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Into It QuickBooks does not have any responsibility for updating or revising any information presented. Listeners should verify statements before relying on them. Hey everyone, I'm Jennie Torres and I'm Austin Haykwitz. Welcome to another episode of Mind the Business Small Business Success Stories, a podcast by iHeartRadio and Into It QuickBooks. In each episode, Austin and I chat with small business owners as they share their stories about the
ups and downs of owning a small business. Plus we'll learn from their experience about how you can help fortify and strengthen your own business.
Genie, I remember in our last episode with Kristin of Claire for Creators, you mentioned having your mom and sister as part of your staff. What was that process like for you?
Well, for me, it was a natural fit and a natural decision because I knew I wanted to work with people that I could trust and also people that I could keep it real with, and you know, when it comes to family, I think they checked off both of those boxes for me. So it's been fun to kind of see each other grow in that perspective and really gain respect, especially between me and my sister as like we're adults, we're colleagues. Now we're working together, we're building
this business. It's been actually really good for our relationship, even on a personal level. So I know, Austin, you found Christian to help you with your business and bring him on as a partner, But how did you determine that his experience and strengths would align with what you needed for your business. Did you actually like interview him and go through that whole process.
Yeah.
So, for those of you that might not know, Christian Blockwell is the co founder of my company and we work in tandem every day to build our business. But when we first met during the summer of twenty Christian was actually doing consulting for PwC in New York City. We did three things in the beginning that set our working relationship up for success. We had a trial period. We were transparent from day one, and we agreed on
compensation and its long term potential very early. So the trial period helped us figure out how we worked well together. I'd argue this was really just a drawn out interview process, but I quickly learned how he communicated with others, how he organized his work, and more importantly, how we'd worked together to solve problems. Transparency in trust was also super
important right as a content creator. I needed to know that I was working with someone that always had my best interest in mind and wasn't trying to take advantage of this awesome opportunity that I was afforded. And finally, aligning on compensation early was incredibly important because we both knew on day one what we were capable of and how that would impact us in the future if we were able to achieve that.
Yeah, that's really interesting. So before I hired my sister, I actually hired my first virtual assistant through my Instagram following I literally made an Instagram post I said, this is what I'm offering five to ten hours as a virtual assistant. This is what I can afford to pay and it was really cool, you know, in a sense of creating this new opportunity for me to now put money into someone else's pocket, and especially you know, as a woman of caller owned business, that for me is
really special. So I'm curious, how did you go about finding talent that you use now for your company besides your partner, you.
Know, from a tactical finding the talent perspective. I also find a lot of cool talent on social media, right I put those feelers out. I made posts on Instagram, LinkedIn Twitter, and even TikTok about my business's needs. And now the hard part though, is deciphering who's the right person for the job. So weirdly enough, Janis, I tasked everyone to email me a detailed description of their favorite vacation spot. That was like the application, like I just
wanted to know that thing. Because I did this for two reasons. One, if someone doesn't have that self started mentality to just go and send an email about something they really enjoyed, like, you know, would they have that same mentality with your business?
Probably not.
That was the first reason. But the second reason was I wanted to learn more about the intricacies that they experience that make them really happy. Right, maybe they're like the time off and they really enjoy interactions or the freebies or you know whatever part of that was. So that then helped me become a better leader and I was then better to align compensation with what they really cared about.
Yeah.
I love that example and it reminds me of the hiring process that I went about for hiring my first virtual assistant slash content creator because I was kind of giving them a lot of different things to help me with. I had everyone give me an example of a piece
of content that they would create for my brand. I also invited folks to criticize what we're not doing great and I wanted to see, like, who would give me the honest feedback that I need in order for me to not stay stagnant as a business owner as a brand. And so when I found the person that I eventually hired, I respected the fact that she was like, you know, you guys are doing this really well, but there's definitely opportunities here that you're missing out on, And that for
me was like a no brainer. I'm like, yeah, this is this needs to be my person.
I love that. I definitely have the same way of thinking about this. Right, I want people to be transparent. I want them to be upfront. I want them to let me know what am I doing right, what am I doing wrong? And how can we work together to solve this problem and become a better units going forward.
Yeah, I think we both still are operating very much in the startup mentality, and I know for sure I definitely need to get a more formal hiring process together. But luckily, our guest for this next episode, Kevin Wog, the co founder of Lunar Heart Seltzer, has some insights on how to do just that. After a late night of partying in twenty nineteen, Kevin and his best friend Sean Roe stopped for a late night bite at their local Korean fried chicken joint. While trying to order drinks
with their food. That night, the idea for Lunar Heart Seltzer was born. It's the first and only craft heart Seltzer brand made with real Asian fruits like yuzu and leechi. Their goal was simple to deliver an elevated heart Seltzer experience using flavors most emblematic of their childhood, heritage and identity in an unapologetic pursuit of what they call the
reverse lunchbox moment. At Lunar, Kevin leads sales and finance while he and Sean developed new flavors and products in the Lunar lab together.
Kevin Wang, welcome to mine the business.
Thanks for having me really excited for this episode, man, So I need to know how did you come up specifically with the idea of your company. We heard a little bit of the origin story here from Janie, but I'd love to hear it from your own words.
The story is as what Jennie said, we were eating dinner. We were drinking bud light and a white Claw, and we were like, why isn't there something that really resonates with us, right, that really pairs well with the food. And that late night drunken thought turned into early morning, eight am ordering you know, brewing equipment on Amazon and online, and the next thing you know, we've got all this stuff, you know, kegs in fermenttors in our apartments in New York City.
It started off really just innocuously right, brewing something that represented us, that took the flavors that you know I loved growing up. You know, I was I'm Taiwanese American, and every summer I would be in Taiwan, you know, on the streets with Grandma. She'ld buy some leachees and I would bite into those and that moment, like that is a core memory right there, And how do I take that and share that with people who've never had LEECHI like they're missing out right? How do I share that?
And that was really kind of the goal. And you know, we would just brew. I'd have friends come over every month to try whatever we were cooking up. And by the end, after about a year and a half, they were like, Kevin, this is this is really good, Like you should sell this? And we were like, yeah, why not? And that was the beginning of that slippery slope. I love it.
So let's keep rolling with that idea. What is the reverse lunchbox moment?
So my parents immigrated to the US from Taiwan, and they would make lunch for me and for me to bring to school for a lot of you know, children
of immigrants. You open up your lunch box and you've got you know, maybe like a ammy or you know, fried rice or kimchi, and the kids around you are like, ew, what is that, And that's a lunchbox moment, right when you all of a sudden feel this this insecurity, this feeling of being an outsider because people are judging you for what you're bringing for lunch, and for you, you're like, that's what I eat every day, Like this is my favorite I love ed a mommy like that was my
favorite favorite fruit growing up. And so the reverse lunchbox moment is us trying to take that and actually own it, own that narrative and be like, look, here is what I'm bringing, and I am proud to be bringing kimchi for lunch. I am proud to be seen drinking a leechy hertzelter instead of feeling ashamed. So how we reverse that and reverse that narrative?
I love that.
So, Kevin, can you tell us how long into the business did it take you to realize, oh, I need some help, like I can't keep doing this, you know as a two person show.
Yeah, both of us quit jobs in February twenty twenty one, and we made our first hire a year after. And the first year was the most tiring year of my life. With the business that we're building, right, it's a physical product, it's alcohol. And you know, when we started a lot of different distribution partners, retailers, you know, investors, they were like,
this product is so niche, right, which stun that hurt. Now, first of all, there's twenty two million Asian Americans in the US, but also, hey, who doesn't love Alchi martinizz Come on, that's not a niche product. And so we really had to go at it ourselves and we had to prove that this was beyond just a niche. And to do that, I literally was running the streets of New York. I would knock on doors Monday through Friday, the whole day, the whole night. I would just have
a backpack of cans. And by after about a year, we had the traction where distributors partners were like, oh wow, Lunar is everywhere, like this is a thing. Let's work together. And by then I was like, Okay, I need someone to help me here. I can't be doing this the whole time. I have other things to do to run this business. So we made a first hire, which was our director of.
Sales, and then from there, what did the scale up and building of the team look like from that point on?
Yeah, So we started with our director of sales, and we quickly realized we need more salespeople to help kind of share that load, and so now we have We're at about five employees today. Most of them are our sales team. They are feet on the streets. They are there actively working with their customers, working with our distributor partners, you know, really being out there to resolve any issues, close new business, and then up sell and grow our
accounts as we continue to build our prisons out. Very cool.
How do you find the right talent for your team? Like where do you source these folks from?
You know, that was a great challenge in the beginning. You know, I don't come from this alcohol world, right, I use the work in tech and so like when I started, I was like, you know what, I'll post on LinkedIn, you know, I'll put up a post, I'll ask friends, but like, no one I knew knew anybody in the world. Like, it just was so many degrees removed from this industry. So referrals was kind of out of the question. And I was like, Okay, shoot, how
do I find the right people the talent? We're looking for people that can represent our brand right and really champion the values and really kind of be a storyteller for us as Asian Americans, or it just probably ask people of color, like, how do we be there and really represent a fight for our narrative? And that's like even more limiting right on kind of the pool of applicants. So we started posting on industry specific job boards, and then we did a lot of asking our accounts for help.
So we would ask our bartenders or our beverage directors at a bar, at the hotel, or at the beer buyer at a grocery store. We'd ask them like, hey, do you know anybody who was in this industry? And that's how we were really getting the word out about the brand. That plus a lot of press. We really focus on media to get that attention, to get that awareness, and that kind of came back to us where we started getting a flood of pretty awesome applicants that kind
of matched those criteria. People were self selecting into this job. So we're we're pretty blessed to have an awesome team. We're majority minority employees. It's really awesome to see.
Yeah, that's brilliant.
So Austin and I have talked about the fact that I actually work with my sister in my own business, and I'm still figuring out my company policy because I think it's easy when you're working with somebody that's so familiar, it's like, yeah, we'll just figure it out as we go. So I'm curious, what have been some important factors for you and Sean to be able to figure out how to work together well? And then also, how do you communicate your company expectations to employees.
We're kind of making it up as we go along.
That's super real.
We have a culture book, we have company values, and so it's like a page. It's super simple.
You know.
The culture is built by the actions and behaviors we take in the words we say when we're together. I think rather than a corporate doc on the screen, like who's going to just like open that? Let me reference my behavior against this dog, like who's going to do that? You know, like we're you know, we're human. And people say culture comes from the top. I think it does, but also comes from the people that you bring on.
You know, especially in an early stage of a company, it's really around making sure that everyone feels included, feels value that we're taking time to appreciate each other. We have a team all hands every week and we'll kind of do snaps where we kind of show thanks to our colleagues or kind of really make sure we're showing appreciation.
And I think that's important for us as a company and then for like me and my founder, the two of us, we had never worked together like we were friends before, we never like work together, right, Like, that's like a whole thing, Like that could be a whole show about like how do you transition a friendship into a like a partnership, Like that's a whole thing. There
was definitely a challenge learning how we worked together. So we actually made a commitment to each other that we would go to like couples therapy, making sure that we are investing time in our relationship beyond just you know, work, which is all consuming, and making sure that we are taking time to be intentional about how we are, you know, checking in on each other.
So that's is it actual couples therapy? Like, Yeah, that is the coolest thing I've ever heard.
I need to do that, I need to try that. At least I love that idea. Christian, if you're listening to this, we're going to a couples therapy.
My god, I love that. Oh my gosh.
Coming up on Mind the Business Small Business success Stories.
First, you start off by journaling what did I do this week? And then you kind of group those and be like, what are tasks that fit into a rule? Where do I need help? But you're either solving a need because you need more or you're solving a need because you need better.
We'll be right back after the break.
Welcome back to Mind the Business Small Business Success Stories, brought to you by iHeartRadio and Into It Quick Books. All right, Kevin, let's get into the numbers. When budgeting for a new hire, how do you make that decision? Do you build a model? Do you try and figure out the sales aspect? Walk me through a step by step how you figure out is it time to hire another person?
Yeah, you know, it's such an art and a science. I would say, I think some of it is the numbers, but you always need your budget to make sense, You need a numbers to add up. But then there's a part of it where if I just simply don't have time to like do stuff beyond things that the business needs, that is as valuable as the model if I just don't have time to do anything else, well, seems like
I need help. It always takes longer to hire than you expect, so like for us, we are always hiring in advance, like, well, in advance, we'll telegraph and we will kind of broadcast way earlier than we need. Hey, we're looking for this role because it takes time for people to discover the role, to work with that courage to be like, you know what, this is a jump I want to take to jump into startup world, right, So making sure we're giving people that opportunity, and this
has been really successful for us. We have this thing align on a career's page that says, you know, feel free to invent your own role, and we're inviting people to pitch themselves to us, like here's why you should hire me because of X, like you need my help
in doing why. And that has been so awesome because there are these awesome go getters out there that are going to reach out, that are going to pitch us, and sometimes we're not even thinking about that and we're like, oh, you're right like that, let us put that into the model. Let us think about that, and we'll get back to you. Like, thank you for putting that idea into our mind. You know, yeah,
I think that's really insightful, Kevin. And now here's the statistic. Right, according to quick Books, more than half of small businesses, right, fifty one percent are saying it's becoming harder and harder to hire those skilled workers. Even forty two percent are saying it's getting harder to retain the skilled workers. So let's say you've hired someone you figured it out. How do you keep your employees engaged and happy in a time of inflation and quiet quitting?
Right? How do you show employees that they're valued and appreciated, especially those new hires.
The most important thing is showing appreciation. I think our tradition of snaps has been really valuable.
Right.
There's so many things that happen in any given week, and I think for me and for a lot of people, you're focused on the next thing, you're focused on growing the business, and you might forget or overlook. You know, so and so did this, and this was really helpful for me, and I might have to take it for granted and moved on like awesome, great, cool, let's move on. Let's use this to do the next project and making
sure that we're being really thoughtful about showing appreciation. And I think after that, it's aligning and making sure you're keeping in mind what your employee's goals are long term. Right, Let's say that someone wants to start their own business in five ten years. That's awesome, that's a phenomenal goal to have. And how do I make sure that I am setting them up to be successful in five years, that their time here working with us is valuable and
is going to contribute to their success later on. And so things like bringing them into meetings where like maybe they're not part of that team, but that's okay because they want to learn and experience it. I think things like that are important for an employer to make sure you're not just saying we care about the long term success of your team, but really walking the walk and being there to check in with your employees like, Hey, just want to check in, you know, how you're feeling,
has this been helpful for you? And just making sure you're continually investing in that long term goal. And that's I think how you really, you know, show that you're listening and that you're acting upon it.
Man, does anyone else want to work for Kevin. Now after hearing this, this is so exciting today.
He sounds like the coolest boss ever, Like for real. Okay, So looking back when you first started your talent search, what's the thing that surprised you the most about the process.
I think the first thing is it just tastes longer than you expect. First of all, you need to write it and write it well. I think that is also hard, Like people don't think about that. I think a lot of people like, oh, it's copy and paste the job wreck from somewhere else. No, like you need to really be thoughtful about what you're writing in there so that
people know what you're expecting. And then finding out where to put it, where to market and really push the rec out where can you find the people that you're looking for? Then screening, filtering, there's like so many steps, Like no one really thinks about it. You're like, oh, ye're hiring, right, Like that's like one word that just somehow like hand waves over all the things that need to be done. So I think that was the biggest surprise. Just took a long time.
Yeah, So for the.
Small business owner who's listening right now, who's maybe ready to hire that first external employee or just really take that next step toward building out a team.
What advice would you have for them? You know, I would say, first you start off by journaling in a given week, what did you do? And then you kind of group those and be like, what are tasks that fit into a role. Where do I need help right? Or where am I not good at? I think those are two of the areas that make the most sense. But you're either solving a need because you need more or you're solving a need because you need better. And I would say you start there identifying what rule you need.
And then the second piece of advice, I would just say, start hiring early. Putting out that rec doesn't mean you need to hire. Sometimes putting out the rec and writing it helps you think through who and what you need to hire for. And then I would say sometimes you'll start interviewing people and you'll find someone that clicks. You'll find this all star that is going to be just awesome, and missing out on someone like that to add value
to your business is a shame. There are so many awesome people that can really take your business to the next level.
These are some gems right now, you're dropping for us, Kevin Man, I'm loving these, especially the you know, solving for a need because you need more or because you need better. That's so interesting to think about.
So running a brand that's breaking into markets across the United States requires a lot of understanding of various states laws and taxes for employees. Right, So how did you begin to build out your HR resources?
That is a great question. I think for me, it's when you think about bringing on employees. Right, It's so simple to say, but there's a weight of that decision. Right, all of a sudden, their livelihood, their income is now resting on you as a business owner. It's on your shoulders.
So how do you really take time to make sure that you're informing them of this is your vacation policy, this is their health insurance benefits even you know, like reading all the different types of insurance you could offer, Like I barely understood PPO, and like I don't know all these other I didn't know anything, and nor did I really care. You know, when I just worked at someone else's company, But all of a sudden, I was like, wow, my co founder and I spent a whole weekend with
just reading like what does this mean? What would I want? What would I want when I was younger? What do I want now? Trying to have that whole breadth of options for our employees, I think, and you know, we got feedback to first year they're like, no, this one sucks, like this insurance is really I was like, okay, no, did we had more options? So I think it's really about that. And you know, you're locked into a lot of these changes and things. It's like a yearly cycle.
And so I would say before you commit something so large, just know that it's your employees well being. It's a human's well being, it's their livelihood for a whole year. So make sure you treat that with the respect that it needs.
Yeah, I love that advice.
So as you continue to grow, Lunar Hard Seltzer, what are some of the hiring goals you have for the next call it five years?
Five years? Oh my, five years? Awesome. That's a lot of that's a lot of planning. I think for us, a big part of how we are growing this business it's around geographic expansion. So for us, on the sales side of things, we will be building out kind of a nationwide sales team that's going to cover a lot of regions, so there's a lot of geographic based hiring that we will need to do. And on the flip side,
we haven't really hired for marketing yet. You know we should and so we absolutely plan on building out a world class marketing team and that will probably come online in the next few years. But it's one of those things when it's a challenge to think a year in the future, let alone three or four or five. I can have all these lofty goals, but things change, right and I think it's being able to roll with that
and adapt. I think that's kind of the name of the game for any small business or any startup owner. I agree.
So then let's think about the next quarter six months. What's like real immediate next big things that you're really excited about that might be happening this summer or maybe this fall.
Yeah, we are about to launch Lunar into California, So that is an exciting development for us. Congratulations, thanks man. We've had customers reach out to us for almost two years asking for a larner to be available in the state, and we've always told them coming soon, coming soon, and it's been two years, so now actually coming soon. So we're we're really excited to be doing that. And we are also looking for content creators interns to kickstart our
marketing team. So if you are passionate about pioneering the cultural revolution in American alcohol, drop a line on a website, send us a DM. I love the chat. I love it.
That's awesome, man. Congratulations on launching the State of California. That is super super exciting.
Absolutely so Kevin.
Before we let you go, we have to know what is your favorite Korean fried chicken spot.
Oh man, no pressure, this is a hot topic here, guys. There's a spot in New York City. It's called Turntable Chicken Jazz. It's got vinyl records. It looks super super cool. They've got these massive chicken like drumsticks. These chickens are huge. I don't know what they're doing, but they're so medy, they're so delicious. They're like triple fried. So go there for New York City. It's a blast.
I love that.
My introduction to Korean fried chicken was through a restaurant chain called bon Chon in New Jersey, and I was like forever change, So shout out to the Fried Chicken for being the muse the inspiration for this incredible brand that you've built.
And thank you so much for being here.
Thank you all for having me. Next time we'll do this irl over some Fred Chicken.
Heck, yeah, I love it. Thanks Kevin, Denise. That conversation with Kevin was top notch.
I really enjoyed it.
I feel like I learned a lot of little gems and secrets, But I want to know from you what stuck out the most.
For me? It was two things.
The first, it's always so interesting for me to hear how business owners go about thinking through their hiring process, like what areas of the business am I going to prioritize in? First For Kevin it was sales. For me, it was actually hiring just a virtual assistant who could answer emails and go back and forth with administrative stuff so they could take that off my plate. So I always think that's super interesting, and I think it's a good reminder there's no right or wrong way to go
about building and scaling your business. It's really just about, you know, taking one step out of time and seeing where those deficiencies are in your business model and finding the right resources and the right talent to get you to that next level. So that was number one, and then I think the second for me was I love the fact that Kevin was so real about, you know,
how we do our business. We're just kind of learning on the fly here, and I think that's really what entrepreneurship is for most folks who don't have the background in it.
You are kind of building the plane as you're flying.
And so to hear that, you know, even awesome companies like his are kind of just winging it a little bit, it makes me feel better about the fact that I've also had that similar journey too.
How about you.
Absolutely I'm over here in the seat of you know, fake it till you make it, because that's pretty true.
Yeah.
For me, I think it's.
Two things that stuck out, And it kind of goes back to what you're just talking about with your first hire. You know, are you hiring because you need to do more or because you need to do better? And I think at the end of the day, for you, maybe it was because you need to do more, right, you need this assistant.
To help you out to be more productive.
Maybe some people are hiring because they need a better type of product focused employee or a better marketer or whatever that might be. So I think just like understanding
the difference between those two factors is really important. And then the second thing that stuck out to me was just how long the hiring process was, and especially for the types of sales employees, and how hard it was from to find those people the job description writing, finding those specific experiences and hiring for those skill sets for people to be successful in their role for his business
was super super important. It seemed like, so hiring is one word, but it involves seventeen different processes around it. So I was super excited that Kevin walked us through all of them, and I'm eager to hear what's next.
And so for his company, Louner absolutely shout out to all the solopreneurs and the new business owners who are wearing those seventeen hats and are slowly trying to figure out how to assign them to other people. It's not easy, but you know, it's all part of the journey.
Absolutely. Well, that's it for today's episode. You can find me on social media at Austin Hankwitz.
And you can find me at Yokiero Dineto podcast.
You can also follow Into It QuickBooks on all social media at QuickBooks, and to get tools you need to start, run and grow your business, head to QuickBooks dot com today.
Catch the next episode of Mine the Business Small Business success Stories on Thursday, June twenty second, where we speak to Gulaid and Divina Ismail about their coffee company, Any SIPs, and how they learned to adapt to economic trends.
You won't want to miss that one, so don't forget to follow, rate and review the show wherever you listen to podcasts so you can stay up to date on future episodes.
Check out our show notes for more information from this episode and workforce solutions, and a huge thank you to our guest Kevin Wang. You can catch up with him and all things Lunar Hard Seltzer on their Instagram at Drink Lunar.
This podcast is a production of iHeartRadio and Into It QuickBooks.
Our executive producer is Molly Sosha, our supervising producer is Nikiah Swinton, and our writer is Tyree Rush.
Our head of post production is James Foster, and we will see you next time.