Latest / The Brewery Underground Podcast | Craft Beer Interviews, Reviews and Beer Travel / Curio Brewing's Von Wotring: Leiper's Creek Brewing & Tennessee Farm Beer | Episode 141

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Curio Brewing's Von Wotring: Leiper's Creek Brewing & Tennessee Farm Beer | Episode 141 · The Brewery Underground Podcast | Craft Beer Interviews, Reviews and Beer Travel

• 0:38
  We're back with Von here. Back with Von.
• 0:40
  It's a great conversation. That's all right. 111 motor cars
• 0:44
  and Von von of course, you know you're you're well known in the
• 0:48
  Buick community Curio out here in Franklin, TN had a lot going
• 0:53
  on right. We do.
• 0:54
  We do a lot lot happening. You know, we were, you know, 1st
• 0:58
  4 minutes for our objective with curio and when I, when I bought
• 1:02
  it was to really establish a sense of community around beer,
• 1:08
  just because, you know, that happened to be the conduit.
• 1:10
  It's something that I really enjoy.
• 1:12
  It's something I use in my past life with my with my teams was
• 1:15
  like, we were just going to sit around wherever we were in the
• 1:17
  country, somebody was tasked with going out buying, you know,
• 1:20
  a six pack or 12 pack or whatever it was.
• 1:22
  And on a Thursday and we were going to sit drinking those and
• 1:25
  talk and having the same idea. And with Ethereum, we started to
• 1:28
  build, you know, build that and grow that within.
• 1:30
  And, and I think we've done pretty well.
• 1:32
  I mean, being Franklin's, the brewery of Franklin, TN is a is
• 1:36
  a pretty special moniker. We really have enjoyed that.
• 1:39
  The community has embraced us, but we've also been embraced
• 1:43
  with, you know, outside of state, right?
• 1:45
  So as we've found, you know, brewery tourism, Franklin is an
• 1:49
  incredible city to come and visit.
• 1:50
  And we have a lot of that downtown, but we've also, you
• 1:53
  know, as we've done some of our, you know, advertising
• 1:55
  approaches, people coming in when they come and visit from
• 1:59
  the, you know, from the Pacific Northwest and they are visiting
• 2:01
  Franklin because they want to see Franklin or Nashville right
• 2:04
  now, go to Broadway. But then they've also made that
• 2:06
  trip down to Franklin, down to our little brewery just to
• 2:10
  because they have heard of it, they've read about it or
• 2:14
  somehow, and I don't think it's Kevin Bacon, 6° of separation
• 2:18
  could be failed about it. And we, we and then across just
• 2:22
  in Tennessee in this state to have some great breweries.
• 2:26
  And if it's in Memphis or Knoxville or Chattanooga or here
• 2:29
  here in the mid state, when, when I when folks would come in
• 2:33
  and say, Hey, we were just over at soul and spirits out, you
• 2:35
  know, out in Memphis and they said we needed to stop if we
• 2:38
  were going to Nashville. We just stopped by and Franklin
• 2:39
  sit. That means the world to us.
• 2:41
  That means that we, and I say we, I mean, I'm just a small
• 2:44
  part of it, sure, but I've got a great team that that puts on a
• 2:47
  happy :) and greets people. That's important to us.
• 2:50
  We don't have bad days. We saved those, you know, for
• 2:53
  something else. When you know and folks will
• 2:55
  come in. The beer was great, the
• 2:57
  atmosphere was great, the personalities were great, the
• 2:59
  conversation was great. Whatever they needed, we were
• 3:02
  able to do it. And that's what means a lot to
• 3:03
  me. By the way, we have to talk
• 3:05
  about beer real quick. Yeah, drinking some of your
• 3:07
  beer. Yes, we're sipping on some some
• 3:09
  beers. Cheers everybody.
• 3:11
  Yeah, What do we got here? What do we got here?
• 3:13
  So Chloe, Yep, this is Chloe, This is Chloe's, a English pale,
• 3:17
  beautiful little beer, about 6 percenter.
• 3:19
  Nothing too crazy of going on there.
• 3:21
  All the bulk of the malt, the malts on this one here are
• 3:24
  Marisotter coming through. It's running on Willamette and
• 3:28
  fugal hops and then a just a very simple English ale style
• 3:33
  yeast. And I think you got the Kolch
• 3:35
  Kolch Kolch is so that's straight out of, you know, out
• 3:39
  of Germany. So again, all the all the malts
• 3:42
  Germany, the hops from Germany doesn't there's using a lot of
• 3:45
  Northern Brewer, it's really good.
• 3:47
  He's been on a coach cake lately, so he's really doing.
• 3:49
  I have, it's so refreshing. Well, this time of the year, I
• 3:52
  mean, at 95° outside, it's August, you know?
• 3:55
  Yeah, I have. It's so funny, I, I remember we
• 3:58
  were rating beers, you know, like end of the year podcast
• 4:01
  stuff and we were in the last year we were rating like what's
• 4:04
  our favorite beer styles? And we got the caution.
• 4:06
  I went, you know, I haven't had that many last year.
• 4:09
  I didn't really have that many styles.
• 4:11
  So I would say over the past month, month and 1/2 or so, I've
• 4:15
  been trying to seek them out more, you know, a little bit of
• 4:17
  our mission. Yeah, you know I'm.
• 4:19
  Seeing more and more too and I'm hoping I think so is is the but
• 4:23
  Colsh nights, people are certainly at Colsh Nights around
• 4:25
  here. I don't know this.
• 4:26
  You know where they serve them in the stong stong stong,
• 4:31
  whatever the the glass and a coal service out of Cologne is.
• 4:35
  They keep bringing them to you until you put something on top
• 4:38
  and says. Like a Brazilian steak.
• 4:39
  Exactly like that, yes. Well, they bring.
• 4:41
  Them in the seven ounce glasses. And let's face it, you get to
• 4:44
  this time of the year in in summertime and you want some
• 4:48
  lighter tasting beer. You know, you don't want it to
• 4:51
  be heavy. The cold style.
• 4:52
  I mean, I'm, I'm all about the cold style right now.
• 4:55
  So that. Was very, very well and I I the
• 4:58
  particular yeast I use in there I I'm a big yeast fan.
• 5:01
  I like those bready notes that you can get as you pull it out
• 5:05
  and that that's that beer right there brings it up.
• 5:07
  I've always said that's that is out of our farm that is a beer
• 5:10
  that sits in the barns and the refrigerators that we have on
• 5:14
  there. It's incredibly refreshing, not
• 5:16
  heavy, big flavor going on. I did Chloe and this English
• 5:21
  Pale just to kind of bring it down a notch actually a little
• 5:25
  bit and play very true. Next next iteration going in the
• 5:29
  English world is going to be a little ESB.
• 5:31
  Which is. Incredible British style.
• 5:33
  I've I've not done one of those commercially.
• 5:35
  We we did small batch pilots and well homebrew small batch pilots
• 5:39
  and run and then shared that with some friends.
• 5:41
  I'm very particular about that beard that one has to hit.
• 5:44
  That's kind of like a hep of ice hep, you know, it has to hit and
• 5:48
  that bitter has to be really, really.
• 5:50
  And if I can't do it as good as a fours, I'm not going to do it.
• 5:54
  It's it's a great style. I think people get scared of it
• 5:56
  because of the name of it. We've mentioned this several
• 5:58
  times. You know, bitters, it's really
• 6:00
  not that bad. It's really good.
• 6:01
  They're delicious and the great color on them too.
• 6:04
  Before we move on, you got two others on draft out here over
• 6:08
  here too. So what are the other two?
• 6:09
  Yeah. So sitting back here.
• 6:11
  So we got a little, a little small 4 tap system sitting over
• 6:14
  here on West Coast IPA. The other one sitting on it's
• 6:17
  called Setting Sun. So that is a beer that sort of
• 6:21
  created based on another IPA that I have.
• 6:23
  But I wanted it to have the experience I had when in
• 6:26
  Southern California sitting on the beach and watching the
• 6:28
  sunset. And what that was.
• 6:30
  I used to have a client out there.
• 6:32
  I worked out there and again, going back to those Thursdays
• 6:35
  and what we could do with our teams and so made that beer.
• 6:38
  Big hops in there and I'll say the hop of note in that one
• 6:41
  there that really took that one over the top from me was
• 6:44
  Amarillo. That Amarillo hop is just
• 6:46
  exciting. If anybody knows me, I'm a
• 6:48
  Cascade Centennial guy through and through, but that Amarillo
• 6:51
  really hit. The other beer up there is a
• 6:53
  Basic Witch. Basic Witch is just a beautiful
• 6:56
  little amber lager style, long aging.
• 6:59
  It is smooth as can be. We made that beer following up
• 7:03
  on coming out of Oktoberfest season.
• 7:05
  And I wanted to just keep the logger ring, you know, going.
• 7:09
  And so that's how we made that. And I was describing it to
• 7:11
  somebody and I simply said, well, it's kind of like the
• 7:13
  Oktoberfest, but it's very basic.
• 7:16
  And that's how the basic came in and we released it on the 31st
• 7:18
  of October. So that's where the witch came
• 7:20
  from and it has stuck. And I really thought that beer
• 7:24
  was going to be a filler and we were going to kind of move on
• 7:26
  and maybe we were going to create something else with it.
• 7:29
  It became a name stay. Oh, nice, yeah.
• 7:31
  That and enjoying the and I mean in to sit in in this bar, in
• 7:36
  this lounge and here in the club and have that to be one of the
• 7:39
  four says something for it as well.
• 7:41
  Yeah, because we wanted a nice mix in here and that beer is a
• 7:45
  big, big seller. And they're all delicious.
• 7:48
  How is it you, you just touched on a little bit, but how is it
• 7:50
  it came to be that those 4 beers came here, did Jeremy was part
• 7:53
  of that and like hey, I like these like are you offering them
• 7:55
  up and kind of tasted them or? Well, well, we kind of, we kind
• 7:58
  of looked at clients, you know, and what they need to have and
• 8:01
  we took the, you know, our original beer list of 20
• 8:04
  something beers and, you know, and taps that we had out there.
• 8:06
  And then there's 30 some recipes.
• 8:07
  There's always some kind of hanging and was like, well, we
• 8:10
  have to make it very, very drinkable.
• 8:12
  I mean, we also have a full bar here.
• 8:14
  We're we've got trouble wine, we've got incredible cocktails.
• 8:17
  We've got a tequila collection up there that's amazing going
• 8:20
  in. If you need a smoked old
• 8:22
  Fashioned, you know. Love them.
• 8:25
  I may not be leaving today. We do have a small apartment.
• 8:32
  We just need a couple hours. Yeah, well, when a truck driver
• 8:34
  comes in, they need to crash for a little while, right?
• 8:36
  Right. Oh, it's great.
• 8:37
  But no, it was, it was, you know, one trying to create.
• 8:40
  I could put, I mean, obviously with four, I could throw 4 Ipas
• 8:43
  on there. I have them.
• 8:44
  But that was not what we wanted to do.
• 8:46
  Not everybody's an IPA drinker. Not everybody's, you know, is a
• 8:48
  longer drinker. Not everybody's a cold drinker.
• 8:50
  I know it's crazy. I know.
• 8:53
  So, but we wanted to create this, you know, this continuity
• 8:56
  in the beer, just in the beer that would satisfy everybody
• 9:01
  within 4 taps. But we also carry back here, we,
• 9:04
  we do have some others. I mean, we, we, we have folks
• 9:06
  who want to have a Miller Lite. I swear, I think in over the
• 9:09
  past week or so, I've heard three or four people that have
• 9:12
  said I don't like Ipas and I'm like, well.
• 9:14
  I know. Well, because it was just IPA
• 9:16
  day, National International IPA Day on Friday.
• 9:18
  I guess it was right. Yeah, and the culture thing,
• 9:21
  like I said earlier, the culture thing for me is just kind of
• 9:22
  like, you know, I need to discover this more.
• 9:24
  But anyway, we, we, we really need to talk about sort of like
• 9:28
  the transition of what's been going on with you all because
• 9:31
  Cheerio, you know, you announced recently that your taproom
• 9:34
  closed. So now you're in a bit of a, a
• 9:37
  transition here as well. Can you are you able to expand a
• 9:40
  little bit on on some of your clients?
• 9:42
  Absolutely. So yeah, we, we C star
• 9:46
  operations over at the Noah Drive facility that we've known
• 9:49
  we somebody new is coming in there.
• 9:51
  They're going to create some incredible things.
• 9:53
  It's going to be all things beverage.
• 9:56
  And part of the part of the goal with for my wife and I with with
• 9:59
  Curio and the beer business, if you will, here in Franklin was
• 10:03
  to grow it somehow, somewhere and this is doing that.
• 10:08
  So the the new folks over there are going to do an incredible
• 10:11
  job. We're very excited about it and
• 10:13
  it will become its own at that point in time.
• 10:15
  But it is going to be bigger than what we had before.
• 10:18
  And they're going to be doing ultimate, you know, other
• 10:20
  beverages as well. Yeah, under there.
• 10:22
  But it's going to be in that was important to us transitioning.
• 10:25
  So we have we've been working over here for a little while now
• 10:29
  as this we're sitting here in the in the in the members
• 10:32
  lounge. I'm going in this was the first,
• 10:34
  you know, entry into, you know the bar here of being completely
• 10:39
  redone. We do have two other bars
• 10:40
  sitting out in the showroom that we're working on as well.
• 10:44
  You're. Going to have to drag Steve and
• 10:45
  I out here kicking the screen because we may never.
• 10:48
  Get to this. Next thing we're going to get a
• 10:50
  hotel business. We're going to build a hotel
• 10:52
  right over here. Why not?
• 10:53
  Why not love it? But that was always the idea.
• 10:55
  So we so then, you know, kind of coming over here was, you know,
• 10:59
  very it was normal. It was the transit.
• 11:02
  It was what we were going to do because my wife and I, as we
• 11:04
  first started out, we have a farm out Leapers Fork area just
• 11:07
  into Murray County. We call it S Leapers.
• 11:09
  I'm going in there a little lovely little place called Santa
• 11:11
  Fe. And that was always what we were
• 11:14
  going to do. We, we, we build our a new barn
• 11:17
  facility out there to house. We wanted to bring in
• 11:20
  agritourism. We want to show farm brewing.
• 11:22
  We want to show that getting a beer is a lot different and you
• 11:27
  know, and understanding than what you park, your car, you
• 11:30
  roll into your grocery store, your quick store yourself, check
• 11:34
  out right in 5 minutes you're back in the car and you're
• 11:36
  rolling. We want, we want folks to
• 11:38
  understand and you know, get educated again about where your
• 11:41
  food comes from in this video, your beer and how that happens.
• 11:44
  And that was always our mission with the farm.
• 11:46
  Curio was definitely a stepping stone in that and kind of
• 11:49
  bringing it up. We introduced a lot of farm
• 11:51
  based brews into the Curio, our farm.
• 11:56
  We grow hops out there. Five of the beers at Curio have
• 11:59
  our hops in them. That was a big thing for us to
• 12:03
  do. And then to create this through,
• 12:05
  in partnering with Department of Agriculture, working with, you
• 12:09
  know, our, our, our elected officials to grow the brewing
• 12:12
  community in Tennessee through the agricultural community of
• 12:16
  Tennessee. And because they do go together.
• 12:19
  And I'm a, I'm a French German by heritage.
• 12:22
  This is the way that it would every you, you grew everything
• 12:24
  you brewed everything you made everything.
• 12:26
  When somebody came over to your, you know, to your, your home in
• 12:29
  the countryside, you would bring out your beer that you had made
• 12:34
  and your bread and your vegetables and what have you.
• 12:37
  So we that's a big part of this for us in our little bit of time
• 12:41
  plan that we've got here and to help.
• 12:42
  We think that there's AI don't know, I almost say void and all
• 12:47
  that. It's just simply as a passion
• 12:49
  though for. Us it's harder.
• 12:49
  It's harder to do. It well, yeah, yeah, it
• 12:52
  shouldn't be that hard, right it.
• 12:54
  Shouldn't be. So can you talk a little more
• 12:55
  about the farm? So, so is the plan you're going
• 12:57
  to brew there and have a facility, some form of tap room
• 13:01
  or something to where people can come and hang and and drink all
• 13:04
  your beers there too, right? Yes, yes, that is the, that is
• 13:06
  the plan we're working through now.
• 13:09
  We're working again working with our community, working with our
• 13:12
  our elected officials there make sure we have everything done the
• 13:15
  right way. Farm, farm brewing or
• 13:18
  agricultural brewing if you want to call it is a is a very
• 13:21
  important thing. We're able to do that here in
• 13:23
  the state with through wineries and there are several of those
• 13:26
  out here. Brewing has kind of been left
• 13:28
  left behind there just a little bit.
• 13:30
  And so we want to kind of bring that forward.
• 13:32
  We want to be able to and then support it.
• 13:34
  We want to be able to grow our own barley here.
• 13:36
  We want to be able to grow our own hops here.
• 13:37
  We're not a hop growing region, but we can do it.
• 13:40
  We can make it happen. Especially during for your own
• 13:43
  purpose, right? Exactly, and that's the way farm
• 13:44
  brewing should be. And you said your farm, you said
• 13:46
  your farm is actually in Murray County, right?
• 13:48
  Yeah. We're just.
• 13:49
  Over in Murray County. OK.
• 13:50
  So for people that you know listening to the podcast and are
• 13:52
  like out of state Murray County where you are, you probably
• 13:55
  about an hour or so South of Nashville.
• 13:57
  Is that right? From Nashville, yes, about 25
• 13:59
  minutes from here. So if you're in Beeper's Fork,
• 14:01
  if you're sitting down proper in the village, about 10 minutes to
• 14:04
  the South, you'll, you'll find us.
• 14:05
  You'll be driving along this beautiful Rd.
• 14:07
  It's very cool. Like you don't see anything to
• 14:09
  all, you know, but fields, some hay bales and you know, and so
• 14:13
  forth. And then you'll come on to this
• 14:14
  pot, you know, this big long stretch stretch of the road and
• 14:18
  you'll see these big poles sticking out of the ground with
• 14:20
  these plants growing, buying, you know, and all.
• 14:23
  And you're like, OK. That there it.
• 14:25
  Is what is that That's. Us.
• 14:27
  I'll tell you when, when I when I, when I was at your brewery in
• 14:30
  Curio a few months ago. And I know we've met before at
• 14:33
  some beer festivals and stuff. And I remember telling Scott
• 14:35
  after that, I said, you and I probably sat there for about two
• 14:37
  hours just chatting about everything.
• 14:39
  And I said, I wish I would have had the microphone on that day
• 14:42
  because I just loved the conversation.
• 14:45
  And we've been trying to get you on for a while.
• 14:47
  And there's, there's so many different takeaways.
• 14:48
  One of them you know, Franklin, TN here we are in Franklin is I
• 14:53
  always even even this area. Murray County we're talking
• 14:55
  about as well. Certainly under serviced when it
• 14:59
  comes to like good crappier options.
• 15:01
  Yeah, yeah, that, yeah, that great point.
• 15:04
  And it's, I don't know the reasoning necessarily, but we
• 15:07
  were the only brewery in Franklin.
• 15:08
  Yes, there are only two in Williams County, Mill Creek over
• 15:11
  in Nolensville. So you want to go from Franklin
• 15:13
  to Nolensville? You got an hour of.
• 15:14
  Drive. It's same county, but it's
• 15:16
  closer to my house. That means you.
• 15:18
  Still haven't made it the, I mean, I mean, if you were in
• 15:20
  Fairview, yeah, Winston County is a very bright county.
• 15:25
  It's broad like Tennessee, but yeah, they're just, they're just
• 15:29
  aren't very many. Some have not succeeded.
• 15:33
  I mean, it's a it's a challenging business.
• 15:35
  Yeah, brewing across the country.
• 15:37
  I mean, I'm, I'm getting brewing.
• 15:38
  You know, some some notifications about something
• 15:40
  going down, some trying to pop up.
• 15:42
  And it's it's a tough business And you don't, you have to be in
• 15:45
  this not necessarily to make money for you got to go in there
• 15:48
  with some passion and some love, but some some guardrails.
• 15:51
  Don't get me wrong. This isn't, this isn't just
• 15:54
  throw coins in the pond, right? You get it, you're with it, you
• 15:56
  know, you know, answered. But more and more are, you know,
• 16:01
  closing if they're here in the South or they're in the Pacific
• 16:04
  Northwest or they're in, you know, California, Texas or New
• 16:06
  York, It's it's affecting us all very similarly.
• 16:10
  And Tennessee's Tennessee's is we have an incredible Brewers
• 16:14
  Guild here that works really, really hard to help to come and
• 16:17
  to grow. And we're seeing some of that,
• 16:18
  but we've also seen here in Tennessee, we've seen, we've
• 16:21
  seen some loss on our brewery counts.
• 16:22
  Yeah, a little bit of consolidation, some things that
• 16:25
  might be make more economical sense.
• 16:27
  And it's I think that I still think firmly that we can grow
• 16:31
  this brewing industry within the state.
• 16:34
  And my focus on growing that is through the agricultural
• 16:38
  channel, making farm brewing a positive, you know, thing for
• 16:42
  Tennessee, supporting our our our AG industry in Tennessee,
• 16:46
  getting the infrastructure, putting in so that we can
• 16:48
  process crane so we can have our hostile so we can run that
• 16:52
  creating a farm, you know, a farm bill, if you will, that
• 16:56
  provides an Ave. for for small Brewers.
• 16:59
  And I'm not having big Brewers. I mean, not just just small
• 17:02
  community driven centered. We have some really great ones
• 17:05
  of those in this state. And you got to search out to
• 17:07
  find yeah, but there's some great ones.
• 17:09
  And I think we want to we can do that.
• 17:10
  I don't think we're going to be that big regional hub brewing
• 17:15
  state. I think we can be a lot of small
• 17:17
  farm brewery, you know, kind of place this kind of state.
• 17:20
  And I think it's a maybe it's a sense of pride as Tennesseans to
• 17:24
  have those types of breweries within the state.
• 17:26
  Yeah, we're, you know, shoot man, we're doing a good job of
• 17:28
  that kind of the thing. You know, if that's cool, I
• 17:31
  think it's it's a good thing. Is the you mentioned Tennessee
• 17:34
  the the Brewers Guild? Is the farm to tap part of that
• 17:37
  too? Farm to Tap.
• 17:38
  Yeah, That's a collaboration between the Guild and the
• 17:41
  Department of Agriculture, still running that we back this past
• 17:45
  spring, the Guild sponsored. We were up at up in Nashville,
• 17:50
  at the Capitol, met with representatives, met with our
• 17:52
  senators to discuss what we're doing, what we need to do.
• 17:56
  Can we get more funding please? And you were part of that I.
• 17:59
  Was part of that. OK, yes.
• 18:01
  I know going up there, we have some incredible representatives
• 18:04
  and, you know, great friends here and we, I really appreciate
• 18:08
  them as friends. We appreciate them, you know, as
• 18:11
  a Guild for sure. And to have them show up at my
• 18:15
  brewery. And I mean, the invitation's
• 18:17
  obviously always out there, but when they, when, when I have one
• 18:20
  of our, one of our local, you know, senators show up in the
• 18:24
  brewery and I'm like, oh man, thank you for coming in.
• 18:26
  It really shows that best interest.
• 18:28
  So we pay that, you know, up to them and they've they've,
• 18:31
  they've they've, they've done the numbers, they've went to bat
• 18:33
  for us when it comes to Finance Committee and they've brought,
• 18:38
  you know, answers that can help us support the Guild and grow.
• 18:41
  Yeah, and it's and it's very interesting because we all know,
• 18:44
  you know, political red tape is just that political red tape.
• 18:47
  So you're meeting with these lawmakers and then all of a
• 18:50
  sudden it's like, how do you get everybody on board to where it
• 18:54
  goes into not just on a committee level, but to other
• 18:58
  levels as well? Next thing you know, there's
• 19:00
  legislation being signed that's helping you all, you know.
• 19:03
  Absolutely and if we can and then part of it is create, you
• 19:06
  know, is crafting beer crafting, but the crafting our story, but
• 19:10
  then our purpose, our mission, what we're doing.
• 19:12
  And that's where the AG comes to me.
• 19:14
  Tennessee has a big agricultural state, great history in doing in
• 19:19
  in being so. And if we can, you know, create
• 19:23
  within the state through a farm bill, if you will, that Brewer,
• 19:27
  farm Brewers are going to, you know, this percentage of their
• 19:31
  product is going to be from grains grown in the state of
• 19:35
  Tennessee, this percentage of hops, this or this yeast.
• 19:38
  And if we can start to make that part of the equation now we're
• 19:43
  creating this closed loop, if you will, economic scenario for
• 19:47
  the state of Tennessee that can grow industry hops.
• 19:50
  I grow, I grow hops. Hops are the, you know, pound
• 19:53
  for pound, the single most expensive ingredient in a beer
• 19:56
  going in. So, you know, it takes a little
• 19:58
  bit to get into it. But if we can do that and create
• 20:01
  an Ave. for, for for farmers out there to grow small stands of
• 20:05
  that or if they're doing barley, we have a longer growing season
• 20:08
  so we can double crop on barley or wheat in some, you know,
• 20:11
  scenarios. I think we have a great
• 20:12
  opportunity to grow it here. Yeah, if you feel like the
• 20:14
  legislation and the lawmakers are listening, I know.
• 20:16
  Oh yeah, you got OK, Good. The ones are definitely the ones
• 20:18
  that I talked to yeah. I mean, they're they're they're
• 20:20
  incredible. They take time out to meet.
• 20:22
  They don't that mean that's a job.
• 20:24
  I'll tell you, you know, going up there and that, you know, and
• 20:26
  it goes through and if I can get 510 minutes home with them or
• 20:29
  they provide me with their phone number and, you know, we can
• 20:32
  catch up later. No, they, they really, really do
• 20:35
  they see the value. They do have a lot on their
• 20:37
  plate. We all recognize that yes, they
• 20:39
  help us out where we're absolutely where they.
• 20:40
  Can that topic with beer is just as important as the other topics
• 20:44
  as far as supporting Tennessee and supporting farmers and local
• 20:46
  business and all that stuff, whether it's beer or whatever
• 20:49
  The thing is, it's as important and it should be as important to
• 20:51
  them as it is any other subject. Yeah.
• 20:53
  Oh, absolutely. And in beer, Tennessee is the
• 20:55
  highest tax beer state in the country.
• 20:56
  We pay a lot out there. So and it goes to a lot of great
• 20:59
  causes that are there. But if, if we want to support
• 21:03
  those causes, if we're growing this industry, we can better
• 21:06
  support those causes, which means though, but let's bring
• 21:08
  some of that back. Let's reciprocate just a little
• 21:11
  bit on what those taxes are, what we're paying in and if
• 21:15
  we're buying local grains, Tennessee grains, Tennessee
• 21:18
  hops, let's create or we're using our spent grain going to
• 21:21
  local farmers. That's an incredible they don't
• 21:24
  pay anything for that. That that that subsidizes a
• 21:27
  grain bill, you know, that they have for their cattle.
• 21:29
  A small, I mean, it's not a lot. We don't have to dispose of it
• 21:32
  to a landfill. You know, we're just putting
• 21:34
  something back. We're creating.
• 21:36
  And if we do all of that, I think, yeah, we're growing a
• 21:39
  just very, very strong, you know, Tennessee and it could be
• 21:43
  for any pick of state. We can all do these things.
• 21:46
  But, you know, that really grows and we can do it through beer
• 21:50
  like we can't do through others, you know, through wine or
• 21:53
  through through whiskey and all that.
• 21:56
  That's a, that's a, you know, you know, a little different
• 21:58
  process for, you know, for them. And but I think we can
• 22:00
  absolutely do it. I'm a beer guy and I'm going to
• 22:02
  stand, stand by that. Some of the some of the people
• 22:05
  we've talked to on our podcast are part have have been or a
• 22:07
  part of the the Brewers Guild. Eric Latham, You know, Eric
• 22:12
  Taylor, Chad OR. Like it's just like that.
• 22:15
  When I hear those names, I see those names like you guys,
• 22:17
  you're rock stars, you know, and the fact that you guys are all
• 22:20
  on this or have been on it, it's like it's in good hands, you
• 22:22
  know what I mean? Like it's.
• 22:23
  Well, and I was going to say, I don't remember, maybe you do
• 22:26
  because it's fresh memory for you.
• 22:27
  I know when we talked to Eric in the past, we've had those
• 22:30
  numbers in front of us. But I know I can't remember like
• 22:32
  how many breweries there are in Tennessee and how much revenue
• 22:36
  is being generated. But can you speak of that?
• 22:38
  Because it it's no small number. No, it, it has grown a lot.
• 22:42
  And I think I don't know the numbers exactly.
• 22:44
  This would be an incredible question for, you know, Matt and
• 22:48
  with the head of the Guild thing going through.
• 22:50
  But since roughly 2010, our brewery numbers have grown, I
• 22:55
  mean exponentially did very, very well.
• 22:57
  We've seen now over the last since you know, 2020.
• 23:00
  I mean, obviously pandemic affected a lot of businesses
• 23:03
  going in, seen a little bit of flattening and downturn possibly
• 23:06
  in some areas. If I speak of just of Central
• 23:09
  Middle Tennessee, definitely we've seen some downturn on
• 23:12
  there, some consolidation and and some loss.
• 23:15
  And maybe that's, I don't know if that's writing on the wall or
• 23:17
  not. But that said, still to this
• 23:19
  day, our numbers of breweries in Tennessee are better than they
• 23:23
  were, you know, a decade ago. Yeah.
• 23:25
  So we've grown and that's in that, that's economy, that's
• 23:28
  jobs that and that's a tax base. And we know we pay into
• 23:32
  obviously as we as we talked, it's a lot of great things.
• 23:35
  And if we do it as other Brewers, all the Brewers that I
• 23:37
  know that Eric's for example, we're very responsible with
• 23:41
  this. This is something that we're not
• 23:43
  doing for that, you know, quick turn or you know, we are
• 23:46
  responsible with our, with our, with our customers and how they
• 23:49
  present themselves. How I mean it's, we're not, we
• 23:52
  don't want to be, you know, we don't, we don't want problems to
• 23:56
  arise from our business. What's your livelihood?
• 23:58
  It is, it is and it means a lot. And we and and all of them can
• 24:02
  definitely tell you as a put a lot of effort into it.
• 24:05
  There's a lot of there's a lot of there's a lot of nights or a
• 24:08
  lot of extra hours. If you're if you're a brewery
• 24:11
  brewery owner, for sure you don't work 40 hour week.
• 24:15
  No or. 80 hour week. I think it's something that when
• 24:18
  we first started doing this podcast about 3 years ago and we
• 24:21
  really started delving into the nitty gritty of a lot of things,
• 24:25
  we would, you know, talk to a lot of brewery owners and maybe
• 24:28
  Brewers and you realize it's like some of these guys have
• 24:30
  second jobs. They're not just owning a
• 24:32
  brewery, you know, some of these guys are doing other things
• 24:36
  because maybe they have to or maybe they want to, you know?
• 24:39
  Yeah, that's and, and yeah, this past Monday I was down in
• 24:43
  Columbia and Twisted Copper and so the Guild held a little,
• 24:46
  little get together there. So Matt has, you know, you know,
• 24:51
  scheduled out meetings across and hopefully you guys are, you
• 24:54
  know, maybe you're able to make some of those and got some
• 24:56
  Nashville runs going on here. But we're down in Murray County,
• 24:59
  down in Columbia. And but so Matt brought in, we
• 25:02
  had the Chamber of Commerce there and the business community
• 25:05
  there as well. But then we had our Brewers and
• 25:07
  then it was, you know, one of the one of the Brewers Downer.
• 25:09
  He's he's he has a day job that he has to do and, you know, to
• 25:12
  kind of bring out and he's, you know, small and starting out has
• 25:15
  ambitions and, and wants to do it.
• 25:18
  But he also has to look at the reality and, you know, of of
• 25:21
  what it is. Yeah, it's a it's a difficult
• 25:23
  space. It really, really is
• 25:24
  challenging. But I think I mean, he does and
• 25:27
  and myself and and others, I mean, we welcome the challenge.
• 25:31
  I mean, it's a fun challenge. I mean, it does get you.
• 25:34
  I'm, I'm probably, you know, lost a few hair or something,
• 25:36
  but but it's, it's when you're doing the right thing and you're
• 25:39
  seeing, you're getting the feedback.
• 25:41
  You're, you're, you're hearing that the community is, you know,
• 25:44
  supporting you. In my case right now, as we're,
• 25:46
  you know, in this little transition period of, you know,
• 25:49
  getting some of the, you know, the comments coming in,
• 25:52
  receiving all the texts and the phone calls and emails about it.
• 25:55
  Because I mean, not everybody knows, you know, the whole, you
• 25:58
  know, the whole, you know, game, I guess, if you will, of what
• 26:01
  we're going through. But they want us to be here.
• 26:04
  And I know they want to be Johnson City Brewing needs to be
• 26:07
  there. I think, you know, you know,
• 26:09
  Stokehouse BBQ, they want it to be here.
• 26:12
  If he has no parking spots, it doesn't matter.
• 26:14
  They're going to go there, you know, for the for Chad's, you
• 26:17
  know, for the barbecue and the beer and all.
• 26:21
  I just did an event the other night and raising money and we
• 26:24
  and my wife and I, we big philanthropy is a big thing of
• 26:26
  what we do of giving back as well if.
• 26:29
  And so one we did the other night was the Girl Scouts of
• 26:32
  America. And this is their Middle
• 26:34
  Tennessee branch. And they, they take all the
• 26:37
  cookies and they ask, OK, who can do, you know, and they get
• 26:40
  restaurants and, and beverage makers and so forth.
• 26:42
  And we've done this a couple of years now and you know, we took
• 26:46
  it. You take a cookie, you take a
• 26:47
  theme, you make a beer. And they're kind of true.
• 26:48
  But we all know that Zul is new to Nashville and they're kind of
• 26:52
  coming in and Zul was there. And I mean, we were, we were a,
• 26:57
  a table apart and, but as soon as we walked, we walked in the
• 27:01
  door, they carted some of my stuff in.
• 27:03
  I supplied, you know, the CO2 for, you know, for them to run.
• 27:06
  We're a community we share. And all because they grabbed the
• 27:09
  wrong tank coming in and didn't have and I was going to change
• 27:11
  it. And then the beauty of it all is
• 27:14
  that, and this is about cookies, granted, and raising money out
• 27:17
  of Middle Tennessee. We have pastry chefs and we've
• 27:19
  got all of this. Zul makes this, they have the
• 27:22
  trefoil cookie, I think it was. And it's got this little and
• 27:25
  then they take their they take their beer that they had and
• 27:27
  they make this whole thing, bring it all in, get it all
• 27:30
  going. They win.
• 27:31
  They win. Welcome, Zul, to Middle
• 27:34
  Tennessee. This is the thing.
• 27:36
  And that's what we love about this is that it is it is that
• 27:39
  whole saying about, you know, high tides raising all ships.
• 27:42
  No, none of us as Brewers want to see another brewery fail.
• 27:45
  We want to see everybody succeed.
• 27:47
  That's very important. I was so excited.
• 27:49
  That really is important 100% is I I mean I go into that, you
• 27:53
  know, and and last year we did you know, and our the beer sold
• 27:56
  like hot cakes out of that we did and for the Samoa cookie
• 27:59
  last year, this year we had a a different cookie man hasn't been
• 28:03
  released yet to the to our people to our to the tap room or
• 28:06
  here. And and it's exciting because
• 28:09
  you don't and I was just happy to not finish last onto it.
• 28:13
  And then when and I'm sitting here and we've got, I mean, just
• 28:16
  some incredible places going in and and they announced Zool and
• 28:20
  then Zool was having that night was their their opening, their
• 28:23
  soft opening, I guess, or at the nation's Oh.
• 28:25
  Yeah, that would have been, what, Thursday?
• 28:28
  Yeah, that was it. That was the night.
• 28:29
  So they left out of there carrying their trophy out and
• 28:32
  walk. Mike was going to walk in and
• 28:35
  celebrate. You know, an observation though,
• 28:39
  because it really, and, and we knew anyway, I mean, over the
• 28:42
  years, Southern Grist and Zoll were, were sort of aligned with
• 28:47
  each other as far as like different things they did.
• 28:49
  And maybe maybe those of us in the beer community got a little
• 28:54
  nervous where it was like, we don't want Grist to go away.
• 28:56
  And I don't think grist has necessarily gone away, but to
• 28:59
  see the seamless transition of everything in a classy way that
• 29:04
  this happened between Zul and Southern grist, I don't know if
• 29:08
  that's always a very usual thing to happen in.
• 29:11
  Business. Some of their cans that are the
• 29:13
  legacy grist stuff if they presented by Zul something but
• 29:18
  about grist still on there, like they're still producing that
• 29:20
  Grist beer. So it's kind of cool.
• 29:21
  This is still an homage to to Gristed.
• 29:24
  And no, and you're, you're absolutely right.
• 29:27
  It doesn't always happen. It takes effort to to work
• 29:30
  something that way and be, you know, collegial about it and and
• 29:33
  and that's respect. And yeah, I know I love that.
• 29:35
  Again, it goes it goes back to we are a brewing community and
• 29:39
  we just really appreciate every other Brewer that's out there.
• 29:42
  I mean, I'm, I'm originally from Ohio, from Ohio and all and part
• 29:46
  of them when I go back up there and just melt back into that,
• 29:50
  that little community of a few breweries and that are that are
• 29:53
  around, it's like I never left. And there's, I mean, I don't
• 29:57
  want to be naive, but there's, there.
• 29:59
  I feel there is a camaraderie out there.
• 30:02
  I think so. Definitely.
• 30:03
  We know things, yeah. How we know things well in
• 30:06
  another great conversation that you and I had a few months ago
• 30:08
  where we should have just had the microphones on them, but.
• 30:11
  First of all, before you, you had us back-to-back days
• 30:14
  separately. I know we're.
• 30:16
  Gonna probably walk out on the patio.
• 30:18
  And there's Scott. I mean, Steve was like a.
• 30:20
  Baller, just like it's a 2 hour. Conversation with Steve
• 30:24
  yesterday Yeah exactly. It was like no material.
• 30:27
  OK OK OK yeah, that was that was fun.
• 30:29
  There was something you mentioned because I I know we
• 30:31
  were talking about the beer festivals in Nashville and
• 30:34
  that's how we've got to know you but then I I remember there was
• 30:36
  something you were also talking about a lot of the the the ones
• 30:40
  that aren't always in around Nashville, right Like
• 30:43
  Murfreesboro. And then you have, you know,
• 30:45
  Manchester and you mentioned Murray County and then you also
• 30:48
  mentioned my cap Killer out in Sparta, which by the way, we
• 30:53
  went to cap Killer a few months ago.
• 30:55
  I'd never been. Amazing, isn't it?
• 30:57
  Oh. My gosh, I I was so I was so
• 31:00
  excited. We went to a bunch of them.
• 31:02
  But the point is you were even talking about you're, you're
• 31:06
  kind of alluding to getting maybe a kind of partnership a
• 31:10
  little more with those kind of folks, right, to do a little to
• 31:13
  more to do more things to bring more awareness to maybe more
• 31:17
  rural breweries that aren't necessarily in Nashville.
• 31:19
  Yeah, rural for sure. I mean, Nashville is obviously a
• 31:21
  unique breed, right? We got Broadway and and on and
• 31:24
  so that's all, you know, a little bit different of a model
• 31:27
  you have to run for that. But you know, Calf Killer Sparta
• 31:30
  is just an incredible example of, you know, limited, I'll say
• 31:34
  limited, you know, small, all distribution, creating an
• 31:37
  incredible beer, you know, having an incredible following.
• 31:41
  And then it's word of mouth, you know?
• 31:44
  It's why you drive an hour and. 1/2 drive an hour and a.
• 31:47
  Half word of mouth but and and maybe we can get to this too.
• 31:51
  I'm jumping around today, but word of mouth but also
• 31:53
  destination. Destination group, That's a
• 31:55
  great. We talked about that, you know,
• 31:57
  even though it one hour and a half to get there, two hours
• 31:59
  we're going, we have got to go here at least once a year.
• 32:03
  And combination destination. Yeah, We were just, yeah, we got
• 32:07
  to talk about Common John. We were Common John because we
• 32:10
  went to Chattanooga and we went to Common John not long ago.
• 32:13
  We stopped in there one day for breakfast and and then LeBron
• 32:18
  came in. Lebron's awesome.
• 32:19
  Yeah, LeBron came in and and that's another thing when you
• 32:22
  talk about the beer community you got, you got a guy like
• 32:25
  LeBron who we follow him on, on tapped and everything and he's
• 32:29
  he's in Nashville all the time, in other places as well,
• 32:33
  supporting all the breweries. Well, I think, yeah.
• 32:35
  As much as they got going on. Oh yeah.
• 32:37
  And that's one of the really neat things about LeBron to me
• 32:41
  is that when I have been, if we've done here in Nashville,
• 32:44
  we've done Brew at the Zoo or we've done Pred Fest or we've
• 32:46
  done what, you know, whatever the Music City Fest and you'll
• 32:49
  see LeBron maybe. But LeBron and, you know, he
• 32:51
  empowers his people, you know, to kind of come, you know, and
• 32:54
  to be, you know, a part and represent.
• 32:57
  It's kind of it's like Jeremy, you know, with his, with his,
• 32:59
  you know, with his folk, with his team out there.
• 33:01
  He empowers them to go. He feels they are carrying the
• 33:04
  message. Yeah, LeBron is.
• 33:07
  I mean, it's just incredible. I mean, what they've done.
• 33:09
  And now they're Pulaski. I'm going to open up, you know,
• 33:12
  there. I hope that's going well.
• 33:14
  You know, for him. I haven't seen.
• 33:15
  I haven't seen a lot of folks. That's the other thing.
• 33:17
  Franklin's a lot of like an island in the brewing world and
• 33:20
  you get out. But.
• 33:22
  But yeah, that, you know, you're just an incredible guy.
• 33:23
  And that's where also the I've met with representatives that
• 33:29
  are of, you know, where common John is located and going
• 33:32
  through. And I go in there and I sit and
• 33:35
  I mentioned LeBron. Oh yeah, we we were over there
• 33:37
  and he's married to my sisters. But you know, we get becomes one
• 33:40
  of these really incredible stories and you start and we
• 33:42
  don't talk about the beer community as much and, you know,
• 33:45
  making beer and whatnot. We talk about community.
• 33:47
  Community, yes, meaning the people that are associated and
• 33:50
  where they're out. And that's what really brings it
• 33:52
  home. So that's what, as you
• 33:54
  mentioned, I want to reach out. I want to be a part of, of
• 33:57
  finding those rural, rural spots, not destroying rural
• 34:01
  life. Rural life is incredibly
• 34:03
  important to us Now there we, we take our farm and you know, very
• 34:07
  seriously when we're out there and we love the, the, the sound
• 34:10
  of the birds and the butterflies and the bees and the, the
• 34:13
  waterfalls that are, you know, out there.
• 34:15
  We don't want to get rid of that whatsoever.
• 34:18
  But there's people and there's culture inside of all of that,
• 34:21
  that we can all learn. Damn incredible stories.
• 34:23
  I don't want to lose them. I think beer is a story, you
• 34:26
  know, in a glass and I think the people of your community, they
• 34:29
  their stories too. They don't have to drink beer.
• 34:31
  We can sit and drink tea fine with that.
• 34:33
  I love that going on. And so yes, that's where we we
• 34:36
  want to reach out. We want to be a bigger part of
• 34:38
  that. That's what we were our families
• 34:41
  were that they showed us that up in Ohio and West Virginia, where
• 34:44
  my wife and I grew up. And so we're, we're very, we're
• 34:48
  very aware of our upbringing and what that is.
• 34:51
  And we're going to trying to keep it and show that and
• 34:53
  continue that within. Could you foresee a time when
• 34:56
  you open up the farm of having some sort of beer festival out?
• 34:59
  There. Oh, yeah, yeah.
• 35:00
  We, we, we've done a few small things there.
• 35:03
  So we have, I built AI built a barn.
• 35:05
  Barn was patterned after our watering family barn.
• 35:09
  It sits up in Aurora, WV, Preston County.
• 35:11
  And then that's where my ancestors came through.
• 35:13
  Abraham Vodrin. I'm way, way back.
• 35:15
  And so that barn's still there. So we patterned, designed that
• 35:18
  barn out there like that one and we have a picture of him inside.
• 35:23
  And so we wanted to create that. We wanted to create that story.
• 35:26
  It's supposed to beam. I had it cut out of New England
• 35:28
  and shipped down and all, and we had so many people coming by
• 35:32
  because this is like a legit old school barn raising kind of
• 35:34
  thing. That barn is held up not by
• 35:36
  nails and screws, it's mortise and Tenon and wood pegs.
• 35:40
  And we had folks kind of stopping in And that's, so
• 35:42
  that's, that's another elevation, another level of
• 35:44
  story. And now and we've had people
• 35:46
  reach out, hey, can we have this event there?
• 35:48
  Can we have that event there? And we've been very selective
• 35:50
  and you know, we don't want it to become a, we're going to be
• 35:54
  very responsible again to our community of having out there.
• 35:58
  I'm also I like to go to bed early.
• 35:59
  But the more you say, the more I'm thinking of Calf Killer
• 36:01
  because they don't stay open late.
• 36:02
  You're kind of out there a little bit.
• 36:04
  Hey. And they, you live on the
• 36:05
  property, You're close by. It's like, hey, we don't.
• 36:07
  Yeah, hell. And you meet people and you
• 36:08
  share stories. And we had a little, we had a
• 36:10
  little, you know, a little restaurant spot out there called
• 36:13
  Nets CAF, Nets Diner. And it was the old Santa Fe
• 36:16
  Diner some time ago. And we would go over and visit
• 36:19
  with Miss Net all the time. And you know, the folks that
• 36:22
  came in and it's only, it's a mile up the road from our place
• 36:25
  and folks will come in. They would, it would be there
• 36:27
  and, and miss that she, she sold it.
• 36:29
  I mean, it's been vacant for a little while now.
• 36:32
  And but one of her worries was, and this really hit home to us
• 36:35
  as saying that this community does care about each other.
• 36:39
  And we, you know, we feel that you want to assume it.
• 36:41
  She, she really validated, she was worried about she had a
• 36:45
  small gas pump, really small regular gas.
• 36:47
  That was it, but she was worried that folks that need to come in
• 36:51
  there and get only one or $2.00 because that's what they had of
• 36:54
  gas to get them to the, you know, whatever wouldn't have
• 36:57
  that Ave. wouldn't have that resource anymore.
• 37:00
  And it just showed she she cared so much and she baked all the
• 37:04
  pies and made all the cakes and there was a table in the I wish
• 37:07
  we could be doing this podcast. It was such a beautiful time.
• 37:10
  Soft sort of ice cream machine in there.
• 37:12
  My daughter said she makes the best grilled cheese sandwich in
• 37:14
  the United States. Yeah, just being incredible.
• 37:17
  And that's that's that that that rural community, that place that
• 37:20
  we love that we find that's very inviting and and people that's
• 37:24
  somebody say something to the other day and we've all you
• 37:26
  know, you're driving down, there's another car coming
• 37:28
  across you, right. Do you wave at it?
• 37:29
  And I had somebody and I grew up as we waved, my dad always did
• 37:33
  it. And I always asked him why he
• 37:34
  did that. And he said, well, you know,
• 37:35
  I'll meet him someday. I wanted to be the first one to
• 37:38
  say hi. And so somebody said that they
• 37:40
  had come in and I was like, now you go to the country.
• 37:42
  People wave. Yeah.
• 37:44
  We wave. We wave.
• 37:45
  We don't know you, but we wave. We still wave.
• 37:48
  We still wave because we, you know, for, you know, calf killer
• 37:51
  hospitality number one, that. I mean, that place has grown.
• 37:54
  Yeah. And sitting outside and.
• 37:57
  All of that, such a great experience.
• 37:58
  Beautiful experience and it's, you know, it's, it's, it's the
• 38:02
  basics. Basics done incredibly,
• 38:04
  incredibly well. Just get there earlier in the
• 38:06
  day. Don't go late.
• 38:07
  Don't go late. I mean, they ain't going to be
• 38:09
  there. They will be closed.
• 38:10
  It's that same thing. Same idea.
• 38:12
  Can we go back to the Noah Drive location for men?
• 38:15
  Absolutely. Can we talk about the history of
• 38:17
  that building a little bit? Great, great history uh huh yes,
• 38:21
  that has been so there have been a few breweries here in in
• 38:24
  Franklin over the years. We in other locations.
• 38:27
  Well, we had cool springs brews remember the hub going on There
• 38:30
  was Granite City, which was a pseudo brewery in the Drury
• 38:35
  Hotel kind of going on. But then there's also been Noah
• 38:38
  drive and Noah Drive has been here for 15 something years
• 38:41
  going on. It started out as Turtle
• 38:43
  Anarchy, Incredible brewery. That was one of the first beers
• 38:46
  when we moved here in 2013 and it was running and that was one
• 38:50
  of the first beers that I had. I always, you know, try to find
• 38:53
  those local spots and everything.
• 38:55
  My first local Middle Tennessee beer, Yazoo Dos Perros, loved it
• 39:00
  and still do until this day. Great job, Linus, but I wanted
• 39:03
  to find a local beer and I found that beer and they made that.
• 39:05
  They had a portly stout. Was the beer credible,
• 39:09
  Incredible beer, you know, going on.
• 39:10
  And they did a couple other little projects.
• 39:12
  They started it out, then they moved on.
• 39:14
  And then enter Mantra. Mantra Brewing and Mont Brewing
• 39:18
  created some some more unique beers, you know, cutting edge.
• 39:21
  I'll guess all. Artesian ales I think they call
• 39:23
  them, yes. Under that so utilizing
• 39:25
  different ingredients exotic ingredients in some cases they
• 39:28
  come through ran very, very well there for a while spawned
• 39:33
  another opportunity for that brewery going in there was a
• 39:36
  small brewery, you know, you know, intermittent and then we
• 39:39
  then curio curio curio was a pandemic baby curio started in
• 39:44
  2020 and it June of 2020 and it it it it grew from something
• 39:51
  that was incredibly small and basic and humble doing both
• 39:56
  coffee then doing beer, you know, over the years and then
• 40:00
  maybe it was a few years ago when I bought curio some of the
• 40:04
  guys had some of the. Had moved on and I bought a cure
• 40:08
  at that point and to move it in so we've but it was important
• 40:11
  for my my rationale. It was very important to keep a
• 40:14
  brewery in Franklin at that point.
• 40:15
  By then we didn't have it. Cool Springs brewery had sold it
• 40:19
  became another brewery Huckleberry.
• 40:21
  Huckleberry. Yeah.
• 40:22
  Huckle if you like huckleberry. I mean I love I got a
• 40:24
  huckleberry IPA coming. It's coming yes.
• 40:27
  I'm a Pacific Northwester when it comes to that beer lovely.
• 40:30
  But that you know, that one kind of came on in the old cool
• 40:32
  spring spot and left, and nothing else has emerged.
• 40:36
  You told me once, I think even that you're like, bless you.
• 40:39
  You were like, you would love to have more breweries in Franklin
• 40:41
  as a as a Brewer, you were like. Well, yeah, we were.
• 40:44
  We were not quite on the corner there, Noah Drive in Southeast
• 40:48
  Parkway. But I've always I wanted, I
• 40:50
  wanted three other breweries opposite of me.
• 40:53
  That's that's the passion. That's the weirdest.
• 40:55
  I want, I want I I called a brew pass or whatever we can do.
• 40:59
  You would kind of come up with we all create our things.
• 41:01
  Yeah, I absolutely. Would want that, I think the
• 41:03
  laws in Franklin any any weirder than anywhere anywhere else or
• 41:06
  is that? You have to have a certain
• 41:09
  zoning. I mean, that's the that's our so
• 41:11
  laws. Yes, I guess.
• 41:12
  I mean, it's, it's that the zoning of a brewery is is unique
• 41:15
  as a white industrial zoning. And we don't have a lot of that
• 41:17
  property left. We have commercial zoning or we
• 41:20
  have restaurant zoning. So you can become a brew pub
• 41:23
  Cool Springs Brewery was a brew pub going in, but then that
• 41:26
  limits your distribution and you know, different, different
• 41:29
  things that you can and cannot do as well.
• 41:30
  You have that food. You have to have that food ratio
• 41:34
  to be very, very important as a, as a manufacturing brewery in a
• 41:38
  light industrial zone. That's a lot different.
• 41:40
  We just don't have a lot of that, that property left and
• 41:43
  we're not making any more of that property in Franklin.
• 41:46
  Franklin is an incredibly fast growing city in the, in the, in
• 41:49
  the burbs of Franklin. I mean to say, Franklin, you
• 41:52
  know, a burb of you know, it always got its own little birds
• 41:56
  out, you know? Sitting out there, yeah.
• 41:58
  But yeah, it's so so that's the hard part, leads me down the
• 42:02
  path of why I want to do it. You know the agricultural piece
• 42:06
  in the farm brewing because one, I think in a farm brewery is a
• 42:09
  much more attractive opportunity and and a business to the
• 42:14
  community than is an industrial. Well, and do you also see that,
• 42:18
  do you also see that as more of a evolution because of more of
• 42:23
  it's you're not just a, a place that serves beer.
• 42:26
  We're on a farm. We're doing all these fun things
• 42:28
  and people are looking for that. Now, yeah, 2026 I think
• 42:31
  absolutely. I mean we also grow cut flowers
• 42:34
  on our farm. We have, we have 4500 dahlia
• 42:38
  plants in the ground this year and we'll bring those until.
• 42:41
  And we do that. My wife loves flowers and we do
• 42:44
  them because, you know, you can't maybe have a beer sitting
• 42:47
  at your desk. And but it's good to give
• 42:49
  flowers to somebody. It makes people happy.
• 42:51
  I was talking with my wife the other day.
• 42:52
  She was in the fields and she was cutting bees and butterflies
• 42:55
  or buzzing around and they're having their time with their
• 42:57
  nectar and all these kind of fun stuff.
• 42:59
  And she says to me, she's like, this makes me happy.
• 43:02
  Yeah. You know, she's sitting there
• 43:03
  just trimming and cutting flowers and we're going to put
• 43:05
  those. And then she's going to, you
• 43:06
  know, we go, we are do it there. We go home or whatever.
• 43:08
  And she arranges them and we take them downtown Franklin to
• 43:12
  the Five Points Post office. They're incredible.
• 43:14
  Incredible Julie and her team are amazing and they will sell
• 43:19
  them on there and we've had others reach out on the have
• 43:22
  them there's been weddings and you know some employers have
• 43:25
  reached out and we supplied them over the time, but it's just one
• 43:28
  of those big grow pieces of agriculture that that's out
• 43:32
  there that maybe not everybody understands.
• 43:33
  We walk into Publix, right and the flowers are right there or,
• 43:36
  or Kroger flowers are right there front and center coming
• 43:40
  all. But we have flowers that
• 43:41
  actually came from this county and works through and just down
• 43:45
  the road or wherever they were. And so there's a nice touch to
• 43:48
  that. So we we want to bring that
• 43:50
  again, bring with, with the flowers and then other other
• 43:53
  elements of education, you know, through my wife wants to have
• 43:56
  every animal there is out. That's why you got a farm.
• 44:00
  That's why we have a farm. I call it.
• 44:01
  I call it. I call it Tammy's Orc.
• 44:04
  Maybe a little. Maybe a little petting zoo for
• 44:06
  people out there. Too little.
• 44:07
  Petting zoo, but yeah, if it's, you know, the from the cows to
• 44:11
  the horses and to the sheep. I mean, those are big things
• 44:14
  that are important to her. And again, I guess kind of goes
• 44:17
  back to root to where we grew up and her grandfather, you know,
• 44:21
  having a large cattle farm in southeast Ohio and I'm going up
• 44:25
  there and riding horses as we were kids.
• 44:27
  Yeah, you know and not. And now we don't do that you
• 44:30
  know, we drive cars. But the one thing about I got a
• 44:33
  shout out, big shout out to Murray County, Murray County,
• 44:35
  mule capital of Tennessee. Mule Day is.
• 44:38
  That's right. Mule Day is going in.
• 44:40
  So we have some incredible neighbors up the road and our
• 44:44
  Rd. frontage there on Leaper Street is is pretty long.
• 44:48
  I got a lot of fence to maintain.
• 44:49
  But when I'm out there and you hear the clock clock and you
• 44:52
  hear the wagon pulling you just, you just, I just stop and watch
• 44:56
  and I see my neighbors in a wave at them.
• 44:57
  It's just so beautiful. So, so and neat.
• 45:00
  So that's absolutely. It's not something you usually
• 45:03
  see on I-65 in Nashville. Although the the horse is
• 45:07
  probably going faster than the cars are all. 65 for.
• 45:11
  Sure. Quick, quick little story just a
• 45:13
  couple weeks ago ago, like maybe 3 weeks ago you know Brad and
• 45:16
  Amy love right? So they go to your Noah Drive
• 45:20
  location before you guys close in She she sends me a text
• 45:23
  because have you been over this curio?
• 45:25
  They got great stuff. I go hell yeah I have say hello
• 45:28
  to Vaughn If you say I don't think you were there that day,
• 45:30
  but she was this place is great. You guys got to do a podcast
• 45:33
  where I go. So just guess what, we're
• 45:34
  getting ready to do that just that thing so.
• 45:36
  Awesome. Yeah, we got, Yeah, we have
• 45:39
  some. I mean, our, the, the, our
• 45:40
  patrons have been incredible. They've supported us through a
• 45:44
  lot. We've had a lot of new ones come
• 45:46
  in. I love the connections that we
• 45:49
  were able to make. I mean, we've had our bars not
• 45:51
  very big over there. I mean, it was 66 stools, you
• 45:54
  know, across. And we, I remember one time it
• 45:56
  was on a weekend and like bartender Zach was in and we
• 45:59
  were just kind of getting the lay of the land.
• 46:01
  Some people came in and she had a they had a thick Bronx accent.
• 46:05
  I picked up on, you know, on that.
• 46:07
  And, you know, what part is it? Well, we're, you know, actually,
• 46:11
  you know, grew up in the Bronx, but we lived in Long Island,
• 46:13
  folks on the other end of the bar, I mean, four seats away.
• 46:15
  And what part of Long Island? Oh, here and here is it.
• 46:19
  They turned out they were, you know, like a house away, you
• 46:22
  know, a block, a block away from one another growing up.
• 46:24
  But they never knew it. It was different times, but they
• 46:26
  were in that. And I told, you know, Zach, in a
• 46:28
  time I was like, see, this is what we do.
• 46:30
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 46:31
  We, that we create. Now we go off and we're going to
• 46:33
  go take the trash out or clean the taps or whatever we're going
• 46:36
  to do. And they're going to converse
• 46:37
  and have a great time. And that was what it was always
• 46:39
  about for us. We we Keith and Coop Porch beers
• 46:42
  USA they were telling us they their brewery travels like we
• 46:45
  are and they were sitting there and they had they went to
• 46:48
  another brewery and they were talking about the the the coffee
• 46:51
  beer that they had just had at the previous brewery.
• 46:53
  People over here that are sitting next to they're the they
• 46:56
  were the people that had brewed the coffee for the brewery and
• 46:58
  then that kind of thing. So that same exact thing as the
• 47:01
  community and it's. Yeah, by the way, you guys hit
• 47:03
  some amazing places, right? You got and, and Ohio's a big
• 47:06
  deal. And you get when I go back home
• 47:07
  and visit family. Great.
• 47:09
  I'm I'm grabbing, I'm grabbing my Commodores.
• 47:11
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, buddy. We are the reason it's in
• 47:14
  Tennessee. There we go, There we go.
• 47:17
  We're in Great Lakes, Tennessee, where you did, we did it.
• 47:19
  We're part of it. We need you need Athens.
• 47:21
  OH, you need a little bit of a Mystic.
• 47:24
  Yeah. Yeah, we're, I'll tell you,
• 47:26
  we're we're going to have to go back up there and we hit Hop and
• 47:29
  Frog last year and Great Lakes and all them and then, you know,
• 47:32
  this year the week of mid-september.
• 47:35
  Yeah, we're going to be in Cincinnati knocking off a lot of
• 47:38
  breweries. Some of them we've been to
• 47:39
  before, some of we haven't, but also, and I've been to a couple
• 47:43
  times that before. He's never been Oktoberfest
• 47:46
  Cincinnati the 50th year. I wish Christian Moreland and
• 47:51
  was hitting hard still you. Know it's, it's funny, I always
• 47:55
  talk about because I always remember growing up as a Reds
• 47:59
  fan, you go to Reds games and you hear the guy in the stands,
• 48:02
  ice cold, beautiful booty over here.
• 48:06
  And the Moore line in my house has changed a little bit from
• 48:09
  the last time we've been there. So it's a new kind of thing.
• 48:11
  So we're going to, we're maybe I don't go check it out this trip,
• 48:13
  but that's something, yeah. It's a really cool beer.
• 48:15
  I mean, it really was. Yeah, when they change.
• 48:17
  So they have a location downtown by the ballpark, and they've
• 48:20
  changed their beer styles a few times.
• 48:22
  At one point when they started, there was OTR for Over The Rhine
• 48:26
  and then they changed it, the Moore line and then just a
• 48:30
  couple of no, just a couple months ago, in fact, it's been
• 48:33
  recent where they're now the Logger House and they are
• 48:36
  brewing, It's my understanding they're brewing their own beer,
• 48:39
  but they're also doing some collabs with some of the
• 48:42
  breweries in that area and so a lot.
• 48:45
  Of work for. Other it has been well that.
• 48:47
  Name alone more like. Yeah, yeah.
• 48:50
  Hey, I don't know how many more questions we have, but want to,
• 48:52
  you know, certainly one of the things that we want to get to
• 48:55
  before we end this episode today is putting you on the spot a
• 48:59
  little bit. You've talked about the farm
• 49:01
  timeline. For the folks out there that are
• 49:04
  really interested, is there a timeline or should be?
• 49:08
  Yeah, well. There's been a timeline for
• 49:11
  quite, quite a while. Sure, it takes a while.
• 49:14
  And putting curio, curio became an element of that timeline.
• 49:18
  It wasn't the original part, but we had to way to do that.
• 49:20
  We had to take care of that. That was important.
• 49:22
  And it's, it's rewarded us a lot, been a lot of work, but
• 49:25
  it's rewarded us a lot. So now we're back on track.
• 49:28
  This, this barn that we've built is designed to house a brewery,
• 49:33
  a small brewery, not a huge brewery by any means.
• 49:35
  So we're working towards getting all of that put together.
• 49:38
  Tanks are sitting, we're ready to go.
• 49:41
  I'm working on a deal right now for a cool side.
• 49:44
  One of the things neat, if you ever, if you ever go to, you
• 49:46
  know, if you're in Pennsylvania and you go and find Yingling,
• 49:49
  go, you know, and get a tour and then go down in the caves and
• 49:52
  actually in Cincinnati, yes, you do Underground Cincinnati,
• 49:55
  right? You get, you go down.
• 49:56
  That's pretty. Cool.
• 49:56
  Big tour, Yeah. There, but that's one of the
• 49:59
  things is that we're looking at because we have caves on the
• 50:02
  property and also we were thinking that we could have done
• 50:05
  maybe tag team a little bit with some of that and kind of create
• 50:08
  that similar small. But it's kind of again, going
• 50:10
  back to that educational showing how it was done.
• 50:13
  You know, we didn't have refrigeration in the old days.
• 50:15
  One of my favorite beers is California common, you know,
• 50:17
  anchor steam and going out there and that evolved because they
• 50:19
  didn't have refrigeration. They just did what they had to
• 50:21
  do. They wanted a beer, you know,
• 50:23
  and that that's, then they made it work and it's an incredible
• 50:26
  style and that's out there. So putting the brewery together
• 50:29
  out there and running. We have a, we have a very good
• 50:32
  inventory right now that is going to carry us.
• 50:35
  We are here at 1:11. So we're sitting in the, the,
• 50:38
  the motor club here, as we call it.
• 50:40
  This is a beautiful lounge. This is for our membership.
• 50:44
  It, it is open to the public on, you know, at that times.
• 50:48
  But as our membership grows, we're going to, you know, to
• 50:50
  change it. We have two bars out in the
• 50:53
  showroom. One, both of them had their
• 50:55
  renovation plans, one's first one, second of course.
• 50:58
  And then so we're looking forward to that.
• 51:01
  We are, you know, we've already permitted and done everything
• 51:04
  that we need to do here on that front to run.
• 51:07
  So we feel really good with that.
• 51:08
  And then it'll just be on the manufacturing side that is out
• 51:11
  there. One of the things I've had, I've
• 51:12
  had, I've had three other breweries now reach out to me,
• 51:15
  which is again, just kind of shows the, the camaraderie, the
• 51:18
  passion, the appreciation to help us out and, and, and maybe
• 51:22
  be part of something bigger, but to help us out with first.
• 51:25
  And you need a spot. Do you need support?
• 51:26
  Do you need, you know, one kind of all this?
• 51:28
  So well, you know, we have a plan, but hey, you never know
• 51:30
  what you're going to need. It kind of comes down.
• 51:32
  So we're, we're continuing to work through all of that.
• 51:35
  So we're looking to hear about coming up here in September.
• 51:39
  We're about 5-6 weeks away having an event here.
• 51:42
  It is October going to be Oktoberfest season.
• 51:44
  So we're excited to bring that in and to run it.
• 51:47
  We do, I do, I have, I have a couple of Oktoberfest.
• 51:49
  We're actually running because we are part of this, this
• 51:51
  facility here. So we have a Porsche Club of
• 51:53
  America that runs an Oktoberfest, which is really,
• 51:56
  really cool. Leader Hosen and all, all that
• 51:58
  good fun stuff. Yeah, Longhorns and that, that's
• 52:01
  a that's a great, great time. And then we'll do and we'll have
• 52:03
  ours and that runs as well. And then we're, you know, we're
• 52:06
  going to, we're going to kind of see how it runs into the fall,
• 52:08
  you know, throughout the rest of the fall, you know, as we bring
• 52:10
  in some of our other, other beer, But it's now we're excited
• 52:14
  about it. It's going to be, it's going to
• 52:15
  be a fun time growing the hopefully growing this industry
• 52:19
  and continuing to grow here in Tennessee.
• 52:22
  We're we're definitely not dumb. We're excited about the
• 52:25
  opportunity to showcase the agricultural side.
• 52:28
  I mean, we even have a tractor inside here at 1:11.
• 52:32
  We have a Porsche tractor. It's model number is 111.
• 52:38
  No joke. I'm going.
• 52:39
  So we are, you know, we're incredibly excited about this
• 52:43
  partnership and creating this and it's only going to run us
• 52:45
  out. One of the things, if you're
• 52:46
  ever out at our place, we have a long Leapers Creek Rd.
• 52:49
  We have a great little loop that ties to the Natchez Trace where
• 52:52
  our farm backs up. And and so we, we, you will, all
• 52:56
  of a sudden you will just hear this road rocket full of cars or
• 53:00
  motorcycles or whatever it is coming around, coming down the
• 53:03
  road and you just stop because you're going to see the Ferraris
• 53:06
  and the Lamborghinis and the Paganis will be there too, and
• 53:09
  the Porsches and all, or you'll see the muscle cars or the
• 53:12
  motorcycles. It's a blast when we as we, as
• 53:15
  we do that. And you know, bring all of that
• 53:17
  out there. And I grew up going to car shows
• 53:20
  and super Chevy, you know, Sundays were a big parts.
• 53:23
  We look forward to being, you know, part of that.
• 53:25
  There's some, you know, some incredible stuff out there as
• 53:27
  well. And, you know, we can just sit
• 53:29
  and share stories. I love sitting at, at where you
• 53:33
  were sitting at the bar just a couple, 3 weeks ago, I guess it
• 53:36
  was now. And two guys came in there and
• 53:39
  one of them had, he had a really cool a car shirt on.
• 53:42
  And we just got going on. And I got learning about his
• 53:44
  connection with the Nashville Speedway, the background
• 53:47
  Speedway. And obviously that's a big topic
• 53:49
  going on right now up in Nashville, you know, and saving
• 53:51
  it and about his, his history about racing there and being a
• 53:54
  part of that and going, you know, it's just so, so, so neat.
• 53:57
  So, you know, and again, it goes back to, you know, saving a
• 54:00
  piece of this culture of Tennessee going in, creating a
• 54:03
  culture of Tennessee that we have as well around this
• 54:07
  agriculture, you know, thing I I think it's the beautiful things.
• 54:10
  I I love it and you might be changing the game a little bit
• 54:13
  by doing that. Well, I mean, as long as we're
• 54:15
  not changing the rules in the game, right, Right.
• 54:17
  That's exciting about Yeah. So no, I appreciate that it's
• 54:20
  we, we definitely feel that there, there's something my, my
• 54:24
  parents were educators. I mean, going through maybe some
• 54:26
  of that rubbed off in some ways and somewhere where we want
• 54:29
  people to learn and and grow and develop.
• 54:32
  My wife, she's in, she's in the healthcare world, oncology
• 54:35
  community and friendship and kinship are but always a huge
• 54:39
  part of her career growing up. We have a bigger family than
• 54:42
  we've done because of her and what she did with families and
• 54:47
  supporting them going through that journey of cancer.
• 54:49
  And that that means a lot to us. I mean, it's it, it'll make my
• 54:53
  wife tear up. And still to this day, you know,
• 54:57
  when we think about somebody back in, you know, in the in the
• 54:59
  late 90s that she treated and took care of, right?
• 55:02
  So, you know, we kind of kind of bring all that back in and, and
• 55:05
  we also find that it's a small, small world.
• 55:08
  We we all know some of the same people gangle that that Kevin
• 55:11
  Bacon thing. We we all know a lot of a lot of
• 55:15
  really cool things. And it's super, super small.
• 55:17
  And you can strike that, you know, that that court on there,
• 55:20
  it's a it's a pretty, pretty neat thing.
• 55:22
  And when you know, you're enjoying a culture, I had that
• 55:25
  West Coast IPA. I had a guy, you know, he was
• 55:26
  from he's like, I haven't had a West Coast IPA in three years in
• 55:30
  this, in this state. You know, that touches it.
• 55:32
  Thank you so much for getting one right.
• 55:34
  Yeah. Nice, yeah.
• 55:35
  Well, yeah, we could. We're we're going to keep
• 55:37
  trying. There you go, feedback.
• 55:39
  Is a good thing. Yeah, positivity.
• 55:40
  Here we go, So. Sorry, the other bars in here if
• 55:44
  they want, you know, if you're not a member here, but during
• 55:46
  business hours of of 111 motor cars, can they just come to the
• 55:51
  bar to get curio beer? Great question.
• 55:54
  So we are going to we're we're working on our hours of what
• 55:57
  we're going to be open and how we're going to run that out
• 55:59
  there. So quick answer's going to.
• 56:02
  Be no. So it's got to be.
• 56:05
  So we're going to be, it's going to be the evenings, you know,
• 56:08
  starting out the building. We're always accessible when,
• 56:11
  when we were open for sales, we're open to sit this.
• 56:14
  You don't have to have an appointment to come in here or
• 56:16
  you don't even have to, you know, act like you're wanting to
• 56:18
  buy a car. You can come in here and hang
• 56:20
  out. We got lots of great seating and
• 56:21
  couches and tables and so forth out there.
• 56:24
  We got, still got free Wi-Fi and, but we ultimately we will
• 56:28
  have in the evenings. We're working on our hours right
• 56:31
  now. We're we're, we're, we're, we're
• 56:33
  summoned with the idea of Wednesday in through Saturday.
• 56:37
  And we're, you know, making those hours coincide with what
• 56:39
  we have here, what we're doing with the members lounge as well.
• 56:43
  We've just started being open for them.
• 56:45
  We will bring in Sundays for special events, Super Bowl and
• 56:49
  you know, for example, we'll bring in Mondays, you know, for
• 56:51
  a special event, you know, and that's going on sporting a bit.
• 56:55
  But those will be, you know, some of those unique parties, if
• 56:57
  you will. But so, yeah, we're gonna, we're
• 56:59
  gonna work on that. If we could do a self-serve
• 57:01
  station, maybe, yeah, maybe that's something I could throw
• 57:04
  on there. So any day of the week we could
• 57:07
  do a self-serve. Why not up there?
• 57:09
  You know why not? Steven Scott just patrolling the
• 57:11
  parking lot 4 days a week and they're just like, guys, you
• 57:14
  ain't gonna buy a car. We're just here.
• 57:15
  We're here for the beer. Yeah, we're here for the beer.
• 57:17
  Yeah, you need another oil change already.
• 57:19
  My gosh, what happens? Tires don't have 10 miles.
• 57:22
  On them. That's hilarious.
• 57:24
  When everything cheerio. So we're going to rebrand.
• 57:27
  I'm going in. So I know this is something we
• 57:30
  kind of talk into hit going back to the agriculture, going back
• 57:32
  to the the mission now my wife and I have with our farm curio
• 57:38
  is not when you know we bought that and we are going to yeah,
• 57:41
  we're going to rebrand. We're very we want to focus in
• 57:44
  on the geographical area we are in our farm is on Leapers Creek
• 57:49
  Rd. and we are Leapers Creek Brewing Company that we have out
• 57:52
  there. We're also bells of the South
• 57:55
  Pops. We are the fox and the hare
• 57:58
  flowers farm. So we got these multiple
• 58:00
  elements, but they all revolve around agriculture.
• 58:02
  And that was that's something that's incredibly, incredibly
• 58:05
  important as we believe the naming is important to line to
• 58:07
  the mission straight out of the gate, right?
• 58:08
  That's what you what you look at and that's where we're going to
• 58:10
  hit and we want to become, we want to dig our Leepers Creek is
• 58:14
  beautiful. We're right there on the Creek.
• 58:16
  We got an incredible we don't need to swim.
• 58:18
  We got an incredible swim hole out.
• 58:20
  There. It feeds into the Duck River.
• 58:22
  The Duck River is just an incredible, incredible river
• 58:24
  system here in mid state that runs through, if you ever have a
• 58:27
  chance to go down the Centerville, for example, I
• 58:30
  mean, gorgeous down in there. They do not have a brewery down
• 58:33
  there. Maybe they can, but they got an
• 58:34
  incredible place to serve some really great catfish.
• 58:36
  But that's, you know, that's the kind of the idea of what we want
• 58:39
  to get to is something that was that certainly important holds a
• 58:43
  big part for for a lot of people is simply isn't the brand that
• 58:48
  what we have going kind of going forward?
• 58:50
  We are we're really focused on the ag side of things again, and
• 58:54
  that community element. And we think that this new
• 58:57
  branding and some of the artwork that's going to come with this
• 58:59
  that you're going to see. I'm really reflect upon that.
• 59:01
  And you know, we're really excited about it.
• 59:03
  And it doesn't mean that it can't become something bigger,
• 59:05
  But our focus is not on being, you know, a regional we're we're
• 59:09
  focused on being a, I'll call it a hyper Middle Tennessee
• 59:13
  agricultural, you know, brewing community.
• 59:15
  And in a place where the if it gets bigger than that, I want it
• 59:18
  to become bigger than that because other people want to
• 59:20
  replicate it, not because I have to grow it.
• 59:22
  I want other people to do it. I don't want to, I don't want to
• 59:25
  build, you know, just something massive and monstrous out there.
• 59:28
  I it don't sustainability is about multiple people doing the
• 59:32
  things, not about one person doing it.
• 59:34
  And that's where it's it's important to us kind of going
• 59:37
  through. So yeah, we're we're excited
• 59:38
  about Leapers Creek, Lever Creek Brewing and all the elements out
• 59:42
  of the farm. Nice.
• 59:43
  You got a lot of good stuff going on, and I'll tell you, no
• 59:45
  matter what you call it, the beer's damn good.
• 59:48
  I mean, we'll just say whatever the beer, you keep making the
• 59:51
  beer so. Is that going to be the name of
• 59:52
  the worry? Yeah.
• 59:53
  So that, yeah, it's Leapers Creek, Leapers Creek Brewing and
• 59:56
  we are, yeah, we're super, super excited about it.
• 1:00:01
  Our bars inside here are the LC at 1:11.
• 1:00:06
  We got some incredible artwork on that is put together.
• 1:00:09
  This is the motor club. Then we have the LC.
• 1:00:12
  We have, I mean, and it embodies the logos for that that we're
• 1:00:18
  excited to release embody both the car culture, think racing
• 1:00:23
  suits and such as well as the AG.
• 1:00:25
  Culture. Hey, are we getting an
• 1:00:26
  exclusive, by the way? Yes.
• 1:00:29
  You might be. You might.
• 1:00:30
  You might might. Be Can we call this a Brewery
• 1:00:31
  Underground exclusive it. Is exclusive.
• 1:00:34
  Well, it's almost like a Where's Waldo episode because if you if
• 1:00:36
  you look hard enough, you will find that logo.
• 1:00:39
  OK, OK. I was well and and that was
• 1:00:41
  given. My next question is what, you
• 1:00:42
  know, obviously when are you going to put out other
• 1:00:45
  announcements or where should people follow that for other
• 1:00:47
  announcements that you're going to put?
• 1:00:48
  Out yeah, well, yeah, when we're still tandem, you know there
• 1:00:51
  right because we're as, as we, we still run and people do know
• 1:00:54
  the curio name and and I'm not I'm not an IT guy and and yeah,
• 1:00:59
  I mean, I grew up with VC Rs. I mean, I, I, I, I had my run
• 1:01:04
  there where I would help out all the family when, you know, I can
• 1:01:06
  you put this VCR in for me. I, I had my moment.
• 1:01:09
  But no, we are we're working out the right way.
• 1:01:12
  We have it moving forward right now the website's been designed.
• 1:01:15
  We're figuring out the best way to do the redirects coming
• 1:01:18
  through. We always say have also, there's
• 1:01:21
  a ton of it. You know, all the brewing
• 1:01:22
  community know that there's a ton of work you have to do on
• 1:01:24
  the federal side, state side, local side there.
• 1:01:27
  So we're in the process of all that getting the accounting done
• 1:01:31
  properly. It's so.
• 1:01:33
  But yeah, we're going to have we, we, we.
• 1:01:35
  You have to do social media. Well, you got.
• 1:01:38
  To, but we're looking forward to, I'm, I'm more of a website
• 1:01:41
  guy. So we're looking at a much, much
• 1:01:43
  more robust website now than what we've had before.
• 1:01:47
  We will have the social media or we don't look at the social
• 1:01:50
  media as being the the the number one go to spot.
• 1:01:54
  It's going to more where it's driving.
• 1:01:56
  We're going to have the we want the website.
• 1:01:58
  We can you can house a lot more people look at a lot more it's
• 1:02:01
  and the more utilize, you know, the you know, the content within
• 1:02:05
  that. But that's kind of the idea is
• 1:02:07
  that folks will find us. We'll make these early
• 1:02:09
  announcements obviously through the channels that, you know,
• 1:02:11
  folks have been, you know, accustomed to through the Curio
• 1:02:14
  brand and then, you know, you know, transition it.
• 1:02:17
  The hard part about transitioning right is like, do
• 1:02:19
  you do this long slow or do you RIP the Band-Aid and all?
• 1:02:24
  And I don't know the answer I mean to that.
• 1:02:26
  Well, certainly, let us know. We'll try to help you out as
• 1:02:28
  well. Get the word out for you.
• 1:02:29
  Yeah, anytime I see. Yeah, we see.
• 1:02:30
  We're gonna look for the brand. Yeah, that will know it's you.
• 1:02:33
  Yeah, yeah, it'll find it. Maybe.
• 1:02:35
  Maybe it'll be Incognito. Maybe.
• 1:02:36
  You can't either wait a wait a minute Vaughn trying to slip 1.
• 1:02:39
  By us I'm going to I'm going to see if I can well actually this
• 1:02:41
  is funny because we we got a Halloween party here and
• 1:02:46
  Halloween party last year here Jeremy was the the what is that
• 1:02:50
  commercial It's is it Dos Equis? Yeah.
• 1:02:53
  Interesting man in the world. So he sat up there and the
• 1:02:56
  ladies came in in there and he did his all makeup and he had
• 1:02:58
  his old suit jacket, you know, on about being the most
• 1:03:01
  interesting man in the world. So anyway, we might become sort
• 1:03:04
  of like, you know, do some sort of do some sort of intro that
• 1:03:09
  revolves maybe around that play might be kind of interesting
• 1:03:13
  where you're not going to know I'm going to be sitting there or
• 1:03:16
  Jeremy's going to be sitting there drinking a, you know, a
• 1:03:19
  cocktail, you know, of sorts and whatnot.
• 1:03:21
  And he's like, well, when I do drink beer, who knows?
• 1:03:25
  We will have to be paying attention.
• 1:03:27
  Yeah, yeah, we can't wait. We can't wait for the future
• 1:03:30
  announcement. But I thank you guys so much.
• 1:03:32
  You guys have been great. Yep, what I've seen, what I've
• 1:03:35
  watched and and you guys keep putting the word out.
• 1:03:38
  I mean, Tennessee breweries, it's amazing.
• 1:03:39
  We need that. We need that word kind of coming
• 1:03:42
  out and whatever the channels are, we absolutely need it
• 1:03:44
  because that is I think that's important to the growth of the
• 1:03:47
  industry within the state. It's only going to help what my
• 1:03:49
  mission is. We put that on and as long as
• 1:03:52
  you guys are having a blast doing it and investing in
• 1:03:54
  incredible microphones and all and I mean and got you know a
• 1:03:58
  mixing board is going to be coming.
• 1:04:00
  And our little fancy camera. Over here.
• 1:04:04
  Pretty. Appreciate it.
• 1:04:05
  Well, thanks for saying that. We are beer consumers first.
• 1:04:08
  I've said it many times. So the fact that we do this, if
• 1:04:10
  this helps the community, it helps us because there will be
• 1:04:12
  continue to be beer that we can continue to drink, that we can
• 1:04:15
  continue to talk about. Well, there's a lot of great
• 1:04:17
  stories to tell. And I know we mentioned it
• 1:04:18
  earlier. I mean, we, we were excited to
• 1:04:21
  get you on. And like I said when a few
• 1:04:22
  months ago when I came out there, I sat there like 2 hours
• 1:04:25
  and Texas Scott, like we gotta get bought on it.
• 1:04:28
  He's just fantastic. So, well, just like you said
• 1:04:31
  when you were talking to him, that was an episode.
• 1:04:33
  When I was talking to him the next day, I was like this.
• 1:04:35
  Is right it? Was like 2.
• 1:04:36
  Hours, but we got you here today, so thank you man.
• 1:04:38
  Made it happen. We connected dots and that was
• 1:04:41
  good up and you guys had great patience and waiting for me.
• 1:04:44
  I kept. Excuse me.
• 1:04:45
  Sorry. Yeah.
• 1:04:46
  No. No, no, we had to get set up.
• 1:04:48
  No, I. Mean over the over the months,
• 1:04:50
  you know, kind of coming in no, I mean, obviously I knew where
• 1:04:54
  we were what we were doing and all and I didn't want to I
• 1:04:57
  wanted you guys to get all the best stuff and all the way
• 1:05:00
  through because back then there was you know, parts we hadn't
• 1:05:03
  figured out yet yeah and I don't like, I don't know answers, you
• 1:05:06
  know that's going to be fun it's.
• 1:05:07
  Definitely worth the wait. We knew it was going to happen
• 1:05:09
  at some point. We knew it because you are.
• 1:05:10
  We were always communicating, so this was the perfect time.
• 1:05:13
  To do it well, now that you're moving your studio here to 111,
• 1:05:16
  this is going to be so easy. Well, the great news is, you
• 1:05:18
  know, we, we don't have to tear down today.
• 1:05:20
  We're just it just stays. It lives here now for.
• 1:05:23
  You'll. Step over.
• 1:05:24
  You'll step over the cords. I'll stay catching the cords.
• 1:05:28
  Well, Von, we've kept you 2 hours.
• 1:05:29
  Thank you. Thank you very much.
• 1:05:30
  Thank you. Thank you.
• 1:05:31
  We really appreciate it. Thank you for inviting us here.
• 1:05:34
  This is amazing, Jeremy, Thank you for having us.
• 1:05:36
  Any, any last words you want to go out on?
• 1:05:38
  Wow. It's a yeah, very appreciative.
• 1:05:44
  I think if folks have the opportunity to kind of come and
• 1:05:47
  see what we're trying to do what what Jeremy's what Jeremy is
• 1:05:50
  doing here. Again, this is only 111's only
• 1:05:53
  about a year and a half in. I'm going it was a long story
• 1:05:56
  and you're going to see some elements.
• 1:05:57
  Excuse me, and then we're bringing this you know, you
• 1:06:00
  know, brewing thing and this beer thing in going to love it.
• 1:06:02
  It's. Going to it's cool.
• 1:06:03
  It's really cool. We can see it.
• 1:06:04
  You can see it coming on SO. Goodness gracious, need more
• 1:06:06
  beer? Though.
• 1:06:07
  All right, well, let's go do that.
• 1:06:08
  All right. Thank you Sir.
• 1:06:10
  Underground Podcast. Cheers.
• 1:06:11
  Cheers guys. Cheers.