Scott (5:24)

Even still.

Billy Busch (5:25)

Even still.

Scott (5:27)

Yep.

Billy Busch (5:27)

That's so silly.

Scott (5:28)

It's so stupid to, it's so stupid. Like, I guess, like, listen, a lot of people that listen to this are, are probably first generation entrepreneurs. They built the business, now they're trying to figure out what to do with that business. And I, 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 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, not only just, you know, 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.

Billy Busch (6:39)

Oh, 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, the, the, 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 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.

Scott (8:06)

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.

Billy Busch (8:22)

Oh, he's not. He's. No, he's not.

Scott (8:24)

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, because you saw what was happening.

Billy Busch (8:48)

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 was having difficulties talking to people, making speeches, wholesaler conferences, things like that, that he was, he was not competent any longer to even make a speech. And, and then, and then I, 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 some of the other beers that InBev was making 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, you know, I still thought it would be an incredibly, a 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 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, 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 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. And people were turning towards the heavier, more tasteful beers, full, full body 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 always got a target on your back. So for 10 years, 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. 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 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.

Announcer (15:07)

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Billy Busch (15:25)

J.