Adam Torres and Ashleigh Lockerbie discuss Kombucha.
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Show Notes:
Better Booch is bringing unique flavors to the kombucha market. In this episode, Adam Torres and Ashleigh Lockerbie, CoFounder and CMO at Better Booch, explore Better Booch and Ashleigh’s journey as an entrepreneur.
About Better Booch
They’re big believers in the idea that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. It’s how they make kombucha – with just tea, water, sugar, a symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeast (SCOBY!), and a whole lot of time – and it’s how we define their approach to health.
Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest in the show, just head on over to missionmatters. com and click on be our guest to apply. All right. So today’s guest is Ashley Lockerbie and she is co founder and CMO over at Better Boots.
Ashley, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me, Adam. All right, Ashley. So excited to get into today’s topic. I want to get into Better Booch the concept, like how you came up with the product and go further into that. But before we do we’ll start this episode the way that we start them all with what we like to call our Mission Matters Minute.
So, Ashley, at Mission Matters, our aim and our goal is to amplify stories for entrepreneurs, executives and experts. That’s our mission. Ashley, what mission matters to you? Yes, my ultimate mission is to help people take small steps towards better health using the latest research and technology and putting it into delicious food.
Who doesn’t like delicious drinks? Love it. What, how did you, were you always a product person or were you always in the beverage space? Like, like how did this come about? Yeah, so no. I actually, my background is in music, so I was in the music industry. I toured as a backup singer With Rihanna and a few others.
That’s amazing. That’s an obvious way that you get into food and beverage. That’s obvious. Naturally, natural, the natural step. Amazing. Yeah. So I, after years of touring, you can imagine it’s not the most healthy of lifestyles. Yeah. A lot of fun, not the healthiest. So when I moved back to LA, I yeah.
Was, you know, really focused on health and what that actually meant from a holistic perspective, you know, and also, you know, spiritual, mental, emotional, physical health, like what, what does that actually look like? And how do we build towards something that’s a sustainable career to maintain all of those aspects of health?
And so yeah, I met, I met my partner right around that same time who was also in the music industry and was also looking to transition out of that and was also sort of had the same sort of mindset at the time. And around that time as well Trey, my partner got a call from his sister that she had been diagnosed with cancer.
And so that just really brought our, Journey into focus and that’s how we discovered kombucha and we started making it at home and we thought, man, this is really delicious. And we were playing around with different tea combinations and herbs and finding ways to flavor it without adding a lot of sugar from fruit juice and other additives.
And we thought, man, This is pretty delicious. I bet more people would be able to drink this and benefit from it if they knew that it could actually taste really good and be enjoyable to drink. And so we started very organically at Farmers Markets and bootstrapped for six years before raising our first round of fundraising and and grew pretty dramatically year over year since then.
What an amazing story. And was this year, did you always have that, that kind of like that on, I knew you were in music, but did you always have that entrepreneurial, like bent or that thought process? Or was this kind of like the first time you’re like, you know, it just kind of happened organically for you.
Like, was that in you or what would you say? Oh, definitely. I mean, I think, you know, there are more crossovers between the. to have a career in music and what it takes to be an entrepreneur. And it’s more like personality traits, right? That willingness to, to get up and be self motivated and find the next step if it’s not clear is valuable both in the music industry, because there’s really no playbook for the music industry.
And, It’s also valuable as an entrepreneur because there is no playbook as an entrepreneur. You’re just making it up as you go along and pursuing the logical next step. So and you know, I think having lofty goals and then learning how to execute towards those goals are, are sort of personality widgets that work in both fields.
So yeah, I think strangely being in music and prepared me A lot for the grit that it takes to be successful as an entrepreneur and a business owner. I want to go back to those, to those kitchen days where you were, I’m using these words, you didn’t, where you were a mad scientist in there creating your concoctions.
As you can see, I have a vivid imagination. Like, I’m trying to picture what this looks like creating these beverages. Like, like, what was that like? Oh my gosh. Well, first of all, we rented our, our first commercial. In order to sell at a farmer’s market, you have to operate out of a commercial kitchen. So we had to find a commercial kitchen and we found one that would rent to us by the hour, and we rented them the over hours.
Oh, you wait. Did you start, you start in a commercial kitchen though, right? No. You started at home. Am I wrong? Well, we started in our, we started in our apartment. Yes. I wanna know that story. That’s the one I want before that we can get to the commercial kitchen First, I want the, in the apartment story, like how old was that like?
Yeah, so being a singer, I’m really into tea, so I, I sort of was well versed in, in the differences between the different types of tea and what they each tasted like, and I love to cook too, so I was really playing around with different herbs and spices and seeing if, you know, what, and infusions and seeing how we might be able to flavor this thing and make it taste really, really yummy without having to add a bunch of sugar, and And you know, the, the recipes that we found on the internet were like basic black tea type of recipes, and there was nothing else out there for any other combination.
So we didn’t even know if it would work using a different types of tea. And over the years, we’ve learned so much about how the different teas react to the culture and the kombucha culture. That’s what I’m talking about when I say that. And so, yeah, it was just like. I mean, we even had, we did it in Trey’s kitchen cause he had more space than I did at the time.
And so, yeah. What did your friends think? Did the friends come over? Were there like tastings? Oh, yeah. I feel like there was some kombucha parties that we don’t know each other, but that I wasn’t invited to. There definitely were some kombucha parties, and his roommates were very patient. With us in our, in our like, gallons of stinky tea.
Oh my gosh, that’s what I’m picturing, like, gallons of, and you said now you’ve learned much about the culture, but you didn’t know in the beginning, so there had to be a couple disasters. Oh yeah, we were just experimenting. Yeah. Yeah. So so that was cool. And then, you know, when we started selling at farmer’s markets, my friends were like, wait, I’m sorry, you were just on tour with Rihanna.
And now you’re at my farmer’s market. What is happening? Oh, that’s what are you doing? And not to glance over this. So you did it the correct way. You had a commercial kitchen, you started creating, you got your, you’re starting to now figure out your processes, how you’re gonna, you obviously had a, recipe or two that you felt strongly enough about to bring to market and that you enjoyed enough to bring to market.
Okay. I just wanted to make sure I filled in those couple of gaps So now you’re at the farmer’s markets. They’re like you’re on tour rihanna and now you’re serving me my kombucha. Come on, go ahead I know i’m i’m like hanging out at the farmer’s market in yoga pants like serving serving kombucha to my friends who are walking by And yeah, we just, actually the farmers markets were a really, really great way to start because it offered us weekly cash flow.
That’s so important when you’re starting a business is your cash flow. I mean, we’re still thinking constantly about cash flow even 12 years in. So yeah, I think the, the farmers markets were a great way to start because we were able to, Bring some cash in and grow organically grow sustainably.
At that point, at one point, we were doing, I think, eight farmers markets a week across LA. And it was, it was also really good marketing because you built it probably had a community around the drink. At that point, you were doing such so many, and we were actually having to do a lot of education because not a lot of people knew what kombucha was at that time.
And so, You know, I think a lot of people still don’t really understand what it is. But but they definitely didn’t at that time. So there was a lot of education and Usually when you’re thinking about like Matt, like Matt in the, on a macro scale branding and marketing campaigns, the educational campaigns are the most expensive for big companies to do around a product because we were really hyper focused on the local community and the farm, the farmer’s markets enabled us , an essentially free way to get the word out and to educate folks about what kombucha was and to gain a little following here in L.
A. And so that was definitely the right move to start. And then we started getting into some stores, and we were literally just going door to door with our, like, igloo cooler full of kombucha, and saying, hey, do you guys wanna Selva’s products, and and we were able to get into a bunch of stores around Los Angeles and at one point Trey was, we bought a minivan because Trey was delivering all the cases at once out of the minivan.
He was, he was, you know, driving around LA, delivering hundreds of cases a day, a day, out of his minivan. And we were like, we just knew nothing about the beverage industry. And so oh, I love this story. You don’t know. You don’t know. And if you did know more about the beverage industry, of course you might not have done it.
Who knows? Absolutely not. No. Hell no. We would not have done it. And so the point is, hey, I gotta hell no. We thought you know, we thought, Oh, more stores, we just buy more vans and, and, you know, hire people to drive around. It’s like, no, we didn’t even know about distributors at the time. So we finally, we, we brought on some really great mentors and they were like, okay guys, let me just connect you to this.
Distributor that I know in LA and we were able to sign a deal with them so that they would take our product Wow, so you were pretty far along before having that knowledge, by the way You were if you’re delivering hundreds of cases, you’re pretty far along like without having that knowledge. That’s amazing.
Yeah, so you were Yeah, good. We had we didn’t really have designs when we started the business. We didn’t have designs About on the business being a nationally distributed beverage, we were like, we truly started it because we, wanted to do something that we felt meaningful, was meaningful to us, you know, for leaving music, the arts, like something creative that’s so close and personal to us.
We wanted to make sure that whatever we stepped into was something that we could feel good about and feel great about and, , you know, serving people something that can truly improve their health is like a pretty good feeling. And watching people taste it and enjoy it and come back for more is really, really cool and rewarding.
And so you know, it sounds corny, but we, truly did not, we were like, we just want to make enough money to stay in LA and make an album. You know, we really did not. Anticipate that this thing would catch on the way that it did. And and so there were many conversations over the years of being like, okay, do we want to take this next step?
We would be at an obvious crossroads where we needed to either, you know, wind down or scale up, get bigger and. Every time we had that conversation, we were like, yeah, let’s keep going. Let’s keep going. Let’s see how far we can take this. And yeah, we’ve learned. What kept you strong during this time?
Because you mentioned like six years, I believe, I believe that was the number you mentioned before taking on capital and bootstrapping. Like what kept you going? Because obviously there’s, there had to be some low moments during that time, like at any business. Oh, of I mean, I think it was just you know, the mission, like we, really believe that what we’re doing is, is helping people and improving people’s health.
I mean, the cool thing about kombucha is that it can also help with sugar cravings. And so even though it takes sugar, kombucha is a fermented beverage, it’s, the recipe is essentially tea, water, sugar, and the culture of bacteria and yeast, which is. What we call the SCOBY and the sugar is like fuel for the cultures and the culture turns the sugar.
by the process of fermentation into probiotics and beneficial acids. And so it can actually really help. It helps. There’s a ton of research on it now. Finally in the last five years, there’s been a lot of research on fermented foods and how they contain inflammation in the body and how they can really diversify the gut bacteria, which improves your immune system and your digestive system.
And and so, yeah, I think, All right. Really being like, okay, what we’re doing is meaningful to people and making an impact. And we want as many people to be able to drink this and benefit from it as possible. And yeah, there were definitely low times. But like I said, the music industry requires a lot of grit.
And so, you know, it wasn’t anything that we, it wasn’t like anything that we hadn’t experienced before. I’ll put it that way. So the last question for you here, Ashley, if is there an, is there a story, I’m just curious, cause it’s such a great name, Better Booch. Is there a story behind the name? Like how’d that come up?
When we were initially thinking about this product and thinking about this business, we were kind of like, Oh yeah, it’s kind of fermented, like, like a beer, you know, we’ve heard some people call it Booch before. Yeah. You know, I, what if people would drink this instead of, instead of a beer you know, and be able to, like, enjoy it as a complex, interesting beverage, like, in place of an alcoholic beverage and so we were like, okay, we could call it booch, but that’s maybe, like, basically like calling beer, beer.
So, you know so there was, I had this like inside jokes with my friends when I was a kid. It honestly comes back to when I was a tiny kid. And whenever we would have to come up with a team name for something, our team was always called team better. Because no matter what the other team was called, we were always better.
And so we call it Better Booch cause it’s always going to be better than the next guy. Team Better. Get out. That’s the best. What’s your team name? Team Better. Cause we’re better than you. I love it. Yeah. And no matter what they’re called, it’s always better. Oh, what a wonderful story. Well, Ashley, this has been so much fun having you on.
And I’m so happy to bring this story to my audience. It’s just , I’ve had a lot of fun learning more about what makes a team better, better and and better boost. So this is amazing. That being said, if somebody wants to learn more about the product, follow the journey, how do they do that?
Well, you can visit betterbooch. com, B E T T E R B O O C H dot com and you can order a case right from there. Or you can find us at Whole Foods we also have a product called Sprouts called Live Soda that just went national with Sprouts. But Better Booch is in Stop and Shop WinCo, Winn Dixie Meijer, Whole Foods, Sprouts, Lawson’s.
Basically, all your natural food grocery stores, you can find it there. Fantastic. And for everybody watching, just so you know, we’ll definitely put that betterbootch. com hyperlink in the show notes so you can grab a case. And speaking of the audience, if this is your first time with Mission Matters and you haven’t done it yet, hit that subscribe or follow button.
This is a daily show. Each and every day we’re bringing you new content, new ideas, and hopefully new inspiration to help you along the way on your journey as well. So again, hit that subscribe or follow button. And Ashley, again, thank you so much for coming on the show. This has so much been a pleasure. Of course.
Thanks for having me.