An Interview With Martita Mestey
Learn from mistakes: We have had our fair share of mistakes. Some have been costly. You have to take these on the chin and move on. Once it’s in the past, let it stay there and focus on moving forward.
As a part of our series called “5 Things You Need To Create a Successful Food or Beverage Brand”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Andrew Rigney.
Born and raised in Delaware, Andrew Rigney spent all of his summers enjoying the Delaware beaches with friends and family. After many nights at Dewey Beach’s beloved local restaurant and bar, The Starboard, his love for the Orange Crush cocktail was born.
At an early age, Andrew worked for his father in a grocery store where he gained a curiosity and appreciation for how food and beverages were made. This led him to earning a bachelor’s degree in Food Science from the University of Delaware. After graduation, Andrew worked for many global and national food companies, such as Keystone Foods and Allen Family Foods, where he developed a number of recognizable products on the market today.
Inspired by The Starboard and Dewey Beach, Andrew and his co-founder, Jarret Stopforth, have brought the iconic crush cocktails to the masses in a ready to drink format. With Dewey Crush, it’s a 365 day experience full of fun and on-the-go cocktails to sip on anytime or anywhere!
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?
I grew up in a middle-class household with two other brothers. Being the middle child in a house of three boys was just as you would expect it. My father managed grocery stores and my mother was a stay-at-home mom. At the age of 13, I started working in the grocery store with my dad, which ultimately led me to studying food science at the University of Delaware and to my long career in the food and beverage industry.
Can you share with us the story of the “ah ha” moment that led to the creation of the food or beverage brand you are leading?
My wife and I enjoy traveling, especially overseas. When COVID hit, it put a halt to any plans we had and we had to rethink things. She’s an expert travel planner and put together an itinerary that would take us across the fly over states in the upper northwest in late June 2020. We started in Denver and drove all the way to Oregon and back for 12 days by car. Early on in the trip, we were driving across Wyoming and I started thinking about the alcohol space and how the seltzer market was exploding. I knew it wouldn’t be sustainable and was thinking of what would be coming next. Canned cocktails were starting to enter the marketplace and I knew this was an area where we could play. Living in Delaware my entire life, I enjoyed many Orange Crushes at the Starboard in Dewey Beach. My brain started to put things together and came up with the idea on June 26, 2020. I know the exact date because I texted my co-founder, Jarret Stopforth, that exact day with “I have an idea that we need to discuss”.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
I don’t know if this is funny, but when we first started working the Dewey Crush idea out, we worried way too much about the naming, trademarks, etc. I remember numerous conversations with our legal team going back and forth for more than two weeks. They had some recommendations for us but Jarret and I knew that this had to be called Dewey Crush. We finally made the decision and ran with it. Looking back to that time, we stressed way too much about that given the challenges we have faced since then. That was probably the easiest part of the business, but we had no idea what was coming! What I learned from that is to not sweat the small stuff because bigger stuff is always around the bend.
What are the most common mistakes you have seen people make when they start a food or beverage line? What can be done to avoid those errors?
The biggest mistake that people make is thinking that they know everything. We found out quickly that even the smallest detail matters. We had an issue before launch with our packaging and luckily caught it in time. It was only because of a chance meeting with an industry expert that this was identified. If we launched with the packaging as it was, it could have doomed the brand right out of the gate. We have learned to always listen and take advice from others who have been there. They are our most valuable resource.
Let’s imagine that someone reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to produce. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?
The first step that I would recommend is to find a good product developer that understands the vision and can make it a reality. We were lucky that Jarret and I both have backgrounds in food science and product development. Jarret is a wizard when it comes to product development. He understood what the end product needed to be and was able to duplicate it in a ready to drink format. Secondly, you need to realize what you need help with and bring in people that do those things extremely well. Jarret and I were fortunate to bring on David Stober to our team. David is a rockstar with everything from production, packaging, web design, etc. We definitely would not be where we are today without David on the Dewey Crush team.
Many people have good ideas all the time. But some people seem to struggle in taking a good idea and translating it into an actual business. How would you encourage someone to overcome this hurdle?
This is the entrepreneur’s struggle, right? My dad came up with ideas all the time. Some he acted on and some he didn’t. Luckily, I inherited this trait from him and have come up with many ideas of my own over the years and like him, tried some, and let others go to the wayside. There are many times where I’ve kicked myself years after I had an idea when I saw someone else selling the same thing successfully. The way that you overcome this hurdle is to take the chance. You will either succeed or fail, but either way, you will learn a great deal which will lead to better success on the next opportunity. And there will always be another opportunity.
There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out on their own?
Invention development consultants can be of help, but they will want one of two things: money or a piece of the company. If you don’t have any real experience in the area you are going into, then you can always look to them. Personally, I like to strike out on my own as this is how I learn. If it’s a kitchen gadget, pay to have a prototype made so when you are discussing with potential customers, they can see and touch it. If you are making a food product, there are many resources from an ingredient standpoint where you can get development help. You don’t need to pay someone or give a part of your company away unless you get to a roadblock that you cannot get around. That’s the only time I would look at a development consultant.
What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?
We decided early on with Dewey Crush that we were going to use SAFEs and bring in family and friends. This was the first time that I raised capital on an idea (we hadn’t even produced prototypes yet). The more people that we talked to, the more they became interested and they told others they knew and they came on as well. We were able to close our first SAFE within six months of opening it. As your company grows, you can always look for venture groups, but I would advise against doing that right out of the gate. I spoke to a friend of mine in the venture arena when we first started and he told me the same thing. Raise through family and friends, grow the business, and look to venture when you are looking to make the next step and you have a proven concept.
Can you share thoughts from your experience about how to file a patent, how to source good raw ingredients, how to source a good manufacturer, and how to find a retailer or distributor?
We were very lucky to have a legal team that partnered with us from the beginning. They specialized in startups and handled a lot of the heavy lifting on trademarks, etc. We made some mistakes with manufacturers early on and learned from that, but those are things that you have to experience because you don’t always know how it’s going to go! Do due diligence on everyone. Make sure you get references from other customers and ask to speak with those customers about their experiences. We have done that multiple times and, from that, have made new friends that have helped us.
Here is the main question of our discussion. What are your “5 Things You Need To Create a Successful Food or Beverage Brand” and why?
- Determination: There have been some trying times over the last two years where we could have given up, but our team stuck together and saw each of them through.
- It’s always darkest before the dawn: Whenever we have run into any challenge or issue where it looked like there was no hope, out of nowhere, something changed and we were able to get things back on course. You have to believe that things will work out, but also be ok if they don’t.
- Learn from mistakes: We have had our fair share of mistakes. Some have been costly. You have to take these on the chin and move on. Once it’s in the past, let it stay there and focus on moving forward.
- Find good partners: This is not just your suppliers and manufacturing partners, but also the people that are on your team. As I mentioned, we would not be where we are today without the contributions from all of us. Jarret, David and myself all bring different perspectives, viewpoints and areas of expertise to each conversation and decision that we make.
- Blue Ocean: One of my favorite books is “Blue Ocean Strategy” by Renee Mauborgne and W. Chan Kim. In this book, they discuss differentiating your business from your competition and making it something new. I’ve seen many brands fail because they become a me too item and swim in the red oceans with the other sharks. They don’t find their own blue ocean. With Dewey Crush, we fortunately found a blue ocean an opportunity with very little competition.
Can you share your ideas about how to create a product that people really love and are ‘crazy about’?
One of the things that I identified when I came up with Dewey Crush was to find a way to make it relatable to a large number of people. The Starboard, in Dewey Beach, draws large numbers of people from outside of Delaware. We were fortunate to have Steve “Monty” Montgomery, owner of The Starboard, allow us to use his logo and name on our can as our inspiration. This gave us immediate authenticity and recognition by consumers across the region. When we launched, we sold out of 200,000 cans in five weeks. After that, we knew we had a winner on our hands!
Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?
From the beginning of Dewey Crush, Jarret and I were adamant that we wanted to make this a fun brand. We want people to enjoy our product and forget about their worries. When we say “We Canned Summer,” it’s more of a state of mind that summer can be experienced 365 days a year and not just in a season. Summer is the time for get togethers, family vacations, and trips with friends. We want those times to be shared anywhere and at any time.
You are an inspiration to a great many people. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.
Wow. That’s a great question! One thing that I would love to start is having people communicate again face to face. We have become a culture of screen time, texting and video calls. I’ve always enjoyed physical presence with others, having conversations, and enjoying their company. It’s easy to send an email or text or talk over the phone, but it takes extra effort to make time to spend with others. We have lost this and I would love to see this return.
Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.
Andrew Rigney Of Dewey Crush On 5 Things You Need To Create a Successful Food or Beverage Brand was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.