Today we are joined by Alastair Brogan, Chieftan of Boulder Spirits. Alastair came to the USA from Scotland with a mission to make an original American single malt whisky. Join us for a discussion on the root of distillation. How to distill an award-winning whisky and the brand identity behind it. A great spirit represents and reflects a sense of place. Its climate, its philosophies. A great brand does the same thing for a company. Both can lift you up, take you down and put you in any state of mind.

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“I think the biggest thing to overcome was fear. Fear of losing everything. Fear of your customers seeing the rebrand and not recognize that change. And we weren’t big enough to worry about that too much. But we were big enough within Colorado for a lot of people to question. So when we did it, fear really was the driving force. I knew it had to be done. A step back to go forwards, as you say.” – Alastair Brogan

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Evan Faber
Welcome to Brands with Moxie Sozo. My name is Evan Faber, CEO and Chief Strategist here at Moxie Sozo. Today we are talking to Alastair Brogan from Boulder Spirits. You’ve referred to yourself as the Chieftain of Boulder Spirits, which makes sense because you personally conduct so many of the tours and manage so much of the brand. Boulder Spirits is a Boulder-based whiskey company. For those who are into whiskey and into micro-distilleries, can you share with us a little bit about Boulder Spirits and what separates it? What makes it unique?

Alastair Brogan
Thanks Evan. Yes, I am the Chieftain of Boulder Spirits, Chieftain because I couldn’t think of a better term. Obviously, by my accent, I come from Scotland and there’s lots of chieftains in Scotland. So I made that decision to do that. I came over to the US eight years ago, and I really wanted to make an original American single malt whiskey. I’m a big Scotch whisky fan. But I wanted to make something uniquely American, unique to the location where we were. And over the last six years, we’ve been laying down barrels, all sorts of different whiskies, and also, not just single malt whiskies, but also bourbons.

Evan Faber
Excellent, one of the highlights of your portfolio is this American single malt whiskey. Can you share with us a little bit about what makes it unique? You know, Scotch is thought of as old-world. It has a strict distilling process. Here we have this emerging category of American single malt whiskey. What has drawn you to that and what makes it special?

Alastair Brogan
Well, even in Scotland, where you’ve got about 135 single malt whiskey distilleries, in a population the size of a country similar to Colorado, each and every one of them is incredibly distinctive, even though they use almost the same malted barley, the same yeast, the same processes. They’re unique. And they’re unique for a lot of reasons. It’s how the process is done, where your cuts are done, the bottle selection, the water, the climate in that particular area, and how even the still is designed. So everything is different. When I came over to the US, I wanted to be distinctive as well. And it’s distinctly American single malt whiskey because it’s made in America, because we’ve got spectacular water here in the Rocky Mountains, the base of the Rocky Mountains, we have got great multi-barley yeasts. And also our climate is really unique. We’re swinging from hot to cold and day to night. Changes of temperature means changes of pressure means it really sucks into that barrel in a different way than you would whether you’re making single malt whiskey in Scotland, New Zealand, Australia, Germany, or Japan. So we’ve got really unique things here in Boulder, as does a lot of other regions of the US. But the biggest difference with American single malt whiskey and the rest of the world, is we put in new oak barrels. And that new oak really does give a huge hit of char, huge hit of the carmelization of the sugars coming off. So it’s distinctly American for that reason. Most of the world, they use ex bourbon barrels. So they’ve had some people could say, the barrels have had their life sucked out of them, but it just gives a different flavor profile of individuals.

Evan Faber
My background is in beverage and I spent a little time learning how to distill whiskey and distill gin. So this is a topic and a brand that’s near and dear to my heart. When we signed on to do packaging and a brand refresh, which we’ll get into in a little bit, we were so excited to work on this because a great spirit represents a sense of place and really reflects a sense of place. Its climate, its philosophies. And a great brand does the same thing for a company. It captures its sense of purpose and sense of being and its climate and its purpose and philosophies. So there’s some similarities to what we do. We are both distilling something. You’re distilling spirits, we’re distilling ideas. Both can lift you up, take you down and puts you in any kind of state of mind. So I love what you’re saying about the American single malt.

Alastair Brogan
I think for us, it really is about sense of place. It’s about production, how we make it, and where we make it. And I think those, especially, for single malt whiskey, whereas I’m sure rum makers and tequila makers will tell me the exact same, we really wanted to focus on those two things because the spirit in the bottle is all about the place. And it’s all about the production because our class is agricultural industry, so it’s really important that those two things are highlighted. In our discussions with Moxie Sozo, through discussion that’s what we really wanted to express on our packaging, so people can look at the label and really try and understand what is behind the actual brand. Behind the liquid itself.

Evan Faber
So if you’re listening, let’s do our part to move it out of the niche and into the mass market once you try it, seriously it is everything you love about gin and everything you love about whiskey in one place. It is phenomenal and it also was awarded the gold medal from the Bartender Spirits Awards and so it’s so easily mixed. The critics and the professionals all love it and for good reason. Anyway, not a shameless plug. It’s just a heartfelt “I love drinking that stuff.”

Alastair Brogan
It’s funny because I will go to bars and try and sell at bars. And they’ll go, no, we’re not this is not the bar for a ginsky, but can I have three bottles for myself? I’ve probably sold as many bottles to bartenders, as I have almost to on premise. It’s incredible because the bartenders really understand it. We’ve got a couple of hotels that pour it with ginger beer as their head cocktail. And they they offer money back once they see it’s brown and hey if you don’t like it, we’ll give you your money back. And that’s now been two years on a very large hotel chain. So, fun.

Evan Faber
Awesome. Well one of the goals of this series is to talk about the big bold moves that brands make the wins the losses and the learnings and we’ve worked on a brand refresh with you but the history of boulders spirits goes back quite a bit. It started as Roundhouse Spirits, it’s now Boulder Spirits by Vapor Distillery. Rebrands are tough. And so I’m wondering if you could just walk us through the evolution of Roundhouse, the Roundhouse brand, and what inspired or what triggered the rebrand to begin with and what has led you to where the brand is today.

Alastair Brogan
Boulder Spirits, or the distillery, has been going 12 years. We’re mainly a gin company. And we built a reputation origins. Six years ago, I got involved with Ted Palmer, who was the gin maker there, and we always had this client, I would lay down my barrels, I brought a Scottish copper pot still, from Scotland designed specifically for malted barley. It was always arranged that after five years, he wanted to go away and do other things in his life, he had been a brewer and distiller for 35 years. So it was Roundhouse initially, there was a trademark issue, as there’s a lot of trademark issues with with craft distilleries. So I let it run until we were launching the single malt whiskey. And it was at that point, we were still called Vapor Distillery, we changed from Roundhouse to Vapor, because of the trademark issue, probably around five years ago. But I decided to not make any changes until we had launched our whiskies. And at that point, I rebranded almost everything. So Vapor Distillery is the location. Boulder Spirits is the product line. We sell in the UK, we sell in 15 other states, and we’re really known as Boulder Spirits, because almost all our line is now Boulder Spirits. Uniform, recognizable, pushing the Boulder Spirits brand now.

Evan Faber
Excellent, not easy to change your name, and what challenges did you face during the rebranding process?

Alastair Brogan
I think the biggest thing to overcome was fear. Fear of losing everything. Fear of your customers seeing the rebrand and not recognize that change. And we weren’t big enough to worry about that too much. But we were big enough within Colorado for a lot of people to question. So when we did it, fear really was the driving force. I knew it had to be done. A step back to go forwards, as you say. It was a long process to do it. And it was a long sort of soul-searching to change what I had. And you’ll have noticed that even in Colorado over the last 2-3 years, a lot of the major or the biggest craft distilleries have actually had a major shift in their rebranding and the way that they present their story and present their packaing. They’re still the same name, but a real shift. I’ve noticed that with probably eight or nine Colorado craft distilleries in the last 2-3 years.

Evan Faber
Where are you seeing the shift heading?

Alastair Brogan
I think everybody has got to raise their game. I think the days of the squatty bottle with the the handmade label from the computer was very attractive and really appealed to a lot of people. Because of the cheapest bottles you could find find, the small squatty bottles. But people have now seen the competition is hard. And they’ve had to raise the game, whether it be in packaging, even down to the stoppers, the story detail. Everybody has started to raise their game. Now, the barriers to entry are a little bit more difficult because you’re competing against a lot of people who’ve gone through this process.

Evan Faber
A ton, a ton in the spirits category. And this is a topic I wanted to hit on which is competing in a crowded category. You are competing with some of the largest, you have huge beverage conglomerates that are driving economies of scale and value chains with huge resources to spend on advertising. And then you have the startups and the scrappy micro distilleries that are popping up at a feverish pace. And so really the the alcohol category, tell us a little bit about competing on product versus competing on brand and how you try to stand out in all of that chaos.

Alastair Brogan
It’s hard. 2000 distilleries and craft distilleries in the US. A lot of them are very difficult to know whether their craft or not because the big guys are trying to pretend their craft distillers, their small batch. They’re basically lying to their customers to try and get a piece of the action of the 2000 craft distillers. We are growing at 30-35% per annum more and more people exactly like the beer guys. It’s something like 12% of volume in the beer category is small brews. We are down at roundabout the 3% mark and we’re growing like the beer guys. People are starting to want something different, more interesting. They want to relate to the story. They want to give people a chance. They want to give their own community a chance. So, Boulder, Colorado, they want to give them a chance. So it’s very difficult to compete against Pernod Ricard, the Diagios, They’ve got such vast amounts of power, that literally you could get lost. So we really rely on the curious, we rely on tastings. We rely on people tasting our products, doing events. There’s some phenomenal events in Colorado where you can go and taste spirits. So we rely on that. And it’s almost a groundswell of people who are interested in trying something different. I hate using the word millennials, but I do feel that more people would rather have quality over quantity. Depends what stage of life you’re in, but it’s more quality over quantity. Because craft spirits are more expensive than your your standard whiskies or gins.

Evan Faber
You brought up a word which came up in our first episode, and that’s curious. Curiosity. Good Day Chocolate was who we spoke with back then, and Simeon Margolis was espousing the power of a brand and its need to spark curiosity, even over education. You have to make people curious first, and in the branding work we do, it’s not a word that we hear from clients, it’s one we would like to hear more of, what are you doing to spark people’s curiosity to make them interested in you? Are you educating or are you entertaining? Are you informing or are you delighting? In the spirits category, there are functional and emotional purchases. You have to buy a hammer, okay? It’s a functional purchase. If you’re buying a spirit, that’s more of an emotional purchase. And so with more emotional purchases, that brand becomes a badge of honor. An indication of who you are as a person. Because it says a lot about you. I see you nodding and so when when people buy Boulder Spirits, Alastair, what do you want the brand to say about themselves? If you’re a Boulder Spirits drinker, what are some of the qualities that you might have?

Alastair Brogan
I think curiosity will drive the craft spirits industry. And, yes, it’s more expensive. But as I say, I think a lot of people are going for quality over quantity. They spend the same amount of money but they just drink a little less, perhaps. I went for some wine in a local liquor store. I’m not a great wine buff, but I was asking the staff at the liquor store, what do you recommend, and they were able to well trained staff, we’ve got some great experts in spirits, wine and beer in Colorado in most of the liquor stores. They tell the story, they educate, but they’ve been educated by us, they’ve tasted our spirits. And it’s that groundswell of just keep on going keep on moving forward, they will then pick that bought up, they’ll put it on the table with their friends. You want to give something a little different, they’re maybe not going to bring a $12 bottle of vodka, or 1999 bourbon, they want to maybe just elevate that curiosity to the people they’re bringing it to. There is an element of hey, look, I’ve got something new and unusual. That curiosity (ignore that their friends are also curious) that groundswell, I see a lot of distilleries rising tide. So as we all educate now, you talked about single malt whiskey. In the US there’s an association: American Single Malt Whisky Association. There’s 150 distilleries signed up to try and get a standard of identity for American single malt whiskey. We are all doing it. We’re doing it. We’re all hundred percent malted barley from one distillery, distilled under 160 proo, put in oak barrels. So there’s 130 passionate distilleries that are educating the total wines and more, the massive liquor stores, and we’re all educating. And you know, we’ll all grow with that. As people become more curious,that bottle gets left with parties, people taste the product. And that’s what really craft distilling any craft, I would suggest in the food and beverage industry, hope for and wish for and really try and push.

Evan Faber
Fantastic. So a couple points there. One, it sounds like your ideal audience is discerning, they’re curious they want to be in the know and share what they find with other people is one piece and the other thing you talked about, which is an important note is that your connection and investment with the in-store ambassadors, so a lot of people do trials, they do taste tests with consumers, it’s almost the difference between giving someone a fish or teaching someone to fish. If you keep pace testing consumers, converting one at a time. But if you invest in the stock person, the people working the store, you’ve now taught them to fish and get multiple consumers in, and so brands would be wise to take a page out of your playbook and figure out what’s their program to educate, inspire and entertain the in-store brand ambassadors that people have? And what’s the equivalent online with influencers and things of that nature?

Alastair Brogan
Absolutely, with craft or at small batch or any person that’s really trying to grow a brand that is different, maybe unique, a lot of them are a little bit more expensive, is really education, and is educating the people about the story, about the process, about the location, about what are the benefits of this, over something else. We find with liquor stores and liquor stores are really switched on about this. Most people who are working liquor stores, if you go to the spirits section of the wine section, they’re tasting all the time other people’s products, they know what is good for them. They know the stories and it’s it’s great. It really is. Unfortunately, we can’t do as many tastings because of COVID. So we’re really bad foot at the moment, a little bit, on that in the tastings and the education and that side of things.

Evan Faber
I want to get to that I want to make a note of what you just said, and that was education, one piece, but linking the education to benefits. If you’re just informing and educating about your product, you’re not getting as much power from your message as when you’re educating and linking it to benefits. Whether those are functional benefits or emotional rewards. So when you combine education, emotional rewards, functional benefits in your messaging, that’s when you see the power come together. And Alastair you’ve mentioned the shift that’s occurring and you rely, I would imagine, a lot on the tasting room, which is not seeing the same amount of volume that it was, and so many brands are being affected by digital disruption right now. And so with what’s taking place, how are you approaching brand building right now?

Alastair Brogan
Yeah, it’s difficult the moment even though the liquor stores are selling 20% more than they were before COVID. They’re not selling craft spirits because we can’t get in, we can’t explain we can’t educate, we can’t really connect to the customers in the liquor stores. And what is happening is and hey, I get it, people are going into the liquor stores, especially the early days and buying volume, you know, handles of of everything have have skyrocketed. Tequila has skyrocketed.

Evan Faber
That’s a good sign.

Alastair Brogan
Yeah, I know it’s handles of everything. So we’ve sort of taken a step back, we have not benefited. Craft distilleries have not benefitted quite as much as the major brands. And so we need to get back into that tasting room. We do bottle sales, and we’re actually going to do ready made cocktails now, which is an emergency condition at the moment. We’re going to do that.

No, you know, you nailed it. The question was about digital disruption and how that’s affecting the branding process. And I want to call attention really quickly to the point you made which was that you’re no longer able to tell the story directly to people that you once did. And that means the importance of your branded assets, your website, your packaging, everything you’re doing in market, is it selling it for you or are you having to push it and evaluating the different brand to make sure that it’s working hard for you when you’re not there to support it.

To your point, the community of craft distilling in Colorado is phenomenal. We are picking ideas from each other, we’re on closed groups on Facebook. If somebody’s doing something, is this working, you know, are we allowed to do it? And that’s happening a lot within the craft distilling in Colorado. And it’s great, because we’re not competing against each other. We’re such a small percentage of the market, we’re not really competing against each other. So we’re helping each other out in what we’re doing.

Evan Faber
Awesome. Well as a thank you for participating and sharing your wisdom and knowledge with us, the final piece of our talk today is a shameless plug. So anything you want to hype about Vapor Distillery, Boulder Spirits, where to find you, what to buy, you (get some ginsky, that’s my shameless plug). And it’s more of a kind piece of advice that I’m offering here. But Alastair, shameless plug for a Vapor Distillery and Boulder Spirits.

Alastair Brogan
Shameless plug: we’re in most of the liquor stores in Colorado. If it’s not there, ask for it. Most of the liquor stores will bring in. That does a huge amount for us. If customers are asking in the liquor stores, and secondly, come down to Vapor Distillery. We’re open 12 o’clock to six o’clock, seven days a week, come down, one of us can give you some tastes, one group. We can give you tastings there and then. If you want to taste the ginsky, if you want to taste our single malt whiskey, we’ve always got time. We’re enthused about it. The invitation is there. We’ll spend some time. As long as it’s single groups, masked up. We’ve got things sorted.

Evan Faber
Awesome. And you can drink vicariously by visiting their website and on social media, as well, where there’s some beautiful outdoor shots as well as shots of the spirits. So Alastair, thank you so, so much for joining us today.

Alastair Brogan
An absolute pleasure. Thank you

Evan Faber
Yep, there there has to be the story behind the ingredients to make the value of those ingredients shine and connect with the consumers. The white oak barrels, bottled at the base of the Rocky Mountains, we have to make those ingredients come to life. Your work has paid off. Your bottle and bond American single malt whiskey, getting a gold medal at the Beverage Tasting Institute and the ginsky, which is one of my all-time favorite spirits. Can you tell us a little bit about the ginsky. And what makes it unique.

Alastair Brogan
The ginski is a phenomenal spirit. It’s a little bit of a niche because when people see a gin that’s brown, they start questioning, they are curious. It is our Boulder Gin, put in new American oak barrels for two years. Pretty extreme. So it really drives out the flavors and aromas that you would normally expect from whiskey, and the process of barrelling and aging it in utero is exactly the same way as you would do for a straight bourbon or a straight single malt whiskey. So it’s quite niche. Once you’ve tasted it, you’ll never go back. It’s probably our most awarded spirit in our portfolio. You know, we were listed as a top 16 spirits in the world. It was one of the top 16 spirits by the International Wine and Spirits Institute. We’re really proud of it. It’s never going to pay the bills. But we love doing it as a lot of our craft distilleries have got several products that are loved, but they’re never going to be mass market products.

I am absolutely delighted and happy and confident (I always have been) with the quality of the spirits inside. The branding let us down a little bit, we rebranded, we shifted, and I feel happy and content that that is doing a job in the liquor stores for us. Even though we’ve sort of flatlined a little bit during this time, we need to get back into the stores. So what are we doing other than that, to try and build our story, you’re right website, we are allowed with emergency powers, to do home delivery, which is another topic, and we’re allowed to use ready-to-go cocktails, straight, fresh from the distillery, we mix it up into 75, 750 bottles. We got to find other ways of trying to push our story. We’ve been doing a lot of Zooms, we even had a Zoom whiskey tasting, where everybody got their products delivered. And we did the Zoom whiskey tasting. That has a lot of issues legally regarding getting the bottles, distributing the bottles, etc. Well, all of companies are appearing for home deliveries. Sadly, we’re not allowed to do that as far as postage to the postal network, we’re not going to do that. It’s a huge bone of contention. Craft distilleries would absolutely skyrocket if we were able to do that. But legislation doesn’t allow us to do that. We’re fighting that. It has to go through two tiers of basically, in fact, three tiers of profit-making before hits the consumer. So our whisky is getting sold at 30% more from online markets. And that’s something which has to be addressed because it’s restricting consumerism, it’s restricting the choice of craft spirits that people in the US can enjoy, because of the federal and state laws.

Evan Faber
So it sounds like we need to start a campaign to enlighten people on this.

This is a conversation that I have been hearing more and more of, and it’s one that is incredibly powerful: businesses being champions of each other. And looking at markets as where as an opportunity to collaborate, what are the overarching issues facing us all that we can pitch in? How are we facing these giant, complex social and environmental issues of our day, and businesses talking to each other as peers, as well as competitors, almost like a peloton where everyone’s competing, but everyone’s pulling each other along, as well. And that’s a powerful place to be. I hope that that continues because as the challenges of the 21st century get more complex and more broad, it’s going to require people industries, ideologies, to come together and use our unique brilliance to make progress together. So I love that that’s taking place and it can be done over whiskey.

Alastair Brogan
Yeah, and the Colorado Distillers Guild are great. I mean, we lobby to have rules changed. We help each other out. And it’s a good feeling, having that kind of community. I know if I have a question I can throw open to people, and I’ll get 15 answers. 15 opinions sometimes. Opinions are fine, you sort them out, but yeah, it’s this whole, the whole Covid in every industry has had an impact. And you’re trying to think of new creative ways to spread your word, to tell your story. But we actually, right at the moment, for the last six months, it’s getting a little bit better now. We’ve relied on the bottle sitting on the shelf, telling the story for us. That’s what we’ve had to rely on. And also how it looks when it’s positioned. I know we’ve had new liquor stores that have never had our products before that are buying our products and consumers are taken off the shelf, first time, second time. You know yourself Evan, whiskey drinkers are curious. If they see a bourbon or they see a single malt whiskey, they’re willing to really chop and change. I’ll try that for now. Put that in my cabinet. I’ll see how that tastes. And whiskey drinkers are very, very curious about chopping and changing their whiskies.

Evan Faber
Yeah, they’re curious in multiple ways. But they certainly are curious. They certainly are seeking novel flavor experiences, which brings up a great point and that is in the craft beer space in the craft distilling space is driven a lot by flavor exploration. We know that that’s a consumer habit. So for other brands out there looking at your category, how much is exploration playing a role? What what are the major consumer forces that are driving choice and driving behaviors in different categories? Exploration being one in the craft spirits space? So just a broader note there. Wrapping up here, Alastair, you allowed Moxie Sozo to celebrate our holiday party at the distillery last year. So one question I had is, would we be allowed back?

Alastair Brogan
Um, I was. I don’t know if this is an American word, flabbergasted at how much 28 people can consume in one evening. But they discerningly, in great cocktails. Lots of discussion about the cocktails. But wow, you consumed a lot. And it was great. And it was fantastic night. Course you’re welcome back. Unfortunately, right in the moment we’re at 50% as a lot bars and restaurants are. We’re hoping for changes down the line, but always welcome.

Evan Faber
Thank you. Heavy consumptions, it’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said. That’s a beautiful thing. Love whiskey. We have at the end a wildcard question, which we like to ask that out of out of left field. But whiskey comes from the phrase, and I’m gonna butcher it, but “uisce beatha.” That was the name given by Irish monks of the early Middle Ages to distilled alcohol. It is simply a translation of the Latin aqua vitae. I think something close maybe to that. Water of life. And it signals in, you know, that’s how important it was. I mean, back in the day, it was safer to drink alcohol than it was water. And for a lot of reasons, but water of life, something that is essential to you. So as an entrepreneur, what is the water of life for you? What are some essential things as an entrepreneur that have made you successful?

Alastair Brogan
I think every entrepreneur has to have one thing. One thing over above, I would suggest anything else. And it’s passion. Passion for what they’re doing. The 2000 distilleries in the US, very few of them, including myself have a background in whiskey making. And it was something that we were driven to, we wanted to do, we have a passion for, and we made it made it work. We made it happen. And I think that passion for craft distilleries, and craft beer and craft really anything shines through, whether it be in your story, whether it be in your packaging, any interaction you have with customers, it shines through and people are lifted by that. I’m lifted when I go in even going to Costco and somebody’s serving, a new and interesting food for samples. Their passion, their interest, their story. That’s what people like and want. And so, I would say passion, I would say also go in with a specialty in distilling and this is not only coming from me, it’s not a short term making money. It’s a long-term, life commitment for 15-20 years. But I’ve never been happier in what I’m doing because I’m doing something, creating something that I’m passionate about. That to me, is really what life is about, you know.

Evan Faber
Love it. And that’s a topic actually I’m passionate about. I think there’s a difference between enthusiasm and passion. Enthusiasm is like coal, it’s a commodity, it’s easy to come by the root word of passion means to suffer. And passion is what coal becomes, when you’ve suffered enough that you’ve put enough pressure on the coal to become a diamond. Enthusiasm is coal. Passion is a diamond. Passion. Ask the question, what do you love so much that you’re willing to suffer for it? And yes, it means things that we really like. But a true test of passion often involves trials by fire and pressure that turns just the shallow enthusiasm into something far more precious. So I totally agree.

Alastair Brogan
I think enthusiasm also allows you to roll with the punches. So enthusiasm, sorry, passion, allows you to roll with the punches. So when things are hard, when things are tough, when sales aren’t going well, when you’ve messed up, you’ve made the wrong decisions. Passion allowes you to pick yourself up and carry on. And I think with craft distilling, every one of us have gone through that that and are going through that at the moment. So I think you know that passion really helps you as an entrepreneur, to get to where you want to be and persist and keep on moving forward.