Mark Kondrat wants you to discover craft beer across Alberta at festivals and events

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[00:00] SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Canada's podcast.
[00:05] SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to Calgary's podcast with Mario Toneguzi on Canada's podcast network.
[00:11] SPEAKER_00: Joining me today is Mark Condrat, who is CEO of Alberta Beer Festivals and a few other
[00:18] SPEAKER_00: things and we'll get to talk about those later.
[00:21] SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining us today, Mark.
[00:24] SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thanks for having me.
[00:25] SPEAKER_01: It's fun to share my story.
[00:27] SPEAKER_00: All right, well, let's talk about Alberta Beer Festivals.
[00:30] SPEAKER_00: Can you maybe describe for me a little bit about what it is and what you guys do?
[00:37] SPEAKER_01: Well, currently it's something that is deemed illegal.
[00:42] SPEAKER_01: So, but usually what it is is, so we've been doing our festival since 2005.
[00:51] SPEAKER_01: Me and my business partner, Bill Robinson, have been working together probably since 2002,
[00:55] SPEAKER_01: but Alberta Beer Festivals is just a way for us to kind of share the stories of local
[01:02] SPEAKER_01: breweries, distilleries, restaurants and also people that come into the province.
[01:09] SPEAKER_01: So, Alberta is one of the most probably welcoming places in the world in terms of welcoming other
[01:15] SPEAKER_01: breweries into distilleries and to showcase their products.
[01:19] SPEAKER_01: So, yeah, we have six festivals that we do across Alberta and we try to make them all
[01:25] SPEAKER_01: unique so that they're featuring different things.
[01:27] SPEAKER_01: But ultimately, yeah, we want to create an environment where people can share their story,
[01:33] SPEAKER_01: whether like I said, their restaurants, breweries, distilleries and connect directly with consumers.
[01:39] SPEAKER_01: So, we're hopeful and we're working hard to make sure that we're able to do that again soon.
[01:44] SPEAKER_00: Yeah, unfortunately, we can't do that these days, can we?
[01:49] SPEAKER_00: So, tell me, when you look at the landscape in Alberta, we've got an explosion in the
[01:59] SPEAKER_00: last few years of breweries, of distilleries, etc. What are your thoughts on why we're seeing that in the market?
[02:08] SPEAKER_01: Well, a lot of it has to do with just government policy.
[02:11] SPEAKER_01: So, they made the minimums significantly lower.
[02:15] SPEAKER_01: Like, the ability to create a brewery five years ago or 10 years ago, you had to have like
[02:24] SPEAKER_01: some really deep pockets.
[02:26] SPEAKER_01: So, they made it impossible for a lot of people to do it.
[02:30] SPEAKER_01: So, once they kind of eliminated those minimums, it made it viable for people to experiment and to try.
[02:37] SPEAKER_01: And so, yeah, that's what you saw.
[02:41] SPEAKER_01: I don't know exactly what it was.
[02:43] SPEAKER_01: I think it was around 2013 or something like that.
[02:45] SPEAKER_01: But, anyway, and then you've just saw that, you know, really Alberta has a great entrepreneurial spirit.
[02:51] SPEAKER_01: So, once you give people an opportunity to do things, the entrepreneurial spirit of us kind of
[02:58] SPEAKER_01: kicks in and then you see the explosion, right?
[03:01] SPEAKER_01: So, as soon as the opportunity was there, people started taking advantage of it and it's been a lot of fun.
[03:06] SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and you see the types of people who are starting this are all over the place, right?
[03:13] SPEAKER_00: And including people that may have been laid off from jobs say in the oil patch
[03:20] SPEAKER_00: or people who are just tired of working for the man.
[03:27] SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, yeah.
[03:29] SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so, do you think there's an oversaturation of them right now or not?
[03:39] SPEAKER_01: I don't believe so.
[03:41] SPEAKER_01: I mean, and I asked that question of them a lot myself.
[03:44] SPEAKER_01: And, you know, it's like restaurants.
[03:47] SPEAKER_01: You know, sadly, you see restaurants close, but that doesn't necessarily mean that there's too
[03:53] SPEAKER_01: many restaurants. It's just sometimes certain models don't work in certain situations.
[03:57] SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
[03:58] SPEAKER_01: But the concept is still viable.
[04:01] SPEAKER_01: I think talking with a lot of breweries these days is what they have to be more careful of is what
[04:08] SPEAKER_01: their model is. And so, what you saw years ago is these big breweries popping up that had, you know,
[04:15] SPEAKER_01: a lot of distribution. And so, you know, they were built to, you know, supply a lot of liquor
[04:22] SPEAKER_01: stores with a lot of beer. So, that part of it, I think, is more challenging now than it would
[04:28] SPEAKER_01: have been five years ago to be a player in that kind of area of the community. And where you see
[04:35] SPEAKER_01: a lot of opportunity, I think still is in smaller areas, so smaller towns, specific neighborhoods.
[04:42] SPEAKER_01: So, you're first and foremost, you're really serving a specific group.
[04:49] SPEAKER_01: And I think those, what I'm seeing is those guys are being very successful.
[04:54] SPEAKER_01: And once you have kind of your defined neighborhood that you're supporting, you can grow slowly
[04:59] SPEAKER_01: from there. But so, I don't think that we've hit saturation per se, but I think people need to be
[05:04] SPEAKER_01: very careful and thoughtful of what their model is going to look like before they start a brewery.
[05:11] SPEAKER_01: So, I'm curious. How did you get involved in this line of work?
[05:16] SPEAKER_01: So, I've always, like, given when I was, I went to, I graduated from University of Alberta.
[05:21] SPEAKER_01: And while I was going to school, I was, I mean, like, most university students,
[05:26] SPEAKER_01: a lover of beer. And I was lucky enough to work for Moulson while I was going to Edmondsson.
[05:33] SPEAKER_01: And that was back when they still had the brewery there. So, it was just a really cool experience.
[05:38] SPEAKER_01: And so, I fell in love with the industry and the people that were a part of the industry.
[05:45] SPEAKER_01: But I was always also an entrepreneur and I knew that I would have to
[05:49] SPEAKER_01: do something on my own. And so, this was kind of my way of being able to kind of scratch both
[05:56] SPEAKER_01: of those itches, I guess. And so, when I left, when I came back to Calgary, I connected with a
[06:03] SPEAKER_01: friend of mine and we started doing festivals. And we eventually landed on doing a beer festival,
[06:12] SPEAKER_01: one of our friends, Bernrain Cock, that we're so close with. He had an agency and he said,
[06:17] SPEAKER_01: hey, you guys, there's no beer festivals in town. Why don't you guys do a beer festival? And we
[06:22] SPEAKER_01: thought, yeah, that sounds like a fun idea. So, we did it. And the industry really embraced us and
[06:30] SPEAKER_01: did a lot to help us. Back then, it was mostly agencies. And so, there's people bringing beer into
[06:36] SPEAKER_01: Alberta. And that's why we called the first one the Calgary International Beer Festivals,
[06:41] SPEAKER_01: because that's what was really that's what was sexy back then was all these international beers
[06:45] SPEAKER_01: coming in. And so, it's been really cool to be a part of because we've seen the industry evolve
[06:53] SPEAKER_01: into what it is now, which is instead of having all of these beers coming in from other countries
[06:59] SPEAKER_01: and provinces and states, most of what we get is local. And so, it's really cool to be able to share
[07:05] SPEAKER_01: these guys stories from a local perspective. So, I'm curious, what were you taking at U of A?
[07:11] SPEAKER_01: Business. Yeah, so I took I took commerce. And yeah, I went to U of C first and then I took my last
[07:18] SPEAKER_01: couple years at U of A. And because I had no friends, I just became like a real nerd in the business
[07:25] SPEAKER_01: faculty. So, I was like the president of the market association and stuff like that. So,
[07:29] SPEAKER_01: it allowed me to kind of experiment with some projects and kind of, you know, do some entrepreneurial
[07:34] SPEAKER_01: things. Well, at school. So, yeah, you know, kind of, you know, when I look back at it, it kind of,
[07:42] SPEAKER_01: it, I was doing in university what I ended up doing essentially as an entrepreneur. So, I've
[07:48] SPEAKER_00: been very lucky with that. Okay, super. Now, you mentioned a lot about being an entrepreneur.
[07:53] SPEAKER_00: One of the other things or one of the other gigs, I guess you have is pinched, sorry, pitched
[07:59] SPEAKER_01: tent coffee. Like what do you do there? Well, so one of the things that I thought about, I've always
[08:08] SPEAKER_01: loved coffee. You could probably tell that I'm jacked up on caffeine as you speak. Yeah, but
[08:14] SPEAKER_01: yeah, so one of the things over COVID lockdown, I'm married, I got two kids and my wife works from
[08:21] SPEAKER_01: home and she was already working from home before lockdown, before the first one. And so, I'm
[08:29] SPEAKER_01: trying to figure out, okay, what's going on? As I said, my company was kind of at a standstill. And,
[08:36] SPEAKER_01: you know, we've always enjoyed drinking good coffee. And I thought, I wonder how shitty things would
[08:40] SPEAKER_01: have to get before our coffee budget became a topic of conversation, you know, because she likes
[08:48] SPEAKER_01: good coffee and I like good coffee. And so, as one of those things where I understand and I have a
[08:54] SPEAKER_01: lot of respect for the brewing of beer and the process and how hard it is for these guys and
[09:00] SPEAKER_01: girls to do it. And I've never wanted to brew my own beer. I've always just admired from afar and
[09:08] SPEAKER_01: I'll enjoy the fruits of their labor. From the coffee perspective, I thought, for some reason,
[09:14] SPEAKER_01: I was just more interested in the process in terms of like actually getting my hands dirty and
[09:19] SPEAKER_01: getting in there and doing it. So, it's just started out as an interest as a hobby. But I got to
[09:27] SPEAKER_01: learn, you know, where, you know, I got to start sourcing the beans. So, I have a guy locally that I
[09:33] SPEAKER_01: use and he's from Columbia. So, I always feel like I'm doing like some sort of drug deal when I go
[09:39] SPEAKER_01: to grab my coffee beans. A good friend of mine, roast coffee. He's got his own coffee company.
[09:45] SPEAKER_01: So, he's been really nice enough to help me in terms of learning how to roast and package and
[09:52] SPEAKER_01: and all that stuff. So, it's been a lot of fun and it also allows me to kind of like be creative in a
[09:59] SPEAKER_01: way that's not like with my other companies, I have partners and stuff like that. So, with this one,
[10:04] SPEAKER_01: I can just kind of be creatively a little bit more of a goofball and kind of use that part of my
[10:11] SPEAKER_01: brain, I guess. So, it's been a lot of fun. Okay, you mentioned other companies. Yeah, what else
[10:17] SPEAKER_01: do you have on the go? Well, so, most of it is sort of beer-related and beer-based. So,
[10:24] SPEAKER_01: what we've done is that we've actually consolidated all of our companies that people go to, let's
[10:29] SPEAKER_01: speak for a beer.com. You'll kind of see everything. So, Alberta Beer Fest is by far our biggest,
[10:39] SPEAKER_01: it's been around forever and it's what we love, it's what our passion is. And then from that,
[10:45] SPEAKER_01: we have a few projects that we've been working on. So, one is Hoppy Pass, which is essentially a
[10:50] SPEAKER_01: scheduling platform that allows people to book tastings for small groups. And what we want to do with
[10:58] SPEAKER_01: that when things open up is we basically want to take the tools that we've developed through
[11:03] SPEAKER_01: Alberta Beer Festivals and kind of help use those tools, work with breweries to kind of use those
[11:11] SPEAKER_01: tools to drive traffic to their breweries. And I should say distillers as well. So, because one of
[11:17] SPEAKER_01: the things that we've learned over time is how do we attract thousands of people to our festivals?
[11:22] SPEAKER_01: And so, we can use those same ideas to attract people to these breweries and stuff like that and
[11:29] SPEAKER_01: to help share stories. So, that was the idea with Hoppy Pass. And then we do Beer Fest in a Box,
[11:34] SPEAKER_01: which is essentially what we've done is we have an eight pack. So, every quarter we introduce a new
[11:41] SPEAKER_01: Beer Fest in a Box and it's just local brewery. So, we'll showcase eight local breweries from
[11:46] SPEAKER_01: Crossell, Alberta. And it's just a good opportunity for us to continue to share their story without
[11:53] SPEAKER_01: being able to do festivals. And we get so much awesome feedback from that because a lot of these
[11:58] SPEAKER_01: breweries, you know, because they're available across Alberta, a lot of people haven't heard of these
[12:03] SPEAKER_01: breweries. So, it's a really good way to introduce people to these breweries. Yeah. So, where do you
[12:12] SPEAKER_00: spirit from your part begin? How do you get into all this and why?
[12:20] SPEAKER_01: Where did it begin? I don't know. I don't know. My dad was always an entrepreneur from what I
[12:27] SPEAKER_01: understand. I mean, he's still very much with us. So, he's just lazier these days. But he was
[12:34] SPEAKER_01: always very entrepreneurial and he was very, you know, he saw opportunities that weren't necessarily
[12:41] SPEAKER_01: in his kind of lane and he would go and do them. So, I was always exposed to that. And I was never
[12:50] SPEAKER_01: discouraged from doing it. Like I said, even in university, I had a good job lined up. I could
[12:56] SPEAKER_01: have worked for Moulson and I said, I just want to do my own thing. And my dad was always very
[13:02] SPEAKER_01: supportive. But he's just like, I don't care. You're the one that's got to pay your rent, not me. So,
[13:07] SPEAKER_01: and then luckily, if you start being an entrepreneur at a young enough age, you know, you're not
[13:13] SPEAKER_01: really getting paid that much from companies. So, you can kind of scrape by and you're also just
[13:18] SPEAKER_01: used to living like a student. So, you know, when you're young, it's the best time to be an entrepreneur
[13:23] SPEAKER_01: because you're used to eating craft dinner every time a day and, you know, sleeping on a buddy's couch.
[13:30] SPEAKER_01: So, and it's always just been, and to be honest with you, especially in Calgary, I know I'm
[13:36] SPEAKER_01: in Sinsa-Same. I've just been lucky enough to be surrounded by people who, if I've had an idea
[13:43] SPEAKER_01: that have supported us and, you know, like good friends at the industry that like, hey, we want to do
[13:48] SPEAKER_01: this and they're like, sweet, let's do it. So, the environment has just been very supportive of me.
[13:53] SPEAKER_01: So, yeah, continue to do it. Okay, you're also into podcasting, I say.
[13:59] SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely. So, I actually have two podcasts. So, one is, let's meet for a beer.
[14:06] SPEAKER_01: And then the other is the contract podcast. So, with Let's Meet for a Beer, I've kind of turned
[14:11] SPEAKER_01: that into something where I just share people's stories from, from the industry. Because I just,
[14:17] SPEAKER_01: I think so many of their stories are so awesome. And if I can be a platform to help share those stories,
[14:24] SPEAKER_01: I love to do it. Really, what we try to do is look at everything we do as a platform for people
[14:30] SPEAKER_01: in the beer community to share their stories. And so, whether it's like I said,
[14:36] SPEAKER_01: through the festivals, through Hoppy Pass, through the podcast, through Beer Fest and Box,
[14:41] SPEAKER_01: it's just a way for us to share those stories. And so, that's been awesome. And then the
[14:47] SPEAKER_01: contract podcast is something I do on my own to share stories of entrepreneurs that aren't
[14:54] SPEAKER_01: necessarily in the in the beer industry. But there's just so many cool stories, inspiring stories
[15:01] SPEAKER_01: out there are people that are that are doing things and people need to hear those stories.
[15:07] SPEAKER_01: I always think, you know, business people and entrepreneurs on some level are very misunderstood
[15:12] SPEAKER_01: in that, you know, people think if someone has a business though, they must be a millionaire.
[15:16] SPEAKER_01: They don't see the struggles that are behind the scenes and the risks that they're taking in. So,
[15:22] SPEAKER_01: you know, I want to be able to share those stories with people.
[15:25] SPEAKER_00: So, in those sharing of those stories and for the successful entrepreneurs,
[15:32] SPEAKER_00: but do you notice any common threads of, you know, sort of the secret ingredients,
[15:39] SPEAKER_00: secret sauce making a successful entrepreneur?
[15:43] SPEAKER_01: I think, well, I would say one is you have to, you have to just keep going every single day.
[15:53] SPEAKER_01: It's, you know, because especially like right now we live in a world where it's just, you know,
[15:58] SPEAKER_01: because I think the world, the word entrepreneur gets thrown around.
[16:04] SPEAKER_01: And, you know, it's because you can call yourself an entrepreneur and then you're an entrepreneur
[16:09] SPEAKER_01: and match it greatly. But the people that are true entrepreneurs, in my opinion, it's a life
[16:14] SPEAKER_01: long endeavor. It's not an albeit entrepreneur for a year and then I'll go work for a company.
[16:21] SPEAKER_01: So, it's baked into their DNA, a true entrepreneur. And so, you have to,
[16:25] SPEAKER_01: you're to time horizon for success might be 20 years. And so, you have to, you might be failing
[16:31] SPEAKER_01: right now, but you need to, you need to somehow, summon up the energy to keep going,
[16:37] SPEAKER_01: knowing that your success might be a year from now, two years from now, five years from now.
[16:43] SPEAKER_01: So, I think that, and I don't know what that is, but I talk to entrepreneurs all the time and they
[16:49] SPEAKER_01: just always are like, okay, they're figuring out what their next step is, even in today's environment,
[16:54] SPEAKER_01: it's so uncertain. And then I would say the other thing is the successful entrepreneurs that I've
[17:00] SPEAKER_01: been lucky enough to be with help each other. They don't put, they don't put walls up. They don't see
[17:06] SPEAKER_01: their success. They don't see that if someone succeeds, it's at their expense. Like, if my friend
[17:12] SPEAKER_01: succeeds in business, I'm truly happy for him. And I know that the friends that I've built are
[17:17] SPEAKER_01: truly happy to see my success. And we need to, we need to build each other up. And if you,
[17:23] SPEAKER_01: in my opinion, anyway, if you're not like that, you're seeing things on too small of a scale.
[17:29] SPEAKER_01: So, do everything you can to build up the people around you.
[17:32] SPEAKER_00: You know what I found, and I have a big sports background, years ago, I was a sports reporter
[17:41] SPEAKER_00: at the Calgary Harold, right? So, so I still have that connection with the sports community.
[17:46] SPEAKER_00: But I found is a lot of these athletes have become very successful entrepreneurs. And I think
[17:53] SPEAKER_00: being an athlete teaches you a number of things, you know, like everything about discipline and
[17:58] SPEAKER_00: perseverance. But more importantly, how to, how to get up when you fall, right? And how,
[18:07] SPEAKER_00: and how to accept failure and move on. And I think that's part of the road to entrepreneurship,
[18:14] SPEAKER_00: because if you can't accept failure, like you're in the wrong business, because you're going to
[18:19] SPEAKER_01: fail at times, right? Yeah, you're going to fail and you're going to, yeah, and it's a bumpy road
[18:27] SPEAKER_01: man. You're going to, because it sounds like a good idea at the time. And then you have to go
[18:31] SPEAKER_01: through it to realize, you know, oops, that was a terrible idea. But, but it's all part of the
[18:37] SPEAKER_01: journey. And, and you're also going to have cycles where people don't necessarily
[18:43] SPEAKER_01: believe in you. And so you have to believe in yourself to keep going. And, and one thing that I
[18:48] SPEAKER_01: did realize along the way is what I, I felt like for myself, when I first started out, my motivation
[18:54] SPEAKER_01: was to prove people wrong. People would say, oh, you couldn't do that. You can't do that. Whatever.
[19:00] SPEAKER_01: And then somewhere along the way, you know, motivation actually has to, or for me anyway,
[19:05] SPEAKER_01: it had to kind of change, which is being an entrepreneur motivated by the chip of my shoulder,
[19:12] SPEAKER_01: it was no longer what was going to drive my success. It would have to be to the energy had to go
[19:18] SPEAKER_01: into helping other people, right? So at a certain point along the way, if you've been in the,
[19:23] SPEAKER_01: in the game long enough, people, I think stop looking at you like, oh, you can't do that. You can't
[19:29] SPEAKER_01: do that. And so you have to find a new motivation, which is helping people. And once you're motivated by
[19:34] SPEAKER_01: helping people, it's like, I mean, then things are easy, right? Because every day there's someone
[19:41] SPEAKER_00: you can, you know, share their story or whatever. So yeah, now pardon the pun, but is there any other
[19:50] SPEAKER_00: ideas on to Pernaro ideas perculating? Get it? Perculating? Yeah. Yeah.
[19:59] SPEAKER_01: Yeah, there, there, yeah, there's always ideas. And yeah, eventually I, like, you got to just shut,
[20:06] SPEAKER_01: you got to shut that off and focus on on what you're doing. So,
[20:13] SPEAKER_01: what I'm really focused on right now is more evolving what we're doing. And so not necessarily
[20:20] SPEAKER_01: creating new concepts, but just saying, okay, you know, how can we make our festivals better?
[20:25] SPEAKER_01: You know, because what we want to do, this is a really unique opportunity for us. You don't often get
[20:33] SPEAKER_01: your business shut down for a year and a half or two years. So on to some level, it sucks on
[20:40] SPEAKER_01: the, on another level, it's like, okay, well, when we come back, we can reimagine what we do. And we
[20:45] SPEAKER_01: can, we can talk to everybody who is involved in their festivals and see how we can make it better for
[20:50] SPEAKER_01: them. And so hopefully what you'll see when Alberta Beer Festival comes back is, is kind of an
[20:57] SPEAKER_01: evolution of what, what we've wanted to do. Because we've had time to, to sort of sit back and,
[21:02] SPEAKER_01: and look at it and, and make things better. And then the other thing is you get to ask yourself why,
[21:09] SPEAKER_01: about everything? Okay, why are we doing that? Why are we doing that? And we've always been okay with,
[21:16] SPEAKER_01: you know, we've never been the type of people that are like, oh, that's perfect. Don't ask
[21:20] SPEAKER_01: question without like, we, we rip ourselves apart and read, try to reorganize things all the time.
[21:28] SPEAKER_01: Because we want our shows to be better all the time, we don't want them to be stale and stagnant.
[21:32] SPEAKER_01: So this has kind of been a great opportunity to do that. Despite it's been a shitty year too. So,
[21:39] SPEAKER_01: you got to take the good at the bad, right? You bet. All right, super. Well, thanks very much, Mark,
[21:44] SPEAKER_01: for joining us today. Yeah, thanks for having me. And, like I said, if I,
[21:49] SPEAKER_01: I know you told me that it was video, but I feel like if I would have remembered that, I'm going to
[21:54] SPEAKER_01: shaved off my, my grade nine facial hair, but maybe next time. Okay, thanks a lot, Mark. All right.
[22:02] SPEAKER_00: I was Mark Conrad, who is CEO of Alberta Beer Festivals and a serial entrepreneur with ideas such as
[22:10] SPEAKER_00: pitch tent, coffee and other things. This has been Calgary's podcast with Mario Taniguchi on Canada's
[22:17] SPEAKER_00: podcast network. Thanks for joining us today.