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Shy Bear Brewing & Rich Coast Coffee: Jason Ufema on Building a 100-Mile Radius Beverage Empire · Ready To Drink Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Jason Euphema, owner of Shy Bear Brewing and Rich Coast Coffee.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: All right, perfect.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: So with Shibear Brewing, did you first uh come up with the idea for Shibear?
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: We started the idea of Shy Bear in 2012 initially, and then um, well, the name didn't come until later.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: The concept of wanting to to build a brewery was about 2012.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh 2015 is when we um when we first got the the ball rolling with uh legal and um finding the right engineering firm and land development uh project.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: So that's I would say 2015, 2016, and in that realm was when um things really started to come together.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: I I guess when we start paying for things.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, exactly.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_02: When we want to start accounting.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_02: When and talk a little bit about uh Lewistown, Pennsylvania.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_02: Talk about the kind of community and not kind of geographically where you guys are located in Pennsylvania.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Lewistown is truly in the very center of the state.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, not exactly in the center, but yeah, there's a lot of conjecture of that.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but we are 20 minutes south or 20 miles south of State College on the south side of uh the Seven Mountains, as it's called.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then about 60 miles uh northeast, uh I'm sorry, um 60 miles northwest of Harrisburg.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: So we're basically between those two uh markets.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: And um and uh we we uh my my father um built his home here uh in uh the 60s and uh on this property and and his his uh childhood home was this house that's at the bottom of the lane.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: So this was a um this always seemed like the bright place uh to do something like this, and also the work-life balance of being able to be at the brewery or be at Richcoast and be home and kids at at a particular age that were um not necessarily self-sufficient.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: So all of those things came together to be um to the reason why we did uh what we did.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so just let's go a little bit to to Rich Coast and let's uh describe people that there's two businesses on on the uh, I want to call it the comp the campus, you know what I mean, as far as what you guys have going on and and directly across from each other.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_02: And and uh talk a little bit about Rich Coast and your dad starting that one uh many, many, many years ago.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, uh my father Lance started that in 1978 uh out of this house.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um the house was our garage, one side of the garage was the service shop, the other side was where the coffee was kept.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: And little by little we built another warehouse next to our home, and that's where the coffee was kept, and then the entire garage turned into the service shop.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: And little by little, over 13 acquisitions of other coffee service companies over the years, uh, it just grew and grew uh honestly larger than we ever intended.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and then we actually did a little contraction over the last 10 years to be a little bit more specific to the to the service area that we can really control.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and that that was that was a kind of a grown-up decision that you know when you're when you're first building and you're still and you're growing and things are great, um, you realize that the whole concept of a service-based company is only as good as the reaction time to to being able to be there.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: So even though we were selling more than we felt that that was also not necessarily the right realm of where we wanted to be for the type of coffee service that you know that that people expect.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: And if we if we can't be there within 24 hours to fix something, um, especially a customer that we really want to maintain, um, you know, there's no business uh uh to or there's no reason for us to have business in an area that um if if we can't maintain those so those uh that quality of service.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_02: And when you're doing this, this is a so everybody understands this is a wholesale operation.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_02: Do you have your own private label uh brand during the wholesale operation and then how many accounts and what radius?
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we do.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: We have our own Rich Coast line of coffees, our own blends.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: We buy all of our coffee from the commodities exchange.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: And uh so we're in control of all aspects of it.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um the uh the radius that we currently operate is roughly a hundred mile radius from Lewistown right now.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: So we are still encompassing a very large uh area, but not we were in Maryland and Lehigh Valley before.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um so we we got out of those particular areas specifically to kind of focus more on rural Pennsylvania.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that's that tends to be a better fit for the style of coffee that we make.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I touched on a little bit before, but we you know we we've never really chased the trends on on the coffee side.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: We've we've kept a particular mild medium roast level for most of our coffees, even through the uh the Starbucks boom of uh of coffee blending and and sourcing, mainly because we just always felt like we wanted to appeal to the coffee drinker and not necessarily to the frappuccino drinker.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um so that's kind of um I'm glad that we that we held held strong to those uh principles back then.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, some of those, some of those uh those trends and fads came in hard and quick and then left, and everybody was stuck with a lot of equipment that was uh useless at that point, too.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I and I equate a lot of that also to how we've treated beer uh from the idea that the fads and you know we just didn't go when hazy IPAs were super um were super popular, we still kept maybe two, at most three out of our out of our 20 that we have on tap.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that was all that we would ever make.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um and now we maybe have two uh at most at any one time.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: But then same thing with fruited sours or um any type of thing that just kind of was um beer du jour.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we've always kind of kept that at something that we if if if it doesn't necessarily make sense for us, uh we've we've uh luckily been able to avoid uh doing something we don't really feel is um is too.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, we will always want it to be complementary to the experience here and and what we can and not only what we want to make now, but also our consistency of making it in the future.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_02: Let's let's talk about a bit about building a brand, and this this accounts for both coffee and beer side of your of your enterprise.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_02: Talk talk a little bit about why it's so important for you to keep a hundred mile radius.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of times I I meet on here in founders, and it's like we're gonna be national, we're gonna be regional, we have distribution, we're all all these things.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm not trying to pick on it, but at the same time, talk a little bit about why it's so important to keep like you talked a little bit about it for a second there about the 24-hour notice of a fix or anything like that.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_02: I believe it goes deeper.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_02: So let's kind of elaborate so that other founders that might have aspirations of national might realize the importance of building your home base at a real foundation prior to ever expanding outside of those markets.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, I think you first have to look at the dilution that that happens from that, you know, personally, right?
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: So you're like, how are how can I spread myself to a particular point where it becomes fallible?
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, where the your your personal dilution of what you can do and how you're going to train other people to understand how it works.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not, and I'm not a new age kind of guy and like the culture that we create kind of person.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like I think that that's a I think that's um it's more about leading by example.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: My wife and I, when we're at Shy Bear, we're touching tables, we're talking to people, bus and tables at the same time.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: We are doing all of the things on a personal level that should rub off on the rest of our staff.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I feel that that's the same way that this works with how you would want to build something in distribution, is that uh those personal touches and being able to send somebody a thank you and being able to know that you're stopping into a place personally, even if I'm not the delivery driver, I'm not the um, I'm not the salesperson.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: I don't have a direct interface with a customer, that the only way that that really makes any impact in in today's world, I believe, is if you're still making the personal touch to it.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I think you just have to look at how you can do that.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: Now, if you have a larger family and everybody in the family is involved and they have more, you have more tentacles, so to speak, then I believe then you have, you know, then your growth is limited by uh your your ability to to do that.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: But I think in this day and age where customer service and 800 numbers and chat and and AI chatbots are the only way that you can possibly get an answer to something.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: I think that the only way we can differentiate ourselves is by being a place that you call our 800 number and there's a human that answers the phone.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um that's that's my philosophy, and I believe it's something that people are still um grappling with, with the idea of growth versus that personal touch.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_02: When you were growing up and and and dad was running in Rich Coast, you were let's say you're uh say you're 15, 16 years old when I'm asking this story.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_02: What's going on what's going on and like what was it like as a as a kid growing up with I assume both parents were involved in the business and everything like that, and you're living there.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_02: So it is consuming every part of your life.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_02: Was that was that something that was like intriguing to you at that age, and you were like, I'm definitely gonna continue this, or were you of the track at different points where you're like, I gotta get away from this as fast as possible?
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I would probably lean towards the latter.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, as most teenage boys are concerned, you know, I was thinking that I was going to have a life in um in something much more fantastic than living in central Pennsylvania and doing all of this.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um between being a professional athlete or being a rock and roll drummer for a monthly crew, you know.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there would be uh there's uh uh you know, flights of fancy for sure.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: But deep down inside, I I I enjoyed the entrepreneurial aspect to being able to see and do everything that you want to do, and you kind of create your own schedule and you and as long as you're putting the work in, the work um can show itself as being fruitful.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um in today's age, I mean, there's always the the the before COVID era of our business and the during and after.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: And obviously it just feels like, I mean, we for Shy Bear, for instance, I mean, we've been open for nine years and we've really seen three specific years of that of pre-COVID during and after, and they all feel exhausting.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, in so many ways, because they're just like, I can't believe it's only been nine years.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and that's kind of the the I think the mantra that I look at is that each one of them, I have different areas of pride and and hindsight to all three of those eras.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, but hindsight being 2020, all of the things you would have changed and all the things I would have known that would have evolved in in this business and also in Rich Coast during that time, because obviously the office coffee drinker kind of went away in our business.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um and you know, obviously the not just the people.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I know people are returning back to the office versus where we were with COVID, but we're not at the same place where it was prior to, and we never will.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um that is uh I think a lot of businesses realize that, hey, I don't necessarily need to have a$15,000 a month lease for an office building that we really didn't see that much of a drop-off in our productivity by having this big office.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not like I'm not getting customers because of it.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_00: So I think there's a lot of um, I think there's a lot of things there that can dovetail for us and for other people with the idea of now finding that where did those coffee drinkers go?
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: And likewise, when we're looking at it from Shibear, where did the travelers go?
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um a lot of the people, and obviously when you're looking at a$4 gallon gas, a lot of those travelers were not traveling as much.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: But I also look at it from a local perspective, the locals maybe aren't going on the bigger, more extravagant trips that they once were.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: So now how do we try to capture more of that immediate regional audience that uh wants in the summer potentially um were not necessarily staying local, but now they are.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's a really important piece because a lot of times we get we get hung up on gas prices and oh, nobody's gonna do this, nobody's gonna do that.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_02: I think when you have a brand like yourself and others like you that have built such a great foundation on their home, it's a repivoting of the marketing to like the little luxuries of life.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_02: Where it's like, hey, you might not be able to make that trip to you know the beach this weekend, but come on over here for you know 50, 100 bucks and have a good break from the world or whatever.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's you know, without being negative and dystopian about things, I think it's really the little luxuries that I think we in the beverage industry have the advantage of.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas the tourism business and different things like that, they're gonna get hurt with that.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, but if we can focus, and we're not gonna force people to start traveling, but if we can focus in our neighborhood, uh we can find people that might want to break from their house and everything like that and kind of get a little uh reprieve, let's say.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: I agree 100%.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's um it's one of the biggest things afterwards, and I I have a fun one too for you, is we always talk about the negatives of COVID.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_02: Did COVID hit anything in a positive way where you realized there was something inefficiently going on or anything like that, or was it all just chaos and mayhem?
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_02: I haven't heard anybody tell me anything really yet, so don't worry if you don't have one.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I mean it was certainly chaotic, mainly because it all fell on my wife and I to do anything that was going to require any kind of income or any type of revenue.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um that was chaotic, but at the same time, what else are we gonna do?
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, like there's only so many Netflix shows you can watch.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I think that we we figured out a way to be able to do stuff, and I think that we collectively had I think we reacted to what COVID became incredibly fast, and that helped us get traction with our direct-to-home deliveries.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_00: And at one time, I mean, at the at once once the word spread and we were rolling with it, I was doing 50 home deliveries a day.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um and minimum of three four packs uh that was required for delivery.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but we were and we had two people just canning and um and doing as best as they could to fulfill these orders in-house.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and my wife was coordinating everything between orders and what I would go and deliver, and she couldn't even come with me because we had too many, we had too many uh deliveries to be made.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: But even Christmas that year, we dressed up as um as uh Santa Claus and Mrs.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Claus, and we delivered uh beer on Christmas Day that year, too.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: So that was that was pretty cool.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: And people were absolutely I mean, they had the video cameras out.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was it was something that was um it was pretty fun, you know.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: I look back on those days and I'm thinking, like, how did we do it?
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_00: But at the same time, I it's um necessity as the mother of investors.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: So it's uh uh you know, you just uh we you know and so I we were the most profitable um during COVID, um, mainly because if you look at it in hindsight too, uh with the um with the stimulus package that we got from the government, plus the low overhead to pay for the fact that we didn't have the people anymore or the business, and the fact that we were doing that much beer and not food, which generally is a trade out of cost to uh to sales.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: We are, you know, I think that we were probably the most profitable uh that we've ever been uh during COVID, oddly enough.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: And and and I would say not just the immediate COVID time or era, but when outdoor dining was the only option, we were uh I think top of mind to everybody, knowing that we had the space, we had the six-foot separation between tables, we had the ability to get a lot of people under roof um in an outdoor setting.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: We were, I mean, by far inundated.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: We've never seen sales like that from um uh just like from the moment we opened at 11 to 9 p.m., it was just full.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um so we were that was uh that that we've never seen uh since um that type of um uh support, uh if you will.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: So it was um so from that perspective, um, you know, that it was good, but um it's not to say that right now isn't good, it's just that that was just completely a different um era for us.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, we would I'm not saying I would never want another uh COVID uh for a variety of reasons, but um like for us it was uh it would it was a good um it was good while it lasted.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_02: The um for the rich coast side of things, do you have any customers uh on the wholesale side that are have been with you guys the entire time?
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: Pretty close.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: I was gonna say not necessarily, I mean, like we've had I mean a lot of a lot of them that have like um yeah, I mean, like we've had, I know maybe not from the very day that we opened.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um I mean like our first our first customer was the burn of OIP here in town.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it's changed hands over the years and stuff like that.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: But we've um but you know we've we've had a variety, and I mean I would say probably um in close to our 50 years now, I think we're at 48 years, uh, I would say that we still probably have a hundred accounts that have been with us for 40 years or more.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_02: That's amazing.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like a lot of um whether it's banks and or um some small restaurants and um and we've had we've had a lot of long-term, you know, a lot a lot of long-term relationships that have that have helped this uh this aspect of of what we've done with Shadbear, but also of any other new beverage aspect or any new beverage project that we're looking at in the future, we have a foundation that um is enviable.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, so we have to figure out you know what where our placements what what they look like and what they and what will they really do?
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I and I would I would hearken back to my dilution side of this too, is that you also don't want to confuse the end user on, you know, what kind of company are you anymore.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I think that that's always um a part of my mind too.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_02: And and you know, we talked about, you know, over the years you've you've you very much have resisted the trends and the fads, but obviously in the past few months and and beyond your interest in let's say the hemp THC and the functional has been more that you're seeing it like I do, where it's a foundational category moving forward as opposed to a blip in the radar of some sort of a line extension or any sort of wild creation in the creativity realm of things.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean you can go down a rabbit hole with any of the trends, but then you gotta separate the trend from the lasting impression that you want from your brand.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: Whereas where where would I find the best um feeling of something that can be complementary to the other beverages we already have?
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I guess that's that's where I would want to place that.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: And when it comes to the functional beverages, whether it's uh you know electrolyte, nootropic, um.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um THC, hemp derived, all of the different things.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of different ways that people will sense that direction will come from the other things that that would be complementary to it, I guess.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: And then so I you know that that really gets into into the weeds.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_00: But I think you I the more that we understand what the where where the boundaries are for these beverages is the best way that we can make uh informed decisions on the on the way that we want to promote it.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_02: I was uh I was shocked.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_02: I was interviewing an uh a bar owner in North Carolina down in Atlantic Beach, North Carolina, Tony at A B Bottleco.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_02: And it's a craft beer bar.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_02: He's he had a craft brewery out in Arizona, he's you know one of us, you know what I mean?
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_02: Like, and then opened this up and then got into when they had the law in North Carolina, they were allowed to also sell hemp beverages and functional.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_02: He went all in on it.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_02: And I was shocked when I asked him as a retailer, I said, Well, what percentage of this is your of business is your revenue if this was to go away.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_02: 35 percent of his bar business at that beach is hemp THC beverages.
• 23:13
  unknown: Wow.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_02: Tracks with my time.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_02: I went out and spent about two months in North New Jersey interviewing liquor store owners to ask them about that.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_02: And that it was trending between 25 and 30 percent of their gross revenue was hemp THC beverages.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_02: That's crazy.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_02: And then I asked Tony, I was like, if you lost these, what would that mean to your business?
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_02: And he straight up on camera, he's like, I probably would have to close.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_02: He's like, I don't think I can afford a 35% hit after COVID reduction and things like that.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_02: So, with that part said, you know, in Pennsylvania, for our audience to understand, this this goes around the country and every state's different, and a lot of states are used to seeing hemp beverages in liquor stores.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_02: Pennsylvania, we the only law that exists on paper is the inverse, uh, the reverse of that.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_02: So we can't sell it in liquor stores, you can sell it everywhere else.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_02: What would that mean to your business on both sides if you if this law, if House Bill 2309, the hemp beverage bill in Pennsylvania passed, and then you'd be able to have not only a beverage license for your retail spots, but also you could buy a beverage license for distribution and everything.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean that would um yeah, from the rich coast side where we don't have any alcohol um any issues there, you know, we're not uh you don't use any of that to to transport any of the alcohol.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: So I would say that that would be the natural fit uh for what we're doing there.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I assume PLCB will still have a particular opinion uh in addition to the wholesalers lobby on what you know what how it would impact anything from our G license.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: So I assume that there will be no there will be no intermittent intermittent.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so you would uh basically you would buy a hemp beverage bolt-on license, uh, which would be a permit, and they'd run it similar to the way they ran the RTD Spirits permits a couple years ago.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, okay.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_02: So you also, yeah, you would, and also uh yeah, so yeah, exactly.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_02: Like a distributor would be able to buy a distribution license for it, manufacturer would be on manufacturer's license, etc.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_02: etc.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: Got it.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, then yeah, then that's uh that's certainly a possibility.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so when you uh when you look at the future of this, let's say that never comes through or anything like that.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_02: Is there is there ever a feeling like you don't really need to expand because you're still you're working so deeply into the the the weeds of where you are right now, or is there expansion in the future where you have, you know, you want to look at some other parts of Pennsylvania or possibly and I I'm also uh to be fair, speaking of both sides, I guess, yeah, whichever brand you want to choose on that question.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, both.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, right now I have too early to tell you the details, but I have uh I have um I have some big news uh coming soon on a couple different things.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_00: So the and it's involving both um coffee and beer together.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: So that those are certainly um in the in the hopper, um some uh some legal uh obligations to uh still uh to to discuss and figure out.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um but yeah, it's it's we everything that we look at right now is is both.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um there's not um there's really not a benefit for me to look at anything right now in growth that wouldn't include both um entities at the same time.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_02: And you're gonna it's more than just a coffee beer, right?
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, yes.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_02: Much much more than that.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_02: You're bringing back the the what was it, the coffee IPA or whatever.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's right.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: The coffee IPA.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_00: We I mean why not?
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_02: You know, we did uh make fun of it, but I actually I had one at Rogue out in Oregon, and I actually really enjoyed it to be honest with you.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_02: Like I I I thought it was I I I saw that it wasn't for everybody, but it was a weird thing I enjoyed, yeah.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, um I guess the way it's like how it's extracted, right?
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: You can do uh there's a lot of ways that you can really get a lot of interesting body off of uh coffee, uh depending on how it's extracted.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_00: If uh you know most people will do some sort of cold brew uh uh situation of a of infusion into a stout or a cream ale or a lot of different things that I've had in you know, coffee brown ale.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: But the way that um but you can really get some you know interesting lemony type of acidity off of coffee that is strange, you know, from the concept of if you don't necessarily grind it, if you just put whole bean into a bright, uh, for instance, I mean you can get a lot of really interesting um lemon notes off of it that I wouldn't even imagine um unless you try it.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_00: So it's uh it's a pretty uh it's a pretty fun thing.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_00: And you're not just getting full-on roasty notes or um any of uh that uh I guess some people would consider it almost like leather tobacco uh types of precursors.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: But I, you know, there's um it's a it's an interesting product for a lot of things.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, on top of gravies and uh sauces that we used in the um in the restaurant.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_00: Coffee does uh does a lot of things for a lot of purposes.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_02: When you um when you talked about the choices of the styles of beer, are you the are you still brewing or do you have a brewer now that that does the brewing?
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: I've never brewed uh uh anything here.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_00: I I used to brew uh when I worked in Charlotte uh or the second oldest brewery that ever existed doesn't even exist anymore in Charlotte, North Carolina.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um that was late 90s, and I'm telling you, that was iced to Eskimos.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, uh it was I mean, really, it was the NASCAR fan of Charlotte, North Carolina of the late 90s was like Cores Light was on the um was on the upper level of acceptability on the flavor profile.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was it I can't, I it it it it blows my mind to think of what Charlotte is like now and and breweries on every other corner.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um because that was not the case in the late 90s for sure.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_02: No, no, yeah, Cor's Banquet was the most bitter beer there was on the line of the chance.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it was just like, whoa, that's way too strong for me.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_00: That's a full-body beer right there.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, give me some of that core's like something like Cole's light.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_02: Oh man.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_02: So so like when you when you're choosing the beers, then I guess to to brew, and and I'm sure the brewer has a has a play in there as well.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_02: Is it is it always based on kind of the sales stuff, or is it really based on kind of the mood and and kind of experimentation or a combo of the two?
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, uh well, Roger McKelvey is our is our brewer.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_00: He's been our brewer for almost eight years now.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um Roger and I have an excellent uh way of communicating each other's reasons for why we do what we do.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I think collectively we are both of the same mindset for 90% of the time.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, he's always trying to exercise a particular type of his brain or um uh just curiosity.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like if we put these things together, I I'm sure it will taste like this.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: And then I also have to temper those expectations with how is it gonna sell?
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: And at the same time, not limit the creativity because of it just selling.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: I also need to know that everyone has an itch, and and if we don't scratch it here, we're gonna have to scratch it somewhere else.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I would I would love to say that we agree 100% of the time, but that's not that's not that's not reality.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_00: But at the same time, we have a commonality of understanding that in the end, if it sells and people are are enjoying it, and I wouldn't even say from what they say on untapped, and that's a whole other um thing about untapped, and I don't see and I I I admittedly I don't see untapped as a terrible tool for the industry.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: I see it more from the idea that you're just being oh it's overused for the sake of gamification.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh if it wasn't if it was if somebody doesn't like a sour and they rate a sour, then I don't feel that that's the use case that that you should be uh that you should be using the app.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um but if for the idea of critiquing, giving some honest feedback from somebody that isn't talking to you and they can be a little bit more anonymous with what they're saying about it, uh, I have no problem with that.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um even though a lot of other people say, well, what kind of what type of uh opinion do they have?
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: Well, they just bought the beer.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_00: I think that they're entitled to an opinion of um of what of what they liked about it and what they didn't like about it.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I don't I don't see it as as um as polarizing as a lot of other brewery owners or brewers do, but we do look at those and we look at it from the object objectively, but we're not gonna create our beers based on BJC standards or what that beer is supposed to be, and if it has any type of phenol type of thing in there that it's immediately thrown out.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_00: Like I don't look at it that way.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: I look, you know, because we're we don't we don't make our beers to go up for judgment in that kind of capacity, and we don't also make our beers for the idea of getting only 4.5 rated beers, because then all we would make is IPAs and pastry stouts.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, if that's if that's what I was looking for, then that's all we would ever possibly do.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_02: We're all gonna be 500 pounds and hopped up if everybody starts doing that.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I mean, I think that was my biggest wake-up call right before like three and a half years ago I got I got sober, but right before that was like right into that milkshake beers.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_02: And I think it was like a year into my sobriety, I started to look back at the calorie counts I was doing, and I'm like, holy shit, I'm doing 40,000 calories before I even had dinner, you know.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_02: 100%.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, I think you know, so to go back to like where we put our beers into categories is that we really want to take take more of a cultural tour of how we look at these things, and we'll have English, Belgian, um even French to a point right now, um and German Czech.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we try to take the true cultures that have defined beer to this date worldwide, look at those and say, well, why can't we just use these as the foundations to to win all?
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_00: And that's that's more of what I find the interesting part of these things.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: And and this year we did a Czech lager, uh golden lager that we aged on Sakura Japanese cherry uh wood staves.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's that's the type of thing that I look at and I look at that beer, and it's not it's not a classic Czech lager, but because we were able to do something different with it, it makes it stand out from the other ones that are in the marketplace, but also something that Roger got to scratch an itch.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I, you know, and that's the kind of stuff that I feel is adjacent to being creative.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I mean adjacent to being um marketing the beers the right way that isn't just adding store-bought cereal or you know, whatever, you know, the the types of things that we think make sense to a to a particular level.
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_00: I I I I I'm really happy with beers of that nature because it it it kind of adds to um the anticipation that our customers have with it too.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_02: I'll uh I want to elaborate a little bit on the untapped thing because my perspective is is very unique, but also very grounded, I feel like, in it.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_02: And it's similar to where yours is, but I blame the people on untapped.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_02: And I want to say that untapped as a structure is where it needs to be, but I don't think people understand, and I've had this argument with a million people in the in my entire career in this industry, especially in the heat of when my job was to fly around the country and find new brands and bring them into distribution in Pennsylvania.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_02: So my job was to go to places and to discern whether the product was good, the culture was good, the branding was good, and all this.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_02: That forced me, and I'm the naturally curious person, hence why I'm doing this podcast and asking you these questions off the cuff.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_02: But I don't think people understand, and I want this to be to every consumer to realize that like every taste is different.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_02: And like to the to live your life, and I'm somebody again, three and a half years sober, but I'm encouraging everybody to go drinking and experiment.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_02: If you've not gone to a place and said, I'm gonna buy two to three flights at this place and nothing else, just to try everything that they have, that's the way I used to live my life, and not because I was an alcoholic, but because I was a researcher, and and that's where it's like we really went away from that experimentation and where it's like, oh, well, this beer is only four and a half stars.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you didn't try it yet because you don't know how many stars it is for you.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_02: Because if you actually spend the time and care about this craft, which is where I'm gonna go next from the academic standpoint, we are dealing with complex beers, we're not dealing with with you know straight pilsners all the time, we're dealing with Czech Pilsners, or we're dealing with Belgian triples, they're complex and they're beautiful in so many ways.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_02: And I I openly say this that's the only thing I miss about drinking is the different types of flavor profiles that I experienced when I would go out, and that's because that was the joy behind it.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_02: And it's we need to get back to that where untapped should exist.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_02: We need to know a macro level of interest and demand, and and I'm a data guy, and that's true.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_02: But for somebody to snub a beer because it their best friend didn't like it, I'm sorry, guys, but we forgot how our our human body is built.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_02: Like you will taste something different about every single thing that somebody else does.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_02: That's a that's a fact because our taste profiles are built on our own unique experiences.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_02: There's a neurogastronomy behind all of this, and and I I want to give compliments for untapped for doing what they're doing, but I also believe that we're not educating ourselves and our consumers enough to understand that try it.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_02: You know what I mean?
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_02: It's like I feel like we're back at the dining room table with my kids, where it's like there's only a bite on the plate, try it.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_02: You know what I mean?
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_02: Go to the go get a flight.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_02: It's all I always tell people at samples when I'm standing, even today, I stand in in beer distributors pouring out samples, and then people will be like, No, I'm good.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_02: And I'd be like, Oh, you're driving?
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_02: They're like, No, I'm just good.
• 38:47
  SPEAKER_02: I I saw that online, and I always say to them, I'm like, dude, it's two ounces of your life.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_02: I was like, You'll get a don't work.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's free, right?
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're not paying for it, right?
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_02: So, my my encouragement is the weird thing that everybody's gonna be like, Why the hell is he saying this?
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_02: But it's go try all the stuff, and and I'm not saying go drink 16-20 ounces of every single beer on a tap, but walk into a place, be curious, ask questions, and order tasting pan or uh uh uh order to tasters, order the flights.
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_02: And I know and and and talk with the bartenders because just like Jason, just like you're saying, man, everybody there is for a passion.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_02: And I think sometimes we get away from that where we're just trying to not us as the industry, but consumers are just like, I'm either this this objective or this objective.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_02: I think we all just need to slow down and enjoy the craft of what's inside, not the effect of the craft.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_00: I couldn't agree more on on everything you're saying, and specifically when it comes to beer festival.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um there's so there the the excitement around doing it from a brewer's perspective and an attendee's perspective has diminished so greatly in tenure that I think the core part of that has to be back to you are tasting it, to really being able to open your eyes to something that you're tasting because you are truly just tasting it.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about consumption as much as it is about tasting and the whole idea of a taster, and not that you're getting an entire point of it, is because you are supposed to be comparing and contrasting these things in a particular way that um should be more exploratory than it is uh just based on like having.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, obviously you want to have a good time.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_00: Part of it is doing it socially, and it should be convivial, but it should not also be to the point where you're going to decide which one of these samples I'm gonna give you because you're looking at untapped first before I even give you the sample.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's you know, I mean, that's about as bullshit of a reason to be at a festival than then there is, but to your point.
• 41:09
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's kind of like the one of my favorite movies of all time is Josie and the Pussycats, um, was like this whole this whole brainwashing idea that we all have in America that just like, well, if they're doing it, then we're doing it too.
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and that movie couldn't make fun of the American culture of our of our capitalistic way of how we market something to to brainwash people.
• 41:37
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it it's it's pretty much a textbook um movie to uh to describe what that's all like.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that is I think that's what's happening in the beer world.
• 41:48
  SPEAKER_00: We are being told uh breweries are shutting down.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_00: Well, beer beer is terrible now.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_00: We should we shouldn't be uh we shouldn't be going to breweries.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_00: Uh no, you know, some people closed because they really weren't so in some cases they didn't have enough capital to to deal with the costs and the and the labor, and they wanted it to be a uh a hobby.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um and some are basically at the particular point where they just don't enjoy it anymore.
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's not a that's not a that that happens uh people who detail cars or people who um you uh clean uh clean homes, you know.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, like at a point, you know, it's like it would be fun to do this, and then you also realize that maybe it's not really what I want to do for the rest of my life.
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_00: So um that doesn't necessarily shouldn't speak to the to the product or to the concept because I still find beer to be the most fascinating beverage out there, and I say this as a coffee guy: coffee is generally pretty monotone in comparison to beer.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_00: There's so many different things that can go into a beer that can make it exceptional or mundane.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_00: Same ingredients, same brewer, same water chemistry, same everything, and the minute changes um that can occur between mash temp, um the amount that it's um at the rate that it's dry hopped, uh, you know, all of these different things can make so much difference um in the final product, whereas coffee has the same kind of geek, uh geeky qualities to it um in some in some aspects, but you're not gonna taste as big of a uh as wide of a of a difference as you will with poorly extracted or moderately extracted coffee.
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_02: I want I want everybody who's watching and listening to to Really digest what we're saying here at the end because we talk a lot and I cover media and all aspects of this industry.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_02: And I do talk a good bit about you know the beer industry declining and the closures and what can the beer industry do to pivot and grow and expand.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm gonna put the pressure on the consumers, is exactly what we just said.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_02: Nobody's telling you to go out and get drunk, but I'm encouraging everybody to be going out and having a flighted taster, you know, have a tasting flight because most times that's only in total 12 to 14 ounces in total.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_02: It's not gonna do anything to you.
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_02: What is it gonna do?
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_02: It's gonna let you start forcing your brain and your flavor profile and your taste palettes to understand what else is out there.
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_02: I have gone around the country many times trying the craziest stuff possible.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_02: I drank, I remember one time even uh being with the guys at Brew Dog and and uh trying that uh the most uh alcoholic at a conference.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_02: I had the most alcoholic beer ever out, and I drank it out of a taxidermy squirrel.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_02: Literally, the squirrel's lips were on my lips while I was drinking the the it tasted like scotch.
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_02: And and like that's the stuff that like I want everybody to get back to.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_02: We don't need to be drunks in the alleys, and I did I tell my stories on this show and I went too far, and now you need to go do it for me, you know, go do it for me so that you can continue that and get out there, order a order a tasting flight, and then order one more after that, you know what I mean, or or two more, whatever it is, whoever's driving the safest way possible, but experiment, don't go into your local tavern and buy the same beer every Friday at 5 p.m.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_02: Because that's with it.
• 45:33
  SPEAKER_02: Don't go to your local bar and say, What's the highest ABV you got?
• 45:36
  SPEAKER_02: Because I had a rough day.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_02: You know, don't do that.
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_02: Stop doing because you're gonna be what kills this industry.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_02: Get out of experiment it because all of a sudden you're gonna go out there and you're gonna go in there with a Pilsner mood or an IPA mood, and I bet you you're gonna walk home being like, That was a damn good blueberry lager I just had over there, you know?
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_02: And also for the men out there, don't be afraid of the fruited beers.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, yeah, I would say that too.
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, and um and and with the idea you're saying about flights is that you know, you and so many people that come in and they get essentially the same uh I mean, whether it's you know, the the difference.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I you I mean we see it, we see all kinds of people who are really getting flights to to try a variety of different things, but typically I find that they kind of stay in a particular lane, and if we it's like dark beers, like you know, the people who like dark beers, I mean, there is not a single light one in the in in the uh and then I also always look at that as like almost like the um the control uh you know of A-B testing and and concepts of of understanding that there should be a control in in between the uh the tastes.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_00: So there should be a little bit more um uh of a forced you know one in there to make you uh almost reset your palate in some ways.
• 47:00
  SPEAKER_00: And and and that's where I always find the the also fascinating with sours in that um that I always feel like that also allows you to be able to get something a little bit more of a reset uh if you are having uh several things in a in a taster, is that it it almost um almost between the different sips, you know.
• 47:23
  SPEAKER_00: I always will recommend somebody getting a sour in between just because it really will taste something completely different the second, third time on top of the temperature changing, of course, of particular beers and and higher alcohol beers that we have that often they taste a thousand times better uh if they uh slightly warmer than than than syrup.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_02: So I always recommend people you know coming back to it too after a particular beer and saying, well, just give that give that five minutes and taste it again and tell me what you think that uh that's that's a whole I could go down a rabbit hole of uh of the how the temperature changes and everything like that.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_02: Like most people want to drink them quick, and actually to be honest with you, sometimes let them sit to room temperature changes everything about it.
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_00: Perfect.
• 48:12
  SPEAKER_00: Have you ever been to uh Church Key in DC, Washington, DC?
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah.
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_00: And then they and then they serve the beers specifically at uh at the temperature that they should be served at, and that's even that's even cooler.
• 48:26
  SPEAKER_02: That uh I was down there uh last time.
• 48:28
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, I guess it was one of the craft brewers conferences that was in DC, is when I was down there for something.
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_02: I think it was uh Sly Fox when they first did that 360 can top opener.
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's I remember being in there, being handed one of those and uh and trying to cool man.
• 48:44
  SPEAKER_02: Well, hey, Jason, thank you so much for taking the time today, but most importantly, thanks for coming on without any script, without any agenda.
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_02: And we had our issue on the last one.
• 48:51
  SPEAKER_02: I appreciate you doing the reshoot and uh really kind of getting in here and telling your story.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_02: I think your story in Pennsylvania and beyond is very unique.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_02: Not only is it unique in the history of the coffee and to the beer, but also not a lot of people live on the place of their work, and I think that changes the psychology of how you view your business, and I think it changes the psychology of how you live your life.
• 49:12
  SPEAKER_02: So I was really fascinated to hear how you speak about, you know, I called it the campus, but you know what I mean?
• 49:16
  SPEAKER_02: Like as it's definitely a campus.
• 49:19
  SPEAKER_02: As being as being there, and it's it's one of those things where you also have this, you have a really refreshing perspective on growth.
• 49:25
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's something that we get really excited about growth and entrepreneurship, and we get really excited about expanding.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_02: But I think sometimes we don't pause enough to realize which cart is before the horse, the cart before the horse, and trying to get ahead of our skis, so to speak.
• 49:39
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm it I'm in my own fault for different things in my in my entrepreneurial career, but at the same time, it's a cautionary tale.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_02: And it's one of those things where being smart about it and being strategic about it is the best way possible.
• 49:51
  SPEAKER_02: And the fact that even in the headwinds that this industry is seeing, you're looking at expansion opportunities and growth because you have a solid foundation built.
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_02: And that's what I'm trying to say is you're not looking at it from a scarcity mindset or anything like that.
• 50:04
  SPEAKER_02: It's like, okay, we're doing good here.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_02: Now we can expand out a little bit more.
• 50:07
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's that's how a true ripple is is at its smooth its strength.
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's uh I'm excited to see where everything goes for you for the future.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, I I I I appreciate that.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's um I I always look at it from uh you know zigzag, you know, kind of thing.
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like when when all of the craft beer growth was happening, it was we were pretty staunch on just keeping everything as is.
• 50:33
  SPEAKER_00: And now that there seems to be, you know, this little recession in in the industry, it feels like the right time, you know, when when someone's zigging and we're zagging, um, this feels like the right time to really make you know some some strides.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I think uh some of the news that will be coming out soon will illustrate that.
• 50:52
  SPEAKER_02: So awesome.
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_02: I'm excited to see you when it comes out.
• 50:55
  SPEAKER_02: So you're gonna close out here for everybody.
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, like real quick, uh, remind everybody the two brands, where to find everybody on social websites and everything like that.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_00: You got it.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_00: So ShaiBear Brewing, you can find us at shybearbrewing.com, uh, Instagram and Facebook also at Shy Bear Brewing.
• 51:12
  SPEAKER_00: And Richcoast Coffee, uh, Richcoast.com is our uh website for that.
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_00: You can uh order anything for home use.
• 51:20
  SPEAKER_00: Uh in addition to if anybody's looking for coffee services in the central Pennsylvania area, we uh there's a quick sign-up form in there.
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_00: We'd be glad to uh do a um an assessment for you.
• 51:31
  SPEAKER_00: We come and look at your uh equipment and um andor electric plumbing supply.
• 51:37
  SPEAKER_00: We supply the equipment free of charge and uh we uh we do the um we do the delivery um for all the products that go into those machines as long as you're putting our products in the machines we own, then uh we're we'll we'll never have a problem.
• 51:51
  SPEAKER_02: So excellent.
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_02: Well, hey, closing out with everybody, want to remind everybody thank you, Jason, for coming on and also remind everybody that while this is called ready to drink, we talk about business, we talk about beverages, this is also about human connection.
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_02: Jason and I, while we do live in Pennsylvania, we've never interacted in person.
• 52:07
  SPEAKER_02: We've shot some emails over the years and seen each other in the distance at festivals, but we've never shared a beer together or sat and bellied up to a bar.
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_02: But with that said, that is what this is.
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_02: This is human connection.
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_02: This is strangers meeting strangers with no script and no agenda.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_02: While you are out in the street walking, put your phone in your pocket, look at the strangers while you're walking by.
• 52:28
  SPEAKER_02: When you're at the gas station filling up that Rich Coast cup of coffee, look to the person next to you and actually ask them how they're doing and pause and listen to what they say.
• 52:37
  SPEAKER_02: Five minutes a week is what I'm asking everybody that listens and watches.
• 52:40
  SPEAKER_02: Five minutes of kindness to a stranger every single week, 20 minutes a month.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_02: Your life could be full.
• 52:46
  SPEAKER_02: You could have everything you want the boyfriend, the girlfriend, the husband, the wife, the kids, the picket fence, the dog, everything.
• 52:51
  SPEAKER_02: Not everybody's in a good spot.
• 52:53
  SPEAKER_02: Five minutes of kindness to a stranger a week, every single person that's listening.
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_02: It is a mandatory obligation to be in this community.
• 53:02
  SPEAKER_02: All right.
• 53:02
  SPEAKER_02: Jason, thank you so much for your time today, man.
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_02: I really appreciate it.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_02: Appreciate it, buddy.
• 53:07
  SPEAKER_02: You have a good rest of your day, buddy.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_02: Take care.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_02: All right, see ya.