REAL IS RARE EP 9 - Chris Wagner and Austin Holt with MacroCap Labs

What does it take to build one of the fastest-growing beverage manufacturers in the country? In this episode of the Real is Rare podcast, the guys sit down with the team behind MacroCap Labs—the company helping power some of the biggest protein and functional beverage brands on the market today.

From carbonated protein drinks and functional beverages to explosive growth inside Costco, Sam’s Club, and major retailers, this conversation dives deep into the business of innovation, manufacturing, and surviving the chaos of scaling fast. The episode covers everything from protein shortages and flavor innovation to why most brands fail, how great partnerships are built, and what separates companies that last from companies that disappear.

But beyond the business talk, this episode is packed with real entrepreneur moments—taking massive risks, betting on yourself when nobody else believes in the vision, learning from failures, and building companies through relentless work ethic and obsession with improvement.

If you’re into supplements, beverages, entrepreneurship, branding, or just want an inside look at how major products actually get made and brought to market, this episode is loaded with gems.

Transcript

Eric Simpson 0:06

Chris Wagner, Austin Holt, MacroCap Labs, welcome. Thanks for having me, guys.

SPEAKER_03 0:10

Good seeing you. On this side.

Eric Simpson 0:12

On this side. Yeah. I know. You guys are on the opposite side of the United States over here.

SPEAKER_00 0:16

Yeah, I feel like it's dinner time, but it's 1.30 in the afternoon.

Eric Simpson 0:20

How's the weather out here compared to Florida?

SPEAKER_03 0:22

It's colder, hence the jackets that we bought when we landed. But uh, you know, we're we're getting used to it.

Don Grace 0:27

Well, we appreciate you guys making the track. I know from from Beverage Forum where you guys were coming from, it's uh it's it's not an easy ride by any means. It could be, you know, your flight home. Yeah. How much time it could be.

SPEAKER_00 0:40

I think it was 30 miles, uh, four and a half hours. Yeah. Something like that. Exactly.

Don Grace 0:46

But again, we really appreciate you guys coming out here and and you know taking the time out to actually tour the facility, meet with Eric and myself and meet with the team.

SPEAKER_00 0:53

Yeah, thank you guys for the full tour. It's great. Yeah, appreciate that. Yeah, thank you guys for having us. Beautiful facility, seriously. Thank you.

SPEAKER_03 0:59

Very, very clean. And you were just you were just at our facility, what, four or five weeks ago?

Don Grace 1:03

Beautiful. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you guys are very like very similar to ours. You can eat off the floor, I feel like, and super, super clean. Everything was super, super organized, and like the team seemed very, very happy.

SPEAKER_00 1:16

I think we're all trying. We're all growing.

Don Grace 1:17

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

Fighting the same fights. Yeah, absolutely. That's one thing that I really liked. Uh that I I don't know if anyone else picked up on while we were walking around, but you saying hello to every single employee that you passed. I we do that, and it's very rare that I I visit somewhere and usually it's like the boss walks by and you know everyone's like afraid to look at them. So it was really nice to see that.

Eric Simpson 1:42

Yeah, thank you. Yeah, uh, you know, we build good company morale around here, you know, everybody here's family. You know, everybody here works hard. You know, you get more flies with uh honey than you do vinegar, you know, screaming at people, ripping their asses apart. I mean, that that's not a way to do business. Like we we don't run our operations with fear, you know, it's motivation and you know passion. And it, you know, it all starts from the top. So, you know, if you got good energy and aura on the top, it trickles down, you know, below you. So yeah, our team is amazing.

SPEAKER_03 2:11

So really does.

Eric Simpson 2:12

Couldn't couldn't do it without them. But yeah, you you guys crushing it. I mean, you guys are all over the place. Everyone I asked, well, who's making your beverage? Macrocat, macro cap, macro cat.

Don Grace 2:21

Every single person because micro cap packs at this point. I mean, you guys pretty much own the application. That'd be nice. I was thinking of it earlier. I'm like, the king of carbonated proteins. I mean, basically, you guys are like the the only person who could do that application. Correct me if I'm wrong.

SPEAKER_03 2:40

Pretty much. I mean, we spent a lot of time perfecting it at this point. I mean, we started doing this three years ago. I think we started maybe four started working on it. RD was yeah, like right after COVID. I mean, it's been a while. Lots of development. Um, acidified whey's come a long way. I mean, you guys know you've been in the space now for a long time as well. Whey protein tastes a lot better now than it did back then. Yeah, so it's easier to flavor. The flavor houses have come a long way, and then our processing to figure out how to get everything hydrated and in and compressed into like a 12-ounce can. Um took a little while, but uh now it's it's it was worth figuring out. And uh, we're very fortunate that we've got several like major partners that are in some major retailers. And uh the GLP one and protein craze is certainly helping with those tailwinds to push protein further and further.

Don Grace 3:28

Yeah, for sure. Uh that's the problem. I was getting protein. It's a constant battle, right? You guys struggle with that too?

Eric Simpson 3:36

No, well, yeah, you guys are sucking it all up. Yeah, all protein manufacturers are moving their isolate off the line because AcroCat needs to clear isolate.

SPEAKER_01 3:46

Easy, easy, easy.

Don Grace 3:53

It's wild though to see, like you're saying Starbucks subway. It's like everything they're featuring has protein in it. Everything functionality GLP1.

SPEAKER_03 4:02

Which is great for us. I got a bag of protein Doritos last week. How do they taste? Dude, they're actually really good. Go buy them, they're phenomenal. Yeah.

Don Grace 4:10

Shameless plug for Doritos. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:13

Well done. It's like the family size bag. I think I crushed like half the bag. I couldn't stop. Really good. I mean, no. I think I had the uh the Kardashian protein popcorn. Yes, okay. I mean, there's pro proteins everywhere. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's for so long, protein was sport. I mean, we know. We we we've all grown up in sports nutrition. Protein was sports nutrition only. Now the masses know, like, hey, I don't really know what protein does, but I know it's good for me. I I need to consume more protein.

Eric Simpson 4:42

Right. Yeah, but uh you guys are uh killing it out there. I mean, every bottle we see, you know, at Sands Club and Costco, it's you know a brand that was manufactured by you know MacroCap Labs. That's uh gotta be a good feeling for you, right?

SPEAKER_03 4:55

I mean, it comes with its own stresses, as you know, right? Like um I feel like we're constantly expanding, constantly full, um, constantly hiring, but um it's a really good problem to have, right? Like it's I'd rather have that than the other one. Yeah. Um and we've been trying to define the different categories for protein in regards to is there a is there an opportunity for a brand to have a five gram like protein soda on the shelf, a 10 gram protein soda, which we're seeing a lot of success with a handful of brands, 20 gram options, and then 30 gram all the way up to club. So it's like defining all of these different consumption categories that like you wouldn't normally think there's some variable variability, but like a 30 gram does taste a lot different than a 10 gram, right? Like a 10 gram is more watery, it's much more consumable. You can have a few of those per day versus a 30 gram, maybe you only want to have one of those per day, but that does exceptionally well in club, and then we break it down to like shots. So we have a couple shot customers that are 3.3 ounce, 23 grams of BLG protein, which is the highest potency of what leucine? Yeah, and and Uncle Kyle. Yeah, exactly. Kyle's great. We love Kyle. We love Kyle, we love Kyle, good product. Yep. Um, but yeah, so like all of these different functions and formats that I'm sure you guys are seeing on your side as well for protein are just raising the tide across the board for protein consumption.

Eric Simpson 6:18

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it's it's everywhere. Um, you know, price prices are just insane. So everyone's trying to figure out what's the next best step, what can I do to you know, bring my price down, but still keep the content up, protein content up. And you know, there's different blends, you know, your collagens, your milk protein isolate, your um your your caseinates, you know, there's all sorts of different areas to go, but it's just it's it's just so tough to see all these brands. You know, we used to run so many five-pound tub isolates for a ton of brands, and we're not doing those as many anymore. They're now down to two pounders, one point five pounders, one pounders. Yeah. You know, everybody's just trying to, you know, stay ahead and not go broke at the same time. It's just it's just been wild. I can only imagine what you guys are going through with the amount of proteins that you're moving. You're probably moving just as much, if not more protein than we are.

SPEAKER_03 7:09

I forget how many loads we do. I mean, I think we go through a load in a little over a day. Just about every day. Yeah. And then a load of collagen as well. Because usually like it just depends on what we're running. Yeah. Um, so one to two loads. I would say like every 36 hours is really the consumption.

Don Grace 7:30

Are you doing much with any of the vegan uh products or applications now or no?

SPEAKER_03 7:35

Um, we've had like two of the large vegan players in the space explore the beverage. I think we have one solution that we just got from a group that we met at was it Expo that we were all at? Yeah. That tastes really good and it's actually cheaper than WPI. So I think there's a there's a play. There is a play, yeah. The the um the potential issue with that is like people see plant-based or vegan and they am it's like when you see natural, you're like afraid to taste it. Which I think like most of that consumer sentiment is starting to shift now because the natural stuff is starting to taste good. It seems like 10 years ago or whenever it became like the first fat, it just tasted awful and scared people away. But it's starting to become very clean and taste. Palatable. Yeah.

Don Grace 8:18

Um, and now if you can put the sucralose in, that's the trick.

SPEAKER_03 8:21

Yeah.

Don Grace 8:22

Yeah. So it's interesting though. Um, that's something we'll talk about offline. We we have a client that does real well with the vegans, and yeah, we can we can definitely work that way with it, but we'll talk about that offline.

SPEAKER_03 8:32

Yeah, no, that'd be awesome.

Don Grace 8:33

Um and that's that's you know, when you get into those different categories too, you all of a sudden you start seeing new growth from new customers that you didn't have, which is great.

SPEAKER_03 8:41

Yeah, correct. Yeah, it's funny about that. You say that with the sucralose. Um a long time ago when I was running a brand, um, we had a vegan protein that was uh or plant-based protein that was naturally uh sweetened, like monk fruits, tibia. Um then a couple years at later, I start seeing a couple brands launch plant-based proteins that tasted phenomenal. I couldn't figure out like what it is. You look at the label and they put sucralose in there. Yep. And the market didn't care.

Don Grace 9:10

The trick.

SPEAKER_03 9:10

Yeah, that's probably you guys that fucked up that market, you know?

Don Grace 9:14

Hey, we presented it the way the customer wanted it. And at the end of the thought, but but at the end of the day, I will say this like there's certain products, I'm not gonna say any names. I swear to you, like I think they're natural. I think the customer thinks they're natural. But if you read the label, it says sucralose on the back. And they just throw stevia, but but I don't think like anybody even it doesn't register. I think when they're buying that product, they just feel like you want to make sure it's vegan.

SPEAKER_03 9:36

Yeah, vegan's the big thing. Well, I think I'm kind of the consumer for that myself. Like plant-based protein for the most part, when I consume that, I feel better. That especially if I'm drinking like a dirty whey product. I don't care if it's stevia or sucralose. I prefer it to be sucralose because it's gonna taste better. I'm just there for the plant-based side of this thing for the gut. And who I I didn't think about it, and I mean maybe it was you guys that did it. Someone thought about it and realized like that's actually the market. Those people are looking for that benefit. They don't care if it's got sucralose or stevia in it. Yeah.

Eric Simpson 10:07

And sucralose isn't gonna kill you.

Don Grace 10:08

So I think we could have a next year about this particular customer, this particular category, and explosive growth. Yeah, you know, added on to what you guys are currently doing, which is cool.

SPEAKER_00 10:20

That's what we're trying to do right now, is just diversify. Yeah. Because like we said, white protein is scary right now at the market.

SPEAKER_01 10:28

Fuck, you're taking easy arts and all that talking over there. The protein cost is getting.

SPEAKER_03 10:35

Oh no, you get a drink of water. Yeah. You kind of look like it, don't you? You dig too much trend or something. Um too much peptides. Peptides are kicking in.

Don Grace 10:47

So so how like like how did you? I mean, Eric and myself, he put his name on the side of the building. We're crazy enough to get into this business. Like, you know how difficult this business is. Yeah. You know, what what made you decide to get into this business? How did it like how did it all start for you? Because like what you're doing and how you scaled, it's impressive. Thank you. I mean, like there's us and there's you, and then there's everybody else who's like owned by private equity companies getting bought out, and it's it's impressive. So thank you.

SPEAKER_03 11:19

I'd be really similarly, likewise, right? Like, I just walked around your seven buildings and it's like a labyrinth of different labs and filling lines, capsule lines, three PL fulfillment. I mean, this is incredible. Thank you. Even here we are in our own little like sanctuary of gym and podcast room. Well done.

Don Grace 11:36

I couldn't have done it without him. I could promise you that. Would it look like this? Um probably just similarly, right?

SPEAKER_03 11:43

Just being addicted, right, to what we do and relentless. Um, but no, thanks for asking. I went to Daytona Beach for aeronautical engineering um from high school. And when I was in school, I worked out a lot, took a lot of supplements. Supplements were cool, right? Like it's it's still cool, right? But when you're that age, I was like 20. Um, it's really cool. All you want to do is get into the industry. So I built a website to resell products. And at the time, I think I was reselling like uh BSN, then that would explode, optimum nutrition. Like, pick pick one of those brands, right? They were they were just the high-moving products. And one day I looked at the products I was making, um, or I'm sorry, I was selling, which was Universal Nutrition Creatine, uh, I think it was like 200 gram in this small little like uh 70 millimeter neck uh bottle, right? And I realized that that cost like a couple dollars to make, but I was selling it for $20. Creatine was at a much higher price back then. Um, and so I looked up like how do I source these materials? How do I make this product? And I got the product made for me and um put my brand label on the product and started selling that alongside uh the BSN NO Explodes or whatever you have you at full retail rather than at like, you know, five to ten points above wholesale. And uh through that process, I started just adding commodity products and just started manufacturing my own products for myself. Launched that brand and through the distributors that I was selling or I was buying the products from on the wholesale side, and eventually shut down the um the website and started traveling the country selling my products into retail stores because back then retail stores were like the it factor. Internet was not quite there. Like I was selling on eBay, Amazon, and my website, but it wasn't what it is today, where the market is just like I don't know about you guys, but like if it's not on Amazon, I'm not buying it. It's just prime.

Don Grace 13:36

Yeah, there's validity to the product if it's on there.

SPEAKER_03 13:38

Yeah, today I want my stuff. Um, and so I would travel and travel and travel and sell the products in the doors. And I did that for like 10 years, just like building my brand, trying to build my brand, but also building a manufacturing facility to support my brand. And along that way, like I saw VPX Bang just going vertical with their energy drink sales. So I tried to get someone to make the energy drink. Nobody could make it, nobody could flavor it. We were doing all of this. Lewis, who's my RD director, came to me and was like, dude, we can make this. Like, why aren't we making this? He flavored something up, it was better than anything that we got made at the time. And and keep in mind, this was eight or nine years ago, right? So the flavor houses weren't where they are today. Um, so we flavored it. Then we couldn't afford to get anybody to make it because back then the MOQs were high because it was just like Aniser Busch or Pepsi or Coke. Their coke packing business wasn't as built out as it is today. And uh then Lewis came to me again. He's like, we can make this, we have manufacturing, we know how to do this. Go buy a line. So we bought a line, started, launched our brand, started making an energy drink. Raise. Yeah, that's good stuff.

Don Grace 14:41

Did we bring it back, boys? Bring it back. You never know, huh?

SPEAKER_03 14:45

Maybe one day. We'll see. So we'll see. I don't think so. I like making the raise for somebody. Exactly. Um, and so we did that for a little while, and then I just realized I have so much manufacturing infrastructure like you guys have here. I can't do both. I needed to pick a path. Like, and I was I was doing everything and I wasn't good at anything. So made a decision in like 2020, it was kind of through COVID, to say, like, I'm not gonna, I don't want to do this anymore. I want to focus on manufacturing. Um, and so that's what we did. We I wound down the brands. Austin was with me. He was managing GNC at the time. Um, I came into Austin's office. We had a team of different sales reps um at the time and said, Hey, I'm gonna, I'm making the switch. We're getting out of the branding business, we're gonna wind this down and we're gonna go full contract manufacturing.

SPEAKER_00 15:30

Everyone in that room, I think you literally, I think everyone but myself at that time was like, this is stupid, this isn't gonna work. And uh I slept on it and I came back the next day and was like, dude, let's let's let's do this. Yeah, yeah, you were excited.

Don Grace 15:44

Yeah, every you saw you saw the opportunity nobody else could say.

SPEAKER_00 15:48

Yeah. Well, I I just I went back and I'm being a brand is very difficult. That's why I have so much respect for everyone that we work with and agreed. What they go through is it's not easy. I I mean you're you're gonna get I mean, same thing with manufacturing, you're gonna have a lot more shitty days than you have good days. But I was thinking about you know, every brand has a life cycle. You can go completely vertical, you might be there for a year or two, you know, five, ten if you're lucky, but eventually you come back down. And I was like, you know, if we're manufacturing, it doesn't like like we can cycle through these guys, and you know, we all know, like once brands do go through that maturity cycle and they they go on to you know, I don't want to say die, but they start going down. The people that started that brand they just move on to another brand. So like if you're able to build that network, right?

Don Grace 16:40

You know, Ben, for example, we meet, we get together. Ben was one of my first accounts in the industry working at you know GNC in the Orlando area. What a small room. It's like you work out with them. That's what that's what we come to find out. And Ben's been like almost like a journeyman.

SPEAKER_03 16:56

I mean, he's been he's the man, yeah.

Don Grace 16:57

Yeah, what was it? Neutrable, right?

SPEAKER_03 17:00

Ghost. He knows everybody too. There is not a single person that Ben doesn't.

Don Grace 17:05

I've never heard anybody say a bad thing about him ever. No, but that's why you know, but that's the that's that's that work. You guys are working out together. I had no idea.

SPEAKER_00 17:14

Every morning.

Don Grace 17:15

Nice.

SPEAKER_00 17:16

So like that, that's I mean, that's what but like that's why I was like, you know what? Like, let's just do this 110%. So not to hijack your story. I'm really content. You were there.

SPEAKER_03 17:25

I mean, every sales rep other than Austin uh came to my office to try to talk me out of it. Um, so you know, we were struggling. We had to figure out which path we were gonna go down, and um, I chose that path, thankfully. Um, and from that point, we just started focusing on like perfecting what we do as a manufacturer, but also we spend so much time, like these, like our brand partners do now, trying to come up with the next big idea. Like that's that's the core of a brand is like innovation and marketing, right? And if you can be first, you get you get a long runway and then you can build your company. And if you try to be, you know, fifth, sixth, or seventh, it's a lot more marketing dollars that you have to spend to try and catch the number one or two if you can catch that person. And I'm sure you guys see it all the time. And we watch these guys and they're scrappy and they have like these crazy unique marketing advantages that we never had access to to go out there and win. Um and so with these brands and the application of the innovation, I said, well, hey, we have flavoring, we have ideas. Let's just take some of these ideas and these flavors and bring those to some of our adjacent partners, which are really competitors at that time, and just ask them if they want to launch these products because we we're getting out. Like we don't we don't want to launch these products anymore. That worked really well for us. Like it was, I'm not saying that we have great ideas all the time. We just have ideas. And sometimes the brands like those ideas, and maybe that's a crazy flavor, maybe it's a frit, crazy spin on cotton candy, maybe it's a liquid stable creatine that we're trying to figure out. Like any one of these ideas that we bring to a brand, let's just say one in ten, they say, Hey, we like that, we want to launch it. Great, we just want to make it for you. And we don't we don't charge them for it for any of that, we don't do any types of crazy contracts, we're just like happy to be a part of their journey. And that's where we have just one on the you know battlefield of contract manufacturing. Whereas some of our competitors or a lot of our competitors, they're out there trying to steal the business from someone else's business where we've looked at it like we we just want to create the business. If we can create the business and we can create the shelf space and we can just be a part of that idea with those brands, that's a lifelong relationship and partnership.

Don Grace 19:41

Yeah, that's great. Innovation. I mean, if you're if you're innovating and you're, you know, you have the the ability to separate yourself in the marketplace, that's where all the money is. The innovation, customer service, and what we do, if you do those two things really well, it price doesn't matter anymore. It doesn't matter. It's just it's like, okay, this is a fun project that we're all gonna be working on. Here's how it all works, here's some of the pitfalls, and you just run with it. And then when it explodes, it's like it's the best thing ever. Yeah. Because you're like, okay, these sales, I knew it was gonna work, but it doesn't work every time. Exactly. It doesn't work every time, you know. But you know, you you you fail to, and then you get that third one that works. You're like, all right.

SPEAKER_03 20:24

Every time, yeah. You learn through those mistakes, though. It's like catching that wave.

Don Grace 20:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:28

Well, we both do, like, we're we're in a commodity business. There's other people that make capsules and powders, there's a lot of other people that make beverages. So, like, we have to differentiate ourselves, and that's how you do it. Like, like you said, I don't I don't want to get in a price war where I'm diming and trying to steal business from other cobackers. It's just it's not worth my time, it's not sustainable long term. Like, I mean, I think we have the same goal as you guys, like we want to build something that that lasts, right? You know, like it's it doesn't make sense to run something one time.

Don Grace 20:57

No, no, never you don't make any money. I mean, we could go over that, like yeah, the RD. How many runs typically does it take?

Eric Simpson 21:05

Yeah, uh, for us, you know, we really don't see a good profit until that third reorder. Yeah, I tell people that all the time. We're not a one and done type manufacturer. If you if you want to do a one-time run, go somewhere. No interest. Now interest. Time and money, you know, RD, the bat trackers, the test methods, uh, stability. There's all this work that goes into 500 units or a thousand units. If this guy doesn't reorder again, you just threw shit against the wall and you don't make any money at the end of the day. So yeah, we uh we definitely want to help all of our partner brands that come to us, you know, expand and grow time after time because you know, not a sales gimmick. Their success is our success because the more they grow, the more business we're gonna get, and the more that we can save the money, the more we're both gonna end up making more money in the long run. So some people don't look at it that way. You know, you got some of these other shy guys that are just like trying to steal business, do this and do that, and you know, they'll offer them you know everything they're gonna do. The world to them, but oh guess what? It took 20 weeks to get your product.

SPEAKER_03 22:03

Yeah.

Eric Simpson 22:04

Was it really fucking worth saving a dollar a unit? A whopping thousand bucks? Wrong size scoop. Yeah.

Don Grace 22:09

I mean wrong lid, labels crooked. I hear like weird. All that is all taken care of. And same with you guys, right? It's like all those checkpoints mean a lot. Yeah. So yeah, good service.

Eric Simpson 22:21

I mean, you just you cannot put a price on that.

Don Grace 22:23

And then with the raw materials, you always have to buy from the same suppliers for each particular customer. You have to have consistency in RAWs. If you don't have consistency in RAWs, you're gonna have issues. You know, it might test out the same, you know. Okay, test out the same. We got a better price. And then when you put it into the product, it might just look a little bit different, taste a little bit different. So these are all meticulous things. That's why Eric quotes every single product.

Eric Simpson 22:48

Gotta use the right product for the right project. You know, years ago before I even started Simpson Labs, you know, when I was working down at Robinson Pharma, I was also, you know, consulting for other brands for RD work. And these shady motherfuckers, dude. I'm not gonna name any names, but I I put this project together for um a big distributor out there. Okay, and I flew all the way down there to witness the first run at this facility because it was the first time that this product was being ran at this new facility. And I go there and it was like 30 batches that they were doing. I stayed to watch three of those batches run. Everything was great, it tastes good, does all look good, filled right, everything was perfect. So I left. Three weeks later, I get a call from uh one of the owners of the distribution company. They said their product turned into sludge, just slop, just like sand. And I'm like, what? I roll over to my wife, kiss her, I said, I gotta go, I gotta go down to fucking a three-hour drive to go look at some some products at some stores. So I drove all the way down there, I went and reviewed all the products in all these different stores, they were all the same. I'm like, oh my fucking god. I mean, we're talking like three million bottle run that went down. So after fighting and finger pointing and these guys trying to just drag me, my name through the mud, it turned out that these motherfuckers swapped the patent ingredients for some generic ingredients. Guess what? Those generic ingredients don't fucking dissolve, they're not water soluble. So they pulled a shady one all to save a buck. And yeah, it got real nasty and real ugly. I ended up losing that account. And uh yeah, I actually stopped doing my consulting after that because it bothered me so much that I just done. So I just continued my tenure down at Robinson Pharma and then you know built Simpson Labs in the background and the rest is history. But the point of the story is you gotta use the right materials for the right project, but there's shady fuckers out there that will swap things around just to save a nickel. It's just awful.

SPEAKER_03 24:55

We've seen it, we see it all the time. Terrible. Yeah, and you're in the beverage space, so that's that's that's tough. I mean it's even less like identifiable too. I mean, that's like we we will get so we the majority of what we do is on the innovation side, but I've I've said I think like especially recently, like we're starting to get people that have like gone around to some of our competitors that we we were talking about, one of them that have just had some less than desirable experiences. And uh we've also had um we've had like one or two customers leave over pennies, right? And then you know they come back because at the end of the day, we might be delayed a week or two, and maybe we messed up, like maybe we forgot to buy something, but we do care. But I feel like sometimes the customer doesn't think we care, and it's like just sometimes I can't get I can't fix the mistake as fast as they would want me to fix it. I can't get the label company to turn it around in 72 hours.

Don Grace 25:51

Oh, labels. Don't need to talk about labels. We just got some of your labels.

SPEAKER_03 25:58

What? Yeah, what are you talking about? But that's what I'm talking about with labels.

Don Grace 26:07

I don't want to say any names, but this company's coming like high praise. Everybody's oh, they're great, they're great. I'm like, who was it, AD? Says their name. I'm not gonna say any names. I'm like, you gotta be kidding me. I thought this was like the new company that's supposed to be great. That's the next thing. Mark my words. Oh, that's hilarious. Yeah, I'm looking at you, I'm looking at you, looking at you two, looking at you two. We're gonna get into that business eventually. Because I feel like it's a huge bottleneck for us, right? We're super creative to begin with. I feel like it's always wrong, like with the label companies, right? The majority of the time. And then we're the ones having to fix it with our quality and our our you know, regulatory team, all the labels and fix the mistakes and go back to them and have them reprint them. And it screws up the production like crazy.

Eric Simpson 26:54

We won't blend anything until your label's here for that exact reason. No, and then it comes and it's not right, and we're like, oh my god, and now we gotta delay their runs, and then we gotta call audibles and switch things around. I mean, luckily for us, we're always weeks ahead on our blending schedule, so we have the ability to move things around in our schedule still at the end of the day. That money of that material is still sitting there, and that that fucking time, that clock is ticking on you know our terms with our suppliers. Yeah, you just keep moving and running. But yeah, um, if we did our own printing, we could help control the narrative. Great, we have all of our materials for this customer. Let's go to print, guys. Boom, we'll have labels at our other facility the next day and we can start running. But it it's a big thing.

Don Grace 27:41

You guys are getting crocking, right? Something new to us next to a certain degree, right? That's what you're saying earlier.

SPEAKER_03 27:46

Yeah, I mean, we do nine to fifteen loads a day, I think, of transfers, just inner facility transfers through our distribution. You guys have a great setup because you have your production facility on the other side of the road, and then your other three of your other buildings just attached to each other right there. Ours are seven miles apart. So we have we're shipping water or transfer transferring water. Yeah, and a truck for us is not worth what a truck is for you guys, right? Like a truck for the brand is maybe $40,000. For us, let's just say it's you know $25 or $30,000. And so we're producing, you know, X trucks per hour, X trucks per shift. It's gotta go somewhere because our production facility just fills up like this. Um, and I'm paying $275 for each one of these loads, seven days a week, 24 hours a day. Uh, also with the control, right? Like, I gotta call my broker, freight broker, whoever it is to like move these trucks around. Now, of course, we're at a point now where basically they have allocated drivers and trucks to support our business. But I'm looking, like you're talking about you see every number that goes in and out. I'm looking at how much I'm spending on this. I'm like, oh my God, like I'm I'm spending almost $150,000, $200,000 a month on just inner facility transfers. Yeah. Making me sick thinking about that. So we bought five freight liners. So you bought how many? Five, yeah. Nice this morning. Um, actually, when we were touring, I was like, are you serious right now?

Don Grace 29:14

That's like you're you're you're a true entrepreneur. This embossed it right there.

SPEAKER_03 29:18

I mean, it just bothers you.

Don Grace 29:19

You know, I turned and looked at him, I'm like, is he really doing that? And he's like, I just bought five of them.

SPEAKER_03 29:24

I mean, I only need two, but it was a good deal.

SPEAKER_00 29:28

That's what we do, right?

Don Grace 29:31

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_00 29:33

You find the pain points in the bottle next, and yeah. I cut the hair.

Don Grace 29:37

Seriously, I had the the hair all the way out because they were uh, you know, they're from Beverly Hills, Jewish. I had to keep the hair long. Okay. Was that why? Yeah. So right after we got the deal closed, it was his kid's birthday. I cut my hair. That was the whole reason. Yeah, my wife's like, thank God. You gotta look older than that. My wife said that too. Yeah. But they're a great group to work with. Yeah. Acra. Yeah, they're a really good group, really good people. Um, and then they've been here for day one. I that was before we were here, the the other group that you work with that was the same group.

Eric Simpson 30:12

Yeah.

Don Grace 30:13

So, like literally, all the buildings that Eric and myself have right now are all the same buildings that he used to work out of. Some of them. Oh, really?

Eric Simpson 30:20

Some of them, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Don Grace 30:21

Not every single long story. Yeah. That's wild though, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Eric Simpson 30:24

Like our headscreen.

SPEAKER_03 30:26

That's kind of like that, you know, RE Gold entourage story I was talking about. Yeah. The guy with the paintball gun taking the buildings back.

Don Grace 30:33

Yeah. It's a great scene. We could use that. We could use a new entourage.

SPEAKER_03 30:37

Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

Don Grace 30:39

That was the best.

SPEAKER_03 30:40

Do you ever get into Peaky Blinders? Fuck yeah. No. What? Billions. Uh billions of gigs. Now, hold on.

Eric Simpson 30:46

Since we brought up billions, do people call you wags?

SPEAKER_00 30:50

Yes. That's all I call them is wags. All I call them is wags. Whenever I'm talking to Donnie's like, what are the wags? That's a lot to live up to. It's a lot. That's a great fucking character.

Eric Simpson 31:00

Peaky did it mean like that guy's the best guy in the whole show. Oh, that's hilarious. Solid. So funny. That's a good idea. Peaky blinders, though. Peaky's the best. Did you watch the movie too? I wasn't too thrilled with it. I was a little disappointed. But hey, I'll take you know any Peaky Blinders I can. Yeah, good closure. Prequill, you know, aftermath, whatever it may be. So guys are stud.

Don Grace 31:23

Next time when you guys have more time, we gotta get you guys out to do a game or something like that. Yeah, it'll be fun. Yeah. I mean, we've had you know different guys that we work with. We take them out to Sunset Tower, and you know, you have Elon Musk sitting on one side and you have Mickey Rourke sitting on the other. That's true stories.

SPEAKER_03 31:39

Yeah.

Don Grace 31:39

But our buddy wanted to go smoke freaking cigarettes with Mickey Rourke. Yeah. Long story short, guess who was with Elon?

SPEAKER_03 31:46

Huh?

Don Grace 31:46

Amber Heard. What? Yes.

SPEAKER_03 31:50

Wild. Well, he likes a little crazy then.

Don Grace 31:52

This was before the Amber Kurd. So this was before like the whole like Johnny Depp stuff, you know? And that all started happening. Wait, didn't that come out? Yeah. So so so so meanwhile, like I'm not connecting the dots, and Frank's like, she was she was there that night. Amber was there. I'm like, that's who was with Elon. I'm like, you gotta be kidding me. That's who Johnny Depp's talking about right now.

SPEAKER_00 32:13

That's weird. How many kids does Elon have now? 30? That we know of? Yeah.

Don Grace 32:18

I mean, that's a loaded question.

Eric Simpson 32:22

Fuck, I wish I he was my dad. Yeah. I'll call him daddy.

SPEAKER_03 32:29

Right now. Right now. No problem. Oh, that's a wild story, though.

Don Grace 32:33

That's that's yeah, it's good for business for us. Like when you go out around here and stuff like that, there's a lot of like priceless memories and experiences that you could have here if you go to the right places with clients and stuff like that. You can't like really have anywhere else.

SPEAKER_00 32:45

No, I agree. You know, I told you uh Pittsburgh. Orlando next make a uh Eastern Conference Finals. I know Orlando's not in LA, but yeah, yeah.

Eric Simpson 32:55

Yeah, yeah, yeah. For sure. Uh I have not had the opportunity or honor of visiting your guys' facilities yet, but I've heard nothing but amazing things about it. So definitely on the bucket list for sure.

SPEAKER_03 33:05

Yeah, we'll get you out and maybe maybe later in the year. It's about to heat up. Not in the summertime.

Don Grace 33:10

So we have a ton of customers out on the east coast. I do really, really well on the east coast. That's why I go there so much. It's uh it's it's it's a really good market for us. You need to come Florida, obviously. When I I also saw you guys, saw a bunch of other guys. And then obviously, as you go up the coast as well, too. We do the whole coast we do well with.

unknown 33:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:29

Which I mean, what is a Mecca? It's like it's like the mini Utah. It's like the Utah of the East, you know?

Don Grace 33:34

Yeah. Like Utah has a ton going on there too. So much, so that's the one where it's like constantly a new manufacturer popping up in some competitive spot.

Eric Simpson 33:43

You know, their labor's cheap as shit, but guess what? Their fucking service sucks too. Yeah, it does.

Don Grace 33:49

Gotta weigh it out. Well done. Gotta weigh it out. You guys gotta get back though, right? We're at two, you gotta be back by 3:30.

SPEAKER_03 33:54

Yeah, it's close to it. Yeah, be back where we got a dinner. Oh. Does it get progressively worse now? Yes.

Don Grace 34:01

So the longer you stay, the worse it gets crazy.

Eric Simpson 34:04

It's so bad. Oh my god. I'm gridlocked.

SPEAKER_00 34:07

Appreciate you guys having us. Yeah, seriously.

Don Grace 34:09

No, it's our pleasure. We really appreciate you guys making the trek out of here again for Beverage Forum. Like, I know how it is for you guys at Beverage Forum. You know, pretty much anybody and everybody wants to talk to you right now. Speed 80. Pretty cool though. I got that. You're the hot chick at the dance. I remember we saw you out there a couple years ago.

SPEAKER_03 34:24

Yeah.

Don Grace 34:24

You were speaking, it was at BevNet, right?

SPEAKER_03 34:26

That was cool. That was cool.

Don Grace 34:27

That's when we first started talking, and it's like see how far you guys have come. It's it's really, really impressive. And thank you. Kudos to you guys.

SPEAKER_00 34:35

Thank you. Thank you. No, we uh we have great partners. I mean, if it wasn't for their success, no one would know we are, uh honestly. Yeah. And uh, you know, it's just like the sports nutrition space, or it's a small space once you get in it. So just do right by people and I mean everything else kind of takes care of itself. Agreed. I mean, we're like re referrals are the best marketing there is. Yeah. I mean that's how I don't think we really I can't tell you the last I don't want to say that, but we do very little outbound. Yeah.

Don Grace 35:08

Right.

SPEAKER_00 35:09

Like everything, every one of our customers is pretty much an inbound lead.

Don Grace 35:13

Which is great. Yeah. Very similar for us. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 35:16

It's a different relationship too.

Don Grace 35:18

You know, yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. When you're you know aggressively trying to court somebody to be an account for you, it's like they kind of feel like, okay, well, how can I play this guy against all these other people in order for me to get what I want? You know, sometimes you end up in a situation where that's all you are.

SPEAKER_03 35:33

Right. Yeah.

Don Grace 35:34

Which is tough. But yeah, we don't we don't have really any customers like that. Yeah. Thank goodness. Yeah, we have great covers. Great, great partners. I mean, that's what very built on, man. Very grateful. Yep. But um, thanks again for making the trek out here, guys. Yeah, really, really appreciate everything. Really appreciate your time. Absolutely. And uh yeah, you guys keep crushing it, man.

SPEAKER_03 35:53

Yeah, too. Thank you guys. We'll see you in Florida now. Florida. Absolutely. I'll see you there in a couple weeks for a game. All right. So you really might be back in a couple weeks. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Let's go. Fuck no.

Eric Simpson 36:04

I mean, yeah, yeah. Maybe fucking. No. Let me know that it's a good thing. No, let me know. Why am I going anywhere? I was I hold on, I gotta check my daughter schedule first. Okay. Anyways, great seeing you guys. Thanks for coming down. All right, fellas.