Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hey, guys, here we are with Alex, the owner and co founder, if I'm not mistaken, of Siempre Tequila, one of my favorite brands. How you doing tonight, Alex?
[00:00:11] Speaker B: Not bad. How are you? Thanks for having me.
[00:00:13] Speaker A: Oh, man, I'm doing great. I mean, I gotta pour one of these and I only pour this one for special occasions because I know it's so hard to find.
[00:00:22] Speaker B: It's so hard to find them out.
[00:00:25] Speaker A: So. See, and that's what I get. This thing called Fo Row. I have fomo. I'm going to not get, you know, one of your new bottles that comes out and then I get it and then I don't want to drink it because I'm afraid I'll run out and not be able to get it again.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: That's a real problem, you know?
[00:00:41] Speaker A: It is.
[00:00:42] Speaker B: I. I find myself buying the backup bottle and then I drink the first bottle with confidence and I get real low and I'm like, no, I need a backup for the backup bottle.
It just builds from there. Next thing you know, you got a six pack. Next thing you know, you're. You're like the. The owner of Yayo Liron and you got a. You know, I think he's got like a pallet of fortaleza. It doesn't even make any sense, but that's what it is.
[00:01:06] Speaker A: Well, there's a wooden sign back here. I don't know if you can see it in the screen. That is a burnt of your logo framed.
[00:01:14] Speaker B: Yeah, that was awesome. When you send that to me, it's amazing.
[00:01:17] Speaker A: Okay, so I bought a case, right? So I got a whole box and I brought it home and I was cutting up the box and I was like, oh, that logo is pretty cool. I think I'll just stick it somewhere on the wall here in my barn. And my son took it and he said, no, you just can't put that up in the Barn. And he's 32 and I was at his house like five months later and I'm like, dude, there's this box. You said you were doing something with that. Give that back to me. I'm going to hang it on the wall. And. And for Christmas, he pulled that out. He said, I think that looks better on the wall, dad. So I put it right there over the sink and. Oh, that's pretty cool. And then I hung the box up on the wall.
[00:01:55] Speaker B: You're like, I'm still putting the box up, buddy.
[00:01:57] Speaker A: Just put the box on the wall.
[00:01:58] Speaker B: That's amazing.
[00:02:00] Speaker A: Yeah, he just me, I will. He said, he just did a tracing thing and then wood burn it together and I don't know, I'm not creative like that.
[00:02:10] Speaker B: I mean, I like the result. It worked out. It looks cool, man.
[00:02:16] Speaker A: Tell everybody about your journey. How did you get into tequila and owning your own company?
[00:02:25] Speaker B: Well, it involved a lot of poor decisions and mistakes throughout the entire process.
But, you know, I suppose I can start with what I was afraid to say a little while ago, but now we just talk about it.
I was, you know, I grew up awesome. Mother raised me right, taught me everything I know. I. I owe a lot to her. She worked so much. It was. My dad died when I was 3 years old and you know, she. She was working a couple of jobs, long hours, and I was at home alone a lot. And we, you know, we lived in a neighborhood where, you know, there was a lot of. A lot of role models, but not, not necessarily the positive ones. And I just ended up being a troublemaker, man. You know, long story short, at one point I was realizing it was getting very serious. You know, people around us are going to prison, getting shot, getting hooked on drugs, all kinds of bad stuff, and. And I wanted out. And I was working on getting out of the situation and I ended up Getting caught on 27 guns and gang charges and all kinds of crazy stuff. And I just had a two month old daughter and I was sitting in a jail cell thinking my mother is gonna kill me and my grandmother's probably looking down pretty pissed off. And I have this, you know, beautiful little girl that needs a dad in her life. I grew up without a dad. So, you know, I said, look, if I, If I get out of this thing and I get bail, no matter what the outcome is down the line, I'm never looking back. I'm going to straighten it out. You know, I might not make as much money, but I will just work hard to be a positive role model for my kid. I did get bail a little while later and I got out and I said, promise is a promise to myself. I worked as a cable guy and then I worked in the back of the house, a short order cook and bar back and a bartender and whatever I can get my hands on. And ended up applying for school. I didn't have high school. I got kicked out of high school at the end of grade nine. That was a whole other story. And I wrote a letter to the college. It was the best college for advertising in the country. And I pled my case and they let me in. So I ended up going to school for Advertising. Top advertising school in the country. And that's where I met Monica, my partner.
I just loved the idea of being a normal human being. Going to school, you know, learning all this crazy stuff. I ended up working for big ad agencies. Molson, Coors, Audi, Coca Cola. Work.
All kinds of stuff. You know, billboards. I even did a Super bowl commercial. And I was a junior and then an intermediate in that business. Kind of like the show Mad Men. That's what I was doing and just kind of bugged us a little bit. Monica and I, you know, we'd be working on projects and. And, you know, Coke's trying to get us to. To have kids drink more Coca Cola at the dinner table with their family. Or a cell phone company is trying to install more cell phone towers in a neighborhood and have us convince them that it's not bad for the people that are living there. And. And we just felt dishonest. We loved the idea of advertising and creating things and that whole thing, but looked at our paycheck, looked at who was telling us to do what, and decided to do something for ourselves. Monica's grandmother and great grandmother used to make mezcal. Her grandfather was a fruit farmer and an entrepreneur. You know, he's like, I'm growing the fruit. I might as well have a stand. Well, I got the stand. I might as well process the fruit and put it in. You know, he just, like, was always doing stuff, and Monica has a lot of that spirit. And so agave spirits in business were in both of our blood, and agave spirits is in my bloodstream. I tell that to everybody because I was drinking good stuff. You know, like, you. Like you're drinking the Cabo Wabo. I was sipping on the old El Tesoro back in the day, and people were knocking back shots of Cuervo with salt and lime. And we're. We're just trying to think of a tech company to start, I think, at one point. But then we looked down at the glass because Monica's mom's got an awesome tequila collection. And I was sitting at her house on bail, and we just decided to see if we could try our luck at making tequila. Now, this was a decade ago. Tequila was not as popular as it is today. In fact, you know, when we did our first batch, nine out of 10 people would say, tequila, I don't do tequila. They go, tequila. Like, hold on, where's my lime and salt? You know, that whole thing.
[00:06:55] Speaker A: Where's the worm?
[00:06:56] Speaker B: Where's the worm, you worm? In here. And now it's like the complete opposite. One out of ten people will do that. But. So we started at a time where it was really tequila was just about to take off.
We found a ton of distilleries, had conversations with them, kind of made our choices and made 150 cases and started from there. Literally built the company in a van that we built the inside of and the parking lots of Home Depot with my cousins driving from market to market to get it done. It was fun times.
[00:07:32] Speaker A: Now, was most of your original sales in Canada where you live, or did you start in the U.S. well, originally.
[00:07:39] Speaker B: We started in Ontario. Ontario is arguably the hardest market to make it in in the world because the barrier to entry is tough. There's the single largest spirit buyer in the world, and there is one category manager for brown spirits. And tequila was included in brown spirits at the time. They were picking one, maybe two tequilas to list out of hundreds of submissions every single year.
[00:08:05] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:08:05] Speaker B: And it's one store, right? There's 650 of them, but it's one store. And if they say yes, you come in. And if you don't hit a quota, you're delisted and off you go. And that's why we see so many great brands come and go in the lcbo. And that's where we decided to start. So. So we brought product in we could only sell to bars and restaurants through the lcbo. It wasn't in retail on the shelf, and it was 99 bucks a bottle compared to whatever you paid for that stuff. And thank you for buying it.
So it was tough. And so we went from there to opening up Alberta in Canada, which is more of the wild West.
Works a lot like, you know, some of the open states in the U.S. and that was like products in the warehouse. You can sell it to a store. Bada boom, bada bing. Go, go, go. So we got a taste of that and started really hustling over there. And then from there we entered California. Self imported, self distributed. And one thing led to another.
[00:09:06] Speaker A: My friend, I know that you've been at several different distilleries before you ended up where you are today.
And I know a lot of people don't understand the difference between somebody doing a white label or somebody doing a private label and doing what you did where you've helped craft your own tequila, not just somebody else's tequila in. In the bottle with your label on it. So can you talk about a little bit of what those changes were from going from where you started to going to, I Think you went to 1137 and then. Then end up at 14. 14.
[00:09:42] Speaker B: Yeah.
Well, when we started in the tequila business, I think it could be compared to what it's like just starting to drink tequila in general, right? You. You know what you know, and you want to find out more, but you got to learn and make mistakes and, you know, buy. Buy a bottle of crazy additive tequila along the way, essentially, which. Which we've all done, and we've all been like, this is the best Tequila I've ever had in my life. And then, you know, and then you. You learn as you go. So the same can be said about production, manufacturing tequila, all that kind of stuff.
We.
We absolutely fell in love with the town of Tequila and the family over at casa maestri, sorry, 1438.
And they did have a really great master distiller at the time, Agustin Sanchez, who has since retired, and he worked at a lot of great brand houses, and they were making really good juice out of that spot.
But they just, over time, became really entrepreneurial. I think the difference with us, too, is we take up a lot of space. Just like you said, we're pirate distillers. So it's not like, hey, taste this. Tastes good. Put it in a bottle and go. Or like, I don't know, you do it. It's like, really like, okay, show me the equipment. What does this do? What does that do? How does this work? What happens if we oxygenate and what happens if we don't? What does this chiller machine do? And, like, we're asking questions and getting super involved. Where does the agave come from? Does it make a difference if we use this one versus that one? Learned about the heat. So we really, to this day and more extreme, now, tailored the profile based on all the steps in the distillery. And so to make a batch of siempre. Even back then, it involved using certain equipment in different ways. And you can't just turn on the tap, fill it up, and then add flavor in it and off it goes, you know. So while it makes it significantly more complicated, we wanted to do something that was different, that was ours, and we could really stand behind and believe in now.
1438 became incredibly successful.
So successful that, you know, I can say I feel that from a craft perspective, they absolutely lost their way and they might be finding it again. And I think some people go full circle, right? We were sitting in a position where they had, you know, probably 70, 80 brands coming out of that nom. Not all of it was necessarily even produced there. But they were all attached to the nom and they were bottling it or sourcing juice and blending it and mixing it and oh my God, what a, what a mess. And all of a sudden we come and come in and do the work that we normally do and use the equipment the same way, and they're asking maybe we should source it and whoa, we gotta get out of here. And that's what we did. We started doing side projects with different distilleries to see where our forever home was going to be. Because we said we don't want to go through this experience ever again. We gotta, it's. It's like we're gonna go get married somewhere and if we're gonna get married, we gotta make sure that we date for a little while. And that is, that is what we did there. So we developed a great relationship with La Cofridilla, which is just down the road from them nom 1130 37, where we made some, some really great stuff. To be honest, I'm drinking some of the Supremo from there right now.
[00:13:13] Speaker A: I just finished that one off just like five or six days ago.
[00:13:17] Speaker B: It is a sleeper, sir. I think. I, you know, because you look at the nom and this is the whole thing about the Nom. You look at the Nom and you automatically discount and go, oh, no. Well, there's, I don't know about this one, but in our situation, you know, we went over to La Cofardia and look, they're, they're famous for Casanoblade, right? Casanoblade got acquired by Constellation. Production methods changed a little bit, you know, and so did the distillery. Right. They had some additional equipment in another room that they weren't using. You know, shorter fermentation tanks, different stills, even a tohona. I said, charlie, what are you doing with that?
Nothing. Nobody. We put it in, we have it, but nobody's really using it. And I said, can we use it? I said, yeah, I would love that. You know, I think over there they, they really want to get into innovation and doing more craft stuff and, and so we committed to coming in and helping out with that. So we used, we cherry picked the equipment we wanted to use. Again, super involved with the process, buddies with Sergio Cruz at the time, didn't know that we're going to do big business together, but Sergio actually came down a couple of nights, looked at their stuff, advised a little bit, helped out with that, with that project. And so we made Supremo there, which is 100 to honocrush. 12 Fermented with fibers, super old school, unfiltered, still strength.
And.
And then we took that liquid and we made Rebel Cask, which is like prohibition style tequila, very oak forward. It's for the oak head, our normal reposado. The agave is a star, the oak's a co star. The opposite with Rebel Cask, just something super interesting. We made, we made those there too. But at the same time with Sergio, we were working on this other project called Vivo or Exclusivo, you know, and so we had some irons and a few fires. We obviously made an awesome choice and got married with. But I think, you know, I think for a brand to go around and experiment and do interesting things, other distilleries is really interesting. Kind of like Artenom is a great example of that.
You see David Sudo, you know, taking projects and going to different distilleries with it. And you know, we did a little bit of that while we were trying to find our, who we were going to get hitched with.
[00:15:44] Speaker A: Yeah, I've kind of seen you guys in that same light in a lot of ways. You know, I did a, an interview with Jake just recently from Arthenam and his, his story and my story and your story of starting young. Right. I had my first child when I just graduated from high school and Jake was in the same boat. He was really young. And I thought, you know, sometimes success comes out of the necessity of having to go out there and get it done. And you're a, an amazing picture of, hey, I'm, I'm flipping a switch, I'm making a change and I'm going to make this happen. And that's, those are the best stories.
[00:16:18] Speaker B: That's when there's no other option.
[00:16:21] Speaker A: It's exactly.
[00:16:23] Speaker B: You can accomplish.
[00:16:24] Speaker A: Yeah, but who, who gets fired up about the guy that's like, oh yeah, you know, when, when my dad sold his 100 million dollar company, I started my $100 million company. And I'd much rather hear like Elon's story of, you know, the challenges and the things that he's gone through to become what he's done. So I, I think the story is really so much cooler than really the ending. The story is that the journey is what it's all about. It's not, it's not about when it's all done.
[00:16:51] Speaker B: So it is, it is a wise man. So we, you know, one point with Sampra, we thought, we thought we were done, but that's happened a dozen times since, you know, no, no, no. Cash in the bank.
Selling our. You know, this is the first time we. We thought we made it, you know, in Canada, and. And it got to a point where we had to let go.
You know, we. We had a couple staff members, had to let them go. We had to sell some furniture to pay the rent. And, like, it was like, it was wartime. So we. We now use war times as a thing. You know, when I'm like, okay, guys, it's wartime. We got to save some cash. Like, I go back to, like, we're living out of the. The office in Toronto, which was really just a loft above a bar. There's mice and, like. And, like, we got a guy that you see on the Instagram all the time, Daniel. He's living with us too. And I'm like, man, this is so messed up. Like, I don't know what we're gonna do. And he goes, you know what, Alex?
These are the best times that you will ever experience in your life. And I know that you're stressed out right now. When you are living on your island, super rich or whatever, if that ever happens, you're going to miss, like, taking shifts to who. You know, who goes to trap the mice and selling furniture on, you know, Facebook marketplace to pay the rent for siempre. You're going to miss this. And I. And honestly, I do. And now we take the time to appreciate the tough times, and it's really become our brand ethos. Super important.
[00:18:22] Speaker A: Yeah. That's awesome. I feel the same way. Like, I've had multiple businesses, and it's every time, it's the challenge when it's when you're deep in the middle of it and you get it all done, you know, and you figure out and you're like, okay, things are kind of on cruise control. This is getting kind of boring, you know, Now I need the next hard challenge, and I think that's where the character comes from and all the things that you learn. So that's. That's awesome.
[00:18:46] Speaker B: Some might argue in our company that I create chaos when things get quiet.
[00:18:50] Speaker A: Well, the one that's usually the most passionate about the business and the best sales guy sometimes causes all the drama.
[00:18:59] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
It's interesting.
Wes, who does our video stuff or the bigger productions. Anyways, he was over here a couple days ago, and he said he was just reading something about whether it's true or not. I don't know. But. But Vikings showing up to take over a village or conquer a village, the first thing they do when they land on shore is they burn their boats. So it's like we are winning this fight no matter what because we have no boats to go home on. We can't run away.
[00:19:30] Speaker A: So, yeah, one of the best stories, one of the best stories in the book, Think and Grow Rich is a leader brings his group on and they know they're way smaller than who they have to conquer. And he's, we got two choices. We're going to burn the boats and we're either going to win or we're going to perish, which. And they won. Right. Sometimes burning those bridges behind you and pushing forward to do what you want to do is what it's all about. Now here's my question out of that and I'll cheers you on that one.
Yeah. So good.
So so many people get into this industry and they bring out a great tequila. They maybe start with a great blanco and then their repa, then they're on Yeho and then, then we talk about their extra on Yeho and then, then it's kind of on cruise control for them. Where did this, obviously, from the very beginning, where did this heart of innovation and kind of your guys's mad scientist ness to create all of these amazing things within the tequila brands. I mean, to me, it's amazing.
[00:20:31] Speaker B: Thank you. It's a passion for tequila, really.
It's a little bit of restlessness, but I think if we're not creative and innovative, then we die.
And then aside from that, Monica's like, listen, make sure your blanco, repo and anejo are stable and that part of the business is working.
Then you can go out and do all the crazy stuff you want to tinker with and make happen. We say that jokingly, but really we have fun doing those expressions.
That's kind of what we live for. But on the business side, especially these days in the spirits business, and particularly in tequila, because tequila is so congested right now, there's a lot of brands coming out. Innovation is what keeps the aficionados attention. Right. If you watch, you know, like the new shiny toy is what people will pay attention to. And so if you aren't innovating or don't have the ability to be creative, you will be left and set aside. And I think what that does and is helpful for real brands is that brands that are pretty vanilla, no pun intended, or I'm not talking about additives. Yeah, but, but brands that are, that are, that are lame in the sense that they just phoned it in and they thought, I'm gonna start a Tequila brand cannot innovate like we do. Right?
[00:22:06] Speaker A: Right.
[00:22:06] Speaker B: They can't go be like Chava and come up with an 11 bricks and then come out with another one and another one or make a Cerro de loose. They can't do a Vivo then a muerto. They can't do a. A2 skew, day of the Dead Luna and Soul Yayo thing. They can't do it. Right, Right. So it puts the spotlight on people that are actually working, that actually care, that actually want to bring something unique to the business, and it keeps them in the spotlight or us in the spotlight. And the brands that can't keep up, that don't have that creativity, you know, it just. It just helps paint a clear picture for the consumer, I think.
[00:22:47] Speaker A: I agree. I mean, this. This is one of my staples. Right? That's. That's right there with like my everyday drinker. My. My wife's not a huge tequila fan, but that's a sipper for her. We were just recently in Hawaii and I. I was looking at their selection of tequila, which I was blown away by Hawaii. There was great tequila in every bar. And we were at a bar and I said, I'd, like, know some of that that's on the top shelf. And. And then can you make me Paloma with the Sampri? And she's like, yeah. And I said, is that, Is that upcharge? I was just curious. And she goes, no, that's my house brand. We use Semprey as our house brand. I'm like, okay, you just went like the highest ranking bar on my list because you have my staple, you know, as a house brand, and you just don't have that very often. So I went from sipping an XA that I'd never tried before that was on their top shelf, and I'm like, I'd like to sip that. And I want a plumber with that. And then she's like, doing another plumber. And I was like, no, I just want the repo neat. I got my. I got my cocktail, I got my xa. Now I'm going to do like, normal and just drink tequila the way I drink it. So you've done such a great job with the staples. There's such a great job with the foundation that all of these pretty rooms that you build on, they're awesome because they're built on such a foundation of fantastic tequila.
[00:24:04] Speaker B: Thank you. Monica and I jokingly, but very seriously say, like, we. It has to be our favorite because we got to drink a lot of this stuff.
[00:24:13] Speaker A: Yeah, if you need to adopt a 56 year old tequila alcoholic, addicted fella, I'd move right in with you.
[00:24:20] Speaker B: Come on in.
[00:24:21] Speaker A: That'd be great. Although we need to do it someplace warmer.
Yeah.
[00:24:26] Speaker B: You know, I took 54 flights on the airline that I normally use. It's not counting the other ones in 2024. So I, you know, not home too much. We've been building this brand like crazy.
But yeah, you know, I came back to Canada after the most recent trip just before Christmas. I'm like, what is this?
[00:24:51] Speaker A: Yeah. Why is it so cold?
[00:24:55] Speaker B: And yeah, I can, I can get used to not being in the cold, but you know.
Yeah. So we need to make enough money to move the family away from the frozen.
[00:25:06] Speaker A: Yeah. Or just have a second place maybe outside of Arrondis where you can go there and go back and forth.
[00:25:12] Speaker B: Yes. That'd be great work progress.
[00:25:16] Speaker A: So your social media is freaking hilarious.
You've got, I mean, I think I recently seen a guy that had been kidnapped and held by a fire hose. Yes. To read his. The things he had to say. So who's, who's the. Are you the mastermind behind all this crazy social media?
[00:25:35] Speaker B: We are all masterminds. After a couple of.
I push the social media forward. We facilitate brainstorm sessions. We look, we'll, we'll come up with our own. We'll steal ideas and thank the people that we got the ideas from. And I'm just a mixed bag. I think coming from advertising in that world, it was like, hey guys, we need 160 ideas for this brand or nobody's going home for Christmas. So like you had to crank out work. And I think that, that, that drive we try to put into the stuff that we do and you know, social media is one of them. Thank you. We try to, you know, being funny. We are very serious about our tequila and I think that we have proven that little by little. But tequila at the end of the day is something you have when it is time to have fun in a social setting. No one is like looking at each other with angry faces, being very, very serious and quiet while they're drinking tequila. I mean, maybe I have done that before, but it's not an everyday thing. Tequila is meant to be fun. So we want to have fun on our page and we want to invoke that feeling because that's the feeling that you're supposed to get when you drink at Siempre or with your buddies.
[00:26:43] Speaker A: Yeah, you guys do that so well. It's the best comedy comes out of really serious topics. And the best comedy is always rooted in truth, right? Those things are so true. And your. Your website, the color scheme behind your website, just the way your website flows, it is. To me, it's the best tequila website out there. And I show it to people all the time. Like, check these guys, social media, look at their freaking website. This is so cool. So no, you guys knocking it out of the park on that.
You check all the boxes.
[00:27:12] Speaker B: It means a lot.
Look, when you don't have much and you're up against all these big companies that pay all this money to get all these things done, the best thing you can do as a brand is just be big, bright and stand out, you know? Big, bright, loud. Yeah. That's why when we started, we drove around in a holographic chrome sprinter van.
[00:27:32] Speaker A: Oh, that's awesome.
[00:27:33] Speaker B: Driving, disco ball, billboard, you know, because what else are we going to do? That's why the labels were shinier back then. They had to stand out on the shelf. It's all we got. So thank you. Appreciate that. That's why the website's bright, you know?
[00:27:47] Speaker A: Yeah, I love it. Okay, so you guys have this, the vivo, and then you just came out with Myrto, right?
[00:27:54] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:27:55] Speaker A: Okay, so there's a lot of tequila nerds that'll watch this, but there'll be a lot of people that I've drugged to drink tequila that now are kind of liking it. Some of my whiskey guys that started here that now are sipping here, like I'm bringing them in. So if you could explain what. What you kind of did different here. And then what the difference in the. Than myrtle is, which I don't have that lined up here because I can't get it in Indiana yet. But that's. That's the opposite, from what I understand of that. Correct.
[00:28:28] Speaker B: It is, it is completely opposite concept. So first of all, exclusivo. Just so we're all clear, it is.
It is our excuse to do something crazy that has never been done in tequila before and introduce it to aficionados once a year. So in 20. In 2023, it was vivo.
And so, you know, we said, okay, we're going to drop this thing and we gotta. We gotta bring it. We gotta do something that's never been done. So we, we borrowed a technique, actually. First shout out to Adam Fordor and Sergio Cruz. So Adam Fordor, he runs the international tequila Academy. Absolutely brilliant human being. He is a walking encyclopedia. And so he was talking about with us about this ancient Peruvian pisco technique called Mosto verde or mosto vivo, where you distill while the yeast is still alive.
Interesting. Why didn't the tequila world do that? Well, it seems like an incredible waste of money. You're not going to get a big yield out of it. And it's very risky. You risk losing a whole tank of stuff that you're making.
So we said, perfect, let's do it. We burned the boats and did a batch. So essentially we said, look, how would they have made it back then when they were making this pisco in this style? And they would have been cooking it in an earthen pit. With an earthen pit, there's no way you could collect the miele. If you're familiar, you know, agave gets loaded onto slats in the oven. The bitter drippings get discarded and the sweet drippings get collected. And that also goes into the fermentation tank.
They would have no way to be able to collect that. So we said, we will also discard it or use it for a different purpose. Right. So that was the first step. They could never have got the heat and steam to the same temperature. So we actually cooked at a lower temperature for a longer period of time. And then at the time, now there's tohona. 14. 14, baby. But at the time, there was no Tohona. There was only the roller mill.
But they would have crushed it with mallets. So we actually loosened the roller mill so that it didn't damage or press the fibers as much to also emulate the mallet part of it. I think we broke the mill. It was a whole repair thing. Long story. Sorry, Bivanko, guys. Sergio, I got you.
And then we went to the fermentation. So it was a wild fermentation, as some of you may know, but not everybody knows. What is very special about Vivo Mexico is that there are all these unique fruits and trees and plants all around the distillery. Even trees from Japan in the back, cherry blossoms.
And all of that contributes to the unique profile that Viva Mexico has. Not everybody has a bunch of papayas and pomegranates and mangoes and limes that look like lemons growing on their property, you know. And so we did a wild yeast or wild fermentation where we just put it in the tank, let it do its thing. It was collected, all that goodness from the air.
Once it started bubbling and starting to ferment and move around and dance, we yoinked it, put it in, put it in the still, and the copper still is there. And hope for the best.
[00:32:02] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:32:03] Speaker B: And to Be honest. It was. It was really interesting. We spent so much time sipping on those test samples, trying to understand what the hell we were tasting.
[00:32:16] Speaker A: Right. What was happening with each one.
[00:32:19] Speaker B: Yeah. And that was sort of mission accomplished for us. At the same time, it was like, well, it doesn't taste. I can't compare it to any particular tequila, but it is technically tequila. So really, in a way, we've created something that's unique, that's never been done, and. And that was the goal, and we did it. We didn't know if people would like it. And I think that Vivo is quite polarizing.
There are people that are obsessed and absolutely love it, but then there's people that don't like it. That's all right. That's. That's the part of this whole exclusivo thing. You know, when you're doing experimental stuff, it. You know, they can go both ways. And some people like. And some people don't. And then. So that was. Vivo did very well.
[00:33:02] Speaker A: I want to mention one thing. So you said there's not really anything else that tastes like it. And I. I agree with you, 100. And the only thing that I feel is even kind of close is. You mentioned David earlier.
Is it the. The ancestral.
[00:33:20] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:33:21] Speaker A: Which has this.
This doesn't have the smokiness. It has a. Oddly enough, it has a teeny bit of the smokiness to it. To me, even though there's no smoke in the process.
[00:33:32] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:33:32] Speaker A: But it. It's the closest thing that I've tasted to, you know, that real ancestral style. It's. It. That's the first thing I kind of thought of when I very first got the bottle. I'm like, holy cow. This is like that on 10. Like, this is different and easy to drink, yet complex with. It's just such a unique flavor. And I've got a friend that's a whiskey aficionado who currently has a. Her barrel sent down, and they're making a tequila at 1438, oddly enough. And she's got a really strong palate. Like, she's really good. She left here going, okay. She wrote it down, and it is her favorite tequila, so. And that's a new. Fairly new tequila drinker.
[00:34:17] Speaker B: See, that caught me by surprise, too. I thought that only the hardcore tequila geeks like myself and you would, like, would be attached to it. But there are some people who are like, man, I tasted it with my buddy or my wife or whatever, and they don't even drink tequila, really. But this is their favorite stuff. And they only want to drink this now. And I'm like, sense of taste. But that's awesome. It's really interesting.
[00:34:41] Speaker A: Yeah, Yeah. I think it's part of me. I think it's the creamy. You get this, like, creamy. And I think that creaminess just kind of pulls you in. Like, you're like, oh, it's so good, you know? So. Yeah.
Okay, so now you gotta tell me about the other one. What's that other one coming?
[00:34:59] Speaker B: Well, shoot. You make vivo. And then you sit there and you go, well, what have I. How am I going to beat this thing?
[00:35:07] Speaker A: Right?
[00:35:07] Speaker B: Like, you created a problem out of doing something really good. And, you know, also the creative side is like, okay, so you come up with vivo, you distill all the uses. Alive. What is the absolute opposite that could possibly rival it? Well, alive, dead. And then riffing off that, you get to this awesome. This. This concept where you're like, okay, well, what if we. This is the world's shortest natural fermentation. Did the world's longest.
What would happen there? And you break it down, you start researching. So we looked and, you know, you see these type of fermentations happen in, like, I think wine definitely happens in some Caribbean rum, right? They do, like, this really long fermentation. Probably because they're like, we'll go get it tomorrow.
[00:35:54] Speaker A: And different time frame.
[00:35:56] Speaker B: Nice on the island. They're like, nah, have a beer, come back later. But.
But we, We. We were afraid to do the concept, to try it out because it would mean that we would hold up the tanks at Viva Mexico while they got all this production that they got to do for us and other brands, and it would cost a lot of money.
And. And so we were like, ah, we gotta. We gotta to wait a little bit, you know, like, when are we going to get an opportunity to be able to have the whole distillery to ourselves and lock out fermentation for a month.
[00:36:33] Speaker A: You know.
[00:36:36] Speaker B: And then.
And then one day I'm sitting there on the. On the terrace at Viva Mexico, which you'll be at, and you'll probably have 12 tequilas with Sergio on.
[00:36:47] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:36:48] Speaker B: And somebody came up and they're like, big problem. The. The boiler is broken. Can't produce the steam to cook to do, you know, so the distillery was shut down. And I'm like, well, that's horrible.
[00:37:03] Speaker A: This is fantastic.
[00:37:06] Speaker B: Like, how long is it going to take for that part to arrive? Oh, it might be, you know, might be. Might be a week or more. And I'm like, all right. And then yeah. Mexico time. A week or a week could turn into three. So we're just like, okay, let's just wait and see. So, you know, I got a Cesar Vivanco and Sergio, and I'm like, muerto. And he's like, muerto. And says, I was like, muerto. And he's like, muerto. I'm like, huerto. Let's just wait and see what's up. So, yeah. So Happy accident Distillery shut down out of commission for three weeks. There were two tanks that were already going that were just an experimental project where there was a wild fermentation. On one side, there was a wild fermented batch that was almost done fermenting, and it was a wild fermentation. On the other side, it was another wild fermentation, and it had agave fibers in bags and burlap sacks also, like, almost done fermenting. And we were like, all right. And then it ended, and then a week went by, and then it went on longer, and it formed a nice crust on top, and, like, three weeks had passed, and so it had been basically a month for each tank that it had been just in the fermentation tanks. And we were like, okay. Well, I said, okay, look, let's just distill it, right? See what happens. And so we did, and we. We got our muerto. Long story short, we, again, didn't know what it would taste like. And we ended up, you know, playing around with the cuts and tasting different versions of it. I think we made, like, in the distillation cuts of it with the two tanks that we had, plus, you know, just taking different measurements from each tank. We had about eight versions of it, tasted through them, brought some to Remy in Mexico. Best palette in the game.
And just kind of had a, you know, kind of had a panel and decided to, you know, take 50% and 50% of each tank, put them together, and that was muerto, and it was at 54.5%. And with Muerto, I guess what happened was it's kind of poetic is that the, you know, the fermentation process ended, and. And then the juice kind of took on an afterlife, or the fermentation took on an afterlife. It doesn't keep fermenting, right? Like, the dies, and then it becomes alcohol. And then as it sits there, I think there's. There's another lactic yeast that sort of forms, and so there's, like, a second life that happens. Um, and we actually thought it would taste super funky. Like. Like, yeah, yeah. Like. Like super lactic. And it didn't.
It tasted the way that. The way that it does, and it was good. Some people rate it higher than vivo. Some people think that vivo is still the best.
There's a debate to be had, and I think it's kind of split down the line from what I can see.
But, man, that was fun. And it's the first that we only made 750 cases. That's 4,500 bottles for the. For the whole world. All of California's allocation got sold in pre sale.
[00:40:33] Speaker A: No kidding. Wow, that's awesome.
[00:40:35] Speaker B: It's good stuff.
So, yeah, there's. There's a couple. You know, there's. There's probably about 500 cases of muerto that is getting distributed across the US right now. You know, you divide that up across 50 states, that's about 10 cases per state, maybe 60 bottles per state. So if you see it's not very.
[00:40:55] Speaker A: Much, I guess I better order it on the website I seen it on.
[00:41:00] Speaker B: Yeah, you can better get on that. Yeah, if you see it, grab one or two.
[00:41:05] Speaker A: I will grab two. That's what I always do. Well, I guess one of my last questions for you, because I don't want to take up your whole evening. One of them is, okay, you've done vivo, you've done miyarto. What is next? How do you top live yeast and then deadly yeast? I mean, dead was the natural progression.
[00:41:27] Speaker B: All right, guys, ideas down in the comments, please.
I.
We have a really incredible surprise.
[00:41:41] Speaker A: For.
[00:41:42] Speaker B: Next year's, and all I can say is that it's been under development for 35 months so far, and it'll probably be ready in its 36th month.
And that is the only hint I can give you.
[00:42:10] Speaker A: That's pretty good hints. Those are pretty good.
[00:42:14] Speaker B: So. Yeah, yeah. So three. About three years in the making on this year's project.
And then we'll get back to doing crazy stuff like waiting for the distillery to break down to make funky badges.
[00:42:29] Speaker A: There you go. How excited are you about the tahuna there at 14. 14?
[00:42:34] Speaker B: Oh, man. So excited. We have been working on that for a long time. Really, really happy for the family over there. You know, you'll get to know Sergio very well. Even better if you have a good translator. But he.
So if people don't know his story, Sergio literally showed up on the doorstep of Viva Mexico when he was pretty much a teenager with less than five bucks in his pocket in the equivalent of pesos. And he was coming from Nayarit, which is a really poor state, like down by the ocean. And he came up looking for work, said, I'll do anything, mop the floor, I'll be the night guard, whatever the hell you want me to do. Like, I just want to be in this business. And he went from that to literally running the distillery, you know, the, the, the, the production part of the distillery. And not only did he do that, I think that, like 50% of the staff is his family and friends from Nayarit. He brought them all with him. And he's, he's such a hard worker. You know, he, he started from absolutely zero, and so he's so passionate about what he does, and that's what got him where he is. But with Sergio, while working with the Vivacos, they helped put him through university where he became a chemical engineer.
He's an absolute genius. And what he's obsessed with is, is making every single possible profile that exists on the dam planet. So he's got a spreadsheet and he goes, listen, man, I'm telling you, I can make 9,000 different profiles. Who am I going to do it with? How am I going to get this done? And so sometimes when you see, you know, the brands are nomed, you know, on the norm on 14, 14, and you go, oh, this is too much. He literally is like making each profile so incredibly unique that it's unbelievable. You know, it's not like some distillery, see a whole bunch of brands, you go, oh, you know, and they are literally making the same juice, turning on the tap, shaking it a little bit and adding a little bit of that. And there's another brand. No, no, he's, he's going, okay, well, if I harvest it on white soil instead of red or volcanic, then it's going to taste like this. And what happened? So, so he's always got an experiment going at the distillery. He's like, oh, you got to taste this. I use sake yeast. Oh, you got to taste this. I used yeast that I made on my. Like, there's always something going on. And from harvest to cook to crushing, to fermentation, different types of yeast to cuts and still, like, he's always working and he's always innovating. And every single brand truly is, like, very, very unique at that distillery. And I think, I think we got to keep that in mind with Sergio and, and that family, you know, and so the Tona was part of it. There is more getting done. And I think that, that only now they're kind of able to realize, like, their dream of what they want to build at that distillery. So we're going to see other equipment and other really interesting things come into play. You know, with, like, even with, like, we started using volcanic stone that we collect ourselves infiltration, like actual volcanic stone. And. And so keep an eye out for Viva Mexico, which we call Ranchito, el Ranchito and 1914, because they will be consistently introducing new cool innovations and things like the Tohona. And it's super fun. I'm just happy to be with those guys.
[00:46:11] Speaker A: Yeah, that's awesome. I can't wait to see all the things that are going to come out of there. They'll all end up up here somewhere, guaranteed.
[00:46:17] Speaker B: Yeah, we got a man. We got to get more. More brands out in Indianapolis.
[00:46:23] Speaker A: Well, we have really, not really good selection. It's really hard. I mean, it's. When you guys got here, just. I mean, it's been recent that you guys have been here. It's like, man, you know, some of the big staples are here. But to find some of these other brands that we all talk about, like, that's not here. I can't get that here.
[00:46:43] Speaker B: We got any Gale?
[00:46:45] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, I can't get that here. I have all of them. I have all of them up there, but I can't get that here. Nope, can't get that there. In fact, the only reason I've been able to taste that, because I haven't been able to find it anywhere. And I have a budget that I'm allowed to stay within.
And so I go over that budget.
Okay, I'm going to tell. I'll tell this story today. So I went to the liquor store to get this and this because I was almost out and I wanted to have them for this interview. So I go to the store now. I told my wife, I'm only going to get repo and blanc.
I get there and they had the ocho puntas, right, the high proof for 60 bucks.
So I thought, okay, I got to get that. So I get to the counter and I'm checking out. So I know I'm one bottle over what I'm supposed to spend. And I just peruse their top shelf behind the counter. And I said, is that winter blend 20, 24?
Yes. And that's a blanco and a repo as well? Yes. 60 bucks for the blanco, 70 for the repo, 180 for the winter blend.
So I said, I'll take those. And I looked at the lady at the cash registers and I said, I'm going to get a message about this one.
And when it went ding on the capital one card. My text went ding. 501. Really?
That's all she said.
[00:48:16] Speaker B: You're like, can we split this across 17 different credit cards? And backstage. These are different.
[00:48:23] Speaker A: It was funny. And I said. When I got. I called her, I said, tony, they had. They had a winter blend. And she said, well, did you still get the other two that you went for? She thought I spent all that on one bottle. And I said, no, I got. I got everything that I needed. And she, okay, that's all for the month of January. I said, okay, that you win. That's all for the month of January. But honestly, my. We've been married 35 years, you know, she puts up with way too much stuff than what she should. So.
Yeah, that's kind of funny. That was. That was picking these up.
[00:48:59] Speaker B: That's how it goes.
[00:49:00] Speaker A: I got a good exit question for you.
[00:49:03] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:49:03] Speaker A: Because I know you've had a really satisfying career at building this and got a. I know that you can sit back and look at everything and think how awesome it is if you could sit down and share your tequila with anybody.
You know, past, present, any person that you could just sit down and share your tequila and show what you've been able to do. Who would that person be?
[00:49:27] Speaker B: God. I mean, I would. I would say my dad.
You know, that's awesome. I don't know if that's. That's cheating or not. If I need to say a celebrity or a. An interesting.
[00:49:38] Speaker A: No, that. That's actually awesome that. That tells who your heart is. That's.
[00:49:43] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, you know, it's interesting because my dad died when I was three. When I hang out with my uncles, and I think I realized why I pissed my mom off so much, too. They all say you are exactly like your father. Same thing. I got the same mannerisms. You know, I make the same kind of jokes, like, just like him. Yet we've never hung out. And I think that. That the. The tequila thing is. Aside from, you know, raising an awesome daughter is our greatest accomplishment, you know, so to talk about this business with him over a glass of tequila and I could sip it with him. I think that would be pretty cool. You know, that. That's what it is.
So.
[00:50:27] Speaker A: So.
[00:50:27] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:50:28] Speaker A: Well, I appreciate that. I. I appreciate you. I know how busy you are, so I definitely appreciate you taking the time out to do this with. A lot of people will learn just a little bit more of why you guys are so amazing at what you do.
[00:50:42] Speaker B: Cheers to you, man. Thank you for having me. Really appreciate it, Brad. You got an awesome show, awesome page, and please keep doing what you do because we need more of this. Cheers to you.
[00:50:55] Speaker A: Cheers to you. Thank you very much.
[00:50:57] Speaker B: Trail glasses?
[00:50:58] Speaker A: Yeah, mine's got a little tasting tequila with Brad cartoon on it.
[00:51:02] Speaker B: I'm jealous. I mean, I got the Saborn Cultura shout out to.
[00:51:05] Speaker A: Oh, that's pretty awesome. Yeah.
[00:51:07] Speaker B: But, hey, you know, what kind of glassware to drink? You know, the good stuff.
[00:51:11] Speaker A: I got the good stuff. Cheers, my friend. Thanks a lot.
[00:51:15] Speaker B: Take it easy.
