WEBVTT - Beer Without the Buzz 0:00:15.316 --> 0:00:24.196 Pushkin. Beer is deep. It's as old as civilization, older 0:00:24.236 --> 0:00:28.596 than writing or money. Beer is ritual, Beer is delicious. 0:00:28.956 --> 0:00:31.956 Beer is a way to get drunk. So here's a question. 0:00:32.516 --> 0:00:35.396 Can you keep all the ritual and deliciousness of beer 0:00:35.716 --> 0:00:41.276 and get rid of the getting drunk part. I'm Jacob 0:00:41.316 --> 0:00:43.876 Goldstein and this is What's Your Problem, the show where 0:00:43.996 --> 0:00:46.436 entrepreneurs and engineers talk about how they're going to change 0:00:46.436 --> 0:00:49.276 the world once they solve a few problems. My guest 0:00:49.316 --> 0:00:53.516 today is Bill Schufeld, founder and CEO of Athletic Brewing Company, 0:00:53.636 --> 0:00:57.756 which brews craft non alcoholic beer. Bill's problem is this, 0:00:58.316 --> 0:01:01.636 how do you turn non alcoholic beer from a punchline 0:01:01.996 --> 0:01:07.036 into a normal thing? People drink all the time. When 0:01:07.076 --> 0:01:09.796 Bill worked in finance in his twenties, he drank at 0:01:09.836 --> 0:01:12.716 social events several nights a week. He was also really 0:01:12.756 --> 0:01:15.596 into sports and working out, and around the time he 0:01:15.636 --> 0:01:18.636 turned thirty, he found that drinking was slowing him down, 0:01:18.756 --> 0:01:22.036 so he stopped drinking, and that, he told me, made 0:01:22.076 --> 0:01:25.276 his social life much harder. Everywhere I was going after 0:01:25.316 --> 0:01:28.596 I stopped drinking. When I tried to order a non 0:01:28.596 --> 0:01:31.116 alcoholic beer in a loud bar, restaurant. It seemed like 0:01:31.156 --> 0:01:33.876 the music would stop and fifty people would look at 0:01:33.876 --> 0:01:37.476 me and be like, Oh, my goodness, is this guy okay? 0:01:37.556 --> 0:01:40.476 Can he be trusted? Something has happened here, Like, let's 0:01:40.476 --> 0:01:42.036 try to get to the bottom of it before the 0:01:42.156 --> 0:01:44.676 night goes on. Everywhere I was going these days, there 0:01:44.676 --> 0:01:47.556 were just no options on any menu. There were stigmas 0:01:47.556 --> 0:01:50.156 around any choice he would choose at a group setting, 0:01:50.156 --> 0:01:54.116 out of social setting. And it just blew my mind 0:01:54.236 --> 0:01:59.676 that the adult beverage industry hadn't evolved the sophistication of 0:01:59.756 --> 0:02:02.476 a glass of wine or a nice craft beer or 0:02:02.516 --> 0:02:05.876 a very well crafted cocktail, and there was just no 0:02:05.956 --> 0:02:10.436 replacing that. The options were super bleak. Even five years 0:02:10.436 --> 0:02:13.516 ago there had been while the whole grocery store had 0:02:13.516 --> 0:02:16.596 evolved and the whole bar menu had evolved. There's this 0:02:16.636 --> 0:02:20.476 one dusty corner of everything that hadn't changed in really 0:02:20.636 --> 0:02:24.076 thirty five fifty years. It had the same case of 0:02:24.076 --> 0:02:27.516 o'duels that had been sitting there for thirty years. Basically, Yeah, 0:02:27.636 --> 0:02:31.676 these products somehow survived prohibition and survived right through to 0:02:31.716 --> 0:02:36.556 the two thousands. Okay, so go on, So what happens next? Yeah, 0:02:36.596 --> 0:02:41.236 I guess the moment where I had the actual realization. 0:02:41.396 --> 0:02:43.116 Me and my wife were walking to dinner and I 0:02:43.156 --> 0:02:47.676 was yet again complaining, and I just exclaimed, I can't 0:02:47.716 --> 0:02:50.316 believe that no one has tackled this yet, that someone 0:02:50.356 --> 0:02:54.356 should make amazing craft non alcoholic beer that is as 0:02:54.356 --> 0:02:57.596 good as any alcoholic option out there, both in experience 0:02:57.636 --> 0:03:02.036 and quality. And when I said that, she just grabbed 0:03:02.076 --> 0:03:05.396 my shoulder and said, that's an amazing idea, And she 0:03:05.436 --> 0:03:07.316 had never said that before. We had known each other 0:03:07.356 --> 0:03:11.076 for fifteen years at that point, first amazing idea you'd 0:03:11.116 --> 0:03:17.116 had in her eyes? Yeah, And we immediately the wheels 0:03:17.236 --> 0:03:19.476 got turning, and we talked about it the hole dinner. 0:03:19.636 --> 0:03:21.996 We started researching on our laptops when we got back, 0:03:22.116 --> 0:03:24.436 and every data point we pulled up, we were like, Wow, 0:03:24.516 --> 0:03:27.956 this is just a huge opportunity. Or I didn't realize 0:03:27.956 --> 0:03:32.356 this many people don't drink, and like I didn't realize 0:03:32.356 --> 0:03:35.476 how everywhere else except the US, that non alcohol adult 0:03:35.516 --> 0:03:39.796 beverages are an enormous market. I found myself working on 0:03:39.836 --> 0:03:42.396 it on nights and weekends and drawing up a business 0:03:42.396 --> 0:03:45.436 plan and running surveys and calling people in Germany to 0:03:45.436 --> 0:03:50.036 ask about technology, and it just snowballed for two years straight. 0:03:50.716 --> 0:03:57.196 And so going into twenty seventeen, resigned from my resigned 0:03:57.236 --> 0:04:00.436 from my job and went full time on it, which 0:04:00.516 --> 0:04:04.796 was a pretty shocking moment, and especially to work on 0:04:04.876 --> 0:04:07.876 non alcoholic beer. There was no market, there was no 0:04:07.956 --> 0:04:11.756 facilities at the time making great non alcoholic beer. We 0:04:11.796 --> 0:04:14.756 were going to be the first brewery and tap room 0:04:14.876 --> 0:04:18.276 that did non alcoholic beer as a pure focus in 0:04:18.316 --> 0:04:21.876 the country. Now you have this fundamentally a technical problem, right, 0:04:21.876 --> 0:04:25.796 a kind of kind of an engineering problem, a brewing problem. 0:04:26.316 --> 0:04:31.036 You want to make like very delicious, interesting beer that 0:04:31.076 --> 0:04:33.276 doesn't have any alcohol in it, right, which is which 0:04:33.316 --> 0:04:34.916 is a technical problem. How do you do it? How 0:04:34.916 --> 0:04:39.196 do you solve that? Yeah? So I had overwhelming passion, 0:04:39.876 --> 0:04:44.916 overwhelming delusional optimism, call it. And I thought starting a 0:04:44.956 --> 0:04:47.956 business was going to be super easy, And here we God, 0:04:48.516 --> 0:04:51.716 did you really I think I did? I thought I 0:04:51.756 --> 0:04:54.916 would be often running and things scale nicely and their 0:04:54.996 --> 0:04:58.076 vendors for everything, and here we go. And I have 0:04:58.236 --> 0:05:01.396 such respect for anyone who has started any size business 0:05:01.476 --> 0:05:04.756 out there. It is there isn't as anyone knows who's 0:05:04.796 --> 0:05:07.556 built anything, There isn't a single easy step to anything 0:05:07.876 --> 0:05:11.236 out there at any scale, Allen, It's amazing. How so, 0:05:11.316 --> 0:05:13.836 I'd read every brewing textbook out there under the sun 0:05:13.996 --> 0:05:16.036 before I quit my old job, but I'd never brewed 0:05:16.076 --> 0:05:20.396 a beer period. Resigned from my job and started to 0:05:20.396 --> 0:05:25.236 talk to potential brewers, starting to sourceburg equipment, contract brewers, everything, 0:05:25.676 --> 0:05:28.956 and I couldn't believe how much no came at me 0:05:28.996 --> 0:05:33.436 so fast, meaning everybody just said no every time he asked. Yeah. 0:05:33.476 --> 0:05:35.956 I'd gone from a firm where I was a customer 0:05:35.996 --> 0:05:38.636 of three to five hundred people. Everyone wanted to talk 0:05:38.676 --> 0:05:40.756 to us any chance they could get sure you had 0:05:40.796 --> 0:05:43.316 all the money, right, you were a buyer rather than 0:05:43.356 --> 0:05:46.596 a seller in your old job, right, And like a 0:05:46.716 --> 0:05:49.916 phone not being picked up was such a foreign concept 0:05:49.956 --> 0:05:54.076 to me. And all of a sudden, it was unbelievable 0:05:54.076 --> 0:05:56.676 how much outreach I did that just went utterly cold. 0:05:56.716 --> 0:05:59.756 Then I was moving from to a sector that there 0:05:59.836 --> 0:06:02.796 was literally no interest, and people thought, no retails, no 0:06:02.876 --> 0:06:05.716 customers know anything, wanted anything to do with this. I 0:06:05.716 --> 0:06:09.516 would go to brewing conferences, I was posting applications everywhere 0:06:09.516 --> 0:06:11.396 I could, looking for our co founder and a broom 0:06:11.396 --> 0:06:14.756 maaster and did not get one hint of interest. I 0:06:14.756 --> 0:06:18.436 would walk into conferences with ten thousand burgers and tried 0:06:18.476 --> 0:06:22.196 in network and grab people, and it was like a 0:06:22.236 --> 0:06:24.876 middle school dance. I couldn't get anyone to talk to me, 0:06:25.316 --> 0:06:29.036 and it was just like tons of nos, over and 0:06:29.076 --> 0:06:32.676 over again. And so I eventually stopped talking about non alcoholic. 0:06:32.716 --> 0:06:36.076 I just started talking about innovation and took non alcoholic 0:06:36.116 --> 0:06:40.116 out of all the job descriptions. And that's interesting. Yeah, 0:06:40.196 --> 0:06:43.036 And that's when John Walker, our co founder, reached out 0:06:43.076 --> 0:06:46.436 to me. He was an extremely highly awarded boomaster in 0:06:46.476 --> 0:06:51.116 Santa Fe, New Mexico, and our first conversation was, please 0:06:51.276 --> 0:06:53.476 don't hang out. This is going to sound a little crazy, 0:06:53.476 --> 0:06:55.276 but if you give me five to ten minutes and 0:06:55.396 --> 0:06:58.716 don't say no for three days, like I'd love to 0:06:58.836 --> 0:07:02.356 revisit this on Monday. And John did give me a 0:07:02.436 --> 0:07:05.476 good half hour to talk through it. And it's so 0:07:05.516 --> 0:07:07.876 funny looking back at our first emails. He was one 0:07:07.916 --> 0:07:10.636 hundred percent going to say now. And then he's a 0:07:10.716 --> 0:07:14.236 young father at the time, and he loved innovative challenges 0:07:14.276 --> 0:07:16.556 and he was the one person who saw the potential 0:07:16.596 --> 0:07:18.916 impact we were potentially going to have on the world, 0:07:19.436 --> 0:07:22.076 and before I knew it, he was moving his family 0:07:22.316 --> 0:07:26.236 across the country from Santa Fe, New Mexico to homebrew 0:07:26.396 --> 0:07:28.956 in an empty warehouse with someone he didn't really know 0:07:29.036 --> 0:07:32.356 at all, brewing non alcoholic beer and like with a 0:07:32.396 --> 0:07:34.876 big hope for the future. So I know this is 0:07:34.876 --> 0:07:37.356 more his domain than yours, But so just give me 0:07:37.676 --> 0:07:41.276 very basic like how do you make non alcoholic beer? 0:07:42.036 --> 0:07:44.156 And was it hard to figure out how to make 0:07:44.156 --> 0:07:50.876 it good? Yes? So basically all non alcoholic beer from 0:07:51.876 --> 0:07:55.756 nineteen thirties to this day, even ninety five ninety eight 0:07:55.756 --> 0:07:58.116 percent of the non alcolck beer market is made using 0:07:58.156 --> 0:08:01.996 the same two or three types of very simple technologies 0:08:01.996 --> 0:08:04.916 that all don't have a ton of regard for the 0:08:05.076 --> 0:08:08.396 nuance of fermentation and all the subtleties of like a 0:08:08.516 --> 0:08:11.876 finally crowd to beverage. They all just basically blast it 0:08:11.996 --> 0:08:15.476 through torch it rip out a lot of great things 0:08:15.516 --> 0:08:20.116 to dealcoholize it. And what's the problem with those techniques? 0:08:20.116 --> 0:08:25.876 Why are they bad? Ultimately they're just not soft enough 0:08:25.996 --> 0:08:29.156 and careful enough to protect the nuance of a really 0:08:29.196 --> 0:08:32.876 finely crafted beverage. So basically, you take, you take the 0:08:33.236 --> 0:08:36.236 good flavor, the taste along with the alcohol when you 0:08:36.276 --> 0:08:38.436 do it like that. Yeah, So instead of doing that, 0:08:38.596 --> 0:08:41.116 is it right that what you do is you brew beer, 0:08:41.556 --> 0:08:43.556 but you just sort of turn the dials in such 0:08:43.596 --> 0:08:45.436 a way that at the end of the process, instead 0:08:45.476 --> 0:08:48.836 of having whatever four percent alcohol, the beer has zero 0:08:48.876 --> 0:08:53.076 point four percent Yep, exactly. Yeah. So in the fermentation seller, 0:08:53.116 --> 0:08:56.036 for example, our beer never goes above zero point five percent. 0:08:56.636 --> 0:08:59.956 In the conditioning tanks, it's refining a finished product that's 0:08:59.956 --> 0:09:03.356 all under point five percent. And even to the most 0:09:03.396 --> 0:09:06.996 experienced brewers, if you're walking around in our brewery, most 0:09:07.036 --> 0:09:09.876 of it you wouldn't say is a harm all at all. 0:09:09.916 --> 0:09:12.956 It's what we're doing in the tanks with our beers. 0:09:12.996 --> 0:09:17.636 What's different? So do you have IP around your Do 0:09:17.636 --> 0:09:19.836 you have intellectual property of patents on the way you 0:09:19.876 --> 0:09:22.996 make beer? Is it a trade secret? So like the 0:09:23.036 --> 0:09:27.036 Coca Cola formula, so more towards that. It is significant 0:09:27.076 --> 0:09:29.996 IP for sure, and it is a trade secret, but 0:09:30.036 --> 0:09:32.836 it is more in the Coca Cola category where if 0:09:32.876 --> 0:09:34.996 you go for a patent, you have to publish out 0:09:35.036 --> 0:09:39.156 there your patent for contestion and approval and everything. And 0:09:40.916 --> 0:09:43.356 we knew with ten thousand birds in the country that 0:09:43.436 --> 0:09:45.716 if we publish how we make our beer, then we're 0:09:45.716 --> 0:09:48.356 in the business of policing our patent as well, and 0:09:48.476 --> 0:09:51.236 we would much rather just have it be something that 0:09:51.276 --> 0:09:54.796 we do proudly internally in our own berries, and we're 0:09:54.796 --> 0:09:58.516 super focused on quality every step of it in house 0:09:58.596 --> 0:10:01.476 at Athletic. I mean, the trade secret worked for Coke, 0:10:01.836 --> 0:10:06.756 still working for Coke, seems to be for sure after 0:10:06.796 --> 0:10:08.436 all that. I don't want to say that making the 0:10:08.476 --> 0:10:11.796 beer was the easy part. Clearly it wasn't easy. But 0:10:11.876 --> 0:10:14.516 the next thing that Bill had to do, and frankly 0:10:14.556 --> 0:10:17.836 it's a problem he still has not entirely solved, was 0:10:18.116 --> 0:10:27.996 much harder. That's after the break. Now back to the show. 0:10:29.156 --> 0:10:31.956 Here's the hard problem Bill is still trying to solve. 0:10:32.276 --> 0:10:35.516 How do you make non alcoholic beer normal? How do 0:10:35.516 --> 0:10:37.076 you make it a thing you can drink without having 0:10:37.116 --> 0:10:39.956 to explain yourself? How do you make ordering a non 0:10:40.036 --> 0:10:43.356 alcoholic beer as easy as ordering a pilsner or an ipa? 0:10:43.436 --> 0:10:46.236 And for Bill, all that really comes down to how 0:10:46.276 --> 0:10:48.956 do you use marketing to change the culture of beer. 0:10:49.316 --> 0:10:51.676 We knew the marketing side of this would be equally 0:10:51.676 --> 0:10:53.876 as big as the product side, and both were going 0:10:53.916 --> 0:10:58.876 to be enormous challenges on the marketing side. It started 0:10:58.876 --> 0:11:00.476 with the name. We want to make it something that 0:11:00.556 --> 0:11:03.796 was undeniably positive and say the name save the name 0:11:03.836 --> 0:11:08.556 Athletic Growing. It's so awesomely on the nose, right, it's 0:11:08.596 --> 0:11:12.996 so simply unsubtle of a name. We wanted it to 0:11:13.036 --> 0:11:18.036 be undeniably positive, aspirational, not tied to any geography or 0:11:18.076 --> 0:11:20.436 anything like that. We wanted to be an easy bar 0:11:20.556 --> 0:11:24.756 call and then attract high performance people to the brand. 0:11:24.916 --> 0:11:30.556 And our hypothesis was if we could make moderation cool 0:11:30.876 --> 0:11:34.156 and in reach of people, our impact would be an 0:11:34.236 --> 0:11:36.676 untold positive impact on the world. I don't know if 0:11:36.676 --> 0:11:38.996 I would use the word moderation, right. I feel like 0:11:39.116 --> 0:11:42.396 one beer is moderate, you know, one alcoholic beer, Like 0:11:42.436 --> 0:11:45.876 it's not drinking right. Yeah. So previously non alcoholic beer 0:11:45.996 --> 0:11:49.716 was for people who don't drink ever, Basically eighty percent 0:11:49.756 --> 0:11:52.836 of our customers do drink, just drink non alcoholic beer 0:11:52.836 --> 0:11:55.636 at other times. And was that did you know that 0:11:55.636 --> 0:11:58.036 that's what you were going for? I wanted people to 0:11:58.036 --> 0:12:02.236 be able to have great beer anytime, anywhere, and have 0:12:02.396 --> 0:12:04.796 the choice to drink non alcoholic beer, like, I'm not 0:12:04.876 --> 0:12:07.876 out to necessarily like kill the alcohol industry. I want 0:12:07.876 --> 0:12:10.876 people to be able to make their own choices. We're 0:12:11.036 --> 0:12:14.156 never standing on a soapbox and pointing the finger condemning people. 0:12:14.196 --> 0:12:17.916 We just want the options for healthy choices to always 0:12:17.916 --> 0:12:22.516 be there. And we've found that our customers, while they 0:12:22.516 --> 0:12:25.636 do still drink alcohol sometimes for the most part, they 0:12:25.676 --> 0:12:28.796 increasingly drink non alcoholic beer through all other days and 0:12:28.916 --> 0:12:32.796 times and occasions and maybe are swapping in some non 0:12:32.836 --> 0:12:35.876 alcoholic drinks as well. So you have this idea, you 0:12:35.916 --> 0:12:39.756 want to create this aspirational non alcoholic beer as opposed 0:12:39.796 --> 0:12:43.476 to some weird, stigmatized thing, which frankly I think non 0:12:43.476 --> 0:12:46.996 alcoholic beer was before. And in a way this is 0:12:47.316 --> 0:12:50.156 even harder than creating a new category, because you have 0:12:50.196 --> 0:12:54.236 to take a category that has all these negative connotations 0:12:54.276 --> 0:12:57.836 and kind of overcome that. And I know to that end, 0:12:58.076 --> 0:13:01.076 part of the marketing you have done has been paying 0:13:01.436 --> 0:13:05.596 college athletes. And paying college athletes is a new thing, right, 0:13:05.636 --> 0:13:08.436 not just for you, but more generally because the rules 0:13:08.436 --> 0:13:11.396 for paying college athletes have changed just in the past 0:13:11.436 --> 0:13:14.756 few years so that companies can out basically hire them 0:13:14.796 --> 0:13:17.716 as spokespeople. And so I'm curious tell me about your 0:13:17.716 --> 0:13:21.636 work there. Yeah, so college athletes are really exciting because 0:13:22.276 --> 0:13:25.396 we can talk to athletes of all ages. Really, we 0:13:25.516 --> 0:13:27.556 talk to twenty one year old plus athletes for the 0:13:27.596 --> 0:13:30.756 most part, to not confuse children that that is an 0:13:30.796 --> 0:13:33.756 interesting question. Let's just let's just go there since you 0:13:33.796 --> 0:13:37.956 mentioned it, Like, is it legal for anybody to drink 0:13:37.996 --> 0:13:40.516 your beer? Are you making a choice just because you 0:13:40.556 --> 0:13:42.756 don't want to be like the Gateway beer? Like, how 0:13:43.196 --> 0:13:46.036 does that work? Kids? In non alcoholic beer? It is 0:13:46.076 --> 0:13:48.916 in most states totally fine for anyone of any age 0:13:48.956 --> 0:13:51.756 to drink our beer. We do it is that candy 0:13:51.796 --> 0:13:54.836 cigarettees Gateway argument though, Like, it's just a marketing hill 0:13:54.916 --> 0:13:58.476 we don't want to die on. And so we generally 0:13:58.476 --> 0:14:02.276 target athletes and people we market with of twenty one 0:14:02.316 --> 0:14:05.636 plus and encourage marketing to twenty one plus and selling 0:14:05.716 --> 0:14:08.596 to twenty one plus. But of course anyone in most 0:14:08.596 --> 0:14:12.716 states can fire products. But we thought, if we get 0:14:12.716 --> 0:14:18.276 the coolest high performance athletes on campus to be drinking 0:14:18.316 --> 0:14:20.956 non alcoholic beer, like, there's really no one better to 0:14:20.996 --> 0:14:25.476 reach twenty somethings than twenty somethings themselves. And so We've 0:14:25.476 --> 0:14:29.276 had athletes like CJ. Strout, the Ohio State quarterback, Jean 0:14:29.396 --> 0:14:34.036 Robinson running back at Texas, two women on the NCAA 0:14:34.916 --> 0:14:37.676 South Carolina winning basketball team this year. We're drinking r 0:14:37.756 --> 0:14:40.836 beer and so across a huge range of verticals in 0:14:40.876 --> 0:14:45.316 the college sports atmosphere, I have people drinking athletic beer. 0:14:45.476 --> 0:14:48.796 To be clear, that's that's marketing you're paying for. You're 0:14:48.796 --> 0:14:53.276 paying them to be endorsers or spokespeople. Yep, exactly. And 0:14:53.276 --> 0:14:55.676 then we have so we have a whole range from 0:14:55.716 --> 0:14:59.596 amateur to paid athletes. We have an amazing ambassador program 0:14:59.676 --> 0:15:02.956 that started with organic outreach and we have about fifteen 0:15:02.996 --> 0:15:06.636 hundred amateur ambassadors across the country or just posting for 0:15:07.476 --> 0:15:10.516 beer and merch and other reward, and then all the 0:15:10.556 --> 0:15:14.876 way to paid athletes like JJ WATD and like super 0:15:14.916 --> 0:15:17.956 elite athletes who have joined our midst over the years 0:15:17.996 --> 0:15:20.916 as well. And there are much more like traditional marketing assets. 0:15:21.436 --> 0:15:24.796 When you say traditional marketing assets, what do you mean? Yeah, 0:15:24.876 --> 0:15:28.356 anything from social media to usage of name and pr 0:15:28.756 --> 0:15:32.596 name image and likeness and autographs or and we are 0:15:32.636 --> 0:15:35.596 starting to work up towards organized to TV campaigns and 0:15:35.676 --> 0:15:39.716 media campaigns which is a lot of fun. Now, most 0:15:39.756 --> 0:15:42.956 of our marketing efforts from day one were me behind 0:15:43.036 --> 0:15:46.396 a ten at the finish of any race across the country. 0:15:46.676 --> 0:15:49.836 I did say seventy finish lines the first year we're 0:15:49.836 --> 0:15:51.956 in business, and then our sales team has continued to 0:15:51.996 --> 0:15:54.116 do that. So you would just go to a race 0:15:54.196 --> 0:15:58.476 with like trunk full of your non alcoholic beer and 0:15:58.516 --> 0:16:00.076 put it in a cooler and stand there and hand 0:16:00.076 --> 0:16:02.076 it to people when they finished a race, A ten 0:16:02.196 --> 0:16:06.196 A or whatever, Yeah, ten table cooler, draft or anything 0:16:06.236 --> 0:16:08.076 like that. Hand out. The goal is to hand out 0:16:08.076 --> 0:16:10.516 thousands of beers every weekend to sweaty people with a 0:16:10.556 --> 0:16:13.196 smile on their face who might be receptive to hearing 0:16:13.236 --> 0:16:17.156 about nonlocock beer. And I'd usually hear a joke first, 0:16:17.556 --> 0:16:20.076 and then I'd be like, you can make fun of 0:16:20.116 --> 0:16:22.436 me all you want if you just try it. And 0:16:22.996 --> 0:16:25.716 that's when the light bulb would go on. What was 0:16:25.756 --> 0:16:28.436 the classic joke? What kind of jokes would people make 0:16:28.476 --> 0:16:30.956 when you said it's none alcoholic beer, Like, what's the 0:16:31.076 --> 0:16:36.396 point is this? Like decaf coffee? Yeah, tons of stuff 0:16:36.396 --> 0:16:38.476 like that. You get tired of what's the point as 0:16:38.476 --> 0:16:42.116 a question, Well, if the product wasn't so good, and 0:16:42.156 --> 0:16:44.436 I didn't know I could win them, Like it would 0:16:44.476 --> 0:16:47.916 be exhausting, for sure, But the amount of people I'd 0:16:47.956 --> 0:16:50.396 talked to who are like rudely making fun of me 0:16:50.436 --> 0:16:52.956 to my face ninety seconds before they were basically asking 0:16:52.956 --> 0:16:56.236 where they can buy it, it was like a transition 0:16:56.356 --> 0:16:58.756 that I could have done zillions of times and I did. 0:16:59.036 --> 0:17:01.316 And these same people who are making fun of me 0:17:01.556 --> 0:17:04.356 just before all of a sudden drinking it will sit 0:17:04.436 --> 0:17:06.836 there and you see the light go on and they're like, oh, like, 0:17:07.076 --> 0:17:10.276 I could drink this with my night dinner. I could 0:17:10.316 --> 0:17:13.636 drink this like, oh like while I'm golfing, or while 0:17:13.636 --> 0:17:16.356 I'm at the beach with my kids, or you know, 0:17:16.476 --> 0:17:18.276 maybe I could have two of these before I have 0:17:18.276 --> 0:17:21.036 alcoholic drinks at night, and they would past me out. 0:17:21.076 --> 0:17:23.836 And like, people just started rattling off occasions of when 0:17:23.876 --> 0:17:26.196 they would consume non alcoholic beer and when it would 0:17:26.196 --> 0:17:28.596 exist in their life, sort of answering the what's the 0:17:28.636 --> 0:17:32.116 point question themselves in that setting. Yeah, and I know 0:17:32.196 --> 0:17:36.196 you've mentioned that in Europe there has long been a big, 0:17:36.356 --> 0:17:42.196 robust non alcoholic beer industry. It's a thing there. It's 0:17:42.236 --> 0:17:46.836 just the European culture towards drinking, which my theory is 0:17:46.836 --> 0:17:50.076 that they've never had prohibition and never had alcohol strictly 0:17:50.156 --> 0:17:54.236 taken away, and so there's a relative indifference to drinking 0:17:54.316 --> 0:18:01.596 or not drinking and societal norms of moderation or daytime 0:18:01.636 --> 0:18:04.756 cafe culture drinking. So you have a theory that, like, 0:18:04.796 --> 0:18:07.796 the culture of drinking in the US right now is 0:18:07.836 --> 0:18:11.516 still weird basically different than it is in other parts 0:18:11.516 --> 0:18:16.356 of the world because of prohibition. Yeah, prohibition, the romanticism 0:18:16.396 --> 0:18:20.876 of turning twenty one, a number of factors where so 0:18:20.996 --> 0:18:25.156 like drinking versus not drinking is a more kind of binary, 0:18:25.436 --> 0:18:27.876 big deal choice here than it is elsewhere. Is that 0:18:27.916 --> 0:18:32.196 the idea, that's how we frame it for sure? And yeah, 0:18:32.236 --> 0:18:35.396 the European non beer market has been big, and it's 0:18:35.396 --> 0:18:38.036 always been big, and it's growing fast with the same 0:18:38.076 --> 0:18:40.316 health trends that are driving it in the US, but 0:18:40.356 --> 0:18:42.676 it's starting off a much bigger base where the market's 0:18:42.716 --> 0:18:46.596 about twenty five times the size and in quite a 0:18:46.596 --> 0:18:49.556 few countries it's over ten percent of the overall beer market, 0:18:49.716 --> 0:18:53.316 where in the US in twenty seventeen it was point 0:18:53.356 --> 0:18:56.996 three percent of the overall beer market. Point zero point three. 0:18:57.116 --> 0:19:00.036 And the thing is, people think of nonlock off beer 0:19:00.196 --> 0:19:05.236 such a small specific market, and like, my secret thought is, 0:19:05.316 --> 0:19:07.356 I think this is ultimately going to be way over 0:19:07.436 --> 0:19:10.956 fifty percent of the market because alcohol makes so little 0:19:10.996 --> 0:19:14.236 sense in so many times of life. So you mean that, 0:19:14.316 --> 0:19:17.796 like regular beer is going to be the niche, and 0:19:17.916 --> 0:19:20.236 like normal beer will be non alcoholic beer, and they'll 0:19:20.276 --> 0:19:22.436 be like, oh, you're drinking alcoholic beer. You want to 0:19:22.436 --> 0:19:26.476 explain that. I think eventually alcohol probably will. Well, alcohol 0:19:26.676 --> 0:19:30.956 is a niche occasion, it's just that it's a big 0:19:31.076 --> 0:19:35.116 niche right now. Basically a thousand years of history, alcohol 0:19:35.156 --> 0:19:39.276 has been a very big niche, for sure, But I 0:19:39.316 --> 0:19:42.156 think the modern life, there's so many more occasions that 0:19:42.276 --> 0:19:46.436 make sense for non alcoholic beverages than alcoholic beverages. And 0:19:46.516 --> 0:19:49.116 we can empower people and make people feel great and 0:19:49.196 --> 0:19:53.636 relaxed and social and everything without that one ingredient that 0:19:53.796 --> 0:19:56.596 I think it's going to explode. And I've been murdered 0:19:56.596 --> 0:19:58.916 in the beer world for suggesting that non alcoholic beer 0:19:58.956 --> 0:20:01.276 can even be twenty percent. I think it's going to 0:20:01.356 --> 0:20:07.116 be fifty. Yeah, So you were creating a category more 0:20:07.196 --> 0:20:11.036 or less trying to almost create a category. I had 0:20:11.076 --> 0:20:15.756 not previously looked for your beer. But yesterday I was 0:20:15.796 --> 0:20:17.436 at the grocery store and it was not a fancy 0:20:17.516 --> 0:20:20.276 grocery store. It was not Whole Foods. It was foodtown. 0:20:20.316 --> 0:20:23.116 It was a food down in Brooklyn. And not only 0:20:23.676 --> 0:20:26.876 did they have I don't know four kinds of athletic 0:20:27.116 --> 0:20:32.916 Brewing Company beer, they had Stella zero and Heineken zero 0:20:33.076 --> 0:20:38.436 and Budweiser zero. And Brooklyn Brewing Company also has a 0:20:38.516 --> 0:20:41.796 non alcoholic beer, which I didn't even know existed. It 0:20:41.836 --> 0:20:46.516 seems like this is becoming a category, and there is 0:20:46.596 --> 0:20:49.836 this thing happening where you're like, you know, out in 0:20:49.916 --> 0:20:53.116 front whatever, cutting the wind, whatever the sports metaphor is. 0:20:53.436 --> 0:20:56.756 And if you're successful, I guess a draft on you 0:20:56.796 --> 0:20:58.796 as a terrible pun to make in this context. But 0:20:58.876 --> 0:21:01.316 if you're successful, all of these other companies are going 0:21:01.356 --> 0:21:02.916 to come and start doing what you're doing. And in 0:21:02.956 --> 0:21:05.836 the same way that suddenly there's a million craft beers 0:21:05.876 --> 0:21:08.196 on the shelf. If you're successful, there's going to be 0:21:08.196 --> 0:21:12.316 a million non alcoholic craft beer is all surrounding you 0:21:12.436 --> 0:21:14.836 literally on the shelf, And I'm trying to figure out 0:21:14.956 --> 0:21:17.236 is that good for you? Or is that bad for you? 0:21:18.236 --> 0:21:22.756 It's great. So we see this as very much a 0:21:22.836 --> 0:21:25.676 rising tide lifts all shifts. Yeah, like you just said, 0:21:25.756 --> 0:21:32.036 humans have been drinking beer since I think thirty thousands 0:21:32.036 --> 0:21:36.556 of years, but we're getting to like the exponential age 0:21:36.556 --> 0:21:40.076 in human history where it needs a real reframing about 0:21:40.116 --> 0:21:42.716 how people think about drinking, and we're trying to do 0:21:42.756 --> 0:21:47.076 that and really modernized beer for the modern lifestyle. And 0:21:47.316 --> 0:21:50.596 that's going to be an enormous step functioned switch in 0:21:50.596 --> 0:21:54.116 this category. And if we do go to even ten 0:21:54.156 --> 0:21:56.836 percent of the category, there's going to be so much 0:21:56.916 --> 0:21:59.476 room for every other beer, and Athletic wouldn't possibly be 0:21:59.556 --> 0:22:03.476 able to meet every occasion in store, and then we're 0:22:03.476 --> 0:22:06.076 going to need a lot of help. So there's a 0:22:06.076 --> 0:22:08.116 lot of opportunity for Everyone's the long and short, and 0:22:08.116 --> 0:22:10.756 we're very thankful for the dedication of the category. We've 0:22:10.756 --> 0:22:14.116 seen Heineken and has A Bosh, Brooklyn, Sam Adams and 0:22:14.596 --> 0:22:17.116 many others have to the category for sure. I mean, 0:22:17.156 --> 0:22:20.036 I guess if the big fundamental problem you have to 0:22:20.076 --> 0:22:23.756 overcome for your business to succeed is the stigma, frankly 0:22:23.796 --> 0:22:27.196 around non alcoholic beer, then the more nonalcoholic beers, and 0:22:27.316 --> 0:22:31.356 the better quality non alcoholic beers, the better for you. Weirdly, 0:22:32.636 --> 0:22:36.396 for sure, frankly, we wish we had more help, especially 0:22:36.396 --> 0:22:39.436 on the marketing front. You want more competition. You want 0:22:39.436 --> 0:22:45.116 Budweiser to be advertising Budweiser zero in football games. We do, 0:22:45.436 --> 0:22:48.356 and they're starting to do it for sure, So you 0:22:48.476 --> 0:22:51.276 want your rivals to be spending more on advertising. These 0:22:51.276 --> 0:22:53.436 are companies that are competing against you and are right 0:22:53.476 --> 0:22:55.556 next to you on the shelf. We would kill for it. 0:22:57.956 --> 0:23:00.796 There is I think an interesting precedent for Bill's story, 0:23:01.076 --> 0:23:04.316 and it goes back to the nineteen sixties. At the time, 0:23:04.356 --> 0:23:09.596 a US brewer tried to sell this low calorie diet beer. Presently, 0:23:09.636 --> 0:23:11.996 it was a flop. Nobody wanted to diet beer. It 0:23:12.156 --> 0:23:14.516