"Together Talks" # 165: FREE BIRD and Founder, Jay Williams.

FREE BIRD: delivers a clean, crisp taste that'll make your taste buds stand up and salute.

For the 165th feature of our "Together Talks" campaign, we collaborated with Free Bird and Founder, Jay Williams. They believe in keeping things simple, letting authenticity shine, and serving up a refreshing experience with a touch of Southern grit. They are not here to be fancy-but here to bring folks together, just like a good drink should.

"Together Talks" feature # 165: FREE BIRD presented by KLS - Your Trusted Shipping Solutions?In The USA

Story of how it was created?

Free Bird originated in an atypical way. I have a background primarily in real estate development, which, of course, transitions perfectly to beverage! Haha. I did that for about 25 years and had always wanted to do some other things. I had also been in venture capital for years, so I had experiences with other businesses, whether I was on the board or as an investor/advisor. For me, the thought of the beverage industry was always in the back of my mind. I can't really give you a specific reason why, other than to say that the appeal of the process and creative side of CPG, beverage in particular, just interests me.

If you go back about a year and a half ago, I had actually started a water brand and that was my first foray into beverage. When I did that, I knew not one thing about beverage, I didn't know one person. Once I started, I learned a lot, I learned a lot about the process, learned a lot about the people, met a lot of people in the industry, and realized how much I loved it. I was completely all in on the beverage industry at that point, but I had an epiphany midway through that initial business and I knew exactly what I needed to do to be successful. That meant that I needed to pivot.

I got very fortunate and along the way somebody came along to buy that first business and in doing so, gave me the freedom to then pursue what I really wanted to do. That is when and how FREE BIRD was born!! My original inspiration for FREE BIRD came from Liquid Death. There is no denying how successful they have been. Although I am not a customer and I'm certainly not the target audience. What I can say is that what they have done is unbelievable. They have effectively created a new category…a category of brand centric beverage brands. For years, they barely spoke about their actual product, it was all about their brand and it was all about the entertainment side of things. It's only now that they have so many products that they speak more specifically about them. They have done a wonderful job appealing to their audience, but there are a lot of people that probably would love to experience a beverage like Liquid Death, but they're just not going to buy those products. Its simply not for everyone.

I always say, for example, my mother, there's no way she would drink a Liquid Death. My wife, who isn’t 80, will not drink a liquid death either, because she isn’t interested in walking around with that in her hand. That is part of what made me think about creating FREE BIRD. I envisioned a product in an aluminum can that was more mainstream, a little bit more Americana, a little more blue collar and nostalgic, you name it, to appeal to a wider array of people. Also, I wanted to create something a little bit more gender-neutral. Liquid Death skews heavy male. FREE BIRD is more gender neutral.

That is the background of where the concept came from because I really saw there being a huge opportunity there. One other thing I'll mention is that because Liquid Death has done such a tremendous job in creating this new category, they pretty much own the category. They are the Coca-Cola, if you will, of the category. But there is no Pepsi to their Coke. There are other players out there in the market, but nobody's really challenged them, certainly from a branding and marketing standpoint. That's precisely where my mind went when we were creating the company.

What have been the biggest challenges?

We are no different than any other new company, trying to figure out how much money do you raise and when? In beverage, that is a big question. It's not like some other industries where it's very intuitive of how and when you scale. In beverage, there's a big chicken or the egg scenario because going bigger can be great, but it's also a huge financial commitment as well. You've also got to demonstrate the appeal and validate the wherewithal of the company. It's a little game you have to play. The biggest challenge has just been trying to figure out how we go about that process in an efficient way. I'm pleased to say that it's going unbelievably well, but I would say that how we manage that going forward is ultimately our biggest challenge.

Goals for upcoming year + Next phase of the company?

Because we are still early in our development, we have certain plateaus and levels that we're trying to reach as we speak. For example, we only launched our Shopify site about a month ago and that is going well. This week, launched on Amazon, which is exciting. They asked us to be in their Emerging Brands Accelerator program, which is fantastic. There's a lot of great benefits associated with that, so we're excited about the opportunities. Very soon thereafter, we'll be in retail. We are currently in talks with quite a few. It’s truly a very exciting time for the company.

Every retailer you could think of across the country, we are having conversations with. We are involved in these discussion as we speak and we are likely to have some big announcements very soon.

We also just had two incredible and foundational moments occur for the company. Given how important distribution is, that has been at the top of our list. With that in mind, we just signed distribution deals with United Distributors based out of Atlanta..not only are they prestigious, they are one of the most well thought of distributors in the South, and they cover Georgia and Alabama. We also signed a distribution deal with RS Lipman out of Tennessee which is perfect given that Nashville, in particular, should be great for FREE BIRD. Given that the Southeast is our initial focus, these deals are perfect. Most importantly, these are high character, high quality groups who know what they are doing. I could not ask for more. For me, going from having no experience in this industry to now working with these two amazing groups, is pretty cool. I can't help but to feel awfully proud and excited about that.

These partnerships will obviously play a significant role in helping us accelerate our growth. The channels that we'll expand to with them will accelerate and open up new possibilities. We're very fortunate. I would hope that by the end of this year, that we are in no less than 500 stores, and hopefully more.

What have you learned since becoming an entrepreneur?

I can start with giving some context about myself, I define myself as an entrepreneur. If there's anything that defines me, that is it. I always like to say that I was born with a mindset that gives me an uncomfortable amount of tolerance for risk, if that makes sense. I'm virtually fearless as it relates to taking risk. As long as I am taking that risk on myself and I am a part of it. Obviously that’s very different than going to Vegas and rolling the dice where the deck is stacked against you. I like my chances when I can control my own destiny.

I just feel comfortable that I can get things done. Not that I feel like I'm smarter than other people out there, because there's a lot of people a lot smarter than me, but I have simply figured out how to start and run businesses. As it relates to the entrepreneurial journey, I love every part of it. I love the nitty gritty of the process. I love the ideation, because that ignites my creative side. I love visualizing the concept. With FREE BIRD, the first thing that came into my mind was all visual, so I had to write it all down and sort of describe what I wanted. Luckily, I have a fantastic brand designer that helped bring it to life.

In building a new business, I love every step of the way and its nice that I have a little bit of experience versus someone in their 20's starting a new business, I've been around long enough now to where I've figured out some things not to do. I've learned how to make a dollar go further. I've learned the pitfalls of where you don't spend a lot of money early on things that just don't matter. I remember a business that I started when I was around 30. We went out and leased a big office space and bought nice couches and desks and all this stuff. Even though the world's changed lot since then, so it's maybe not as applicable, it was all stuff that literally mattered zero to the business. It was just a drain on our expenses, where we should have been using that money for other things. That was simply a mistake, but now I know better.

I've learned how to be really expense conscious in that regard. I'm just a little wiser than I used to be. For example, I was having was conversation with a younger entrepreneur recently and we were talking about this. I made an observation stating that extensive planning was practically worthless. Plans are fine and certainly important, but when you go into a new company, those plans almost immediately go in the trash. Because the business will go the way it goes and you're going to have a limited amount of control over some of that.

What you really need is not necessarily a great plan, but an ability to adapt and evolve and be resilient for all the that's going to come your way, because it's going to keep coming every single day. If that's not part of your mental makeup, then it may not be for you. I know a lot of people that are super, super smart who had long and detailed business plans. That is great, but at the end of the day, all the day-to-day stuff that happens, none of that's on that plan. None of that's in those pages. You need to be able to react and you must be able to solve problems.

Many have conviction and they think they know what they are going to do and how it will play out, but that’s always tough to predict. You may be smart as hell and have the best idea of all time, but shit happens. So it helps to have been there before...its hard to replicate experience. Being in difficult situations and dealing with problems is part of the deal…and being able to rely on that experience is truly invaluable.?

How have you grown due to becoming an entrepreneur?

The FREE BIRD journey has been unique from the standpoint that if you're in one industry for 20 years, no sane person just automatically switches into an industry where you don't know a soul. You have to be a little crazy to do that. Yet, here I am! What I learned was how hard it was to go into a business where I didn't know anybody. In the real estate business, for example, if I were to go to a conference, I walk in the door, I know so many people and I've got a reputation there. Hopefully it's a good one. But it's from years and years and years of doing business. Now I walk into a room in the beverage industry and nobody knows me at all. I am not walking in with the kind of credibility that I'm used to. That can be super daunting.

But I found myself really going outside of my comfort zone to meet people and to learn. I'm not the kind of guy that goes into conference and is super chatty, talking to everyone. It's just not necessarily my nature, I'm a little more reserved until I am more comfortable. But I had to change that. I had to go and engage and just meet people, I had to introduce myself and gather as much information as possible. It is rewarding to know that in a year and a half I went from knowing nobody, to now I know some of the most influential and best people in beverage. I say all the time how funny it is how many people met with me…that I somehow tricked them into doing it because I don't know why they would have ever met with me. Yet, I just kept grinding, kept hustling.

I give myself a little pat on the back for some of my hustle skills because I was able to get myself into circles that I really had no business being in. I don't think that I would have been able to position FREE BIRD to be where it is now, without making so many good relationships in such a short period of time. Now we are on the precipice of something special. The opportunity is pretty incredible. I think it would have been a lot more difficult had I not broken out of my comfort zone and really learned how to navigate a whole new industry, and it's been an awesome experience.

What do you need to improve on or develop next?

Being able to to identify where the gaps are as our business expands. We're very small and it's already a lot. I've got so many things going on right now that I'm trying to identify what is a worthwhile opportunity versus a distraction. It’s important that I have a good understanding of where I can be effective with my existing team and when I've got to bring on others to fill the gaps. I'm not one of these people who feels like I need to do it all and that's part of the experience I have. But at the same time, it's like the question about scaling...which is, when do you bring on more people to fill these gaps. Obviously they cost money and you don't want to go out and break the bank nor do you want to find the bottom of the barrel for talent. You want to bring in really good people to build a quality organization.

Ultimately the biggest challenge is probably how to fill those gaps and also how to find people that are "in it to win it" for the long run with the rest of us. I've had an incredibly lucky track record so far bringing on team members that are fantastic but that's going to have to continue. Ultimately they become an extension of me and the company and they're going to be out at events and conferences and talking to our retailers, etc. Because I can't be everywhere. I need people that represent me and my company in a way that I feel good about.

What aspect of entrepreneurship do you appreciate the most?

Most definitely resilience. If there is any quality necessary to be an entrepreneur and of course there's a bunch, but if you are not resilient and able to handle the day-to-day grind and the problems that come about, it will wear you down. And by the way, sometimes they're not necessarily big problems, maybe they're small problems, but there might be 50 of them. It never ends. I know friends of mine, contemporaries of mine, who have had businesses that have come and gone because they just could not deal with all the issues. They were stressed all the time, it was overwhelming to them. For some reason, it's one quality that I have. I’m just able to let things roll off me and just focus on a solution. You have to have a resilient mindset or else you're going to crumble.

If I’m allowed to add a bonus attribute, it sales. Sales is critical, especially in CPG. If you're not able to effectively sell your vision...to consumers, to employees, to investors, to an industry, you'll end up finding yourself behind others that do a better job of that.

Share a decision that you made that was detrimental?

I can actually tell you the exact inflection point that caused me to pivot to FREE BIRD. When we started the original company that I started before FREE BIRD, we were in plastic bottles, and we were geared more towards the fitness world. However, I realized that a better opportunity was out there. When I had this epiphany about the FREE BIRD opportunity, much of that is attributed to a beverage conferences I attended. I would look around in all these coolers where they had all the new beverages represented, there were almost no plastic bottles. The last conference I went to with BevNet, I saw roughly 100 companies represented, I believe only two were in plastic bottles and one was in glass. Everything else was in aluminum.

It was at that moment that I realized was that I was making mistake if I stayed in a plastic bottle. Not only for the sustainable component of it, which is obviously very important, but also for the public perception and marketability, The world doesn't work like it did like in 1980, where things took years to be adopted. The world today moves very quickly. Today, when perception starts to permeate through an industry and becomes within the mainstream, it moves fast. I knew plastic bottles were going to be something that hindered me going forward. When we started, FREE BIRD, we immediately went into aluminum cans for the sustainability side of it and for the ability to respond to consumer trends. If there was any decision that I've made that I feel like was crucial for our future potential, it was going into aluminum cans for FREE BIRD.

What is your why?

I think it's probably too early, but without a doubt, when the first cans of FREE BIRD were delivered to my home. I was able to review them before we put them out in the market, it was beyond amazing. To think that I had woken up at four in the morning months earlier with this crazy idea in my head, wrote it all down and sent it to my designer to create. We went back and forth, she's fantastic. She was able to read my messy brain, and she delivered a product design that was perfect.

To see that come to life, wow, it's incredibly gratifying. Obviously, that's just the beginning, we have a lot of work to do, but to go from an idea in your brain, to six months later, something that you're holding in your hand, that you're getting ready to introduce to the public, is beyond comprehension. It's awesome.?

Do you have a moment that brings you the most joy?

I think it's probably too early, but without a doubt, when the first cans of FREE BIRD were delivered to my home. I was able to review them before we put them out in the market, it was beyond amazing. To think that I had woken up at four in the morning months earlier with this crazy idea in my head, wrote it all down and sent it to my designer to create. We went back and forth, she's fantastic. She was able to read my messy brain, and she delivered a product design that was perfect.

To see that come to life, wow, it's incredibly gratifying. Obviously, that's just the beginning, we have a lot of work to do, but to go from an idea in your brain, to six months later, something that you're holding in your hand, that you're getting ready to introduce to the public, is beyond comprehension. It's awesome.?

Partner recognition

When I started FREE BIRD, I knew it was important that I partnered with people that were in the industry and I was hoping to be lucky enough to find somebody that appreciated the vision I had for the company.

I was able to find that group. It's BeyondBrands. BeyondBrands, is based out of New York, and Eric Schnell is the founder and CEO of the company. I met with Eric at BevNet in New York. That meeting with Eric was amongst others, who if I mentioned, you would know that are well known in the beverage industry.

Eric in particular had a very positive reaction to Free Bird. He was so excited. He was almost more excited than me. We ended up having several subsequent meetings with him and his team and I knew they were a perfect fit. As a result, I ended up partnering with BeyondBrands. I cannot tell you how important that component is for me and the company. This is a group that has immeasurable expertise and experience and their relationships in the business are incredible. When we walk into meeting rooms, I get a lot more credibility than I probably deserve because they're sitting with me. I would say that amongst the all the different things that that I've done in building this business, that was one of the smartest moves I could have made. They are now my partners on a day-to-day basis and they are fully engaged in the business.

They are in the trenches with me. I’m very lucky, because they're not only really good at what they do, but they're really good people. For me, that's a must. If there's anything that I've learned in my experiences throughout my career, is that I'm not interested in working with people that don't share the same vision, the same values, integrity, etc. Life’s too short.

Piece of Advice

If you are thinking about becoming an entrepreneur, my advice is very simple. Just start. It sounds easy, but there are a lot of people that become very hesitant and never get out of the starting gate. I recognize that there's a lot of fear with starting a business and it's certainly not easy, but if it's something that you really want to do, you have to take the leap and start.You have to get past the analysis/paralysis mindset. If you can just start, you will at least get in the game. Ultimately, the worst thing that happens is that it doesn't work and you've got to go find something else to do. Not ideal, but you'll learn so much through the experience and you'll be better prepared for the next time.

The way I see it, life's just too short to wait around for tomorrow. The best time to start a new business is yesterday, and if it's not yesterday, then it needs to be today.

In Closing

KLS wants to thank Free Bird?and Founder, Jay Williams, for today's "Together Talks" feature. Follow along for their journey with their social handles below!

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