 And I went to this pig slaughter class and I met this pig. She was alive and then she was dead. And then they let students butcher her. And I was like, no, this is offensive to that pig. Somebody asked me what I would do if you won the lottery, what would you do? And I was like, what I'm doing? Like, this is what I want to do. We just decided this is where we wanna open our business. It's a 100 year old building. No one's ever taken care of it. We got this. Everybody welcome to the show. This is a show about making mistakes. It's a show about screwing up. It's a show about having a dream, having a big idea to say you wanna open a restaurant or you, I don't know, wanna cut hair out of your house and you think you're gonna make a living doing it. And then when you start to do it, you're like, wait a second. I don't know if this is such a good idea or wait a second. I didn't know I had to pay taxes or wait a second. I have to hire a contractor to talk to the county so I can figure out how to sell food. Like, that's what this show is about. Well, I'm not about contacting the county so that you can sell food, but sort of the hiccups along the way to creating the world that you want. And tonight, we will be with Lauren from Ruby Brink, is the name of it. It's a bar and butcher. And I have no idea what that means because I picture drinking with a butcher nearby and that sounds pleasant. Well, we'll find out because I'm sure Lauren is lovely as well. Everybody, welcome to the show. I've got Lauren here from the Ruby Brink. Welcome. I'm excited to chat. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, tell me a little bit about Ruby Brink. What is it? Well, the Ruby Brink is a butcher shop and bar on Vashon Island. We have a whole animal butcher shop and we get whole animals directly from farmers and then we also buy all of our produce directly from farmers. And then our bar is run by a really highly skilled bartender who gets super cool bottles in and makes great cocktails. We put it all together. Oh, hey, you hear that super skilled bartender yet? Oh yes, there are many of us out there. So I haven't been to Vashon Island. I just moved, like I've lived here for like four days now. Just moved up. Where's Vashon Island? So Vashon is, it's like Southwest so it's off of West Seattle instead of downtown. And it's an island? It is an island, yeah. No bridge, no bridge. There's no bridge. No bridge. You have to ride a boat. Yes. A ferry. A ferry. I mean, I guess you could take a regular boat. I guess you could take a regular boat. I'm a clamp talking about this because I'm picturing a butcher shop and a bar. Yeah, it's in the same room. It's in the same room. Cause I picture like, I don't know, like Eastern European, you walk up and there's the sausage hanging down and you're like, have a drink. Exactly, that's the whole point. Like in Europe, market bars are not weird. That's normal. I love that concept of being able to like shop and eat and drink and have it be casual and hang out. We're really just trying to make really high quality food in a really casual place. And the market bar of like having a butcher shop in there sort of helps with that. Cause you have people just coming in and buying things and saying hi to friends and leaving instead of like, you know, having a hostess like relegate you to your section of the restaurant or something. So as most of the food and most of the community, is it like that where it's a lot of local stuff on Vashon Island? Yeah, I mean, we have a, it's like semi rural but it's pretty rural still. So we have a lot of small farms. We get a lot of produce from the island. Just from the island itself. Yeah, definitely throughout the summer, most of it comes from the island. That's hyper local. Yeah. But we're lucky also there are a lot of farms in Western Washington and Eastern Washington. So we have access to a lot of local food. That's very cool. So how did you get it? You're the first butcher I've ever met. Like how did you get into this? Well, I was really interested in food and I knew I like I've always worked in restaurants on and off like throughout the years and I was trying to figure out like what I wanted to do with my life. Like I was about to turn 30 and I was like, what am I gonna do with my life? That's not what I'm doing right now. So this is your 20 something crisis. Yes, totally. I was like, I don't wanna do this forever. So what do I wanna do for real? And so I went to a butchering class, like a pig slaughter class, just like off the just one day. And I went to this pig slaughter class and I met this pig and she was alive and then she was dead. And then they let students butcher her and I was like, no, this is offensive to that pig. Like no one here knows what they're doing. Why are they letting us do that? Oh, because it's just like go to town. So it's like zombies coming in at the. Yeah, it was weird. It freaked me out and I was like, no, this is terrible. If someone's gonna do this, which I kinda wanna do, they should know how to do it right and be respectful then. That doesn't seem like an actual butcher class. No, it was weird. And so that was sort of like my intro into becoming a butcher. Well, tell me a little bit more about, you said you worked in food, but even previous to that, did you have like your own business or your own thing growing up? Did your parents do that sort of thing? No, like I, my family's really into food. Like my dad cooks all the time and my mom makes food all the time and we always cook together and my grandparents were all really into cooking. So I've been cooking my whole life and like one of the big things we do and how this whole like the ruby brink and everything got started was by broth. So I make broth, like bone broth. Essentially. And it's like my dad always made chicken stock growing up. Like there were always pots of stock bubbling on the stove and it was a very normal thing to do with like your bones and stuff for me. And so kind of when I started being a butcher and having excess bones, I started a pop up called meat and noodle where we just basically made broth out of bones and like. And put noodles in it and sold out. No, that's really unique. I don't think I've ever met somebody that was in food, loved making food and it originated with broth. Yeah, I mean, it's like I didn't, I don't think I realized it at the time but just like growing up with that, having that smell and being used to just having a pot bubbling on the stove constantly. Like it wasn't weird for me to just be like, oh yeah, I have all these bones. I'm just gonna make broth. Now I have 10 gallons of broth. What am I going to do with it? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Kind of thing. Like what do you do with it now? The common first world problem. But now I have like a hundred gallons of broth and I know what to do with it. But you know what to do with it. And I'm sure you're gonna be like, it's just sitting in the back. Your parents, did they have their own restaurant? Did they? No. No, did they have like the nine to five type of job and then? No, my dad is a jazz musician so he like played jazz at night time. You're getting more and more fascinated. And then my mom worked, she was like a, she was like a microbiologist at a hospital or something. Your mom was a microbiologist and your dad is a jazz musician. That's fantastic. I used to think that when somebody would improvise with jazz that they were just making up stuff off the top of their head. Yeah, I know. They're not. No. They practice that a lot. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally. Well, they know the bass so well. Yeah, they have the foundation so you can really just go play with anyone. And there's like books of standards that they like, if you're a working musician, you know the standards. You know if you have to. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. What you're talking about and what you're sharing sounds a lot like the work that you do as well. And so like you have to know the standards, right? To improvise. So putting together the bone broth, things like that and putting it together. Totally. I feel like without knowing it, everything that I've been doing over the last 20 years is like giving me the education and experience to do what I'm doing now. So like I've eaten in a lot of restaurants, like I've eaten in a lot of places, I've eaten a lot of food, I've made a lot of food for large groups of people and not in a professional way, just of a way of taking care of my friends or, you know, feeding. You know, when I was younger, we would do shows, like bands would come to Reno and like my friends would book shows and then afterwards like you have this band from out of town that's staying in a house and so like you should feed, like you feed them. Somebody asked me what I would do if like, they're like, if you won the lottery, what would you do? And I was like, what I'm doing, like this is what I want to do. I want to feed people really good food that makes them feel good. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm picturing punk bands being like, of course we'll go back to Reno. Lauren's there. Yeah. She makes really good food. I hope so. I hope that's what happened. It's kind of weird like I fed, you know, like this started because I loved feeding people so much and I was like doing all these dinners and they were for free and for my friends and someone was like, you should charge money for this because it's got to be expensive. And I was like, oh yeah, you're right. So then I started charging money for it and now I have like a business around it. So it is kind of like, it's important for me to, and I know it's important for like my business partners as well, like this is one thing we all agree on is we want people to feel nourished and taken care of, like even though there's a transaction happening, that's not, that's not what we're doing. You know, that's not our intention. It's to pay the bills, and because we have to, but really it's about like taking care of people and nourishing people. You also have to live. Yeah, I mean, it has to pay for itself. Everything costs money here. Well, even the punk bands coming through town. They need money to gas up money. Gas to keep going, right? And continue moving on. Hey, Jack, how are we looking? We're ready, we're ready. Are we ready? I'm ready. All right, what are we drinking? Today we have a drink called the Born Again. It's very flower-forward. Inside the drink you've got Jasmine and Rose and Orange Blossom. Infused, and all of that is a little bit of Butterfly Snappy from a beautiful gin company up in British Columbia known as Empress 1908. Empress 1908 is a color-changing gin. You add acid, it turns pink. I like flowers. And then there's peach soap in your own preserves. Wait, Jack, did you know that Lauren likes flowers and things? I really, yeah, maybe he did. Guy does research. Here we are. Yeah. And to commemorate the mums, Mum Champagne, their reserve brew. One of the fantastic vantages that they have. Oh, that looks good. Like you guys can show you a little bit of peach resin, jasmine flowers on the bottom. Wow. Thank you, Jack Sanders. Yes, you're welcome. Are you ready? I don't know. Do you have a preference for how you, like, oh, she's going to go in? Are we going to cheers? No, you're going to, oh, cheers. Cheers. Thanks for having me. Yeah, salut. No, it's a thing. Ooh, nice. That's flowery. That's flowery. Yeah, it's really good. Yeah, it is floral. But it's good. Like, you could have gone crazy with the rose or not like the balance. Like, it doesn't taste like my grandma's basement. Like, which is really nice. So I assume, and it could be totally wrong, because you've had such good experience, I think, in sort of like laying the foundation and moving forward on this type of stuff. But I assume that there were missteps or things that, like, mistakes you had to learn from. Certainly as a small business owner, somebody getting started on that, like, that were like, oh my god, I didn't think it would be like this. Or even mishaps where you were like, oh no. One of the most challenging times was building this place. So what we did is we started like, Vashon is small, right? And I've lived there for 10 years now, and I knew that if I was gonna open a business there, I knew where I wanted it to be. Like, where I wanted my business to be. Yeah, is it like a downtown area type of thing? Yeah, there's, in my scope, there is from like the main four-way stop to the movie theater. And if your business isn't there, like, I wouldn't do it personally. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So this building became available, and so me and my two business partners, the three of us were like, this is where we want our business to be. This building was about 100 years old. Maybe no one had ever taken care of it, really. And it had been multiple businesses, like sometimes up to eight businesses in the bottom floor of this restaurant. So, and then- At one time in the bottom floor? Yeah, because it's like a big space. And so they were using it for all these small different places. And then restaurants had come in and built on top of it and built on top of it. So it was like a disaster in there. We just decided like, this is where we want to open our business. Like, it's a 100-year-old building. No one's ever taken care of it. We got this. We got it. We got this. No problem. Had you had experience doing anything like that before? No, no, I mean, this is my first business, right? Like we make a business plan and a budget and you think it's gonna cost a certain amount and you go for it. And like, everything happens. Like it's always something, it's always something. Like, and I know that from restaurant life in general because that's something that Amantra, that people say like, it's always something. Yeah, if you, I like that something's always- Oh, it was bad. It was good, it was bad. I feel like I gotta give you a moment. Like it's still flashing back. Yeah, totally. Well, because we've been open now for six months where it's like we're open and it's happening, but like building this place, dealing with contractors, dealing with the county, dealing with all these things where like, I'm a butcher. I'm a butcher, you know? And I know how to run a restaurant. I know how to open a restaurant and I know how to take care of people sitting at a table. I know how to feed them, but building the space, I did not know how to do that. And I don't know if I was ready for how many decisions and how many things and how expensive it would be. Like what was, do you remember some of the big decisions? I mean, did they go to you or to your business partners? Well, I have two business partners. So luckily like, I have to say like, I feel like I'm an entrepreneur and I'm doing things on my own, but if I wasn't doing it with these two other people, with Jake and Russell, I wouldn't be doing it. You know what I mean? Like the three of us are a team and support each other and we all have our different areas of knowledge and expertise and history. And straight up, if I didn't have them, I wouldn't have this place. So getting everything just to the point where you could be a butcher, that was the really hard part, the really scary part. We have investors. I mean, that was a big thing, you know, right? Like, you know, how do you pay for something? Like this is a, this was a huge build out and it's a big space and we want to feed a lot of people and we have big ideas. So we have to make sure that it works on paper because it's still a business. And so luckily our investment team is awesome and they support us, otherwise they wouldn't be doing this. But being beholden to people is scary. And it's scary when things start to go not right. We hired a contractor that took our money and didn't do any work. What? Yeah. He did a bad job and then like took off with the money. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. And so that like, that was a year, I mean that cost us a year, right? And then we had to make more money to pay for that money. And the way you make money is like by asking people for more money. Yeah, because you're not open. Yeah, and like I'm not gonna make $100,000 doing something. Like that's not a thing. I don't know how to do that. Yeah, like. What did you do? You like start. I don't know. You just like, all we could do is just recover, right? Like. That's it. Because I, this is what I want. This is what we want. And this is what we're doing. And we know that what we're doing is good and people will like it. You know what I mean? You kind of learned to like what you can handle and what you can't handle. Like you're just like, okay, I can't think about this right now. This is too much. So I'm not going to. And I'm going to tell everyone how I feel about it. So they all know. And then I'm just gonna like take a week. Yeah. And I'm not gonna think about it. Yeah. Because otherwise like it becomes overwhelming. And straight up like it's weird even talking about it now because the day that the bar opened, I was like, I'm never thinking about that again. Like it was too hard. Also because it's like, I don't even know you're, we're spending all this money and doing all these things and I don't even know if people are gonna like it. Yeah. Like what if everyone hates it? Yeah. Like food sucks. Like what about that? You know, like I bet a million dollars on like the fact that I can make people happy with the food that I make. What does the space look like now? Well, now it's the dropped ceilings are gone and the archways are gone. It's all raised up. And the black paint is gone and the plastic vinyl everything is gone. Is it old brick building? Is that what it is? Yeah, it's an old brick building. And so now it's got basically on one side we have a butcher shop with a little case and a counter and then like a glassed in area as I sort of assume people didn't want to watch me butchering while they were eating, I don't know. I thought that's what would be happening. Well, I mean. Like when you said butcher shop and bar, I was like, okay. I just, you know, there's a lot of vegan people that I know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I didn't want them to have to like watch me work while they're cutting. So. Wait, so do you have vegan people that come in to drink at the butcher shop? Totally. I love this so much. We have lots of vegan food at my restaurant. You do. Because like vegetables and not eating animals is just as important as like respecting and eating a meat in a responsible way. I totally agree. So yeah. We take care of everyone and we use meat more as an ingredient. Yeah. You know, and use the whole animal. What are you thinking about doing next? Like what's coming up? Well, I really, you know, I really want to prove that this model of business is sustainable and doable. And I hope that more places like this pop up around where we buy food directly from farmers. But they can still afford to eat in our restaurant. The farmers can still afford to eat in our restaurant. Yes, like we don't want to price out the people that grow our food, you know. Like it's great if you curate your produce and you buy fancy meats and then you sell it to rich people, but like that's not the point of all of this. Right, right, right. Since you have people that know what to do with the whole animal or the whole vegetable. I mean it's not even, it's like kind of a joke, but it's not like we use kale stems. Like you don't throw those things away, you use them, you know what I mean? And so, like we don't throw away anything. We just try to use all of it. That's really my goal. Like I want to show that this is a sustainable model and that all over the country we can have like great restaurants where you don't have to worry about what you're eating. Really it's just about, I think we wouldn't have food without farmers and I will do anything I can and support any farmer thing I can for small farmers and farmers that are larger just there where our food comes from I will continue to support them and reach for them. I love how inclusive you are about all this, like 100%. I have a place where I want everyone to feel comfortable. I want people to treat it like it's their second living room cause that's why we made it, you know? Yeah, so you're gonna keep doing it. I'll keep doing that. And I mean we've only been open six months so I feel like in five years I can decide what else I'm gonna do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Go on tour. Maybe. With your punk band. That's awesome. I mean it's pretty fun going on tour with punk band so you never know. The on tour butcher, let's hear, like what's another way that you would say, like you've been around food, you've been in Europe, how would you say cheers if it's not cheers? Well I mean I love Japan so kanpai. Kanpai? I haven't said that, kanpai, right on. Thanks for being on the show. Thanks for having me. So strong. And that's a wrap. Thank you so much, Lauren, for being on the show. I love what you're doing. I know other people love what you're doing, especially bringing together people with food. I have a great idea on how to bring people together. You should tell them about the show and you should subscribe to the show and you should click on the like button and all that fun stuff. And if you have your own mess up, go to effups.com. We'd love to see you on the show.