2:00

You gotta have incredible talent

2:02

at every position. There

2:12

are fires burning when you go out. Can

2:15

you believe it? Such an idiot. And then you

2:17

go back to, this is totally gonna be amazing.

2:19

There are so many easy ways. So I have

2:21

no idea what to do. Sorry, we made a

2:23

mistake. But you have to time it right. Oops.

2:27

We're gonna have a three bedroom apartment. It

2:29

just seems absolutely nut balls 10 years later.

2:31

Well, that's just how you do it. We

2:34

haven't made it just how you do it.

2:38

This is Masters of Scale. I'm

2:44

Jeff Berman, your host. Fawn

2:50

Weaver is using every ounce of her

2:52

experience as a marketer, an investor, and

2:54

an author to fuel the

2:56

rise of Uncle Nearest Premium Whiskey. She

3:00

never meant to get into the beverage business.

3:03

Her obsession with the story of Uncle Nearest

3:05

started as an idea for a book. Fawn,

3:08

welcome to Masters of Scale. Thank you for having me. Pleasure

3:12

to have you. I want to start

3:14

by having you take us back to

3:16

your 40th birthday. You

3:18

decided to take a trip. Yes. Some

3:20

people want to go to a beach or a mountain.

3:23

You chose to go to... Lynchburg,

3:25

Tennessee. Why? Because

3:27

that is where the story of Nearest Green was.

3:30

And I had read on the cover of

3:32

the New York Times International Edition, the headline

3:34

was Jack Daniels Embraces a Hidden Ingredient, Help

3:36

from a Slave. The credit for

3:38

being Jack Daniels' teacher and mentor was

3:40

given to a white man by the

3:42

name of Dan Caw, preacher and a

3:44

distiller. And the community

3:46

believed that it was actually an enslaved

3:48

man on his property near screen. That

3:52

was the actual teacher. That was the actual mentor.

3:54

So that's what the story was about.

3:56

I think the reason why it struck a chord with me

3:59

is up until that... when

8:00

they discovered that part of the home

8:02

was a pristine time capsule from the

8:04

early distillery days. The

8:07

wallpaper was hand-painted roses, and

8:09

behind the wallpaper was the insulation, which

8:12

was newspaper. And every

8:14

single newspaper that was used for

8:16

insulation was written October 10th or

8:18

October 11th, 1898. Wow.

8:23

Then you went into the boys' room, and

8:25

someone was barrel stencil practicing all

8:27

over the walls. Fawn

8:31

moved to Lynchburg and went into an

8:33

even deeper research rabbit hole. She

8:36

unearthed piles of old photos and

8:38

historical documents. She also

8:40

interviewed countless relatives of nearest Green.

8:44

Along the way, she heard a common

8:46

request from those relatives. The best way

8:48

to memorialize their ancestor? Put

8:51

his name on a bottle. Fawn

8:54

couldn't shake the idea. She

8:56

started learning everything she could about how to start

8:59

a whiskey brand, and quickly

9:01

found that, to put it mildly,

9:03

it's a complicated industry. Many

9:06

of those complications date back to the

9:08

Prohibition era. The

9:10

entire time of Prohibition, the mob is running

9:12

the liquor business. Then at

9:14

the end of it, the politicians in

9:16

their pockets have this brilliant idea. Well,

9:19

we should make sure the mob is never allowed to run

9:21

the liquor business again. So let's create

9:23

a middle tier so that

9:25

the suppliers can never be the

9:27

buyers. The person who's making

9:29

it can't also own a restaurant. They can't

9:32

own a bar. They can't sell directly to

9:34

the people who are buying liquor. So there's

9:36

someone who can make it and someone who

9:38

can sell it to the customer directly, and

9:41

then there's someone in the middle who's distributing

9:43

it. Correct. Now here's the challenge though, is

9:46

that that happened, but

9:48

somehow every single person in

9:51

that second tier is

9:53

named Billy, Joey, Louis,

9:56

like everybody. And

10:00

now all of these generations later,

10:02

that's not changed. And

10:04

so it is a really

10:07

difficult business to get into

10:09

because there's a lack of familiarity

10:11

of both women in power

10:13

and business in the industry and people of

10:16

color overall. You've got the intersection of both.

10:18

And I have the intersection of both. And

10:21

so imagine coming into this industry and

10:23

thinking, okay, well, I'll just

10:25

take it straight to the consumer. No,

10:27

no, you won't. Absolutely, you won't. And

10:30

so the challenge with that second

10:32

tier, their bills are paid

10:34

for by big guys. And that's

10:37

a huge challenge because you could create

10:39

the best whiskey in the world. But

10:41

if you can't persuade a distributor to

10:43

actually sell your product to the end

10:45

customer, you've got nothing. You

10:47

have nothing. So what did you do to

10:49

figure out, one, how do we make this?

10:52

And then two, how do we crack that

10:54

distribution? Yeah. So the how do

10:56

we make this? Because it was quite fortuitous. The realtor

10:58

who we bought the home from, she said, well, if

11:00

you ever decide to put his name on a bottle,

11:02

I'll come out of retirement to make sure you get

11:04

it right. Wow. So as

11:07

it turned out, real estate was basically

11:09

her second career. She spent her entire

11:11

life in the family business. And

11:13

when she left Jack Daniel Distillery, she was the

11:15

head of whiskey operations. So she

11:17

knew exactly how to get the product

11:19

right and how to get that in

11:22

the bottle. So that piece wasn't the

11:24

issue. It is the cost

11:26

and the influence of being

11:28

able to get your product on

11:30

shelves. And so

11:32

the process that I took to do this,

11:35

I don't know that I would recommend it for anybody, but

11:37

it was very risky. So in

11:39

our industry, the norm is you start off

11:41

in a single state and

11:43

then within about seven years, if

11:45

you're able to build traction in

11:48

that single state, then you'll try

11:50

to get into maybe four states

11:52

that connect to that one

11:54

state. So everything is still touching everything. You can still

11:56

kind of drive to it in a day type of

11:58

thing. From there, hopefully

12:01

after about 25 years, you've built something.

12:03

In my instance, I thought,

12:05

there's never been a woman or a person of

12:08

color to ever succeed in this industry. So

12:10

I can't take the path that

12:12

they're suggesting because everyone else has failed.

12:15

This country is 70% women and people

12:17

of color. And we have

12:19

failed in this industry across the board.

12:22

And so I said, I want to get into all

12:24

50 states in less than two years. And

12:27

the reason that I wanted to do that is

12:29

because I knew the only way that I could

12:31

level the playing field with the hundreds of millions

12:33

of dollars that the big guys were spending in

12:35

marketing is I would need

12:37

to use unearned media to help me

12:39

to tell the story. Well, national press

12:41

has no interest in doing a regional story.

12:45

They want a national story. Well, if

12:47

I'm only in three states, I'm

12:49

regional. But I mean, fun. If you're

12:52

Dwayne The Rock Johnson, sure. There's

12:54

a path to that. You're a first time

12:57

liquor entrepreneur building a brand that

12:59

has an incredible story behind it.

13:02

But how do you make that happen? Well, the

13:04

first thing that I did was people in

13:06

the industry on the spirit side, they had

13:08

this belief that awards don't matter. If

13:11

you got San Francisco, double gold,

13:13

gold, best in class, that was

13:15

the only one that they believed

13:17

mattered. But again, I like

13:19

going against the grain and I like proving people

13:21

wrong. I don't know what that trick comes from,

13:23

but it is just in me. And

13:26

so my thought process was, well, maybe

13:28

people don't care about winning an award.

13:31

But if we became the most

13:34

awarded bourbon in the world out

13:37

the gate, they would care. And

13:39

I knew we had a head of whiskey operations with

13:41

31 years of experience. I knew that

13:44

we could make an incredible product,

13:46

that we could blend an incredible product. And

13:49

so I said submit us into

13:51

every award competition around the world.

13:53

We began doing that before we ever put a

13:56

bottle in the marketplace. Wow.

13:58

Wow. and

14:00

so much money. So we had

14:02

to get consumers talking about

14:05

us even before the distributors

14:07

were taking us on. You pushed all

14:09

your chips in on the strategy. Everything.

14:11

Yeah, and you didn't raise venture. Still

14:14

haven't. Right, and so how did you

14:16

fund this? The very first investor was

14:18

my husband's former employee, employer, and he

14:20

did not like the plan at all.

14:23

Now mind you, my business plan was

14:25

really good. It was solid. I'm sure.

14:28

But it did have to take into account with

14:30

the SWOT analysis that a

14:33

massive threat was

14:35

if Brown Foreman, who owned Jack Daniels,

14:37

decided to wage a war against us.

14:39

They could wage a quiet war. They

14:41

could have opposed our trademark filings. But

14:43

wouldn't have been smart, but you've seen

14:45

big companies do stupid things. And

14:48

that would have been very costly. And

14:51

yes, in the end we would have won, but

14:53

then we would have had no money left

14:55

to actually build the brand. When you were

14:57

talking to your husband's former employer and other

15:00

prospective investors, were you leaning into this threat

15:02

to the business? I was. We

15:05

talk about doing, because it's a move that I

15:07

think very few people actually do, saying here are

15:09

the reasons not to invest in us. Absolutely. Talk

15:11

about how you did that if you would. So

15:13

we leaned into it, and I tell entrepreneurs all

15:16

the time, when you're doing your business plan, if

15:18

you're only looking at all of the strengths, you're

15:20

missing a huge point. The weaknesses

15:22

and the threats are important, because if

15:24

you can't answer how you're going to

15:26

maneuver around those, how you're going to

15:28

win, then investors are not

15:31

going to be comfortable. I absolutely leaned

15:33

into it and said, listen, this could

15:35

happen, but the greatest rewards always come

15:37

from the greatest risks. And

15:39

so I didn't shy away from the fact that

15:42

they were massive risks. Right, for all of our

15:44

strengths and opportunities, here are the weaknesses and threats.

15:46

But here's how I intend to handle them. You

15:49

started raising some capital, you

15:51

didn't sell too much of the business to anyone, you've held

15:53

on to control a bit. You

15:55

started making the whiskey. You

15:58

started winning the awards. that you set out

16:00

to win. Yes. Is that

16:02

when the distributors started saying, oh,

16:05

like how did you get them to the place

16:07

of saying, we're ready to take you national? The

16:09

press. The press. I give

16:11

all credit to the press because

16:14

even before we began winning the

16:16

awards, they just allowed me

16:18

to come and to share the story

16:20

and to share the story behind the

16:22

brand. When we created Uncle Narest, that

16:24

was the first time in history that

16:26

an African American had been commemorated on

16:29

a spirit bottle, any spirit. And

16:31

so the way that I really did it

16:33

was I would go to them and I

16:35

did a lot of these pitches myself. And

16:39

I'd say, look at all these bourbons you have. Which

16:42

one is not a white male? Just any

16:45

of them. And so it was a

16:47

bit of a wake up call for them because no one had

16:49

ever asked the question before. And so then

16:51

they're realizing, yes, our country is 70% women

16:53

and people of color, and you have never

16:56

had a bourbon brand and that commemorated

16:58

either. They thought, well, we can't say

17:00

no, but here's the thing. Not

17:03

saying no and having any idea how to sell

17:05

my brand are two very different things. So

17:08

this is how we got the distributors

17:10

on board. As I told them, I

17:12

didn't expect them to do anything but drop off the product. We

17:15

would sell the brand. We would do

17:17

the work. They would be a high price FedEx.

17:20

But I told them all at the very beginning, there will

17:22

come a time where we are gonna build this brand and

17:25

I am going to have an expectation that you will no

17:27

longer be a high price FedEx, but I'll

17:29

let you know when we get there. But in the meantime, we'll go

17:31

to the Bevmos or the Costcos or whoever it is. We're gonna go

17:33

everywhere. We would do it ourselves. We had

17:35

no expectation of them in

17:38

those first couple of years. And

17:40

so we built the entire thing

17:42

out without having the distributors in

17:44

mind, other than saying

17:46

drop off the product because we legally need

17:49

you to drop off the product, but we

17:51

will do the work. So you were going,

17:53

selling the story, explaining why this matters,

17:56

explaining the quality of the drink as

17:58

well. And, fighting for

18:00

that precious shelf space and promotion,

18:03

whatever else they might give you. Absolutely. Just

18:05

it's hand to hand. Absolutely. And

18:08

it is a, I mean, the

18:10

nature of the distributor world, even

18:12

to this day, it's not static.

18:15

It's constantly changing. It's constantly moving

18:17

around. Their dynamics are

18:19

constantly changing. And so I'm

18:22

always having to refigure that

18:24

out. Well, what's fascinating part about this

18:26

is it

18:28

is in some ways a counterintuitive approach to

18:31

scale because you are

18:33

going door to door. That's exactly what

18:35

we're doing. Selling, but because you weren't

18:37

just doing Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, Alabama, like

18:39

the start one state and go regional,

18:41

you were able to get it out

18:43

everywhere, which I imagine created a virtuous

18:45

cycle because now the press is picking

18:47

up more. Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely.

18:50

And then as there's a little bit of success,

18:52

then from that little bit of success, then we're

18:54

able to share that and the press picks up

18:56

that little bit of success. And I think a

18:58

lot of people are not very good about bragging

19:00

about their brands, but the

19:03

thing is, is that consumers actually like

19:05

that. Being humble about your

19:07

brand is not the way to go.

19:09

You can be humble in your life,

19:11

but don't be humble about your brand.

19:13

You have to brag because that's what

19:15

consumers care about. That is what the

19:17

press cares about. And if you are going to

19:20

go toe to toe with big boys that are

19:22

spending hundreds of millions of dollars on marketing and

19:24

you don't have that ability, you

19:27

better know how to tell your story 10 different ways

19:29

from Sunday. Still

19:32

ahead, how Fawn prioritizes company

19:35

culture in the midst of rapid

19:37

growth. Our

19:46

10 year anniversary as a company was coming

19:49

up and I said,

19:51

you know, I really want to do something big.

19:54

And we settled on the idea that we were

19:56

going to take a grand

19:58

vacation together. That's

20:00

Capital One business customer and Pinnacle

20:02

Company's founder Chris Renner. At

20:05

the time, we had about

20:07

23 employees and we

20:10

chose to invite them and

20:12

their significant others to

20:15

a tropical vacation

20:17

to Mexico. Everyone

20:19

honestly thought we were crazy.

20:23

It was 10 years and it was time

20:25

to celebrate as a team. We had survived

20:28

the first few years of

20:30

every small business, the uncertainty of are you

20:32

going to make it or not. So

20:35

we planned this amazing trip

20:38

and we ended up at the

20:41

little beachside restaurant with

20:44

margaritas in hand and toes

20:47

in sand and the

20:49

sun was setting. It was

20:52

magical just to be there together.

20:55

Using his Capital One VentureX business card,

20:57

Chris was able to apply his travel

20:59

rewards to fund his first company trip,

21:01

which has become an annual tradition. To

21:04

learn more, go to capitalone.com business

21:07

card benefits. Welcome

21:09

back to Masters of Scale. You

21:12

can find this interview and more on the

21:14

Masters of Scale YouTube channel. I'm

21:18

curious because this is really

21:20

a blitzscaling journey in a category where

21:23

blitzscaling. Does not happen.

21:25

Yes, it is. So when you're

21:27

blitzscaling, things break. They

21:29

do. And you have to let some

21:32

fires burn. You have to attend to

21:34

others. Was there a moment where you

21:36

said, oh, my

21:38

lord, we're not going to make it. Yeah. So

21:41

this is the thing. Your blitzscaling, things

21:44

break. They do. And you have to let some

21:46

fires burn. You have to attend to sell for

21:48

four years. So by lay down, put it in

21:50

the barrel. Prices have gone up in terms of

21:53

grains and barrels and all the rest of that.

21:55

But at that time, I think it was just

21:57

about $700 for. all

22:00

in for a barrel. For a barrel. I

22:02

think the first year we laid down like maybe 10,000 barrels

22:06

that I can't sell for four years. But add on top

22:08

of that, I actually need product to be able to build

22:11

the brand, to be able to justify

22:14

paying for that. So there

22:16

were absolutely times where

22:19

account is overdrawn. It is

22:21

so close to zero. In

22:23

our instance, the only reason the checks didn't bounce

22:26

is my husband kept a full-time job at Sony

22:28

Pictures. We had nothing that

22:30

we could call our own. Was there a moment where

22:33

that flipped where all of a sudden you were able

22:35

to breathe? No, I don't think I'm breathing yet.

22:37

Because the thing is is that we

22:39

are still going at such a pace,

22:41

we're acquiring other companies because one of

22:43

the things I discovered coming into it

22:46

is a single brand dies in this industry.

22:49

I might say to a room full of consumers, I

22:51

say the name Bacardi, and people think

22:54

of rum. But if you're in

22:56

this industry, that's not what

22:58

you think of when someone says Bacardi.

23:00

You think of Patron Tequila. You think

23:02

of Grey Goose. And

23:04

that's because they are now a conglomerate

23:07

that has all of these other

23:09

pillars of business. And

23:11

so you can just go in with

23:13

that one portfolio and take care

23:15

of the whole restaurant. They want you to have

23:17

more stuff that they can put on their back

23:19

bar if they're gonna give you that meeting because

23:22

it doesn't take them any longer for you to

23:24

pitch them on your tequila, your rum, your bourbon,

23:26

than it does for you to just pitch them on

23:28

your bourbon. It's hard enough to win the hill, then you gotta

23:30

defend it. Then you have to defend it. And

23:33

so it is a challenge because we're

23:35

constantly scaling and

23:39

we're not just scaling Uncle nearest, but then

23:42

we just acquired a vodka company

23:45

and then we became the largest Grand Champagne

23:47

vineyard owner in the city of Cognac to

23:49

raise up a Cognac company. There

23:52

is so much money that goes out the door every single

23:54

day. So I can't tell you, I

23:56

will probably say when all of those companies are

23:58

built and doing well, Maybe I

24:00

will breathe then, but I'm definitely not

24:02

there yet. I mean, it's so interesting

24:04

because we have this fabled

24:06

story of the entrepreneur who is maxing out

24:08

credit cards and a partner

24:11

is keeping a full-time job and that

24:13

salary is keeping everything afloat. And that

24:15

feels like the heart is pounding every

24:17

day moment. You're at a hundred million

24:19

plus in revenue, a billion plus in

24:21

valuation, and you're still feeling that way.

24:23

Everybody still feels it. It does not

24:26

change. And I think that that is something

24:28

that people don't understand. The bigger you are,

24:31

the more money you need. The

24:33

more you're trying to grow, the more you're trying

24:35

to acquire, the more you

24:37

need. Now, for those who just decide, okay, I'm

24:39

going to sell and just sit back, yeah, that's

24:41

an option. And then yes, they are

24:43

just kind of sitting pretty, but then here's the

24:46

thing. And you know plenty that have done this.

24:48

They all regret it afterwards because now they're trying

24:50

to find their next best thing. And

24:53

then they realize, okay, there's only so many

24:55

trips you can go on, so many boats

24:57

you can travel on. And now you're bored.

24:59

Right. Fun, so many people in your

25:01

position would have done that by now and said, I'm

25:03

going to take the pressure off. I'm going to cash

25:05

out. I bet everything and it's

25:07

paid off. You're not doing

25:09

that. Why are you sticking with it

25:11

this way? The moment I came into

25:13

this industry, the purpose

25:16

wasn't to build a whiskey company. It was

25:18

cement the legacy of Nears Green. And

25:21

once I got in, I understood

25:23

that wasn't possible unless this brand

25:25

began to go toe to toe.

25:28

And it doesn't have to be this generation,

25:31

but it has to be set up

25:33

in future generations to be alongside Jim

25:35

Beam and Johnny Walker and Jack Daniel.

25:39

That's the goal. Well, they've got

25:41

160 year head start. Yeah.

25:45

As you're scaling a company through these

25:47

phases, it can be very hard to

25:49

maintain your culture principles, to keep people

25:53

on the same train that you're driving.

25:55

I know that you've got 10 principles

25:57

for your company. What's your favorite

25:59

one? we do it with

26:01

excellence or not at all. It's number one.

26:04

You know, we are guiding principles are literally

26:06

living principles. If you talk to anyone in

26:08

my company, they know the

26:10

guiding principles. Most will always refer back to

26:12

principle number three, which is every day we

26:14

pound the rock. And that comes

26:17

from, you know, it is not the

26:19

first 100 blows to that rock, but

26:22

that hundred and first that cracks. You can't say

26:24

it was that one blow that did it. It

26:26

was the hundred that came before it. So this,

26:29

every day we pound the rock notion is something

26:31

that we talk about in our company, but

26:34

we don't just have guiding principles. And I don't know

26:36

how many people have this, but

26:39

I wrote out also 10 hiring principles and

26:42

the hiring principles are identical to the

26:44

guiding principles in terms of action items.

26:46

So when a leader is doing an

26:48

interview in my company, they have the

26:50

hiring principles. Each one has a checkbox.

26:53

And so the, we do it with excellence

26:55

or not at all, we'll actually go

26:57

to a hiring principle that mirrors it.

27:00

And if that person is interviewing and

27:02

they can't check every single box, that

27:06

person doesn't make it to me. No, no, it doesn't cut

27:08

it. No, it's gotta be 10 out of 10. Yeah.

27:11

I want to go to one of your other principles,

27:13

which really struck me, which is we pull as we

27:16

climb. We do. What does that

27:18

mean? That means that we cannot do this

27:20

by ourselves. It's not any good

27:23

if we succeed and

27:25

everybody else is still left behind. We're

27:27

still, I mean, in this industry, we're

27:29

still the only one. Again,

27:32

70%, women and people of color. What's

27:35

really striking about this, which I hadn't

27:37

clocked, is this is both an internal

27:39

and an external principle. Yes, it is.

27:41

We're gonna lift up internally, but also

27:43

we're gonna contribute to the ecosystem that

27:46

has contributed to us. Absolutely. And

27:48

we're going to make sure that when we all

27:50

move on from this industry, that when we all

27:52

move on to the next life, that

27:55

we've left this industry looking so

27:57

remarkably different than when we came into. it.

28:01

And to be able to leave that kind of

28:03

a footprint, and I don't look at it as

28:05

important for people to attribute it to me or

28:07

to attribute it to our team. I don't look

28:09

at it that way. I think what's important is

28:11

that two generations from

28:13

now, people would have no idea

28:15

that our industry at one point was

28:18

almost 100% white male. Another

28:21

way that Fawn focuses on the we

28:24

pull as we climb principle is through

28:26

her ongoing relationship with the descendants of

28:28

Nearest Green. They

28:31

brought me in and supported me

28:33

so early on in this

28:35

journey. The only thing that they knew is

28:37

that Nearest Green made the

28:40

whiskey for Jack. All of

28:42

the other details have come through my research. And

28:45

each green that I know has

28:47

read the book now, and there's so

28:49

many great green stories in there, and

28:51

they're learning about it, but it's also

28:54

reminding them that they come from a legacy of

28:56

excellence. And

28:58

then what I did when I brought

29:00

them all together is on where the

29:03

original Distillery Number 7, the original Jack

29:05

Daniel Distillery, where it was on the

29:07

property, the water still runs through there

29:09

the same way that it did. And

29:11

you can drink directly from the water.

29:13

It's filtered by the limestone. And so

29:16

we basically pitched this huge event

29:18

tent right where Distillery Number

29:20

7 was. And I

29:22

took clothespins and

29:24

the entire ceiling was

29:27

covered with these clothespins and hanging

29:29

from the clothespins were photos of

29:31

their ancestors, military records, birth

29:33

certificates, death certificates, marriage certificates. And

29:35

so there were all these things

29:38

that I had found. So as

29:40

they're walking through, they're like, wait,

29:42

I know that person. I know

29:44

that name. Wait, that's my name.

29:46

I got my name from that

29:48

uncle. And so to

29:50

watch their absolute wonder, even

29:52

before we sold the first bottle of Uncle

29:55

nearest, we began paying for all the green

29:57

descendants to go to college. So if you're

29:59

of college, age, all you got to do is get

30:01

into a college. And then once you get in, you just have

30:03

to maintain a 3.0 and

30:05

you've got a full ride. Wow. And

30:07

we've done that very early on. So now

30:09

the family gets together as these graduations are

30:12

happening. Fawn, we're going to head

30:14

into a bit of a lightning round if that's okay. I

30:16

dig it. What's your favorite way to drink Uncle Nierst? Neat.

30:18

Neat. I love Uncle Nierst, neat. No

30:21

ice, no, no sugar, no anything. I mean,

30:23

don't get me wrong. I love a great

30:25

cocktail if I go to a bar, but

30:27

if I'm at home, it's usually neat. Well,

30:29

it's that good. It is. What's

30:32

your latest research rabbit hole? It's

30:35

really funny. My latest research rabbit hole has been

30:37

King Asa. I don't know

30:39

why I'm fascinated in Chronicles and in the

30:41

book of second Kings. It

30:43

just mentions this King very briefly,

30:45

but what I've always been fascinated

30:47

by is every King before him

30:50

just had nonstop wars and every King

30:52

after him had nonstop wars, but King

30:54

Asa, it says, and the Lord gave

30:57

him rest. And because I love

30:59

rest and I think it's really important.

31:01

I think we're a sleep deprived country, which is why,

31:03

you know, so many things are happening that probably

31:05

shouldn't be. I love this notion

31:07

that a King was given rest. So

31:10

that's been my deep dive is trying to figure out who

31:12

the heck was this guy? Is there any

31:14

other habit that you have that has been critical

31:16

to your success that we have talked about? Two

31:19

things. Rest we've talked

31:21

about. I think that that has been

31:23

absolutely critical because the decisions that I

31:25

have to make sometimes are lightning fast.

31:29

And if I am not

31:31

rested, the likelihood that those will

31:33

be pretty big mistakes is high.

31:36

The other thing I would say is, is

31:38

that teaching myself not

31:40

to worry. Entrepreneurs

31:44

spend a whole lot of time worrying. And

31:46

the challenge with that is, is that when

31:48

you worry, you shut down the part of

31:50

your brain that you need the most to

31:52

be able to troubleshoot, to come up with

31:54

creative solutions. And so I bought a book

31:56

by Dale Carnegie. The book's got to be

31:58

80 years old. You know this book,

32:00

How to Stop Worrying and Start Living? Yep. Right?

32:03

And so I read the book and it has

32:06

all these different tricks and trades, but there

32:08

was one that really resonated with me. Which

32:10

one? And it was to write down

32:13

everything that you are worrying about, put

32:16

it in an envelope, and

32:18

I literally put it in the back of my

32:20

desk and I committed to not think

32:23

about anything that was in the envelope. Now don't

32:25

get me wrong, I still worried about another 20

32:27

other things, but I committed to myself, I wouldn't

32:29

worry about the things that were in that envelope

32:32

and those were the things that had been keeping

32:34

me up at night, those are the things that

32:36

I could barely get anything done because I was

32:38

so fixated on fixing those things.

32:41

And after a while, I completely

32:44

forgot about the envelope and I remember

32:46

going back to it, I think maybe a year later

32:49

and reading those things and my

32:51

God, they were foolish. Like

32:53

they were absolutely silly. And so

32:55

what I began thinking about from

32:58

that day was how

33:00

many other things did I allow

33:02

to rob me of moments of

33:04

life and joy and progress because

33:07

I was worrying about it and

33:09

they never came true. Yeah, Fawn,

33:11

when you're feeling stuck

33:13

or unsure about a big decision, who

33:16

do you talk to or what do you do to

33:18

get to the answer? Yeah, for

33:21

me it's super, super simple. I have

33:24

just a foundation of faith. That's where

33:26

we start with this. The

33:29

person who I speak to the most is my

33:31

husband, the most, about

33:33

everything. However, there

33:35

are so many things that I deal with that

33:38

if I went to him every single

33:40

time, number one, he wouldn't be able

33:42

to get anything done. And

33:44

also it'd be very stressful for him. And

33:47

so my process is very simple, it

33:49

involves a lot of prayer. I've had

33:51

the same prayer for almost 30 years.

33:55

God, if this is your will, then

33:57

open the door in a manner in which no

33:59

man can close. it including myself. If

34:02

it is not your will, close the

34:04

door in a manner in which no man

34:06

can open it including myself. So what that

34:08

does is I'm just constantly going through open

34:10

doors. Lip pass, open doors.

34:12

I think Matthew McConaughey called it green lights,

34:14

right? If the door closes, that means

34:17

that it's not for me, but what

34:19

I don't do is stand on the outside

34:21

of the door second guessing whether or not

34:23

I should go through the door. I go

34:25

through the door with absolute abandon without second

34:27

guessing it if it's open. Well,

34:30

I'm walking out of

34:32

this so inspired and so

34:34

grateful for you for living

34:37

your purpose and for living

34:40

it so authentically and for coming

34:42

here and showing your story and

34:44

for inspiring thousands and thousands of

34:46

others to do the same. So thank you.

34:48

Thank you. I'm so grateful. Thank you. I'm grateful that you

34:50

had me. There's

34:54

so much to learn from Fawn

34:56

Weaver's story. She has blended her

34:58

insatiable curiosity and innately rebellious spirit

35:00

into a brand that is growing

35:03

at incredible pace. If

35:05

you want to learn more about the story of

35:07

Nearest Green, Fawn's book is Love and Whiskey, the

35:10

remarkable true story of Jack

35:12

Daniel, his master distiller Nearest

35:15

Green, and the improbable rise

35:17

of Uncle Nearest. I'm Jeff

35:19

Berman. Thanks for listening. One

35:33

of the customers tweeted they got an

35:35

insight that said, why don't you try

35:37

adding a quiz module onto your website?

35:39

It became one of the most interactive

35:41

module on their site. It was so

35:43

cool to watch. I was

35:46

in Vegas about to go on stage

35:48

to talk about the redesign of clarity.

35:51

And if I saw this tweet and it gave

35:53

me a little pep to my step, we put

35:55

in a lot of effort to make sure we

35:57

are customer focused. I am

35:59

Priyanka Vaid. a product lead at

36:01

Microsoft Clarity. And I'm Kiraz

36:04

Baisal. I'm a software engineering manager

36:06

for Clarity Frontend. Priyanka

36:08

and Kiraz are members of the

36:10

team behind Microsoft Clarity, a free

36:13

tool to analyze user behavior online,

36:15

delivering data and insights. Our

36:17

customers were saying, why don't you have

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this as a mobile app solution? It

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was a big investment, making it

36:24

really visual, really easy, super structured,

36:27

so that anyone who wants to

36:29

dice and slice the data, they

36:31

are able to get those insights

36:33

for app experiences. Clarity

36:35

is not only focused on customer

36:37

experience, it's focused on a wide

36:39

range of customers. We want

36:41

to make sure that mom and pop shops, you

36:44

know, a single blogger can

36:46

come to Clarity, get insights and

36:48

make improvements on their sites. It

36:51

may seem small, but to even get those

36:53

insights, they're amazed that we are trying to

36:55

make their lives easy. To

36:58

learn more, go to clarity.microsoft.com.

37:02

Masters of Scale is a Wait What original. Our

37:06

executive producer is Eve Tro. Our

37:08

senior producer is Trisha Bobita. The

37:11

production team includes Tucker Ligursky, Masha

37:14

Makotunina, and Brandon Klein. Additional

37:17

production by Juliette Louini. Our

37:19

senior talent executive is Stephanie Stern. Mixing

37:22

and mastering by Aaron Bastanelli and Brian

37:24

Pugh. Music by

37:27

Ryan Holiday. Our head of

37:29

podcasts is Litaal Molad. Visit

37:31

mastersofscale.com to find the transcript

37:34

for this episode.