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Success Story with Scott D. Clary
Billy Busch - Anheuser-Busch Heir | The Dark Side of Building a Family Empire
01:11:40
Billy Busch is a renowned American businessman, author, and third-generation heir to the legendary Anheuser-Busch brewing empire—a company that became a global powerhouse with over $15 billion in annual revenue and more than 150 years of legacy in the beer industry. As the son of August Busch Jr., Billy grew up immersed in one of America’s most iconic family businesses. Carrying forward the family torch, he founded William K. Busch Brewing Company in 2011, building on the values of quality and tradition that defined the Anheuser-Busch name. His entrepreneurial journey reflects over 30 years of experience in the beverage and business world. Billy is also the author of the bestselling book Family Reins: The Extraordinary Rise and Epic Fall of an American Dynasty, offering a raw, inside look at the triumphs and trials of the Busch family and the rise of a brewing dynasty.
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- [00:00]
Scott Clary
Today's Success Story podcast is brought to you by Vanta. Now listen up. This matters for your business. In today's digital landscape, security isn't optional, it's essential. Without it, deal, stall, sales, cycle, stretch out and scaling becomes really difficult. Why? Because investors, customers, partners, they all expect businesses to demonstrate strong security practices before they commit to anything. And if you can't prove trust, you lose opportunities. So whether you're a startup founder trying to land that first big client or an established company scaling your security program, Vanta helps businesses of all sizes prove they're trustworthy by Automating compliance across 35 frameworks like SoC2, ISO 27001 and HIPAA. The exact certifications your prospects, your customers are demanding. And here's why you need to pay attention. Vanta gives you back precious time you're currently wasting on compliance. Their platform automates up to 90% of the tedious compliance work, and it helps you respond to those endless security questionnaires up to five times faster. And, and they also connect you with experts to get your security program running immediately. And the results, they speak for themselves. A recent IDC report found that Vanta customers achieve over $535,000 per year in benefits and the platform pays for itself in just three months. So join over 10,000 global companies like Atlassian, Quora and Factory who use Vanta to manage risk, improve security in real time, and don't miss this for a limited time, only my listeners can get $1,000 off Vanta. That's real money back in your pocket. Visit vanta.comscott now before this offer expires. That's V a n t a dot com Scott for $1,000 off.
- [01:40]
Billy Busch
I was so busy living the dream and living what our family was doing that I really didn't realize the impact of what was going on around me. Took me years to realize that.
- [01:49]
Narrator
What does it take to survive over three decades in one of the most cutthroat industries in America, Bill Bush has coached at some of the biggest programs in college football, Ohio State, lsu, Wisconsin and Nebraska. Yet he's remained one of the most humble, hard working minds in the game.
- [02:04]
Billy Busch
Living with the elephants was one of the highlights of my life and still is today. They would remember me because it's true what they say. They have a very large brain and they never forget. My dad should have made it more black and white on how to leave Grant's farm. If you don't, it creates a lot of infighting. Now my brothers and sisters, unfortunately, and myself don't talk to each other anymore.
- [02:24]
Narrator
From a small town kid in tender Nebraska to winning a college football national championship with LSU in 2019, Bush's story is one of grit, reinvention and relentless belief.
- [02:34]
Billy Busch
If you're a money person, make sure you have a great marketing person. If you're a top line thinker, then make sure you have a good numbers person. Biggest success in life is if your kids want to come and be with you once they grow up.
- [02:45]
Narrator
In this episode, we dive into the mindset behind Surviving the Coaching Carousel, lessons from coaching legends and elite programs. This is about how to lead, adapt and rise again.
- [02:55]
Billy Busch
You're going to learn a lot more from your failures than your from your wins. Always have faith in yourself to never lose that faith. Believe that God is out there and that with God you can do anything.
- [03:09]
Scott Clary
Welcome to Success Story. I'm your host Scott Clary. The Success Story podcast is part of the HubSpot podcast network. But HubSpot doesn't just have great podcasts. If you're an entrepreneur, if you're a builder, they've got your back. Now why is that important? Because if you're building anything, you know that marketing in 2025 is absolutely wild. Now why is that important? Because you know, if you're an entrepreneur, if you're building anything, marketing in 2025 is wild. Savvy customers spot fake messaging instantly. Anything AI generated, they sniff it out. Privacy changes make ad targeting a nightmare. And everyone needs more content now than ever. And that's why you have to have HubSpot's new marketing trends report. It doesn't just show you what's changing, it shows you exactly how to deal with it. Everything's backed by research but focused on marketing plays that you can use for your business tomorrow. If you're ready to turn marketing hurdles into results for your business, go to HubSpot.com marketing to download it for free.
- [04:04]
Narrator
FreshBooks is supporting today's episode. And if you've ever wondered how successful entrepreneurs stay on top of their finances while growing their business, the answer is FreshBooks. The numbers don't lie. Over 30 million people have chosen FreshBooks, processing more than 60 billion in invoices and saving an incredible 192 hours every year on accounting tasks. Think about it. That's nearly eight full days you could get back to focus on what really matters. Growing your business. FreshBooks is more than just accounting software. It's your all in one financial command center. Create professional estimates, track time automatically, bill clients, and capture expenses on the go. Plus, it integrates seamlessly with over 100 business tools you already use, all backed by award winning customer service. If you're ready to stop drowning in receipts and you're ready to stop chasing down payments, here's what I want you to do. Head over to freshbooks.com to start your 30 day free trial. No credit card required. And for all you success story listeners out there, I've got something special. Get an exclusive 60% off for six months when you visit freshbooks.com pricing offer transform your business with FreshBooks today. That's freshbooks.com pricing/offer for 60% off.
- [05:07]
Scott Clary
Today's episode is brought to you by Vanta. Now listen up. This matters for your business. In today's digital landscape, security isn't optional, it's essential. Without it, deal stall sales cycles stretch on and scaling becomes very difficult now. Why? Because investors, customers and partners all expect businesses to demonstrate strong security practices before they commit. If you can't prove trust, you lose opportunities. So whether you're a startup founder trying to land that first big client or an established company scaling your security program, Vanta helps businesses of all sizes prove that they're trustworthy by Automating compliance across 35 frameworks like SoC2, ISO 27001 and HIPAA, the exact certifications your prospects are demanding. Here's why you need to pay attention. Vanta gives you back precious time that you're currently wasting on compliance. Their platform automates up to 90% of the tedious compliance work. It helps you respond to those endless security questionnaires up to five times faster. And it connects you with experts to get your security program running immediately. The results speak for themselves. A recent IDC report found that Vanta customers achieve over 535,000 thousand dollars per year in benefits. And the platform pays for itself in just three months. So you're going to join over 10,000 global companies like Atlassian, Quora and Factory who use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time. And don't miss this for a limited time only my listeners can get a thousand dollars off Vanta. That's real money back in your pocket. Visit vanta.comScott right now before this offer expires. That is. V a n t a dot com Scott.
- [06:59]
Narrator
Billy, before we dive into business, you have to tell me about living with elephants as a kid. What was that like?
- [07:09]
Billy Busch
I gotta tell you, Scott, living with the elephants was one of the highlights of my life and still is today. As a matter of fact, when I was training the elephants at Grant's Farm, the farm we opened up to the public back in 1987, and doing the elephant shows, I met my wife, who we've been married now for, like, 35 years, and we have seven kids. And she was the monkey trainer that summer at Grant's Farm, and I was the elephant trainer. And we got to know each other and started dating. And really, the elephant was what brought us together. But I grew up with elephants, and, you know, they're amazing animals. They're very emotional. They form a very tight bond with people who work with them day in and day out. And I noticed that and fell in love with the. The. The elephants. We always had some elephants at Grant's Farm when I was growing up. In the summertime, they would come to us from Busch Gardens in Tampa, Florida, and they would be there for the summer tour season at Grant's Farm. And I worked with them all day long, each and every day, and just fell in love with them. And they. I had one in particular that fe love with me, and we formed a very close bond. And, you know, in this. In the book, Family Reigns, as you might have noticed, she actually protected me from bullies. And so they really are amazing animals, and they never forget. So year in and year out, they would come back and forth from Tampa and they would remember me because they. They. It's true what they say. They have a very large brain, and they never forget.
- [08:41]
Narrator
You know, that's a really interesting childhood. Obviously not the norm for most people to be spending summers with elephants. Maybe just tee it up for the audience, because we can talk about Grant's Farm. We can talk about even just the whole childhood and the upbringing and what you experienced. But I think that's a good place to start because it tees up where you come from and tees up your origin story, and it tees up for your family. So talk to me about what life was like growing up in this family.
- [09:10]
Billy Busch
It was always. There's never a dull moment. Growing up at Grant's Farm was so much fun because we had all the animals there. And I worked hand in hand with the workers on Grant's Farm, and they became some of my best friends and mentors, actually. And, you know, working with them, learning how to drive a tractor, learning how to work hard, get my hands dirty, and, you know, be right there alongside the people that worked at Grands Farm and just very. It kept me grounded. It kept me. It kept things very natural for me. And, you know, we were milking goats in the morning in the spring to when we, when we'd bring up hundreds and hundreds of little baby goats and for the, for the people who came that summer to Grant's Farm to feed, that was the biggest attraction at Grant's Farm. As a matter of fact, it was feeding the goats was, was. Everybody said that was their favorite thing to do there, but you know, and then being able to interact with the, with all the animals. I just explained to you a little bit about the elephants, but also, you know, I got to grow up riding horses, working on the farm. We rode a lot of horses. My dad and mom were both in the equestrian sports big time. They showed horses. My dad was a great whip, which is a driver of horses. He learned to drive the eight horse hitch, the Clydesdales, of course. And then he, he loved to drive each and every day the four. The coaching for the four hackney horses that he had. And I talk in the story about what it was like when I used to go coaching with my mom and dad on Grant's Farm. And you know, we were just very connected to nature there and we understood the seasons and it was a lot of fun growing up. And you know, we, we got to do so many interesting things, so many unique things that a lot of people don't experience, like, you know, taking the private railroad car, The Adolphus, from St. Louis to Tampa, Florida, where the Cardinals, which we own, the baseball team. My dad bought the Cardinal baseball team back in 1953 to promote the products from the, from Anheuser Busch. It was an ingenious marketing ploy that he came up with because everybody drinks beer, baseball games, right?
- [11:27]
Narrator
Yeah.
- [11:27]
Billy Busch
Oh, it was, you know, to, to. To ride the railroad car down there. And then later on we had the private planes to go back and forth on and you know, to see some of the parties that my mom and dad hosted were am. Some of the dignitaries and some of the celebrities that came through Grant's farm, like Yul Brenner and before my time, Harry Truman. But you know, mom and dad were good friends with Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson and you know, so many others that I could go on and on. Frank Sinatra was at our house several times because he was used as a marketer for the products too much like they use today, the people in. To market products on social media. What do you call them?
- [12:15]
Narrator
Celebrities? Influencers.
- [12:16]
Billy Busch
Yeah, influencers, exactly. And so, you know, it was just, it was a great time to see all that, to watch what was going on and to learn, to learn so much and then to be around the friends that I had at Grant's Farm and like I said, all the employees was a lot of fun. I learned how to chew tobacco. Come on. I mean if you can learn how to tackle as a kid, you're doing something.
- [12:45]
Scott Clary
A huge shout out to Federated Computer for supporting today's episode. Let me explain why I love Federated Computer. Why they are friends of success story. They are changing the way businesses buy software because we all need software to run our businesses. I don't care what kind of business you're building. But the best business software doesn't have to cost thousands of dollars each month. So Federated Computer replaces a lot of the software that you're using right now. Let me explain. The average typical Federated computer customer saves 75% or more on their software bill and gets great software, top notch customer service and support and a software solution that is uniquely installed for your business without any sort of surveillance or breaches of privacy. For example, if you use Google for email, Salesforce for CRM, Slack for team chat, list Monkey for customer acquisitions and Airtable for data management. With a team of 10, you'd save $9,000 per year on software costs by switching to Federated Computer. They replace all of those. And what's wild is that the cost of Federated Computer doesn't grow as your team grows. You can use Federated Computer savings to grow your business rather than feed the woke Silicon Valley software companies. The Federated Computer team literally invented cloud software. They actually have the patents to prove it and they are taking a hammer to the ridicul high prices of business software that all entrepreneurs are suffering from. Federated Computer They've been a longtime supporter of success story. They're offering 30% off their already low prices when you use a coupon code freelance. So go to www.federated.computer to begin saving 75% or more on your monthly software costs. That's www.federated.com. these folks are going to do you a big favor. Check them out.
- [14:31]
Narrator
That was a different time. That was a different.
- [14:34]
Billy Busch
That was definitely a different time, Scott. Definitely.
- [14:38]
Narrator
You joked before that most kids bleed blood but you bleed beer. And I love that. That's a great line. When did you start to realize what was the age when you started to realize that your family was very different than other people's families?
- [14:53]
Billy Busch
It's unbelievable. I didn't realize it for years because I was so busy living the dream and living what our family was doing, what our family was about that I really didn't realize the impact of what was going on around me, honestly, and what my forefathers had built and where it was going, the direction my dad was taking it in. During my dad's tenure as the head of the brewery, it was the greatest growth of Anheuser Busch. It went from 3 million barrels in sales to 35 or 40 million barrels in sales. So it jumped incredibly. He built eight. Eight new breweries around the United States and put the theme parks like Busch Gardens around them. He opened up our home, Grants Farm, the public, to promote the beer. And there were so many things going on. We had the Cardinal baseball team. But, you know, it was. It was something that really, it was. It just came natural because we lived it day in and day out as kids of our father and mother. And, you know, we had to work on Grant's Farm and we had to keep that wonderful image of quality intact when we were at Grant's farm to make sure everything was always beautiful there. So when the public would come through, they would see the beauty and the cleanliness of everything. And that would then, of course, be part of what Anheuser Busch and the products were all about, the quality of the products.
- [16:16]
Narrator
Do you feel like as a kid, did you feel like you wanted to work? I mean, because. So you had your. You had your lineage, you had your forefathers that obviously built this, and then your father was running it for a period of time.
- [16:32]
Did you feel as a.
- [16:33]
There was pressure for you to sort of follow in their footsteps and to. And to take up this, this, this. I say family business in quotes because obviously it's an enormous business, but it is a family business when you're a kid at this point.
- [16:46]
Billy Busch
You know, I have. My dad had 11 kids, and I was one of six boys, of five boys, excuse me. And. And we had. I had two. Three older brothers, one older half brother, and then two older full brothers. And I knew that, you know, if. As far as running the brewery and becoming a big major player at the brewery would be kind of a long shot for me. Because you were the oldest. Yeah, the oldest that went to correct the succession. So I was looking at other things to do. You know, I was. I was involved in the horses and growing up on the farm, and I really love farming, and I wanted to, you know, possibly be a rancher or a farmer because I love the outdoors, and being in the brewing business wasn't that important to me. But then later on in life, I realized that we might not have avenue in the manufacturing part of the business and Anheuser Busch itself, but we might be able to do something in the distribution part of the business and own a distributorship. So that's what we did. We got into the distributorship business, and I lived down in Houston, Texas, or where we had our own distributorship and worked that. And worked that business and enjoyed the heck out of that. So, yeah, as far as bleeding blood in the business, you know, I was on the entertainment side with Graham's farm and being a part of that and keeping Grant's farm looking beautiful and doing the shows out there and the different things that I did. And then I was in the distribution side of the business, learning the distribution distributing side, going out and meeting with retailers and suppliers and people like that, and that was always fun. And, you know, I guess it was not until I was like, oh, I don't know. I had this wonderful polo career with my brother, and we won pretty much every major tournament in the United States, and we were the Bud Light polo team. Excuse me. And.
- [18:55]
Narrator
Listen, this is all about family, so you can't have a podcast. So family, my butter, Emily.
- [19:03]
Billy Busch
So we. We. It was so much fun. So I was into polo, you know, on horses and what I grew up with, and. And. And then when I was about 40 years old or something like that, and kind of my. My best playing polo was waning, and I was starting to, you know, kind of come down instead of going up any longer. And as a polo athlete, I started really realizing how interesting the business was. And I read this book. It was called. It was called Making Friends is our business, because that was a big slogan that Anheuser Busch used that I think my grandfather came up with, Making Friends is our Business. And they wrote a book, and I read the book, and I was completely amazed by my great grandfather and how he started the business and then how it was passed down to my grandfather, who loved the outdoors. And I'm so much like him, because he didn't really even want to be in the brewing business. He. He wanted to be a rancher. And I tell the story about how his father sent him out to New Mexico to be a rancher, although he really wanted him because he was very competent and very capable to be in the. To be the successor of Anheuser Busch. He said, go out, learn. Be the rancher that you want to be. And it didn't take long. It took maybe six months to a year. He came back home and said, you know what? I don't necessarily want to be a rancher. I'd like to be more involved in the brewery. And then he took over the brewery from my great grandfather. And it's just very, very interesting how it was all passed down. And I loved how they grew the business, the heart and soul they put into it and how family was so incredible, incredibly important to them and how Adolphus and Lilly teamed together to grow the business. And then how my grandfather, August Sr. And his wife Alice were together and they worked the business together. And those two took Anheuser Busch through the hardest years of Anheuser Busch's history. And that was during Prohibition 13 years, where they couldn't sell alcohol, 1920 to 1933. And they kept all the employees, over 2,000 employees employed during that time. Because my grandfather and grandmother cared so much about the employees and their well being that they looked for every possible thing they could do and the innovation they could come up with in order to keep the Anheuser Busch going during that difficult time, which they were able to do. And then of course, you know, when they came out of Prohibition, they were one of the very few breweries that were left standing. And you know, it took off because he kept going, but it did take a toll on his life. August Senior, my grandfather, and he ended up, he ended up committing suicide in 1934 because he was so sick from all the stress of keeping Anheuser Busch going through that 13 years. But it's just incredible what I read and what I learned. And then my father, he left me all these. He left all these notes and relics from the past and even notes from some of his mistresses. He was a, he was a very gregarious guy. He was, he had a lot of fun in life. He kind of naughty at times, I will say, but he loved to keep all his notes. And my wife, excuse me, my wife and I were able to go through boxes and boxes of notes and that's how I was able to put the book Family Reigns Together and talk about the history of Grant's Farm and talk about it from a true perspective of a Bush descendant. And a Bush has never published a book about the family before. So this is the first one out there. There have been books published about us, but none of them right from the heart of the family. So I think this is much more authentic than anything out there.
- [23:04]
Narrator
I think if it's coming from, if it's coming from you, I think it is very authentic. But it was stuff that you collected after, so this was not. So even some of the stuff that you learned about your family. Now I'm just realizing you didn't know all of this stuff firsthand. This wasn't your father telling you all of these stories. This was some of the stuff that you discovered later on in life.
- [23:24]
Billy Busch
That's exactly right, Scott. My dad and I, you know, when I was born, my dad was 60 years old. He was married to his third wife. He had seven kids from my mom, Trudy, and she came from Switzerland. They met over in Switzerland, and he brought her back to the United States. And he was 28 years older than her. And when I was born, he was 60. So when I got to be older and then interested in the history of what was going on, my dad was now, later on in his years, and he really never talked about it that much. So I didn't get a lot firsthand from him. I got it more firsthand from the notes that he left and from the books that I read. And that's how I learned so much about our history and about our family and how it got going. And, you know, again, it's to build a dynasty the way my family did. I'm very proud of. It lasted five generations in our family. Most family businesses last three generations. So, excuse me, we made it for five generations. And the work and the fortitude and the innovation that had to go in and determination, I want to mention, that had to go into building this dynasty and revolutionizing the beer industry was just really, really incredible. And it's a thing of the past. And you just don't, you know, it's a part of history, and I don't think it should be forgotten. And that's why I wrote the book. And I want my kids. I've got seven kids, and I want them to know about it.
- [24:55]
Narrator
No, it's a beautiful story, and you're right, it is a piece of history that shouldn't be forgotten. And I think that. I'll ask you, I'm curious, do you have an opinion as to why your dad didn't speak about it as much? I'm sure there's trauma, there's stress, there's things that happened in the history of the family that if you've lived through them, they're not things that you really feel like chatting about with your kids. But was there a particular reason, something that you can sort of pin down as to why he didn't want to speak about it, sort of that tell you all these stories firsthand.
- [25:33]
Billy Busch
You know, when. When I was growing up as a youngster, he ran the brewery till 1974, where he was basically kicked out by his oldest son of that position of Running the brewery. And I talk about that. That story in the. In the book. And he was so busy with the brewery. He'd come home late every day when he wasn't traveling. He'd come home late every day. He'd have a couple drinks and, you know, have dinner with my mom. We'd all sit at the table. He'd talk a little bit about what went during that day. He'd ask us kids about how Grant's farm is doing, how the animals are, and the different animals that we had on Grant's farm. He'd talk about those. He really didn't talk too much about the history. He was so busy with Anheuser Busch and what was going on at that time that he didn't go back in history too much. He would once in a while talk about how his father and how his grandfather always cared so much about quality. I remember one time he came home from the brewery and he had a test tube bottle of hops. One had the natural flower hop, and the other one was made of a synthetic hop. Now, this synthetic hop, when I looked at it as a kid, it looked terrible. It looked like mud in a. In a test tube. And the flower in the. In the other test tube looked much more appetizing. And he said, this is what that our competitors are going to. They're going to this synthetic hop because it makes it cheaper to make the beer, to brew the beer than the real hop. He said, but, you know, my dad and my grandfather would never. Would never cut corners and would never skimp on quality. They would always do the right thing. And one day the public will realize what, you know, how. How we stick to our guns when it comes to quality. And he couldn't have been more right. That's exactly what happened. And he kept the real hop. A lot of the other companies went to the synthetic hop, and it. It was a downfall of several other companies that. For doing that. And it's what made Budweiser the king of beers. So again, he was very busy. He talked a little bit about certain things, but for the most part. And then he got older. I think he went through some trauma. He. He lost our little sister, was killed in a car accident. His father, his oldest son, kicked him out of the brewery, which was a traumatic thing for him. He got divorced from my mom, and now he was getting on later in years, and he just, you know, as he got older, he got remarried again to a fourth wife. We still. Yeah, that was something. We still talked, but we never really talked about. The history and part of that's on me. I will say I think back to it and should have sat down with him and said, dad, what was your father like? What was was it like when you used to go to the brewery with your dad? And he would have told me stories that I read because I looked at the notes and his and letters that him and his father would send to each other and it would have showed me that, you know what his dad took him through every facet, every part department of the of Anheuser Busch and taught him each department and how each department worked and he had to learn from the bottom up. And that's what dad did. He basically went to the school University of Budweiser to learn the business and that's what made him such a great leader at Anheuser Busch. But yeah, it took me years to realize that.
- [29:12]
Narrator
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- [29:38]
Billy Busch
It's easy.
- [29:39]
Narrator
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- [31:51]
So I'm just looking over some of the things that obviously there's a transition of power away from your father that was very stressful. There was a battle over Grant's Farm as well and that was stressful for the family. If you think about all these events and you can touch on, even give a little bit of context as to what these stories mean and what happened. But what did these events teach you about family business or how did these events sort of shape your perception of family business?
- [32:20]
Billy Busch
Well, I did learn a lot from it. I will say I think in any family business, I think think when you go to pass the baton to the next generation, the leader of that company, they really need to do everything black and white. I think my father, I think it was time he had lost his oldest daughter or excuse me, his youngest daughter. And that was very traumatizing to him and he, he wasn't making the greatest decisions any longer. Not that it was right for my half brother to form a coup in the board and have him removed from his position because I don't think that was right. But I think there would have been a much better way to go to my father, our father, and say, hey, this is, it's getting too hard on you and you need to Step back and allow me to run things. Not now, or something along those lines. And I think, you know, every business owner should realize that when a time. When their time's up and they should pass it on and they should, you know, write up the documents, make it very black and white, say, this is how it is. It's, you know, when you do that kind of stuff, you keep the lawyers out of it. You don't have as much argument going on. Everybody's not going to be as happy, but at least there won't be any infighting. And so when it comes to those kinds of things, definitely it's like he left us Grants Farms farm. He left myself and my five siblings, Graham's farm. And there came a time where it was in a trust, and we knew we had to take it out of the trust because each of our families were getting bigger and there were more and more successors because we're all having kids and we're all married, and we needed to make sure that, okay, what are we going to do with Grant's farm? It can't stay in a trust all the time. It eventually needs to be bought out. Out. So my father, in his will, he put in there that he would. His. His biggest wish was to see one or more of his kids buy Grant's farm out of the trust from whoever didn't want to stay in. So I offered to buy Grant's farm because I was the only one in the beer business at the time. I had a beer company. I felt like it would be similar to what dad did, my father did with the breweries that he built. He built breweries, and he put theme parks around those breweries to attract people. Kind of like an overgrown craft brewery is today. You know, you get to go there and have food, but here you got to go not only have food and try the products, but also visit all the. All the incredible animals and do the rides and all those sorts of things. So I thought it would be a great way to promote our company, a great way to promote our beer. So I offered to buy Grant's farm. And then, you know, jealousy comes in and. And the one. One of the quotes from a sister was, there should not be 1, 1, 1 Lord of the manor, something like that. And, you know, we didn't follow dad's wish at that time, so my family wanted to sell it to another entity and not one of us. And we got into a big argument over that. I talk about an it about it in the book. Almost had the place bought, but then at the last minute? Well, actually after the last minute happened because our trustee at the time, which was Wells Fargo, gave a deadline that whoever makes the final offer by 5:00pm on a certain day, if we don't get a counteroffer, that person would own Grant's farm. So I made the final offer. The counteroffer came about two or three hours later from my other siblings, four of my siblings and another relative, and they ended up bidding higher, going to a place I couldn't go to. So they ended up buying my brother and I out. So I'm no longer a part of Grant's farm. You know, I miss it. It was where I grew up. But, but again, you know, my dad should have made it more specific and made it more black and white on how to leave Grant's farm to a family member or what he exactly wanted to do with it. Because if you don't, it creates a lot of infighting. And now my brothers and sisters, unfortunately, and myself don't talk to each other anymore.
- [36:44]
Narrator
Even still.
- [36:46]
Billy Busch
Even still.
- [36:47]
Narrator
Yep.
- [36:48]
That's so silly.
- [36:49]
It's so stupid to. It's so stupid. Like, I guess, like, listen, a lot of people that listen to this are probably first generation entrepreneurs. They built the business, now they're trying to figure out what to do with that business. And I hear a lot of this, this is going to be this huge transition of wealth because people are all retiring and they don't know what to do about succession planning. And this is the perfect example, obviously at a much larger scale than a first generation entrepreneur. But there are people that build businesses that they don't sell them, they want to pass them over to their kids and, and I don't know how much energy or thought they put into it before it's time. And I think that's going to come around and bite them in the ass. And I also don't think they think about what are the implications of the relationships between siblings. They're thinking about what happens to me when I want to retire. But kind of like your example that you just mentioned, you've actually broken up family bond now because of this. Not only just, you know, the, the fact that your dad didn't make it clear or whatnot, but now between you and your brothers and sisters, you don't have the bond that you should have.
- [38:00]
Billy Busch
You're 100% right, Scott. And that's why I urge any business owner, family business, to make sure that when they do go pass it down, my family always pass it down to the most Competent child. It might not have been the oldest, although for the most part it did work out to be the oldest of the, of the children, oldest male. And, and, and it worked out great for three generations. And then when I went to the fourth generation, it all changed. And the irony of it is the fourth generation took, it basically took it from the third generation and then the fourth generation basically lost the whole company. Because that, I really do think that line of succession was broken the way to probably succeed. And it went then to the fifth generation. And the person that took it over, which would be my nephew, was not unfortunately competent because he had substance abuse problems and he was still given the control of Anheuser Busch and an outside competitor. InBev saw that it wasn't being run correctly, saw the problems that Anheuser Busch was going through, and they realized it was a perfect time to take it over, which they did in 2008.
- [39:26]
Narrator
So where does that leave you in your life? I mean, you've done a lot, so we can talk a little bit about your journey, but all this is leading up to. Okay, so how is Billy going to architect his life now? Because right now your nephew is running the company.
- [39:42]
Billy Busch
Oh, he's not, he's. No, he's not.
- [39:44]
Narrator
No, no, sorry. I meant, sorry. Historically, when, when your nephew was running the company, you weren't thinking, I'm going to step in line for succession, he's the one running it. And you probably saw the decline and you probably saw where it was going. And then the InBev acquisition. Yeah, it was unfortunate, but it probably wasn't a surprise to you at least.
- [40:07]
Billy Busch
Because you saw what was happening. I saw what was happening. I was getting feedback. I really didn't have a lot to do with Anheuser Busch at that point. I was still, we still had the polo team. We were playing professional polo for the Bud Light polo team. And. But I was hearing from people at the brewery, some of the higher up executives at the brewery, that there were problems going on, that he, he was having difficulties talking to people, making speeches, wholesaler conferences, things like that, that he was not competent any longer to even make a speech. Then when I heard that he opened up the distribution system here in America to an outside company, somebody came to me and said that's exactly what this company was looking for. It was InBev. And so now they were selling Stella Artois and Beck's and some of the other beers that inbe in the United States through the Anheuser Busch wholesaler system. And it gave them InBev the opportunity to look at the books, look at Anheuser Busch's books, and figure out a way to buy it. So, yeah, so I did see. I could see it was coming. I was hearing from the executives about what was going on, and I still thought it would be an incredibly tremendous feat to be able to take over the biggest company, biggest beer company in the world. But no longer was Anheuser Busch the biggest beer company, because InBev had formed with other breweries, and they actually became internationally the biggest brewery in the world. And so they were able to swallow the smaller fish at that point. And that's exactly what they did. And as soon as that happened, I started thinking, okay, you know what? How do I keep this tradition alive? After reading everything that I read, and this is during the time I was really getting involved into understanding the history of our family, my life, where I've been leaving some of that to my kids, so they knew what was running through their blood and to understand where they came from. And actually, it was good for me, too. It was very therapeutic for me to be able to understand where I came from. And I just felt this desire to keep that beer tradition going because I thought about my great grandfather and the love he had for his family and for his wife and for all the people that worked at Anheuser Busch, and how he revolutionized the beer industry with pasteurization and refrigeration and how he grew his product and how he even came up with a recipe for Budweiser. And I know you read that in the book, Scott, and that's one of the great stories that I love, is how he went to Germany. Germany. And came up with the recipe. And then I think about my grandfather, about how he takes it over kind of unwillingly at first, but then willingly when he realized that he wanted to be in the brewing industry and not so much a rancher any longer, and how he worked his tail off. And through love and through determination and grit, he. He kept the company going through that 13 years of prohibition and how it affected him after Prohibition negatively, and he took his life because of that. And then how my dad and his brother kept it going and how it became a household name. And the patriots that my father and my. Who was a colonel in the army during World War II and the Patriot that my Uncle Adolphus, his older brother, was, and how he designated 90% of his marketing to support the war efforts during World War II and really put the products on the back burner because he loved this country and knew what it had done for him and his family and some of those things. And then to see how my dad worked and how he loved the industry, I just felt it was in my blood. Like you said earlier, I felt like I bleed beer and so I wanted to keep it going. And so I started, started the William K. Bush Brewing Company. I couldn't call it. The only way I could use a Bush name was by using my full name. I started the William K. Busch Brewing Company. And it was a difficult time because at that point, it was a 2011. At that point the craft beer industry was taking off and I came out with a, with, with more of a everyday beer like a Budweiser or a Miller or a Coors. So your standard, your standard beer beer. And people were turning towards the heavier, more tasteful beers, full, full bodied beers. And I came out. It was kind of bad timing to come out with that, but I did. And you know, to get any traction in the mainstream part of the beer industry where you're going against the behemoths like Budweiser, Miller and Coors is very, very difficult. And they're all. You've always got a target on your back. So for 10 years I, I worked hard to try to grow that business and we got into five or six different, different states as far as distribution goes. But we never could get any traction so we had to end up, we ended up closing that down and we got in. We now are, are doing our own. We built our own brewery right outside of St. Louis, Missouri in an area called St. Charles Barrels. And we invite people to come out to our place, to our farm and enjoy the beautiful farm atmosphere out there. Nature, we've got animals around there, we've got great food for people. We make 12 different beers out there. We have our own brewery and we're actually starting to distribute locally in the area. So you know what? I love the beer and beer business. My family, my immediate family once in a while looks at me and says, dad, you know, why do you keep doing this? You work really hard, you're not making any money doing it. And it's just that I just feel that it's my destiny basically. I feel like it's something that I need to do to honor my ancestors.
- [46:28]
Narrator
I think that's beautiful. I think there's nothing wrong with that. I mean it is definitely not easy. You have the name behind you, but at this point the market is very different than when your great grandfather tried to build something. Right? It's a slightly different competitive environment. Do you find that it's been easier or harder because of your name to build something in the. In the beer industry?
- [46:53]
Billy Busch
You know, it's funny you say that, because one of the things that my father always said was, you know, what would Adolphus do whenever he had to make a big decision? He would think about his grandfather and he would ask himself the question, what would. What would my. What would Adolphus do? And I asked that question because the. Of the saturated market, how would Adolphus handle the beer business today? And I really haven't come up with the answer to that yet, but I know that he would have figured out a way because he was so innovative. As far as the question you asked me about, what was the question? I'm sorry, Scott, I.
- [47:35]
Narrator
It was whether or not your name, the Bush name, makes it harder or easier to build something in the beer industry, in the spirits industry or I guess, beer. Yeah.
- [47:45]
Billy Busch
Well, I think it's harder, and I'll tell you why. I think you. It puts more stress on the person that's trying to build the. To keep that tradition going of brewing. And because you're filling huge shoes. I mean, you're going back to a time when. And your ancestors, your father, your grandfather, great grandfather, were so successful in the business, and it did so well. And you want to try to bring that back to America and make it. Make the American beer. Because, you know, InBev is not American and, you know, is Budweiser. Budweiser no longer the number one beer. And it's. It's daunting. It's a daunting challenge to try to. To reinvent that and. And to keep that going. I took the pressure off myself to say, I don't need to be that big. I don't need to grow that big. Especially at first. You know, we can do this slowly. What happens is when another beer company hears about a bush in their space and they see that. That you're. You're in that space, you've got that story to tell. You're making a great beer. Because the beer that we made, made won metals all around the world. World, incredible metals. We had a great beer. Again, I followed what I learned from my ancestors, and that was quality is everything. We never cut corners, and we made a very, very wonderful, wonderful beer. But what happens is. And it happened within Bev. They put a target on our back. As a matter of fact, I heard the name of the target. They called it the Kill Bill campaign. The Anheuser Busch Wholesalers Kill Bill campaign. It was Killed Me get us out of there. Don't let us get any traction. Don't let us get started. So every time we would get a promotion, you know, a major promotion like in Busch Stadium at the baseball park or something like that, the Anheuser Busch InBev would go in right away and they would say they would tell the vendor in there, nope, you guys can't do that, or we're going to pull our beers out. And of course, you know, the vendor couldn't, wouldn't allow their beers to, to be pulled out of there because their beers are the biggest selling beers. And so they would then drop our promotion right away. And, you know, this happened time and time again. We get a promotion, they'd come in and they would kill it. So those kinds of things were very, very difficult. I guess the advantage of it is that we have that wonderful story. I can tell that story like I'm telling it to you, Scott. And I think every product needs a story, or it's very helpful to have a story behind a product so that they can get that out there, especially today with social media and all the interesting outlets that you have out there to tell your story.
- [50:38]
Scott Clary
A quick shout out to the HubSpot Podcast Network for supporting Success Story. Now, if you like Success Story, you're going to love other podcasts in their network. One of my favorites is Create like the Greats. It's hosted by Ross Simmons, obviously brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network. You're going to join Ross on Create like the Greats. Ross dissects the genius behind history's most remarkable creators and their legendary work. So you're going to get this blend of history and business and creativity. He has a great voice, always good for a podcast, and he has a decade of practical experience. He's going to break down some of the best creative processes that built influential companies, brands and stories in a way that anyone can apply. So whether or not you're fascinated by history, creative thinking, or you simply want to improve and systematize your own creativity without sacrificing productivity, this podcast is your perfect listen. Go listen to Create like the Greats wherever you get your podcast. A huge shout out to Lingoda for supporting today's episode. Now, if you're ready to master a new language, Lingoda is the online language platform trusted by over 100,000 thousand students worldwide. Lingoda offers live classes with real teachers available 24 7. You can choose from German, English, business English, French, Spanish, or their newest addition, Italian. What sets Lingoda apart? The smallest class size in the market. It's just you and up to five other students. Or if you want, you can go one on one for personalized attention. Their native level teachers don't just teach language, they share culture too. And you'll speak confidently from day one. With Lingoda's flexible scheduling and proven curriculum, students report being able to navigate real conversations in weeks, not years. And if you're using Lingoda for business, their CEFR aligned courses ensure that you're learning internationally recognized language standards that employers value. Between sessions, you're going to reinforce your skills with downloadable materials and bite sized practice exercises. Exercises and all success story listeners, they put together a special deal. Try lingoda free with three group classes or one private class. Plus you save on any course with my link. Try.lingoda.com success story and code Scott25 don't miss this chance to transform your life through language learning.
- [52:51]
Narrator
When you look at, when you look at how you built your brewery and how you now you work on businesses now, what has fundamentally changed because you've gone through sort of your own entrepreneurial journey as well. So how do you think about, about business building? You could talk about some of the things that you work on work on today, but how do you build businesses now? What are some entrepreneurial lessons or things that you've learned from your family from I don't want to say like failed venture, but you shut down the brewery so you moved on to other things. What are some lessons?
- [53:23]
Billy Busch
Well, first of all, you're going to learn a lot more from your failures than you are from your wins. So definitely learn from your failures. And I think I've learned a lot from my failures in the beer business. We're now called the Busch Family Brewing and Distill Distilling Company. And you can look up our website@bushfamilyfarm.com or Bush family Brewing and Distilling and check out our website. But I think what I've learned is to not give up. If you have a dream, go for it. And you know, I'm not there yet, but it keeps me going and gets me up early every single day and keeps me passionate. And I think know your numbers. I mean I think one of my big things was if you're, if you're not a numbers person and you're more of the top line thinker in the business, make sure you have somebody very, very competent who can tell you your numbers so that you know each and every day what your numbers are and that you're either if you're losing money, you know exactly how much money you're losing using. If you're making money, you know exactly how much money you're making. If you think you were are where you think you are because sales are good, guess what? You might not be selling that much. Or excuse me, you might not be making that much money because maybe your expenses are running higher than you realize or maybe your margins aren't as strong as as as a as you thought they were. And so even though you could be selling like crazy and you're doing a great job at that, you could still be losing money. So those are the kinds of things. If you're a money person, make sure you have a great marketing person, someone who's a top line thinker. If you're a top line thinker and you're looking and you're pushing for new ideas and the future and what you're going to do next, then make sure you have a good numbers person. Those two things so incredibly important.
- [55:25]
Narrator
A big thank you to Indeed for.
- [55:26]
Supporting Success Story because hiring people is one of the hardest things things you're ever going to do as an entrepreneur, as a founder, as somebody who's trying.
- [55:35]
To build a business. Because it's important to hire. Well, it's important to hire and find the right person, but it takes so much time. It's so labor intensive because like most entrepreneurs, you have a thousand things going on and there's a good chance that you just realized your business needed to hire someone yesterday. How can you find that great, amazing right fit candidate fast?
- [55:55]
Scott Clary
It's easy.
- [55:56]
Narrator
You just use Indeed because you don't.
- [55:58]
Have to waste time struggling to get your job post seen on all these other job sites.
- [56:02]
Sites.
- [56:02]
If you're using Indeed, you can just use their sponsored jobs to help you stand out and hire fast.
- [56:07]
Your post jumps right to the top.
- [56:08]
Billy Busch
Of the page for relevant candidates so.
- [56:10]
Narrator
You can reach exactly who you're looking.
- [56:12]
For faster and the results really speak for themselves. According to Indeed data, Sponsored jobs posted directly on indeed have 45% more applications.
- [56:20]
Than non sponsored jobs. You know what I love most about Indeed?
- [56:24]
It really just makes hiring so fast because everything is streamlined in one place. No more juggling multiple platforms or waiting.
- [56:31]
Weeks for the right candidate. How fast is Indeed Indeed?
- [56:34]
In the minute I've been talking to.
- [56:35]
You, 23 hires were made on Indeed. According to Indeed Data worldwide.
- [56:41]
There's no need to wait any longer. Speed up your hiring right now with Indeed and listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs, more visibility@indoubtedly.com Clary just.
- [56:54]
Go to indeed.com Clary right now and.
- [56:56]
Support our show by saying you heard.
- [56:58]
Scott Clary
About Indeed on this podcast.
- [56:59]
Narrator
Indeed.com Clary terms and conditions apply.
- [57:02]
If you're hiring. Indeed is all you need. When you look at. Even look at your family dynamics, you and Christy, you clearly take a different approach to raising your kids than your own upbringing. You take a different approach to family. What are some specific things? And you can talk in, like, in a family context, in a business context, because family obviously is a central theme for you have a beautiful family. What do you do different, differently than how you were raised?
- [57:32]
Billy Busch
Well, thank you for saying I have a beautiful family, Scott. Yeah, I'm very proud. Christy and I are very proud of our seven kids, and we raised them completely different than what I was raised. You know, I was pretty much raised by the people on Grant's farm, the people that work there, the help. My dad and mom were busy running the brewery and growing the. The business. And so I completely understand what they, you know, that they had to do that. That. But I think, you know, in a family business and any business, I think you have to have your priorities straight. I think it's very, very important that you always put your family first, even ahead of your business, as hard as that can be at times, because sometimes your. Your family and your business are all intertwined. Right? I mean. I mean, in order to send your kids to a good school, you got to make sure you're making money. In order to go on nice vacations, you got to make sure you're making money. So it's. It's very difficult to do that sometimes, to separate the two to. But I think it's very important, and you have to have the discipline in order to separate and keep your priorities straight and make your family your number one, your number one responsibility in life. And everything comes after that. And I just think that that's very important, and it's very easy to lose sight of. And so what Christy and I do today is we're much more involved with our kids than my parents were with me, sometimes to the point where you can get too involved with them, too. You don't want to be that helicopter parent, right? You got to let them learn for themselves and let them fail for themselves. But, you know, we support them in everything they do. My oldest son, Billy Senior. Excuse me, Billy Jr. I'm Billy Sr. Billy Jr. Is now married. He's got two beautiful kids, so we have two beautiful grandsons. They're twins. They're a year and a half old now. And he has his own hunting apparel company called Guy Geist Gear. Geist means ghost in German. Is G E I S T. As a matter of fact I'm wearing it.
- [59:27]
Narrator
Looks very good. I saw it when you jumped on camera. It looks quite good. It looks quite good.
- [59:31]
Billy Busch
Yeah. It's so warm and so comfortable. It's a little cold outside today. So I'm wearing it. And he. So if you're a duck hunter, if you're a deer hunter, if you're any kind of hunter, he has on his website pretty much everything for hunting apparel that you can imagine. And if you go to guysgear.com he only sells online and you can find, find this is very high quality apparel. Great stuff and I think you'll love it. Especially for you hunters out there, you really are a ghost in the woods as geist means. And then, and then, you know, we support them all. They've all gone to college. They've all done a. They all, they've all worked hard. Our youngest son just graduated from high school. He's the only one that's not going to go to college. College. But you know, I'm kind of okay with that today. Scott. I think college might be a little overrated. He's getting in the, in the real estate business. He's going to start doing some developing. We also have a hotel that we're renovating in South Beach, Miami. Right on the beach.
- [60:34]
Narrator
Which, which one? Because I'm in Miami. So I gotta go, gotta go check it out.
- [60:38]
Billy Busch
Go check it out. Drive by it. So it's right across from the Palm Hotel in the ana district. It's 3010 pollen 3010 column. But it's the shell right now. And when it's all said and done, it's going to be 89 rooms. It's going to be a five star luxury boutique hotel with a great restaurant and a great rooftop and a great spa and recording studios we're going to have in there. So yeah, check it out Scott. I think we're looking forward to that being done. So we're partners in that with another family, the Asylene family. So it's the Bush and Aslene that are involved in that. My son Gussie and a couple daughters are much involved in managing it and Peter's now getting involved in that. Our youngest son and then my other daughters are all, you know, some one selling a house. Also in the real estate business. Selling houses, residential homes and you know, we support them. All doing do we support each and every one in what they want to do in life. And they're all becoming productive, really good members of society. And we love to see that. And they. I shouldn't say becoming. They are. I wish they were more interested in the beer business, but it's been a rough go. It truly has. When we had the first company, it didn't go as planned. We hit a lot of challenges and that's what happens in business. So we had to kind of reinvent the strategy on how we were going to the model, the business model, how we were going to do it the next. This time. So we've done that and I think things are going to go much smoother. Smoother. So maybe, just maybe, if I'm lucky, they'll see that it's, it's a good business and that they, they might even get interested in it. You know, I kind of got to do what my great grandfather did with his son and let him kind of figure. They got to figure it out on their own and then if they ever want to do it, hopefully they'll come and be a part of it. But, you know, it's up to me right now to make it happen.
- [62:32]
Narrator
They. So it's, it sounds like outside of all being successful and figuring out their own path and whatnot, everybody kind of still works together. Together to some degree. They're all supporting each other.
- [62:43]
Billy Busch
That's. That's correct. Yeah. We all work together. We're a very, very close family. We take vacations. All of us together. We spend a lot of time, you know, especially holidays together. And yeah, I'm, I'm thankful because they say the biggest success in life is if your kids want to come and be with you once they grow up. And we are very successful when it comes to that.
- [63:07]
Narrator
When you think about everything that you witnessed in your own family, and there's been conflicts and stress with your own, you know, your own brothers and sisters, but it seems like everything's going well with your kids and, and they're very close. So what would be the advice that you give for people who want to mix family and business? How did you do it? Right.
- [63:29]
Billy Busch
Well, I think, I think you have to have a, A, a really strong and a very black and white will or what you. How you're going to leave them things. Okay. And, and I spent a lot of time working on that so that the same thing that happened with my siblings won't happen to them. And that is. Okay, here's what you're. Here's what you're left. Here's how things are, are done. And, you know, it's as fair as I could possibly be for each and every one of you. And they'll realize that, you know, might take them a while to realize that, but at least they won't have the fighting because it's all black and white as much as possible. And they won't be able to hire lawyers and give them money and make the lawyers rich and then lose money to lawyers to. To go through all that. And I think, I think, you know, while I'm still alive, I have to kind of follow those same kind of thought that. That thought pattern and just keep everything black and white and keep it as fair as I possibly can. And even though sometimes it may not be as fair as you want it to be, it still beats the hell out of infighting. And you. Nobody needs that. Try to keep that out of your life. Life.
- [64:52]
Narrator
If you think about all the different aspects of sort of the Bush family legacy, which, which parts of it do you want to preserve through your kids? What are the parts of the Bush family story that you want them to take forward? Because obviously you're not forcing beer and brewery down their throats. You want them to get involved. They like it. But what are some parts of that legacy that you do want them to carry forward?
- [65:15]
Billy Busch
Hard work, hard. I want them to all be hard workers and be productive in life and to give back and to leave a good legacy where they showed goodwill to their communities and to the people that surrounded them. Be great family members, be a good husband and a wife when those days happen. Be great parents, have their priorities straight, keep their priorities the way they should be. And it seems like as the generations went on, our priorities kind of slipped. I look back and see what my great grandfather and my grandfather and I see how they always kept family very, very close and very, very important to them. I think. I honestly have to say I think my father lost a little bit of that. That. Not because I think that I think he was, you know, I think there's reasons for that. And I think the reason for that basically is because he was running this company and he let that company become as important, if not more important than his kids to a certain degree. And. And I think up until then that never happened. And that's why I think there was an easier transition from one generation to the next generation. But I think as time went on, and I think this is why you don't have multi, multi, multi generational businesses, is because it starts to slip and it's easy to forget what's important and what's not as important important and lose your priorities. And I think when you do that, things start to get. Start to fail.
- [67:09]
Narrator
Yeah, I agree with that. And, and I think that you see, like, this is the scary thing, right? Like in one generation, I see people building businesses that replace their families as the priority. And that's when you see people with broken homes and no relationships with their kids and, you know, how many divorces later. But in, in their life, they are financially successful, but there's no, there's no legacy. There's nothing beyond their life. Right. Because that attitude, it never survives. It will never survive. And you saw and for generations.
- [67:47]
That.
- [67:47]
Wasn'T the case in your family until it was. And that's when things start to fall apart.
- [67:52]
Billy Busch
Exactly, Scott. That's exactly right. And I think to leave that legacy, I think, you know, that you have to have your priorities, keep your family close to you, and then everything after that falls in place. And, you know, that's just the way it is. And I think that goodwill and I think what does family do for you? Family actually inspires you to do better and to be a better person and to grow your business. Because now, you know, you're going to leave that to your kids and you're going to leave it to them in a way that's going to make sense. And I, I think that, you know, to be able to leave that legacy and to have that inspiration from your family, to leave that to them, but not only to them, but to society itself, is very important. And I think that's what Adolphus and Lilly did. I just watched this old clip that they made about Adolphus and Lily, and they built a beautiful gardens. It was the first Busch Gardens ever built. I talk about this a little bit in the book. In Pasadena, California. And they built this incredible gardens. It was like 40 acres of horticulture. They had hundreds and hundreds of horticulturists and gardeners working there to make this place beautiful. And they built it for their family. But then they started inviting people there and they left this beautiful estate for people to come and visit. And it lasted for several years, way past my father's, my great grandfather's death, and the last little, you know, up until I pretty much my, my grandmother, my great grandmother died. But they left a beautiful legacy and, and wonderful goodwill. And that's. They talk a little bit about that. And one of their inspirations was for their family, but to leave something for society that's beautiful in life.
- [69:47]
Narrator
I think that's. By the way, just that line, that lesson, I think is a beautiful thing for people to work towards in general. If you're building anything, leave something beautiful behind. I think that's a great north star for people to have when they're building anything. What's next for the Bush family brewing tradition? What's next for you? I mean, talk about if somebody is a beer lover, what do you want them to know? If people just are more interested in projects that you might take on in the future. Future, what would be next?
- [70:23]
Billy Busch
You know, basically, I think the last time we opened up our brewery, the, the brewery that we had, the William K. Busch Brewery, one of the reasons it failed is I think we started running before we could even walk. And I think in any business you have to kind of crawl, then walk, then, you know, hopefully you can run and take off. Right? And I think that right now we're kind of in that crawling stage and you know, we've opened up the brewery to the public. People come and it's very much an extension of what I did when I was, how I grew up, opening up our farm to the public. We're opening up now the new farm to the public. We've got the animals there. We're serving beer, we're making wonderful beers. We make the Gussie Bavarian, which is a wonderful Helles beer. We make a great pilsner called the Adolphus Pilsner. We still make Kreptiglite, which is, which came from our old brewery. And people love. And we make several others that are, they're called by family names. And you know, we're starting now to slowly go to wholesalers. And wholesalers are picking up our beer now and they're, they're, they're starting to take it to the, to retail. So we'll see how that goes. You know, we'll see, we'll. We'll kind of see if that's scalable. We'll also see honestly if, you know, this small kind of craft type brewery is scalable after we see if our proof of concept here works out in St. Charles, Missouri, if that works out, then what's to say we couldn't go to outside another kind of major metropolitan area like outside of Dallas or Nashville or. I'm just throwing some cities out there that might be cool places to build another one like that to tell our story. And I don't know if the public is all into it or into the history, but, you know, if this does prove out to Be something that works well. I think this is a way to get into the beer industry right now. I think trying to get into the beer industry like I did in the past is very difficult. Difficult because you've got the big boys out there that are trying to kill you. I think if you're a craft brewer, I think you're good within about a 25 mile radius. Once you go past that radius, it's very hard to sell your beer because then you have your next craft brewery who people are buying from locally. And it's just. And there's so many darn breweries around now that it's very hard to get traction. So maybe this is a way to kind of start getting traction and become, you know, a major player in the beer industry again. Although I will say, Scott, the beer business is hurting right now. There are a lot of the young people like your age and even younger are not drinking as much any longer. So, you know, the beer itself is down as far as sales go. And will that come back? Maybe it will, maybe it won't. But we'll see. See.
- [73:29]
Narrator
Yeah, I mean, you're right. I, I didn't. The whole market is probably going through a shift right now. When I. When I'm going to a restaurant or a bar. Well, especially in Miami, everyone's drinking tequila, but still. Right.
- [73:40]
Billy Busch
Y.
- [73:41]
Narrator
But I think that, Listen, I think that if anyone has a shot of, of bringing back an industry or being successful, it's. It's a brand with a story. Stories do matter to people. I think that stories matter the most. People don't necessarily really love huge conglomerate. Without a story, I think that feels devoid of any soul. So I think that the story is important and I think that like, you have a good one. So that's a, that, that's. That's a competitive advantage if nothing else.
- [74:12]
Billy Busch
It's a start. To start.
- [74:14]
Narrator
Yeah, to start. It is a start. A lot of work, but it's still, it's still a good. It's still a good basis. So your book Family Reigns, they can get that. That anywhere. They can get books and get on Amazon. They can get it.
- [74:26]
Do you have a website as well.
- [74:28]
That you want to send people to?
- [74:30]
Billy Busch
No, I don't have a website on that, but you can go. Family Reigns. The Extraordinary Rise and Epic Fall of an American Dynasty. If you go wherever, like you said, Scott, wherever books are sold, you can find it. Go to Amazon and get it from there. It's a great read. I think people. I've been getting nothing but positive Feedback. It's one of those kinds of books that you can't put down once you start reading. Reading it. It's not that long of a book. Some people read it in three or four days. So I think. I think there's a little of something. There's something in there for everyone. Everyone's got a story to tell. I told my story. It's fairly unique and I think people will enjoy it.
- [75:04]
Narrator
I think so, too. This is. This was great. We spoke about a lot before we. Before we wrap up. Was there anything that I didn't go into or any question that I should have asked you that you think would be useful, insightful for the audience?
- [75:20]
Billy Busch
I don't think so, Scott. I think we've covered a lot. I think you asked wonderful questions and I hope I didn't go on and on too much about with my answers, but I gotta.
- [75:30]
Narrator
No, this is a podcast. You're supposed to do.
- [75:33]
Billy Busch
Okay, good. I'm really happy with the questions you asked and that I was able to verbalize them to you.
- [75:39]
Narrator
No, you were amazing. I appreciate your time. Last question. I like to ask everyone, and I'll ask you to go a little bit deeper only because you have touched on this a little bit, but is a way that we close this out. So out of all the lessons and the wisdom and the. And the ups and downs, the highs, the lows that you've experienced over your life, if you could only pick one lesson that you can leave your kids with, you can only choose one. The most important thing that you've learned or you've experienced, what would that lesson be?
- [76:08]
Billy Busch
That's a really tough question. I think the lesson would be to. To always have faith in yourself, to never lose that faith, to believe in yourself, believe that there is. That God is out there, and that with God you can. You can do anything. That you have a path in life and that you should find what that path is and go for it with all your heart, mind and soul.