Latest / Coffee People Podcast / Joe Raya, the Founder of Tippleman's Coffee Syrups and Bittermilk joins the Coffee People podcast.

Transcript

Joe Raya, the Founder of Tippleman's Coffee Syrups and Bittermilk joins the Coffee People podcast. · Coffee People Podcast

0:00
How you feeling, how you feeling, how you feeling, how
0:02
you feeling, how you feeling? I'm feeling good, feeling good,
0:06
feeling good, feeling good. Time to bag up the last batch
0:13
that we just roasted. We're going to grab our our
0:15
roast star bags. We'll grab this little roastar
0:19
handy forming shoe. Just pop that open.
0:22
Take that down and this saves us so much time, so much time, so
0:26
much time and then we're just going to fill this up to a 12
0:28
ounce all right, right here. We're working in a in a bit of a
0:31
confined space, but that's because you have the luxury of
0:34
being right inside of the cafe. So customers are right behind
0:37
us. So that's a bag.
0:39
Awesome. Boom, one down 754 more to go.
0:43
Look at that. Guy's got a coffee cup on the
0:45
back of his truck. Oh, no.
0:46
Oh, no. There's a pioneering latte.
0:49
Oh, no. Since getting into the custom
0:52
printed bags, Yeah. Have you noticed any changes in
0:55
how customers view your coffee? So where we started with the
0:59
bags were, you know, craft brown bags, all handwritten for the
1:05
Ethiopia right now, since this is a seasonal special, we are
1:08
handwriting the the name on it. The one that has the name
1:12
printed on there just has a lot more validity.
1:14
With the custom printed bags, we've actually been able to get
1:16
into places that have needed the barcodes, some places that also
1:21
need a use by date. With the craft bags, we weren't
1:25
able to get into as many places because the validity of our
1:29
product really wasn't there when we are having a handwrite all
1:32
the different information. Well, this has been fun, Nolan,
1:39
but I think I'm going to leave you to bag the rest of this.
1:43
Only 759 more to go. Thank you for your help, Nick.
1:47
Thank you. You're hired.
1:48
Thank you. which makes everything official
2:17
once you get that alert. So we are we are live.
2:21
Hello everyone, welcome to the Coffee People podcast presented
2:24
by Rostar Coffee packaging. Big thanks to them for
2:28
supporting not only this show, but businesses of all sizes that
2:32
need packaging for coffee or snacks and so on.
2:36
You can find them at rostar.com. I'm your host, Ryan Wolt.
2:40
Welcome. Thank you for being here today.
2:41
You can find the Coffee People podcast on any major podcast
2:45
platform. YouTube.
2:47
You can subscribe to our recently revamped newsletter on
2:50
coffeepeoplepodcast.com. For those of you keeping track,
2:55
I'm sitting in a guest room here in Minneapolis drinking a cup of
2:58
Costa Rica that I French press this morning from our
3:01
collaborators at the Pinery Coffee Co.
3:04
That new coffee is out now. You'll find that link in our
3:06
show notes. A virtual Our virtual guest
3:10
today is is Joe Riot. Did I say that right, Joe?
3:13
Yeah, Ray Raya. Yeah.
3:15
Raya Raya, he's the founder of Bittermilk Bottling Company and
3:19
their coffee syrup brand Tipplemens, which you can find
3:22
at tipplemens.com. Joe, welcome to the Coffee
3:26
People podcast. Glad you're here.
3:28
Thank you, it's a pleasure to be here.
3:31
I'm glad to join you this morning.
3:32
I wish I was drinking a cup of coffee too, but sadly I'm not.
3:37
Well, this one has been is a little cool.
3:40
I sort of forgot about it for about an hour and a half while I
3:43
was sitting here just getting, you know, ready for the day.
3:48
You know, we we mentioned at the top, you're the founder of
3:51
bittermilk, I believe Co founder.
3:52
I believe your wife is as well. Mary Alana.
3:55
Don't want to make sure we give credit where credit's due there.
3:58
And you now have this coffee syrups brand that's an offshoot
4:01
of that Tipplemann's, which I'm excited to talk about.
4:06
I'd like to get started though, a little bit with you.
4:09
You know, one. Do you have any background in
4:11
the kind of the hospitality side of things or first memories of
4:14
coffee that you know may have motivated you to go down this
4:17
road? If I'm not mistaken, there was a
4:19
bar in your past. Yeah, yeah.
4:23
So background in hospitality, I do.
4:28
I have always loved cooking for people.
4:33
That is since I was a kid. I was, I was the kid that was in
4:38
the kitchen with my grandma or with my mom just sitting on the
4:42
counter or like always wanting to help, always, always wanting
4:45
to do something in the kitchen because it just was fun for me.
4:50
And then I worked in restaurants in, in high school.
4:54
I went to culinary school. I went to Culinary Institute of
4:56
America in New York and had a blast there.
5:01
I met my future wife there. I was like I always say I was
5:06
like super lucky because there was like 1% girls there.
5:10
So that's an exaggeration, but but there was a lot of
5:16
competition for these ladies. So I, I don't know how I, I
5:19
don't know what she saw on me, but I got, I got super lucky
5:23
there. So hospitality always been super
5:27
important, seeing, you know, seeing people enjoy something
5:31
that you make. There's, I don't know if there's
5:33
like the appropriate word for that.
5:35
You know that it's just, it's, it's a, it's a very satisfying
5:39
experience, you know, to see someone really enjoy something
5:43
that you've done. So love that and first memory of
5:49
coffee. That's kind of funny because I
5:51
feel like it kind of made me pretty normal.
5:54
Like you smell as a kid, you smell coffee, your parents are
5:57
making coffee. You're like, man, that's got to
5:59
be the best stuff ever. You just like the smell and then
6:02
you taste it and you're like, wait, what?
6:03
That's gross. Why do you guys treat that?
6:06
And then, and then at some point in high school or college,
6:09
you're like, wait, it helps you like get a little bit of energy
6:13
and wait, what? Maybe I need to revisit this,
6:16
you know, and then, and then your palates kind of changed
6:18
and, and then you're like, OK, I, you know, I could kind of you
6:23
get into it with milk and sugar and then you kind of like, you
6:26
know, you, you dabble deeper. So I feel like my, my story has
6:32
been pretty much like that. But now you can't have a morning
6:37
without it. And even a, a midday coffee is
6:42
pretty cool too. Like, you know, these kind of
6:45
making midday special drinks. We, we have 4 kids, my wife and
6:49
I and our kids, we call them special drinks.
6:53
They're, they're privileges, they're earned.
6:55
You know you don't, you don't get them automatically, but you
6:59
know, for an adult midday special drink, you know there's
7:03
a lot you can do with coffee that is super duper fun.
7:06
So love that about it. My definition of special drink
7:09
in yours might be a little different.
7:11
I'm just saying I I think there's scientific data.
7:15
I know that there is. We should, I should link to that
7:17
somewhere on how our tastes from from birth lean towards sugar
7:23
and sweet to to bitterness as we get older and appreciate those
7:28
flavors a little bit more. At some point you become an
7:33
entrepreneur. How does that transition happen
7:36
from what you were describing before, which I think I would
7:40
call pride of service, you know, seeing, seeing someone else
7:44
appreciate the thing that you're offering without expecting
7:47
something back necessarily besides maybe paying the bill.
7:52
But you, you decide to jump into a bigger, not bigger a, a
7:56
different arena with Bittermilk. Where did that company come
8:00
from? And then how you know, and I'll
8:02
let you kind of take that and and lead us up to Tipplements.
8:06
Yeah. Well, I have to say that man,
8:10
starting your own business, that's a big step.
8:12
That's, you know, starting your own business and having a child.
8:17
Those are both really big steps and very different too, but just
8:24
very big steps. And you, you have to, you know,
8:28
you have to have a lot of confidence.
8:30
And then when you don't have the confidence, you have to fake it,
8:34
you know, but I would say my father-in-law, I don't give him
8:40
enough credit, you know, for we worked, my wife and I worked for
8:46
him for, for a little while in his restaurant.
8:49
And he he gave me a lot of confidence, you know, in being
8:55
able to, it kind of like demithicized it a bit.
8:58
You know, you see someone else running a business from from
9:01
like, you know, 30,000 feet, you're like, wow, they must be
9:04
this, this must be going on, this.
9:06
I could never do that. But then when you see up close,
9:09
you see the day in the day out, you see consistency, you see all
9:13
these different things that fit together, that make a business
9:17
run, a small business especially.
9:20
And I was like, you know, I can do that.
9:23
So that gave me a lot of confidence.
9:25
We started a bar in 2010 in downtown Charleston and we, we
9:34
had saved up for like 3 years working 2 jobs to be able to
9:39
open this bar. And, and that's how we started
9:44
as entrepreneurs. We, we made it through like the
9:49
first two months we made it through the 1st 2 years we made
9:52
it, you know, we, we just made it, We had our first child two
9:55
months after we opened. So that was crazy.
9:58
And so, you know, we have always, my wife and I, we, we
10:04
love working together and not all married people like working
10:07
together. Some are like, I gotta go to
10:10
work just to escape, you know, or just have some time, you
10:14
know, where we like to just be involved in each other's work
10:19
because we're, we're very compatible people.
10:23
And we, you know, like we try to help each other a lot and it
10:29
just is easier when you know what's going on with the other
10:31
person. You're like, oh man, I know that
10:33
she's struggling with this. Let me empty the dishwasher.
10:36
You know, I don't know. But so, so we love working
10:39
together. And so, you know, knowing that,
10:44
you know, like we started Bittermilk because we, we had a
10:51
family and the bar business is difficult.
10:55
My wife, Mary Elena, she, she looked at me one night as we're
10:59
closing up, it's like 1:00 in the morning, We're kind of
11:02
tapering down. And you know, it was maybe 2
11:05
years after we opened something like that.
11:07
And she said, well, you know, you've proven that you can, you
11:11
know, start this bar restaurant and, you know, not go out of
11:17
business. What's next?
11:18
And I was like, what do you mean?
11:21
I mean, we're closing, you know, and then we'll go home, You
11:24
know, She's like, no, like, are we going to work until like 4:00
11:27
in the morning for the rest of our lives or what are we going
11:30
to do next? And I was like, man, I don't
11:33
know. I haven't thought of it.
11:35
And she was like, well, I think you should think about it.
11:38
Like, OK, so then it you know, back then 2010 is when we opened
11:43
Gin joint, we were, we were one of kind of like these up and
11:46
coming bars. We did all the hard stuff.
11:48
Never shield away from hard work, cutting ice with
11:51
chainsaws, making, you know, your own syrups and even
11:57
cordials and, you know, making like a really cool bar program,
12:01
innovative cocktails, you know, precision measuring and like
12:05
beautiful things. People really liked them at the
12:09
time. We would have people that would
12:11
come to the bar and and say, hey, you know, a regular I've,
12:16
I've gotten this cocktail from you guys.
12:18
I love this cocktail. I'm having people over at my
12:20
house. I want to make them this
12:22
cocktail. Can you give me the recipe?
12:24
And we're like, yeah, sure. So I grab a ticket, you know,
12:27
off the printer and write down the recipe, tell them, you know,
12:31
a little spiel on how to make it.
12:33
And, you know, I'd see him back a week later and I'd be like,
12:36
hey, how did that go? How did the cocktail go?
12:40
And they're like, hey, it was alright.
12:42
Like, what do you mean it was alright, you know, And they're
12:44
like, well, it just wasn't the same.
12:46
And I was like, well, I promise. Like, like I didn't leave
12:49
anything out here. You know, I'm like, what's not
12:51
the same, you know, same thing. Like you, you asked for an old
12:56
fashion, which is, you know, one of the more easy to make classic
13:01
cocktails and you go, you know, to a handful of bars in a row on
13:05
the same St. and you ask for an old fashioned, you get a wildly
13:07
different drink at each bar and you're kind of like, what the
13:11
heck's going on? I mean, this is a real simple
13:13
recipe. Why?
13:14
Why is it different everywhere? You know, there's just a lot of
13:16
like, there's just a lot of of kind of nuance and, and folklore
13:23
and you know, all this kind of stuff.
13:25
And so I was like, man, it would be pretty cool to put together
13:29
kind of like a standard, you know, a mixer that's like not a
13:33
mixer like that. You hide under your cabinet
13:36
Margarita mix. It's like neon green where like,
13:41
you know, someone asked for a Margarita.
13:42
You kind of pull it out and pour it, put it away, hide it again.
13:48
But something that's cool, something that can sit on your
13:50
shelf, it can sit next to a bottle of, of your favorite
13:53
bourbon and something you would talk about and something you
13:57
would see and something iconic. And so that's, that was the goal
14:00
is to create that product. And so that's where Bittermilk
14:03
was born. We didn't think anyone would buy
14:06
it. And then, and, and it was that
14:12
way for a couple months, like, you know, but then it, it, we
14:16
won some awards and we started getting orders and then it
14:21
became bigger than the bar business.
14:23
We ended up selling our bar to our bar manager in 2017, who
14:27
still carries it on to this day, does a great job.
14:30
And we focused on Bittermilk entirely for all the, the
14:36
entrepreneurs or entrepreneurs or however you want to call it,
14:43
you know, out there listening and just like digging in deep
14:47
on, on, on podcast content like this, the, the encouraging word
14:53
is like, it's, it is, you know, it's just more work than you
15:00
ever think it's going to be. As long as you realize that and
15:03
you're not afraid of that, then you're going to be fine.
15:05
You know, it, it's just, it's just a, a whole lot of work and
15:10
working double jobs, working, you know, extra hours.
15:15
And that's why I said like, you know, having, having my wife
15:19
who's able to, to back me up and me back her up and we work
15:24
together, you know, accomplishing more.
15:26
I mean, that's just, that's been the secret of the, the success
15:30
right there, because we're just both not, not afraid of that
15:34
work. And but if you got patience and
15:37
a good work ethic, man, you, you've, you've got it made.
15:45
Sliding into your screen is not just any coffee bag, it's a
15:49
Rostar coffee bag. No need.
15:51
Thousands personalized, just 25 in Rostar's design lab.
15:56
No design experience needed. Choose a pattern, add your logo
15:59
and text, or create something memorable with AI being made in
16:05
the Midwest. You can expect it on your
16:07
doorstep. No time.
16:09
Now that was smooth. You were just talking about your
16:17
wife and, and how like that was the secret was the two of you
16:20
supporting each other and pushing when the other one
16:22
isn't. You know, we're, we're up into
16:25
2017 and bittermilk is going, you know, how does that then
16:29
lead into, you know, from the beer or the, the beverage
16:33
industry? I've had bittermilk and I
16:35
actually met you at a convention and took a sample and then my
16:38
wife drank it all. So I had to get another one,
16:41
which was great. We're big old fashioned people.
16:44
We're, we're from Wisconsin and, and it's really funny to see
16:47
what the differences are when you go to different parts of the
16:50
country on that. So I, I relate to that very
16:52
much. How did that get you from booze
16:56
industry? And we have this product that
16:58
seems to be going well into we should do another thing even
17:03
beyond that. I know I'm going to skip over
17:05
some things here by asking it that way.
17:06
But you know, Tipplemann's the the new coffee syrup line.
17:12
What inspires that? Where does that come from?
17:15
You know, how do you go from one to the next and think, I'll,
17:17
I'll just you know, it's not as simple as getting a second pet
17:20
and putting down a second bowl, right?
17:22
It's a whole nother operation. Right.
17:25
Yeah. Well, you know, we got started
17:29
with the Tipplemann's brand because we wanted to produce
17:33
products for industry professionals mainly and also
17:41
beverage nerds. That was the, that was the real
17:43
goal because it started as a cocktail product, Tipplemann's
17:50
and bar syrups, mainly just the sweetener.
17:53
And so Jim Meehan was, is like a famous bartender.
17:59
He coined it a term called like Mr. Potato Head bartending.
18:06
So if you just, you know, if you look at a cocktail like, or any
18:11
sort of special drink, I, I guess you could say as like a
18:14
main spirit, if it has alcohol, you have like maybe a juice
18:19
component, an acid component, you might have a sweetener, A
18:23
bitter component, something like that.
18:25
So you can take those pieces and you can just swap.
18:28
You say, I'm going to make the same cocktail, for instance, A
18:30
daiquiri. I'm going to take a daiquiri,
18:33
but I'm going to swap the sweetener.
18:34
So this, this one, I'm going to use burnt sugar, this one I'm
18:37
going to use ginger honey. This one I'm going to use, you
18:40
know, falernum or smoked, smoked Maple syrup.
18:42
And, and when you do that, you've created an entirely new
18:46
cocktail, still respects the original proportions and ratio,
18:49
but now you have all these different expressions that are
18:53
really fun and, and and innovate them and still balance.
18:56
And they have a lot of complexity.
18:58
And you've just taken a non complex ingredient such as just
19:02
normal sugar syrup and just swapped it out with something
19:06
complex, but still a sweetener. And that's super fun.
19:10
Well, so we just wanted to like give those products, you know,
19:15
we made at at gin joint, we made a lot of our unsweeteners.
19:19
So we were like, you know, let's let's, you know, do these as a
19:24
product. They were cool for us.
19:25
Maybe other people would like them.
19:27
And so we, we already had that Tibbleman's brand for those
19:30
products. And as we honestly, our, our, as
19:36
our kind of like life changes, we grow older and, you know, our
19:42
kids are like actual people now. My son's 14, you know, so like
19:48
that when they're like super little, they're like, you're
19:50
like thinking, Oh, you know, it'll be be fun when I can talk
19:54
to this person more. Now my son is like, he's like
19:57
learning how to drive already kind of.
19:59
I mean, we're like there's just so, so much, you know, and, and
20:04
then they start getting into things and you start getting
20:07
into things that they start getting into or, you know, you
20:10
meet their friends, parents and stuff like that.
20:12
We just wanted we wanted to be in the coffee business because
20:16
the coffee business is so cool. The the fact that, I mean, the
20:20
coffee business is the bar business, but instead of it
20:24
being booze, it's coffee. I mean, that's just like, that's
20:28
just the business seemingly. And I think that that's super,
20:33
super cool. The coffee people are great.
20:37
The coffee industry is so unique.
20:40
Coffee shops, the way you know, coffee shops are, you know, how
20:44
they interact with their consumers, how they're so like
20:47
small and isolated. You know, that they can procure
20:50
ingredients from all over the place.
20:52
It's not streamlined like a chain.
20:55
It's just a cool business to to observe.
20:58
And we thought it would be really fun to be in that
21:02
business and to contribute in some way to that business.
21:06
So that's why we that's why we wanted to kind of explore with
21:12
the the Tipplemann's coffee syrups.
21:15
There are lots of major corporate syrup brands.
21:21
What? You know, what makes your stuff
21:23
different? Why do you know why?
21:24
If I'm at a coffee shop thinking you know, what's going to make
21:28
this drink different, or I'm a barista trying to make something
21:30
for competition or whatever it might be, why not just go with
21:34
some of the established brands? Why?
21:36
Why take on this challenge? You know, where's that
21:39
motivation coming from? Yeah, that's a great question.
21:43
You know what we do? I feel like this is a cliche
21:49
answers like, well, we do it differently and we do it better.
21:54
We I, I want to respect the companies that are already in
22:00
business and that have been, you know, trucking along and selling
22:04
so much of their products in into the industry.
22:09
I mean, they've, they've clearly done a lot there and some of the
22:15
products are really good. But, you know, I think that the
22:21
way that we procure ingredients is just different than than
22:24
these companies. The way that we, the way that we
22:28
establish, you know, formulations and, and our
22:33
perspective, you know, and also a big brand, a lot of times they
22:38
don't take risks on some different things in, in
22:41
formulation because everything has to be so streamlined.
22:43
So we really, we really try to, you know, take a risk and, and
22:48
come out with something that's, you know, different and cool.
22:52
So why try our stuff? Well, we wanted to make it easy
22:57
by making the bottles look really cool.
22:59
Because if, if we can make the bottles look cool and you're
23:02
proud of them, like as a piece of functional decor in your
23:08
shop, then that's already a win right there.
23:11
And if, and if other people think they're cool and you want
23:13
to sell them to, you know, people as a retail item, then
23:17
that's, that's a pretty fun thing as well.
23:20
But you know, we just wanted we wanted to be able to add our own
23:23
creative spin and like there's a couple of new products that we
23:28
have right now that kind of illustrates that.
23:30
One is it's it's pumpkin spice season is like kicking in.
23:35
You know what I mean? It's like, it's like, oh.
23:37
Yeah, we've all seen the we've seen the influencer like
23:40
momentum growing for the last month.
23:43
Right. It's like we're doing like the
23:46
10th year of pumpkin spice. I was well, maybe like the fifth
23:49
year, I was like, this couldn't go on forever.
23:51
And then like the 10th, I don't know how many years are into it,
23:54
but this is now it's a snowball that's gotten bigger and bigger.
23:57
And we're like, you know, we have to do a pumpkin spice
24:00
flavor guys, like we have to do this.
24:02
And then but we're like, we don't want to just do pumpkin
24:06
spice. Well, we did pumpkin brulee.
24:09
It's, it's like a pumpkin creme brulee, pumpkin spice, sort of
24:12
like flavor profile. It's really cool.
24:15
We use burn sugar in it, a bunch of different spices and it's,
24:19
it's really fun. It's different, it's unique.
24:23
And you know, like the reality is we just want to do, we just
24:29
want to do fun things. We, we, we like variety for our
24:32
team because just doing the same thing over and over again is a
24:35
little bit boring. It probably is more profitable
24:39
to do the same thing over and over again.
24:41
So I don't not saying I'm the smartest person out there.
24:44
I'm just saying it is more interesting when you get to have
24:48
variety. Try different things, you know,
24:51
explore, make different things and then see where you really
24:54
fit. You know, I, I can't wait to see
24:57
where Tipplemann's coffee syrups fits in the coffee world.
25:00
That's going to be really exciting for me.
25:02
When I was looking through the list of of products, you know, I
25:06
obviously I saw like a vanilla, caramel, amocha, even pumpkin
25:10
brulee. In my head.
25:11
I was just like, OK, I get, I get where they're going there.
25:13
But then you get into some of the other things that are less
25:15
common, you know, the ginger honey, the burnt sugar, barrel
25:20
aged cola syrup. You have something which I need
25:23
to figure out what it is. I didn't want to look it up.
25:25
Double spiced Falernum, I think is what it is.
25:28
And I was like, I don't, I've never even heard of that.
25:30
And I've been in the bar coffee business now for 35 years.
25:34
So, you know, you're doing these kind of these interesting things
25:38
under this banner of Tipplemann's, not Bittermilk.
25:43
Why? Why go with this different name
25:45
for this, this offshoot, you know, how did you craft this
25:48
story? Because as I'm looking through
25:51
your products on your websites, I mean, there's a story here,
25:55
like you could kind of get lost a little bit in figuring out,
25:58
oh, you know, what's the, what's the back story of this, this,
26:03
this logo, this brand? Yeah, yeah.
26:07
Well, that's, you know, I love, I love stories.
26:16
I love telling stories. I love hearing stories.
26:19
I love reading books I read. This sounds weird, but I read
26:25
all my kids summer reading program books.
26:27
I read all the books they're assigned to read during the
26:30
school year. It's a great way to bond over a
26:33
story, you know, And so we have the story of Tipplemann's is a
26:40
different story than the story of bittermilk.
26:42
And we could simply have put it under bittermilk brand.
26:47
But to me it didn't make sense because it was a different, it
26:50
was sort of a different story that we wanted to tell.
26:54
And I didn't want one to hinge upon the other.
26:56
So that's really kind of why we, we broke it up into a separate
27:02
brand. And you know, whether I don't
27:07
know if that's a good thing, bad thing.
27:09
It, it is what it is at this point, you know, but you know,
27:15
as again, as an entrepreneur, like as a small business owner,
27:20
we don't have like the, we don't have the baggage of having to
27:25
have all these rules. So we have to follow, you know,
27:28
necessarily, but we also don't have the luxury of, you know,
27:31
having experts in the field where we're like, you know,
27:34
they're like, oh, don't do that, do this because, you know,
27:37
whatever. But that's OK too.
27:40
You know, we, we, we love being able, you know, we don't have a
27:46
ton of time to support the different brands, obviously, but
27:51
we love being able to, we love being able to go with our
27:56
Tipplemann's brand into a coffee shop, you know, and, and
28:00
present, present those products to them.
28:02
We love being, it's like a personalized thing.
28:04
It's like this is for you, you know, and then in, in a bar, you
28:09
know, some of our Bittermilk brand products, you know, in a
28:12
bar, especially retail, it's like a really cool personalized
28:17
product for them. And so I like that touch, that
28:22
personalization. I like the story that we're able
28:25
to be able to like have a, a single solid, you know, well
28:31
executed story for, for like this family of products that
28:36
that we have. Outside the traditional flavors,
28:41
you know, where do where does the inspiration for some of
28:44
these other concepts come from? I mean, what how do you get from
28:49
like, oh, I have an idea or a concept actually creating a new
28:54
flavor that's going to go into a bottle.
28:55
Is that question makes sense to you?
28:58
I call that development work. It's that's my a big part of my
29:03
job. And some of it, like some of the
29:10
best ideas you have are random ideas.
29:14
It I'm sure it's like a writer. I'm not a writer.
29:17
Wish I was, I feel like that would be like.
29:21
You wouldn't if you saw our bank accounts.
29:27
Well, I, I think I, I, I, I'm like, oh, if I was a writer, I'd
29:33
be like in some beautiful setting and just writing, you
29:36
know, something like that. But I'm sure like if you're
29:39
writing, you have days where you're like, it's, it's just a
29:45
lot of work and you're not getting a whole lot of return.
29:48
You're not like you don't have anything to show for it.
29:49
You're just like putting in the work and you and you don't have
29:53
anything to show for it at the end of the day.
29:54
I'm sure there are a lot of days like that.
29:56
And then there's some days where you're like, didn't even plan on
29:59
writing and like, all the sudden you've just like got all this
30:02
content and you're like, what the heck is going on?
30:05
I should play golf more often or whatever you're doing, you know.
30:11
And so I, you know, for me, you know, development is kind of
30:18
like that. We work with, you know, we work
30:24
with like different businesses and, you know, other clients and
30:27
stuff and they ask us to formulate things for them.
30:31
And, and it's, it's, it's a whole lot of fun.
30:37
It really is. And it's even funner if you get
30:42
a special drink afterwards, you know, so you're in your
30:44
development and then you get to try it and then you know, that
30:48
makes it a whole lot more fun. Is it is it more science or more
30:52
experimentation, You know, because as we've talked to you,
30:55
you know, your background and culinary and all that and flavor
30:58
understanding flavors, which is probably a great value add to
31:00
now. But I in my head, I'm thinking
31:04
of like you in a lab coat, like with little, you know, putting
31:07
little things in and testing each one.
31:09
Is it that precise? I mean, is that how you guys are
31:12
approaching it? Or is there more of an artistry
31:15
creative bent to it, where sometimes we're just putting
31:18
things together that we know in theory should work and then
31:21
finding that right? I think it's it's really all of
31:25
the above. I built a lab at my house next
31:30
door to my house. It's like a metal building and I
31:35
call it a shed or a lab or a garage.
31:39
The reality is the 2 projects happening on in that place at
31:44
any given time is the 86K5 Blazer that my son and I are
31:49
restoring together for his first car and whatever I'm working on
31:53
in development. And it's just so, so much fun.
31:56
So if you can, you can still picture the lab stuff, but then
32:00
you can picture like the shop in the background where you've got
32:04
all that stuff going on too. Cause another thing about
32:07
development I've found is it's really, it's really important to
32:13
like be able to get your head, like when you're stuck
32:17
somewhere, you kind of got to get your head out and get your
32:20
head back in. And so being able to have
32:23
something that you can another work, you know, keep you
32:27
working, you know, but working in something that is less
32:31
fatiguing or is fatiguing in a totally different way.
32:33
And then you can like just go back and refocus on what, what
32:36
you're stumped with. And that helps me a ton.
32:40
But the scientific approach, I mean, it's scientific in the
32:43
fact that, you know, you have to be mindful of like pH and water
32:49
activity and what happens, you know, with certain colors over
32:57
time or shelf stability and, and food packaging laws and stuff
33:02
like that. There's also like precision
33:05
because you know, if you're doing something on a bench
33:09
level, bench scale, where it's kind of just like small amounts,
33:15
your level of precision has to be pretty high because you're
33:18
going to then translate this recipe into maybe, you know,
33:22
several 1000 bottles or something, you're going to be
33:25
scaling this recipe. So if you're off by like 1%,
33:29
that's like huge, you know, I was in of a percent then, you
33:34
know, it's less huge. But yeah, droppers, little
33:37
droppers, high precision scales, good lab equipment, you know,
33:45
definitely is is super helpful. I know she's not here right now,
33:52
but I can feel my wife pointing at me going, yeah, that's what
33:55
I'm talking about. Like, I never follow a recipe
33:58
exactly. And I kind of just wing it.
34:01
And then when she likes something, she goes, oh, I'd
34:03
like, I really like this. Would you make it again?
34:04
And I say, we'll see. We'll see if I can get there.
34:09
So we need people that's. My natural tendency as well.
34:12
I I that total, I'm not good at organizing necessarily things
34:16
and documenting things. But you know, it's like, it's
34:20
like the same with like when I was in high school and I'm
34:23
writing like a research paper and I'm not clicking the save
34:25
button. It only takes like one time for
34:28
you to lose everything because your 90s computer just decided
34:31
to like turn off and then you've lost your whole, you've worked
34:35
for hours on it. And then you're like, maybe I
34:37
should click save. Maybe I should write this down.
34:39
And I've done that too many times the wrong way that it's
34:44
like, hey, I'm actually, I'm going to make sure I have my
34:46
computer. I'm going to make sure I follow
34:48
a format a sequential approach in development where I'm able to
34:53
start at one point and end at another point and track
34:57
everything in between. Super important.
35:00
You've mentioned a little bit already about how working with
35:03
your, your wife, you know, uplifts this business and, and
35:06
works really well. And we've talked a little bit
35:09
about how you you went from the culinary to the bar business to
35:13
owning a bar to Bittermilk Tipplemann's.
35:16
I want to Rostar is always asking me for like, Hey, ask
35:19
people for advice that we can share for small businesses.
35:24
And something that's come up today a little bit.
35:27
It's on my topic list a little bit here, but it wasn't
35:30
necessarily what I was going to ask.
35:32
Charleston, SC. Well, you mentioned that's where
35:34
you're you're based, that's your home based.
35:38
One of the more hospitable cities I've ever been in.
35:41
Also the most ghosts I'm told of the southern coastal cities.
35:46
I'm wondering it's not what you would say is a traditional
35:50
business hub, right? I think a lot of people,
35:53
especially entrepreneurs go, I've got to be in like a big
35:55
city. I've got to be in New York or
35:57
Chicago or LA, San Francisco. How does Charleston and working
36:03
in a place that is small is not the word I'm looking for, But
36:08
you know, it's, it's not on the way to something.
36:11
You know, if I'm going to a convention in Chicago, I'm not
36:13
detouring through Charleston, right?
36:15
How does that impact what you're doing?
36:17
How does it benefit you? You know what are the challenges
36:20
of it? Yeah, that's a great question.
36:23
And you know, we're a manufacturing business.
36:28
So being close to an artery does impact costs, you know, So, so
36:34
that is important. It's it is a bit off the beaten
36:40
path, honestly, Charleston is, but people are well trotting the
36:45
path. Well, maybe a little too well.
36:49
Even the ghosts don't want to leave type of thing.
36:52
But the the good about that. For instance, we're building a
37:02
new manufacturing facility in a town called Ravenel that is
37:07
really close to Charleston. I mean, it's like it's in
37:11
Charleston County and as close in as close as we can really be
37:18
to downtown and have it and have it be affordable and it is
37:23
affordable. And we have like the mayor of
37:28
Ravenel is like, I reached out to him in the, in the very
37:33
beginning of our project and he wanted us there, you know, and
37:40
he, he helped us and, you know, town council meetings, you know,
37:46
and they like, they're friendly to us.
37:49
They want us to bring jobs there.
37:50
I mean, you're talking to actual people who live here and they
37:55
like, want you to be there. Try getting that response in
38:00
another place, you know, name, name, any other place,
38:04
especially for a small business, It's just really hard, you know,
38:07
small businesses establishing them.
38:09
And, you know, it's just getting tougher and tougher these days
38:13
to do that. And so I, I love, I love being
38:18
in a place where I'm wanted, you know, and, and that's like,
38:23
that's the best part about like being in a, in, you know, you
38:28
said it's not really that small. I mean, it's not terribly small.
38:31
It is small actually space wise. It is small because, you know,
38:38
Charleston used to be one of the major ports in the United
38:41
States, but it just it that business way outgrew the actual
38:45
physical space restrictions of Charleston and went to other
38:49
cities. So there there is a constriction
38:53
there, but we find that, you know, the people that are here
38:58
in in Charleston are are so great.
39:01
I mean, people are are just really awesome people here and
39:07
people want to be here. People want to live here and,
39:13
and people are interested in cool things here.
39:15
You know, it's an artsy city. So you have appreciation of
39:19
history, you have appreciation of arts, you have appreciation
39:21
of music, you have appreciation for find food and find drinks
39:27
and handcrafted things, you know, So what better place to be
39:30
in for me? I mean, I, I can't think of a
39:32
better place. I can't think of a place that I
39:35
would want to move my business to.
39:37
You know, it's just, it's awesome here.
39:41
One of my favorite places to just walk around and look at
39:44
houses and buildings and, and, you know, the, the history and,
39:47
and the art, the artistry that went into building that city.
39:52
In my experience, New Orleans without the mosquitoes, although
39:57
I'm sure there's, there's some, you know, there's so much that
40:00
we could get into. I'm wondering, what did I miss?
40:02
You know, what was something, Is there anything that you thought?
40:05
Man, I really want to get this part, this message out, this
40:08
thing about Tipplemann's or about what I'm doing.
40:11
Or advice for an entrepreneur? Anything that I missed that
40:13
you'd like to share? Well, I mean, I feel like I
40:19
could give advice for an entrepreneur as long as there
40:24
was time in a day. But I guess, you know, the the
40:29
best, the best advice and advice I give myself is that don't
40:36
stress out about things that you can't control, because there
40:41
that's there's already enough stress of things.
40:44
Like if you can focus, focus all of the attention that you have
40:49
on, on things that aren't going your way.
40:52
Just focus them like a laser on the stuff that you can control.
40:55
And don't worry about any of the other stuff because if you worry
40:59
about it, it's just taking yourself away from important
41:02
things, your family, you know, other stuff that you can
41:06
control, you know, and sometimes you use that as a way of kind
41:10
of, it's almost like being lazy to focusing on stuff that I
41:13
can't control because I know I can't do anything about it, like
41:16
subconsciously. But that's, that's one thing,
41:19
you know, I would, I would definitely offer out there
41:24
because, you know, being an entrepreneur, it's, it's not
41:27
just about your operation, it is about your operation.
41:30
It's about sales, it's about marketing, it's about getting a
41:35
bill from the IRS or something like that.
41:37
And you're like, what does that bill even mean?
41:39
Then you got to research it for two hours.
41:41
You know, it's just so many different things that that come
41:45
up. And there's no requirement to
41:48
have some sort of credential to open a business.
41:51
You know, you would think you would like you have to have a
41:53
driver's license to drive, you know, you don't need a light,
41:56
you know, you have to have a business license, but there's no
41:58
like, you know, there's no like, hey, did you pass your
42:02
entrepreneurial, you know, credential?
42:06
No, didn't I'm still learning that one.
42:09
All all this weigh in. So you just have to, you know,
42:14
you just have to take it one day at a time.
42:18
As far as Stippleman's, you know, we, we are super excited
42:22
for this, this product. We're super excited.
42:25
We, you know, we yeah, we did come out with the basics first,
42:27
but we're really excited to just see what people want us to do,
42:32
you know, see what's valuable. We don't know the industry well
42:34
enough to know that intuitively. And we do have a new product
42:42
that we're pretty excited about that we just are actually
42:44
bottling up and it's a sugar free syrup.
42:53
So we, we have like a basic one that's like not flavored and
42:57
then we're going to be having flavors added to it.
43:00
And it's all natural sugar free. So it's made with allulose as a
43:07
sweetener, which is pretty expensive compared.
43:10
I mean, sugar is expensive. Sugar has gone crazy expensive,
43:14
but this is even more expensive. It's like 3 times the cost of
43:17
sugar, but it's natural. It's not like, you know,
43:22
sucralose is what most of these big brand coffee syrups are with
43:29
sugar free, which is just not that good for you.
43:32
And so allulose being a natural sweetener has, you know, a lot
43:39
more of a positive effect, I guess positive outcomes for
43:47
enjoying it and not having all the all the calories associated
43:51
with with sugar. Because, you know, these days,
43:55
you know, a lot of people are, are really into that, you know,
43:58
limiting their sugar content either for health reasons or,
44:03
you know, whatever reasons they have.
44:05
Sugar keto diet My wife and I did the keto diet last year.
44:10
More challenging if you're a vegetarian, but still doable.
44:14
But all, I mean, you almost have to be a scientist just, you
44:16
know, and you're a parent. So like thinking about what your
44:18
kids are eating and all of that. You really have to be aware.
44:22
You know, when I try to read labels, sometimes it's like, all
44:24
right, well, I only know half of these words.
44:26
And then I know like, oh, maybe I shouldn't eat that.
44:29
It's a tough thing to to do, but you know it.
44:33
But that requires having the luxury of time in the grocery
44:36
store or, you know, online ordering or whatever you're
44:38
doing, in addition to continuing to grow Tipplemann's and bring
44:43
on new flavors and try out new things like sugar free or, or
44:46
light or however it works out. What's the future for you?
44:50
You've got, you know, I'm assuming at some point your
44:52
wife, Mary Lynn is going to look at you and say, well, what's
44:55
next? I.
44:58
Mean, yeah, she just wants me to hire out her positions.
45:01
I think that's what she's looking for.
45:06
Yeah, I, I see like some sort of like bookkeeper slash accountant
45:12
go higher in our future. That's like her milestone.
45:16
Now she's like, she's like Joe, What what do we have to get to
45:19
like, what kind of sales are we talking about?
45:21
Like I, I guarantee if I told her a goal and we'd meet it like
45:26
next month, because she'd be like, I got to get out of doing
45:28
bookkeeping. But, you know, we're building
45:34
our, our new production facility.
45:37
It's the most we've ever spent money wise on anything, which is
45:42
pretty. It's kind of scary to do that
45:46
and but it's going to be awesome.
45:49
I mean, it's going to be so awesome.
45:53
And like, you know, we are building our business as a
46:00
legacy business. We are, we're a manufacturing
46:03
business that we want to be, we want our kids to be, have the
46:09
option of working in our company, you know, and taking it
46:14
over and doing whatever they want with it.
46:16
You know, we, we bottle lots of stuff.
46:20
They, they're probably going to be smarter than us, you know,
46:23
hopefully and they're going to figure out some really cool
46:27
stuff that they can make and contribute.
46:30
And so I, I just want to like have a good, nice base and, and
46:35
platform for them, for, for them to like go after it and do
46:39
something really cool. So that's the real, you know,
46:43
the real goal at the end of the day for for me and my wife.
46:47
When you're out in the world, which I've seen you at
46:50
conventions, I know you get out sometimes from the Charleston
46:54
community. You stop into a coffee shop.
46:57
What are you going to order? I'm man, that's a good question.
47:02
I'm going to order whatever they tell me to likely.
47:08
You know, like I always when people would come into my bar,
47:12
especially when we were brand new and not a lot of people were
47:15
doing fancy cocktails back then. And I'd see them look at our
47:19
menu and they look up and then they just start, start, you
47:23
know, about to order something that's not on the menu, like or
47:26
something, you know, they're about to go to their safe drink
47:29
is what they're about to do. And I'm like, don't do that to
47:32
me right now. Don't go to your safe drink.
47:35
Trust me with more than than giving you your your safety
47:39
drink that you order at a bar because you think that the
47:42
bartender can't make what you really actually want.
47:44
So I want to give, I want to give the burrito the opportunity
47:48
to make like what they are into and what they, what they, what
47:52
they want to make. So if that's an option, that's
47:56
where I go to right away. And my wife would order a latte
48:02
which is like 95% of everyone else.
48:05
I like that you treat it as if it's an experience, you know,
48:09
going to a bar, especially now. And we're all kind of going, OK,
48:13
where's my luxury money going to?
48:15
Well, I'm going there. This is supposed to be the
48:17
expert. You know, let's see what they
48:19
can do. And I would argue that's what
48:21
gets me to come back to a bar or restaurant is when they do that
48:24
thing really well. That they do.
48:28
Joe, I really appreciate this time and consideration.
48:31
Thank you for being here on the show.
48:33
Yeah, thanks for inviting me. This would be great.
48:35
To everyone else, you'll find Tipplemann's rich coffee syrups
48:38
online at tipplemanns.com. Keep an eye out for their no
48:43
added sugar lineup, their new flavors, all the new stuff
48:47
coming out of there, and from bittermilk.
48:49
We'll link to those in our show notes.
48:51
That's the show for today. Thank you for listening, for
48:54
watching. You can find us online coffee
48:56
peoplepodcast.com. You can search for Coffee People
49:00
podcasts on all of the platforms, probably there, and I
49:03
probably have a link somewhere below wherever you're listening
49:06
or watching right now. Thank you to our show sponsor,
49:09
Rostar. They're low minimum order
49:11
quantities and quality packaging products.
49:13
They're, you know, the ideal partner for me.
49:15
There's someone I believe in. So they'll meet your coffee
49:18
snack packaging needs. rostar.com to build out that
49:21
brand identity. If that's something you're
49:23
thinking about doing, you'll find all of our friends and
49:26
supporters in the show notes or in the rolling credits in just a
49:29
moment. Cheers to everyone.
49:31
Please don't forget to tip your baristas and of course, to drink
49:34
a coffee. And that is it.
49:41
I hope Joe, that was pretty painless or at least enjoyable.