“Scaling up, without selling out.”
Our story begins at home, making Mario's Hard Espresso from my dad's old Sicilian recipe. While it’s only four ingredients, to achieve the incredibly rich flavor of Mario’s, they have to be four of the best damn ingredients you can find. Simple enough, right?
After getting the wild idea to bring Mario’s to market, I figured I’d just start with the basics, learn a little every day, and chip away at it as I went along.
Pantry to Production. Only Four Ingredients. What Could Possibly Go Wrong?
The first thing was to source the ingredients we needed. We made Mario’s at home using true espresso from a local roaster, real Madagascar vanilla, cane sugar for a little sweetness, and for our base spirit, I’d send away for 190proof Everclear. Yep, the same stuff poured into everyone’s favorite high school party punchbowl. The problem is, you can’t start a spirit business of any size and continue to source ingredients from the grocery store. We had to scale up!
“Find a Distiller,” They Said. “It’ll Be Fun,” They Said.
So I set out looking for a contract-distiller that would scale my dad’s recipe and make it for us in larger batches. One distiller up in Idaho that I really liked told me straight up "You're never gonna be able to scale your dad's recipe." He said, “you need to go to a flavoring company.” He told me they would get our costs per-bottle “waaaayyyy down, and that's when you're really gonna make real money.” I thought this was excellent advice! But I had one question: "What's a flavoring company?"
Science, but Stickier.
He then hooked me up with one of the largest flavoring companies in the US. I talked to the head guy there—he was so enthusiastic! I arranged to send him a sample of our homemade Mario’s, confident we were on our way. In a few weeks, I started receiving sample bottles from him with labels like Flavoring 1, Flavoring 2, Flavoring 3 and so on. I tried each one, and honestly, they were really awful.
I couldn't quite figure out what was going on. #1 too sweet. #2 too bitter. All of them—too artificial. Then it dawned on me: they did not have real espresso. I’m not sure whether it was even real coffee! As I looked closer at the list of ingredients, I realized it wasn’t real vanilla either, but “vanillin.” I remember thinking, “What the hell is vanillin?”
Google, Don’t Fail Me Now.
So I went straight to the grandest source of all knowledge: Google. Try it yourself; it’s amazing. Anyhow, vanillin, as you might have imagined, is not real vanilla. It’s a flavoring that sort of tastes like vanilla, but not quite. Like the way a cousin sort of looks like a sibling. I learned that “vanillin” is made from castoreum. Never heard of it? Allow me to enlighten you.
Castoreum is a secretion (this is a good place for the squeamish among you to skip ahead) that is extracted from the anal glands of beavers. Yep, beaver-butt. Technically, it’s coming from their caster sacks, but those little buggers are in close enough proximity to the big “A” that it’s basically the same. Like a curb and a sidewalk.
The Phone Call: When Time Stood Still.
Just about that time I got a call from my new buddy at the flavoring company. “How’s it going Joe?” he asked, “You get the samples?” He was so earnest, but I had to break it to him. That’s not actually espresso you’re using is it?” Silence on the line. “You know Espresso is in our name, right?” I said. “Yes, but no one will know and your costs will be so much lower...” I interrupted him. “Also,” I said, “Vanillin? Beaver juice? You realize that’s my dad on our label, right?” Again, silence.
Fork in the Road, Meet Your North Star.
That’s when I basically quit listening. I really don’t remember anything else that was said, and I knew exactly what I had to do. It was a moment of perfect clarity. A true fork in the road that has defined everything that’s come since.
From then on, we committed to doing things the hard way—the right way. Dig deeper. Source the best. Do what’s right. Real espresso, real vanilla, real ingredients, no shortcuts.
The House Rules
Now, every decision we make comes back to one question: Would this make my Dad proud? If the answer’s yes, that’s the path we take. We never cut corners, we stay true to his ethos, and we can say unequivocally, that Mario’s is:
Made from Triple-Distilled Neutral Grain Spirit,
100% Dark-Roast Espresso, Organic Madagascar Vanilla and Cane Sugar.
And absolutely no beavers were harmed in the making of this product.
Cheers to keeping it real everyone!
—Joe
