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Speaker 1: You were listening to the Hammer and Nigel Show. Hello,

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Speaker 1: I'm Nigel Jason Hammer right over there with a very

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Speaker 1: special Lytton Studio.

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Speaker 2: Yest busy weekend downtown.

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Speaker 3: You had basketball, you had football holiday season.

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Speaker 2: Let's talk about it with our.

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Speaker 3: Bow Brynn Jones of Hughes Culinary, one of the big

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Speaker 3: gurus of the marketing department. Bren, welcome back, and we

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Speaker 3: were kind of talking off the air. Yes, Indiana and

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Speaker 3: Ohio State was the headliner this weekend, but that IU

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Speaker 3: Louisville basketball game brought tons of people downtown as well.

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Speaker 3: I came downtown to run a few errands here at

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Speaker 3: the building. I saw a lot of Louisville people standing

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Speaker 3: outside of Saint Elmo. So I can only imagine the

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Speaker 3: amount of patrons you guys went through this weekend was

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Speaker 3: a pretty strong number.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, it was a sea of red and athletics and

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Speaker 4: all of the things. You couldn't tell when it was

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Speaker 4: got to the football game. You couldn't tell if somebody

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Speaker 4: was from Indiana or Ohio State unless they spelled their state.

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Speaker 4: We don't know. There's there's only one state that has

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Speaker 4: to do that obnoxiously. But yeah, it was the basketball

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Speaker 4: game was a little bit of a sleeper event. I mean,

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Speaker 4: we knew it was coming, but yeah, a lot of

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Speaker 4: a lot of Louisville fans and yeah, it was it

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Speaker 4: was it was solid. It was really good.

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Speaker 1: Really just really quick remind everybody, like, what is under

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Speaker 1: the huge culinary umbrella?

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Speaker 4: We have, Yeah, so huge culinary restaurant brands. So we

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Speaker 4: have Saint Elmo obviously are the flagship, and then Harry

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Speaker 4: and Izy's nineteen thirty three lound in HC Tavern. So

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Speaker 4: of all of those, we're up to eight locations there.

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Speaker 4: And then we have the Spirit side, so we have

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Speaker 4: Saint Almial Cocktails, and then we have a whiskey brand,

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Speaker 4: rare Saint Whisky, which we've brought some stuff to share

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Speaker 4: you guys, and Barkeep vodka, which you've been fans of

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Speaker 4: in the past too, So we've yeah, we've got several

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Speaker 4: different spirit brands, and then the bottle cocktail, sauce and

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Speaker 4: all those things. So yeah, we've every time we get bored,

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Speaker 4: we just come up with a new project to to

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Speaker 4: take to retail and have some fun with. So that's

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Speaker 4: that's what we've got.

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Speaker 3: And I think it speaks volumes about the brand of

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Speaker 3: Hughes that when somebody comes into Indianapolis, visiting one of

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Speaker 3: these restaurants is like on the bucket list. Right if

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Speaker 3: you're a tourist and you're coming to Indy to watch

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Speaker 3: your team, or you're here for a convention, you're thinking,

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Speaker 3: where's that place with the spicy shrimp or where do

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Speaker 3: I get those sliders?

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Speaker 1: Think of how many I couldn't have mentioned, how many

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Speaker 1: times I've been watching national televised broadcasts and the sportscasters

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Speaker 1: and whoever they mentioned sting elbow my name.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, We've been very fortunate to have a lot of

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Speaker 4: that over the years. I think it's gotten to the

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Speaker 4: point now where they do it because they'll reach out

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Speaker 4: to myself or Krager, you know, somebody and know if

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Speaker 4: they say something kind about us, that when we've got

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Speaker 4: four thousand people on a wait list, they'll they'll find

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Speaker 4: a way to sneak their way into the restaurant. And

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Speaker 4: that certainly can't hurt. But yeah, on the marketing side,

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Speaker 4: I think a lot of times people ask me what

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Speaker 4: I do for a living, and I just say I

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Speaker 4: take credit for good operations because we have such an

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Speaker 4: amazing team of people that have been in the restaurants,

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Speaker 4: you know, fifteen, twenty thirty years, and it's like, right,

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Speaker 4: they're great at what they do, and we run great

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Speaker 4: restaurants and have fun doing it.

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Speaker 1: How was the restaurant industry in downtown in Dannapolis, Because

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Speaker 1: I know there's a lot of empty office space right now,

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Speaker 1: but that's different than people coming down and enjoying basketball

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Speaker 1: games and football games and going to restaurants. Is there

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Speaker 1: a difference there?

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Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it certainly since like before COVID to

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Speaker 4: what it is now, and I think people have gotten

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Speaker 4: back to office. Everybody going back to the office. That's

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Speaker 4: pretty much normalized. But yeah, there's still a lot of

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Speaker 4: empty office spaces, and I think it's from a business standpoint,

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Speaker 4: I think it's almost kind of feast or famine a

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Speaker 4: lot of times, because if there's nothing going on, then

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Speaker 4: things will get really slow. But then a seventy thousand

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Speaker 4: person convention will come into town and then you've got

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Speaker 4: to ramp up for that, and you know you're bringing

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Speaker 4: in all staff available and all hands on deck. So yeah,

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Speaker 4: it just depends on what's going on. But you know,

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Speaker 4: the city does such a good job of scheduling things

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Speaker 4: and keeping everybody you know, well commune unicated too, so

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Speaker 4: you know what's coming and it's you know, it's just

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Speaker 4: something you can plan for. A lot of things are

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Speaker 4: cyclical too, so Big ten Championship last year, you kind

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Speaker 4: of know what to expect. This year we got Final

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Speaker 4: four coming up, so yeah, you kind of know what

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Speaker 4: to expect.

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Speaker 3: Big one and full disclosure. Hughes Culinary is an advertiser

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Speaker 3: with Hammer and Nigel. We've been talking about the gift cards,

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Speaker 3: which again Nige and I we put our names on

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Speaker 3: stuff that we believe in, and I keep saying on

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Speaker 3: these commercials that we're reading, it's the perfect gift card

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Speaker 3: to get someone or to give to me. Like, if

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Speaker 3: you need somebody to give a gift card, I will

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Speaker 3: gladly take it off your hands.

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Speaker 2: How are the holiday gift cards going.

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Speaker 4: It's going, it's going, it's going great. Yeah, I mean

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Speaker 4: we really a lot of times the bonus gift card

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Speaker 4: programs that restaurants do, there's like you've got to come

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Speaker 4: in and use it on a Sunday in April, you know,

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Speaker 4: and we have really no stipulations on them for the

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Speaker 4: following year, so they're valid bonus gift cards are valid

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Speaker 4: for a full year, come in whenever you want. There's

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Speaker 4: no blackout dates. So if you think you're going to

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Speaker 4: eat in twenty twenty six, probably a good idea to

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Speaker 4: do that because you can save yourself a little bit

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Speaker 4: of money, and for us, it just kind of protects

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Speaker 4: against future sales and it's a thank you to you know,

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Speaker 4: a lot of our loyal guests and people that are

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Speaker 4: they know they're coming in, so this is a way

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Speaker 4: that they can save a bit of money and it's

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Speaker 4: kind of a thank you for them.

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Speaker 3: And I love watching people's reactions when they go to

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Speaker 3: one of your restaurants for the first time. Like my

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Speaker 3: old man has lived in India's whole life, finally took

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Speaker 3: him to Saint Omo a year ago. He's like, oh

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Speaker 3: my god, that was the best stake I've ever had.

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Speaker 3: I'm like, I tried to tell you.

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Speaker 2: But you know right.

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Speaker 4: And again, like gift card sales, which are the retail

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Speaker 4: department and marketing department, we take a lot of pride

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Speaker 4: in doing whatever we can to help push those But

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Speaker 4: again it comes back to what you just said. It's

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Speaker 4: run great restaurants and people are going to come back.

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Speaker 2: So so what is this little bottle of happy that

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Speaker 2: you brought up to us here?

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Speaker 4: So, yeah, this is a fun project that we've done

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Speaker 4: for Rare Saint. So Rare Saint whiskey as a whiskey

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Speaker 4: brand kind of under our portfolio, and we launched it

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Speaker 4: a little bit over a year ago and.

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Speaker 2: N I just putting it up on the YouTube camera

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Speaker 2: right now.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, So Rare Saint what started off as a brand,

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Speaker 4: like we've been doing single barrel selections in our restaurants

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Speaker 4: for you know, a couple of decades really, and so

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Speaker 4: that's where you're you're selecting, you know, out of a

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Speaker 4: bunch of different barrels and you're picking the one that's

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Speaker 4: that that's the best one available out of the bunch

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Speaker 4: that you get. And so we wanted to have a

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Speaker 4: little bit more control over that as a brand. And

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Speaker 4: so that's kind of where we're saying when is like,

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Speaker 4: let's source you know, whiskey and be able to be

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Speaker 4: very selective in which you know which ones we and

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Speaker 4: just like we.

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Speaker 3: Said earlier, we don't put our names on anything. Like

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Speaker 3: you guys are the exact same when you put something

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Speaker 3: out like the vodka that you guys had out the

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Speaker 3: barkeep vodka so unbelievably good and smooth, and I would

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Speaker 3: imagine this process of finding a whiskey in a bourbon's

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Speaker 3: the same way.

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Speaker 4: It really is, and you can't fake it.

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Speaker 2: You know.

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Speaker 4: We don't have one person that's a master distiller that's

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Speaker 4: doing the selection. We'll put a team together, people that

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Speaker 4: have been, you know, enjoying whiskey, like Carrie Wafford on

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Speaker 4: our team at Saint Elma. I mean he's he's just

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Speaker 4: hit forty years at Saint Elmo and he's been you know,

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Speaker 4: drinking bourbon for thirty years. So with this project, what

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Speaker 4: we did is we took four different mash bills blended

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Speaker 4: that into one. Already it was amazing and everybody was

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Speaker 4: excited about it at that point.

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Speaker 2: Let's taste it, but yeah, it give it a go.

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Speaker 2: What are we drinking to brand? You're making the dum.

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Speaker 4: Sports in Indie right now. I mean, it's it's going.

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Speaker 4: It's going really well.

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Speaker 3: So true nobody on Indiana Hoosiers blowing out an Achilles

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Speaker 3: because apparently that's the thing.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, it's it's going around.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, So that is legit right there.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, and fifteen proof, but SIPs like it's uh maybe

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Speaker 4: maybe ninety ninety five proof. So this yeah, so we

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Speaker 4: we uh, there's a couple of different spirit ratings groups

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Speaker 4: that will submit to We submitted this to USA Spirits Ratings.

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Speaker 4: It got ninety six points and was named Blended Whiskey

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Speaker 4: of the Year out of out of like seven hundred

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Speaker 4: close to seven hundred spirits. And this is across all

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Speaker 4: categories vodka, jin whiskey, anything, seven hundred different spirits. This

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Speaker 4: was tied for fifth out of all of them. So

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Speaker 4: we're like, it really just kind of validated everything we've

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Speaker 4: been we've been doing for real Saints available pretty much

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Speaker 4: any total wine in the state, in the area where

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Speaker 4: it to select Noble wine and spirits, a few twenty

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Speaker 4: first amendments. But it's I mean, there's there's such a

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Speaker 4: limited number of these bottles out there, Like I think

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Speaker 4: probably about four hundred bottles is all that went to retail.

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Speaker 4: So it's it's kind of one of those things where

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Speaker 4: you know, the bourbon and the whiskey hunters are out

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Speaker 4: there trying to find it. It's that's the hunts.

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Speaker 2: Holiday gift man.

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Speaker 3: People like to exchange bottles for the holidays, grab a

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Speaker 3: bottle of rare Saint telling you if you can find this,

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Speaker 3: it's going to make the holiday bride.

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Speaker 2: I'm enjoying it right now. Brent, you're the man. Brother.

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Speaker 2: Thank you so much for coming on.

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Speaker 4: I appreciate it.

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Speaker 2: Thank you for supporting us.

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Speaker 4: By the way, we absolutely you guys are fantastic.

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Speaker 2: Stammer and Nigel show