 I want to be able to architect a business that serves not just our audience, but also us as owners. Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Unscripted with Wilson. Today we have the honor of interviewing a good friend of mine, Kyle, who runs Nimble Bar. And basically it started off as him being bartender and he was thinking about, I guess, like ways to be able to generate more revenue to the restaurant business in the bars. And to date, he has generated more than $85,000 as this side hustle. So actually, you know what? Why don't you tell us a little bit more about yourself? Yeah, for sure. Think, you know, thanks so much for having me, Wilson. I'm stoked to be here. Yeah. So I've been in the trenches of hospitality for like 17 years. You know, as soon as I was old enough to work in a bar restaurant, I was 15 years old and that's that's what I did. And I also I went to school for music, actually. So I have this kind of like performer inside of me. For a while, I was on parallel tracks between, you know, being on the stage as a singer and then being on the stage behind the bar. And as time went on, I approached or I came to a crossroads where I was like, OK, you know, which stage do I really want to live on? You know, music felt kind of like a chore for me. And and I wasn't that naturally gifted at it. It was actually a lot of work for me. Whereas I would, you know, look at my time behind the bar and it was so much more fun and and it's so so much more rewarding and frankly lucrative. So I decided to stick with the bar. And I actually, when I first started out, my first cocktail bar, it was really that was really hard to and it was scary. And it was extremely anxiety inducing because the caliber was very high. And I I didn't really have the chops. And that didn't actually go that well. I I think I kind of got fired or like or something. And so that was in Toronto. And then I moved to Victoria, British Columbia, and I was still pursuing music. And all I wanted was just a simple bartending job. So I just wanted to like go work at a pub and, you know, just just rake in the dough and pay down my student debt and blah, blah, blah. Unfortunately, none of the pubs would hire me. And so I I happened upon this cocktail bar called Little Jumbo in 2013. They saw on my resume that I had worked with liquid nitrogen at one of my at the bar that I basically got fired from. And and that's pretty much why that hired me. I went into that scared to death. But there was a very key difference there. And that was that I got really good at bartending really fast. Realized that that was because I was working with my now partner, Nathan Cottle, and he it was like I could learn from him by I was most of so I was just sort of working beside him. And and he would take the time to explain things in detail. And he would show me like how he did certain little tricks or techniques. And, you know, it probably just took about two months of me working side by side with him when I started to hear people say things to me like, you know, you're like the best bartender I've ever seen or where like what university did you go to to learn how to bartend? And, you know, stuff that you just wouldn't really expect. And I realized after having had enough people ask me that that, oh, like maybe we should create, you know, a training program. So, so before before you go on, definitely really fascinating. I know I know a lot of people who are thinking about creating their own business, specifically in the food and hospitality field and industry. They start off being in the trade, whether they are a waiter or back of the house, line chef, line cooks, whatever the case may be, it all starts off kind of progressing that way and really being in the trade to understand the industry a lot more. And I think that's exactly what it is for you because by you being in the trade, you see exactly what's what goes on in the field and what opportunities there are. And I think that's exactly where you're able to start this bar school that teaches people. I know and I know you generated a ton of like buzz right off the bat. And I think that's how we met because I was so intrigued with your story like a year ago. Actually, you know what? Why don't you share with me that story? I think like a lot of our our viewers would definitely be able to get some inspiration from that. Sure. Like the story of how we started the company or the story of how you decided that education is a great addition. And then why, you know, why is that the case? Because typically speaking for the regular restaurant owners, like they're thinking about their traditional stream of revenue walk-in traffic, that's pretty much it, right? 80 percent of that 20 percent delivery. But nowadays, especially with the pandemic and everything, maybe shifting into 40 percent, if not, you know, completely lopsided 80 percent delivery because of all the restrictions, right? But then you have a very different approach all together and to diversify most crafts people in this industry. And I do think many of us are crafts people, whether you're bartender or chef, the natural progression that we think of is, OK, so we're a chef. Now we're maybe going to become a GM or maybe we'll just like hopscotch straight straight straight to becoming an owner, right? My partner, Nate, and I actually went that route for a little bit where we're like, OK, well, now we're going to open our own place. And we came up with this crazy like raw juice bar, like cocktail concept. And it was very like in retrospect, it feels very granola. But we like we found a spot. We were talking to landlords. We had a design, blah, blah, blah, and then I went back to Toronto to just finish my degree because I was halfway done and I had to finish it. And I realized in that time that I really had no interest in what I perceive to be a tremendous amount of complexity and overhead. That comes from, you know, starting and owning a restaurant. So I kind of went back to the drawing board and we we decided that we wanted to start something different. It's so we still wanted to serve the industry because because it's what we know. But not own a bar restaurant, per se. So actually, you know, speaking of which, a lot of people are specifically in this stage where they want to start something and you were a gun hole in having this idea ready. And a lot of people would would fall into this fallacy of confirmation bias totally where they find out all the facts that would support their bias of, hey, this is a great deal. This is a great opportunity. Let's go ahead with it while ignoring all the shortfalls. But for you, it's a little bit different. You're like, hey, you know what? You realize something when you took yourself out of that environment. What did you realize that? You know what? Let's take a stop on that. Yeah, well, I realized at that time, Nate and I, it's not like we were flushed with money and I sort of there were people who were interested in investing in us. But I realized that in order for us to make this really work, like it is going to be a tremendous sacrifice for a very long time, which again, like you're saying earlier, most most people in this industry are passion driven and they're like, this is all I want to do. But I had also read the book The E-Meth Revisited by Michael Gerber, right? And it tells the story of a baker, you know, a technician who becomes a business owner. But she gets trapped in it because that's all she knows how to do. And she never gets out from inside of her business to work on it. And so I thought I came to the realization what I really want to be great at is at that point in time is working. I want to be able to architect a business that serves not just our audience, but also us as owners. And so that's kind of that was a pivotal shift for me. What do you mean by serving not just the customers, but you as an owner? I want to dive into that a little bit more. Well, you know, a lot of technicians and craftspeople, they will work, you know, 16 hour days to produce the thing that they need to produce, right, the thing that they're trained to produce. And so as a result, I think that they kind of they oftentimes manufacture a bit of a prison for themselves. Does that make sense? And correct me if I'm wrong. What you want to be able to do is to create something that that works within your own lifestyle, something that you you you're creating this as a vehicle to bring you happiness for you to have that creative output, but not really locking yourself down to the typical fallacy of a restaurant owner working 16 hour days through the holidays and so on and so forth. Yeah. And I want it to be sustainable, right? Which if you're working in a in a prison, even if it's of your own making, that's not sustainable. You'll you'll burn out or something worse will happen. You know, the other thing for me is that, you know, maybe someday we will open something, but we will have put ourselves through such an education and, you know, ideally we'll be well capitalized that we can do it on our terms. And I think that that is actually key to what was what the earlier case was when we decided not to go forward with this like raw juice bar concept, right? Because we would have been beholden to investors, right? And it would not have ultimately been on our terms. Instead of having, you know, you know, one boss or something like that, we probably would have had a few bosses in the form of investors. And that just it started to weigh on my heart. I could feel it in my body. And I was like, yeah, this feels it doesn't it wasn't fitting. This is a very long winded way of saying that that was the point at which we went back to the drying board. No, I like that totally, totally, because I think at the end of the day, like creating a business should be there should be a really strong why and there should be a really strong conviction of of anyone just going through it because any type of business, whether it's a restaurant business, you come business or retail, it doesn't really matter what it is. If you don't have that conviction or that purpose or or that it's fitting to the way that you want to do things, it just becomes a grind and you're not going to be ever successful because every time you put in that hour, it's work. It's not something you building towards something else, something greater and something for your family, something for yourself. And which is the reason why it's so important. And that's why I want to dig a little bit deeper into why isn't off fitting for you at that point. So for the people who are listening, when they are at that situation, when things are not, it doesn't feel right, then maybe it's a good time to ask themselves, why, why are they doing this? Right. For you, you don't want to be able to to have that that that restriction, right, and be able to actually create something on your own terms. And quite frankly, that vehicle wasn't the best vehicle at that time. Doesn't mean later on it's not. So definitely, I think that's very, very insightful for for me, myself, actually. So now that you decided, you know what, you came back from Toronto, you're like, you know what, juice bars are probably not for me. And then you're like, let's be creative. What did you do next? Yeah. So well, I don't actually know if I've ever told you this, but when we started the Nimble Bar company, we kind of like, we started it as this like events and media company. And we had, we had no idea. And so I think that this is, this is also part of the, the tuition. It's part of the education, right? Especially as entrepreneurs, we, I feel like it's this, it's almost a rite of passage that you start something. And it just like, I forget who said it, but it's like, if you don't look back at the thing, or if you're not embarrassed by what you're doing, you're like, you're, you're starting too late or something like that. And, and I, you know, I'm not embarrassed per se, but like when I look back at the early version of the Nimble Bar company, it's like, it was, we started it like a media circus. We went across the country, like making cocktails and national parks and like taking videos. And it, it was cool, but ultimately, like the numbers don't lie. And we just lost like a shit ton of money. And so, so, um, so when we got back from that trip, that's when I had to look really deep. Cause I was like, okay, like the, you know, we're making a lot of noise, but maybe that's all it is, is noise. Um, and sure people are like, Oh, that's cool. But like money wasn't coming our way. Right. So you describe me that how, how that looks like when, when you said that, there was a lot of noise because I, I, I understand exactly what you're saying. And I think that is a really beautiful story that you can illustrate from your past experience. Yeah. So like we were putting out a lot of content, but it was like, it was just kind of like, it was, you know, um, do you know that, uh, content business dude, perfect. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So like, like super cool. Um, but it was almost like we were trying to be a company like that where we made entertaining videos and that kind of thing, which is our environment. Yeah. Well, like, so for example, we would, um, we would, you know, one of our first videos is we went to Cathedral Grove here on Vancouver Island and we made this cocktail that suited the environment that we were in. Like we, we got spruce tips and made like a grand, um, for spruce tips, salt and made like this margarita variation with BC ingredients. And, you know, it sounds cool when I say it out loud. And it kind of is. Um, but there, there was just something missing and it just like, when I say we created a lot of noise, it was just like a lot of stuff like that, but you know, and you were marketing that like you were like, I would say like you're in the bar and you created the special cocktail drink and you just like, Hey, you know what? Come and try it out guys. Is that what happened? Um, we would just make, here's the problem. We had nothing to sell. Okay. So we had nothing clear to sell. We could come and do events for you, but it was like, that's really hard to, especially when you're parading across the country. Um, we can, you know, help you with your cocktail menus. There were a few things that we could do, but none of it was clear and it's, you know, I'm just reminded of that saying, I think it's like, it's a mist in the pulpit. It's a fog in the pews. You know, I want something like that. Anyways, it was, it was very unclear to us. So for everybody else, it was like nothing, right? They're just like, Oh, this is kind of cool. But because we had nothing clear to sell, we were unable to monetize it. So that's what I mean when I say noise, like people might be like, Oh, like what you're doing is cool, but like, I don't get it. And I really don't understand how you make money. Um, and I think that, like that creates a little bit of a disconnect between a brand and its audience. Um, does that make sense? Sort of. It seems like that, uh, and I guess like to clarify, you were just going, you and your partner, Nate, was just going around town and you're like, Hey, you know what, you approach different bars and you're like, let me come in, create an event for you, uh, spice up your cocktail menu and stuff like that. And you created these crazy, dancy drinks. And, but then at the end of the day, you were not really making any money out of that. Is that more or less kind of not even so we were at, it wasn't just around town. We were going across the country and we figured that every city we stopped at, we would be able to call bars and restaurants and say, Hey, like we could make like videos. And so we're like, Oh, like bars and restaurants want videos. So we'd be like, Hey, do you guys want to like a video? And they'd be like, I have no idea who you are, um, maybe. And, and we also did set up some interviews. So we like did some interviews stuff, but ultimately it was like, it was just way too many things, um, without any clear direction. So I, right, right, right. So like I would just, you know, early on it was just a tangled web of mess. And we were adding complexity to it by traveling across the country. So anyways, when we came back from that trip, that's when I was like, okay, I gotta look deeper here and just really like we need to make a product. Right. We, we need to make some kind of a product that we can sell again and again and again and again. And so, you know, I was like, what do, what do people want from us? Do they want anything? Um, like can we create anything of value? Um, and that those are hard questions to ask, but I think that they're the necessary questions to ask. And so I went back to our roots as bartenders and I went back to all of the people who asked us, where did you learn how to do this? And that's when I was just like, you know what, why don't we just make a course? Um, and this was a counterintuitive move because bartending schools are very negatively stigmatized in our industry. Like, like people who are really high caliber bartenders or like managers or owners, they always kind of like look down on bartending schools because they tend to breed entitlement in the folks who come out of them, like, like people walk into an establishment will be like, I'm, I went to this course, you know, hire me. Um, and so they're, they're negatively stigmatized. And so that was something that, you know, that's something that we continue to fight against a little bit. Um, but yeah, so that's kind of the long-winded story of how we just finally came to the conclusion that we needed to make a course. And then that's where we went from there. It's very interesting because like I was saying, a lot of restaurant owners, they, they don't really think about creative ways of adding value to their customers because they all only see the food as the only value. And that's the, like a lot of my clients, that's exactly what they are, they're, they're, they're stuck with is just thinking, they're thinking about, Hey, what can I sell? What more can I sell in terms of food wise? They're not really thinking about ways of, Hey, in today's world, we can actually sell a lot of things. And I cover this within a lot of the stuff within my channel. It's like, Hey, you can sell meal kits. And this is pre COVID time, by the way, like meal kits was one of them courses was one of them. And events, workshops, like there's so many different things. And even when I was running my ice cream shop, we were, we were actually selling events, workshops, teaching people exactly kind of like, Hey, what is the process between having from conceptual to actually creating an ice cream? And it's just a good two, three hour of outing for our patrons. And then they enjoy it. They understand exactly a little bit more of what goes into the creation process. And at the same time, it creates a really great culture and a bond within the community. So I think it's great that you were able to get so creative with this, because you're like, not only is your bar, your restaurant specifically able to sell drinks and food, but also now they have ability to monetize through selling courses for the people that want to start a career in bartending. So how did you sell the restaurant owner on this idea? Well, it was a lot of what you just said, right? Like and and we have, we've since licensed our training program and the really interesting thing that kind of took me back was and yeah, so the the owner of the establishment that we're going to be running this licensed version of the school out of is like they're excited to have their brand associated with ours. And I think it's because, you know, if you are a place providing what we call high performance bartender, you know, training, it I think it would lead the consumer to believe that you know, you have high performance people behind your bar. And you know, maybe some other stuff that I'm kind of missing, but back to the first establishment, which was Little Jumbo in Victoria, BC, that's where we continue to run our school today. You know, they were excited to put put up like home of the Nimble professional bartending school on their like right beside the menus and stuff like that. I just think there's something about it that that lends credibility. You know, I just think ultimately education is is one of the not so secret weapons that that bars and restaurants can actually use. So let's say for yes, so let's say for for example, I am trying to open up a restaurant right now, I want to explore this Avenue as a way for me to generate revenue. What would your advice be for someone that's starting like that? Yeah, so I would go I would go two ways or two options. One is you could you could license our program like we've you know, like we have built the entire training thing, right? The other that you could do is you could enlist the experts who already work in your establishment, those bartenders or the chefs and you can say, look, guys, I want to create an educational experience that you know, we can run out of this place that just kind of sits empty, you know, during the day, maybe your place that's just open at night, right? And I would, you know, I would just have a couple of sessions with them, you pay them by the hour. And I would say so I want, you know, module one to be this module two to be this module three, et cetera, et cetera. And then just like say, I'll pay you, you know, 20 bucks an hour or whatever and just create some content around it. You know, that might be easier said than done because not everybody is not everybody's great at content, frankly. It's it is a bit of a skill. But there is definitely expertise within your four walls that you can you can leverage powerfully, whether it's creating that experience inside or maybe you maybe you just shoot some videos and they don't they don't need to be fancy either. You put a tripod up with a camera and just shoot or you can even have your phone and just say, OK, make like, let's just record some videos where you're going to make these maybe it's just our house cocktails. Maybe you every single menu you come up with, you create a little course on how we how we create these cocktails and you can come in at this day and this time and we'll you know, we'll teach you how to make our menu or something like that. There there are a ton of different ways to do it. But I think back to one of your earlier points about oftentimes restaurant owners don't get creative with this kind of stuff. I think it's because they're often in the weeds, right? Like, you know, it's it's very overhead intensive. And so I think that to say to a bar restaurant owner, oh, like, why don't you create like an educational program to drive, you know, more incremental revenue? If I were a restaurant owner and I was in the weeds and already I was like, I don't have any time. My inst my gut would tell me that is going to take me forever. No way. But what I'm here to tell you right now is it can actually be a fairly low impact. It doesn't have to be as hard as it sounds. Totally, you definitely make some very, very good point because a lot of people over complicated this whole thing. And even for us, when an example that we had within our own ice cream shop was that aside from teaching and showing people how to make ice cream, we also brought in other professionals who were great at what they did. So I'll give you an example. One of the brands that we collaborated with is a florist. OK, she's a she's a home florist, let's say. Right. So all she did for Mother's Day was they brought a bunch of flowers. We pre-sold this event to begin with. We just basically emailed our list. We had signages up on our social media and in person. And we just told them, hey, you know what, come in on Mother's Day, sign it for this workshop, 25 bucks. And you're going to be able to leave with a bouquet of flowers and a cup of ice cream. So that way you can bring it to your mom or this is a great activity for you to bring your mom and enjoy. And that alone was able to generate thousands of dollars for us. And on top of that, we're able to create a very, very, very good community. And we didn't need to teach anything. We just need to supply the space for the people to come in to promote this event. And it was a really, really great experience. So our partner, the florist was super happy because for her, she was doing all the teaching and she was buying all the flowers, wholesale. And then now she's basically able to touch more of our clients. And at the same time, my clients, they were super happy. They were like, wow, you're doing something really good for Mother's Day. And on top of that, they had a great experience with their mom. And at the end of the day, when it comes to restaurant business, hospitality and something that I want everyone to really pay attention is that it's all about the experience. Truly, like when we are selling food, when we're selling anything, it's all about the experience of what they feel like after they leave the establishment. We don't need to just sell food. It could be any other thing. There are paint nights and that's the reason why those are super popular as well. So for us, when the people with the customers with their mom leave with the bouquet of flowers and ice cream, they associate that type of feeling of warmth, connection, family with our brand, because that's what we help them deliver. And quite frankly, it was a really, really successful campaign as and to your note, it didn't require us to do anything extra. So for the people who are listening, if you're thinking that, oh, you know what? I'm already in the weeds. Is there a lot of things to do? It's very difficult to execute. It really isn't. And we can be very, very creative with these things. And it does add another dimension of revenue to this business model. Yeah. So totally and you can you can leverage other other experts in your city. Just like you said, you know, I'm reminded of the the gin company botanist took a number of bartenders. They connected with with a local forager and they took a you know, a number of bartenders out on like this foraging experience, you know, and and that that was probably very easy for them to do. And and it's also just a phenomenal way to cultivate relationships as well with other with other folks in your area. So yeah, I'm a big fan. I want to touch on one other thing, too, which is so you created this, you know, flower or an experience with a florist, right? And and I love educational experiences because it adds another dimension and another layer. And what it does ultimately is you are giving your audience a resource, right? You're giving them a resource. And you know, one of our fundamental human needs is to kind of collect resources so that we have a better chance of survival. And when you add education to an experience and you give folks that resource, you are you are fortifying them with knowledge. And and at the deepest level, what people feel when they leave is they feel like you're helping them survive. And I know that sounds a little bit woo woo, but it's it is it is true. So I you know, if there's I believe that every barn restaurant should have, you know, should be looking for new ways to imbue their establishment with education. So yeah, I love that. Thank you. Thank you so much for sharing so much gold with us and really I didn't like being able to inspire us with different avenues and be creative. Let's say if people are wanting to license from you now, drop your handles, drop your plugs. How can they find you? Will you let us know? For sure. Yes. So so you can hit us up at nimblebar.co. Our you know, our phone number is there. Email is there if you're interested in licensing our training. You know, you can email me directly at Kyle at nimblebar.co. And and I also I also help bars and restaurants with with with their marketing, marketing that actually works over at guestgetter.co specifically all about getting guests. And there's a there's a free weekly newsletter and weekly podcast there as well. Awesome. Awesome. Awesome stuff. Thank you so much, guys. Give Kyle a big follow. And once again, I definitely do very appreciate you jumping on and sharing all these nuggets with us. So thank you so, so much. Thanks, man. Thanks for having me.