E115 Danil Nevsky

This week's guest is Daniel Nutsky, a Russian blow-shotter who is currently living in Barcelona, Spain. Dan is the founder and CEO of Indie Bartender. Dan established the Indie Bartender platform as it means to push the future of the modern bartender. We have a fascinating discussion with Dan as he explains his motivation behind developing Indie Bartender and the goal of pushing yourself as an independent brand.

By joining the platform, he gave access to bartending manuals, training resources, and bar business exercises. It's an incredibly interesting and novel approach and well worth a listen. You can get more details on the website, indiebartender.com, and check out Dan's Instagram profile at Cocktail Man. Enjoy the show.

This episode of the industry podcast is sponsored by Rick Berencelli at the Case for Wine. Rick has everything the wine lovers are looking for whether you're a bar or a restaurant or just a private consumer. Rick has a selection of wine that you will fit your needs. All regions and price ranges are available.

Email Rick at Rick at thecaseforwine.com. And welcome to the industry podcast. My name is Kit. This is Dan.

How's it going, man? I'm all right. How are you? Hey, I'm going to put a podcast on a hangover.

Excuse me, a pretty constant routine for me. Yes. You were out in public getting drunk last night. That's right.

And usually most of the time these are work days when we record this weekend for once I'm on the run over on the work day. It's really easy to adult. Yes. I'd like to give a big shout out to the Nick McLean Quartet who was the reason that we're both hungover today.

Yes. That was a great show. At Sugar Run Bar, downtown Kitchener. You should check that out if you're in the area.

Also, Babylon's sister's wine bar, uptown Waterloo. Check out both of those spots if you're in the Kitchener Waterloo area. Cool. So we have a great guest.

It's always Dan Nesky who's going to be joining us in just a minute here. We should mention that if you're enjoying what you're hearing on the industry podcast, you should subscribe, rate, and review the show. And if you want to be a guest on the show, you can either email us at info at theindustrypodcast.club. That is also where you can email us for potential sponsorship or you can DM us at the industry podcast on Instagram.

Make sure that as always do zakana at zakana.co for the artwork you guys with the show and you should be checking email for any of your graphic arts needs. And I think that's about all we got to talk about. Perfect. All right.

Let's bring in our guest. Dan, how you doing buddy? I'm good. I'm also hungover.

I'm live rolling. Okay. Perfect. This will be a nice slow conversation.

Yes. No, no, no, no, no. You're rushing. Perfect.

Thanks for coming on the podcast. Yes. Thank you very much. And you're coming to us from Barcelona today.

Yes. Thank you for inviting me. Always great. Especially.

I didn't know that that was people who give a shit and I don't kind of do that. But I feel quite nice. Yes. Well, you'd be surprised the amount of shit people give.

So tell us why. Let's start by telling us why you're currently in Barcelona. Long story short, it was I've been like a gypsy all my life pretty much lived in a different country so far to date. And when I mean live, I mean, I actually settled in.

And when my job finally did go to a point where I didn't have to be location based, I was like, cool, which part of Europe has a sun, has a sea, has a pretty decent like life ratio. The rent is in too high and Barcelona is like an optimal sort of place, especially if you don't have local salaries because they're not great. Right. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, Barcelona's amazing. That's one of my favorites. It's in the world.

So fun. It's such a fun party atmosphere too. If you, I mean, I'm too old for that shit now, but if I don't know if you are, I like walking past it and go, all those kids. Yeah.

Yeah. So let's talk a little bit about how you first got into the service industry. How did you get your start and just kind of walk us through the basics of the beginning of your career? Well, it's it's a funny one because I think everyone in, I don't know how old you are, Kip or Dan, you look great.

And I don't feel good inside right now. So you're better than I am. But basically like most people, it was a means to an end sort of situation. Right.

I think when I was growing up, it was an Instagram or TikTok or any of the stuff going on. So we're looking up to any fancy fancy bar standards in my city. We're just like, all right, I want to meet people starting to get some hair in my balls. I want to be, you know, I want to, I want to possibly socialize with people I'm into and I'm going to go and work in service.

And I started off as catering for Scottish weddings. So loads of kilts and loads of skirts. And I know the difference now. The toilets are non gender binary.

They have the same photos. They figured that one out. So that's basically it, really. We moved to Scotland when I was 15, because my mother's in petroleum industry, oil and gas kind of knows a lot about that.

And so being being one of those families, that's why you move around a lot. You go over the oil list, thank God we have to go to Libya. But Scotland is where it was at. And that's how we got into, I wanted to meet 15 years old, you started one of socialized and living outside of the big city.

I was living in a not far but from a city called Aberdeen, which is like 200,000 people. And I was living on the outskirts of that. And so a bus would come. You should take buses if you were a kid, because my parents were like, you're a don't know, back in your day.

You know how parents are. Yeah, when I was your age, I used to walk for 40 miles from gunfight. All of them have this World War II style story. And so to get any money, I had to go work in catering.

That's what I did. Humble beginnings, really. Yeah. And you've like since then, I mean, we were reading through your bio and like you were named what top 100 bartenders in the world?

It's a weird one. Hey, that list is what? Like four years old. So it's fairly new.

And it's a funny one because the world is split. I talked about this a lot because I was born in Russia. I'm from Eastern Europe with family in Ukraine as well. So really fun time right now.

Right. Super on point. I'm potentially going to point. But it's one of these things where it's like, who is really influential, right?

Like I've never been to Canada. I've met a bunch of Canadian bars and there's events before, right? But anyone who reads that list is going to be like, who the fuck is that? I don't know who the fuck that is.

They didn't influence me. You know, so it's one of these lists like, yes, it's like a time article or a horse feed top 10. I know, obviously I'm using it in my email bio to get as much money as possible. But right.

If I was to go like, who's really influential, you'll be like, yo, CEO of the idea like permanently number one person decided to create a non-alcoholic category. Now it's worth millions. No one gave it shit before that. Right.

Yeah. It's one of these things, you know? Well, if you like alcohol, you should probably reach out to ripair Angelia. Rick at the case for wine.com.

He's got a ton of amazing products, including the Lupo de Revé d'Oron. It's one of the finest examples of Granash in the region and it pairs beautifully with like a veal fillet, Chantrell mushrooms or cook cheeses. So once again, that's ripair Angelia. Rick at the case for wine.com.

Okay. Dan, so I love that. I love that so much. It reminds me of that was like old ads where someone gets a very raspy voice.

Hey, hey, big boy. Are you in the pot, milks in your area? That's right. I'm trying to bring the sex to wine.

I've got that phone number memorized. So many times. It's funny they talk about wine though, just because it's inspired. Like I don't know if you've been to New Orleans for like, for like, for like, like tales or something.

In fact, I'm headed there just July for a tales of the cocktail. We're going to be doing live interviews. Are you saying it's not your first time or? It's not my first time of tales, but not in New Orleans.

Cool, fair enough. So if you get a nearby, if you're going to be there on a Sunday, go to back an owl, which is the best wine bar in existence, in my opinion. Because it's a Sunday thing. You own there in Sunday.

But the most amazing Yorna is just because of wine is what you're talking about. Yeah. But it's not an official effect. Everyone just goes there.

It's not in the city center. You got to take a super-assuber way out. And it is the greatest wine bar for one very simple reason. You go into there.

It's all there's no reservations. You come in when you walk into a wine shop. But the way the wines are categorized is not by regions or by styles. It's literally how you feel.

So there's a fridge that says patio pounders. And we went in there and we saw this magnum of rosé. It's called brosé before hosé, Quervo. That's it.

We're getting some brosé. It's all like this. It's like with the Y for its date, anniversary. None of that makes sense.

But then you just buy the wine and open it for you. You go to the other room. There's these empty hinds and you just put yourself. You just put your wine in there yourself.

Ice yourself. White glasses is fun and table. You get absolutely responsibly drunk. Yeah.

That's amazing. I'm definitely going to check that out. Thanks for the temp. Dude.

It's the greatest music. It's just awesome. And it's very well priced. No one has to come up to you and make it open the wine and smell it.

That's stupid ritual of sommeliers. Hey, is this the wine you ordered? I don't fucking know. I don't speak French.

The irony is that you're in Canada. So you actually might have to. Yeah. A little bit.

I'm pretty rusty. But yeah, I speak a little. Okay. So I want to talk a little bit about your current business.

So you play it as the independent bartender. Tell me what that is. Actually, it's pretty cool. So it's according to me because it's my business.

I'm going to say it. Yeah. I think you probably thought it was cool. I hope to one day that it'll be long with most of them.

I'll explain basically the precursor, what's happening and what I run into. In 2020, I sold my previous business back to the founder of that business. We were business partners, but I sold my shirt back. And it was a social media platform for bartender's called cocktails for you.

And I didn't know COVID was coming. Nobody did. So I sat there and I had a bunch of cash and then COVID hit. I'm like, cool, I don't have a job.

I don't have a bar. I don't have a job. I just got some cash. It looks like I'll be living a fact.

So I had an easier COVID in terms of I had some money saved up. Yeah. Now, by the end of the first lockdown, I had no money saved up. Burning through savings, even if Barcelona is pretty well priced, you just burn through it, right?

And so the idea came across just trying to think of what I'm going to do next when you're back against the wall. And I'm like, cool. Like, no one's off. Like, that's the whole point.

No one's offering your job. You don't even have to invest an opportunity because you don't have to have cash anymore. You're worried about investing in this time to open a place, you know, whatever. And I read about a thing called Red Bull Academy.

So Red Bull has a single Red Bull Academy where they basically take extreme sports. So if any of you guys are out of down, keep your into any sort of sport as a bartender, we usually just lift the glass and do our biceps, you know, but basically the, they just get like extreme sports, people's athletes that are in. So whatever they're in. So they go, Hey, I'll lock you down for a five year contract.

You go do whatever the hell it is that you want to do. How much do you need a month to get paid? Oh, three K. Cool.

We'll give you a five five year contract. We'll give you three K every month to skate, jump out of buildings, whatever, but you wear a red bull patch and you know, we use it on our marketing and if they end up becoming huge, that pays itself back to Red Bull. And if they die in the budgeting sports, well, that's their problem. You know, what, what ends up happening is that they have a creative freedom to go do exactly what they love and get better at it without having this, you know, the nine to five sort of situation or having to hoard and sell that stuff.

I was like, how do I do that and bring it to the bar industry? Now, realistically, it already exists in the form of the brand ambassador in a way, right? So these people go do what they like. They usually go to spirit or a category that they like and they don't have to worry about whatever they do.

However, I was like, yo, brand ambassador's have to get depressed within the first five years because they hate the probe and the brevin because we're not as weak anymore. I feel like getting them up to notice, you know, there's difficulty when you get into the corporate structure, not everyone sort of can molds very well. It's going from bartending the most loosey liability thing in the world to nine to five, go to an event and still get to the office for a meeting at 90 and then exit. Right, I'm ranting.

I'm ranting. So basically, the business model is simple. I was like, cool, what if I actually myself is a brand, right? I'll do exactly the right thing.

I'm the brand. Well, here's one of my four years, here's my experience. Here's everything I know. What if I create a brand punch for me as if I was a product for 12 months, I find it, I budget it, and I finance it.

So I go in there like, where do I want to go? Which part shows which country I want to go to? What do I want to do? So for 2022, cost 35,000 euros.

And I basically, that was most of my savings. So I was like, pumped in there. Then once I go to this plan filled out, I go to brands that want to work. And I'm like, hey, the annual retainer for me is the same as mine.

So you're not a sponsor, you're a partner to partnership on equal rights. So that means that I have creative freedom within the company because I just basically sell myself like a speed rail. Right. That makes sense in a bar.

I'm like, cool. 35,000, you're my firm with partner 35,000, you're my agent partner. And here's where you come in. Here's how you're going to utilize.

Of course, it's like a Venn diagram. So some of the brands, they want certain stuff to, you know, they can request certain things. And then I just go and do it, you know, and then I, there's very clear clauses in the contract where I'm not, I'm not going to endorse other products in the same category, but I can still visit the scale of reason I can still be in the same building as another gin or another vermouth because I'm a two partners now. And it means that I can say no to ideas that are evidently really stupid.

That is right. But there is downside to it where it's like the first partner basically gets your investment back. Right. And then the second partner pays the taxes that you have to pay for invoicing.

So I would say that now with the two partners, it's stable, but I used to have to make quite a lot from different events against bartending brands and sort of short term stuff. But the basic business model is very simple. You are the brand as an individual, you create a brand plan, you budget it, you finance it, and you sell yourself like a speed rail to different brands for whatever it is that you're invested. And it's completely up to you how big or small you want to be.

You want to be the size of Canada, you want to be North America, you want to be global. It's all within what you can think of and what, you know, how far you want to go. Also bear in mind, you want to be like a NASCAR driver with like a bazillion patches of brand. There's only so much you can do and you don't want to sell, you want to stick to who you are as a person.

I really like this out. I don't mind it. I have some right here on the table. But if I was to sign on a mess, I'll brand everyone who knows me and be like, dude, you're a bullshit.

That's what you're saying. So you got to really stick with yourself. I think this independent thing, this sort of partnership, rather than sponsorship, is possibly a new career path for people who don't want to stay in operations, who don't want to go corporate and who say consulting is a mess. So that's the way you can work with brands but still stay financially stable but still creative.

But it's all based on your creativity. If you suck at creativity, you will be able to get anything. Right. So like, where are you physically doing the bartending though?

Like, do you just get sponsored bars or trade shows or how does that work? So mainly, I don't have a physical home here in Barcelona where I bartend. The idea of it is, kind of the way I view it is what's, I don't feel Charles Jolie who won't talk about she years back, he's an American bartender. We spoke about the term bartender and compared it to the word of like, I don't know, singer or songwriter or artist.

Do you have to physically be five days a week behind a bar to still be a bartender? Right. Or somebody, somebody takes gigs every fucking weekend to still be a guitarist or still be a songwriter. No, they can make music in their own house.

So I kind of view it, it also matches my rhetoric. So to be honest, you can call me out of that shit. So I think bartending is, once you've done it long enough and I've been in the season since I was 15, I was bartending 18, till age 28. So I did a whole 10 years solid behind the stick.

You put me behind a bar, give me half an hour to get you to it and I'm good to go. I'll complain the next day from me that I don't use to stand in behind a bar for 12 hours. But I can handle the shift, no problem. And I can probably handle getting into some time again, but I do not have a permanent home.

So it's usually guest bartending or out of it. So that's kind of it. Now, the whole point of indie bartender is, show the business model, here's how it works. And then the other end of it, this is part of an umbrella idea.

Like I have so many clients, they're discussing the ambitious and probably half of them are going to stay on miserably. However, I share on my website educational content that I think that is missing currently, globally at all varsity. And that's namely stuff like, training materials from different groups around the world. Like we have the milk and honey training manual from London online.

I got permission to share it so that if you don't know how to build training program, download theirs and adapt it. You know, I've got body language training materials, I've got speed pouring training materials, I've got the idea is to share all this kind of stuff. But also I'm working now on business related training stuff, like how to write a brand proposal, I have a free template on my website. So if you have an idea for an event where you want to get something sponsored like a guest bartending gig, yo, here's a template just to let these dogs and then send it to them.

This is the kind of stuff that nobody teaches you, this kind of business end of it that you have to stumble for years to figure out how do we get sponsorship for our podcast? You know, how does the agreement look like so I've got like a template for an agreement that's kind of legal in Europe. So you might have to adapt it for different countries. That kind of stuff.

I have a calculator for guests. You don't know how much to charge. You don't know how much to charge a brand. Go on there.

It's at all the categories slide around which hour you rate, how much time to take off. And there's some notes and you can figure out your rate. It's useful. One stop shopping and then you know where else you can get one stop shopping for wine.

With Rick Beren telly at the case for wine, Rick at the case for wine.com he's got the 2019 blueprint Cabernet Sauvignon from Lael vineyards. And this is a it's just a stunning cabin in Napa Valley. And 10% of the proceeds from blueprint wine go to organizations fighting climate change. So that's great.

That's Rick at the case for wine.com. Yeah, so that really does sound like you can just kind of get everything right from your platform. It's like literally one stop shopping for anything bar related. That's the thing.

We're still building on it because people are very precious about their stuff. You know, it's hard to convince people on their stuff that I find online. But the idea is that I want to cover the education. You don't get taught.

You know, so right now we're looking at legal agreements, for example, if you're going to be invited to become an investment or part of your sweat equity in a bar. Yeah. Cool. What is that contract look like?

Right. So I've got working with a lawyer, we like to do the most tentative contract to make sure that people also then modify depending on their country. Because it's hard to do when you're working globally, there's so many niches, you know, like issues between countries and legal systems, you can't just go, hey, there's a legal contract. And then somebody downloads a trust open a bar in Canada.

And then the other person, you know, financially foxes, because it's not anybody. Right. So, but at least to give people an idea, you know, because I think sometimes the bar in the bar is the same. We get fucked the most because we don't know.

We just don't have the business education. We haven't gone through business school, our parents aren't necessarily multi-tenial operators. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that's where your platform.

What's the online website address? So, so is www.indibartender.com. You go in there, you sign up, you know, part of the community, you get access to all the materials. We have also, like a calendar, industry calendar of all global industry events with like links to their websites, and I update that frequently.

So you can do anything. The point is of Michael's thing is that I want in five years to be people who call themselves indie bartenders and use my template to work. Right. That's it.

That's my goal. Like, and they don't need meat to hold their hands. They can just use that and develop their own indie bar to networks. Like empowering sort of people in the parking need to use that sort of work.

Just like those influencers back in the day, nobody knew what the fuck that was. Yeah. And now everyone's in, you know everyone knows what that means. No one understands indie bartender means at the moment.

But hopefully five years time will be a whole bunch of them. And they, this is where it came from. And so to empower sort of the little guy, which is so virtually soundish and just annoys me because I'm an asshole. No, it makes sense.

So, yeah. And so I'm just trying to think about like, how has the response been basically from brands for you? And like, like, how many partnerships do you currently have with brands? So I have two global retainers based on my 2022 plan.

And then I've got two run brands. So, for example, there you go. There's a technically a conflict of interest, right? So one run brand is called Run Cologne.

It's a Salvadorian run. And they asked me to basically completely take care of the cultural competition, which is called Daccharine Combat, which is basically made two dacrages as fast as possible. That is it. There's no other rules.

There's no chat, you come in and make two daccharages as fast as possible. I'm going to film it. And I've been hosting events in five different countries doing that. So that's their jam just for that.

And then Florida Kenya, we are going to sign in the next couple of days. They've been doing all this whole sustainability thing because they got caught like with slaving blood money a couple years ago. And so I managed to convince them and go, Hey, you know, I'm not a sustainability kind of guy. I take the piss out of it all the time.

But if you want to work with me, I will, you know, I want to make a campaign called a sustainability bullshit. And they, for some reason, they thought that was a great idea. That's a surprise, actually, because that's really their whole platform these days is about how their run is sustainable. So what I did was I reached out to the vice journalist, because they asked me two years ago originally.

And I reached out to the vice journalist who originally uncovered all the stuff and I emailed him and then turns out they didn't even fucking know they were doing this stuff. It was also outsourced, you know, and they didn't even know this was going on. And they've actually brought everything in house. So their cane sugar workers are now being hired and directed instead of doing this, outsourcing it to the people that did do the bad stuff.

But the rest of the barwell doesn't know this because we're very good at throwing stones at somebody. The moment is a problem, but we don't follow up. We don't actually care. So the reason they liked it is because I'm going to challenge it.

So they've given me actually the freedom. This might get all cut three months in once the CEO realizes I'm doing this, who knows. But the marketing guy thinks it's a good idea. And the idea is to go to four different bars around the world that are few key sustainability and literally interview their owners and dive into it like as a mini doc series going, Hey, this sustainability bullshit.

Right. And then just challenge everyone. I think they want that sort of investigative journalism because it doesn't exist in the industry. Everything's paid for.

It's a shit press release. Yeah. To read out, you know, no offense are reading out of something. We all got to do what we got to do.

You know what I mean? I think we're changing. I think industry's changing where authenticity and proof not just saying something you have to show it, right? It's sort of actions people out of the world situation.

And the fact authority kind of accepted this two years on is showing me that there's someone in that brand who has gusto, you know, has a bangle. And that's what we're going to do. That's a cool idea. And so what do you think you're going to, like, what is your idea?

Do you think that you're going to find out the sustainability is in fact bullshit or what do you expect to find from this? I'm expecting, I'm expecting to probably do what I always do, which is piss a lot of people off and possibly get banned from some bars because the idea is to give people an opportunity to speak. And challenge sustainability in general, because realistically cocktails are like a luxury product. Right.

So, and there's so much elements to this, you know, oh, yeah, don't use lemons and lives, but then you're the keyless tribe of half around the world, you know, to be here. There's so many of these elements. And so I think we're going to find that nothing is great. Nothing is black and white, sorry.

Everyone's a great guy. You know, and but I think that there's, I think I'm, for some reason I feel that there's going to be something that's going to go wrong, that's going to piss somebody off and someone's going to die from the bar. I have a feeling about this. I'm just going to end up saying something stupid.

But I think we're going to find out some practices that are real. Like, I'm really looking forward to going to Australia to barcode Ray, which is everything in that bar from the floor to the everything has been from repurposed materials. Okay. Apparently.

So that's the whole point, the deep dive. Oh, this is repurposed materials. Where'd you get it from? Like, what's this back?

Like, is this, are you just telling me or can I, you know, can we do this? No, oh, this is a glass of repurposed, but is it or is it from a massive company industry? You know, like, let's challenge every element to it. And that's where I say, you know, we might find some bullshit or not.

That's a whole point. Yeah, that's kind of it. And so you're, you're just a question about brands, right? So in both my closes, when they ask me, Hey, do you want to run my deck, recumbat thing, I'm like, this is a, this is a collaboration specifically for console competitions in the realm.

So I'm not going to run any other console competition in the realm in the meantime. Right. But that's your, that's your playing field. So I just, you know, if I get, if I'm doing a guest bar thing with another round, don't get upset.

If I'm going to do something in another field, don't get upset. So authority cany came to me. I was like, Hey, I'm already doing a very transparent load. So poke our hands up.

I'm already running this cocktail comp, you know, on several markets with this brand. Is that cool with you? And the authority cany guy goes, I want you to do a documentary, maybe a series of us, say, really, I couldn't give a funny fuck about a deck or a console belt. Right.

So that's cool. You know, so they, you know, that that's it. I guess it's easier with brands that are a bit more dependent as well. And so the smaller I don't think the agile Jesus Christ, I didn't podcast with them.

The amount of NDA's inside. I don't know. Oh, is that right? That doesn't surprise me.

Yeah. Well, we're going to give you the NDA for this one after this show. Um, yeah, no, that's, I mean, that is pretty awesome though. Like, like you said, it's sort of like smaller independent brands are, and I like it to how like, like, for instance, in my business, I own bars.

So three or four independent bars in my area, like I like to look at us as all working together as opposed to bring like awareness to a certain area of the city. So people come, because no one wants to hang out in the same bar all night. Everybody wants to bounce around, right? So rather than working, looking at the bar next door to mine as competition, I look, like, look to them as like partners.

And so maybe that's kind of what we're getting with these brands as well, where they're like, let's just bring awareness to rum in general. And that helps like on rising tide lifts all boats. Yeah, would you rather have a small cake or a bigger piece of a massive ass cake? You know, right?

And the other end of it, I think now it's just kind of like, it's almost lame to be like, I love competition because it get me all riled up and I want to do stuff. It pushes me to try harder. But it's kind of like, most jealousy comes from your own insecurity. And most jealousy comes from your own lack of, you know, you're doing something wrong.

So you're, you're lashing out. And so what I, but communication is key. I just, the number one thing in everything, it's just communicate. 30 can you came to me, I told Ron Colone, I'm speaking to 30 can you, they're like, thank you for letting us know it's all cool with us.

You know, if I just said now, I'm working with 30 can you have to be like, Oh, yo, you're working with us already? You know, so it's communication is so so key. Like, it's the funny thing about the irony of the bar industry. We're so good at communicating with guests.

But we can't tell our manager we're unhappy about something with it because, you know, or we can't, when our manager knows something's wrong, what does it kind of seem to be able to just sit somebody down and do worship, you know, and figure it out. And if you're at a bar and you find you're unhappy with a wine selection there, then you should be written as a Rick Beren jelly, Rick at the case for wine.com. He's got the 2017 premiere crew domain, Rainion Christian, which is a beautiful burgundy pin on the wire. And it's perfect for summer shipping.

And then once again, that's Rick Beren jelly, Rick at the case for wine.com. Yeah, sorry, I left my train. I thought I read in the ad cut. You should do this, you should do this ad.

But then Dan just sits there and has a whole bottle with like a speed pour in it and just like, or reviews it in the moment. Five as in, five as in, it's like three glasses of wine. Yeah, we got to sell a lot more ads to afford this wind and pressuring. We're not doing a premier crew burger.

Stick on your contract. Yeah. Any winds I'm repping? I got to get a bottle.

Can we talk a little bit about what was the social media platform was cocktails for you, correct? Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if you want to talk about this because it's sort of in your past, but I'm sort of interested in that platform because I've definitely seen it on social media, obviously, it's massively popular.

So talk to me about how you develop that with your partner and share. So no, no, it's it's any sound. So any, any of it's in this case is a good friend of mine. We're still good.

Like we spoke yesterday. So everything's groovy. He founded it in 2012. Eddie is a Lithuanian Irish, I guess, is the best we described it.

And he lives in a 7,000 people small town called Monathan in Ireland. And he's a bartender. He was in the IDA. If anyone here knows what the IDA is, the oldest bar organization, largest in the world.

And they love to do a couple of competitions where you hold a bottle and you're like, Hey, this is students, sir. Oh, cool. And stuff. But he's a part of that.

He was like a silver melist. And basically back in the day, it was on his Facebook right Facebook was the platform. And he went to sort of separate his private life with his like cocktail site. And he didn't want to post on his own private Facebook constantly stuff about cocktails because it just gets, you know, like, dude, so he made this page called cocktails for you.

He couldn't think of a better name, put it all together. Next thing, you know, just put his cocktail photos on there. And that's, you know, social media networks changed and it became less about you and your friends. It's like ads and pages started popping up.

People started sharing the content. So it was just kind of like the first cocktail dedicated Facebook page. And well, no, 50 bartender. Let's give, let's be honest.

Yeah. The freshman college of cocktails. So when it was the first one that was industry sort of focus, and people started contacting him going, yo, can I send you one of my creations? Not just like, and he was at first, he was like, Hey, John, sweet, it's about me.

And then he realized like actually there's nothing wrong with that. I can't always have time to create content or whatever because he's still bartending full time in that small town. So he started sharing other people's creations and that kind of grew. And it was the first page, you know, first kind of, it was it was a creator.

It was just a platform, an MCD music, so to say. And that's how it exploded. You know, it's almost like 1.5 or 2 million followers on Facebook. Now when I joined and me and Eddie Medi-Cock took on the competition, we got drunk together.

It turns out we have a lot of comments, both Eastern Europeans, moving to Western Europe, both speaking English have like Eastern European roots. And so we'll go to like fucking camels, who just got along. And then I was leaving my bar at the time, it's 2016, I was leaving my bar called Tales of Spirits, which was at the time 50 best bar. And he was like, yo, do you want to come in work for me?

Because I'm just doing this really, really stupid idea. I basically blew all my money. There's a pattern you notice I blow all my money. You can keep making it back.

Just lose it all again. So I basically, all the money I had saved as a bartender, I decided I'm just going to spend it traveling. I was going to work in different bars every month, free of charge up to 40 hours a week, as long as I go to learn something. And so that was my plan.

It's called the Vagabond Project, basically Gypsy for Life. And he was like, hey, why don't you come in and join the company? And I was like, I don't have any money to invest in blowing it all on this project. He's like, well, if you do that under my umbrella, we can talk about share, you know, shareholder.

And so I was like, cool, how much is your company worth? He's like, we don't make any money. I'm like, how do you know, how do you make no money with 200,000 followers on Facebook and 50,000 on Instagram? And like, this is like 2000.

He's been running it for four years. And he's like, I don't know. I'm just no one's ever offering a sponsorship. So I'm like, no, I feel like I want to beg.

I'm like, all right. So I basically, we incorporated a new company, it was an LCD and whatever it's a limited company. And I was a 50% shareholder and we split everything 50, whatever. And I was like, this is development.

And then I my buy in was that the only money I was blowing on this project was going to go under his umbrella. And so he still had the original page, but we put all the funnel of money to this company. And so that was kind of it. But what ended up happening was because I was traveling for 18 months all over the world, bartending for free, I was so I got a really cheap global brand ambassador.

And so that suddenly they managed to put like a logo to a face. And so it ended up happening that we ended up exponentially growing, because also the time of people really pushing like pages and this kind of stuff, it was just right place, right time as Instagram is exploding as Facebook was exploding, take a bit of a bit of it didn't even exist. And everybody was really getting into cocktails, right? Before 2020, right?

It was just where we're peak, peak, everything. And that was it. That was, you know, I don't want to, there was no secret sauce. It was just 18 months of traveling to a different country every month.

And hey, I'm from consoles for you. That's put you online. Oh my God, this is amazing. And so next thing, you know, brands just come themselves over, start getting brand sponsorship, the partnership and that's when I developed the retainer thing.

So we started getting annual retainers with different companies. And that's kind of how it went. Crazy. And so when you were doing all this traveling around, that's an awesome idea, by the way, just traveling to all these different countries and different bars to learn.

What were some of your favorite experiences in specific countries of ours? Honestly, they were all pretty cool. I think there's a lot you learn. I know there's a lot of stuff I didn't like after your fifth country.

I ran a song to buildings. We don't give a shit anymore. It's all Renaissance. It's like, this is all Renaissance Museum.

Yeah, like every other fucking European country like this. It's not cool anymore, you know? But I think the cool thing about it was cultural differences, right? A lot of people don't realize how culturally different all these different places are.

I can, you know, I went through, I was quickly going to like quick fire, you know, in Norway. I was there for a month. And these people, they don't really, they open up when they're shit-hannered. They're a lot more calm.

They're a lot more like very respectful, very politically correct, and all this kind of stuff. But after mid-like, just like remnants, after no alcohol, the death metal comes out and it just becomes mental, you know? So there's those people, right? Then there is South Africa for a month.

I didn't realize how racism is intensely mental in that part of the world compared to where I'm from. We think like Rosa Parks said it bad. Jesus Christ, I have a story where I'm in Durban, South Africa. And I'm just, I'm just bartending.

I'm just setting up. We just open up. And they have the largest expatriate population of Indian people in the world, because of the slave trade. People can realize there's two million Indian slaves came to South Africa.

So while they were exporting South African people, well African people to America, they were importing Indians. That's crazy. Yeah. You would never learn that unless you went there, you know, just kind of historical facts.

But now they have 2.5 million Indians living there, especially in this area, and their sugar came there. South Africa makes rum. South Africa has tequila. They have agaves.

They grow there. It's just crazy. And this guy comes in with this lady. They obviously, you know, they're not comfortable.

They sit down. He goes to the washroom and then he's there for a while since taking a shit, obviously. And this other dude comes in the bar, he's also Indian, right? Indian local, right?

And this other dude comes in and starts hitting on the chick in this like mixture of South African English dialects and some Indian, South African English dialects. I have no idea what they're saying. Sort of English. And the other guy comes back and he gets into a huge life.

You're hitting on my chick situation. I'm like, oh, come on. It's just starting to shift. Yeah, that's what you mean, right?

Yeah. And then this thing happens, which just blows my mind. The guy who came out of the toilet goes, you can't hit an ear because you're black. And I'm just like, I'm East in European whites.

Right. I'm like, I'm just, and the guy next to me is East in European white as well. And I'm like, I think, like, I think realize, we're the whitest guys in the room. I'm calling him Black.

And then what I realized after the first guy left, he was trying to explain that in their culture, if you're a darker skinned in the Indian community, that means you work on the fields. So that the whole like house or fields situation. I got to be a lighter. That means you work in offices, you're a higher class.

Right. They have like a classes and racism is the most crazy thing in the world. And you know, this is how long it's got to be racist for you to have developed a class system within that racism. That's fucking crazy.

Dude, it was so mental. And then I, you know, so it was like a moment. I'm just like, this blows my mind. I have no idea.

Everything I believe in just them crashing down. So there was moments like this, you know, there was another moment that I was in, I was in Hungary. And I was serving who was in my gashift. And we had a local paper come down because they much to sell me as this like amazing dude taking photos.

They did that. I realized there was an American Hollywood star in the bar who was from that film Dracula, whatever it's called, a new one. He was in the Hobbit as well. Like I, who was the human in the Hobbit, the new film was seen.

Let me just check. You'll know about Dracula film. Apparently Hungary is very, very big for Hollywood movies. I don't know.

Brown Stoker's Dracula, it's stupid for whatever. It's gonna be when I say it, you'll understand the Hobbit. Cool. So who's this guy from?

Fuck him. Someone listening will know any mail is if you know who the fucking person is, the industry vodka. Yeah, the guy who plays the human kid in the village with the water and whatever. So he's in the bar and I'm serving drinks and photographers taking photos of me for the local paper and the drinks bit.

And he's there for, I didn't recognize him. So just like a little bit of a thing around, I didn't recognize him as a bar writer. And he just slabs his drink down. I was like, okay, I got anywhere in the city with people recognizing me.

And he just walks out and we're all standing there going like, what? Everyone's just like oblivious. And I'm like, did he please go? I like, and then the funny thing is, I was a good like, 20 seconds of silence is a long amount of time when you're all just confused.

And then somebody in the room was like, oh, you're ruining it for me. I was trying to take like Instagram stories of him. And I'm like, what? I was a famous person.

He was a famous Hollywood actor. Building a film. He thought nobody recognized them and he thought that the journalists went into photos of me. I really didn't take photos of me.

Yeah, crazy. And actual nobody. So it was this bit like that, different parts of the world. I was in Kazakhstan and I had fermented horse milk and fermented camel milk.

That was weird. And they drink that stuff there. And it's like a friend of Branca for them. It's just makes you ship self.

Just things happen. You know, well, you've had a crazy career. Like, it's super fascinating. And I just love how you just keep reinventing yourself and coming up with new and like original creative ways to sort of spread our industry all over the world.

So thanks for everything you do. And thanks for coming on the show. And let's talk about how people can follow you and learn about your ship. Honestly, it's just, I do everything on Instagram at the moment, just me and my wife is the co-owner of my company.

So at Cogtill Nan is what I do. I do everything with their humor, which can sometimes be a little bit agey for people. So I pre-worn everybody over the lights, disposition. I like to make fun out of myself and the industry because I feel like, you know, it's hard enough already.

You know, everyone in the bartending is the most greatest job of the world, like hands down. The way I explain this is that, you know, you could be a bartender, you go to Fiji, I don't know what I'm saying is you can be a Fiji, but imagine you're in a beach bar at Fiji and you somehow explain to the bartender working, Hey, I'm also a bartender. And maybe you get a beer, get shot, whatever you have sit down. And after an hour or two, you guys are now you people that are there.

You are you're on the same level. We're both in the industry. And maybe that person gets slammed and you might end up helping clean glasses or cleaning tables. You could just jump behind and help out and that's going to be super super great and appreciated.

Now, if you're a chef and you go to Paris and you go, Hey, I can make quadsos. They're not going to go, Oh, no problem. Here's a thing. We're going to go with that.

Shop it and help us out. You know, bartending is the only session where that can happen. It's universal. It goes beyond culture.

It goes beyond borders. It's super, I think it's like anthropology study of people. And I think the reason for that is because bartenders see so many people every single day. And we handle such a cause we're like human relations, right?

And I think that this is where we are important in this sort of sense, we become like shepherds of society because you get a, that's why I think I love it. And I think that's why it's easy to stay creative as long as you open the stuff, you know, when you travel, you know, you could work in a bar in a box box central for 40 years and be the greatest bartender in a box central. But you know, when you travel to the place, you become bigger, you, you, you, you gain more experience to meet people and you get better at dealing with shit, you know. And I think that's what makes it great.

It's more of a spiritual thing as opposed to a financially great thing. And that's why you love it. I guess you can't be with a bunch of bars you mentioned earlier. That's why you become spiritual than one of ours.