were bankrupt, the festival was going to die.
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 4: And so we changed bankrupt the festival was going to die and so we changed that.
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 4: So I love the fact that there's still something away in the local.
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 4: You know the barrel relay on Saturday morning is still very local.
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 4: You know the food trucks are on purpose left into the open so the community can come out and have some fun.
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 4: And the cheers of Barnstown are put on by friends of ours and we collaborate and cross promote and so I just love it.
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 4: I think it's cool when you can see a town have all these different things going on.
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 2: It really showcases it to everybody and takes the sting out of it.
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 3: But then you look at that secondary thing that this festival has evolved Bardstown into.
• 1:18:19
  Speaker 3: Yes, bardstown was the bourbon capital of the world, right, but at the same time, now with this festival and people discovering, you've got more people investing into the local community, like, for instance, circa 1856, I think it is which is the chicken cock tasting room specifically for tasting harrison smith house.
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 4: Yeah yeah.
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 3: So you've got like the distilleries now wanting to have that experience right there in the square and downtown.
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 3: You've always had talbots and everything, but it's making the city like the festival is now spreading out into the actual city and there's money that's being put into the city to make sure that when people come, you know they're used.
• 1:19:08
  Speaker 3: They're used.
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 3: You know it's going to be more bourbon related.
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 3: You know, I think that's really cool.
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 3: It's the whole industry.
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 4: There's 10 core distilleries in nelson county.
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 4: They're all part of the bourbon capital alliance.
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 4: There's a year-round effort to elevate awareness and education and of these distilleries.
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 4: So I mean, as cool as it is to think that a three or four day urban festival might be driving this stuff, it is absolutely a share everything, yeah festival wouldn't be successful without the industry, and the industry is kind of collected by this organization that elevates everybody and educates people year-round.
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 4: So we benefit from it.
• 1:19:50
  Speaker 4: We help them and we're finally figuring out how to be the bourbon capital of the world.
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 4: It's taken a few years, but when I first came in to Barstown first time in, there was zero anything that told me I'm entering Barstown, the bourbon capital of the world.
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 4: I mean, the water towers are not everything's branded street.
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 4: You know the barrels and the flags and the signs and the welcome to, but five years ago that wasn't happening.
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 4: So it's been a concerted effort for everybody to elevate what we're doing in barstown um well also.
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 4: But just remember one little piece.
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 4: I mean people might time their visit to barstown or to.
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 4: It's actually because we know people come in and they do the bourbon trail and then they come to the festival and then they go home, or they come in for the festival and then stay on for a day or two and go to some distillery tours.
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 2: So it's a 10-day swing it's.
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 4: It's the monday before the bourbon festival, on the wednesday, thursday after, so we have a 10-day impact window they might come any other time, but they're coming now because the bourbon festival is there.
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 4: So I mean it's all part of that piece, but it's huge dollars when you think about it.
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 4: If we had moved in November, I'm sure the distilleries would see some kind of a spike in visitation during November because the festival was there.
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: So I mean regardless of where we are.
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 4: We're part of that landscape that drives people here.
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm sure it's a big economic impact to the area but I think, randy, what you've, what you've added in and I know that the distilleries, in some cases like for instance, jim beam, they know they, they they partnered with, and same thing evan williams with major league baseball and everything like that they they have those experiences.
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 3: But what you did was prove in a setting like that, if you present it right to people, they can make a decent amount of money selling their stuff, and that's something that before that's not how the festival worked at all.
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 3: Before, before it was just kind of everybody getting together and you sampled some stuff and you went to the events.
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 3: The events were off site and they were not anything to do with it.
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 3: So what you've evolved it to, I really you know it just makes me want to keep coming down there as much as I possibly can, and you guys have a presence year round.
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 3: Really.
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 4: And thank you for that.
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 4: But the bigger picture is the kentucky distillers association and our shared legal counsel rewrote legislation that got approved, that allowed the distilleries to do what they're doing and allowed me to offer this as an extension of their main property.
• 1:22:44
  Speaker 4: So I mean yes, I mean I can exploit the law, I know how to take the law and make sure these distilleries are taking full advantage of that.
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 4: But again, all these moving parts.
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 4: The bourbon festival didn't just change and become this.
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 4: It changed as a result of the industry pushing the legislation that allowed us to be able to.
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 4: There's so many moving parts and so many different layers that if the laws of 2019 were still in place today, this festival would be either gone or certainly drastically different.
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 4: You used to have to go to off-site venues to actually have spirits, as opposed to now.
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 4: It's here and then you can order it.
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 3: Well, the tasting was the gala, and that was off-site and that's where everybody was, that's where Brown and Foreman was and that's where you know.
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 3: They all had their little areas and you would taste throughout the night.
• 1:23:36
  Speaker 3: But now the tasting is all through the weekend.
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 4: But that is obsoleted, because the laws have finally gotten modernized.
• 1:23:45
  Speaker 2: Justin's House of.
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 4: Bourbon model from 21 and 22,.
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 4: That's been obsoleted.
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 4: We love Justin's, but the laws have changed to where the distilleries are selling directly, so why do you need to have the bottle shop there?
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 4: So I mean, there's so many things that have gone on with the legal advancements of Kentucky and there's still some glitches and weird things that are preventing other distilleries from doing what they'd like to do.
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 4: But compared to where we worked five years ago, we just know how to take that and make the most of it, and that's Stacy researching.
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 4: It's Greg and the other distilleries pushing us to say legally we can do this.
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 1: So we need to sit back and say, well, yes, you can legally do it, but now how?
• 1:24:27
  Speaker 4: does that affect?
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 4: We always have a level playing field.
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 4: I had lunch with Mark Irwin from Barstown.
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 1: Bourbon Company on.
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 4: Monday and I said I have every confidence that I can look you in the eyes and tell you that your package with Barstown is the same as Beam and Four Roses and Heaven Hill and we work really carefully to make sure that we're creating this nice fair.
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 4: There's no under the table deals.
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely.
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 2: You're definitely not a guy that does?
• 1:24:56
  Speaker 3: you're an above ground person.
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 3: There's no doubt about it.
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 4: But you have to.
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 4: This industry is so small and incestuous that so-and-so leaves this facility and goes over here.
• 1:25:06
  Speaker 4: This person that used to be the finance person that is over here and and you know so, you can never try to fool someone.
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 3: It'll always come back, and that's not the way I operate anyway well, right, you've, you have taken everything above ground, and that's that's what you got to do to make a successful thing that you don't want torn down, based off of what you just talked about, because that's the kind of stuff that gets everything torn down, and you don't want something building something like this.
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 4: You don't want it to get torn down, and I will tell you the ABC, the state commission, they're not in the business of handing out compliments or being friendly, they're enforcement, right Rules and regulations and enforcement and fines and penalties.
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 4: Last year they told us that we were the gold standard for alcohol spirits related festivals in Kentucky and if anybody comes to them trying to start a new festival or an event, that they would direct them to us.
• 1:26:04
  Speaker 4: And I'm very proud of that.
• 1:26:06
  Speaker 4: And we work as you should be.
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 4: The hours that Stacey and I have invested in this evergreen event 10 bottle shop just to make sure we had seven or eight of our important you know distilleries able to be there illegally and be a part of the festival.
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 4: I mean we'll never be made whole financially for the investment we've made, but we've given it our best effort to make sure that everyone who wants to be a part of this festival can legally do it and and again.
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 4: The net result is when the distilleries are happy and profitable and the guests you, me, the people that come through those front gates are the winners.
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 3: So it works it works All right, so let's finish up.
• 1:26:56
  Speaker 2: I do want to leave everybody with it or leave you with one of the last questions as I went around and I asked and it was a two part question, it was the final question I asked everybody that I interviewed Will you come back to the festival and will you tell somebody about it?
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 3: Every person I asked that last year year that both answers were yes and yes, yeah, thank you, yeah, that was one thing when we made the video, that's one thing.
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 2: Yes, there was, there was um couples, you know, yeah the newcomers, to the people that had been there several times over, and you all lived the nightmare of 2021 with me.
• 1:27:43
  Speaker 4: It was so hard to get that event off and we dropped the ball on a few things.
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 4: And I remember going into the new Great Tent concept and our scanners weren't working.
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 4: So I was working the lines.
• 1:27:57
  Speaker 4: People were mad.
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 4: I'm handing out my business card saying this is me.
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 4: And in the next year we made it right.
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 4: We offered complimentary tickets to make good for what?
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 4: And every single one of those people and two of them came up to me and they said you don't remember me, do you?
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 2: I'm like.
• 1:28:13
  Speaker 4: He's like, I'm the guy that chewed your ass out last year.
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 4: For what screw up, blah, blah.
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 4: He said.
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 4: Man, you listened to us, you took care of us.
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 4: He gave me a bro hug and said that's how you take care of customers and um, and you know, I, I, I was so beat up and battered that first year or so.
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 4: But when people come up to me and said the festival is okay, but you really tripped up on the stuff this year is amazing, keep it up.
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 4: I mean, that means that makes it all worthwhile All the long days.
• 1:28:40
  Speaker 4: And when people come up to me and realize that we really do care for them and want them to have this experience that they can be happy about being a part of and bring their friends, we kill ourselves.
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 4: I hope everyone watching knows that we kill ourselves to bring this experience to you.
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 3: It's a year round job for you, there's no doubt.
• 1:29:01
  Speaker 3: And then also, you know that I felt so bad for you because 2020, that was the virtual year and you did really good as far as the productions and everything in the way.
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 3: But then we come along 2021 set up really good, but it just wasn't fair because that problem with the tickets happened instantly as people were walking through the door.
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 3: So to start your day and the festival was a ticket disaster that had nothing to do.
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 3: You guys had it set up.
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 3: It should have worked.
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 3: It didn't, but then you worked your ass off to make it right with everybody you possibly could and that's what that's part of you.
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 3: Get that out of the festival, you're gonna.
• 1:29:47
  Speaker 3: You can't, you don't have control over everything.
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 3: You can't control it all, but you can fix what you can fix I'm getting ptsd.
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 3: I know I saw that.
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 4: We opened the gates at Friday at 10 am and I had my Churchill Downs crew that knew what they were doing and the scanners weren't working and all that and I literally jumped behind a tent and got on this toll-free number trying to get help from our ticketing people and there was no help.
• 1:30:15
  Speaker 4: There was no helpline.
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 4: My buddy that I did brew festivals with in wisconsin was on the live chat on his computer with me on the phone and it was this nightmare.
• 1:30:27
  Speaker 4: I was like this is not how I wanted to start this event.
• 1:30:30
  Speaker 4: But you know, we've rebounded and I've picked better partners and um and it's real time now.
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 4: So if something happens, we fix it now, we don't wait till next year.
• 1:30:41
  Speaker 4: But but I appreciate you, you guys.
• 1:30:43
  Speaker 4: You guys are my brothers, you were there and you, you felt my pain.
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 4: You bought me a beer at scott scouter when I was sitting there all by myself one night.
• 1:30:52
  Speaker 4: It gets to be a very lonely, isolated little situation.
• 1:30:57
  Speaker 4: I'm throwing the best party in town and here I am over the corner just like not wanting to talk to people and you guys cheer me up.
• 1:31:04
  Speaker 3: Well, you, you were throwing the best party in town trying to get allowing people to come in and you did, you got everybody got in.
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 3: I mean, they did it wasn't at one point.
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 3: You know, kate, kate just jumped in and started helping and you were just like, okay, yeah, I see it, go, go, go go.
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 4: I grabbed a scanner.
• 1:31:24
  Speaker 4: I mean I'm scanning people and trying to get people in the door.
• 1:31:27
  Speaker 4: My problem is the PTSD came from Churchill Downs, my first year at Derby.
• 1:31:32
  Speaker 1: We had the same problem happen.
• 1:31:34
  Speaker 4: We had 90 minutes waits for people to get into Churchill Downs and when it happened here, albeit a smaller scale, it was like, oh my god, this is happening all over again.
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 4: It should not take more than five minutes to get someone in this festival.
• 1:31:49
  Speaker 4: Why is it taking 45 minutes?
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 4: It's the stuff that when people say, what do you do the rest of the year, the festival's over, what do you do?
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 4: That's what we do.
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 4: We improve those processes and we, we select stronger partners and we will take a look at what we did right and and what we could have done better, and we constantly internally evaluate what we're doing and and.
• 1:32:13
  Speaker 4: Uh, it's just, you have to always want to be better, otherwise you won't be.
• 1:32:17
  Speaker 3: Well, I'll give everybody an example.
• 1:32:20
  Speaker 3: Initially, when people with the barrel picks, there was a line for that first year for Justin's House of Bourbon that lasted all freaking day.
• 1:32:32
  Speaker 3: But people bourbon people are used to.
• 1:32:35
  Speaker 3: That's the one thing you got going for you, randy.
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 3: We love lines.
• 1:32:38
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 3: We're used to waiting in lines.
• 1:32:40
  Speaker 3: But, what I'll say is you've eliminated the lines with how you've set this up.
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 3: There's going to be a couple little small lines at the places people want to go, but when you've got as she said, 45 barrels from 36 different distilleries.
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 4: That's a spread out right there People yes, there's going to be a couple of distilleries this year's program, the magazine it has a map of the festival.
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 4: It has specifics on where distilleries are.
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 4: We have barrel icons next to the ones that are doing the single barrels and we have a special section.
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 4: That's all the expert tasting notes that Steve Coombs did so people can advance figure out like the three of us that stand in line, jeff you're heading to Heaven and Hell, to get the Elijah Craig Nash.
• 1:33:29
  Speaker 4: You're going to Four Roses, I'm going to run over to Maker's Marker, I'm going on down to Peerless.
• 1:33:34
  Speaker 4: You can game plan a little better and divide and get with only lines of 10 or 15 people most times, yeah, but but not only do you have the the 45 different barrels last year, but then you throw in working with our wives, and all that last year you throw in, as were other people with with their others, but you, you're gonna yeah it was so much fun
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 4: yes, I watched people through that VIP gate come in and scatter yeah it was so cool.
• 1:34:02
  Speaker 4: Yeah, that's what it's supposed to be.
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 2: Divide and conquer man.
• 1:34:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah exactly Divide and conquer, and that's fun.
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 3: Let's finish up.
• 1:34:14
  Speaker 1: It's the third time, Jeffrey.
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 1: Yes, I've tried to finish up.
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 3: It's so much fun talking to you, randy.
• 1:34:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it is.
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we're on freaking an hour and a half.
• 1:34:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we are, we're up there, man, anyways.
• 1:34:29
  Speaker 4: We're just hanging out, I forget we're actually broadcasting.
• 1:34:32
  Speaker 3: But that's fine.
• 1:34:33
  Speaker 3: But what I want to say is everybody one of the cool things when you walk into the festival, depending on you know you've got different vip packages that everybody can pick up.
• 1:34:44
  Speaker 3: You've got, you know, this year the one package is, um, what's the top package?
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 3: What was it a?
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 3: Decanter club yeah, the decanter club which I'm wearing.
• 1:34:54
  Speaker 3: Last year's decanter club.
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 3: I was proud to be a part of that.
• 1:34:57
  Speaker 3: That was phenomenal, uh, having the decanter and the glasses.
• 1:35:00
  Speaker 3: And then there's the other.
• 1:35:03
  Speaker 3: There's the VIP with the Flask Force.
• 1:35:07
  Speaker 4: Right, there's a Flask Force, one Flask Force, and then there's the basic original OG Flask Force, which is a copper flask, and then there's Flask Force Gold, where you get a 24 karat gold plated glass and then you have the general VIP right, but everybody gets the, you know.
• 1:35:29
  Speaker 3: And then there's all the merchandise.
• 1:35:30
  Speaker 4: But now and then, when you walk in, you get a mini Glenn right for your tasting, or is everybody gets a mini Glenn, all the VIPs that you just talked about get the traveler kit with the two glasses in it on karen.
• 1:35:42
  Speaker 4: So you open it up so you can stand that's.
• 1:35:45
  Speaker 2: That's the mini glenn's that we got last year, and last year they had uh like individual uh distilleries on the back of them right.
• 1:35:55
  Speaker 3: one of the cool things walking out is that One of my biggest nightmares, by the way, too Nash.
• 1:36:00
  Speaker 2: Having to get all the different distilleries we had nine distilleries at the top level.
• 1:36:08
  Speaker 1: And each of them got a thousand glasses with their logo on it?
• 1:36:12
  Speaker 4: Yeah, we had Rabbit Hole and Beam and all that stuff.
• 1:36:16
  Speaker 1: The idea was you're supposed to just?
• 1:36:18
  Speaker 4: randomly grab one Like oh hey, I got a Maker smart I got a jim beam one or trade and it didn't work out as smoothly as that well, the what was cool.
• 1:36:27
  Speaker 3: At the end of last year's festival you were like, uh, what would you?
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 3: What were you doing?
• 1:36:31
  Speaker 3: You were dispersing inventory from the years before, which was kind of cool.
• 1:36:36
  Speaker 4: You know it's a fire sale.
• 1:36:38
  Speaker 4: Gotta go, you get a free you get a free bike.
• 1:36:41
  Speaker 4: Yeah, you can land it.
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 4: Remember, remember, in Jeffrey Yep, every piece of furniture you get a 10 speed bike TV landing.
• 1:36:52
  Speaker 3: Yep, yeah, that's.
• 1:36:54
  Speaker 3: That was a different time period, right?
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 3: My dad bought his first VCR.
• 1:37:00
  Speaker 2: One thing from Aaron.
• 1:37:01
  Speaker 2: He said anything we can do at GR to help support the cause, please let them know.
• 1:37:07
  Speaker 2: You rock.
• 1:37:09
  Speaker 4: You being there, aaron, and the team, I try to create the forum for you guys to shine, and nothing more, nothing less.
• 1:37:19
  Speaker 4: We're a three-day bourbon festival and we just want to make sure we, you know, let every distillery shine.
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 4: What you can do for me, aaron, and pass the word, is bring your A-plus game like up it, because now we have our guests, are voting on people's choice, canton, cooperage, bridge out in Lebanon they're doing barrel heads for single barrel, small batch and craft.
• 1:37:40
  Speaker 4: So whoever the people's choice awards for those different categories win that, and we really want to kind of plateau and stop growing the number of distilleries and now work with the distilleries.
• 1:37:53
  Speaker 4: We have to really shine and bring it.
• 1:37:57
  Speaker 2: So when you say that are you going to have like voting barrels, is that going to be something that the people that are attending are going to vote on?
• 1:38:09
  Speaker 2: So, are you going to have like voting barrels for?
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 4: each.
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 4: We're not 100% sure, but Seth Thompson does Bourbon Classic in February here in Louisville and they did something, so we're actually working with them.
• 1:38:23
  Speaker 4: I think it's like SurveyMonkey or whatever, but we are going to be promoting that.
• 1:38:27
  Speaker 4: There might be QR codes that you scan.
• 1:38:29
  Speaker 4: This is my favorite.
• 1:38:32
  Speaker 4: We're scanning that.
• 1:38:33
  Speaker 4: Yeah, there you go.
• 1:38:35
  Speaker 4: We'll tabulate on Sunday afternoon and announce.
• 1:38:39
  Speaker 4: We want to make sure that Sunday only the Sunday sampler people have a chance, so we'll probably cut it off at like 2 o'clock in the afternoon so people have a couple hours on Sunday to also vote.
• 1:38:49
  Speaker 4: But then we'll make the announcements.
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 4: And Canton Cooper I mean their oak barrels are works of art.
• 1:38:57
  Speaker 4: I mean it's furniture grade oak, it's sanded, so I'm so excited to have them on board.
• 1:39:03
  Speaker 4: They just signed up for three years of partnerships with us.
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 3: You know that they originally came from Canton, Ohio, where I live.
• 1:39:13
  Speaker 4: So I mentioned Canton.
• 1:39:14
  Speaker 4: See this little one inch by one inch, canton Cooper's donated 800 of these, and what that has become is 800 of our new Kentucky Bourbon Festival pens.
• 1:39:29
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 1:39:30
  Speaker 4: The official pen writing instrument of the Bourbon Festival the 600 bourbon enthusiasts that we talked about, the VIPs, we'll get that in a special case.
• 1:39:43
  Speaker 2: That's cool.
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 4: Limited edition of 800.
• 1:39:46
  Speaker 4: This is number 007 because I am 007, james Bond.
• 1:39:51
  Speaker 4: This is my pen, highly collectible, msrp, about $90 a piece.
• 1:39:57
  Speaker 4: We got a little America on the end Awesome, it's a great writing instrument.
• 1:40:04
  Speaker 4: But it started off with Kentucky Oak, canton, cooper's and it ends up with this fine writing instrument, and I've got one for you guys, of course.
• 1:40:16
  Speaker 3: Thank you.
• 1:40:17
  Speaker 4: Thank you.
• 1:40:18
  Speaker 4: I sell them on eBay.
• 1:40:19
  Speaker 4: I know how many there are.
• 1:40:19
  Speaker 4: We you.
• 1:40:19
  Speaker 4: Thank you.
• 1:40:19
  Speaker 4: I'm selling on eBay.
• 1:40:20
  Speaker 4: I know how many there are.
• 1:40:22
  Speaker 3: We don't sell anything.
• 1:40:24
  Speaker 3: Look at behind me.
• 1:40:25
  Speaker 3: I mean, for God's sakes.
• 1:40:27
  Speaker 2: you know Absolutely not Nothing's sold on eBay, but let's all right, let's, let's Look right there.
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you got yours there too.
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 3: So just know, randy, for the people that have been interested in oh God, oh yeah, that was so cool, you killed me on that one.
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 3: That's awesome.
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 3: That is an awesome barrelhead.
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it was.
• 1:40:54
  Speaker 3: It's the only one in existence.
• 1:40:57
  Speaker 4: I'm going to auction it off, I think.
• 1:40:59
  Speaker 3: There you go, go.
• 1:40:59
  Speaker 3: I don't know that one's worth keeping, especially this year.
• 1:41:03
  Speaker 3: It's the prototype, so I think what you should do is have that one person sign it if, if he wins what I want to do.
• 1:41:14
  Speaker 4: there you go, I've got that.
• 1:41:18
  Speaker 4: My next project is going to be a Funko Pop bobblehead.
• 1:41:23
  Speaker 3: A Deadpool A bourbon festival.
• 1:41:26
  Speaker 4: Not me but something bourbon related.
• 1:41:30
  Speaker 3: You know, you could just go and get bobbleheads of yourself.
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 3: There's a company that will actually do it from a picture.
• 1:41:37
  Speaker 4: I know, I don't like the real little one they had all of a sudden.
• 1:41:43
  Speaker 3: Yep, yep.
• 1:41:45
  Speaker 4: Anyway, I love you guys.
• 1:41:48
  Speaker 3: The last thing is tell everybody how they can get the final tickets if they stayed this.
• 1:41:53
  Speaker 3: Tell them where to go.
• 1:41:54
  Speaker 3: Do the promo.
• 1:41:59
  Speaker 4: KYBourbonFfestivalcom.
• 1:42:00
  Speaker 4: I think we're down to under 100 tickets left, so get there If you can't get a ticket sign up to be a Bourbon Insider, which gives you access next April, when we go on sale and when all the fun begins, is really before we even start selling it to the public.
• 1:42:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Thank you for everyone watching, listening.
• 1:42:21
  Speaker 4: We love you.
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 4: I know a few of you that are watching.
• 1:42:23
  Speaker 4: I hope I didn't put everyone to sleep and five minutes after we started this thing, my doorbell was ringing, the pizza guy was bringing my pizza.
• 1:42:35
  Speaker 3: You should have just started.
• 1:42:36
  Speaker 3: You should have had Kate just bring it down and just eat it while you were doing it.
• 1:42:39
  Speaker 3: I hope double okay saved you some.
• 1:42:41
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think so.
• 1:42:42
  Speaker 4: I told her to stop in and pop in and say hi, but she did not bring any pizza, yeah all right.
• 1:42:49
  Speaker 2: She came down and popped in behind you there, I know.
• 1:42:52
  Speaker 4: This is my life, and then four days to get rid of it afterwards, so October 1st has never looked so good.
• 1:43:03
  Speaker 3: I'm actually.
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 2: We'll be there, I believe, on Wednesday.
• 1:43:10
  Speaker 2: We're scheduled to be in there for Distillery Setup Day, no Tuesday.
• 1:43:15
  Speaker 3: Tuesday, that's right.
• 1:43:16
  Speaker 3: Tuesday.
• 1:43:17
  Speaker 3: Wednesday's the bus tour Bus tour, that's right, we love.
• 1:43:19
  Speaker 3: You is the bus tour, bus tour, that's right, so we love you for that too, Thank you.
• 1:43:23
  Speaker 2: Our pleasure, our pleasure.
• 1:43:25
  Speaker 3: I wouldn't miss it.
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 3: I think it's almost as fun as the festival.
• 1:43:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, I had a blast last year.
• 1:43:32
  Speaker 4: Well, it is fun, I mean to see kind of behind the scenes stuff.
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 4: Not everyone sees that, but couldn't do it without you.
• 1:43:40
  Speaker 4: I mentioned the volunteers earlier.
• 1:43:42
  Speaker 4: I know your media and I know your ticket customers and thank you for that, but you know the volunteer part and there's a lot of camaraderie.
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you've got a lot of good people helping out last year too, and I want to reiterate that, and I want to reiterate that this year, anybody in and around Bardstown, that is what, starting on Monday or Sunday, monday, tuesday, wednesday- Tuesday, wednesday distilleries and Thursday is when our marketplace people come in, but we start building the day after Labor Day, and it just takes us that long to get it ready for you all to come in.
• 1:44:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:44:19
  Speaker 4: And I mean it.
• 1:44:20
  Speaker 4: We have volunteers that sign up.
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 4: They work a day.
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 4: I give them a ticket to the festival.
• 1:44:25
  Speaker 4: So it is absolutely.
• 1:44:27
  Speaker 4: You have a couple hours of your volunteer time and we'll make sure you come in and have a great time.
• 1:44:30
  Speaker 2: So anybody that wants to volunteer, who do they need to get in touch with?
• 1:44:39
  Speaker 4: and how do they do that?
• 1:44:40
  Speaker 4: To come on down, let's give you a small group here.
• 1:44:41
  Speaker 4: Yeah, we have a new volunteer coordinator.
• 1:44:42
  Speaker 4: It's a full-time job to coordinate and build this.
• 1:44:47
  Speaker 4: So if you can email volunteers at kybermancom Karen is the young lady on the other end of that email that will see that she is coordinating things through sign-up genius.
• 1:45:00
  Speaker 4: There's a whole rigmarole on how you can sign up for shifts and stuff, but if you just email volunteers at kybourbonfestivalcom, you will get the golden ticket on how you can come help us build this and also enjoy it once it's up.
• 1:45:17
  Speaker 2: All right, there we go, everybody.
• 1:45:19
  Speaker 2: Now you know how to get in free to the Kentucky Bourbon Festival for a little bit of work and help and have some fun doing it.
• 1:45:29
  Speaker 4: That's how I started my festival career in 1987.
• 1:45:32
  Speaker 4: I volunteered to set up a stage and help take band gear off of a band and, next thing you know, I made a career out of it.
• 1:45:41
  Speaker 4: So volunteer, you never know.
• 1:45:43
  Speaker 4: You might end up being me, which is you may not want that.
• 1:45:46
  Speaker 4: All right.
• 1:45:47
  Speaker 3: All right, before I started wwwscotchiebourbonboyscom for all things scotchy bourbon boys.
• 1:45:56
  Speaker 3: Follow us on instagram, facebook, youtube and x, and then all the major podcast formats, mainly Apple, iheart, spotify and anything else that you listen on.
• 1:46:06
  Speaker 3: But remember, thank you, randy and Super Nash, that good times and good friends equal.
• 1:46:14
  Speaker 3: Good bourbon equals good times and good friends.
• 1:46:16
  Speaker 3: Well, good bourbon equals good times and good friends, don't drink and drive, drink responsibly and live your life venturously, and little Steve-O is going to take us out.
• 1:46:38
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 1:46:39
  Speaker 2: Thanks again everybody for tuning in From Facebook and YouTube hey.
• 1:46:42
  Speaker 3: Randy, remember, we're going to be Facebook live and YouTube when this is over.
• 1:46:46
  Speaker 3: We'll still be live.
• 1:46:50
  Speaker 1: Oh, don't ask why.
• 1:46:51
  Speaker 1: Show me the way To the next Whiskey bar oh don't ask, why don't ask why, oh don't ask why.
• 1:47:03
  Speaker 3: For if we don't find the next whiskey bar.
• 1:47:09
  Speaker 2: I tell you we must die.
• 1:47:11
  Speaker 2: I tell you, we must die.
• 1:47:13
  Speaker 2: I tell you, I tell you.
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 1: I tell you, we must die.