Last week, CNN reported that Facebook and Instagram are shutting down all peer to peer sales of alcohol. This wasn’t a joke. In the span of 72 hours, all of the major bourbon groups were wiped out. The secondary market is synonymous with Facebook. The growth of bourbon’s popularity can be attributed to it as well by those that are in it to flip bottles. Owen Powell didn’t create the first group to buy, sell, and trade bourbon, but he certainly created the largest. The Bourbon Secondary Market group is no longer around on Facebook, but the story of how it was built, the ways discussions were moderated, and how it served as a data gold mine for valuations is told. We uncover the progression of the group from a few hundred members to reaching over 50,000, what leads to certain distilleries being banned on a black market, and if the secondary market will actually end if Facebook groups cease to exist.

Show Notes:

• This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about Parker’s Heritage Collection.
• How did you get into bourbon?
• Talk about the growth of the group. Were there any growing pains?
• How many members are in the group?
• How many admins do you have?
• What do you look for in admins?
• Why do people have animosity towards admins in these groups?
• Let’s talk about the rules in the group.
• How did the secondary raffle site become its own thing?
• How does a dispute come about?
• What do all the acronyms mean?
• What is the best way to handle a dispute?
• Have you ever had accusations of counterfeits?
• How do you handle that kind of situation?
• Why did you do an open group?
• Do you keep a log of all the transactions?
• You’ve banned a few distilleries. How are rules like that determined?
• Why do you run the group even though you don’t get paid?
• What do you do when someone prices something too high?
• What about monthly dues?
• Do you think groups could end on Facebook?

Transcription:

0:00
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0:35
people add their wives to the group and then immediately regret it because you know their wives mad at them they’re always on their phone. wife gets in there sees how much they’re spending on it then it’s like when you kick my wife out know that you got to do figure that out on your own. I’m not getting in the middle of that. I think I might add my wife

0:52
to it because because being part of the podcast now I’m like, I gotta you gotta have a pulse on what’s happening. So you know exactly uninvite.

1:10
Hey, this is Episode 212 of bourbon pursuit. I’m one of your hosts Kenny. And as usual, a little bit of news. On July 26 2019 beam Suntory broke ground on what is to become the friend be no craft distillery. It’s part of a $60 million investment and what will become known as the James be distilling company and that can be located in Claremont, Kentucky. All of the building itself will be fresh construction. The brands that are gonna be produced at this new craft distiller are ones that were already familiar with like Booker’s knob Creek and Basil Hayden’s all as well as new brands such as little book and legend. Its name for the seventh generation master distiller Fred know which has been on the show few times before, and this new distillery will give know and his son Freddie the opportunity to experiment with new fermentation and distillation techniques. The distillery has also announced that they will be updating the visitor experiences with behind the scene looks at their brands, a new tasting room, and much more. Heaven Hill has announced the 13th release of the Parkers heritage collection, and this will be a heavy char rye whiskey. While

2:22
standard barrels and heaven Hill are a chart three the barrels the distillery used to age this rye our char five, that means they’re burned for 50 seconds longer than a typical char three. The heavier char the easier it is for the whiskey to penetrate the wooden staves and take on those heightened open spice flavors. This new ride is going to be eight years old and nine months in these and was aged also in the seventh floor of Rick house why before being non shell filtered and bottled at 105 proof. The Parkers heritage collection is named after heaven Hill master distiller Parker beam, who passed away in 2017. After being diagnosed with ALS back in 2010. portions of the sale are donated to fund ALS research, and sales from the past six editions has raised over $1 million. The retail price set on this is going to be $150 MSRP. Ryan and myself are excited to announce that we are going to begin the process of opening a distribution of pursuit series in three states. You can look forward to Georgia, Texas, and of course Kentucky as the first states that we will be hitting the first barrel has been selected by Justin’s House of bourbon with a second one quickly going into liquor barn, we’re super excited to be able to bring our single barrel offerings at stores selections at first. And you can look for more information on stores in the States on our website at pursuit spirits.com. Now, don’t worry if you aren’t even in those states or Heck, even if you are you can still purchase your bottles and have them shipped to your door through our online retailer at sealed box dot com. You can go to pursuit spirits calm and click the Buy Now button and you’ll be redirected to the site for that particular single barrel. Right now we only have about 20 bottles, let them stock but we’re going to have a brand new September release, so get ready for it. Last week, CNN reported that Facebook and Instagram are shutting down all sales of alcohol, cigarettes and other similar things like e cigarettes. And this wasn’t a joke in the span of around 72 hours. Half of the bourbon groups that I belong to were wiped out. Many of the larger secondary groups with 30 to 50,000 members were gone immediately in over the next 24 hours more disappeared. And even some groups that sold or raffled charitable causes for bottles were gone as well. We can’t say for sure if this is the end of the Facebook secondary market, but it sure is a swift kick to it. Immediately following the demise of the large groups. Many of the smaller ones with less than 3000 members change their names, they also change the rules. And while multitudes of even more smaller groups started to emerge, it’s uncertain if we’ll ever see a group with over 20,000 members ever again. And that’s kind of why we decided to release this podcast, the secondary market, it’s synonymous with Facebook. This can also be attributed to the growth of Bourbons popularity by those that are captivated at some of the values that some of these bottles Dr. ON pal didn’t create the first group to buy, sell and trade bourbon, but he certainly created the largest, the bourbon secondary market group is no longer around. But the story of how it was built, the way discussions were moderated and how it served as a data gold mine for valuations is a story that needs to be told. we uncover the progression of the group from 100 members to reaching over almost at the time it was cease to exist as around 50,000. And really, we’re also going to talk about what leads to certain distilleries also being banned on this black market and at the secondary market will actually end Facebook’s cease to ever exist again. Now you’re done listening to me. So let’s go ahead and listen to Joe over a barrel bourbon. And then you’ve got Fred Minnick

6:12
with above the char.

6:15
Hey, everyone, Joe here again. Our Bourbons have won a few medals, some of the most prestigious spirits competitions out there. But don’t take their word for it. Find out for yourself. Use the store locator and barrellbourbon.com.

6:28
I’m Fred Minnick. And this is above the char. This past week, I posted a photo of the new Parker’s heritage release. It was like a lot of PR release images. It was shiny. It told you all about the new whiskey. And it came with a price tag hundred and 4999. So pretty drastic increase from past Parker’s heritage releases past releases were around 89 to $100. So you’re looking at about a 50 to 60 you know, dollar price increase depending on what market you live in. People on my Instagram went crazy. I mean, maybe not crazy, but they were very upset with the price increase. And I had people writing me saying that this is solving Parker’s good name. As many people know, I was really quite close with Parker been before he passed away. And it got me to thinking about where we are in bourbon right now. There’s actually price increases across the board, not just with these really nice bottles like Parker’s heritage, and the Buffalo Trace antique collection. But you’re seeing it like an everyday Bourbons. I remember when I used to find four roses small batch for like $20. Now it’s a $40 bottle. Now, some of that is on the retailer’s for selling it to that price. But the fact is Bourbons that are 40 $50, I used to pay 15 to $25. for them. That is where we are. But I’m curious, I’ve been curious as to how much that might actually impact the retention of consumers. So I did a little digging. And as it turns out, if you are running a business and you are selling a product, one of the best things you can do is increase your price. In fact, they say that people actually grow their profits, and they also grow their consumer base. So according to this thing called the McKinsey report, it suggests that for basically like every 1% of increase in price can yield an 8% increase in profits. But these reports and all these people who are talking who are studying price increases also preach transparency. They say, Tell your people tell your customer base, why you’re increasing the price? Did your costs go up? Did you have a bad loss in the previous quarter? And you’re trying to make up for it? Why are you increasing prices, if you don’t start telling your consumers, especially the bourbon consumers who have been with you from the very beginning, why you’re increasing your prices, you will start to see a massive boycott. I’m talking about the kind of boycott you find on social media that ends up trending and people will no longer be buying your bottles. And that new consumer you think you might get because you’re increasing the price and you’re not coming off as cheap. Well, that person is going to be googling who you are when they’re in the total wine or whatever liquor store. And when they Google you and they find out you’ve been increasing your prices 50 600% they’re going to walk away and they’re going to go to something else. In today’s day and age, you cannot increase a price almost 100% and get away with it. Consider this some free advice to Bourbons everywhere. Keep your prices affordable. So the everyday person can buy them. If you want to have really ultra expensive products, create a new product and brand it to be ultra ultra expensive. But going from $89 to 150. It’s just not good. It’s a bad optic. So be thoughtful with your pricing and be transparent. You’ll be rewarded by customers who love your product. And that’s this week’s above the char. Hey, did you know that I’m also curating hometown rising a country music festival that’s featuring Tim McGraw, Luke Bryan Keith Urban and Little Big Town, go check it out at hometown rising.com. I’ll be on the stage and you can hit me up and have a drink with me. Until next week. Cheers.

10:52
Welcome back to the new episode of bourbon pursuit, the official podcast of bourbon, Kinney and Ryan here today talking about us subject that is very familiar to the bourbon culture and the whiskey geek culture. Because if anybody is really getting to bourbon, you’ve probably gone down your aisles, you see a lot of the regular stuff that’s out there, you start getting really influenced by all of it and you want to learn more about it, then you learn about, we’ve talked about our own journeys into this, you learn about limited releases, and how hard it is to get your hands on limited releases. And when you get down to that path, everything all leads to one one sort of in gate here. And that’s the secondary market.

11:36
Yes.

11:38
Well, you start out and you’re like excited, you know, you found the Weller, you know, Elijah Craig barrel proof. And then you’re like, well, what else is there, and then you gotta get bored with the stuff that you can find, then you’re like, then people inches, like you introduce me to the Facebook world. And like, I was like, Oh, my God. It’s like a Pandora’s box. And that’s how I got introduced to dust ease and all the limitations, and it’s like, it’s the best thing that’s ever happened. Yeah, and the worst thing

12:03
is the best, worst thing you know, and we’ll we’ll talk about, you know, really our guest, because he is he’s really the ones that as kind of spearhead and really grown this movement. But you know, just on the topic of dusty, I remember getting into the secondary market. And this is this was like, early 2014 timeframe when I was introduced to it. And this is before I think even this group was around that that became the largest one, he had all these secret code name groups that you got into. And I remember seeing dusty, and people were paying like 100 bucks for some 1970s old grand, I bought an 86 Oh, granted for 75 bucks, like in 2015. I bought, like, I bought like three or four of them. And but I was looking at it back then I was like, What moron is I know.

12:49
There’s a 999 sticker on it, like

12:54
10 towns that but now it’s like, why didn’t about all of them?

12:57
Oh, gosh, I’m sure we all have some of these stories. So let’s go ahead and introduce our guests today. So our guest today was one of the founders or is one of the founders of the largest secondary group that’s out there on Facebook. So Ellen Pao of bourbon secondary market, welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. Well, thank you for coming on. And you know, really kind of giving us a behind the scenes look of, of what really happens here. And, and just to make sure that everybody’s clear, like, oh, it is not sitting here like advocating but he does this he kind of just operates a community. Right? And that’s really what it is. And it doesn’t matter if it was him or anybody else like this is going to thrive and exist no matter what,

13:35
no matter the channel no matter what. Absolutely.

13:38
So before we kind of dive into that, oh, and let’s talk about kind of your past like how did you get into bourbon? How did you kind of find your way into into the scene?

13:49
See, I got into bourbon probably around seventh grade, just kind of like parents houses.

13:57
Usually people

13:59
get you’re like,

14:01
like liquor cabinet. And, you know, us doing appreciate the corner. Yeah. But that was just, I mean, that’s when I first got into it, then there was a pretty good time that I quit drinking it just because I had bad experience in high school and kind of just like, oh, not doing that. So it’s usually when people have those

14:21
variances. And

14:22
then I guess freshman year in college, I worked at liquor barn in Lexington, and I was like, I’m gonna go out and get on, try and get back into this, you know, put it behind me got a bottle of Elijah Craig 18 for 50 bucks. It’s like, I can’t believe I’m spending this much. You know, went home had a party, we mixed it with Coke, you know, did shots of it just, it was, you know, one of those 1980 ones that were really good. Corey Putnam just chugs all the time.

14:54
And, you know, you look back and you’re thinking like, Man, I wish I had that bottle of appreciation

14:58
anymore. You know, of course. The whole everybody looks at it, like a stock with they bought it when it first came out. Yeah, you know, but it is what it is. I

15:08
only bought Apple when it first came out.

15:11
Right? Yeah. $10 wouldn’t, you know, but, uh, so and then, I guess, getting my education in hospitality, you know, I was managing restaurants and hotels, and in that kind of just the whole food and beverage thing just led me into spirits and naturally just

15:34
kind of evolved and got

15:36
naturally just start a secondary group.

15:40
I mean, we can get into that. And that that was a that was mostly because of back when you like we were talking about 2014. You heard of the group, she if you were in like bourbon info exchange, people will talk about it. But you got to know somebody to get in. I didn’t know. I didn’t know anything. You know, I was like, screw it. You know, I woke up at like, five in the morning Didn’t you know, I was like, I couldn’t get back to sleep. Like, I’m just I’m going to do it. Public, you know, all these secret groups. Why do you know why not? and it blew up. And I immediately became the guru and I didn’t know it. People send me. They just assumed because I created this group. I knew everything. Yeah. So you know, they send a picture of this to me, what is this? How much is it worth? I have no idea. You know, like, Yeah, what is it? So all I do is Google. What is it? And I got educated, self educated on all the dust DS and fake it to every naked, you know? Yeah. I mean, I wanted to learn myself, I was intrigued by Why is, you know, why are people paying, you know, so? And then it just, it just kept getting bigger and bigger. And, you know, yeah, it didn’t stop people rioted, that I let it be not secret, or, you know, and not bringing it to the forefront. And I think it did a lot. I mean, I think it affected the industry a good.

17:01
Oh, absolutely. I mean, I think I think that’s what the secondary does. I mean, there’s there’s

17:05
brands that get like, totally thank the secondary model. Yeah, they’re like,

17:09
I mean, yeah, I mean, it helps them evaluate exactly what they have in and maybe they start realizing everything’s undervalued. Like, yeah, that was the that’s probably the biggest thing. Communities had a huge impact on the black culture like do you think like old scout and like them county would ever be a thing without a bourbon secondary market? like it’d be tough to say yeah, I really would be it even be tougher to say that. Even would would group pics or store pics even have a place to be that are becoming that are, I guess you’d say sought after? Yeah. Because if you see something, and it’s it’s, it’s got a group name on it, you’re like, Oh, I immediately have that I’ve never seen it before. I remember for myself coming on to the secondary market with the first time. I remember seeing the Willett family estate bottles, just, you know, just the regular ones. And this is right as right as when the foil tops started taking over. So they’re still wax ones in circulation. And I’m like, I’ve never seen these bottles before. I’ve never really seen them before. And so I’m I’m sitting there, I’m always going around the stores, trying to check them out. Trying to find these, you know, 10 910 14 year will family states. And I’m getting one in like Northern Kentucky. Like, I don’t know, probably in late 2014, late early 2015 from the party source. But I didn’t know like the whole entire time I could have just been driving to Bardstown. I mean, the whole time I could have been doing that. And so it was it was an edge. It’s an educational experience as well for people that come into it. And just another education experience. I remember everybody’s got their their Blanton story. You find Blanton’s, you start learning about he learned about the letters in the horses in the bottle shape, and you come and trade with it. And then you learn out like, Oh my god, there’s a barrel proof version. But you can’t get the United States. How do I get my hands on it?

18:55
Like, how do you get a whole barrel on it?

19:00
It’s exactly I mean, that’s exactly like the the curiosity that gets sparked out of a community like this. So kind of talk about the hyper growth of what it was. And were there any kind of growing pains along with it. There were too many growing pains. It was just

19:20
occasionally we get to a point where like, I guess some of that some admins are like, Man, I’m having a baby now I don’t have time for this. You know, I think it’s kind of weird. Having admins leave because they they they really feel like they’re getting noticed that a job. One of them like, Man, I’ve been trying to tell you this for a month now.

19:43
I don’t care what kind of severance

19:45
do yeah, like,

19:47
I need an extra.

19:49
But uh, so yeah, it’s only growing pains as as it got bigger. We just had to take on more admins. So what would you say you started start? 20

20:00
1415? And now how many about how many members are roughly?

20:04
About 35,000 35,000?

20:06
Yeah.

20:08
So do you have like a certain amount admins part? Thousand? Do you have like a like ratio

20:14
already have a certain amount of admins and time zones? Okay. That makes looking for West Coast because, you know, and then there’s other things that we look for? What do they do during the day? Are you like a firefighter? Are you sitting in a firehouse for hours on end doing nothing but looking at Facebook or your hair? You know, really tech industry? Yeah. But, uh, so that’s one of those are some of the things. And one of the things I told everybody, I was like, we don’t want to hire anybody that actually comes to us and says they want to do it. Because then, you know, we actually did hire a guy that it you know, there’s no wrong, you know,

20:57
some ulterior motive and,

20:59
and we there was, and but, you know, and it’s just kind of a, you really got to be level headed, and most importantly, thick skin. Because if I mean, essentially, Europe, a boss of, I want to, I won’t say it’s a company, but I’ve, you know, you have to create these rules to keep the riffraff out. And then someone breaks one. And you’re like, well, you broke the rules. Sorry, you got to go. But, and they’ve been drinking all night, and they’re pissed. And then they, they’ve got to, you know, create a spoof accounts of your own Facebook or, you know, I had one admin leave because his kids were pictured him pictures of him and his kid were posted everywhere on their fake account, just like really, you know, sleazy stuff, but, I mean, it’s, I mean, I kind of, I don’t care what people say, doesn’t bother me too much. You know, I just decided to keep doing what I’m doing.

21:57
Yeah, I mean, I guess it is tough. Because you’re dealing in a market where these aren’t, these aren’t grandma’s that are just knitting sweaters. Like these are, these are, these are, for the most part, a lot of grown men drink whiskey, and

22:11
it’s an online bar, they have

22:13
seniors, and they have opinions. And they’re very strong about them, too. And they

22:17
have a lot of liquid courage. That

22:20
in when you when you’re behind the screen, and a keyboard that amplifies liquid courage is there’s no repercussions really, except maybe a message back.

22:28
I mean, I’ve gotten into arguments online with people, you know, and then met them in person here. One guy, I, you know, he’s his name will call him bow. And he came up here with Jamie from Lincoln Road, and we went to I went to a bourbon tasting that night and hung out with him. And you know, ha, mon, and I was like, Oh, hell, you know, me and him really got into it. And we went out drinking. I was playing Jamie and ping pong. He was cheering me on. He was all on my side. But the third bar was get to He’s like, I go up to him. I was like, Can we bury this online hatchet, and he’s like, Oh, we have a beef online. I was like, Yeah, he’s like, what’s your last name? I’m like, pow. Just started cousin. Oh.

23:16
Yeah, man.

23:19
God, I mean, he’s a good guy. But so it’s one of those things. It’s like, Oh, they hate you. They hate you. But if you actually meet them in person, pretty much everybody’s good people. But behind that keyboard, liquid current. Oh, yeah. FUFQFU. You know, you’re the devil, you ruined bourbon.

23:34
Why do you think why do you think people do like have that animosity? I mean, it’s and I know that you end up having to not post under your own personal accounts anymore. You do an inner page account to try and kind of hide and make sure the admins aren’t aren’t necessarily targeted anymore. So why is it that I mean, at this point, you are the godfather of the BSNV. Like that’s, I think it’s everybody love

23:59
that title, everybody. Hey,

24:01
everybody kind of understands your name. And when they see it, like, like, anytime it happens, like there’s their posts, flurry that happens, but there’s also some people that that hates you for no reason. Do you? Any idea?

24:13
I think it now, no, not really. I mean, I kind of see it as like, I know, I guess kind of the culture that everybody’s gone through in the last six years of, you know, they don’t care what they bought, you know, they’ve already made up their mind. They they’re going to judge you for whatever it is that they think is true. And if they’re presented with facts about the actual situation, you know, cognitive dissonance just goes in and they don’t, you know, right ever, you know, yeah, I could be Mother Teresa.

24:51
You know, you ruin burden. If mother

24:53
teresa Rana face well, and when you’re,

24:55
you’re, you know, you’re you’re separated by a screen and you’re not looking and talking to each. It really? Yeah, because you take the human element out of it is that you’re like, you know, you can’t it’s if I’m sitting here Yeah, I’m not gonna yell at you for in person, but it might be a little easier.

25:12
Well, you know, I’ve never met you. I don’t know you. I don’t care. Right? Exactly. Yep, for sure.

25:21
So let’s let’s kind of talk about the rules a little bit because the one thing about bsm is that you’re in compared to other groups like it’s, it’s a lot of like, no nonsense, like, this is what you’re here for. You’re here to buy bid. And that’s it, like, no talk, no discussion. So kind of talk about the rules that that were in place and why they made them place like that.

25:42
So the the no discussions came up in a lot of rules were just formed by some of them sending me a pm saying, why don’t you do this. And one of them was, I hate seeing discussions, when I’m only here to buy or look for something in particular. And the group’s gotten so big, just, you got rid of it, I mean, then go somewhere else. And I was like, that’s a great point, you know, bourbon or, or info, exchange, go there and talk about it. Here. We’re one thing. So that’s how that that happened. In a lot of the rules just were developed as we evolved. And just, I mean, people wanted it a certain way, it was mostly majority ruled on how things evolved, you know, from other groups and

26:26
stuff like that. And then you also have the secondary site that was doing kind of like raffles and all that sort of stuff. How did that sort of spin out and become its own separate thing?

26:38
saying basically, same thing, it’s it’s mucking up what a majority of people were there for. So it was like, we were just here for the bourbon, we want to buy it. That’s what I want to I don’t like gambling. I don’t want you know, it’s it’s mucking up my area. So in the whole gambling thing, aspect, that’s like a whole nother of great legal things that’s going on. Doing a couple of things wrong there. And so I mean, that’s that was just a separate it, you know, kind of

27:07
one of the first ones to do raffling different department.

27:10
I can’t remember. I mean, I saw there was there was somebody in the community. I know that ran a group for a while he has since passed on. There not don’t name names. Yeah, just for the sake of it. I mean, I remember it was red balls or whatever. Yeah, red balls or something like that. I forget. But there was there was there was those days and it I don’t know like for I’ll pass it to you guys. What would you rather do? Would you rather sit there and gamble on something or buy it outright if it’s something you want?

27:40
Well, at first it was I won like my like first, like, like one out of 30. So I was like, This is amazing. Proceed to lose like 50 X in a row. And so then I quickly realized that let’s just not a gamble. And let’s just take the money that you would gamble and buy what you actually want and get it so it I’d rather much buy it now

28:02
then do it. I like I don’t gamble at all with it. So I mean, I had no interest in in that help separate it too. And mostly the group ran it’s the raffle group ran itself. And then people started getting crazy. We’ll do a bottle bus was put in a bottle and then and then they’re all gambling. So then they start someone owes someone a bottle, then they gamble with that bottle before it’s even been shipped. And then it’s like a cluster of who owns what where it was, you know, it’s just like, so

28:34
it’s it’s kind of like I’m ready to double down. I didn’t ever believe in those randomized. Like, I just still don’t like mega ball ones. You know, it’s like public knowledge. What’s What’s the number? Yeah.

28:47
So you were talking about just you know, who has what bottle and whatnot. I know that there are there’s always disputes. kind of talk about what happens or how does the dispute come about sometimes?

29:03
A lot of times the biggest popcorn,

29:05
right. Explain popcorn to for people that don’t understand that.

29:08
Yeah, remember? Yeah, explain. Because when I first saw you see like coronas and popcorn. And I’m like, What is all this mean? Like, yeah, go over the targets for the

29:17
words just means at the end of five minutes to go and your auction that you’ve created. If someone bids in that five minutes last five minutes, it extends the auction another five. And it just helps. You know, people are watching TV at home and 10 o’clock at night and they forget. Oh, someone did it. I can get in and you know, so it helped push it along and drive up the price but kind of stops that a little bit of the the eBay sniping kind of riots it does. You know if that happened, kindness, just Continental United State, cheap way to our easy way to say I’m paying for your shipping. I don’t know where the the list of all the acronyms were created. came from somewhere before bsm came around and years before that. So you know there’s I mean, those groups have been going around for

30:08
Yeah, I love the i’s and T’s and

30:11
GCS. Yeah, you gotta learn everything. That’s I think that’s, that’s almost like a rite of passage we are getting into the bourbon world is that if you if you go to somebody and you start talking all this vernacular, and they don’t understand that you’re like,

30:24
welcome to the club. I think I won like an auction. And then I didn’t realize what popcorn was. And somebody when I was like, wait a minute, I wanted it’s time it went off, you know, but I didn’t understand the rules. And it’s kind of like read roll 13.0 and I was like, Oh, okay. Not this one in your videos. Another one.

30:41
I just discovered one. Last week, some South Carolina guys came up. And they were calling old Weller antique Ola. And I’m like, I’ve only heard it. Oh, da, I guess it’s a, you know, different level. I’ve always heard of ODA, but apparently everywhere else they call it Oh, my God. You know, the vernacular,

31:01
it changes. That’s for sure. Yep. So So kind of talking about what happens in a dispute, like what Ryan said, If there is, if there is something that somebody bids, but then somebody says like, nope, nope, it’s over. Like, how, how does it when does an admin need to get involved in a situation?

31:18
Well, we wrote the rules. So hopefully, that they don’t have to get an admin involved. But and they can people can will, you know, show the rules. It didn’t, you didn’t win it. Because here’s the rule. It says, you know, after five minutes, it’s over of no bidding. So, you know, you can check the timestamp of someone posting in that and determine if you actually did bit in time or not. So, I mean, things like that. If they’re disputed, it might be well, the package says delivered, but it’s not on my front porch, whereas Well, I know where it is. Someone stole it, you know,

31:54
who handles that part?

31:56
I mean, and you’ve even got the the drivers might steal it. I’ve had that happen. I know. You know, I was waiting for a package and excited that it was coming and got a notification that it was delivered in like, No, it wasn’t, I’m literally by the front door. never showed up. So I bitter about that. FedEx.

32:13
Yeah. But I mean, is there is there a reason that admins have to step in the in a situation like that when a package is lost? Like

32:22
a? Not? Yes. Because usually the guy that ships it, they’re responsible until it says delivered. And, or if it breaks during shipping, you know, the guy might open the package, and it’s all busted. And he’s like, Hey, this is broken, or the seal broke, and it’s a collector’s item, and I want it in mint condition. They’ll they’ll accuse, you know, the seller might accuse them of tampering with it, they just want a free bottle out of me or, you know, they’re lying. This is bowl, you know,

32:54
Haven, they just have blue bears the liability and the Alicia Burton tell

32:58
if it’s broken up, it’s okay. You threw in, you know, three pieces of newspapers packing material, and it’s broken, you know, come over here. Yeah, you know, and then a lot of the packaging suggestions that I gave actually came I used to work in a UPS hub one summer in Lexington. And I mean, I literally saw packages falling 30 feet concrete floor off these conveyor belts that get jammed up, and they just pack just are overflowing and just falling crashing down. So I was like, immediately, okay, I know how to pack a bottle from now, you know, you can’t overpack in, you know, you really should you know it. Things like that happen all the time. So, it just,

33:39
I prefer their bottle packs their

33:42
wine wine bottle shipper things.

33:44
Yeah. Cool until I someone’s like, showed me a bottle that they just, it kind of gives a false sense of security. Yeah. And they don’t they don’t throw anything else in there. And

33:54
well, y’all will have one of those in and then I put the popcorn around it or not popcorn, whatever. The styrofoam plate Stockholm, peanuts, peanuts.

34:02
Yeah. So in that situation, it’s it’s kind of it’s up to the buyer to try to make it right. In a situation like that. Now, we’ve also seen it in some of the How

34:12
do you make it right, though?

34:13
Like, it’s it’s either reading under.

34:16
So if it’s broken, it’s refund the money if, if the tech strips broken world, it’s kind of like you ask the buyer? Did you buy it to drink it? Or did you buy it to throw it on your massive wall? And, you know, whatever the answer is usually, okay. Well, then we take $50 for the, you know, crack seal, right? or something, you know, because

34:38
you’re going to drink up to them to figure out the Yeah.

34:42
Yeah, we direct them to figure it out themselves got

34:45
you’re not like the Better Business Bureau where they’re like, they’re like, have a dispute. And

34:50
you don’t you don’t have to resolve and

34:52
that’s it. I was I was gonna think they’re like a mediation court. You will, you know, like, you’re going like husband and wife are going through divorce. Let’s get together. No room real quick.

35:02
Yeah, I’ve had that quite a bit, actually. People add their wives to the group, and then immediately regret it. Because you know, their wives mad at them. They’re always on their phone. wife gets in there sees how much they’re spending on it, then it’s like, well, you kick my wife out. Know that you got to do figure that out on your own. I’m not getting in the middle of that. And then divorces have come up. No way. Oh, yeah. Like, those wives know how much that collections worth. And you’re getting into a divorce for whatever you did wrong, or whatever happened. That’s, you know, needs to be split up. So then they want me to kick their wives out so they can let them know what they’re selling or, you know, just like crazy. It’s like, I’m not No, sorry. Sorry about your luck. you dug your hole. You know, that’s my, my problem. Well, I didn’t know that. There’s a lot of that’s something that I think about I think I

35:51
might add my wife to it because because being part of the podcast and I’m like, I gotta you gotta have a pulse on what’s happening. So you know, exactly uninvite jacket.

36:03
I forgot she had it sees.

36:05
So I guess another thing is, you know, there’s a, there’s another thing that always happens, these groups that people call out other people, they’ll say, you know, they’ll tag and say like, Jimmy Joe, he’s, he’s a, he’s a shifted, he’s not he has a, you

36:19
know, good pair.

36:20
Well, I know that are like, I bought something. And then it’s been two weeks, and he hasn’t shipped it out. And he’s not responding back to messages. Like, is that the right thing to do? Or is it like,

36:32
the worst thing to do? If If there’s something going on, sometimes there’s something actually happened, man, I’ve been in the hospital. That happens, it happened to me once and I had to take a picture of my armband and send it to do I’ll ship your bottle out, it’s just going to be a little while I don’t know when. But uh, usually someone’s if they might be scamming Omen or something like that. calling them out is the worst thing is he’ll just piss them off. And if they have a conscience, and we’re going to actually they messed up and they were actually having attention to get get you back, well, our refund you or something, calling them out, just ruined your chances. Best thing is to conduct admin and say, Hey, this is what’s going on. And then we can reach up and I mean, I’ll just send a message, Hey, yo, this bottle what’s going on, you know, not a no accusations, I want to hear your side because a lot of times, there’s, it’s not their fault or something, you know, whatever. So, I mean, you do have to be diplomatic and not assume whatever you’re being told is that the whole story and go to the other side. And most the time, it works out fine. And they solve the problem. Occasionally, someone just, you know, turned into a drug addict and is stealing or, you know, ripping people off. But we’ve done a good job of like letting people into the group, it tells you when like when someone tries to join the group, it tells you how pretty much everything where they where they live? Are they a member of any other groups that you’re a member of? Are they friends with anybody? How windows? When did they create the Facebook page or in just all kinds of things? So if you’re just created this in the last year, you’re not getting? You know, if you’re created the Facebook in the last two years? Why did you just create Facebook? And you know, all right.

38:30
around for a while, I know you’re in your mid 30s? You

38:33
should know Yeah, exactly. So the and so we will have them prove their identity. Sometimes if their accounts really, you know, just send us a photo, a picture of your photo, Id block out all your pertinent information, we just need to see you actually who you are, you know, somebody that you’re not afraid to. And now these days, you can if you have that information, just like a name and a city. You can find them on their address, every relative for free note, you know, not some search site, white pages. com. It’s all

39:06
out there. So it’s like LinkedIn work. So if you ever add accusations of counterfeits or frauds.

39:15
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41:03
Have you ever had accusations of counterfeits or frauds?

41:06
And the BS showing in the group? Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, there’s, there’s been that. And there’s been people that have done it that we just thought I like I went to this guy’s house and got a bottle off of them. About a single project for 60 bucks or something. And house he’s living in a $400,000 house in which in Louisville is pretty good sized house 30,000 square feet or so maybe bigger, nice part of town comes from a wealthy family, well known family. And you just wouldn’t think he would be doing that. But I you know, who knows what motivates people to commit fraud?

41:45
So in a situation like that, where people have been wrongs, for say, like buying a buying a counterfeit on the page? Is there any?

41:57
Right? How does it How does it go about to try and make people whole or anything like that it’s like, man like this is this is a black market, you get what you get immediate action from an admin is if that accusation is made, we immediately ban you, or stop you from being able to because we don’t want to keep, you know, until we find out what’s really going on. And there’s been times where, yeah, I bought that. Yeah, I sold him that bottle. I got it from this guy who’s also in the group in this transaction. And you can see me buying that tree. Yeah, and you know, and then it’s like a, these bottles have been passed around for 10 people in the same group in three months. You know,

42:33
that’s what I always say about the secondary, it’s like, it all just stays in the group. Like, it’s, it’s like, we’re all transferring and firing the same bottles. Like, it’s funny how they pass around that. So

42:42
yeah, there’s, I mean, there’s some guys out there that do incredible work chasing these people down and finding out where the counterfeits are coming and how they’re happening. And and

42:55
they’re those five fighters or send on

42:58
Facebook every day. Well, I mean, it’s just good that there’s people like that, that they find enjoyment out of doing it, right. And they they either they find enjoyment, or it’s maybe they’re doing it to protect their own ass, because they do have a very large stake in bourbon. And they’ve got to make sure that what they have is still keeping its value as it goes. So two sides of that coin. Now, there’s also times that we just talked about that people finagle people out of money. Somebody says buy it now you say sure sounds good. Take your PayPal, Facebook account deleted, I’ve got my money and run. What do you what do you do to help? Or is there a way to help those buyers either become whole? Or is it kind of like, Man, that’s it?

43:41
Sorry? I’m hanging out with PayPal?

43:45
Is there a BSM community pool? where people are refunded like No, I mean, it’s interrupt your own risk type of thing. I mean, there’s not really a safeguard to protect you. And we tried to hope, prevent as much as we can by screening the people that come in there. But there’s, I mean, there’s an inherent risk, you’re gonna, you have to assume when you go into it, yeah, especially, what’s your legal recourse at that point to? Well, we’re gonna go, you’re gonna, you know, it’s kind of like, tell me what, Wise Guys, you know, what are you gonna do about it?

44:19
You gotta kind of look at the history of you know, those trends,

44:22
right, and the whole vouching for what they’re building? Yeah, I need a reference Jacqueline, this dude that, you know, yeah, that helps a lot.

44:30
In speaking of something like that, I just kind of thought of this to, you know, when you started this group, you also started in a way that was a lot different than others. Some other ones, like the old days, that’s not around, which was BX people would go in there and they would post bottles, and you would, they wouldn’t be transparent. It would say, like, you want to sip or you want to taste and that means it’s for sale, or if it’s for trade, and you would be post in the comments, or whatever it is, and everything what happened through PM, right? When when you built this site, it was almost completely opposite. It’s like, full transparency, open market sort of thing. What was the idea of doing that versus kind of like keeping it behind these sort of like, secret code words?

45:15
One I didn’t, I didn’t know about the code words, because I wasn’t able to get into those. And that’s the whole reason it was created. And the whole transparency thing, you know, as like, after I started it, and it was starting to take off. I was like, What is Facebook’s policy on this? So I found it. And it literally said, You must be at least 18 years old to buy alcohol, you know, sell alcohol and buy it on Facebook? And I’m just kind of scratching my head, okay. Oh, maybe they’re just seeing it as an international company. And well, we’re not really in it. And then it changed to 21 then it they said, Okay, now you can’t do it. On marketplace, and now it’s a at all so we’ll see what happens. And I think I lot of that most recent changes, probably has to do with the legal trouble. Facebook and Zuckerberg or or in with the Justice Department and their his emails were leaked, and he might be in a lot of trouble. So I think Facebook legal team is just like, okay, no more chicken groups and gun groups, like, whatever, all these crazy little white, there’s chicken group. There’s like cockfighting and stuff. No, like, what are they like? Not heirloom. But, you know, crazy breeds of chickens that like rednecks are collecting that happened, really, but they don’t they don’t they don’t let it pass for everything. I was like, I remember a secondary market like it like a like a Facebook

46:42
ad that said, like, find your people like there’s there’s groups for everybody. And I didn’t know that.

46:48
So I just heard about that. Because I mean, when groups get shut down there, apparently there really is a history like a what Facebook normally does, and they take out the big one, and then they let it because all these groups, you know, all these little sub small groups, all those people are usually in the biggest group. So take out the biggest group and everyone will find out and maybe they’ll go away or whatever. The term. Yeah, now I gotta roll down here.

47:17
I mean, in this also, like, I know, there was a huge opioid crisis that was happening through Facebook as well. I mean, there’s people buy sell trade, you know, illegal drugs and stuff. I mean, those those groups go fast. But that’s, that’s sort of the way that the world works, I guess. And then so another way that those was a lot different from other groups as well. So there was another group that’s it’s still out there today. So I’m not going to put a name to it. But they always wanted to try and keep a record of, of transactions and sales, and it was all done online. And that’s kind of what also fueled bottle Blue Book calm and everything like that. So kind of talk about why you said like, or just said, like, I’m not gonna, we’ll just like, if you want to know, something, just research search it, right, instead of having to own a catalog or an Excel spreadsheet.

48:13
Yeah, it won’t, I don’t want to maintain it. Is

48:18
I mean, it doesn’t pay anything to sit here and you know, play around on it.

48:21
Yeah. But the other thing is that also, you know, that that data was also used in some research studies to actually see how the prices of bourbon had been affected from years of just, you know, actually having a particular bottle and seeing how evaluated over the years, seeing how different types of bottles, you know, changed in value over the years.

48:43
Yeah, what was it like the average return was like, 200% on in, like, just a two year span? Something like that. Yeah,

48:50
it was crazy. I mean, some maintenance sucks. That’s,

48:53
yeah, I just didn’t want to spend time doing it. But in I felt like bottle blue, but does a really good job of you know, I don’t I haven’t been on there and years and but just because the history and in my group got so big, I didn’t need to, and it was probably more current, because

49:09
you can search any, like thing, right? stir the group?

49:14
Yeah, if you can, if you can just run the search button and know you right, or exactly know how to filter. I mean, you can you can find pretty much anything but yeah, there was, I don’t know really who’s running pooper. So if somebody like us yet, there’s another transaction and BSMNE to go and enter this NL

49:29
introduced into the toilet. Like, I’m always wondering, like Wikipedia, like, it’s crowdfunding, like, Who the hell goes takes your time to fill out a Wikipedia page? You know, I’m

49:38
sure there’s a lot of people out there. I mean, if you have a

49:41
if you have passion towards that topic,

49:43
exactly. I mean, I guess

49:45
it also has with Wikipedia, you get I mean, it’s like a credibility and a point system, like, it says, you know, like Ryan Cecil did this, right? So so you get you get a little little badge or a star on your shoulder, I guess you could say, if you want to do that.

50:00
One thing I wanted to bring up and wild turkeys a good example. How the market affect your like, we hinted at it, but how the secondary market helps companies see where their brands going. I was doing a barrel pick at wild turkey several years ago. And I was talking to Eddie about the secondary market. He’s like, yeah, I’m in that group. I love watching those bottles and what they sell for, you know, like, really, he’s like, Yeah, and I got to thinking, I was like, you know, your name’s not in my group. So he’s under some, I don’t know what he’s under. But uh, and then I got to thinking about wild turkey in their high end premium brands that they release. They don’t like, they don’t work. They’re out on the shelf at 350. And they might sit there for up to a year, but it’ll finally all sell. He feel like they see these brands nudging up and know, okay, we put it out here, we’ll be able to maximize our profits and smart business in my opinion, but

51:01
it is it is a way that companies can gauge what’s happening. Yeah, I mean, it’s,

51:07
it’s totally, totally took off the secondary market to raise raise prices, both heaven hills doing it, everybody’s doing it. They see the value? Well, it’s the first ones that were like, all right. We don’t image that. Yeah,

51:20
well, I mean, the other thing is, is when you look at just what these Facebook groups are able to do in general is is it not only just helps with value, but also helps with prediction of the changing consumer? Like what do what do all these people, what are they gravitating towards? I’m sure you can look at the stats that happens when you sell a pallet to a distributor, and that distributor gets it out to the the stores. But it’s kind of hard to kind of track that data and you kind of hard to see like what people are saying about it, however, you go to an online forum. And you see some kind of like, let’s take like Bill need honey, for example. Like, I saw honey, and I kind of like whatever, honey,

52:02
yeah, flavored whiskey, and then

52:04
and then all of a sudden, you know, in Nashville is a whole other thing. You get this whole group in Nashville that that seems to kind of create other little like a tornado of, of I don’t know what you would call it, but somehow they’re able to hype a lot of stuff up. And now bill need honey trades for like four or 500 bucks. And I’m like, how, how is this even possible? Because I wouldn’t I wouldn’t have find myself like particularly interested in it. But if you look at what the market does and what it’s valued at, they’re probably like, Oh, shit, we better add some more honey, these barrels, you know, I don’t really know, like, that’s a process. But it’s a way that they can see they can gauge exactly what what consumers are gravitating towards. So yeah, for sure, another way to look at it. So there’s a there’s another kind of way to if we if we look at the the group that you had built as well, there’s particularly one, maybe there’s a few others of distilleries that you’ve banned from being inside the group, as well as like, these bottles are not allowed to be traded. You know, we don’t need to give them a platform and say like, let’s talk about who that is. But is there a reason why that you would go through and say, I think we need to put our foot down and we shouldn’t have these type of bottles be on here or on my market?

53:18
Yeah, so one, we’re bourbon secondary market. So we keep it it just whiskey. There, though, I guess one that everybody knows. And it’s thinking about, we I, I was getting really pissed off at all the people that were thread shooting on, every time one of these bottles came up, as I got in, and they’re just, I didn’t even know what they were fighting over. I just got tired of hearing about it. And then I heard there might be market manipulation, and I was just like, screw it band. And then I heard about all these things coming out about someone going in and doing a barrel pic with the secret camera and, and trash cans and whatever. I was like, I didn’t know that. And then of course, everybody assumed was that, you know, I was just tired of having to admin, my own group, like shutting people up. And people get in fights and yelling, and just like, We’re not here for that, you know, it was just like, just ban it get rid of and then it

54:22
took off and

54:23
be like, what’s your motive?

54:24
And then the gifts come out? Right? There’s always the gift stream of how

54:30
but only wrong. There’s a lot of funny pictures. Oh, yeah,

54:33
kids that are very creative.

54:37
If you can just like add some good laughs Oh, yeah.

54:41
So the other thing is, if we look at the time that’s invested into this

54:47
time is time is very valuable time is very valuable to all of all we’re

54:51
equal, let

54:52
it all have equal time and it’s in it’s in for I think a lot of people out there they take it, they take it for granted, the amount of time that you’ve probably invested into this group over over five years now. And last time I checked, you weren’t collecting a paycheck from a warrior. Nope. So what what’s the motivation behind going through it and continuing to do this without seeing any kind of upside, per se?

55:21
One, it’s, it’s a passionate hobby of mine and every other admin in there, there are some incentive or benefits to it. Like someone comes to town they know they know who you are, they know you live here. They want to hang out and share samples with you or bring you some samples or mail you samples. Get that all the time. You know, we don’t even we don’t pay for it. It’s that nice and fun. But

55:50
I mean, there’s no

55:53
it’s really kind of easy, and especially if you’re like working a job. So a lot of I used to manage a liquor store. A lot of time I’d be just it’s just sitting there and doing nothing. I mean, it’s shelves are stocked, okay, we’re good. Now you’re just waiting for customers, and it was a slower store. So get your phone out of time. A lot of time here, you know. So, I mean, what else am I going to do? You know, just watch cat videos are

56:21
still fun, but I’m more interested in bourbon.

56:25
Morrison getting yelled at?

56:26
Yeah, nice people in the area.

56:29
Yeah, start fights for out of nothing. It’s a bourbon of all things. But just funny and amazing. Like how people getting arguments over bourbon. Like there’s, there’s just so much like, yeah, we’ll get into heated debate, whether it’s about a particular bottle or whether somebody prices some sex. Yeah, good question. What do you do in a situation where somebody accidentally prices something? We’ve seen it, we’ve seen it both ways. They’ll say way to live got this happy? 15 I’m going to put a for sale for 2500. And then the laugh emoji start coming every day that’s coming. What do you do in that sort of sense? You

57:06
know, there’s, there’s kind of a range of All right, I’m just gonna delete your post because you’re an idiot, or you’re just going to piss off everybody, you know, 2500 for whatever the bottle goes for now. You know, if it’s $1,000 too much, you’re probably going to get delete, because I know what’s gonna. But if you You know, I’ve seen the opposite where Pappy 23 170 someone you know, 10 people Ben, Ben, Ben, Ben bit, you know, and then they want to hold

57:39
zero

57:40
exactly what was clear that you were not trying to short yourself that much money, you know,

57:44
yeah, so selling it below the cost of even retail, you

57:48
know, I’m not being that nice of a guy and you’re being an asshole. So it’s like, no, you’re not getting your free bottle of Pappy basically. So. But yeah, I mean, so there’s a if it’s just if it’s too much. I mean, I’ve seen it where it’s like $100 too much and they’re still losing it and it’s then we do actually kind of manage it and just mute everybody. All right. You said something, you know you redshirted me your digital duct tape for three days?

58:14
Yeah.

58:15
Is there actually like a like a thing where you’re like you’re because I’ve never actually added a group before? Is there really a like a button that you can say like you’re you’re cut for 10 days or something? You didn’t you’re

58:26
just like three options? No way that’s awesome. Three days seven days Really? Okay. And depending on how I feel that day, you

58:36
know, it’s it’s just progressively gotten worse.

58:38
seven day max punishment.

58:41
Alright, you didn’t break like Facebook rolls so you’re not out of the group, but come on.

58:46
And then there’s there’s the other side of this where there’s somebody that posts like a mixers 20 for will say like 1000 bucks, right when that’s easily an 1800 dollar bottle or 2000 or something like that. So what happens if they accidentally undervalue it? And it’s not an obscene and it’s not an obscene value like a they

59:09
they literally know.

59:12
we owed it to them. And usually when they realize like someone tells them you just lost $800 you could have had 1800 dollars or something whatever. They’ll just disappear from the group by themselves you know

59:27
that that point is like no harm no foul like you’re you’re faster the trigger on their keyboard but that’s about all we can give you right now.

59:33
Yeah, exactly.

59:36
And so sometimes hold people hold up themselves to the boat you know all right, honor it Damn it. I don’t I don’t want to but sometimes they swallow their pride

59:45
now hopefully somebody like returns something in their favor to or if they cry it opens them a sample or something like that that’d be old

59:52
least which is IRA karma.

59:54
That is true thing I mean, there’s bourbon karma out there there’s people talk about all the time you know, you have somebody find a bottle you ship somebody something you send them somebody a sample, hopefully the karma God’s smile down on you and you go walk into middle of nowhere Oklahoma, you stumble upon an old dusty turkey or something, you know, like, that’s the truth thing. Now, there was also I think it was maybe a few years back. It was around Christmas time in did the community come together and like by the admins, some, like some Van Winkle or something like that.

1:00:26
I remember that. Yeah, so that wasn’t actually in my group. Oh, no, that’s fine. So everybody wanted to Dave on the back for being a great admin and he got a bottle of Pappy 29 I didn’t know about it. And someone saw that and was like, we should do it for Oh, and I’m like, No, just donate $20 to charity or something. Don’t send me a bottle. That’s not what I’m quit bother me. I’m done. I’m not trying to you know, I don’t need a handout. Not that it was that I mean, but it until after the fact you

1:01:01
know, I just literally and then so kind of going back and looking at this whole thing of you know, in time is time is very valuable for for a lot of people as you start going down this path and in everybody’s got careers outside of just bourbon least hopefully most your friends. I mean, well, I mean, I met outside of like flipping bourbon. Right? Right. So everybody’s everybody’s hopefully has some career and flipping bourbon just isn’t it. But that’s, that’s what kind of go backwards or time is valuable. And you look at it, you say like I built up a network of 50,000 people? What if I was able to charge like $5 per person per year for dues in that would go towards? I don’t know what it would go towards, like, if it is to like actually help with the time that value that spent or whether it goes into like an insurance bunker for

1:01:51
bottles? How many people don’t think is instantly enough? Sorry, charging depends now and how many active out of 50 that would even know that are?

1:02:00
can probably see that data. But the thing is that would that setting could only work off of Facebook. And so when Facebook bands up, you know, kicks every all of it off the Facebook, that might actually happen. Not necessarily for me. I don’t want to do it anymore. But it might I mean, it might be a good vessel. But the problem with that is everybody loves to get up their phone. Look, I mean, me, I don’t say they love it, but they do it. They get out their phone, they start scrolling through Facebook, they see grandma, they see someone else’s kid. Yeah, I see bourbon in usually my newsfeed that’s the only way. I just see bourbon bourbon bourbon. And I’m sure a lot of y’all can.

1:02:45
That’s the only reason I keep Facebook Like I loved it when you could only have the group app. And you didn’t have to have the Facebook app you could just do. And then they made everything go to the Facebook app. And it was like, you could just totally keep your cool. Yeah, it’s

1:02:59
so good.

1:03:01
People off of loan to a whole nother website. It’s going to be a challenge. And so setting that up. That’s a lot of work. And I mean, you better have some really good reason for people to go there, you know, and how you got to make it worth their while to go there.

1:03:19
Yeah, that’s true. I mean, it is it is hard to try and monetize a platform like

1:03:23
this, because it’s the path of least resistance you don’t face because people are already there.

1:03:28
It’s against Facebook rules to actually try that or do that.

1:03:32
No, well, you can’t export the group lists, like on the spreadsheet.

1:03:36
You can everyone move over? Well,

1:03:39
knowing that then I guess that rules that out? Yeah, I was just trying to think of a way that you know, you could you could try to try to, you know, make it worth the time. That’s that’s actually invested. But it sounds like it because granted this This is by far the biggest group. But it is not the only group. I mean, there’s probably I mean, there’s got to be upwards of hundreds now. Not only just just markets where you can buy sell trade, but there’s local markets, we can buy sell trade. I mean, there’s there’s level ones, there’s Lexington ones, there’s ones in Ohio, and so forth. So I guess if if you try to do that, like people just go elsewhere. You know, there’s always there’s always somewhere else to

1:04:18
go when you for that.

1:04:21
So I mean, the other thing we kind of look at is is how these have grown? is there is there going to be a way that one day that you’re going to kind of see this is like do you think it one day could all possibly in on Facebook? or? Yeah, yeah, for sure.

1:04:39
And quite honestly, I’ll be honest, it’s already the market has gotten so big, that it is going to go quote, legal. Since DC can buy straight from collectors, you know, like jack rose does. distributors can do it. New York, you can do it. There, this is going, you know, it’s like, you know, what is it? How much money does a distributor need to take to? You know, do this all legally from? Not you know, and if, when if and when it gets all shut down on Facebook? That whole? I mean, it’s it’s coming, I could say that, I would think because it it’s already evolving here in Kentucky with us being able to sell to liquor stores and bars just straight up, take this bottle right in and I want to sell you this much, you know. So, I mean,

1:05:40
I don’t know, I mean, there, I think there’s always going to be a need for a peer to peer distribution system. I mean, if even just think of like just clothes. And people sell clothes on Craigslist, they don’t always want to go to a consignment shop or something like even though a consignment shop exists, but you’re going to get more money for it if you put the time and the effort where to go. And like do you

1:06:01
want to say we

1:06:03
were just cars in general? Yeah, sell a car. You can you can go and you can try to put on your own marketplace versus just going to the dealership and saying, Give me you know, 40% less than. Right,

1:06:15
right? Because that’s typically what happens. Yeah. No, I totally agree. Cuz I mean,

1:06:23
I don’t even know where I was going with that.

1:06:26
Whiskey get into No, not yet. I was just, I kind of blanked.

1:06:30
Yeah.

1:06:30
Well, I mean, this was, this was a really good conversation. And I think it was, it was it was really a true testament to kind of see exactly the thought process behind it really the growth. A bunch of the crap you have to deal with, like, I’m like, I think that, that people need to give admins a break every once in a while. Like there’s there’s just so much stuff that probably happens behind closed doors that everybody just doesn’t see. Yeah. I mean, I know you all probably have your own messaged threads of trying to figure out like, what do we do about this, and there’s, there’s got to be an issue every single day.

1:07:06
Every single day, there needs to be a national admin day.

1:07:11
Where you just support and thank your admin. Exactly. But maybe you do have like national Secretary David Rogers combined together,

1:07:18
whatever it is, and

1:07:19
that’s where I was going early.

1:07:20
There you go. And, and so remember that for next year. But like I said, I think everybody kind of owes a lot of what you do as a great debt at great debt of gratitude, because of not only just, as I mentioned, just the crap that goes on and having to monitor and manage it, but for the culture that adults Yeah, you know, we hadn’t mentioned it, it really does. It sets the precedent for the market. And not just the secondary market, but the actual market. Right. And so it’s, it’s huge.

1:07:50
Yeah, and it it just, for me, personally, it provides such enjoyment. Like, I can’t tell me like Thompson on throne or just, you know, laying around scrolling through bourbon, or just seeing what’s going on, you know, like seeing what’s going on the market seeing the funny pose that funny out outrages, you know, it’s like Pinterest definitely improved the quality of life. So thank you

1:08:13
for that. And and then you also see a few different things. You know, like I said, for your own personal education, you learn what bottles are out. Yeah. You learn who the biggest ballers in the,

1:08:25
in the bourbon world don’t even know who blonde brothers was. You know, like,

1:08:30
What do you mean, when I say ballers, like you see people that post like epic bottles, and you’re like, Holy smokes, or these people that they’ll post like 20 bottles and a lot and they’ll say like, it’s $10,000. And somebody’s like, buy it now you’re like, holy shit, that guy just spent,

1:08:44
like you see, like those Eagle rare 17. And they’re like, 38 people that are like, Whoa, I didn’t think this existed.

1:08:53
Exactly. So it’s definitely cool of not only that, and it’s building community around it. So thank you so much for kind of coming today and explaining that. But I also know and give you kind of an opportunity to talk about sort of the next venture that you’re going on, if you want to kind of give people kind of a heads up on on that.

1:09:10
And yeah, I’m happy, happy to do that. So I being in this doing all this, I’ve gotten to meet so many people in the industry, just liquor store owners, bar owners, just bar managers, bartenders. And it just, it spawned out other businesses that I didn’t see ever happening. And one of them is I’ve started my own brand. And I’ve sourcing barrels going to be putting it out. Part of why I won’t be you know, need to focus on that is not admitting because I don’t want to sitting at home all day playing on my phone.

1:09:53
So yeah, that’s coming out.

1:09:56
I’ve got some samples here for you, I want you to try some, one of the things I’m doing is my first batch will be single barrel proof, then I’m going to have a say that’s the mid tier, then a small batch that hopefully I can get to the point where I’m buying tons of barrels and mass distributing that. And then there’s one that I’m calling exceptional and rare and through these people that I’ve met in the industry, it’s surprised, you know, everybody’s like, Oh, well, there’s 23 year old barrels out there. But you know, you better be happy if you want them or Evan Williams if you want them but there’s other you know, younger ones that are out there they just really hard to get and you got to know the right people and I think hopefully I can get to them got some samples that I might be able to get. So I want you to try but

1:10:44
we’ll definitely do that after we wrap up here. But you know, we want to say again you know good luck on the next adventure you know the the time and effort that went into building and managing among this group and then kind of shepherding it on to the next generation of admins you know it there was a lot of times that was invested to it so I think everybody kind of

1:11:03
debt of gratitude when it comes down to it.

1:11:05
You’re welcome.

1:11:08
I know there’s people out there that don’t agree with it.

1:11:10
Yeah. Well, I mean, of course like I always get into the show saying like if people want to learn more about you can they do it but it’s gonna be on Facebook, wouldn’t it?

1:11:19
Go like from Creek bourbon?

1:11:21
Yeah, there you go. Like Fern Creek Byron. Love the label. It’s awesome. You’re welcome.

1:11:26
did not create it. Yeah.

1:11:29
So make sure you go and you check that out and make sure you follow us bourbon pursuit on all the social medias, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. And if you like what you hear you want to be a part of our community where we don’t buy sell trade however we talk about it we get our own barrel pics. We’ve got cool swag. We do all kinds of shit like there, but it’s it’s fun. Go check it out. patreon.com slash bourbon pursuit, or anyone can close it out

1:11:49
there. Yeah. Thanks, Ellen. Man, that was awesome. Appreciate the studio space. We got a legit studio here if you’re watching on film, but uh, no. Super cool stuff. Like I said, I’ve wasted a lot of time on your site. So thank you for that form of entertainment. And then you’re

1:12:06
welcome. I think you’re welcome to come back in our studio here. And also record anytime as long as I mean, come as long as

1:12:13
you keep bringing wild turkey 13.

1:12:16
We’re in every time. Good cases.

1:12:19
Yeah, but everyone listening, please let us know what you think. give us feedback, show suggestions, comments. We’d love hearing from you all because this is we do it for you. And so let us know how we’re doing and how we can make the show better. And with that, we’ll see you next time. Cheers. Cheers.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai