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Insight News
July 25 25,, 2022 - July 31, 2022
Vol. 49 No. 30• The Journal For Community News, Business & The Arts • insightnews.com
REVEL SPIRITS Photos courtesy of REVEL
Micah McFarlane (left) CEO and founder of Revel Spirits, Inc., introduces his business partner/investor Justin Hartley to Twin Cities audiences over the next couple of weeks in a series of advance and in person promotions to build brand awareness and sales for the the company’s award-winning Revel Avila, and for new weber blue agave products the company is bringing to market. Micah was featured guest on Conversations with Al McFarlane’s Tuesday broadcast on KFAI FM 90.3, a broadcast that is streamed nationwide via insight news and blackpressusa.com on Facebook, Youtube, Twitter,and LinkedIn. Tuesday, July 25, Hartley is a featured guest on Conversations, inviting Twin Cities to Thursday July 28th: 12-2pm -Surdyk’s (Northeast Minneapolis) Bottle signing event, and to the 5pm Friday, July 29 Revel sponsored Gary Clark, Jr. concert at the Hilde, in Plymouth, MN.
Born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, raised in Morelos, Mexico By Al McFarlane, Editor It has a homecoming kind of feeling. Micah McFarlane and his business partner, television superstar Justin Hartley, are in town this week to spike the buzz around their agave spirits beverage, Revel Avila. In a KFAI 90.3 FM The Conversation with Al McFarlane radio and social media interview with me last week Micah McFarlane recounted the steps that led to his emergence as a trailblazing innovator in the liquor industry. He looks back to friendships that go back to grade school, in Worthington, a rural Minnesota town in the southwest corner of the state. McFarlane said he was at home stressed by an overbooking conflict. He’d made a commitment to have dinner and hang out with his best grade-school buddy, Blas Gonzales, when a meeting that he could not afford to miss opened up. The business meeting was with Hector Ruiz, celebrated chef and creator operator of several trend-setting restaurants in Twin Cities including Rincon 38, Enya, and Costa Blanco. He wasn’t sure what the meeting would yield, but it had to do with a new career focus he had been exploring. Backstory: McFarlane had been developing markets and potential investors for a startup in the Mezcal agave spirits line. He had approached some of his childhood friends with the idea of investing in a new venture and was told, “Micah, I like the idea and the product, but I would only consider investing if you owned the company.”
Lightbulb. Friend Blas shows up for their planned meeting and hears Micah describe the dilemma: honoring the commitment to his friend, recognizing that Blas had traveled over 200 miles to hang out and remember being kids and best friends in grade school. But…there was this business pressing against the moment. “I’ll go with you to your meeting,” Blas said. “Let’s go!” It was a first meeting for Micah and Hector. Micah recalled walking into Enya, on Grand in South Minneapolis and taking a seat with Ruiz’ lawyer guys on the other side of the table. “Blas and I are sitting out there and Hector comes up to the table. He looks at Blas. He looks at me and he goes, to Blas in Spanish, ‘How do you know this guy?’ And then Blas, in Spanish ‘We’re best friends from Worthington, Minnesota. There was one Black family and one Mexican family in Worthington. And we became best friends” Hector just smiled and started laughing and then spoke in perfect English, “How are you doing?” “And that was the intro. That was the seal of approval. My best friend from grade school, Blas Gonzalez opened a door and created a bridge of trust and possibility, that give birth to the Revel Avila phenomenon,” McFarlane said. Reflecting on their childhood friendship, McFarlane said, “As a kid in Worthington, I got the good books, good schools, small classrooms, opportunity was there, but I did the same thing every little farm kid did. I walked the soybeans, I tasseled the corn. I did my snow and ice skating and playing hockey and football and baseball. We went spear
fishing with bows and arrows. And we had wrist rockets as kids, these high powered, sling shots. We learned how to do Polish cannons, where you take a bunch of lighter fluid and you tape a bunch of cans together and put a tennis ball in there and we’d have these fights as eight year olds.” McFarlane said, “I treasure my childhood. I talk about it. I loved it. I love Worthington. And I treasure my relationships. Five or six of my first investors in Revel are all from Worthington, Minnesota. We all were from six to eight years old when we met.” On meeting Justin Hartley, award-winning star of This Is Us “Justin is an investor and a partner in Revel. I met him accidentally,” McFarlane said. “I went up to him and just started talking and he just kind of went along with me. And then I went back to my friends and said, ‘Hey, I had the strangest conversation with this guy named Conrad or with Conrad.’ And then my friend goes, ‘Micah, Conrad’s not here.’ And I said, ‘Well, who’s that?’ ‘That’s Justin Hartley from This Is Us.” “Then it all clicked. I went over to him and I said, ‘Man, thank you for being gracious.’ He goes, ‘That was funny, wasn’t it?’ I said, yeah and we just started laughing. I said, ‘Hey, do you like Agave spirits?’ He goes, ‘I love Agave spirits.’ And I said, ‘Well, I own this company called Revel. And I’d love to just send you some product.” “I wasn’t thinking about him as an investor or anything. I was just embarrassed because of what I just did. And then he said, ‘give me your card.’ I didn’t bring any
Justin Hartley cards with me. He says, ‘let me see your phone.’ And he plugs his number into my phone. And then after a couple weeks I text him: ‘Hey, I’m a man of my word. I want to make sure you get this product.’ And he says, ‘Can you come by tonight?’ I said, ‘No, I’m in New York.’ And he said, ‘oh, when do you get back?’ I said, ‘Tomorrow.” He goes, ‘Let’s meet up tomorrow,’” McFarlane said. “We sat and talked for about three and a half hours. And it was just amazing. I am like blown
away by just how cool he is. I’ve been around in the entertainment business for a long time and I could go stories on stories, but this guy walks the walk and talks the talk. I mean, he’s just down. He’s a kid from Chicago. I don’t think he came from a lot. He bar tendered, bussed tables, he’s done all of that. We just hit it off. We talk about a lot of stuff besides the liquor business, and become real genuine friends,” McFarlane said. “So what Justin brings to the table is that he’s using his
platform to help amplify what we are doing in getting liquid to the lips and telling the story. He’s gone down to Morelos Mexico to meet with Hector’s family of growers and distillers, and the authenticity is amazing. And so what we’re doing here is that we’re a sponsor for Live at the Hildy, a music festival in Plymouth, Minnesota, on the 28th. Therewill be all sorts of Revel product out there, tasting tables and everything.” For the full interview: www. insightnews.com