Today we’d like to introduce you to Tuan Lee.
Tuan, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
We, the founders, all met in a bar in Los Feliz. It was Messhall. Hope Ewing was our favorite bartender while Alex and Tuan were her favorite regulars. As the friendship grew, Tuan realized each of them had complementary skill sets to launch a canned cocktail brand. In 2016, we began the early groundwork: creative r&d and searching for the ideal co-packer which we eventually determined would be a craft distillery based on our vision of bar quality cocktails. By December of 2017, we connected with Ventura Spirits and began transitioning Hope’s kitchen r&d to the distillery r&d. During 2018 and early 2019, we developed and completed our four sku’s without third-party beverage labs. This “no shortcuts” path paid off. After soft-launching in seven months before Covid, we quickly received critical acclaim from local and national press, including top 16 canned cocktails by Food & Wine.
Before founding VERVET, I worked as a commercial photographer and producer. VERVET affords me the opportunity of continuing my love of storytelling in a larger entrepreneurial endeavor. I’m very grateful for this to have come together.
What I’m particularly proud of are the values VERVET is guided by. We are committed to sustainability as our product scales. We are not perfect but so far, we know we will never package in plastic, continue to up-cycle agricultural material whenever possible and source locally to reduce our carbon footprint.
Equally as important are our DEI values. I’m Viet-Korean and we’re also female and Filipino-Jewish founded. We believe diversity should not only be our foundational responsibility, but it is our underlying strength. Our recipes include flavors and ideas from the many cultures of LA and our brand is celebration of the unique cultural alchemy here. I’d like for VERVET to be part of the reimagination of an LA brand and in larger part, what an “All American” can be.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
Where to begin here, there are so many challenges we have given the goals we set out for us. I’d say one of the biggest challenges comes from our product development. I chose a bartender as a co-founder not only for her skill set and creativity but to also to bring their recipe ethos to our beverage formulation. Hope is committed to making sure Vervet delivers cocktails she supports and is enthusiastic about from an ingredient standpoint. One of those ingredients is fresh juice. But as any bartender will tell you, fresh juice is amazing but has a limited time before the freshness and quality declines. It was very important to get his right. Our recipes include not only citrus juice but also tomato and strawberry juice. We spent over a year solving it until a solution met our satisfaction. I’m proud her “no shortcuts’ attitude paid off with recognition from publications we have tremendous respect for like Food & Wine and many more.
Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about VERVET?
VERVET is a craft cocktail bar in a can inspired by the diverse cultures and food scene of Los Angeles. As a premium brand entering the ready-to-drink cocktail space, we deliver a California experience with sustainable, sparkling farm-to-can cocktails: made by our co-founder, veteran bartender and author, Hope Ewing. We have 7% abv out now, 4% and 0% alcohol in the 2021 pipeline. Woman-owned. AAPI Owned.
Any big plans?
I’m excited to share we have a new craft cocktail we’re releasing as a direct alternative to White Claw and other similarly made commercial hard seltzers. We want people to have a low-calorie, low ABV, gluten-free option that is craft made with quality and truly natural ingredients.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://drinkvervet.com
- Instagram: @drinkvervet
Image Credits:
VERVET
