E236 Melissa Brennan

This week's guest is Melissa Brennan, who joins us from Vancouver, British Columbia. Born and raised in Toronto, Melissa has over a decade of experience behind the bar. Having previously worked at such notable establishments in Toronto as Bar-Raval, 416, Snack Bar, Short-Turn, and Mother, Melissa made the move to the West Coast of Canada where she's currently behind the wood at Mount Pleasant Vintage and Provisions. Melissa is also a brand ambassador for Ellevison in 1250, at Tequila Brand owned and distilled by women.

In our interview with Melissa, she discusses her journey in the service industry, starting off as a host and transitioning to bartender. We talk about the significant changes in the bar industry post-pandemic and the challenges faced by young professionals in the field. We explore the declining interest in the service industry as a long-term career and the importance of creating a supportive work environment. We also talk about Melissa's current role as an assistant bar manager and brand ambassador while touching on the balance between tradition and innovation in the spirits industry and the importance of supporting bars through signature cocktails.

One additional note, Melissa's fiancé Ben Kingstone was a previous guest of the show on episode 151, so make sure to check out that episode too. You can also find Melissa online on Instagram at melissa.brennan and make sure you check out the show notes as always for all the links. Enjoy the show. Alright, we're back with another episode of the industry podcast.

I'm Kip. This is Dan. What's happening? Not too much, thanks for joining us for a couple weeks of working for the remote now.

Yeah, that's right. So now you're done leaving your house at all. Completely. I don't even leave the house go to the liquor store.

You should have our friend Alcoma's alley over to bring your cocktails in because then you don't want to leave the house and go to the bar anymore. Yeah, the restaurant's actually a couple minutes away, walking distance. You'll never make it. It's alchemist.ally if you're looking for anything that she offers which is cocktail classes.

She'll do parties at your house. She will. What else will she do then? I'm going to leave a bar looking to revamp your bar program.

Ali can help you out with that. As I mentioned, he just cocktails classes or want to host for an event for now. Summertime, summertime backyard barbeque. We're a wedding and anniversary birthday party show or baby shower, bridal shower.

That's her thing. That's your girl to run your program. She can help you out with anything alcohol and mocktail related. Alcoma is not.

Sorry. Yeah, I will have a link on the show notes as always. Yeah, unlike you, I'm always out the house and I'm like, all the time with these new gigs. And I tell you, it's been good for anger management.

I drive it all over the province. I'm going to hear me out though because I'll be driving along having a great day. having a great day, listen to music or podcast or whatever, driving to the next location in Ontario. And then all it takes is one car to slow down and turn without putting their signal light on.

And then I'll just lose my fucking chair. And now all that anger is gone for the rest of the day. I think that any reputable therapists will tell you that that's a gangbusters way of handling it. Sure is.

I got things covered. And if you want to know what is happening with that business, it's kipsonders at gmail.com, K-Y-P-P-S-A-U-N-D-R-S at gmail.com for wine from Malaguar Winery or Terawai Wine or a liquor from the Lord of Stillery. Yeah, so email me there to find out what's going on there. If you like what we're doing here on the show, the best way you can help us is to subscribe, rate, review, or just tell a friend.

Yeah, telling your friends the easiest thing to do takes about a minute and just shares the reach of the show, which definitely helps us out a lot. Yeah, and if you'd like to be a guest on the show, you can email us at infoathenestrypodcast.club or you can DM us at the industry podcast on Instagram where you find amazing artwork from zachanadsachanad.co. So that's a K-H-A-N-H-A-W-N-A-H.co for all your graphic arts needs. If you're in the kitchen area, come visit my bar, Sugar Run.

That's at Sugar Run Bar at on Instagram to find out everything that's going on there. What else? Anything? No, I think Michael should mention ambibia.

Oh, of course the prevention of the presenting sponsor of the industry podcast are good friends at Ambibia. How can I forget? Tell us all about ambibia. Sure, ambibia is a cocktail app for bartenders, restaurants, and drink nerds built by a bartender with more than a decade of experience behind the bar.

Thoroughly researched historical variations of classics included with extensive notes on history and methods. Right now it's on version 2.02 and this version includes professional profiles featuring showcase recipes and flavor profiles for all recipes and ingredients, search by flavor list creation and curation, feature requests, and most importantly the recipe builder, a unique and comprehensive interface for creating recipe cards or drinks. Builder features hundreds of icon options for methods, garnishes, and glasses. Builder also features a constant growing selection of ingredients which can be selected using all popular forms of measurements.

And yeah, including more nuanced cases specific to cocktails, notably float, rinse, nest, dash, and smoke. Ingrated info cards now also feature suggested substitutes based on flavor profiles, the database of flavor profiles for its kind, enabling search by flavor and a custom recommendation algorithm. And once again, that's done by Jean-Mrak Dykes. I've been Biblioth, and you can always find links to that in the show notes.

In Biblioth, it's an invaluable tool. Okay, well certainly that's all we have to talk about. Yes. Okay, let's get to our guests then joining us from Vancouver as well as Brandon.

How are you? Hi, I'm well. How are you doing? We're doing very well.

Thank you very much for joining us on special show notice. We appreciate it. We had a post moment. So thanks for filling in.

Of course, happy to. Yeah, we just bumped you up a ladder a few months. We're doing great. Yeah, so, okay, so most of you grew up in Toronto or that's I grew up in the St.

Clair area of Toronto and spent the first 20, what, oh my, 20, seven years of my life there. And I've been in Vancouver for just over a year now, which has been a very nice change, honestly. But I will never not love Toronto, but this has been a great bit for me. It's a different vibe, entirely.

Yes. And yeah, I think I still love Toronto. I've got many dear friends there and I go back and visit often. But this has been a really nice move for me in the later part of my 20s, for sure.

What prompted the move? My partner. Yeah, but of a funny love story there, it started on King West and then didn't really go anywhere. And then years later, we reconnected actually at Brandi's of all places in Vancouver for those who don't know.

It's like the industry hotspot exotic dance bar that's open till three AM. And I kind of just never left after that. Oh, nice. Amazing.

So what was your first job in the service industry? My very first job in the service industry was at Lavelle on King Street West. I was 20, barely funny, I think. And I was a host, a girlfriend of mine, worked there.

She was like, you should come work with us. It's really fun. It's just a bunch of us girls and we get to fuck around and be silly together. And I had actually just dropped out of university and was a little lost as to what to do.

So I took the opportunity and really one thing left to another. And I clearly never left the industry and I'm happy I worked out this way honestly. And what was your first experience behind an actual bar? Like when did you get your first experience bartending?

I got really lucky. I've had a lot of pretty awesome mentors in my career. I was at Lavelle for a handful of months. It was really infatuated and intrigued with bartending.

And I moved just down King Street West to a place called West Lodge a few months later. RIP to that wonderful place. But moved there as a host. And within a few months, I became good friends with one of the managers there.

And he was like, you're cool. I'm taking you with me. I'm opening up a pub on Blur Street as a same company. And he was like, I'm making a bartender.

And I had zero experience. And I was terrified. And it was definitely a shit show for the first little bit. But I was like, I dove right in.

I was reading all the books. I was asking all the questions, sitting at my friends bars, asking questions being nerdy. And from there, I just kind of kept propelling forward and upward. So when you get from behind the bar, there's you had basically no knowledge of any class of cocktails or anything at that point?

I had only what I had learned from being at West Lodge and sitting at the bar after work and maybe having a couple too many and asking a lot of questions. I don't ever forget one of the most embarrassing things. I mean, I'm pretty over it now. But I was mortified at the time.

The owner of the company asked me on the opening night to make him a grownee. And I made it wrong. I mean, I think I made it with Jen Campari and Aperol. And I think he liked the luck shot at it.

And he didn't want to say anything. And he didn't say anything. But I knew pretty soon after I was like, Oh, fuck, I fucked that up so badly. I made it wrong again.

But I had never been behind a bar before to learn how to move and remember my drinks. And I was like, I got really into it. I got a notebook and I wrote everything down and measured the distance between the lines and made sure I had the most perfect organized notebook of classics and studied it as much as I could. And then, yeah, I had some sweet people around me that just put up something to their wing and showed me the way.

So do you find that you're more of like someone who learns by studying than in practice or is it a little bit above? Oh, god, no, I have to do something to I can read a spec or a book a million times. I can have an idea about it, but until I make it or do it, like that's the key that like bakes it into my brain. Yeah.

So was that they have like their own, was it was a lot of craft? Excuse me. Was there a lot of craft dealing or was it kind of like a wannabe bougie pub like a step above a second? I don't know, Fox and Taylor.

Okay, go to write home about. But I'm glad that it gave me my start for sure. But yeah, there was like, somehow it's classics that were basic, whatever drinks, but it taught me how to like build things and why you put certain things together and also just understand like what the classics are. But yeah, it was it was honestly of all the places to be thrown behind the bar was zero experience whatsoever.

It was a great place to do it. And my boss who took me there right now are sorry, my boss who took me there. He's actually still a really good friend of mine, actually officiating my wedding mixture. Yeah, we stayed close.

Yeah, I'm like so grateful to him for just kind of seeing something in me and and giving me that like first step towards where I'm at now. It's kind of the ideal spot to first get your like major main bartending experience in a way because you're get like so many people in their first bar jobs, I think starting like places where you just like cracking beers and making bar rail drinks like drinks for the recipes on the title sort of thing. So at least you were getting some experience making classic cocktails, but not being overwhelmed with like crazy signature cocktails and exactly. And you know what that actually about place taught me a lot about like being organized, I think, because as all young bartenders are you get stuck on or most I guess you get stuck on the day shifts.

So I would be another day girl and sometimes be the only person in the restaurant. And you can put like, and tables in a full wood and you can drink so everyone. So learning how to be efficient and multitask, I think that was like as much as I have some PTSD from that job. It was a really good takeaway for sure.

Right, wait, wait, what was the bar where you first started making sort of your own drinks or god, like some sort of say in the cocktail menu? So I, my entry to the cocktail world, I was a king west gal for a while bartending was where I got my start. I'm grateful for most of that. I had been at a restaurant, don't need to name it, but they, it was the end of the first wave of COVID where restaurants were kind of just starting to reopen that there were a ton of rules around it.

And I, so it was only outdoor dining and I was bartending inside and they decided to cut the bar out of the tip pool. So I was watching a 1% tip out with another person and not having a wood. And they were just being kind of shitty to me. My dad actually happened to be there that day.

And I was like, I've kind of done a few of the things in the past. And read me the wrong way. And this is not my character, but someone just came up and I was like, fuck this, I'm out of here. I was like, dad, do you want to go to a 416ac bar?

He was like, yeah, good idea. So I was like, thank you so much for your time. And I left and I went to a 416ac bar with my dad where I met Sally Gillespie, who was the barman at the bar at the time. And I was like, I just quit my job.

And I had never met her before. And she was like, cool, do you want to come work for me at a bar about? And I was like, really? And she was like, yes.

So that was, and then she became one of my biggest influences and mentors and was the first person to really put me on and bring me into the cocktail world. So wait, just, just I had this happen exactly because that sounds like out of a movie. So you're just a dog. I went to the bar with my dad.

I met Sally an hour later and she offered me a job at barbell. Like you met her, like you were just talking to her, she was working or like, no, she wasn't working her partner, Adrian Novinsky. I was like, I ended up going on to work there years later. But finally, yeah, but again, it was everyone was outside.

There's no one hanging on the sidewalk. And I was with my dad and he just loves to work the room and talk people up. And so we ended up just chatting with Sally, who I've never met. And she was like, don't come work for me.

Oh, that's great. Really was super center put us and like, I'm so grateful for that. The one time I like had some backbone to because I'm not really that type of person to just up and leave like that. But I'm so glad I did.

It was hard to remember that time, even now, like that crazy time. I know it's like at the time it was just seemed all consuming and it wasn't even that many years ago. But like, I still have a hard time remembering that exactly though, like I remember the situation because I remember being like only a lot of 10 people inside and all this shit and how terrible it was for my business. And like my one bar is well, the only bar I still have is a, is a speak easy.

It's downstairs in a basement. We don't have a patio. So yeah, it was just fucking brutal. Like somehow, even though that was a devastating time for the business, it seems like so far so long ago now.

Like I can hardly remember it. Yeah, like almost like it didn't really happen. Yeah. And like, you know that it did, but it just feels so yeah, what a trippy time.

And I'm so glad it's so funny. The other thing I feel that like, the only reason I know what that it happened is because the bar industry has not come all the way back yet. Like, you can tell we're just not as busy as we used to be right. Like, so like, that's how you know, but like.

There's a kind of a different energy about it. I feel. I don't know how to explain it. Maybe part of it's just because certain people went their separate ways and it just was really like a, real like change in time.

But there is something palpable that's like a different, I feel. There's three main things that I can put my finger on because I think I don't have to think about it a lot. But like the one is that I don't feel like the week nights are as busy as they used to be. Like most people kind of people don't have so much money, right?

So they can't go out as often as they used to. And so it tends to be very concentrated on Friday and Saturday, even more so than it used to be in the bar industry. I also think that people are looking to be entertained when they go out now, whereas before you could just be like, we're a cool bar, I've opened my doors, come check it out. Now it's like, you got to give them a reason to come to your spot.

And then the third thing, I think, is that the whole industry, because like you said, a bunch of people left the industry and some of them, a lot of them have come back because they found out that the nine to five gig was not what they were hoping for. And it's probably why they were in the industry in the first place. But a lot of them didn't come back. And now we have a much younger like sort of labor force in the bar industry.

So that has changed the vibe about everything as well. Absolutely. I think that's quite astute. I would say, from the age of bartenders that I'm from is West Lodge, for example, was such an era and such a moment.

And so many sick people came through that place. And I was still a baby when I went through there. So I wasn't in the full swing of it. But I saw it and I was like, gobsmacked by it and infatuated by it.

And then the world just came to a halt shortly after. And I want to bring that energy back, hopefully in a little bit of a healthier way, a little bit of debauchery in there, for sure. But yeah, I think a lot like the newer people, sorry for my dogs, the newer younger people in the industry, like never really got to see that world. That's right.

And there tends to be, I like, there's always exceptions to this rule. But I feel like the younger generation that's coming through the industry now, there seems to be fewer of them that are looking at the service industry as a career, and more just kind of a placeholder till they find the real gig. We always had people like that. But there's more of them now.

Yeah, I would kind of agree with that. Generally speaking, it's kind of why I really like to understand what the people I work with want out of the situation, what their expectations are, because I think if we're all going to be here, and I'm here for the foreseeable future, and you're here for excellent time, let's find a way to make it sick for all of us. If you can at least take it seriously and invest as much as you're willing to while you're here, like we can still do some dope stuff and have some really cool experiences, even though this isn't the be all-end all for you. How do you think we can get some of the younger generation more excited about this as a potential career again?

Because I feel like you said, right before the pandemic, there was plenty of people in your age at the time who were definitely feeling that way, but excited about mixology was hot at that time as well, right? Lots of mixology influencers and TV programs and what have you. I talked prior to the cocktail influencer, I would say, but yeah, it was like, people were really excited about it at that time, for sure. So what do you think we could do to get a younger generation more excited about it again?

That's a really good question, I think a lot of it kind of comes down to longevity, in my opinion, because for me, I'm applying to my life where I'm trying to plan my next steps and hospitality is my career. Whether that is behind the bar or not, I still want to be in this space, but some of the things that prevent that from happening, benefits are big ones, taking care of your body, taking care of your mind. It's just not a sustainable place for a lot of people for those reasons. So I think employers who invest in their stuff is probably the number one way to get the most amount of longevity out of them, which is hard.

I get it, especially for small business owners, that's no small task. Benefits are expensive. But I think there's ways to inspire that within. For example, where I work right now, I don't know if that's right now, I've had them before, but they do try to do things like offer free yoga classes.

We go rock climbing and go sawn in cold country and things that try to promote general being, but obviously, it's not a direct substitute for benefits, but it certainly can help promote people taking care of themselves. That is what is going to allow people to stick around. Right. Sure.

You got to offer some sort of incentive sometimes, right? If you can't report the benefits, it helps promote people in the right way. So that's always a good thing. And good team building is up too.

Yeah. I think the other thing too is offering interesting opportunities. Everyone is all about the gas shift right now, the competition getting to travel for their job. That's a huge joint factor for a ton of people, myself included, who doesn't want to get paid to go to Mexico or New Orleans or what?

Pretty sweet. So I think from the brand's perspective, continuing to offer opportunities like that for people to engage in community and build those relationships and get people opportunities to see new spaces, see what other people across your city or country or the world are doing is super important. Yeah. That's one thing.

One of the few positive things that came out of the pandemic, and we talked about a lot on this show, is the fact that so many people were forced to come up with creative ways to try and monetize their skillset as bartenders and servers or what have you know, like setting up a restaurant anymore because they weren't around. So that has helped. And now there's all these things, there's a ton of new jobs that you can do in the service industry that didn't exist before. Yeah, no, that's actually super fair.

I think that's really cool too. We're like, a really interesting evolution that hopefully can, you know, make it a sustainable career path for people. I still don't really know what I want to do in five years from now because eventually I want to settle down and have a family and that's, I know it's possible to do while bartending. I don't have a game plan for it right now.

So I'm definitely looking at other opportunities for myself how to like hone and maximize on the experiences that I have and what I can offer that's not necessarily making the cocktails myself. Yeah, well, it's kind of good because it's like, I'm not sure that any of these jobs would have been created if not for the fact that we were forced to think of them, right? But you, one of the things you've done is you've been, you've sort of moved yourself into a brand ambassador role as well. So talk to us a little bit about that.

I do have a part time ambassador role with a brand called Alabasseon 1250. So tequila brand that is made by a woman named Iliana Partita, which is a fourth generation master distiller. And I think one of, I believe one of four women in Mexico who are master distiller and CEO of their own company, which is pretty cool. And she's just like such a baddie.

I could, I like want to be her when I grow up, honestly. But yeah, it's definitely a different side of the industry than I'm used to. And there's a little bit of like growing pains or just, I don't know, I'm having to exercise new muscles that I haven't had to use before, or haven't had to use in a very long time. So it's been really cool in that regard.

But yes, I was like super super passionate about women's issues, talking about women, hiking up women, I love women. I think they're best. And I think that there's a, like a lot of conversations to be had about women in the industry and kind of back to what you asked about how can we get younger people excited. I think a huge part of that is taking care of the young people who entered the industry.

I went through a lot of shit when I started out when I was younger, shit that went fly today, all kinds of horrible misconduct. And I'm really passionate about looking after the people that I work with right now, I try to offer resources, I'm actually in the process of going through some stuff to offer management training where I work over on like social harassment, like sensitivity training, things like that. Because if you can't, like we were going to business, it's like drug and alcohol field at the end of the day, you can't look after the young people who come to the door and are going to inevitably come across some kind of bullshit. Like, how can you expect them to stick around?

I've said this before, if I wasn't so passionate about this industry in what I do, I would have loved it really long time ago. Yeah, that's right. And I think that that's one of the things that's actually definitely changing for the better. It's certainly, it's a completely different situation than I grew up in in the service.

I'm a lot older than you, but like back when I was in my twenties, it was like the Wild West industry, right? So, and there were no rules, there was nothing, there were no rules about anything, really, there were certainly no HR departments, no like, you know what I mean? Like, yeah, like lots of inappropriate behavior, all the time was the norm. Like nobody felt like it was inappropriate.

Now, looking back at it, you know, now, of course, oh my God. Like, I can't believe that we were, that was the ship we were doing all the time, but like, now, like looking back at it for sure, but at the time, it was just like, that was just the industry, that's how people behave. That's like, that's what you learned, because that's what the people who were older and you were, that's how they were behaving, right? Like, and that goes down to like chef's ill as well, like throwing shit around the back and screaming at people.

For sure. And I've seen a couple of those that comes, you know, there's a few factors that play for sure, but really the thing that I'm kind of most passionate about right now in this space is taking care of women amplifying their voices, looking after the young women who are around people who, like those, I know it's not always girls, but in many instances, the sweet young girls at the front door, they encounter more shit than you'll ever know about. Like the hostesses, yeah, yeah. And there's such an overlooked part of the team, but part of the team, and people like don't even think to check on them or ask like, you know, I have said this to people I work with and started some conversations.

I'm like, there are things that have been said to them, done to them that you will never know about because they don't want to talk about it. It's not necessarily, you know, they don't necessarily feel safe to. So I will like, surely, don't go on that hill after people informal positions like that. And it's interesting you say that too, because like so many people, that's the first job that they get.

Exactly. Yeah, I was there, right? And so if that's your experience with the with your first job in the service industry, why would you want to stick around, right? Exactly.

I'm so glad that I love what I do because there were times when I was like, is this fucking worth it? Yeah. Well, I think that part of it is like there's some of it you can control with like providing a safer and more respectful workplace. Like that's on all of us to do that with any industry.

But there's not a lot that the other side of it is like, how do you deal with like the fucking behavior from guests that just feel like they can talk down to the host and and like be sometimes verbally abusive terrible to them? Like that's a harder thing to control. It is a harder thing to control because I think that when you're dealing with so many situations, you do have to be tactful. It's not always like get the fuck out of your fucking you sort of friend.

Sometimes it is in which case, ciao. But you know, I think also like if you call people out gently, it's like a lot better than saying fuck you if you kind of look at them, you're like, do you really like to say that to like, yeah, like, are you okay? Oh my goodness, do you need a minute, like and kind of flip it around. People are usually like, once you make them aware of their behavior, one of the time they're pretty comfortable.

I'm sorry, like that was my bad. I should have said that I should have done that. I'm drunk or whatever the case may be. But at the end of the day, you as an establishment are responsible for what kind of space you create.

And if you allow and tolerate certain behaviors, like that's what's going to happen. Like, I've heard places are shit was tolerated that really, really shouldn't have been. And I left for that reason. So the important thing about a certain portion of humanity is that they will take their shitty behavior to whatever bar you said it at.

So if you said it at a bar of allowance at a certain like height, then they're going to go all the way to that height. But if you said it at a much lower level, then that's then that's the level you said and that's as far as they can go. For sure. And like, I don't want to sound like too much of a Debbie downer.

I think we actually live like exists in a space of extremes, like the best of the best of people. And we see the worst of the worst of people in some sense. A lot of people are benign and whatever. But like, you I've had some amazing guest experiences like, oh, incredible.

And this is what I love about the job. It's got incredible relationships with regulars who have become friends who have met my family who have, you know, been incredibly generous to me and taking me to do things to lovely dinners, get a wonderful gifts and wine and become like close personal friends, like that. Like, that's wonderful. We do get to see like the really wonderful, generous and raw side of people.

Unfortunately, and again, I don't want to say that it's it's rampant because I would say I generally have way more positive experiences with people than negatives. But it's really important to handle those negatives delicately and deal with them properly to make sure that we can like, just have some fucking respect for the people. You know, it's really not that hard. Well, I like we said earlier too, because there's a certain art to like subtly embarrassing someone into recognizing their shitty behavior, right?

Like, and the other thing too, is like just trying to put yourself in other people's head space. Like, some of that being like complete prick, then there's probably some underlying reason that's nothing to do with you or your bar restaurant. Right? You know, I've had it before.

You know, I've worked in some crazy like more nightclub-y settings and people like, Hey, hey, over here, whatever. And if you just, I've, you know, been able to straight up say like, if you snuck your fingers at me, I'm not going to serve you. Yeah. But I'm so like, I'm so sorry.

Like, yeah, yeah, shape up. But sometimes like, I used to not feel like I had a voice and a lot of that was because of the way I was treated early on in my career and specifically how men spoke to me, made me feel super like small and like I couldn't stick up for myself. And it took me a really, really long time to have a backbone. And I don't know other people for that back then when I needed it.

So I'm so glad I have it now because, you know, it's not everyone who gets treated like shit is able to stick up themselves. I used to, I did some like, like work before, I used to when people would be waiting or snapping. I would just stop what I was doing and speak to the rest of the bar and be like, this guy down here clearly thinks he's more important than the rest of you and needs to get served before you. Is everyone cool if I go serve him first?

That's awesome. Yeah. And that would end that problem immediately. I actually have a coworker who the other day, because we're working out not pleasant vintage and Vancouver love the spot.

I'm so stoked that I landed there. It was, it's such a good fit for me. But we do on Friday and Saturday is completely changed, styles of service. And we like take away all the bar stools and we had a DJ and a product comes in like, basically, someone that's like waving in his face or snapping at him.

And he was like, hey, I was next. And he goes, watch this. And he took the orders of like seven people around him and was like, what can I get you? What can I get you?

What can I get you? You're writing it down, check his time making that one. It's like the person who's waving in my face is getting served last. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Talk to us a little bit about that place you work in now. So is this like you, you basically move that Vancouver and you got your job at the spot right away?

Yeah. Pretty much again. Another like, sir, in just moment that I'm very grateful for. I admit here, like a couple weeks after my thing, I was having lunch with my partner.

He was like, come eat me at this spot. I had never heard of it. We sat on the patio. We had some lunch.

He had met the bar manager there. His name is Soren Shakowski. Shout out to Soren. He's become a really, really good person in front of mine.

And he was like, man, things are going great, but I really need an assistant bar manager. And I was like, that's so crazy. Because I know if you're never really need a job. And it turned out to be like the best fit I could have asked for.

It's very me. It takes itself just seriously enough that you can make good drinks. We're very lucky to have great equipment. It's what it wrote about in a centrifuge.

Climb on machine and all that stuff. Yeah. But all the toys, but it doesn't take itself that serious. And I don't have to wear an apron or a chef toad and no shade at all to be able to do that because I respect the fuck out of it because I can't do it.

Like, I don't feel like myself. I feel out of body. It's very important to me to feel like myself when I'm working and be myself and be able to be silly and whatever. So it's like the perfect hybrid for me.

So I started there as the assistant bar manager. And then as I got more entrenched in brand ambassador life, I took a step back, which has been awesome. They've been so supportive of me, like not running myself into the ground, trying to do everything at once and accommodating my scheduling needs. And so now I just get the clock in and clock out.

I mean, I care more than that. But yeah, no, I know it's possible for anything. Yeah. It's kind of nice, especially if you've done a lot of that management work in the past to sometimes just take a step back and bartend.

And like they've even noticed, like, I show up and such a good night every day. Yeah. Like it's shocking what a little bit of work life balance. Wait, are you also yelling at other drivers?

Because I coming in and being in a good mood and being stoked to be there and being able to give the guests in front of me a great experience. That's yeah. Yeah. It goes back to longevity and, you know, taking care of people around you.

And they've been so so good to me and accommodating to me. I found out that place is awesome. Well, that's my favorite kind of bar that can make that you said like a place like that that puts a lot of time and care into like the cocktails, but doesn't take itself too seriously. That's like my favorite.

I mean, I like all the spots. Like, I can find something to like, you know, every kind of bar, but like. I'm so with you. Yeah.

But like I do love like I think that my wheelhouse is exactly the type of bar you're describing. It was just like amazing. I know I got a buddy who keeps trying to give me the comment. So yeah, I was a few years ago to thank you for Victoria.

But it was like a short weekend. I went to see Sean at we were in Victoria. I went to see Sean at what's his bar again? No, so when is that now?

No, it was the last one, the hotel bar. I can't remember either now, but Victoria. Not yet been to Victoria. Unfortunately, there's how much to do list this summer.

But as a new to the province gal, I haven't been there yet. But yes, I agree with you. Like, I can find something to like in every bar. I can appreciate the talent and the work that goes into like the crazy molecular, like super high-end stuff.

But that's not necessarily where I feel comfortable every day. This is like, so that bar for me where I could, you know, if you wanted to order a rainbow sign like you went in a heartbeat, but you can also have a PBR and a JMUSM. Right. That's great.

Those are the best kind of bars to me. Like that's my favorite. That's the wheelhouse. So how are you?

So you're trying to balance this with the investor thing now. What like, give it sort of a breakdown of what your responsibilities are with the, like, could you say your part time as a brand ambassador? So what, like, how many hours a week are you putting into it? What specifically are you doing just for people who don't really know what those are?

I'm actually kind of like going through that with a fine-to-face comb right now with the ownership. But my role, it's not technically a sales role, but there is a degree of sales involved because that's kind of how you show the impact of the ambassadorship program. So one of the big, or some of the bigger things that I do is education and brand awareness doing tastings for both bartenders and the general public, doing events, planning parties, things that get people excited, especially things that get decision makers out and in the room, bar managers, people who give a shit about the new ones of tequila. Right.

And also, like, account management event. You know, everyone wants to, if everyone has 12 cocktails or 15 cocktails on a menu, that's a lot to fight for. And there's a lot of deserving talent out there and incredible products and people with a lot of budget. Yeah.

Fight for those spots. So a lot of it is relationship building as well, right? And also the product itself has to be really good. Compete for those places.

And thankfully, one of the things I've always said from the start is, it's so easy for me to get passionate about this product because it's actually really good. Like, I don't feel like I'm spewing some bullshit or peddling crap to people. Like, I can genuinely stand behind it and it's a product or a brand that I genuinely enjoy and respect. So that makes it very easy for me on that end.

Yeah, like, the craft tequila is obviously the menu for everyone in Mexico. It's like, over the last like, what, six, seven years, it's really exploded in North America. What, and of course, there's a lot of garbage out there, like celebrity indoors, shitty brands. But what makes this tequila stand up?

A few things. First of all, I think, Iliana, who is the master's still is just such a freaking weapon. Like she is so cool and so pounded and lives, breathes, dies tequila. And it is, and these are not actually just buzzwords.

Like, I actually do mean something additive free actually does carry a lot of value in the tequila world. There is consumer education that is involved in translating that to the general public, but it doesn't add a free and organic tequila, which is great. It's her family, like I said, it's just a fourth generation master distiller. And before that, they were agave farmers.

So this is like, this is the way this is the life. And it's not necessarily particularly common to see producers who both grow their own agave and distillate into their own product. A lot of places will buy agave from other places. And I think a lot of places they're adding sugarcane from.

Yeah, I've read some rumors. But I mean, also like at the end of the day, what you like, if you want some vanilla bomb, go for it. But I think people are not, I think it's a known thing. Consumers are becoming way more aware of what they're drinking, like way more aware.

And good products speak for themselves and kind of, you know, you've got to put them out there. But another one of the things that I really admire about Iliana, she said to me before she was like, innovation is not against tradition, if it's respectful of the methods. So one thing that she is like really into doing is trying new and cool shit. So for example, the line up right now is a Blanco, a repizato, a rosa, which is across several provinces now, BC Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, which is right, a minute so widely.

I don't work with all the problems, but the rosa is amazing. And there was a S.B.S. Y'all, which is was done. So the business partner of Iliana is from Toronto, and he's a fucking legend.

And he decided to do like a really cool Canadian Mexican collab. So the tequila that they made is aged in former Sleeven barrels. Oh, really? Yeah.

100% Canadian rye barrels. And it's so good. I don't know if you can get your hands on that one now, but like she's down to triclos, the rosa is rested in Cabernet 7 y'all barrels from La Rorca 14 days. It's stunning.

If I could show the people on the audio what it looked like, I would love to, but it's like the most beautiful pale pinky or into all of her seats are stunning. So I think what she's doing, what sets her apart is she's like not afraid to be a bit different and be a bit weird because she knows that the methods that she's using are like tried and true and represent her heritage super well. But like, what's kind of weird about that? Like, you know, I really appreciate it.

Like, I like, look, I have much respect for the people who are like, this is the tradition of this distillery or brewery or whatever. And this is the way we do it. We're not interested in expanding them. This is what we do.

And we do it perfectly. I totally respect that. I think that's awesome as well. But I also love it's like, what you were saying is that like, oh, you can be steeped in tradition and still innovate at the same time.

I mean, like what, like all music is that every form of music is just innovation steeped on tradition. So, that's a piece of that. Expanding something that you've heard before into something new. And like I said, I respect both styles, but I think it's cool when I'm not a purist in either way.

I think like, you know, we're at the point in time where everything's been done. Yeah, of course. Yeah. It's the same with I really knew cocktail you can make.

I was just going to say that like, it's like, and you live in the world of craft cocktails at the same time. And we always talk about this too. Now, like, where can we go in cocktails anymore? Almost everything's been done, right?

So, and that's what like kind of stresses me out, but maybe makes me a little like, what's what I'm looking for. Like, it kind of lets me back a little bit because I'm like, like, everyone's already done all the like crazy cool, like everyone's been so innovative. There's people way smarter than the other who come up with way cooler shit than I have. And that's fine.

I like don't really feel the need to reinvent the wheel with cocktails. I just want to make tasty stuff that's like good quality, tasty, in a comfortable environment and have fun with it. Because, I don't know, I just don't think there's anything that innovative that I can personally offer to the table. I don't know.

I'd be surprised if there's much innovative that anyone can offer to the table anymore to be honest with you. And that's fine too. There's only so many things that taste good in a drink. Like, yeah, you can make me make a tweak here and there.

I'm not like, I don't want to be the guy saying that innovation isn't possible anymore. Maybe there's something we haven't thought of yet. I'm sure there's people working on some crazy shit out there. Right.

But I'm six to 12 months like I also think that like I always predict this and maybe it'll never happen, but there might be some sort of backlash towards just people going back to straight classic cocktail drinking. And I certainly see it a lot at bar at my bar even where it's like people are almost over ordering the signature cocktails and they're just like straight, just like, yeah, just going straight to a classic cocktail. Like, yeah, I'm guilty of it myself. I like when I go to bar openings or new places, I hate to say it.

But like, I often order off their menu out of a courtesy to draw their creation. But honestly, what I want at the end of the day is I want like a daiquiri or a bony or something. You know, Josh, you know, Josh Lindley? Yes.

So he was on the show. He's on the show a couple times and the first time he's on, he said something that stuck with me. Like, I mean, Josh was awesome. But like, he said something that stuck with me, which was that, look, every time I go to a new bar, I'm going to order one drink off their signature cocktail list because somebody there puts so much time into coming up with it.

And he's like, and then maybe I'll go back to a classic after that. But like, I'm at least going to order something off their list. 100%. Like, I think, and that's what we do is we support each other.

Like, we make these cocktails mostly for the general public. Obviously, there's a degree about that, like, you know, we like to do industry things and shit that resonates with industry people. But like, I like seeing what cool shit my friends can do. I like seeing the way their brains work.

I am influenced by many people who I learn from. So my brain works in a certain way. And I love when I get to see someone whose brain works in a totally different way. This is something I love about young bartenders too.

Is that so like, they've come into this world where everything's been done, but they can have some like pretty crazy out there ideas. And sometimes they really land. I've seen several works in Toronto by a young guy there. I think he seems crass, shout out to crass.

But he put the hell as you do. He did some shit I would never have thought to do. And I was with Soren, my bar manager, and we were like, wow, neither of us would have thought to do that. But he's a young guy who's probably seen some other people's crazy combinations or it's very fearless.

I think it's what I'm trying to say. And I really admire that. Yeah, I think I love that too. I just think that what we're getting less of these days and a little bit, and I'm not trying to be negative on the show because I'm trying to support all the craft coctailers out there.

But like, you need somebody at the like somebody with the sort of final approval on some of these drinks before they make your list. Because I see a lot of like, I'll go try some of these drinks on some list. We were just at a bar locally. I'm like I say, which one that I tried a couple cocktails and one was like, one was fantastic.

And the other one was like, I can't believe they put this on a cocktail list. And it was very like, I wanted to try it because it was very out there, ingredient list. And I was like, but then I tried it. It's just like, this is not good.

Like, so yeah, so easy to be like, oh my god, yeah, like, that's so interesting to me. I want to try and maybe there's a reason that. Yeah, that's the reason why no one's tried to combination the ingredients. Yeah.

Anyway, Melissa, thanks so much. You've given us so much to your time today. We really appreciate it. What are you guys drinking right now?

I'm curious. Oh, so you don't want to know what's embarrassing. No, no, please. That's why I want to know.

Okay. Well, not why, but I'm so curious. Here's this one embarrassing. Mine is I got juice and you went to the style IPA from one of my favorite breweries, Sada City.

Well, that was pretty solid. I am drinking kind of Springs vodka soda than I can. I was not embarrassing. I just got like, I'm doing a high end fucking podcast about crap bartenders on here.

I'm well into myself to you. What do you have in preparation for this? I was like, should I make a cocktail? I was like, I don't know if I'm making anything right now, but in all fairness, I'm supposed to this evening, I've got two pop ups that I agreed to attend.

One is my fiance, Ben Kingston's doing one at Japito and the other one at Burt's Got Jungle Room. Shout out to all of those bartenders. But I was like, I need something chill. I don't feel like I'm making a cocktail because I'm going to go drink later.

So I did and this might be a considering fancy, but I've got Gregor's Pear from my freezer, which is my favorite, with some coke extra dry, a little squeeze of lemon juice. And I didn't have any soda, so I used a grapefruit Laquat. I had my french fries. There you go.

See, that's already better than what I've been. I know what. It was pretty tasty. It was pretty cold.

It was perfect at home, to be honest. And it's also like mid-afternoon for you right now. So it's like, what's more clogged? That's 100%.

So you're not looking to get too fancy at that time of day. No, no. Maybe I'm going to go drink some other more talented people's great creations later. Well, that sounds like a fun night.

So good luck to you. And thank you for giving us your time. Congratulations on the impending nuptials. That's exciting for you.

We should have your fiance on here too sometime. Tell him. I think so. I think so.

Yeah. When I told you to go to where, I should remember when it was probably a while ago. He did. What's it?

Ben Kingston. Ben Kingston. I don't know. Maybe he thought it was something else.

We're up to like 230 episodes now. So it's hard to remember. We've got a lot of our time to keep track of it. Yeah.

But I'll look into that. We'll look into it. If you haven't, I'll reach out to you and tell him to reach out to us. Thank you.

That's super fun. Thank you. That's super fun. And cool women and tequila.

And I appreciate it. Yeah. Where can our listeners follow you or find out what you're up to next? Yeah.

I post what I'm doing on my Instagram, which is melissa.brennan. It's melissa with 1L and 2Ss. And it's E-R-E-N-N-A-N. Usually my stories are the up-to-date things that I'm doing and where I share my stuff.

So if you're in the Vancouver area, please feel free to hit me up. And I'm in Toronto often as well. Yeah. That's about it.

Okay. Amazing. Thanks so much. This was super fun and entertaining and educational.

Thank you so much for your time. Hey. There we go. Before you go, I did find Ben Kingston's episode.

2023-05-01. Okay. Almost two years to the day. Okay.

I'm so sorry. Married episode once we try the non. Yeah. That's what we should do.

Have you both done together? Sorry, Ben. I apologize. I didn't remember.

Yeah. There we go. It's like King Coxions. Yeah.

That's fun. Okay. I did the video series. Okay.

I know what this now. Cool. Yeah. Okay.

Well, thanks again. Let's have a great evening. Say hi to Ben for us. Even though I'm not remembering.

Absolutely. Thank you guys. Have a good night. Have a good night.