The Spirit Guides

How a Gourmet Coffee Roaster Became a Bourbon and Tequila Big Deal - Episode 10

The music business, training as a chef, competing on a cooking show, opening a coffee roasting business and balancing that with being a spirit guide… Wayne Cafariella’s career has been an impressive cocktail of experiences! The man behind @drinkwithwayne first began creating content for his coffee business but later became a fully-fledged spirit guide after some words of encouragement from his wife. Now, his social media presence of spirited opinions has racked up well over 100k fans and counting.

@drinkwithwayne’s Journey from Rockstar to Chef, to Coffee Roaster and Spirit Guide

In this episode of The Spirit Guides, Tequila Jay Baer sits down with Wayne to hear about his journey into the world of content creation. Wayne talks us through his days as a chef and even appeared on the show Chopped before pivoting into coffee roasting.

When Wayne started his coffee business, that naturally led him to start creating content all about coffee with the help of his Twitch streamer friends/business partners. Later, he found his passion for creating different types of content about cocktails, bourbon, and tequila.

Wayne shares some stories about his first big hit on TikTok and the moment he accidentally posted a video too early and saw it blow up. Staying true to his passion project, Wayne gives his take on the monetization of content, the dreaded editing process, and what keeps him going even during moments of impostor syndrome.

Grab the Kings Coast Coffee Company promo code: DRINKWITHWAYNE

In This Episode:

Wayne shares his stories of being in a punk band
How Wayne pivoted from rockstar to becoming a chef
Wayne’s experience on the show Chopped
Why he started Kings Coast Coffee Company
His first experiences with online content with his Twitch-streaming friends
How he got used to being on camera with his coffee content
Why he began making content about cocktails
How monetizing spirit content changed his process
What keeps Wayne going despite occasional impostor syndrome
Wayne tells us about his first big viral moment
What annoys him most about creating content
How accidentally posting a video too early became a huge success
Wayne’s advice for creating content

Resources:

This podcast is brought to you by LoveScotch.com and produced by our friends at Content10x.com.

How a Gourmet Coffee Roaster Became a Bourbon and Tequila Big Deal - The Spirit Guides 10 Transcript

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[00:00:00] I'm just having so much fun with it. I think to me, you know, this is what I wanted to do. I just wanted to kind of just have fun with it. Record the process and put it out there for people to see and people resonate with it You know, it's like you grow following and it's weird. Um still, you know, I kind of get the imposter syndrome sometime You know where like you put a piece of content out there and you're like, is anybody gonna watch this or who am I?

You know, like why does anybody care? But Um, you know, you do it for the people that, you know, might see that video and then change their opinion on something or try something new.

How did a chef who was on the TV show chopped end up opening a coffee roastery before becoming an emerging voice in both the bourbon and tequila scenes online, let's find out right here on the spirit guides. Wayne Cafarella is drink with Wayne on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Facebook. He's the co owner and head [00:01:00] of coffee at King's Coast Coffee in Long Island, and is now blowing up with his short form content about all things, bourbon and agave with some home bartending tips mixed in here and there what's next for Wayne and how has his life changed since he started on this journey?

As a spirits content creator, we'll find out on this episode of the spirit guides, the show about the entrepreneurial journeys of the world's top booze influencers. I am your host tequila, Jay bear. Now. Fans of this show are known as the sippers and all you sippers know that every episode of the show can be found at the spiritguides.

Info and the videos are always at the spiritguides. video. Show is, as always, sponsored by our pals at Love Scotch, the premier online shop for scotches, bourbons, tequilas, and a lot more. An extensive collection curated from around the globe. They bring the world's finest distilleries right to your front door.

So whether you're a seasoned enthusiast like Wayne or just starting your journey, they've got something for you and check this out. Shipping is always 1995. So it doesn't matter if [00:02:00] you buy one bottle, it's 1995. You buy 20 bottles, it's also 1995. So stock up doesn't apply to Hawaii, Alaska, you know, Greece or whatever.

But, uh, for, for the contiguous 48, 1995 flat rate, go to lovescotch. com. That's lovescotch. com. And the show is produced by content 10 X go to content 10 X. com for all your content creation and production needs. Speaking of which here's that spirit guide, Wayne Cafarella. Wayne, thanks for being here. Thanks Jay.

Thanks for having me on. I am super excited to talk to you because. Your original, original life plan was rockstar, right? That was the, that was the initial plan. Tell, tell, talk to us about that a little bit. Yeah, that didn't last too long. Uh, I quickly learned there's way more talented musicians on the planet than I was.

Um, but my whole thing was playing in a band and, you know, kind of, you can, the sum of all parts kind of makes a really great band. Uh, but yeah, [00:03:00] that's, uh, that kind of got me, uh, I was in high school. Just love playing punk rock and Long Island's got a big punk hardcore scene here. So like that was everybody was, if you're not in a band, you're always going to see shows.

And that was kind of like, got me into the music industry, um, you know, in high school and then started touring around and, you know, jumping in vans and, uh, you know, parents were like, you gotta, This isn't gonna work. You actually have to get a job and become a real member of society. Yeah. So you became a chef, which is also a very easy job.

Yeah. Yeah. That actually, uh, that was kind of divine intervention because I was able to work in restaurants, um, sleep, Sleep all morning, you know, work all night, party all night, and then go back to work the next day. And that, that was a, that was a good transition from wannabe rock star to, uh, to chef. And it felt like it was kind of a, just a foreign, [00:04:00] raucous environment, um, you know, to be in, uh, working in a restaurant.

And she was just like, it's, it's amazing to the people who do it. You know, you know why you love it. It's just. You get that rush, the adrenaline rush, it's loud. It's, you get to be who you want to be. Um, you don't really have to confine to corporate norms. Um, so that was always. You weren't just, you know, any chef, you, you, you were a very acclaimed chef.

I saw a lot of media coverage. Uh, of your work across multiple restaurants in New York. And, and you even did a spot on, uh, on shop. How'd that go? That was, uh, it's so funny too, because that the chop thing, I kind of almost forgot about, or I kind of forget about it and every now and then it pops up and somebody is like, were you ever on shop and went, Oh yeah, I was, um, if you Google the episode, I look nothing like I do now.

Um, that was very early stages of, of young chef Wayne, um, thinking he was the, the hot thing, you know, but, uh, that was, uh, it was basically just like an open call. Uh, I had [00:05:00] knew I'd worked with a chef who was on the show and had won. Uh, when he goes, dude, just apply. He goes, if they like you, they'll call you in and you know, you could be on the show.

Um, so that was a, that was an interesting process. That was, it took a long time to like the whole casting and calling. And, um, and then finally the day that you go to suit, it's like a really, really long day. They do the whole shot, you know, whole episode shot in a single day. And yeah, time starts 20 minutes ago and you're just literally, I'll never forget that feeling of like, Oh, what am I even doing?

Uh, you know, you can't practice. You kind of have some ideas of like what you think you might do. Um, and then sometimes the plate just kind of comes together as you're going. Uh, but it was definitely a challenge and I got to the entree round and then I got chopped in the entree round. I looked that up because I really wanted to, I wanted to know.

Uh, you went out on ham hock carbonara, uh, was, was the dish that was not accepted. And so my question for you, Wayne, is, [00:06:00] did you then go back and try to perfect your ham hock carbonara? Or are you like, okay, that's dead to me. I'm never making it again. I never made that dish ever again.

Took his failure with grace. I love it. You started, uh, King's Coast in, in 2017. And, and as I understand it, you, you sort of had an amazing cup of coffee in Syracuse, kind of figured it out. It started roasting at home, like in your own kitchen. And then like pretty quickly said, I'm not going to be a chef anymore.

I'm going to start a coffee business. That's, that's quite a leap of faith. It was a leap. Um, very, very big leaps. So friends of mine, um, they're in the, uh, the Twitch streaming realm. Um, they, they kind of like got into, this was like around 2015. Streaming destiny on mine or the fortnight and all that stuff.

Um, so they kind of got into this, this Twitch gaming, you know, space. And so I was like, this is pretty cool. You know, just kind of paying attention to it. Uh, [00:07:00] I had gotten into coffee when I was living in Syracuse. We had a really good local scene where there was about three or four different coffee houses there where they're all roasting their own coffee.

And to me, it was like, I tried this one cup of coffee and it kind of just changed my, my outlook on, on coffee. I always thought of it as just like, you know, it comes from. Coffee comes from the coffee pot and that's it. Um, I had this Ethiopian coffee that just, it literally just packed this punch of blueberries and it had depth and there was so much complexity in this cup.

And I'm like, Why is this coffee taste so good? So I started talking to the guy, Aaron, um, places called salt city, uh, coffee roasters up in Syracuse. He's still, still keep in touch with him. He's a really good dude. So I went down to his shop and I was like, I just got to see you roast coffee. I just want to see how it's done.

See how it's made. And once I saw coffee roasting, like, this is pretty cool. And he's like, Oh yeah, you can do it at home too. He was in his little countertop roasters and stuff. And then King's curse coffee kind of was [00:08:00] born in the summer of 2017. So basically my partners with the coffee company, their Twitch streamers, the famous line, I've heard this for so many entrepreneurs is, Hey, how hard would it be to start our own coffee company?

You know, and that's how King's curse was born. It was kind of born out of necessity, a little bit of spite and, um, you know, a little bit of just like. Hey, why not? Why not us? You know, like, let's give this a shot. This was like in 2017. And then luckily, you know, from day one, we were an online coffee roaster.

That was our whole business model is like, you know, you go on our website, you order coffee, gets roasted up, packed up and shipped to your door. Usually within. Three to five business days of it being roasted. Did your experience with, with sort of that community and, and into the live streaming video, did that make it more comfortable or easier for you to start making your own content?

Obviously not on Twitch, but in, but in social in general. Yeah, I think so. Because like when we started, I, my buddies and [00:09:00] I were doing a podcast, you know, they're called worst radio show, but it was just literally the four of us would get on and talk about video games and movies and kind of just rip on each other.

Um, but we, you know, I got used to talking on camera and doing, uh, you know, live streaming and jumping on Twitch every now and then with those guys, you started out making. Online content about coffee, right? Like Instagram, et cetera. Like you, like coffee was the original kind of. Yeah. Coffee was the start.

So I, you know, we're with being an online business, you got to always have an online presence. And it was kind of, we, we started talking about it. We were just posting pictures of, you know, coffee and there's a, you know, you gotta, at some point you have to kind of. Put a face to a brand and you want to have a, someone who can talk about your brand.

And I was like, all right, I'm willing to do it. You know, I feel comfortable enough talking about the coffee. I obviously, I do all the roasting and sourcing. So any type of questions that were going to come along, like, I'm the best person to [00:10:00] answer these. So I started doing coffee content, um, did it on Tik Tok.

I started in 2021. Um, so started posting coffee Tik Toks and that kind of took off and it was doing well. Um, Like from day one, it was always like, you know, I was the face of the company. I was on, on the Instagram, on the social media for, for the coffee company. And then it just, you know, during Covid it was like, you know, I feel like everybody got into like sourdough.

Um, yeah. Oh yeah. That for me, I, I didn't get into sourdough. I got into tiki cocktails. I was like, my thing. Um, and my wife is. What happened was like, so we built out this bar space behind me in the house. And you know, that was a, people would come over and they're always like, all right, what are we drinking?

You know, the joke was everybody wants to come over to just have drinks with Wayne. And then, so my wife was like, you know, she's, she's been my rock man. Like anything, I had these crazy ideas and she's always on board with it. She was like, all right. It's going to work out, you know, just, this [00:11:00] is the new thing.

This is what we're doing. Um, so she's been amazing, uh, support in that. But yeah, there's coffee content was where it started. And then it eventually kind of got a little bit boring talking about coffee all the time. And she was like, why don't you, she's like, why don't you just like post cocktail recipes and you're always buying bourbon tequilas, like talk about that stuff.

And so we, I started my own channel with that. And then within the first like month. blew up and I was like, okay, I guess this is a thing now. Um, it's fun. I love doing it. I, this is a passion project. It's my whole thing is like, I'm not an expert in spirits at all. Um, I'm not a bartender, uh, but I'm really into the craft of bartending and understanding the history and learning, you know, all these classic recipes.

Hey sippers, hope you're loving this episode of the spirit guides. If you are, Would you please follow the show on Spotify, Apple, wherever you get your podcasts, or subscribe to the show on YouTube? [00:12:00] And the most important thing you can do for the show and for me is to leave a review. It makes a big difference.

Thanks so much. Back to the show. So when you started with coffee content, and now it's mostly, now it's mostly bourbon and tequila content, uh, do your partners at Kings Coast be like, Hey man, how about some more of that coffee content? Cause like we're trying to sell coffee, bro. Yeah, there's a, we do mix it in, you know, I, I, I am always like, I've always got the Kings Coast hat on.

And, you know, it's funny too, cause I've had people follow me and they're like, Oh, Kings Coast. I love that coffee. And I'm like, have you ever seen our social media? Like same face. You know, it's funny. But yeah, my you know, my partners are they understand it too because that's what they do for a living They're they're streaming and they're always you know Doing content and it's so funny because like i'm always like can you just drop our name more, you know?

Yeah, exactly this it's such a fine line between like You know, talking about it [00:13:00] organically and then just trying to force, like, buy my coffee, buy my coffee. It's, and to me, I'm like, I never want it to be that way. Um, so like, if any way I can naturally fit it in, I always do it. You know, when you're now starting, uh, with the success of the bourbon and the agave content, starting to monetize it a little bit, some brand partnerships, affiliate revenue, that kind of thing.

Like. Does that change how you think about what you want to shoot or how you shoot it? It's it's funny that you brought that up too because like I was just having this conversation yesterday where the the monetization With like content, right? It's like I feel like it's the natural cycle You start doing it because you like it you're having fun with it and brains reach out They start sending you free stuff and they're like, it's amazing, you know, and then then all sudden a brand comes along and they're like Hey, we'd love to pay you to make a post for us or you know, like You You're like, wow, I can actually make money doing this.

This is our, you know, supplement the, the hobby, the joke. I always say, well, it's not really a joke, [00:14:00] but my stance on it is, you know, when I, every time I talk to brands, if I'm already, if I'm talking to them, I've already done my due diligence. I've researched the brand. I, it's somebody that I'm willing to, to put my name or my reputation on.

Like, I won't even talk to brands that I don't want to talk to. Um, The way I look at it is monetization to me doesn't pay for my opinion or my viewpoint on anything. I look at it is the monetization pays to keep the lights on. It keeps, you know, buys new bottles to put on the shelf. It's, it's. Kind of just basically, you know, my time of the day to sit there for instead of a couple hours sitting there talking to my wife, uh, I got to record videos while she yelled at me in the background, you know?

Um, but yeah, that's, to me, like, it's, it's interesting, you know, the whole, Monetization side of, of this, I'm just having so much fun with it. And I think to me, you know, this is what I wanted to do. I just wanted to kind [00:15:00] of just have fun with it, record the process and put it out there for people to see and people resonate with it, you know, it's like you grow following and it's weird.

Um, still, you know, I kind of get the imposter syndrome sometimes, you know, where like you put a piece of content out there and you're like, is anybody gonna watch this or who am I, you know, like, why does anybody care? But, um, You know, you do it for the people that, you know, might see that video and then change their opinion on something or try something new.

And then you get the DMS and they're like, Hey, I just found, you know, Castano's tequila, or, you know, I finally got Fortaleza. And you're like, Oh, cool, man. I'm glad you, you know, it's, you see the direct impact. And that kind of makes it absolutely worthwhile. Yeah. You know, that, that to me is the big part of it.

I love the randomness, uh, of, of your first sort of big, uh, Breakup video on Tik TOK, uh, over, over the holidays at Costco. You want to tell that story? Yeah. So that was, that was the first like video that I posted that actually like [00:16:00] got pretty viral. Um, or at least, you know, in my standards of like, I was like, nobody's ever going to watch this, but so this is kind of what spurred the whole, you should start your own Tik TOK channel, um, randomly going into Costco.

It was like. Couple days before Christmas, and I just I don't know what it is about me, but people want to talk to me I everywhere I go people are just like my wife's like it's hilarious. She's like people just they're Naturally gravitated to you or they want to talk to you. So I'm standing there Costco is just opening up.

There's a mob of people running through the front doors. Um, and here in New York state, we have Costco and then we have a liquor store next to it. It's not actually, you can't sell it inside. Um, so this little old lady standing there in the crowd and I just, I got locked eyes with her and she just looks at me, she goes, do you know where the liquor store is?

I was like, well, that's exactly where I'm going. So. Follow me. And I'm like barreling through the [00:17:00] crowd. She's following me behind. And she's like, Oh, thanks. I'm like, what are you looking for? She's like, well, I got to get a bottle of bourbon for my grandson and I'm working, I need a bottle of wine here. I am walking her through the Costco liquor store.

I'm like, well, this is a really good, you know, what are you having for dinner? You know, obviously, you know, the water would go well with that or pairing up her wine. And, and then, uh, they had a, you know, Eliza Craig store pick. And it was like, all right. We're going to get any kind of bourbon. I'm like the stuff he wants, you're probably not going to find here.

Um, she's like, yeah, he said something about, you know, like Blanton's. And I was like, I was like, you're not going to find it here. Uh, but I was like, this is a one of a kind bottle. You know, like they only have it here. It came from a single barrel of bourbon. And she was like, and now you have this cool story you can tell to your grandson and you know, whatever.

So I just got back and I just recorded that. Recap of that conversation in the, in the parking lot. And then that video just popped off and it did really well. And, and then, um, [00:18:00] I followed that up with another, just like coming home and forgetting your wife's home, like you're hiding bottles of bourbon and that video popped off.

And I was like, all right, I guess this is the thing now. And it just kept snowballing, you know, and it's just, it's fun. It's going well on the content creation side, obviously. Uh, what, what annoys you about it? Um, editing, editing has become the bane of my existence. I feel like I can come up with ideas galore.

I have like a list of, of rolling videos in my head of like, I got to get to this one, I got to get to this one. I like, and, um, I, what I like to do, my, my strategy for content is I have a couple, like preset videos for the week of like what I want to do. And I like to just like, Like feedback form and engagement loop.

Like, you know, if I get comments, I like to reply to comments. I feel like it's a big part of what's helped grow the channel is that interaction, um, do, you know, stitching [00:19:00] people's videos and replying to comments with the video and like that kind of like. So there's, you get these really good questions.

You're like, I can't type this out, but I can give you a video. Um, and then people see that and they're like, wow, this guy just replied to me with a video, like took time out of his day. It was like, you know, that's, that's the fun part. I could do that forever. It's always the ones you never expect. You're just like, Oh, just put this post up, whatever.

Or my first real viral video that went over a million years. I didn't mean to post it even better. Yeah. I had it queued up. It was in my, you know, it was in my drafts and I'm like, I'm sitting there and I'm like, I was going to edit the caption on it. And I just fat thumbed it and sent it. I was like, Oh no, it's 1 15 in the afternoon.

Nobody's going to see this post. Cause you got to post at 7 PM, you know, to hit the tick tock algorithm and then. Literally. I'm like, Oh man, I was like, I was going to delete it. Uh, and then I got a phone call and I'm listening, I'm on the phone call and then I hang up the phone and I was like, I got to take this video down.

I want to save this one for later. This is [00:20:00] a good post. And I looked at it. It was like 10, 000 views. Oh, okay. I was like, who knew? And then that video just exploded. And I was like, okay, you know, hit almost 2 million views on that. A video. I didn't even mean to toast because I thought. It would be better if I posted it at a certain time, but that's the, the biggest thing I tell anybody is like, if you have ideas, just post content, just, you never know what the video that can make or break it will be.

There you go. So, so sippers, you sippers who are coffee fans, uh, Kings Coast coffee online, uh, it'll be roasted by the man himself drinks with Wayne, Wayne Cafarella. There is a, uh, I do have a promo code going, it's DrinkWithWayne, uh, DrinkWithWayne or DrinkWithWayne20. I think it's DrinkWithWayne. Should've prepared for this.

We'll put it in the show notes. I'll make it DrinkWithWayne. Yeah, there you go, it'll work by the time we publish it, yeah. DrinkWithWayne promo code, folks. Yeah. And look [00:21:00] in the show notes for that. Uh, he is the one, the only Wayne Cavariella. Uh, look him up on the coffee company, of course, but also TikTok and Instagram, all the places.

Wayne, thanks so much for being here. Appreciate it. Thank you, Jay. Thanks for having me. Absolutely. Friends, don't forget, you can find every episode, including the promo code we just talked about at the spiritguides. info. All the videos on YouTube at the spiritguides. video. Big thanks to our pals at lovescotch.com for their support. Check out their extraordinary Curated collection of spirits. They'll send it right to your front door. Maybe with some coffee. The show is produced by content 10 X who we love and recommend for all digital content. I am tequila, Jay bear and sippers. You can make mine a double. See you next time on the spirit guides.