Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
So I want to hear, like, what is your mindset?
I mean, because I've heard you say, you know, when
you were going through it, when you were building, you
would look at your husband saying, you know, this is
just another chapter in the book.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
I did that.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
I love that.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
What do you mean when we were building? Are you
getting me? This is an everyday conversation too. I mean
literally last night. I am in four to five states
every single week and out there pounding the pavement sharing
the story. The spirits industry right now is in the
(00:33):
most turmoil it's been in at least three decades in
at least no one in this current generation in business
has seen what we're dealing with right now in the
spirits industry. It is unprecedented where we're coming in, where
we're getting it from every side. Now you want to
add tariffs on top of that of everything else going on,
and so every single day is a box of chocolates.
(00:56):
We have no idea what we're going to get, but
we look at every single challenge and we go, Okay,
how quickly can we get to the solution? And this
is going to make a great chapter, Like literally, this
is going to make a great chapter in the book.
It's going to encourage people, it's going to inspire people,
because what we won't do is die in this moment.
What we won't do is fail in this moment. We'll
get to the other side of this, and so we're
(01:18):
confident that, you know, all of these things will become
really great chapters in a book. That's how we look
at it, and it'll inspire and will encourage, and it'll
challenge other people that would otherwise give up well before
it's time. I love I love that.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
So I wonder, like, because you are personal your persona
at least on social media, like he Black, for real, Listen.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Listen who I am on social media. You gotta understand
every social every every investor that I have follows me
on social media. Every every bank that I do business
with follows me on social media. I am the same
person at all times. However, I love people of every background,
(02:04):
I love people of every race, and so I know
how to speak to them in a way that allows
me to remain authentically me, but then also allows them
to be able to create a natural connection with me.
That's the part that I think that many of us
miss is that we think in all of our blackness,
(02:25):
that we're the only ones who can understand us. And
maybe that's true. We've got a different swagger, we've got
a different confidence, we've got a different way that we move,
different foods that we like. That may be true, but
everybody in this country is an immigrant. That means that
there is a tie that binds all of us, and
(02:47):
I choose to lean into that whenever I'm talking to
people of other races, of other background, of other socioeconomic status.
A lot of people don't understand this because of possibly
the circles there. But I've been in every circle, from
the hood, from Watts, from Jordan Down's. I've been in
homeless shelters, I've been in that circle. I've been in exclusive,
(03:10):
more exclusive, billionaire you know, retreats. Then then I can count.
And the thing that is consistent in every single one
of those situations is every single person is still longing
for something. So I walk in without that longing, and
they want to know why they're drawn to why do
(03:33):
you not have this longing? I was in. I was
brought up to speak for a group in Big Sky,
Big Guy, Big Sky, Montana. I joke, because all of
these these billionaire groups ISAI. I don't know what it is.
But White people when they get money, they want to
go where there's no air, where you need I can't,
(03:54):
and where you need motrid. Black people, we get money,
we want to be on a big sea.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
That's effect as effect.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
That's the biggest difference. But what I have found in
every single one of those scenarios. In that particular group,
they had me come in to be a speaker. In
that room, there were about one hundred people. That one
hundred people represented one hundred and sixty billion dollars. You
want to know what their question was for me? How
(04:23):
do we find our purpose? Oh? Wow? So what we
don't understand is money doesn't. Money doesn't give us purpose.
Money doesn't give us purpose. Money doesn't. There is a
There have been so many reports that show the point
of diminishing returns. I think it's like, after you reach
seventy thousand dollars a year annually, I have to go
(04:44):
back up and look to see what that number is.
But the bottom line is is once your needs are met,
it's a point of diminishing returns from there because no
matter what you buy, no matter how much more you have,
everybody's at a life a playing field wants niter met.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
Yeah, yeah, beautiful, beautiful. I want to understand your mindset,
like your leadership minds. I've heard you. You know all
these gems for sure. I hear all that which I love.
And I wonder, what is how does Fawn think about
leading her team? Like if we were to interview your team,
(05:23):
what would they say about how fun runs the meeting?
Speaker 2 (05:29):
That she is that she literally stays out of our way.
She cares about one thing and one thing only. You
go after your goal and don't let anything distract you
from your goal. And I don't care if they're doing
it at two o'clock in the morning from a pool
and a biza, or if they're doing it at two
o'clock in the afternoon from our distillery. It is of
(05:49):
no consequence to me where the success happens. And so
my team will tell you they are given a lot
of freedom to do their jobs. So many leads are
so focused on the process that they micro manage it
unintentionally and end up with a really high turnover. Right
for me, I am not micromanaging the process. I am
(06:12):
squarely focused on the end result. What is if there's
a problem. What is the solution. But one of the
things they will tell you I don't play with is
not owning mistakes. I'm not looking for an apology. I'm
not looking for you to tell me what happened. All
I need to know is a mistake was made. You're
(06:33):
owning it, you're fixing it. I don't even need you
to tell me who made the mistake. Let's just it
came out of nowhere. And what they'll tell you is
is the amount of grace that I give with mistakes
is as long as you own it and you fix it,
you'll never hear about it again from me. I love that.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
What is in your EDC, your everyday care. You know,
I asked this because you've seen.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
I saw you, but I hadn't about it myself. Sunscreen.
I was like, that's more a black women because we
just started using sunscreen, had doctor as all those years
ago and had us sinking that our melanin keeps us
from need to have UH. So I so consistent with
(07:21):
with with with uh with Monique. I always have water
you this like this sucker, you gonna see this with
me at all times? And and there's you, yeah, yeah, exactly,
there's usually ice in it. So that's a newer thing
for me over the last few years. Premn apozzle on
my body. It creates ice, and so now I went
(07:43):
from drinking water room temperature all the time. But I
always have water with me at all times. You will
always see it in my hands. I always have snacks.
Like if you my bag, you just find tats, oatmeal,
raising cookies, You're going to find lily chocolate cover omens.
You're gonna find many peanut butter kind bars. I always
(08:06):
have snacks. And then the other thing I always have
with me, I literally have this in every single thing.
Are these because I don't I don't use powder. There
are charcoal things to get off the shine. I don't
use powder with makeup, so I have to like and
I and my skin can get willy. So I'd say
(08:26):
that those are the things that I always have with me,
are those charcoal wipes, my water and snacks.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
It's ask. So there's again. I told you I got
a bunch of coults from fall Weaver. So his is one.
It says I am not going to fail and I'm
not going to sell. Yes, say more on this please.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
Well, you know in this industry.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
Here's why I ask because when you go to we
have investors, and investors want to know where's the exit,
where's the liquidity event?
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yes, and you say, I'm not selling secondary. That's that's
the piece of it that I think a lot of
people a lot of people miss. And the only exit
is not to sell or to go public. There is
a third exit that you're bringing in new entrepreneurs that
are going to be a part of your journey from
(09:20):
where you're beginning now. People always assume that the investors
who began with you that they're the only investors that
go throughout, but it's I mean, right before I got
on here, I've got a secondary transaction in my emails
to approve where one investor is selling an a one
investor is selling a portion of their shares to another. Now,
(09:42):
we've not had anybody sell all their shares. I don't
even think we've had anybody sell twenty five percent of
their shares. But when there has needed to be a liquidation,
then I am always out there. People ask me all
the time, when are you doing your next raise? And
I tell them I'm raising at old times. I'm not
necessarily raising for the company. I'm raising to make sure
that I have investors always interested, so that when I
(10:05):
have investors that want to go out, they have the
ability to do that. But a lot of people don't
understand what secondary what that secondary market looks like. And
so I would encourage our entrepreneurs that are out there
to really understand that. Is it easier to sell to
(10:27):
a big spirit conglomerate.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
Maybe I'm not convinced of it, And I'll tell you
I'm not convinced of it. I'm not convinced of it
because if you see every single entrepreneur that does these
deals with the conglomerates, and they say they have control,
and they're the ones that are out there, and they're
the ones that the faces all the rest of that stuff.
When stuff hits the fan, somehow, some way, those.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
CEO and founders somehow get replaced or pushed out. And
what do they do every every single time they try
to create a new business that can recapture the passion
they had in building the first business. Even when I
look at Sarah Blakely, she didn't need to sell. Sarah
(11:15):
took no money. I mean, she owned one hundred percent
of the company. She brought in strategics, all was well,
all was great. Now she's selling tennis shoes with heels.
What the heck does happen here? But do you see
what I'm saying. You see that time and time and
(11:35):
time again, and you can't convince me that's a coincidence.
And so I think that there is this thought process
that if you don't fail, then your goal is to sell. No.
When I look at one of our investors and she's
an incredible advisor to me, as a woman by the
name of Helen Johnson Leopold. You can find her on
(11:55):
the Forbes list, really high up. She is SI Johnson Air.
All of the sc Johnson Airs are good, like whether
they work in the business or not, they are good.
Why because se Johnson decided he one goes sell. You
can go through all of our greatest companies and in
(12:19):
every single instance, how beautiful is it when we set
up the next generation to not have to start from scratch,
and so many that sell. A part of why they
go back into business is they blow through that money
so fast, so now they're trying to start again instead
(12:40):
of just keeping the original vision. I'm not saying there's
anything wrong with selling. Don't get me wrong. If you
want to build to be acquired, that's a beautiful thing
and there's nothing wrong with that. But if God has
placed it on your heart to hold for the next
generation and has told you you are the steward and
this generation, giving it up is not an option. So
(13:03):
for me, giving it up isn't an option. And so
every week I can tell you stock transfer agreements, I'm
signing them, I'm approving them. I have to approve every
single share. I've got first right of refusal on the
shares in my stock, on the shares of my company,
and so I either can match it or I can
(13:24):
approve it. But people bring investors in all the time
that are excited about the journey. The first seven and
a half years of this, the first eight years coming
up on it, we've been a single branded company, Uncle
Niars Premium Whiskey, one brand. Moving into the future, we
have a Cognac house in France that is coming and
(13:45):
is going to revolutionize what we've seen in the cognac
business in America. And by the way, we're going to
do it during a period of time where everybody is
questioning my judgment on this because they're looking at it
and saying the category is dead. The category is dropping
faster than any other category. African Americans, the culture has
(14:06):
decided they no longer want cognac. They want tequila. Only
way to believe that is if you're not a part
of the culture. What the culture wants is a better Kognak.
And so I'm going into a space where if you're
looking at cognac as a category in the ten k's
in the ten ques of the Big Sphere conglomerates, or
(14:27):
if you're looking at it on a graph, what I'm
about to do is absolutely crazy. But those who are
investing at this current moment are like we saw her
bet big on whiskey, on bourbon, going into a space
in which the only consumer that anyone really knew or
(14:47):
marketed to were all white men. And she's coming in
unapologetically as an African American woman and telling a uniquely
African American story. And yet she's marketing to everyone, including
the core consumer of bourbon, that had never been done before.
Whenever we had come out with a spirit, we would
(15:08):
market to us. And I said, I'm going to market
to everyone because I want to pass this to the
next generation that means that I can't be reliant on
this small percentage of the thirteen point nine percent of
African Americans Black Americans in this country that drink alcohol.
There's a lot of us that don't drink alcohol. There's
a lot of us that are under age. There's a
lot of us that are over the age that we
(15:29):
would be drinking alcohol. So if I've built this whole
entire company on just a fraction of the percentage of
people that drink how do I get that to build
and scale large enough to pass to the next generation.
How do I turn that into a global brand