← The Brainy Business | Understanding the Psychology of Why People Buy | Behavioral Economics
The Brainy Business | Understanding the Psychology of Why People Buy | Behavioral Economics
502. How Maker's Mark Redefined Loyalty During Crisis
00:41:38
In this episode of The Brainy Business podcast, Melina Palmer welcomes Greta Harper from Maker's Mark for a conversation about the brand's innovative approach during the pandemic. Recorded live at the GreenBook's IIEX North America conference, this...
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- [00:01]
Melina Palmer
Hey there Melina here. If you've been thinking about raising your prices, maybe waiting for the right time or the perfect plan, consider this your sign. Clients expect prices to rise right now. The key is making them feel good about saying yes. And that's exactly what we do in our four week pricing sprint. Aligning your strategy, story and price with behavioral science. I work directly with just 12 clients a year on this and there are only three spots left. In 2025, you'll walk away with more than just new prices. You will have a behavioral pricing framework you can confidently use again and again and again. Is now your time to raise your prices and sell more confidently? Email me at melina the brainybusiness.com and let's talk. And of course, when you're ready, let's start the show. Welcome to episode 502 of the Brainy Business Understanding the Psychology of why People Buy. In today's episode, I'm excited to introduce you to Greta Harper of Maker's Mark. Ready?
- [01:08]
Greta Harper
Let's get started.
- [01:13]
Melina Palmer
You are listening to the Brainy Business podcast where we dig into the psychology of why people buy and help you incorporate behavioral economics into your business, making it more brain friendly. Now, here's your host, Melina Palmer.
- [01:29]
Hello. Hello everyone. My name is Melina Palmer and I want to welcome you to the Brainy Business Podcast. Before the pandemic, do you remember how many individuals and companies said they couldn't go remote, that it couldn't happen, people wouldn't switch, they couldn't figure it out. It was impossible. Until it wasn't, when the whole world was forced to shift. So somehow it became possible fast. Many people, of course, did the bare minimum and only showed up when they had to, anxiously waiting for the opportunity to get back to normal. But there were so many experiences that were once thought to be only possible in person. Elementary school conferences and various job roles that were reimagined and in many cases for the better. Eating out was of course something that was struck hard and many restaurants didn't make it through. But there were some who looked at the problem differently and were able to create amazing experiences when people couldn't eat out, creating loyalty and fandom amongst their patrons. For many bars and restaurants around the country, those efforts were supported by Maker's Mark. Today's conversation is a replay which originally aired on, funnily enough, June 3, 2022. So we're refreshing it exactly three years later to the day. Completely unplanned, but feels like a perfect, sad, serendipitous full circle moment, especially for an episode that at its core really is about long term thinking. This conversation was recorded live at Green Book's iiex North America Conference, where I sat down with Greta Harper, who talked about her work at Maker's Mark. And while we dig into how the brand stepped up during the height of the pandemic, supporting bars, restaurants and hospitality workers when they needed it most, what really stands out is the depth of of intention behind every decision they make. We're talking about a brand that makes plans 100 years into the future. Yes, truly. From planting oak trees that won't be harvested in their lifetime, to reducing packaging waste and becoming B Corp. Certified, the team at Maker's Mark is thinking way beyond the next quarter or campaign. And if you've been following along, this episode pairs beautifully with an upcoming conversation I'll be having with Jason Vojovic where we explore how historical insight can help us make smarter choices today. And in that case, we're looking back to the innovations of the Great Depression. It's really amazing and interesting to hear how much was bought and created during that time period that we don't associate with growth at all. So definitely be sure to stay tuned for that in a few days. And if you aren't already subscribed to the Brainy Business podcast, now is a great time to do so. But for now, enjoy this timeless and timely look at behavioral bartending, brand legacy and doing the right thing with the amazing team at Maker's Mark. And don't forget, there are show notes for the episode with my top related past episodes, books and more waiting for you in the app you're listening to and@the brainybusiness.com 502 all right, let's go back in the past to this conversation with Greta Harper.
- [04:37]
Greta Harper
All right, welcome everyone to the Brainy Business podcast here at IIEX North America Day 2. I'm so delighted to be joined by Greta Harper from Maker's Mark and we are talking about behavioral bartending with Maker's Mark and some really amazing and inspiring things that Makers did during the pandemic that I think everyone really can learn from. My name is Melina Palmer. I'm your host and the host of the Brainy Business Podcast, which as of recording now outside of the conference has 200 episodes already and is all about applying behavioral economics into businesses of all kinds from around the world. I also teach Applied Behavioral Economics at Texas A and M University and do consulting and speaking and write books and lots of fun stuff. But today I'm very delighted to have Greta here to tell her story. So, Greta, please let everyone know a little bit about you, your background, and what you do at Maker's Mark.
- [05:46]
So my name is Greta Harper. I have worked in the service industry just about my entire life. So it started out probably before working. My grandmother ran a boarding house, and I used to sit on the floor and play Legos underneath the table. And she would have people from the boarding house come down and have coffee and have dinner, and they would share stories and antidotes and things about their day, and she would make them coffee and food. And I was there for all of that. And it gave me an education from the time I was about 5 or 6 in the hospitality world. When I graduated high school, I moved to Atlantic City and I started working at Hard Rock Cafe. And I fell in love with the industry. And it was never the same since.
- [06:31]
Yeah. Yeah. And so kind of working up through the industry, how did you find yourself at Maker's Mark and what do you do there?
- [06:41]
So took about 15 years. I was never a giant whiskey fan when I first started out. I was a vodka drinker and a tequila drinker and mixed drinks throughout college and working my way through the industry. I started out as a merch girl in Atlantic City, worked my way up to be a server and a bartender and a general manager. In 2014, I went to Kentucky for the first time and I got to meet Distillers. Absolutely fell in love. Love with the business. And I remember going to Jim Beam and Megan Breyer, who does something similar to what I do now, jumped on the bus and she had this huge smile, and I thought, that's what I want to do with my life. And I gave myself a five year goal. And then I worked really hard, forgot about it, and five years later, I got hired with Maker's Mark.
- [07:32]
Yeah. Like, was it one of those, like, kind of weird, serendipitous things where it was like almost the anniversary of the five year point where you set that intention that it came true even though it sat on a shelf for a while?
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Yeah, it was about two months, two months into it and two months from the anniversary where I sat down and I realized that I had made myself that goal and I actually achieved it.
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Yeah.
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So I gave myself one of those little rare pat on the backs and I was like, this is fantastic. But going through the industry as a woman and trying to learn from neighborhood bars and high volume bars, then getting into craft bars was difficult at that time, especially in a smaller market, because I had Moved to Pittsburgh. So learning was not always easy. And I always said if I had that chance to do something in the supplier world, I would make learning easier for everybody else that came behind me.
- [08:26]
Yeah. And so I know you mentioned college, but on the academic side of college, you studied anthropology, which, you know, working in restaurants in anthropology maybe seems. Well, I'm sure there are lots of people in restaurants with very diverse backgrounds, for sure. Absolutely.
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Absolutely.
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But as far as, then, your interest in behavioral sciences, it, of course, makes sense to me on the anthropology piece, but can you talk a little bit about the people side of the business and you know how that kind of came together for you?
- [09:00]
Sure. I think bars and restaurants are that traditional third space in society. It's not work and it's not home. It's where you go to get away from both of those things. But to connect with something different than yourself, it's kind of, for me, it's the last democracy left out there. And going to school and being in anthropology every day was like a research assignment. I could see how people made decisions and. And what people looked for and who did what. So it was always very, very interesting. When I took this job, I remember one of my colleagues, Josh Pearson, had just gotten back from Kansas or Iowa. He's. He's from Australia. And he said, I just found out that there's a ton of different corn out there. Is anybody interested in corn? And, of course, I raised my hand. I said, oh, my gosh, this is. This is so interesting, because mesoamerica was one of the things that I had studied in anthropology. And he said, great. He was like, there's apparently a guy at Texas A and M. You should talk to him. And that was Seth Murray.
- [09:59]
All right, so an interest in corn is where it began, which I think that obviously, with work I've done with Texas A and M, I know that there are people that have lots of interest in corn and eggshell thickness and all the weird things, all the aggro stuff. But. So when you found yourself at A and M, then you were able to have a conversation with someone from the human behavior lab.
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Exactly, exactly. And I mean, corn led me there because, I mean, bourbon has to be at least 51% corn. It's an American product. Seth, I don't think, really knew what to do with me, and he was on a completely different level than I was. So I went around the university, and I had meetings with just about, I think, every department imaginable over three days. But my favorite meeting was with the behavioral Economics lab. And I met Jeff Poole and he popped up on the screen a picture of Maker's Mark that I know that he did just for me. And he said, what do you think pops out at you the most? And I was like, well, the red wax. And he said, look at this eye tracking. And he, he did an experiment on me because I think that's how most people start friendships, is. Let me experiment on you right in the lab.
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That's how we. Yeah, yeah.
- [11:14]
That's how we make friends. And I, I immediately saw the application for everyday use in restaurants and retail, and I was absolutely hooked. And I stayed in touch with Jeff. This was so. The first time I went to Texas A and M was January of 2020.
- [11:33]
Yeah. And you were all excited to start doing lots of research. And then you.
- [11:38]
So excited. So excited. We have a thing in, in beverage alcohol. It's called Tales of the Cocktail. Part of it is a big party in July every year down in Louisiana in New Orleans. But the other part of it is education around trade. And I said, I really want to bring what we learned here today. Two tails. So I wrote up a seminar. I was so excited. I pitched it to everybody on my brand, which is Maker's Mark, and further up in the beam, Centauri universe, and they said, great, keep pitching it. And it got accepted. And I was working on that. And then March 2020, and the pandemic happened.
- [12:16]
Right.
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And I thought, well, it might not affect July. We might be okay.
- [12:22]
Right? Oh, we all thought that. Right. But so for everyone who didn't get a chance to catch my session yesterday with Sarah from Walmart talking, and if you're not super familiar with the behavioral sciences yet, just as a little bit of an explanation of what it is that we do is understanding how much of behavior is done on a subconscious level and that decisions and that we're making, humans make on average 35,000 decisions every single day. And most of those are done on a subconscious level. And when we sit down and we think about our brands, like talking about the red wax on the makers, right? And you think this is absolutely going to stand out, or everyone has to notice this sign, or you think about the logical application of what you're doing and what people should do, which here at the brand Brainy Business, I like to say is a four letter word. We don't say should we? Well, you maybe feel inclined to say should, and then you should stop yourself and say, if we think people should do that, what will they actually do? And that's what we understand through behavioral economics, behavioral science, understanding those rules that the subconscious brain uses to make those automatic decisions so you can better communicate with buyers, with employees or anybody else as you are looking to do any communication, just making it more effective. So you had a plan that got amazingly derailed, just as everything did at that time. And if we. Let's take a little moment to talk about your role and from the way that Maker's Mark approaches it, as well as how other brands may maybe tend to do that pre pandemic, so then we can talk about the really cool stuff that, that you all chose to do and how it was different.
- [14:14]
Absolutely. So I work in the advocacy sector of Beam Suntory, which is the parent company of Makers Mark Advocacy has traditionally been specifically for the on premise world. That's hotels, restaurants and bars. At Maker's Mark, it is slightly different because we are part of sales as well. So we manage a barrel program for the markets that we work in, which means that we straddle sales, marketing and advocacy. And before the pandemic, it was highly focused on, on premise, even within Maker's Mark and other suppliers out there. For us, when the pandemic happened, we were all worried about our jobs. Are people going to keep doing what they've been doing? Bars and restaurants are closing down at a rate that we've never seen before in the industry and they already work on really, really small margins. If you're a restaurateur and you're making between 5 and 8% profit a year, you're doing great. And that is razor thin. So when this happened and there was a shutdown for what we thought was just going to be a couple weeks or a couple months, we got really worried. And our parent company, Beam Centauri, very quickly, by the end of March sent out a company wide email and they said, we just want everybody to know that until this is over, we're not going to have any layoffs. And that was huge for me. I have two kids, I have a husband, I have a mortgage just like everybody else. And it gave me a place of psychological safety that I could start working through what I needed to do for my people, which is the industry.
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Right? Well, and it's not formally really announced into the world yet, but my second book is going to be coming out this fall and it's about change management and working with teams, helping them to better adapt to change within companies. And I love this aspect that Beam Centauri took on of really being able to empathize with where their teams were we're at and knowing that whether it's just sort of intuitively at that point, but this cognitive strain that is placed on people when those habits are upended. So you know, I was talking about how much the subconscious is doing to make decisions on that automatic level. That's done by habits. So where you keep your coffee cup, the way you drive into work, how you drive your car, what you do every day, how you open up your computer, where you sit, all those things are habits that helps your brain to run efficiently. And when those are shifted, you only have so much cognitive bandwidth that you are able to give up into every single day. And so the things that you would like to be able to spend more time on the creative processing, thinking through big picture plans or whatever projects you're working on are now given up to. Where did I put my cup again? Right. All these little things where I had a client that, you know, a few months into the pandemic was talking about calling it the COVID blahs, where you just were so tired. It's like I'm at home working, I'm in my sweats, I'm doing way less, I feel like, than I used to, but I'm so tired.
- [17:26]
Why do I need a nap at 2pm Right. I haven't done anything right, absolutely.
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And it's because of those lifts, little things that are changing. So those micro changes have such a big impact on our ability to think bigger. And I think we all saw in the pandemic the natural tendency then is to be looking really myopically at what, what are we going to do tomorrow? And not being able to have that foresight into how's this going to be impacting a month from now, three years from now from now? What can we, what should we be doing now? What's the right thing? People just got so focused on immediate problems and didn't invest in the future. And of course that's not what Maker's Mark did. So can't. So by having that empathy from Beam Centauri saying, hey team, you don't have to worry about your jobs and now you can focus on that advocacy for our partners in, you know, whatever aspect that is. So share a little bit about what you, you and your greater team did.
- [18:31]
So my team is fantastic. There are about 22 of us throughout the country, some of the most creative people I've ever met in my entire life. We are all out of the box thinkers and very, very passionate about what we do. Having that safe space to say, okay, I don't have to worry about survival. I don't have to worry about paying my mortgage. We could then focus on other people and we could focus the empathy that had trickled down to us and that had been given to us outward, which was absolutely fantastic. So part of Maker's Mark, just a little bit history here. It was started in 1953 by a husband and wife, Bill and Margie Samuels. And they started by baking bread in their kitchen and figuring out a mash bill that was all about taste and flavor. It had to taste good, right? There's, there's been bourbons before this that it's just like blow your ears off bourbon, right? They didn't want to do that. They wanted to focus on taste and flavor. So as we looked out, we saw that so many people were suffering. So many people in the on premise didn't have a safety net. They couldn't pay their rent, they couldn't eat those type of things. So we started planning, programming to help that. One of the very first things that we did as a company was do shift meals to go so we would buy food from a restaurant that was struggling and actually feed their people. And the trade community is very tight. In any community, usually bartenders jump around and they know all the other bartenders because you want to go somewhere after work to have a drink that isn't your bar. So one restaurant would make meals for everybody else and all of the trade people front of the house, back the house would come and get those meals and we could provide for them that way. And there was no ROI for us at the time. We just knew that we had to take care of our people. These are our people. Another thing that we did, based on our brand history and what was going on wider culturally was baking bread. So we decided to come up with breaking bread and we hired a baker to come in and show everybody how to make their own sourdough starter and actually bake bread for themselves and keep that starter and pass it on to their friends and family. And then at the same time that the on premise was suffering, the off premise was booming. It was crazy. So traditionally in beverage alcohol, November, December are the busiest months in retail. So we're talking about groceries, stores, liquor stores, chains, things like that. They get their highest amount of sales in November, December for the holidays. From March 2020 on through the rest of the year, every single month was November, December. So they were doing great. At the same time, consumers were changing their buying habits. They couldn't go to bars and restaurants, so they were Going to these grocery stores or chains, but they also didn't know how to make drinks. So we went online and we started doing virtual cocktail classes. It was fantastic. There was a lot of feedback. People actually took ownership of our brand in their house to do that.
- [21:39]
What I think is really important to stress here. So you were talking about this balance between the on premise and the off premise. So on premise for everyone who's not in the industry, that's your restaurants, your bars, place where you would go out with friends to get something off premise. Like you were saying, being buying something at a retailer or a liquor store off premise. If you had that myopic view to where you were really focused on how's makers going to survive this, you would be able to look and say, well hey, like our sales are up in off premise. And so let's just go all in. People can't be going to the restaurants right now. That'll come back someday and we'll be there when the restaurants need us eventually down the line. But like right now we can just go all in on this off premise stuff and we're gonna do cocktail training classes through YouTube and we can build our channel and all this like stuff that you're able to do, that's all about makers, which would have been a decent strategy, however, because of that empathy, knowing that those restaurant partners and you know, it's like walking the walk where you're saying like, we're here for you. And so instead of just doing your own, like tune into the Maker's Mark YouTube channel or doing video ads or something that you're able to show people how to make cocktails. You went and partnered with the restaurants. Right. And so talk a little bit about how that's lifting them up of being able to help do a class, you know, with the restaurant.
- [23:09]
Right. So we knew that the on premise was always a focus and we wanted to be there for them. So like you said, instead of just going with the easy way, we could do something that was a little bit more difficult and we could actually lean in with them, the distillery at this point, because buying patterns had changed, people were buying bigger sizes for us. We do, you know, 200 milliliter bottles, 350, 375 milliliter bottles, 750s. People were buying those bigger bottles and they were stockpiling at home. Well, the smaller bottles weren't being used and they were still at the distillery. So a couple of us got together and did a buy from the distillery. We purchased the smaller bottles. We Got them shipped into our market and the on premise could then use those bottles and they didn't have to buy them to do cocktails to go. So we started to do those things. We leaned in at a time when everybody else, some people in other supplier roles didn't have a job and they weren't going to these accounts. We were the only people that continually showed up in a safe way. Whether it was, you know, dropping something off in the back of the house or dropping something off in the front of the house and leaving or partnering with them so their bartenders could do an online class. All, all of these things helped over time. Just basically to show that we were leaning in at a time when nobody, that we weren't getting anything out of it.
- [24:35]
Right.
- [24:35]
Nothing at all.
- [24:36]
Well, and that's, I know just across other side of the industry where there were companies then trying to do virtual zoom happy hours that everyone hated, but you still missed this social connection. And so for people that were used to going out to a bar or restaurant who maybe weren't necessarily ordering like, you know, vodka being the. An example here, right. So it's like I just want a vodka soda. But it's not necessarily about the brand. And potentially they weren't necessarily familiar with or ordering Maker's Mark didn't have that affiliation or weren't thoughtful about it. Some people, but they knew the restaurant that they used to frequent or the bar that they went to. And if they said, we're going to be putting on this, you know, virtual, you know, cocktail making class that everybody gets to come on Zoom. You get the social interaction that you would have had and you get to interact with us and we laugh and we joke and they were able to pick up actual. So it's not like they had to go buy their own stuff. They were able to pick up kits at the restaurant with like a meal or something that they could bring home and then make their drinks with everybody.
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Right. And it became a place where the bartenders and the consumers could still come together in that it was kind of their own third space. That virtual environment turned into that third space. And we all miss being together. And it wasn't quite the same, but it gave people a reason to believe in actually helping someone else. We knew and consumers knew that their favorite places might not survive and they had the long term thought to say, oh, if I support my restaurant while everything is closed down, my restaurant and bar will still be there when things open back up and I can go back in and I can see my bartender And I can be there on a Wednesday night or Sunday to watch the football game. And they showed up for it, which was absolutely fantastic.
- [26:20]
Right. And so just being able to support something again with that long picture view and going to that seminar you talked about. So back we were talking about some of the A and M stuff, and you were really excited about the seminar that you got approved and it was going to happen, and then it couldn't happen. But then there was an opportunity to extend the support of restaurants. And based on your knowledge in the industry of knowing, you know, where, it might be difficult for them, but they have now an opportunity to learn. Can you share a little bit about how that kind of morphed?
- [26:53]
Sure, sure. So while it was a pain point for me that I didn't get to present this seminar at Tales of the Cocktail, it was always in the back of my head that I still wanted to do it. And helping the trade and advocating for the trade, educating the trade, has always been at the heart of everything that I want to do. It's very important to me because as a young bartender, that wasn't available to me. And when I went out and asked, like, hey, can somebody help me learn how to do this or make a Sazerac or some technical thing, I was told, hey, go read a book. That's what we did. And I knew that, that if I ever got into a place of power, so to speak, that I would do things differently. So I thought, okay, I'm going to turn this lemon into lemonade. I don't get to present at Tales of the Cocktail, which is something that was always on my bucket list that I wanted to do and check off my list. But I can still give back to the industry the same education and knowledge. And so when I was a generation manager and I was writing menus, long before the pandemic happened, I sat down with my executive chef and we looked at how to write a menu. And we had looked into getting somebody to optimize our menu, and the price was astronomical. Like I said before, your Profit margin is 5 to 8% in the restaurant industry. We couldn't afford the $5,000 bill for somebody to just fix our menu and then come back and do it again, maybe in a year or a season or three months or six months. So I thought, okay. I gave Jeff another call. We had been talking like once a month at this point. I said, would you be interested in doing the things that you're already doing at Texas A and M for a wider audience? And then I had to go in the back of the back end and garner support at Beam, Centauri and Maker's Mark and say, hey, can we pay for this? Because it's something that can help the industry when they really don't have the capital to invest themselves.
- [28:48]
Yeah. And so knowing that they needed some help with the menu optimization and some other areas and say, you know, how can we help support them? And so we did a four part training. I was very excited to be able to be a part of that. Partnering with Jeff and teaching about foundations of behavioral economics. We did a class on tipping and how to understand behavioral sciences to increase tips, of course, menu optimization and then on marketing and being able to. Yeah, social media tips and understanding how those restaurants can apply these lessons long term to be able to increase their own profits, be more effective, support their teams. And all this again was just something that Maker's Mark did.
- [29:41]
We just decided to lean in and we got the autonomy on our side to be able to do these things and to think outside the box and say, this is what's possible instead of this is what's prescriptive. This is what's always been done. So the pandemic opened up so many avenues for us just to think differently, which hopefully is sustainable in the future. And I think it is because we learned so many things. And so if I go back and forensically look at the numbers, because everything is all about sales at the end of the day. Right. So all big companies look at sales. If you look at the sales from the bars and restaurants that attended that sent their people to these seminars and it was all virtual, it was very safe from 2019, 2020, 2021. And now today we're talking about double and in most cases triple digit growth numbers, which is fantastic. And it's not just with makers. Bean Centauri has so many other brands besides Maker's Mark. It's across the board throughout our portfolio. So it made a huge difference. And people now look to us as that North Star, which is absolutely fantastic.
- [30:51]
Yeah. And within. So I feel like more celebration for that, like, amazing that, you know, we did these trainings and they made a huge impact for the restaurants themselves. Having higher profits at a time where it's just difficult to be competing and others are closing and whatnot. That they were able to have apply and see results is amazing. Also they there's the reciprocity piece where you might still then be saying, you know, so what's in it? Like, so okay, what's in it for us here at Makers Right. Was it really worth it? And knowing that in behavioral science, reciprocity is a really big concept of when we give things to people, they feel compelled to give back to us. This is, I love the. To use the example of you imagine it's, you know, you're about to go on a holiday break and you're getting ready to wrap up your desk at work and then someone comes in and says, oh, hey, hey, I wanted to catch you before you left. I got this little gift for you. It's nothing fancy, but here it is. You don't have a gift for them, like on the spot, in the moment, you feel terrible. Right. You feel awful. And then you probably say, oh my gosh, I'm so sorry, I left your gift at home. I'll bring it back after the holiday. And now you're gonna spend those, that time that you're away trying to find a gift to match this. Because we feel as humans compelled to give back when people give to us. And so this giving freely that Maker's Mark has done and that they were stepping up at a time that other brands were not. Yeah, yeah. Not just that they weren't stepping up, they stepped back. So I know you had conversations with some of those bartenders like you said that they, those restaurants are now pretty exclusively choosing or be more likely to pick.
- [32:40]
Yeah. So now, I mean, as holistically, when you look at how this industry works, there are distributors and suppliers and then your retailers, your bars and restaurants. So there are reps from other companies that are now showing up when things are safe, when it matters, when, when growth needs to happen. And they're looking at menu placements. Menu placements are huge for everybody. If you get a coffee cocktail on the menu, it means that you're going to continually order something and people see it on the menu and it's easy to order. So they're like, I want the maker's mark old fashioned. So these reps from other brands are now going to these establishments and they're saying, hey, I'd like to do this. And the bartenders or the owners or the buyers are saying, I'm doing this because these people were here for me when nobody else was. And it's made a huge difference for us.
- [33:29]
Yeah. So those like double and triple digit, like you said, not just at makers but across beam. Centauri is because they know that you were there and they want to support you in the way that you supported them. Which is just a feel good. I've got the goosebumps. Hopefully we've got some audience members with those two. I think it's such a great story that of doing the right thing and having it come back around where even if it hadn't, it would have been the right thing, even if it didn't end up being, being, you know, with such lift. But I love that it did and that there's such support of what you were able to teach in that. So as we are getting to wrap up our conversation. When you look into the future of, you know, work that you're doing that you're excited about from Maker's Mark, or insights in general, things that you want to be looking at, maybe some stuff at the lab, whatever it happens to be, you know, what's, what's on the horizon that you're most excited about. You think the audience should be too?
- [34:26]
Well, I'm a giant nerd, so I'm curious about absolutely everything. But something that I am so excited about and just it makes my heart grow three sizes because sometimes I'm a little bit of a Grinch, is the fact that we are all about sustainability at Maker's Mark. So we just got B Corp certified, which is fantastic. And there are so many stories about what the distillery is doing in Loretto to reach out to the community and to reach in to the employees. It is a fantastic place to work. We, we have a voice, we get to hear everyone's voice. They just changed some of the packing material and this is indicative of a lot of what Maker's Mark does. Kim Harmon is in charge of sustainability. She is our environmental sustainable champion. And one of the maintenance guys came to her and he's into cars. His nickname is Chili and nobody really knows what his real name is because that's how things work. And he said, hey, I just got shipped a car part and it was actually in bailed cardboard that was cut out. And we go through a ton of cardboard and glass and other things at the distillery. He said, is this something that we could look into? And she said, absolutely. So she did the research, brought, brought in this baler that actually cuts up the cardboard and now we can use that cardboard as our packing material instead of plastics, instead of things that aren't sustainable. I mean, we've partnered with the University of Kentucky. We have a white oak repository. One of the most important things about bourbon is oak and it just doesn't grow in a day. So you have to look 80 and 100 years out. And as a company beam Centaurian makers, Mark, we look at those hundred year goals and we can plant the seeds today that we personally may not see the shade of or don't get to climb those trees, but somebody else will.
- [36:14]
Yeah. And I know that even with products like you said. So the oak you're planting 80 or 100 years out, how many people listening are planning even 80 or 100 days out sometimes. Right. And just knowing too that product, because of the maturation project process, not just aging, you know that you have a five to seven year span that you can't just decide to make more bourbon tomorrow because you have big orders. You have, you know, you're five or seven years away if you needed to up.
- [36:47]
Yeah. I always joke with people, there's a huge difference between age and maturation. I feel like I'm in my mid-40s and. But that's my age. My maturation seems some days is like a 19 year old, some days is like a 12 year old boy. It just really depends. And I think that we're all like that, but it all affects the end product. Right. Like you, we've always been. Our North Star has always been taste and flavor. Taste and flavor is at the heart of everything that we do. And we can then, because we've been so focused on that one thing through our entire DNA, we can then focus on sustainability. Now we know exactly where taste and flavor comes from. We know what levers to pull. Now we can start looking outward and focus that way.
- [37:32]
Melina Palmer
Right.
- [37:33]
Greta Harper
And just being America's most loved bourbon brand.
- [37:37]
Melina Palmer
Right?
- [37:37]
Greta Harper
Absolutely.
- [37:38]
Yeah. So for everyone, as a lesson to take away from this leaning back on that, not getting so myopic and it's not just at times of great change like a pandemic. Hopefully none of us have something like that coming up on the horizon again, but we get too focused on the little stuff, the tomorrow. Like I said, 80 days out, you don't have to be thinking 80 years into the future like Maker's Mark is, but maybe planting some faster growing trees and thinking about the shade that you're going to need in a few years and thinking about how you can be doing the right thing in a way that's being able to use reciprocity, understanding how you can support your partners in a way that's just going to give back and help to. I feel like I'm going to just totally abuse this metaphor and like nurture that tree or something. I don't know. We'll just leave it there. Before I get too ridiculous and I want to say thank you again to Greta Harper from Maker's Mark for joining me today to talk about this amazing work and everything that you've been doing. And of course shout out to the Human Behavior Lab at Texas A and M University to Jeff and Marco Palma who is running the lab there. Love being a part of that team as well. I am Melina Palmer and this has been the Brainy Business Podcast here at IEX North America. And for everyone who is here live, get ready to enjoy another amazing live podcast from Happy Market Research. Thank you.
- [39:07]
Melina Palmer
Thank you again to Green Book and Greta Harper and the entire Maker's Mark team for their heart, forward, thoughtful approach to business and for reminding us what it really means to play the long game. So what got your brain buzzing as you learned from Greta today? For me, it's that powerful combination of empathy and foresight. Maker's Mark didn't just show up during the pandemic, which still would have been more than what a lot of other companies did it. Instead, they invested in people, relationships and trust. Not for the press or a short term spike in sales, but because it was the right thing to do. And that built loyalty in a way no promotion ever could. I also love how sustainability isn't just a buzzword for them, it's in every detail of their brand story, from distillery experiences to packaging to planting for a future they may never see. That's the kind of long term thinking we could all use a little more of. And if this episode resonated with you, you're definitely going to want to hear my upcoming conversation with Jason Vojovic on learning from the innovation and product development of the Great Depression. It's a fascinating dive into buying psychology at a time where we might be more likely to believe that no one was buying anything. But this era was actually the rise of personal color photography, domesticated pets, monopoly, and and so much more. While your business might not need to plan a hundred years into the future, there's a lot to learn from history and more long term thinking. Try this thought experiment to show how this can work on a personal level. Imagine it's five years from now and you've made it. If you're an entrepreneur, your company and lifestyle is exactly as you've always dreamed. If you work in a business, you've achieved a pinnacle role in your career. What does it look like? What are your days like? How are you spending your time? What's the balance outside of work? And how does that differ from what you're experiencing today? What can you do today to make that dream a reality in five years or less? And what do you need to stop doing now. It's the same for your company. What should you do now or stop doing to be who you dream of becoming in 5, 10 or 20 years? Whatever it is or whatever stood out for you in today's episode, come share it with me on social media. I'm the brainy biz pretty much everywhere and Melina Palmer on LinkedIn. And as always, there are links to everything, including my top related past episodes, books and ways to connect waiting for you in the show notes which are found within the app. You're listening to and@the brainybusiness.com 502 and thank you again to Greta Harper for joining me on the show today and for Green Book and the iiex North America Conference for making it possible. It was a delight to chat with and learn from you. Join me next time for a conversation with Jason Vojovic to discuss his new book, Bullfrogs Bingo and the Little House on the Prairie. It's gonna be a lot of fun. You don't want to miss it. Until then, thanks again for listening and learning with me and remember to be thoughtful.
- [42:17]
Thank you for listening to the Brainy Business Podcast. Molina offers virtual strategy sessions, workshops and other services to help businesses be more brain friendly. For more free resources, visit thebrainybusiness.
- [42:30]
Greta Harper
Com.