Gordon Little - Importing and Distributing Australian Wines!

In this episode, Nikolay and Yuliya (Julia) are joined by Gordon Little, an entrepreneur in the wine industry who owns his own business importing and distributing Australian wines in the US.

Tune in (maybe even with a nice glass of Shiraz) and listen as Gordon tells us more about his business, Little Peacock Imports, and about the world of Australian wines!

Additionally, Gordon shares what he has learned over the years as a business owner as well the challenges he has overcome along the way!

As a bonus, Gordon is giving a free (and delicious!) bottle of red wine to the first listener who inquires! Email info@nyglobalgroup.com for your chance to win!

To learn more about Gordon & Little Peacock Imports:

Webpage:  www.little-peacock.com  
Email: gordon@little-peacock.com

To learn more about Nikolay & Yuliya:

Webpage: http://nyglobalgroup.com/
Instagram (Nikolay): @Nikolay.NYC
Instagram (Yuliya): @Julia.Afanasyev

And as always, DM or email us at info@nyglobalgroup.com if you have a story to share!

Transcript

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This is Success & Setbacks in NYC podcast with your host, Julia and Nikolay, coming to you from New York City with some of the most amazing life stories of how various people turn their challenges around. Tune in to get inspired, learn more or simply enjoy. Afternoon everybody. Julia and Nikolay here with success and setbacks in New York City, and we have a wonderful guest today, Gordon Little. Hello, Hey, Gordon. Gordon is a good friend of mine. I think I can say that now. And Gordon is in wine industry. He is from Australia, and he's in the industry of selling Australian wine. Gordon owns a business which we would love to hear more about. We'd love to hear your story, your journey, how it began, how it's going, or what do you see yourself? Any setbacks that you've experienced? I'm sure you have as all of us, you experienced them as an entrepreneur. And just wanted to point out that as we're doing this, we're actually tasting this wonderful looking wine that Gordon brought us here. Yes. I love this. Yeah, Gordon, please tell us a little bit more about where you were born and grew up and where it all started? Absolutely. So I grew up in Australia, in Melbourne, in the 1980s. And my mother is American, and she moved out from to marry my father. She'd never been to Australia, but she had never lived there. And she lived she was in New York City, at the time, working at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. And she was I think, shocked when she actually moved to Australia. She keeps telling the story that's like, you went from like, the biggest city in the world to you could not buy an avocado, in Melbourne in the 80s. And, yeah, so that, I mean, Australia is wonderful, it's a great place to grow up. There's a amazing quality of life there. And there still is today. You know, it's the tyranny of distance in that it's so remote. And far away that it you know, it's somewhat protected from a lot of things. And yeah, it was a it's been a wonderful place to grow up. So I lived there and went to school there. I went to university there. But I think one of the things with Australia, and you'll notice that because every time you walk outside, there's 1000 Australians, right? Grand Central Australian accent everywhere. You know, Australians do have a tendency to like, go and travel. And again, like the lifestyle permits that because for weeks annual leave is like a thing. And also taking a year off after you finish school to go work overseas is a big thing. And so, you know, you see Australians everywhere, so they tend to like go overseas, and spend some time living and experiencing other cultures and other places, which is growing up in Spain. We actually had a couple of people from Australia playing and training for tennis. I really no. Okay, yeah. I mean, people will be like, super laid back always like they've been very, very chilled. Yeah, it's very, it's it is very laid back. One of the things that people are jumping ahead a little bit in a business setting that you try and teach Australians, and I try and teach my wineries to just because Americans speak English, does not mean that the outlook is remotely similar. Like, you know, Australians are so laid back and self deprecating, like, yeah, in America, it's not like that at all. Like you really have to push and get people to be forward and with people. But yeah, like, so the Australian lifestyle is, is, is really good. And I try and bring that into the, into our company, as well. Like one of the things when we started, it's like, you know, you'll get four weeks annual leave, because I just think that's important. Yeah. And that doesn't include Christmas or Boxing Day or Easter. Like they're all additional to your four weeks, because it's really important. Like that's how that's what I the values that I sort of grew up with it. I want to instill. Do you get those four weeks? As a business owner? I don't know. I don't think so. I you know, your work even even if you take two weeks off. Yeah, you're on the email every single day. I can like I just go too crazy. In my mind. To be honest, I have like all this ideas and stuff that I want to do. So usually on day three, I'm like, Well, this vacation is too long at this point. Yeah, yeah. I think that's anxiety. I think Yeah. Especially like over the Thanksgiving breaks. And, you know, I was trying not to do I'll put my out of office on Yeah, with like, no, like, Call me if you need anything. So like, I'm out. I'm not checking emails. And I yeah, like there's parts of it, where it's like, what am I doing? Like, yeah, I should I should do something. I feel like I should do something. So yeah, so I think you would know from business, it's zero. If it's your own business. You're never fully switched off. Yep. could not agree more. So that was it. So you finished school in Melbourne finish school in Melbourne went to University in Melbourne. Okay. It's not like America, where there's tons of options for university like there's like, there's many universities, but they tend most people tend to go in the city where they grew up with, for me like a lot of the same people I went to school with, oh, everyone ends up at the same university. It's like, yeah, so it's very, like, you grow up, you go to school together, you go to university together, you end up working at the same companies together. I worked for Deloitte Consulting straight out of undergrad. And yeah, it's like, there was no one I went to school with. But there were people I've been to college with. Going to the same thing, because it's again, it's a small pool of people. Yep. In Australia, same same size as America, that 24 million people. And while we're in the school subject, could you tell us a little bit more about the final year of high school? Oh, final? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, there was a lot of drinking going on in grade 12. So I was Yeah, I got I was at boarding school. And you know, at certain points, like they leave you to your own devices with friends on a weekend. You're there. So it's like, yeah, we did. We did some drinking. And, yeah, I did get caught. And that was not fun. It was not a fun car ride home with my parents. But you know it. Again, like my mother actually said at the time, she was like, it's not so much that you were drinking. But it's like you were doing it out of plastic cups. Ask why. sound really cool? Yes. I literally like it was the most awkward car I've ever had home. But we'll meet we didn't actually go home. We went out to lunch. I was like, Would you like a big like, yep. Yeah, it was his. That's how it was so safe to say you. You had appreciation for wine from early on? How did you so when did you come to the States? And I came to the States in 2008. So great year. Yeah, I know. Right? I was living in I was working with the Australian Government and living in Germany, in from 2007, to most the way through 2008. And, you know, reading the paper and watching the world, implode, and then girlfriend, now wife, she's American, from Virginia, was living in Washington, DC. She's a lawyer. And she had a federal clerkship like a judicial clerkship in Hawaii. And we had this like, long distance relationship going on between Frankfort and Washington DC, which is manageable, right? Because it's a red eye flight. It's, it was not expensive at the time. And turns out like, again, frankly, it's a small city. And her were, I was working for the Australian Government. Her firm had an office in the exact same building. Oh, well, so she could come and she'd be like, I'll still work. I'll just do it in from Germany for like, long weekend. And so she could like, take a weekend and then work two days on either side. And again, like being in Washington, DC, I could go on, I could work out of the consulate. There or the the embassy. So, like it works, but then when she got this, like one year posting to Honolulu, it's like, well, you can't fly. Yeah, like, it's just it's too hard. So I was like, you know, I'm kind of done with the government. And it was world of cost cuts and everything because recession, and we're closing offices. And so I was like, I'll just move. My mom's American. So I have a passport. And I was like, Let's go see. We'll see what it's like. We'll see. So we moved across the world, knowing nobody, she didn't know anybody there. I don't have a job or anything. So and it was the peak of the recession. So I was like, Yeah, let's just see what happens. And it's not a cheap place to be in, I believe. No, no, but I mean, yeah, back then is that's the first time I encountered $4 A gallon gasoline. Well, you can do it now. You can you do. Like your friend. Yes. He's like it's over five in California. Yeah, I was just gonna say if you want more. Yeah. So happy that we're an electric now. Like, we just couldn't be more excited unless electricity cost goes up. Yeah, dramatically. Your Tesla, Louis. This Well, Louis. Yeah. Nice. Cheers to Elon. We're not really smoking joints on the podcast, but we're drinking wine. So that's Yeah, it seems like Tesla is really taking over. Yeah, at the moment, like, seems like everyone I talked to they're like, Oh, we're getting a Tesla. We just got one. Yeah. Yeah, I think we should do that. But it's very it's a bit difficult in Bed Stuy. Because you're in Bed Stuy Brooklyn. Yeah, we can't. There's no parking. There's no charging. Yeah, we have to run a cable. Long Way Down the street. Neighbors would charge it. Zoom. What was the name of it? Oh, I'm sorry. No, Brooklyn Museum Museum. Yep. Botanical. superchargers. Yep. Yep. Which is pretty convenient. Yes, right. Yeah, so So you came in 2008 So you guys stayed in Hawaii for a while and then stayed in Hawaii for a year. Okay. And we left at the end of 2009, I was close to getting another job. And you know, there's a certain point, Hawaii is an amazing place if you've ever been there for a vacation. Actually, we're in the talks. Yeah, it's not been yet. It's beautiful. It's fun, like everything about it is pristine. It's still a lot like being in the 1980s. As well, like time tends not to pass there. Because every day is also between 70 and 80 degrees. There's no seasons, rains, it rains more in November. But that's about it. You don't wear socks for a year. I don't like a cold. So this is perfect for you. But like the downside of that is that nothing really changes. And so it's all kind of same, but there is a point and we arranged it towards the end of the year where it's like, no, I have this job. I was working in freight forwarding. It's like, and you got to work. You got to work like seven 730 In the morning, and you're done by like three ish. And then you just go and swim in the ocean. And so you're bopping in what we lived in Waikiki? So you're like walking in the ocean in Waikiki? Like, you know what? I can I could do this for another year. Right? Like, and that I think would be, at least for me, like, that would be the that was the danger point of like, if you say yes to that, then the year after that, you say yes to that. And the year after that, and nothing changes. Yeah. Yeah. So that that's all you would do forever. Yeah, maybe we'll pick up something where? Yeah, I think I get way better. So yeah, so we, we didn't do that. And we came back and instead of moving to DC, we moved to New York. What? What? What made you move to New York? I wanted to live in a really big city. Okay. Melbourne is big. It's 4 million people. But Frankfort was small. Yeah, let's, you know, less than a million. And DC is small. It is. And it's very, like my wife lived there for so long. It's like, she has a network there. She has friends. It's like I felt like we just be I'd be moving into her life. Yeah. And you wanted to, I didn't mind it. I want to start something new and move to a really big place. And you know, it's New York or London. We were told that if Brooklyn alone was a city, it would be don't quote me, but it was something like it would have been fourth largest city in the United States. Yeah. And it's not even the city. Yeah, so I, it's it. I think, living being in a dynamic city like that for a while my plan was not necessarily living forever. But it was like, I just wanna experience what it's like to be in New York. Do you? So 1312 years later, do you still get to this out in New York in the next 10 years? Or is it still using this maybe just a temporary stop and ongoing point of discussion with my wife? No, no, no, I would never met anyone. Like similar to here. I think, what's what's so compelling about New York, and we have two young children who are five and a half and almost three. So like, we're really not, we're barely scratching the surface at the moment culturally of what New York has to offer, because everything revolved around the logistics of two children. And we often talk about it's like, alright, if we didn't live here, because someone described New York to me the other day that like, oh, it's all the cost without any of the reward. We have a few friends from other cities, hotel hotels, the same thing. Yeah. But then it's like, okay, well, where else would we vote? Yeah, I agree and disagree. At the same time. I think in New York, you get a unique opportunity to meet amazing people actually, that come here together, that probably you wouldn't find this many amazing people anywhere else in terms of like, what they do and how they think. And it's so like, progressive and stuff like that. So I feel like you pay more for that lifestyle to be surrounded by amazing ideas, amazing people. And yeah, I think that's a part of enjoy about New York. And it's also like a very international melting pot here. I agree. 100% I think everybody here here feels at home, no matter where you're from. Yeah. 16 years later, I still have a very heavy accent, but nobody ever makes me feel bad about it. Except Nicola. There's a great book, if you know it by EB White, who was the author of Charlotte's Web. And it's just called this is New York. And it's, it's 50 pages. It's less than an hour read. Right? And it's, it's basically an essay of her being here in summer, and just writing about, like what New York is, and I'm sure after all these years, it's like in the 50s, and now and there's so much about it, and it's like if you want to feel good, just gently if you want a feeling of warmth going through just read this book. It's amazing. Right? And it's like it's Nothing that there's so much that is the same. Well, because the geography is the same, yep. Yeah, I love it. We have the same book in Russian actually, that was written exactly 100 years ago, I bought two Russian writers traveling through United States. And they describe each state, how they are American culture. They start in New York and then go all around, basically. And same thing, I reread it last year. And I would say 99% of descriptions still apply to every single state. Yeah, interesting. But yeah, I actually would love to pick up this is New York. Yeah. It's like 10 bucks on Amazon. I don't want to endorse necessarily Amazon, but buy buy this book. I gave one to each of our salespeople. Last year as part of the Christmas gift, cuz I was like, you know, if you're feeling down about New York, that's COVID. Like, just read this book. And like, it's it explained it. It's why we're here. Yeah. And why we all I guess, find joy in this city. I tried to experiment and try to do something else or go somewhere else, but then end up thinking like, I just really want to be in New York. Yeah. Yeah. And for me, personally, from a food and wine perspective, it's the best place states, if not the world, because you're there is the Finger Lakes and Long Island for wine, but they are not dominant in the way that Californian wine regions are dominant in the wine selections within that state. And you, Europe, to the east, you have you know, a lot of South American and Australian and New Zealand wine coming up from the south like, and a bunch of great chefs, this is the best place for food and wine. Yeah, for like a select a diverse selection. I agree. wholeheartedly. You told me recently how many restaurants there are. So I read that New York City has enough restaurants that if a person decided to go to a different restaurant every night without going to the same restaurant twice, he would spend 51 or 54 years eating amazing today. We're way behind, like way behind. A lot of work today, post COVID Not a lot of things open for lunch. Yeah. Frustrating. So speaking of food and wine industry, I'm just I'm curious to learn how you actually got into the wine industry. Was this something that you always wanted to do? Or was it an accidental thing? It wasn't accidental. But it also wanted to your high school history shows that yeah, like I like, I like drinking, like as Australians. I like food. And I had throughout college, like just a little bit getting into wine, like not in a big way. And it was all very Australian based, but, you know, paying attention to stuff and I was gifted a few bottles for some musical things I did. And it's like, oh, okay, yeah, I'll try and sell this and I would, I would store at home. And then I went away for like, a summer and then I came home one year and like, my parents had been getting into it. Like just drinking it. Like without paying any attention. I was furious. And then like, my dad very kindly replaced this bottle of pinfold celery, sure, as it was a different vintage, and I was like, and so like I was, I was like, paying attention, but not in like, this is going to be my life. Because I was also going through college, and you know, in the corporate trying to get a job, you know, corporate world, etc. And then I worked in freight forwarding, when I got to Hawaii, just by chance. It's like, you know, you, when you when you move to a new city, and you don't have a job, you try and talk to people, and you're like, hey, Okay, who else should I talk to? And then you go, and you have a coffee, and they give you ideas. And then eventually I got connected, connected, connected to someone in freight forwarding, they're like, oh, yeah, we can we have a job available. So it's like, Alright, so then, you know, before that I was working the Australian Government export promotion. Again, not wine related, but like exports, and talking. And going back to what we discussed at the beginning. Just because, you know, it's the advice that you give Australian companies that just because you speak English in America, it's not the same country, you need to adapt your way of business. So I had a little bit of export promotion, little bit of freight forwarding. And then when I moved to New York, we lived in the West Village. And we lived next to this great little all Italian wine store, which doesn't exist anymore. It exists in a different form now, but not all Italian. were led by very passionate guy Carlo Errico, who lives in New Jersey now in Montclair. And there was the next block away from us. And it was like when we first we finally got an apartment. It's like, yeah, and we were like, let's celebrate. So it's like, oh, there's a wine store. And he was so nice. We're like we just want like we signed just gonna lease an apartment and we want a sparkling here's like, Oh, hey, I was like, well, we don't have any glasses. Oh, have glasses have glasses. I take them. Bring them back. It's like it's like so we hung out there. A huge amount, just like as drinking And he was so knowledgeable and we met a bunch of wine reps. You know, like in you know, you sometimes you got to install tasting though, you walk into a store and someone's pouring stuff, you make these wine reps, you stop talking, you get to know them. It's regular. And we would hang out in the store, like late at night with them. And did you have a preference in wine back then? Yeah, heavy reds. Not surprisingly, Australian, you know, Italian, Italian, okay. And what I mean, it was his store was all Italian, and we would buy 90% of our wine. And it was talking to wine people in the store. And they could have these very, very, very detailed discussions about Italian grapes. And, you know, like, there's this grape called ruukki. And there was like, an hour long discussion one night that we walked in, it's like, is this a masculine grape or a feminine grape? And they could there was like a heated argument about this. I remember it very vividly. And but then we get to Australian wine, and they've everyone be like Australian wine. Oh, that's all crap. That's just heavy, high alcohol. overwrote crap. And I was like, No, it's not it's just the in the States. It doesn't seem you can buy good. The nuanced side like yeah, you can buy a lot of Australian wine I just put them on was huge. Here. It was 2005. Six, right up to the the global financial crisis. It was massive. Oh, really? Oh, yeah. I had no idea. Like if you go into a store now you'll see like 2770 blocks from New Zealand that used to be like you walk into a store, you see 20 different shirt sizes, like right at the front, everyone can't get enough of these wines. And then it all fell off in the GFC. And there was nothing and but what was left was this aftertaste of like, Australian wine is big and heavy and overlooked. And it's like no, it's not it's just that this is what was being sold here. This is actually phenomenal. Like I'm highly enjoying it and fun fact is I haven't had any food today. And what is it like?

1: 21:52

02pm? Probably a good lunch. Yeah, probably glass is gonna hit me in the conversation. Make it more fun. I'm gonna give a shout out to the Gilbert family. wilin Simon Gilbert for this. It's a it's a pet matter Sangiovese A. from the hills of Maggi in New South Wales. Oh, yeah. He's a well as a like a young. He was young winemaker of the year, this year. Award, which is great. And we just won one Australian award. Yeah. Wow. Amazing. It's fun to share with you beautiful bottle actually as well. It isn't. It's a pretty color. It is pink. It is. Yeah. Thank you. It's very light. And I think it's perfect for this time of the day. Thank you. Well, I mean, I would write anybody knows what to drink? At what time today? It's a Friday. So it's five o'clock somewhere. So yeah, we were talking about like, getting into things and I was or getting into like a business. And I think, for me, it wasn't like necessarily, you wake up or you just fall into it. It was just like, all the pieces. It's like a puzzle. They just seem to be fitting together and you don't see the water is until you start. All of a sudden, like one more piece fills in. It's like, Oh, yeah. And I had just I did a master's degree at NYU, in international relations when I moved here. And I was going to work in energy policy in commodities. Following that, like I had a job offer to do that. And we went to Italy, over the summer of 2011. And we're sitting in Italy, in Parma, drinking friendship quarter, and eating parma ham, who doesn't love Italy, right? It's amazing. And he's the lifestyle and you're like, Ah, it's really like food and wine. And then my wife was like, just like, why don't you just shut up that talking about it? And just like, do it, like, bring in some wine? Try it out. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work. But if you don't do it, I don't want to hear about it. Like you can never talk about this again. Good position. Yeah. And we had this, like, we had this little opportunity to do it. And so I said no to this job. And we took the money that we had saved and went to Australia and just went to wineries drove around. And some many of them I knew and it's like, we'd like these wines. Yeah, I think we like them. Who do you export to the states? And they'd be like, Oh, no, like, America, like it's on the down. Right since global financial crash. So then they'd go and someone, someone else would come out from the back. And they'd be like, Oh, who you were like with nobody? You know, we're thinking of starting a company and importing some wine. We like this. Would you be interested in selling your wine to us? Yeah. And that's how we started. It was just you know, it's door to door. It's the same it's the same process to sell wine to you just go door to door. Yeah. As you as you would know, in your business as we were speaking during, before we're speaking about cold calling. It's acquiring customers and acquiring vendors. What can you do in the stores? Are you doing the stores or restaurants? We're both both but we had dominated by retail. Okay, I think you know, particularly for the Australian category do you do on the New York City? Or do you go to other states and stuff? We do. Twin tea five states in total. We sell our wines in. How do you manual these days? Yeah, East Coast and Midwest like, okay, across the California, Texas a little bit in Florida. And then yeah, like Washington, DC, Maryland, right by our apartment. There is a wine so well, it's wine liquor, but it's very, like nice and classy. They're busy consistently. What's the place? The name of it? Yes. Pedal sterile while spare okay. Yes. And they're just busy consistently in because their areas so residential in Hoboken, New Jersey, and people like their drinks and wine there. So I remember one night waking up because like people were coming to remove the garbage. And I just heard like, a bunch of wine bottles, I think like, hidden against each other. All the garbage people were picking it up. So it's a very busy spot. We'll we'll share with you information. And we can check as well for you to see if there is any Australian wine mix mix me going here. Just ask about Australian wine. Yeah, and see what happens. Because that's mostly what I say to people that time is usually like, tonight. Well, we are actually, I mean, we don't know nearly as much about wine, as I'm sure you and your wife and people in your company do. But I think we have been growing appreciation for wine over the last year and a half, I would say. And we're just curious. We have not had many Australian wines, I must admit, what is I've had Australian wines because I had a wine class actually, in my college. That was the most most anticipated class of the week. And the professor who was teaching it. I think he just stopped teaching maybe this year. Him and his family they own the oldest wine store and wine auction in the nation. Wow. Okay, so the Upper West Side, their original Zacchaeus location. I don't remember the name. He would probably not be happy that I don't remember the name. But I can I can ask them. Yeah. They're wonderful, wonderful people. Oh, nice. Yeah. So I mean, that I think the nice thing about wine is you learn by doing. Exactly. And it's a great thing to do. And if you find people who appreciate and love it as much as you do, it just, I mean, I think it just brings people together. And yeah, yeah, it's a sharing convener, and it's fun. Even yesterday, we had Gordon and I were in a big networking meeting yesterday. And we met a few people and you know, people who Oh, I've been to California to these places, Europe, this place is you should check this out. So it's a community, which is nice. It's always a conversation starter. And it's certainly a good subject where you can exchange experience and ideas. My question was, me personally, in my life, I have not had much Australian wine. I've had it occasionally. Not not. It's not something that I probably used to go to, when I go to get wine. It could be again, now I'll be more open to it. Now that I speak with you and I know you what, what is it? Is there like a sentence or two that would describe Australian wine compared to I don't know, French, California? Or is that? Or am I speaking as like an amateur? It's no, it's a great question. And I think one of the challenges with Australia and parts of the new world is there is no there's no rules in the new world. You know, when you look at French and Italian wine, you have Apple a strictly controlled Appalachians of what you can grow and where and wine from Bordeaux you know exactly what it is within certain parameters or or wine from the Rhone, you know exactly what it is. And then it is delineated by vineyard sites and areas and like, it's so down, like you know exactly what you're getting. Australia, California, South Africa, and Australian Shiraz, for example, you can be apart from being Shiraz. It can be anything. It can be heavy, it can be big, it can be light, it can be cold climate. It can be spicy, peppery, or it can be creamy, rich, it's like there's no one thing so apart from saying that Shiraz is over 50% of the crusher in Australia, it's the dominant grape. It's very hard to define for a consumer like what to expect from Australian wine. That's one of the like the challenges. I think that we have like what do people expect from Australian wine I say you should expect as much from Australian wine as you do from French or Italian wine. California and you should pay for it. That's a good way to sum it up actually. Yeah, I'll keep that in mind. Yeah. And certainly we'll be more open to trying something more. Sure. Yeah. Or indeed like Sandy advisor. Oh my god, this is amazing. So so like, like, so nice. Yeah. This idea for branches. Yes. And you don't need to like mix it with anything. Like, I hate when like people mix things with like sweet stuff. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Don't I most is the worst deal on our list. Yes. Just get a bottle of sparkling Yes. So I'm sure as in Australia, I mean, is it certainly regions in Victoria or everywhere? Everyone everywhere grows, even though it's not required by law? Pretty much everyone. Oh, really? Crusher as Yeah, I mean, in certain in certain Appalachians, it's not possible. But, you know, it has very little shores in Tasmania, for example, Tasmania, the island at the bottom. Very, very cool climate. It's Pinot Noir Chardonnay sparkling Riesling? I was like that's some people do brochure as but it's very, very small. But yeah, like mostly and I look every year what we sell the most of its Sure. But you know, that's again, that's what we don't what Australia dominates in the categories shreds, so it makes sense that we would sell the most well, actually, I guess that's a good way to, you know, for, again, beginner, beginners like us. Good way, you know, when we're looking for a full bodied Cabernet? I mean, we often go to California. Recently, we'll go to Gen X. Shiraz could be Australia, and yes, please, that's that's the way to probably kind of for people who are not very familiar with different kinds of wine, maybe it's a good way to simplify things to start trying different things. Yeah, I mean, you know, champagne, sparkling or champagne, champagne, we can't call it champagne in the new world. So you know, Tasmanian sparkling. is also Yeah, it's like, you gotta you gotta start with the basics and then work outward. And again, like if you if you live near a good store, which is it was so important to me. Going to a good store, not a liquor store, but like a place where your what you drink is determined by what they sell you. It's not what you go in and pick off the shelf. Again, I think that's like, I cannot speak highly enough of the stores that we work the closest and the best with, they all have cultivated their customer base to be open and interested. I wouldn't. I would have loved it actually, if somebody like consulted us, because for the good or the bad event, we just open up their Vivino app, or like, alright, well, let's start going through it. Alright, well, good review. Alright, let's see what's how is the body? Is it full? Is it late, like what's going on here. And then we'll make a decision. Like, sometimes Julia sends me to get some wine. And I spend a while because I'm like, I'm not settling for anything that I'm not going to like, like, I'm very careful with my selections. But if somebody was there to actually point me in a new direction, it would be amazing, because I think up until maybe a year ago or so, never, never thought that I would like Port wines. But we're doing the wine tasting. And the last thing that they gave us was port. I was like, I'm gonna try it. And I was like, Oh, wow, like, this is amazing. Actually, this specific port was great. But otherwise, I would have never tried it. And I feel like same thing, if somebody in our wine store was there and pointed us into Australian wines could have had it much sooner. And in a different capacity. I could not agree more. Yeah, I mean, some of the best experiences that I've seen, it's like you just walk into the store and you're like, I am doing fish with lemon. And broccolini. What should I drink? Yeah. And right, and like the store be like, Okay, these are, this is what I would do. These are the like five different things and different price points. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Let's do that. Like, that's the way that's the best way to buy wine. Yes, I think. And I see it and we I often get the excuse that you go and try and sell wine and people like Oh, Australian, no one buys Australian no one else for it. It's like no, I get I get that no one asked for it. But like, you should just you can sell it though. People will drink it and they'll come back for it because they like it because it's good. And it over delivers at the price point. But you actually have to do your job of selling wine, right? Not just putting stuff on the shelf and expecting it to move by its own like do your job of selling wine and cultivating a customer base, rather than just sitting back and letting life happen to you. Yeah, so I have a couple of questions actually. One is Which year did you open the business? The second one is did you What are the like usual price points for the wine and have the price points that you are selling changed since you started the business? Until now superb questions. We started the business in you do like the paperwork I mean, 2011 We didn't get the wine here until like midway through 2012. So next year is our 10 year anniversary like the big one, like we've made it 10 years well. And so, we will be it will be 10 years, when we started. I think the benefit slash failure was that I had no real experience within the wine industry. You know, fairly because I didn't know how things really works, but also benefit because I did not come in with any biases. So to say that, yes, I walked into every store every restaurant like, now I know how corporate wine buying works for restaurants. It's like, Yeah, I'm totally wasting my time back then I didn't sunlight is walking. It's like, well, yeah, how many Australian wine was the last time someone showed you some? Let's taste okay, great. I like that approach. Actually. Yes, that's, you know, when you have no preconceptions, everyone is a customer. Yeah. And so you just go, go go. And if pounding the pavement, any kind of business section, any business, it's totally relatable. Also, if I was like, in the restaurant, and somebody came in and said, hey, you've never tried the wine from Australia. Let's try it now and be like, Where were you my whole life before. So it holds true for any industry, you just, if you try to do something and try it out, you just keep going. And you keep working on it. And if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. But now that I understand, you know, 10 years on, I want to understand stuff, I look at some accounts, and will my sales team kind of like what about this? And like, no, don't bother, right? It's like, they're not, this is not the right people, they're not going to buy the wine. You don't waste time doing that. But in the beginning, you wasted a ton of time, because you don't know. But you also open doors. That's how you get in. Right, right. Like for us, a lot of things have been relationship based. And I realize it over and over again, I'd much rather skip on a sale, then ruin the relationship, which it's been like heavily relationship based. I want people who work with us to trust us. If I see something wrong with a place, I'm going to point that out. Which to your point, some sales that didn't happen on the spot, or some of those restaurants, I'm sure some relationships came out of it, or you are directed in a different direction. Oh, so it's all it's all relationships? I think that's a really great point. Relationships. Everything in every industry people buy from the person. Yeah, you're not the product. You don't buy the product, you're buying the person. Basically, yeah. And that's why I like cultivating these relationships over the long term. And yeah, I always say like, we should sell the right wine to the right, for that customer. The right not just because we're trying to push something that we need to get rid of. It's like, it's not right for you, like, don't bring it like I've been enjoying this conversation so much that I've already like was thinking I thought about some restaurant owners who I want to connect you place more customers. But yeah, I think there's certain fundamentals of business. And I think that in the networking thing that we did meeting that we did, session yesterday, that holds true for the four people who did the panel, they all relationship based, right. And that was the whole thing. It's like, you need to find your niche of customer that you work the best with and like, just focus on them and cultivate it. Gordon is referring to, again, the networking meeting we had yesterday where we had a few panel speakers who graduated from one level to the other, and in the business, their business owners, and the topic of the conversation was how important it is to find your core client. Find your ideal customer and cater to them and build a relationship and that ultimately, that is the key to success. Yeah, yeah. And I you know, build a niche. Yeah, be that niche person, you guys have a niche. I have a niche like we need to not. That's the one of the big things I took away from yesterday was like, Don't be afraid of being niche. Yeah. Cherish it. Right, do not deal with you narrow it. Right. Like, actually, that's what we should do. A lot of business owners, I think, are afraid to narrow down to sort of niche, they want to cover all of these aspects in their industry, that ultimately they just end up getting lost in all these different directions. So I could not agree with you more. Yes, it is. I think it is so important to pick a niche to pick a direction there will be some would be called sawdust business, you know, some leftover like side businesses to your core business, or I think always in business probably. But you have to pick a direction. It's hard. I think also when you're starting out to turn down money, it is an opportunity you I like it, and even like we have so in New York City, it's a very seat. It's a seasonal wine market and especially for us in July and August. People go away. I've never been in intraseasonal city is New York. It applies to real estate as well. Yeah, like Yeah. Before COVID It used to this year has just been brutal. There was just like ever since February with a small interruption in August. It just been like, Go Go, go, go go like non stop going crazy. Right, like, but usually there is seasonality like December shouldn't be typically a very busy month, but it is. Yeah. I mean, kind of changes things. But yeah, so it's, you know, it's seasonal. So you get to that we've had some pretty scary August's No one's buying anything, especially when there's no tourists in the city. Yep. So a lot of like, the places that would be like, running through a glass pole. They're like, no customers. And so you're like, Yeah, I'm gonna take whatever money I can get, like, Let's go push some stuff. But, you know, you feel I don't feel good about but you've got to do it. So you don't want to turn down money. But, you know, every year like, I'm fine, like, now I try and brace myself for it, like, Yeah, we're gonna have like slower August and because it's summer, and I don't just want to sell stuff for the sake of selling it. I couldn't agree more. And I'm happy to hear that you are in a position to be able to pick to pick who you want to service and who you want to have in your client base and who's the best fit. So I guess ultimately, the kind of a small conclusion we can draw out of this piece of our conversation is for any business business owners out there, it is important to realize who is your ideal client and to cater to that ideal client? And you have to learn to say no to some other opportunities to be able to concentrate on the other core part of your business. 100% Yeah. And also, yeah, we're who's taking the most time for the least return? Yeah, like we got to exit out. Yeah, I know. Again, none of this is rocket science. But when you're in the doing it, they actually do it every day. It's like, you don't you don't look at someone. Yeah. That it is not rocket science. And you had a question about prices? Yes. What were like the original prices, what are the current price like, has it changed is more or less the same? So again, going back to, you know, the, the opportunities and costs of like, not really knowing anything, it's like when we started we we bought nine wines in and nothing was below$20. Retail. Which is it seemed, that seems like normal ish, like, $20 isn't, it's not high, but most of the YZ brought in, like $36 on the shelf. Okay. And they were kind of weird. Like, there was a Dolcetto Shiraz, there was Shiraz. Mataro blend Pinot Noir and Chardonnay that was not cheap. $36 for Chardonnay, on the shelf is not like it's not an easy sale. Particularly for Australia when everyone's looking for sure as and it's like, oh, but this is a really fantastic, was more like a state from Mornington Peninsula. And it's just the wine is killer. And but it's like so we're showing, I'm only showing you like expensive wines. If you ask any person who sells wine, any sales rep, any winery, any company distribution company, it's like, what do you sell a lot of the cheapest thing, like that's what moves the cheap 899 on the shelf. 1199 on the show, like that's what I was like, We never had to start like, we never want to do that. That was my college years. I was like, Pinot Noir, nine bucks. Oh, this is a great deal. The brands? I remember the name though it was called Cloudbreak. It was not. It was not bad, actually. But now we've moved discussing. We're like anything below $20? I don't think we want to engage. Yeah, the sweet spots really? 25? Yeah. I don't think we bought a bottle of wine recently that's below 25. No, you can it's been 25 to 50. I would say. Yeah, I'm ashamed to say how much money we've spent. And upstate this this time around. Yeah. But this bit that, you know, that's what you have to do. And it's part of lifestyle. There's a there's an Australian wine personality, right, a big guy who who's passed on now. But his name is Lynn Evans. And he was big in the 80s and 90s and early 2000s Getting Australian wine like friend of mine, like promoting it to the world. And he has like a magical theory of capacity. And it has 1010 points. But one of the points is, what percentage of your life is wine? Is it 10%? Is it 20% Like when you're having the best time so you haven't with a glass of wine over a meal. So like, ergo, you should spend that amount of money on that amount of your income online. And that principle should apply to all parts of life. Well, that's interesting. That's a cool principle. Yes. I've never heard this before. I'll take note of this. Essentially like for every bad bottle You can only drink so many bottles of wine in your life. Every time you drink a bad bottle. You're never going to get that back. You agree? Yeah. So you should only drink good ones, the good ones that you can afford. Very interesting. Yes. Yeah. So the bottle of wine, let's say, a bottle of Shiraz. That was $20. Back in 2012. Yeah. How much is it now? Still $20. The funny thing is price points don't move 1999 1499 999 It's all up here. It's the mental right thing. So it's like, people have not changed. They might know, we might we might go up like every few years, right? We might be like, Oh, I'm happy to pay 2399 for a bottle of wine, right. Whereas I used to, like cap out at 1999. But that's still a mental price point. So we still have to have wine that sells for 1999. And finding that, you know, in what are we 6% inflation that despite the Yeah, like, it's hard, it's hard to keep doing that. And wineries, you know, and not super profitable. Like, outside of certain that we realized, actually, after the trip to California, we realized like a lot of people it's their like secondary third for business like they're, they're already established, and they're happy just to like, break even, at least on the winery, if not losing some money, but doing it out of passion. Yeah, labor of love. I mean, there's very few, like everywhere, there's very few unicorn companies is very few wine brands that will sell for a billion dollars. But there are some, but everyone else is like eking out a mega, or happy living, just doing something that they're passionate about the amount. And this is why you get much more value from the wine once you over $20. Because you think about what's in a bottle of wine, you have the glass, the glass cost the same, almost, whether it's one, you know, $10 a bottle or $20, a bolt glass cost the same for the cost of labeling. You got the cost of shipping it you have an importer markup, a distributor markup, you have a retailer markup all of these things take up X amount of cost, right? What's what's left at the end is like the value of the wine. Yes, if it's $10, a bottle, the value of the wine is very small, because all the other those cards like it costs you the same to import a $10 bottle of wine as it does 200 $100 ball of wine. So therefore the value of the wine that you're getting so much more of that bundle, the more you spend. That's why you like when he starts to heat it 20 or 25. Amazing 35. Wow, most of the values in the wine? Well, that's actually it's actually will be for people. Yeah, so that's why it's like yeah, I mean, drink what you like drink what you can afford, but know that it is a it's a it's a exponential curve. In quality, the higher price point you go. Amazing. So what would you say is like, was maybe your biggest setback or the biggest challenge once you started growing your business? Besides the supply chain, so I'm sure last year, definitely. Please fix that port. I think one of the hardest things for us is, and I've thought a lot about this lately. You know, you talked about like valuing your business? Or what are you going to do with your business like, we import and sell wines and wineries that we like, and we want to share with other people? I don't own any wineries. I don't own any vineyards would you like to I don't I'm also not talented enough to grow grapes and make wine will sell Summon, collect 6%. You know, this is a labor of love. And if a distributor if a winery wants to pull the plug on us, we don't have any exclusive agreements with them. They can do what it's their if their product they can do with it what they want. We're just the sales channel. We're just the people like yes, and we've talked about sales being relationship based. We have the relationships and the trust and the fact that we pay everybody on time. We've built all of this, but we don't own the product. So we've had instances where overnight, we've lost wineries. It's just like, hey, there's been a change of management. And this winery is now decided they don't want to export to the US anymore. And so you've had your last order goodbye. Well, and it's like what hold on like, oh, like we you know you rely on the revenue you also you do all the work to build the brand, right and there's a million different wines so getting one wine to get reordered to get places model classes take such a long time and so much work. Then when someone overnight is like, yeah, you've lost that placement, or you'll never get to how many times has it happened? It's happened four times. And it's like, Excuse me, you can spend, we spent three years building something right to the point where we were about to do a whole distribution arrangement in California with one particular brand. And they just overnight, like I was calling them, no one was answering the phone deliberately not answering the phone to do this, and it's like, I can't. Now we have to start again, we've just wasted three years here, we've made money on it. But we've just wasted three years, you make money in wine, reorder it, not when you show it to them, and get them to buy it for the first time. So once you lose the reorders, and you have to start from scratch, you say, Oh, I've just wasted three years, promoting this and making this a core part of like what we do and telling my sales team every time you go out. This is in the bag, right? This brand is is in the bag, it doesn't matter if it's, you know, who it is like, but you want to be showing it to as many people as possible, because we can really grow with this. They have capacity to pricings. Right that brandings great, like, so yeah. So that's, that's one of the biggest stem setbacks. But you know, now I look at it. And it's like, well, we've got other things that we can do to increase the value that come in the control that we have over our certain things that we do. So what do you do as a result? Do you go and look for somebody else? Do you fly back to taste new wines, you do that you do that? So we replaced that with a different set, which is great now love the new wiring go to the biggest competitor. But no, also there's there's a few little things that we can that we can do. I think for our business, we have some private labels that we do now where we own the label. Oh, and we can source from whoever we want to put in that label. And yeah, so what to do. It's where you gotta you got to come up with a brand, and you have to build a brand, and then get it out there. A lot of people and again, we're having hiccups at certain parts, we have one particular label where 75% of people love the label 25% of people hate it. There's very little in between of like, Oh, it's fine. It's like, love it, hate it. And you know, how big is 25%? That, like, we should think about changing the label? Because maybe we can we can actually capture 100% of people. So it's like, okay, that's a new discussion that we're gonna have, like, that we hadn't had before. So yeah, like we can we can do little things like that, where we increase the ownership that we have, or they can you know, the value within our own business. What is your current structure? Like, I understand that correct me if I'm wrong, like before? It was, is a joint business with the wife worship. Okay. So before it was just you guys doing all the work? When did you hire people? How many people do you have? A different position? I guess to simplify? Yeah. Good. Good question. We started in 2012. We hired our first person in 2015. For years were fun. Yeah. Yeah. Right. And that was, she's still with us. Oh, yeah. So she's been with us seven years now. And she was a former buyer of ours, like we didn't, I didn't advertise for the job. It's just like, she started doing a little bit of like, helping us for a bit. And then I was like, hey, you know what, we can make this like an actual job. And that's scary, as you know, when you get your first w two employee, and it's all new, and then after that, and then last year now, sorry, 20, year 2020. We on onboard a new employee as well. And then we also had a part time marketing person for two and a half years, as well. But at the moment, we have two full time employees who do very self focused. So I have two questions as well. One since you mentioned that I know your wife is partner and co owner of the business do you see any challenges there in having listeners now that Michael and I are happily married so what are the challenges they added? There aren't any because I think your wife also has a full time job as Yeah, so that's probably a little bit different. I would love to meet your wife. Yeah. It's we should have dinner. Yeah, I'm with one with one. No, we when we start we were not as ingrained in the business together like like you are. We made every decision to get I mean, she's she was the money when we started right, we're 50 50 partners. And when we say we made all the big strategic decisions together, she has a terrific palate, as well in terms of wine tasting, what kind of a law practice. She was a bankruptcy litigator, and just a wine lover, I assume wine lover wine drinker, right. And also like growing in terms of Australian wine, but she's American, but she understands like the value of Australian wines, and we drink a lot of it. So we would make all the big strategic decisions together. And what wineries we want to start with how we'd like we would like wording of emails with drafting back and forth like at the very start. And yeah, big decisions, everything went together, like we would, we would hash it out. And then now that we're 10 years in, she doesn't work in full time like, she will taste wines. When we decide my even sometimes we bring on distributors without tasting. But I find that it's better when we both make a big decision together. Then if I'm just doing it by myself, same place twice. And I think a lot of husband and wife. Any challenges you experienced? Well, yeah, I mean, not we kill each other way. I mean, COVID COVID just work in the same spot. Like, actually, she just arranged it, which is great. We Yeah, it's like now also, she's her job at the moment. She's on. She's on calls all the time. And it's like, I can hear her. It's annoying. And then she can hear me and she's annoyed. And then like we're drinking, is the sales team support? Is this sides wrath? I'm too angry now. Yeah, so it's like, you have to manage that. But I think it's better. I think it's better when we do big things together. But the day to day, we don't, okay, I don't involve her in that. And if I do need to bounce things off, we set that up in advance. I'm like, I need to talk about a couple of things. Or I'd love your feedback on a couple of things. I'll do it now. I won't do it. At 945. At night, as everyone's like tired on the other day, it's like, by the way, what do you think about the pricing strategy I've got here like 168 On three? Well, 170 213. Like, that's too much. I don't want to like test. It's like, we have to set aside a specific time you talk about work. And then the rest of the time you don't get into the weeds about it added to the calendar. Yeah, makes sense. Yeah, we don't want to talk about you talk about your deals at 10 3011 o'clock at night. Unless for lack of a better word, that shit hit the fan, we don't talk. But a lot of our stuff is there are challenges lately, especially after COVID. And they were fun. All the deals that are like pretty big deals, when you're getting into like the millions. There are challenges, there are important challenges. And we want to make sure our clients are protected. And the brokers on the other side want to make sure their clients are protected. So that there is a lot of that which takes time. And we also have attorney so a lot of parties involved. But Julia told me something very interesting before and correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that you may have originally had some challenges with retention of talent. But once you put them on salary plus commission, that kind of result some of it right. Yep. Yeah, we were discussing that kind of bouncing that over each other. And I shared your experience, I thought maybe that's the way to go. It's it's very specific to company, it's very specific to industry, wine and restaurant, like wine industry, the restaurant industry, they all have their challenges. New York State has over 200 different distributors, right? It's there's a couple of really big ones. And then there's many mid tier and then there's a ton of tiny ones. And a tiny means anything from like 20 to 100 150 whites, right? Like it's hit of a pin. Now, all these companies, they all want sales reps. But it's like the pitches, oh, you can? It's unlimited earnings. Right? As long as you do all the work, and we give you nothing. And we'll give you seven to 10% of what you sell. And there's no health insurance, and there's no benefits and there's nothing. So it's like, you know, when you're starting out building a brand, you have no territory and no one knows you. It's like you can't make any money. Yeah. So it all sounds great. But you really have to invest. I think you'd want a players you're gonna invest in them. And yeah, at the moment, we switched to salary, which also makes sense for our business model and working with distributors. It's people have to pay rent, the rent is the same every month. So it's much better if they can they know how much money they're getting as a baseline and then we incentivize a bonus on top of that. Makes me so mind. Yeah. And for our listeners there this is we're just talking about business models here. And for anyone who owns a business, many of us hire salespeople, and we're talking about the structure whether you should have salespeople based on commissions only or salary plus some type of a bonus. Actually, I agree that it is really up to the industry and also coming back to the beginning of conversation when we were leaving the Tesla I was communicating with one guy. And then I was communicating, communicating with the second guy. And I was like, Look, I don't really want to overstep any boundaries, because I know one guy has done a lot of work with me. And I don't want to, like, Screw him out of the commission, like I'm in a similar industry. And he was like, no, no, like, we're actually all on salary. And they don't even have any Commission's the people who sell Tesla's because a lot of is done online. And they're just like behind to support you. But I thought that was pretty interesting. I think it's impossible for New York City Real Estate. But I think it depends what it is at this point possible. So good thing to consider for many business owners, I think, yeah, I think it's, again, individual parts of the puzzle and who you are and who you want to be. Even again, like I want, with the beginning, we didn't have health insurance. I was like, well, that's okay. But like, we don't do health insurance, but we do annual leave. And that's important. Like, now we are able to do both. But you've got to instill the values that you want in your people. And that's, you know, and the benefits, I think 100% Speaking of and I think we briefly touched on the challenges that you experienced, over the years. Have there been moments in your business where, you know, it was just that last drop that got you to the point that said, I'm done, hate this business want to quit? Don't ever want to hear about one exporting again? Sounds like my tennis career. Yeah, I think we've all I think we've all been there. Various hot, you know, you haven't you just have a bad. You can have a bad day when nothing works out. Like why am i It typically coincide with snow days. You know, no one's buying any trudging in the snow, and you shine, it doesn't taste good. Like everyone's angry. And you're just like, why am I doing this? I'm done. Done. Right? And yeah, but you've somehow you managed to get up the next day, or you come up with another strategy to like, Alright, how are we not going to do that? Again, I think it's a series of like having these bad what you do with a bad customer, an angry customer for some reason, and there might even be a customer that you're trying to sell to them. And they just unnecessarily rude. It's like, Am I doing this? Very often? Yeah. Do you have any advice to any, not just people in wine industry, but in any other industry? Any business owner? What, what do you do? In your business, you got to get up the next day and do it again, like you have to tolerate rejection. It's a big commitment. It's a big commitment. Whenever you run a business, like, it just it just never runs smoothly. I feel like maybe we have those amazing days, once a year, once every half a year, something like that. But the rest is really just like how you treated in terms of the challenges of college. I feel like challenges are like everyday every hour that come, but also what makes us who we are and just build a stronger business owner and a stronger leader. Ultimately, yes. And I feel like you learned with yours how to, I guess react or how to process I remember the first time my very first deal that fell apart. I was like, This is bullshit. Like, this is like, I never want to do this again. But ultimately, I think it's easier to say it now than it was back then. But I was like, okay, it made me a better person. Yeah, I think I agree. I agree with everything you just said. And then I think one of the I thought when you run a business is like after you've been in for a certain amount of time, like it'll just get easier. It doesn't there's still challenges. It's just the challenges, how you process it? Well, it's just different, right? Like the challenges and level everyday that we had back in 2012. A very different to the challenges that we face today. Same amount of challenges, same amount of work, or more work, but just different. Yeah, doesn't get easier. It just gets different. It is. I could not I could not agree more with that, actually. And for me, I have a final question if you have or not. But for me, the final question would be what's your long term vision from here on? Because I, I know based on your networking group, that you have a pretty good business and you guys have done a lot of growth and considerably, it's still a young business. I mean, 10 years is not a very long time, actually. So what's your long term vision moving forward from here into 2022 and beyond? I mean, I'd really I'm what I'm working on, is making everything work by itself, like a business that can sort of self generate without the owner, founder, main person doing a lot of this stuff. And that requires stepping away from things and I have two wonderful employees and like, I need to step away more because I know they can handle it, but how hard is that? When you say like yeah, I just I don't want to be involved. volved with any I shouldn't be involved, like, just, you can do this. I want to step back from it and see if the company can just keep going. And then growing, I think, I think it's wonderful. Because the key is to, to hire the right people who are capable of doing that and who are passionate and who are an extension of who you are. Yeah, that's ultimately our job as business owners, I think, yes. Who we hire. And everyone yesterday, this networking seminar talked about hiring a players and like don't let them get away, you need to find them keep always keep hiring. Absolutely. We always Yes. And you always keep looking for a player. Because somewhere you want to have those people going. I have one other question. Work life balance. Does it exist? In your industry? Yeah, absolutely. Definitely. In the wine industry, work life balance definitely exists. I mean, it seems like you know, there are there are, there are these amazing high points where you are dining out and ENs, having a while visiting wine regions, wineries having this wonderful time, like, it's amazing. But there's also those times where you're slogging through the snow, making no sales. Yeah. But it is, if you and I, I think I've never met any successful business owner who's never worked really, really, really hard. That doesn't continue to work really, really, really hard. But you've also got to take some time. And like, at least to the industry, when we weren't me doing my job, often is just sitting and drinking with someone like us sitting in a bar, trying to get an appointment, like having a good time with someone selling who I am selling the relationship selling that. And it's overweight as I'm trying to do it over. So yes, right. So it's like, it's actually yeah, there's, you can have work life balance. And Wine is a good industry, for it for it. Okay, how do you? Are you able, as a business owner, are you able to draw that line in your day or in your week when it's okay, that's it. I'm done working today, or this week, that to spend time with the kids or time to spend time with my wife? Or it's a date night? Or you notice? I don't have it? No, I don't have a secret or formula. Anyone does. Young children are hard. Anyone looking to have young children? It's hard. But like I think, as a bit, again, we talked about being a business owner, it's hard to switch off. So I can give the business 50% And the children 50%. Because it's what's going through my head at one time, it's like how do you switch off and give the children 100%? But that's the hard part. For sure. Yeah. So to kind of conclude our conversation, which we very much enjoyed, actually with wine, one bottle of wine, yes. And shout out again, to the Gupta family for this wonderful wine that we just had. Just to some of our conversation in general, I would say, what would be your advice to a business owner who maybe is she or he on her his first, second or third year of business in any given industry experience challenges. Not knowing whether this will work out or not not knowing if this is the right industry for them or not thinking of hiring their first employee, but being unsure whether it's the right time, what would be maybe one two pieces of advice that you will give based on your experience. I think you have to keep evolving, can't sit back and be like this is our business plan. And we're still doing it, you need to change that every three years. You need to adapt to what's happening in the marketplace. And we've done that multiple times. And if we hadn't done that, I don't think we'd still be here. Yeah, and the second part is at some point, you're gonna have to take the plunge. And just make that decision, spend that money. And if you lose it, you lose it. Like you've got to sit, you're just gonna do it rather than think about doing it endlessly. If you think it's good enough to do and you've been thinking that for eight months, and just you got to do it, just do it. For sure. Yeah, absolutely. I completely agree with Gordon. And ultimately, for the listeners and stuff if they wanted to reach you or learn more about your company, is there an email webpage or something that they can see? Yeah, it's w w w dot, little dash peacock.com. And I'm Gordon at little dash peacock.com. And we'll put it all in description as well. Amazing. Well, thank you. Thank you Golden. Thank you for sharing your experience. I mean, it was wonderful to hear your story. And always I just love speaking with business owners and entrepreneurs who especially came from a different country and started a business from scratch and become successful. And key takeaways from for me today. Were You know, being being open to improving, evolving and taking risks, and I hope everybody got a little something out of this conversation and thank you for listening. Gordon's information will be in the description of the podcast and we look forward to hearing from everyone. Yes. Thanks. Thanks. Thanks, Nikolai.