Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome to the Cut the Tie podcast. I'm your host, Thomas Helfrich. I'm on a mission to help you cut the tie to whatever it is holding you back from the success of which I hope you define for yourself. And if you haven't start with that, you got to define your own success. Today we're joined by Mr Chris. Chris, I would try to pronounce your last name. It's like Wollstoneholm, Did I get it right?

Speaker 2: 0:18

That's pretty good. Yeah, I mean okay. No, I'll give in on that one. No arguments on that one.

Speaker 1: 0:21

Chris, just take a moment. By the way, thanks for joining me. I'm here, You're in Atlanta. Here you can hear his accent. It's very. It sounds like Alabama, maybe Birmingham. Chris, why don't you introduce yourself and what it is you do?

Speaker 2: 0:32

Absolutely so. My name is Chris, obviously originally from Australia not quite the right A, you know, not with Alabama, but definitely Australian and I started a business here in Atlanta, georgia, called MAPE, and it's the world's first vodka protein water.

Speaker 1: 0:48

This thing. So, as a former drinker, vodka was my choice. You couldn't go wrong and you couldn't get enough of it. I'll tell you that right now. But if I had protein in with it, I'd be like honey. I'm so healthy.

Speaker 2: 0:58

See, you're going to be a fitness influencer. You just didn't know it.

Speaker 1: 1:09

Hey, listen, when I work out first, I like to drive here. Okay, that's the best. Don't do that, people. I'm not getting that. Don't do that, okay, so make sure. I think it's a very competitive kind of space and we're going to get into your story a little bit. But why should people pick? It's your first one, but why should someone pick vodka with protein in it?

Speaker 2: 1:24

so I just sort of discovered that people were tired of the bubbles, right, they were tired of the heartburn, the bloat, that sort of thing. But at the same time there's that classic saying drinking is empty calories. Well, what if it didn't have to be right? So there was the protein element. But the big third component that really sort of made me want to stand out is I self-financed? Right, this is my business. I don't have banks, I don't have backers, I don't have anything along those lines. So how do I stand out on a shelf, like you said, in a very competitive space? There's the protein. I'm the only one with protein on the shelf, with alcohol. That makes me stand out.

Speaker 1: 2:04

I mean, I like the idea of mate. If you drink enough of it, you know what's going to happen.

Speaker 2: 2:08

Everyone's going to be your mate by the time you've had a couple.

Speaker 1: 2:11

I mean the mate of your choice. I mean because if you have too many to pass out, you might get a mate of a sex you don't want. I mean, you don't know what could happen at that point. Anything's up for grabs there, melbourne, you're safe.

Speaker 2: 2:31

The major cities. You're safe Just way away from the big bugs and the kangaroos and everything else that wants to.

Speaker 1: 2:36

By the way, I don't think people realize this. Their balls are amazing. If you have not checked out kangaroo balls, you go to the zoo, you're like I just can't get my eyes off their balls, like they're, like, they're huge. Yeah, not part of your brand. Kangaroo Balls is not the name of his brand. It's made. Oh, we'll take a moment here. So, first and foremost, before we get in your story, I do want you to define what does success mean to you?

Speaker 2: 3:02

So I thought about this long and hard.

Speaker 2: 3:02

What does success mean to you? So I thought about this long and hard. I mean, I've been working with a career for 20 plus years. Right, I was in hospitality, I was in restaurants, did it all over the world and success changed from year to year depending on how old I was, what season I was in that sort of thing. Now it's very much, especially with this. Mate has the opportunity to be something that is served all over the US, could be bought by Coca-Cola one day. You never know. These exits are available to you.

Speaker 2: 3:34

The success to me is I want to be able to retire my mother. Hey, here's a million dollar check. Just quit working and do you Buy my sister a house. Check, just quit working and do you Buy my sister a house. Be able to have a certain level of freedom where you're not worried about bills. Your friend needs some help. Great, let's help him. I think everybody's very centrally focused on what's in it for me my success. I will feel successful when I'm able to help others without having to really think long and hard whether or not I can afford to do it.

Speaker 1: 4:08

Right, that would be. I mean, listen, anyone's success can be where they do change over time, and I love the idea of that's more altruistic in nature. I think that's a pretty, pretty beautiful place to be in your own journey. What's been kind of the biggest metaphor tie you've got to cut to help try to achieve that success you defined?

Speaker 2: 4:25

Comfort. I mean I was very, very good in restaurants, right, I was very well paid, I was a great GM, I made my bonuses all the time. There is a big level of comfort and stability in those things. But unfortunately restaurants you very much hit a cap so you can't really grow any further financially because there's so many other costs related to a restaurant. If I want to be able to help others without thinking about it, I need to create something bigger than just a single building in which I serve people. So the the biggest one it's that comfort word.

Speaker 1: 5:04

Well, I think it's a great one, because when you make a transition to chase success, specifically as an entrepreneur, you sometimes forget you're going to have to probably take a pay cut, take a lifestyle change. Not everybody, but I'd say 99% of people, have to go through burning, through savings, just changes of style of life because things have changed, and comfort is a great way to describe it. It doesn't mean you're not happy, you give up or you start retooling or you stop going out as much because you're just trying to shave off money, because you're trying to make a future bet to achieve that success, and that's an important one. Do you remember the moment though I always ask that kind of question the aha moment of when you knew you were going to make that pivot, to become your own kind of journey, and then you're like but I'm going to have to cut this tie. Do you remember the moment?

Speaker 2: 5:55

Yeah, I think the whole cluster of COVID really helped that cabalist. We popped out the other side. I can really tell you the exact moment and it's it's kind of a little bit gross, so I'll try not to be. Oh, it's fine, it grows, it's good. It grows, it's good. All right, I'll tell you the whole thing. So we've reopened the restaurant. After COVID, everybody's got masks on, you know. People are just starting to come out again.

Speaker 2: 6:18

But because of the problems financially, I'd been put on 750 an hour, right. So I'm just working like everyone else. I'm a GM but I'm being paid hourly but I've got all these responsibilities. So a couple comes in, we seat them down. Guy's like I just need to go to the bathroom quickly. Yep, no worries. So he disappears, comes back about five minutes later, grabs his girlfriend or wife, whoever she was, and they run straight out the door.

Speaker 2: 6:43

I'm like that's a bit mean. Oh boy, did I blow up Interesting? I'm at the front desk. These two ladies come up and they go. Are you the manager? I said I am. They're like you might want to go check one of your bathrooms. It's like oh no. So I go down there and he has pretty much vomited all over the entire and I'm mopping and cleaning right, because I have my team upstairs working and I'm sitting there going. I'm getting paid $7.50 an hour. I've had this idea to do something for a while now. I haven't taken the jump. I've got the money in the bank. I know I have the money in the bank. I have a supportive spouse and instead I'm mopping up vomit. I'm done.

Speaker 1: 7:34

Did you quit that day?

Speaker 2: 7:35

or did. Was it just mentally? No, so I I never do stuff like that. I think that's a horrible thing to do. I gave them four weeks notice and said I'm out. So you know, I I did all the right things. I got him through covid, I was great to my staff. I I did everything I was supposed to do. But yeah, no, that was. If you need a catalyst moment, that would be definitely the moment.

Speaker 1: 7:56

Yeah, not paid enough to clean up stuff.

Speaker 2: 7:59

You're like, if I'm going to do this, I might as well, just cheat, I may as well be uncomfortable in my own business.

Speaker 1: 8:07

Well, and that's good too, because you picked something up. What I like is you're you picked an ancillary business where you have people to go to and say, hey, can I try this here? Can I do this? It's not like you're now going in a yoga studio and you're here to learn yoga, which isn't a bad thing. I'm just saying it's not like completely on the other side of the world, of something new. It gives you at least an easier transition and who knows what will go from there.

Speaker 2: 8:36

So you said one of the reasons things you had to do is start cutting comfort. So you go through the how, because it's one thing to declare it, it's one thing to know it, it's another thing to do it. So this is going to sound really sort of nonchalant perhaps, but just get started, like it's. It's when we think about something for five minutes you talk yourself out of it. It's it just you need to. When you've made that decision, you need to just go. You need to get started. So for me it was.

Speaker 2: 8:58

I came up with the idea over pizza and beers with my wife, so we knew what I was going to do. I put in my resignation. That very day I started the design of what I wanted the cans to look like. I started the design of what I wanted, just with a printout and highlighters and a Sharpie. But just get started right. Build the LLC, do the things. If you do one thing to move your business forward every single day, that motivation stays there for the discipline to come behind it. I know it sounds really cliche, but it's just start. Just start and get moving forward. Plan B is I go back to restaurants. I can always go back to doing what I was doing. It was a great salary, it's very easy, I have plenty of contacts. So why don't we make plan A what I can do and just keep moving forward?

Speaker 1: 9:52

You're spot on and you know it's the atomic habits. 1% math. You're 37, what is it 0.8 times better at the end of the year if you've just done 1% better every day? And that literally it could be. And for those who kind of have the ADHD or get overwhelmed just pick one thing to work on. That's pretty important. It might be forming your LLC. It overwhelmed just pick one thing to work on, that's pretty important. It might be forming your LLC. It might be like what is my mission statement? Who's my real customer? Just go work on one thing until you get it done. You got to get your EIN. There's a couple steps ahead of that, but you'll be triggered into it. To be fair, by the way, you can do all that in a day.

Speaker 2: 10:28

All right.

Speaker 1: 10:32

If you've got ADHDhd and we only get one thing done every day, get one thing done you. You probably do that an hour, just to be clear. That's all online anyway, but that would be a win. What's been the impact on your life or others since making the move?

Speaker 2: 10:43

it is a bit of a roller coaster. I mean, I don't think I quite realized how much I missed or how much I loved in a restaurant, how much I miss now leading a team, right, really being the head and helping people and sort of moving everything forward. Right now, the team's still just myself. We're starting to bring people on, we're having those conversations. When we're talking about comfort yeah, I mean, there's things that kind of have to go right. I can't do multiple vacations a year and I have to scale back on maybe some of the supplements that I use and I, instead of dining out at the local Mexican place every Friday, well, maybe that's once a month now, right. So you have to be very honest with yourself in the mirror and you have to reallocate where you put things right. The, the kids, schooling and college needs are going to come for, for, you know, first, and the mexican restaurant's probably going to come 20th, right. So you, you, you just need to reallocate and make sure that you know what you're doing.

Speaker 2: 11:49

My father-in-law lives in Iowa. He's got a rule If we come to him, we don't pay, okay, well, that's going to be our vacation. We're going to go to the lake with him. We're going to hang out with him as our vacation, instead of going to Florida for spring break, where we pay thousands of dollars for everything. So it's not necessarily removing all of the comfort, it's just a reallocation of where that goes.

Speaker 1: 12:15

You said some important ones. I tell people this all the time. I don't think education at the college level is worth the investment. So do it for free. Because go for free, finance what you can that you can pay off in a year living at home. Otherwise the math doesn't work to be fair.

Speaker 1: 12:33

And it gives you freedom to go, be your own boss, to make less and enjoy what you do. And we're parents who aren't going to pay for our kids' school. We're like you will pay for it yourself, you'll earn it or you'll go to community and work your way through it, because it's just the investment's not there. It's not worth it. The other thing I I'll tell you from florida, so I'm in atlanta as well, as you know. Sure, we we love going there, doing that, but we started doing a camping and I we are not campers, but you can rent a really nice spot, fun, for like 150 bucks for the week and and it's and it's like you just take a bike down the beach. It's really chill, there's great bathrooms and like showers. I'm like I actually enjoy it more than the $3,000 a week hotel, because I don't, I can just kind of be in fire at night. It's so much love it and it's like way cheaper. Anyway, throw that out there to people Sometimes. Just change your expectation comfort of yeah, we're not going to be in an air conditioned place, but you'll find, just go in the fall or spring, it's a little cheaper, it's no money, it costs almost nothing to be there for the week and you get a sense. You've got to meet your Love it.

Speaker 1: 13:39

Anyway, my point is reframe it and listen, I do not like camping. I actually really enjoy going there. I sleep well, it's night, you like it, you know it's, it's just fun. If it rains, you leave. You don't lose it's any money. Or you go indoors somewhere for the day. What?

Speaker 2: 13:54

are you most grateful for? I guess there's probably several things. Um, I am grateful for the fact that I get to do this right. I I have, I'm in a country that is allows me to be able to create something like this right, the, the, the frameworks in place. You know, I'm grateful for my wife's um, unwavering belief, right, and she's an overthinker, so she's very openly said I've overthought this entire thing and I still think it's going to be okay.

Speaker 2: 14:31

Um, so, and then, obviously, I'm really grateful for the fact that I was able to be in hospitality in America and apply, like you said, knowing other people in the industry already that across. So it's, it's sort of all the two prongs of you know. I'm grateful for the support. I'm grateful for the opportunity. You know we said a little bit earlier, there's 330 million people in America to sell to. There's 25 million in Australia with the same size landmass. So I'm grateful for the fact that I've got a green card, I can be here and I've got the opportunity to possibly make something that exits it let's call it 50 million and that would solve basically every problem anyone would ever have.

Speaker 1: 15:24

It would create a whole new set. Do you take private or commercial? It's not quite enough. What's your biggest lesson to a listener?

Speaker 2: 15:33

Just don't quit. Don't quit Right, it you're going to have, it's going to go up and down, it's going to suck, it's going to it's. It's not going to be pretty every single day, but those days where somebody calls you, finally, finally, and they go hey, we, we know your drink, We've got a bar. We'd love to you to come in and show us about it Instead of me going to them. Will you buy? You know other people buying, coming on and saying you've got something good here. You actually have something. We want to be a part of this. Can we chat further? So just don't quit. Don't quit and see what happens on the other side.

Speaker 1: 16:18

That's right, that's great. You know some rapid fire questions here for you. Who gives you inspiration?

Speaker 2: 16:25

My mother. She was in sales Single mom for years, always kept, kept me fed, kept me clothed, all the good things right. So yeah, I mean my mother?

Speaker 1: 16:38

solid answer. Really honestly you're like, oh, I bet my kids might got the grid one. I mean like who? All I love that answer. What's kind of the best business advice you've ever received?

Speaker 2: 16:50

So there's a couple. Firstly, service beats everything. No matter what it is that you do, whether it's sales, whether it's whatever, if you make things really easy for people, they're going to rebuy. And then I would say you know, do that. Like I said earlier, do one thing, one thing every day that gets the business forward. You know, that was I didn't come up with that, I was given it, and no matter what happens it could be nine o'clock at night, I can feel like nothing's happened I can still get one thing done for the business to to move the needle forward. So service over everything. And uh, and then, yeah, make sure you do one thing every day.

Speaker 1: 17:30

That's solid advice. That's move forward advice right there. Do you have a favorite book? Sure, do yeah.

Speaker 2: 17:36

So I've given this book to everyone. The book's title is it Takes what it Takes. The guy who wrote it was Trevor Mullad, big NFL guy who helped NFL teams sort of bring their thing together. The whole crux of the book you don't it's about. You know, yay, thick, this is the crux of the book. It takes what it takes, right? So if you want it to be successful, you're going to have to put the effort in, no matter what. Whether you are going for a run, for a marathon, training for a high rocks, building a business, it all takes what it takes.

Speaker 1: 18:08

I like that. You get it done. It's exactly right, because if you don't think in that mentality, you're going to make an excuse, you'll play victim to entitlement and now that stuff's going to work pressure, you know. Just get it done. If you had to start over today and you could go back to any point in your life, when would you go back to and what would you do differently?

Speaker 2: 18:32

So I would probably say I really like 25. 25 is a good year. I'd just gotten back from London the first time, so I had a lot of experience under my belt. What would I do differently? I'd changed the people who I was hanging out with and dating right, I'd be very, I'd be far more clear-cut, uh, in regards to that, and I'd probably buy bitcoin. Can I say that I'd probably, if I, if I could go back to 25, I'd buy bitcoin I mean, yeah, you just go, I'm to dump my whole savings into that.

Speaker 1: 19:08

I'm going to go read that at some point in the future. You know I like that and in Europe normally people, there's a few ways you can ask that and I love the fact that you're like I think I just changed who was around me. I think anybody who thinks about that like you still look at that. Now, in real time of going, I'm going to be very conscious of who I surround myself with, and that's usually what happens in my question.

Speaker 2: 19:34

If there was a question I should have asked you today, though, and I didn't. What was that question and how do you answer it? So I love this one, because I thought long and hard about this one. What should Americans know from a non-American living in America? Okay, go for that, I got that, you got that. And the answer is this because I've said this to other people when I've done tables, tastings, whatever If Americans realized that when you travel, you're just an American, you'd all get along really well. You're not Southern American, you're not southern american, you're not northern american, you're not white american, asian american, african american. You're not gay american, straight american, whatever. You're just american. And that's what americans forget with the rest of the world, because when you would sit down at my table when I was a waiter way back, when the person handing me the ticket saying you've got a table over there and they're American, they wouldn't say, oh, that's an African-American family. They just go, you've got Americans and I go, I'm going to get tipped. This is awesome.

Speaker 1: 20:45

That's not actually true from all demographics in the United States, just to be very clear. There's. That's not actually true from all demographics in the united states, just to be very clear. There's emigrated european americans. No tip, okay, my wife's from survive?

Speaker 2: 20:54

yeah, absolutely. But if you all just realized you're just americans, I reckon america would all get along better with each other well, you know that's not polarizing.

Speaker 1: 21:07

God, stop unpolarizing us, sir. Thank you, by the way, for coming out today. Who should get a hold of you? How do they do it?

Speaker 2: 21:16

So there's a couple of different options. You can follow the business that's Make Beverage. Obviously, we post there the most Make Vodka Protein Water. If you Google Vodka Protein Water, I'm the only one It'll show you everything pretty much immediately on the first page. You don't need to go searching through Google. And if you want me personally, chris underscore Wolston home, just be aware there is another Chris Wolston home in the world and he's the base player for Muse, so make sure you follow the right account.

Speaker 1: 21:41

I mean you can follow both, Just don't go down the rabbit hole. The other guy just like oh, I like both of that. And then you're like, let me get the real one, exactly right. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. You coming on, this is great.

Speaker 2: 21:51

Yeah, thank you, it was an absolute pleasure.

Speaker 1: 21:54

Anyone who made it this point you rock. I appreciate you listening and watching. If this was your first time here, I hope it is the first of many. On Cut the Tie.