Thirsty Thursdays @3PM EST
I'm a 20+ year veteran in the wine and spirits industry who loves innovation. I'm interviewing those who are creating it from agriculture to glass. We will deep dive into their journey and provide insights to help yours.
We will discuss their major industry pain points and outlook for the future. If my guest has an item to drink or eat we will try it throughout the podcast. Come on the journey with us!
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Thirsty Thursdays @3PM EST
How a Navy Veteran Turned Bartender Created the Top Rated Michelada Mix I KC Hensley of Momo’s 🍺🔥
📢I talk🎙️with KC Hensley, of Momo's Michelada Mix👏🍷 🎇 🎉 ✨ 👏 🥂 😁
Just in time for International Michelada Day on July 12th!!
From bootstrapped beginnings to statewide success, KC Hensley shares how a trip to Nicaragua inspired Momo’s Michelada Mix — a tomato-free, top-rated drink that’s shaking up bars across Texas. 💥
In this episode of Thirsty Thursdays, Jessie Ott and KC talk:
- The origin story of Momo’s (and its “Stupid Rim Salt” 🤯)
- Why tajín can ruin a michelada
- What it’s like launching a CPG startup during a pandemic
- Tips for entrepreneurs, bartenders, and cocktail creators
- How Whole Foods came knocking
- KC’s early "business" renting his dad’s VHS tapes (yep, you read that right 😂)
🔗 Shop Momo’s: https://www.momosmicheladamix.com
📍 Find it near you: Store locator on the website
📅 Michelada Day is July 12th – celebrate with the good stuff!
—
🧃 Follow @ThirstyThursdaysat3PMEST for more bev-industry stories, tastings, and founders shaking up what we sip.
#micheladamix #momosmichelada #bevindustry #drinktrends #founderstory
📌 Keyword Tags
Momo’s Michelada, KC Hensley, michelada mix, stupid rim salt, bartender startup story, tajin michelada, tomato-free michelada, craft cocktail trends, Austin beverage brands, beer cocktail, Thirsty Thursdays podcast, drink entrepreneur, Whole Foods beverage startup, Texas CPG founders, michelada tasting, rim salt alternatives, startup beverage story, drink mix innovation, Latina founder tribute, military to mixology
🔥 Hashtags
#MicheladaMix #StupidRimSalt #DrinkBetter #TexasDrinks #AustinStartup #LatinoOwned #FemaleInspired #CPGStartup #DrinkDifferently #BartenderLife #MicheladaDay #TomatoFreeCocktail #FoundersPodcast #ThirstyThursdays #MicheladaMovement
“Michelada mix without tomato”
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Host Jessie Ott's Profile on LinkedIn
Jessie Ott (00:29)
Hello everybody and welcome to Thursday Thursdays. am Jessie Ott and I have a great guest today. One that I found all on my own at the state fair, KC Hensley with Momo's Michelada mix. I'm so excited you're here.
We've got a great story coming up here. So, where are you calling from, KC?
KC Hensley (00:49)
So me and my wife live
in the suburbs of Austin aka Flugerville It's a little bit north of Austin Originally I'm from Idaho and she's from the Bay Area and we've both been in Texas for her about 18 to 20 years and I've been about 13 years
Jessie Ott (00:57)
Okay.
⁓ okay, nice. And is that-
okay. Okay. Awesome. Yeah, it's kind of hard to leave once you get there.
KC Hensley (01:23)
here
as soon as I could and I haven't haven't ventured away since.
Jessie Ott (01:29)
Yeah, it's a great state. Well, should we jump into the tasting? I'm super excited about it. ⁓ Maybe we... I know! We don't want the beer to get warm.
KC Hensley (01:35)
I know you're thirsty and we don't want that beer to get warm and stuff. yeah. So what you're about
to taste is Momo's Michelada mix. It's a, the top rated mix on Amazon. Although we don't want any of you listening to go to Amazon to buy it. You can buy it on our website or go to a store and get it.
What's special about it is it's tomato free. It's lemon based the reason that the reason there's no tomato is I get inspired by the Micheladas done in Nicaragua and that is why there's no tomato, but people really appreciate that difference and and we're
Jessie Ott (02:04)
Isn't it amazing?
Yep. It's a huge
differentiator. How many are out there that do that?
KC Hensley (02:22)
To my knowledge, I know of two other brands that don't have any tomato, but they are also very, very different. They're very Worcestershire heavy. So you have to really love Worcestershire in order to enjoy that. Ours is like a derivative of what is familiar, but taking it in a direction that's a lot more
Jessie Ott (02:35)
Okay.
KC Hensley (02:48)
light and refreshing and that's what you should want out of a michelada. If you want something thick and heavy and hearty you go the bloody merry route. If you want something to crush all day and just enjoy that little kick of spice but just like a nice almost shandy flavor that's what a michelada can be and that's what we kind of go for.
Jessie Ott (02:58)
Yeah.
Okay.
And there's the International Michalada Day coming up here soon, right?
KC Hensley (03:20)
Yeah,
National Mechalata Day is July 12th. Order some. Go buy some some Mechalata mix wherever you can find it in Texas or just hop on our website and get you some ASAP.
Jessie Ott (03:24)
All right, so that week is yours.
Okay. Well,
that's the short version. He's got a little bit longer version that we'll get into, but we'll just do the quick tasting that I'll, like I'll do a separate posting of the tasting itself. So people have it and then, you know, all the rest of the story. So, okay. We've got the beer. Right. We've got a 16 ounce glass with a beer and Momo's stupid rim salt on the top. All right. And so you just take.
KC Hensley (03:53)
Yes.
Yeah.
Jessie Ott (04:04)
How many ounces is this?
KC Hensley (04:06)
So that's two ounces. That's dummy proof. That's convenient. You can take it on the go. You can take it on a plane. You can take it to golf course. can, I know you're always flying around and stuff. So that airplane angle strikes the court.
Jessie Ott (04:14)
yeah!
smells so good.
Hehehehehe
So it just
mixes itself, check that out.
KC Hensley (04:28)
Yeah, that's why I like to pour it over the top of the beer because it doesn't settle at the bottom and it just kind of disperses throughout the rest of the beer.
Jessie Ott (04:28)
That's.
So I, I love, we love the state fair. My wife and I and our friends, we go every year and there's a little spot that we like to go to and the girls like to have German beer. And I was like, ah, I don't really want to have a beer right now. So I go over to the stand where KC's Momo's mixes and I was, I don't even know what I was going to get. And someone said, Hey, you should try, you should try Momo's Michelada.
It's really good. It's made by a local. He's from Austin. And I'm like, wait, what? And I didn't really want a beer, but I was like, I got to try this, you know, I have to try it. And so he poured me one and I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe how good it was. And I'll be honest, I don't think I've ever had one. I don't think I've ever had a Michelada before. And so I was blown away and just sucked it down because it was hot and it was great. And, you know,
I shared it a little bit with my friends and wife, but I mean, I was like, I have to get to know this person. And so I ended up taking a picture of the bottle. I had just missed you actually. And so I took a picture of the bottle and I think I got in touch with you like, you know, on your website or something.
KC Hensley (05:42)
Yep, shortly after that we got a message from you.
Jessie Ott (05:47)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's kind of, that's how it went. was like, I have to meet these people. I have to meet them. This is like incredible. And what blew me away was it smells like you smell tomato. You know what I mean? It looks tomato. So do you want to, can you want to talk about the story of how it kind of came about?
KC Hensley (06:02)
Yeah, ish.
So yeah, I don't know where to even start. One fun thing that I like to kind of tell people, I'm not embarrassed about it or anything, but my entrepreneurial roots are very old. My first endeavor that I embarked on as an entrepreneur was renting out my
my dad's VHS porno collection to all my buddies. And so like, was wild. I had it down. I never got caught. I had a log and I would rewind the movies back to where they were left off. I would...
Jessie Ott (06:37)
is smart, dude. Dude, that is smart.
You had a little
rental business. You're a blockbuster.
KC Hensley (06:58)
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, no overhead.
And I was able to just, I was able to get the movies back by threatening to go tell their parents because I know where they live. Small town Idaho stuff. But so I've been an entrepreneur for a long time. And basically, I joined the military.
And then after the military, me and my buddy had our minds set towards us wanting to open a bar. We were Navy. I was in the Navy. And my best friend was in the Marines. We both joined at the same time. The best response I've ever heard, and I mean it when I say it right back to you, is you're worth it.
Jessie Ott (07:27)
Which branch did you serve? Navy. Okay.
Guys, well, thank you for your service.
KC Hensley (07:45)
the people in America, like America can be an amazing place. A lot of people will disagree on what the direction that's going, but like this country is worth fighting for, for sure. And so it's my pleasure to say that I served. So.
Jessie Ott (08:04)
Yeah, no doubt. Appreciate it. Yeah.
KC Hensley (08:11)
After the military, my buddy and I, we were naive and young and, you know, of course we want to open a bar someday. So we built a business plan and I just started learning to bartend and bartending. And I would share my business plan and the fact that I wanted to own a bar with
people that most likely didn't really care, but they would act like they were listening. And then one day this lady walks in and says that her son got thrown in prison and he was managing this bar that she has no desire to be a part of. And if I would take over the lease, could take over the bar.
And so at like 23 years old, not a lot of money or anything like that, I became a bar owner. And yeah, it's just kind of they say the what is it? The secret is you would you'll you keep saying things and putting them out there to the world. Yeah, manifest. I like that's what we did, essentially. And
Jessie Ott (09:00)
That's a gift.
Manifesting. Yeah.
KC Hensley (09:19)
So I did that for a few years, sold it and moved to Texas. And then I just started doing entrepreneur or not entrepreneurial, but like service industry jobs and stuff like that. And
Jessie Ott (09:35)
Is there anything you like the most about the service industry?
KC Hensley (09:38)
of
I always...
That's a good question. So I always bartended. I hated managing or running venues or anything like that. So I love bartending. But the community of bartenders and servers and cooks and everything kind of has a special place in my heart because
It's just like, you say it's a small world, it's a small city, it's an even smaller industry and like, it's really cool being.
Jessie Ott (10:11)
Yeah.
KC Hensley (10:15)
Being that crowd that likes to go out on a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday to go see your favorite bartenders and stuff like that. And hanging out with all your industry buddies that are working on the weekends and stuff. It's pretty special industry. that's why I got a pineapple tattoo on my arm. It's the international symbol of hospitality and it's in my...
Jessie Ott (10:36)
love it.
Yeah, we learned that on our,
we went to Cuba on a cruise over Thanksgiving one year and we learned that they have, pineapples everywhere. I didn't know that until then. That's cool.
KC Hensley (10:50)
Well,
on the cruise it might have been a different meaning, ⁓ okay, like in hotels and stuff like that. Yeah. So that's generally a symbol of hospitality. Yeah. So, I was the, my most successful thing I've done in business was
Jessie Ott (10:55)
No, in Cuba. We were... Yeah, they had pineapples everywhere. And they said that's the symbol for hospitality. That's cool. I love it. I love pineapple.
KC Hensley (11:15)
I started a Facebook group like back in 2013 or something like that. And that group was dedicated towards the hospitality industry and it slowly grew and grew and grew. And then it actually got acquired by a tech company that wanted to kind of build the LinkedIn for hospitality professionals.
Jessie Ott (11:30)
Okay.
Really?
KC Hensley (11:44)
And
yeah, so they looked at my Mike, what's up? Yes, it got acquired and we, I was working with them as well as I was an investor in a bar up until the pandemic. And I'll have to kind of move forward to move back to tell the story of Momo's, but.
Jessie Ott (11:47)
What is it?
Did they do it?
KC Hensley (12:10)
Yeah, I was working with this company. They were called seasoned. I think they're still trucking along kind of but I was working with them trying to help them build this platform and then COVID happened and when your your customer base is the hospitality industry and you're tech company just burning money you have to go do layoffs and
They
Jessie Ott (12:34)
yeah.
KC Hensley (12:34)
held on to me for a little while and then just the unknown of not knowing when the world would open back up, kinda told them like, all right, we gotta cut this guy, this, this guy KC loose as well. So, so I got cut loose and now I'll rewind a little bit. so
Back in like 2017, a buddy of mine was traveling from the southern tip of California to the southern tip of South America on his motorcycle. And unfortunately,
Jessie Ott (13:10)
That's so
crazy.
So he's doing this really cool trip on his motorcycle.
KC Hensley (13:16)
So he's traveling and he makes it to Nicaragua. I'm not following his travels or anything, but he reaches out to me because he needs help. His motorcycle broke down. None of the local mechanics had parts or access to his motorcycle parts. So...
It was easier for him to ship the parts to my house, buy me a plane ticket and have me mule the motorcycle parts to Nicaragua. And of course I got a free trip to a place I've never been before. and so I took him up on it and, we fixed his motorcycle and coincidentally, right around that time I was building the menu for that bar that I
was invested in. So I was not drawn down there looking for inspiration, but after I got there, I quickly realized like there's not much of a craft scene there or anything. It's a little more third world than I thought. know, they do simple stuff. They got one beer in two flavors, light and dark.
Jessie Ott (14:17)
It's simple.
KC Hensley (14:23)
It's called Tona and they also only have a couple different varieties of liquors. Of course, they got rum, Flor de Cana. They might have like Jose Cuervo, Johnny Walker Black, know, those super legacy, like they've been around forever, global brands, Smirnoff.
Jessie Ott (14:35)
Jaeger. ⁓
KC Hensley (14:43)
You know, very simple stuff, not very elevated cocktail programs.
Jessie Ott (14:48)
Not
16 types of vodka and bourbon and all the fun things.
KC Hensley (14:51)
No, not like what we're used to here. And
so I saw them making micheladas. And even though I was not a michelada fan at the time, I decided to see what their michelada is all about. And it just blew me away. A, I enjoyed it, which I had never enjoyed a michelada.
before that, like the tomato based heavy, like inconsistent, like those canned, those canned RTD micheladas are just really kind of watery tomatoes and stuff like that. Never did anything for me. And also didn't like really sit well with like my stomach acid and stuff like that.
Jessie Ott (15:30)
Ugh.
KC Hensley (15:37)
I have acid reflux issues and so I tried this michelada. I planned on going to the pharmacy to grab some Prilosec afterwards and just deal with repercussions. I really enjoyed the michelada and I didn't have any issues. And right then and there I was like, okay, want to make micheladas like they do down there for my guests and put it on our menu at our bar.
So I just started doing a bunch of note taking and talking to the bartenders and no one really gave us, gave me a recipe, but they gave me some directions and I was able to look at local ingredients and stuff and just kind of formulate like a rough plan of what I, how I wanted to accomplish this and what the flavor should ultimately be.
And I texted my wife, my now wife, was my then girlfriend, Marissa, aka Momo. Momo is her nickname, is, hence that's the name of our business. And...
Jessie Ott (16:37)
That's awesome.
Very cool.
KC Hensley (16:41)
Also,
as a tip of the hat to where the inspiration derives, there's a volcano in Nicaragua called Momotumbo. So it's a tip of the hat to where the inspiration came from, as well as a dedication to my partner. so it's nice. And I try to do things like that.
Jessie Ott (16:59)
Very cool. Isn't that Kismet?
KC Hensley (17:08)
I love alliteration. Our daughter's name is Bianca Bay. So it just kind of rolls off the tongue. Momo's michelada mix. ⁓ So yeah, I texted her from Nicaragua, talked about how much I loved their micheladas. And we actually have a screenshot of that little two-part conversation. And she was like, really? You don't even like micheladas. This must be good.
Jessie Ott (17:16)
Yeah, it works.
Hahaha!
KC Hensley (17:34)
And so it's like, yeah, it's amazing. I can't wait to come home and make it for you.
Jessie Ott (17:40)
Was it a
popular bar drink in Nicaragua?
KC Hensley (17:43)
Yeah, they were making a lot of them because there's not a lot of options, you know, you got you got light beer, dark beer, ⁓ you got your couple of liquors and then you got to play around with it.
Jessie Ott (17:47)
Right.
Beer. Yeah.
Do they normally use the light beer or is it a combo of both or it just depends on the customer?
KC Hensley (18:06)
I, that's something I don't remember. only.
Jessie Ott (18:09)
Okay.
KC Hensley (18:10)
So, but in moving way ahead, my favorite beer with momos is actually darker beers like Victoria or Negro Modelo. Those kind of like they're light, but they have a little multi-body to it, which is nice. But yeah, so that's, that's where.
Jessie Ott (18:11)
Yeah.
Yeah, so
KC Hensley (18:30)
everything kind of started, came back to the states with... Yeah, yeah.
Jessie Ott (18:34)
Can I ask some more questions first?
Okay. So when you're sitting there and you're talking, you're seeing all these drinks and they probably make huge batches of it in buckets, I presume. Probably daily. Was there anything that surprised you outside of the no tomato of any or any natural ingredient that you were shocked that they were actually using?
KC Hensley (18:54)
So I wasn't previewed to any of the ingredients that they were using. I knew was that it tasted fantastic. It was light and bright and refreshing. that was the difference because our typical micheladas that I've ever seen or served before...
Jessie Ott (18:59)
Right. That's fair enough.
KC Hensley (19:17)
momos started were very heavy and you know heavy salty hearty you know something you would it kind of weighs you down makes you feel heavy very imbalanced very you can drink one and then you move to something like drink a regular light beer or whatever to balance things out
Jessie Ott (19:23)
Yeah.
Heavy.
KC Hensley (19:40)
Whereas down there, I was just like, it was light flavored, it was refreshing, had a perfect little kick of spice. I'm sitting in the jungle after the beer and drinking these beers just one after another and then waking up the next day with a little hangover and drinking them again. it just, that's what I, that was the difference is just, it has to be light.
Jessie Ott (19:40)
Okay.
Yeah.
Did you
notice any difference from bar to bar or are they pretty similar?
KC Hensley (20:11)
No, and that's, so there was no difference bar to bar. Not that I could like actually extract that flavor. So.
Jessie Ott (20:17)
discern. Yeah.
KC Hensley (20:20)
completely different experience from what I'm used to because michiladas are consistently inconsistent like two bartenders working behind the same bar will make two different versions of what they think a michilada tastes like and You might enjoy it you might not but the next one you get chances are it's not gonna taste the same because they're just they're just doing a hodgepodge of Whatever they feel like
that that moment. They might put a little extra effort into it one day because they're not that busy and then the next day you just get tomato juice, beer, you know. So being able to just order a michelada and know what you expect is a game changer and that's part of what we want. That's the opportunity for us actually.
because we want to create a high quality standard for micheladas so that people can go and order micheladas confidently from bars that have momos and enjoy their brunch or their bar outing, if you will, with some micheladas.
Jessie Ott (21:37)
Yeah.
Okay, very cool.
KC Hensley (21:39)
Yeah, so thank you for bringing that up. I didn't prompt you to say that, but that's like honestly the biggest problem that we, like when I go to a bar to sell it, I more so lean on the fact that we offer, what we're selling is operational efficiency and consistency. And then a nice little added bonus is it tastes phenomenal.
So.
Jessie Ott (22:03)
And is this, this is a leader?
KC Hensley (22:06)
Yeah.
Jessie Ott (22:07)
And is this so like, what sizes do they come in?
KC Hensley (22:11)
So that's our one liter, that's 34 ounce. We don't use like the 32 ounce bottles that disguise themselves as a liter, whatever. We use a true liter. And then we have a 16 ounce bottle. Actually, so 16 ounce bottle kind of looks like a barbecue sauce. That's good for us. That's good for us. Eight beers.
Jessie Ott (22:29)
yeah, it does. It's cute.
KC Hensley (22:35)
And then you already brought it up, but here's the mini on the go convenience, not as cost effective, but it's all about convenience when you're doing this.
Jessie Ott (22:40)
One beer.
It's convenience.
Yeah. Like 7-Eleven or something.
KC Hensley (22:51)
Yeah, plus because our bottles are a little more expensive than other bottles, it's nice to have like a smaller option that people can try and see if they like it before they invest on buying the fake bottle.
Jessie Ott (23:02)
Yeah.
Yeah.
And how many ounces are these? Is this again?
KC Hensley (23:11)
to 60 milliliters. Yes. So just a little bit of mix does a lot.
Jessie Ott (23:17)
Yep. you
just pour it on top. No ice. And then talk about what are the prices for those?
KC Hensley (23:21)
And
So if we're talking to retail, it's about $20 for the big bottle. That ranges. If you go on Amazon, it's like $25 because we factor in shipping and stuff like that. This bottle generally goes for about $12. Many bottles should go for about $2.50 to $3 a bottle.
Jessie Ott (23:26)
on your website.
Okay?
Yep.
Nice. Okay.
KC Hensley (23:51)
And
then our Stupid Rim Salt, this goes for about six. It's kind of our new product. It's obviously, we call it our Stupid Rim Salt. It's kind of like our bastard product, you know? Like we think our Mechel Atom Mix is the best and you don't need to add any bells and whistles to it. But if you're gonna do anything, add it to add our Stupid Rim Salt to it.
Jessie Ott (24:00)
Great.
Yeah
KC Hensley (24:18)
It's got a bit of a citrusy dill flavor with some salt and some jalapeno. Great on cucumbers.
Jessie Ott (24:21)
Mm-hmm.
there's jalapeno. I'm gonna cuz I cuz I was like that come from the salt or the actual you know momos but yeah okay that makes sense. Interesting. It's delicious together.
KC Hensley (24:28)
Yes, there's how big of problem there.
Yep, ⁓
the black, the bigger black pieces in there are actually black Hawaiian lava salt. Not peppers, or not black pepper.
Jessie Ott (24:48)
it's good.
Black pepper.
Do bars, do they take the stupid rim salt sometimes?
KC Hensley (24:57)
Some of them have,
we don't really push it. Like I said, it's kind of like our product that we created and we don't care too much about it. But we also kind of created a monster because basically the story behind this, sorry, I go on tangents, but everything has kind of a funny story.
Jessie Ott (25:01)
you don't? Okay.
No, I want to hear
about it because it's awesome.
KC Hensley (25:21)
So I don't want to throw any shade towards people that really enjoy tahini. But tajin has a lot of citric acid in it. When you take a lick of it and then try to enjoy something after it, really everything just kind of goes flat. It ends up taking away all the flavor.
of what comes behind it. And I love tajin on like pineapples or mangoes and stuff like that. I love that spicy, citrusy, sweet combo. But when people were putting it on the rim of our glass, we were like...
taking a little bit too much offense by it because we already knew that it didn't compliment our mix. And for that reason, we didn't want people putting it on the rim of the glass. So that's why we kind of set out to create our version of what a rim salt.
Jessie Ott (26:17)
would go well,
KC Hensley (26:19)
would go well
Jessie Ott (26:19)
yeah.
KC Hensley (26:19)
with Momo's should you need it for like the Instagram photos or whatever. ⁓ But also another pro fact is bartenders are quickly getting burnt out with all the tajin and stuff like that. It gets everywhere. Everyone's just like... ⁓
Jessie Ott (26:25)
Right.
yeah.
Hahaha!
KC Hensley (26:43)
like licking their glasses and it just, it's become an annoyance for bar, a lot of bartenders. I can't speak for everyone, but, so again, another reason to call it stupid rim salt
Jessie Ott (26:52)
Gotcha. And so.
So when you go out and talk to the bars, are you talking to the owners or bartenders then? You kind of working through your network.
KC Hensley (27:05)
So, you know, when we go in and we try to sell it, we ask for a decision maker, but we're not the brand that like just shows up and if the decision maker isn't there, there's no benefit of being there, you know? Like, so we try to make, we understand that...
especially as bartenders like, like it's so annoying when sales reps are showing up and just like lingering waiting for the bar manager and they want nothing to do with just regular servers, bartenders, bar backs, whatever.
Jessie Ott (27:42)
Yeah.
KC Hensley (27:44)
and we're
cut from the same cloth. So we try to give them samples. We have good conversations with them. Sometimes if we're not too busy or we're trying to avoid traffic, we'll order a beer and just like enjoy it and tip them well and get on our way. So.
We go in looking for a decision maker, but we don't get discouraged when they're not there. We just make the most of it and just. We want to like once the decision maker makes a decision, then those bartenders and bar backs are our champions. need them to fall in love with it. We need them to get in there.
Jessie Ott (28:13)
Yeah.
Right. 100%. You just trained them. Yeah. ⁓
KC Hensley (28:36)
their managers here that they should carry this stuff. It's actually really good. So.
Jessie Ott (28:40)
Yeah. Yeah, 100%. Are you focused on
Hispanic accounts or just everything?
KC Hensley (28:48)
Honestly, no, we aren't focused on any particular establishment. We got golf courses, hotels, vegan spots, brunch spots, golf courses. We've got some Mexican restaurants. We're kind of...
Jessie Ott (29:04)
Nice. that's a great idea.
KC Hensley (29:09)
We're all over the place in like our targeting because we're not really targeting any one particular person we want to reintroduce people to micheladas because we want to There's the few people that actually know what a michelada is A lot of them don't like them because they like myself have had very kind of
subpar experiences with micheladas nothing to get excited about and like you Hopped on like I got excited by the micheladas and I had to text my wife and take a bunch of notes you got excited and you had to like Go meet the owner and the owner wasn't there. So you tracked me down, you know, the That's the
Jessie Ott (29:56)
Yeah, I was on a mission. This product was
good.
KC Hensley (30:01)
That's the reaction and that's what we're going for. And really anyone with a mouth can experience that aha moment. So we don't really just try to focus on Mexican restaurants or Latin heavy markets or anything like that. ⁓
Jessie Ott (30:11)
Yeah.
Brunch spots
would be perfect.
KC Hensley (30:24)
Brunt spots are great. And also, you know, a lot of people are kind of set in their ways.
Mexican restaurants, they've been serving a michelada for however many years their restaurants been open and to them it's fine or some of them are like I love this my michelada mix but most of them are just taking a Bloody Mary mix and adding all these different things to make it their own. They're not actually creating like
a michellata mix that's meant to be a michellata from scratch, you know? So that's a very rare thing to see is someone building everything from scratch. Most people are using like Clamado or Bloody Mary mix to kind of get their start and then they kind of, but.
Jessie Ott (30:57)
Right.
Yeah. Or tomato juice and.
KC Hensley (31:15)
What we really aim for is the people that are just pouring Bloody Mary mix and jujjing it up and calling that a michelada, that's our target. But if they take pride in making their micheladas from scratch, then so be it. But the one thing we will say, and this is humble confidence,
Jessie Ott (31:31)
Yeah.
KC Hensley (31:37)
If you can make a better michellata than us, you should bottle it and sell it. ⁓ But if you can't, we would love to just like...
Jessie Ott (31:42)
Hahaha!
KC Hensley (31:47)
take that off your hands and let us do what we're good at and let's try and create that high quality standard for Micheladas and just create a nice operational efficiency and put some respect on Micheladas that is kind of, it's not really there. A lot of people are just like, eh, whatever.
Jessie Ott (31:53)
Yeah, for sure.
Can I go back just for a second? So you're in Nicaragua, you're texting your wife, you're like, we have to figure this out for the bar that you're working in. So what's the first thing you do when you get home? Like, how do you go about doing this?
KC Hensley (32:28)
you enter a mutual out of competition. It was just a random coincidence, a buddy through my, acquaintance, I would say rather, he posted something on Facebook about a mutual out of competition. And I was like, all right, bet. And so like the mutual out of competition, I had like a month, but I didn't.
Jessie Ott (32:31)
Hahaha, what?
How much time did you have?
my gosh.
KC Hensley (32:54)
I didn't start really doing anything till the night before. So yeah, cause in theory, like I didn't realize that I was onto something so special, you know, I just wanted to just kind of.
Jessie Ott (33:06)
There.
KC Hensley (33:09)
use that inspiration and kind of tweak things up a little bit to be able to figure out how to make these, make that mutual out of that I remembered. I actually, through the course of the night, we actually got really, a really good result in.
Jessie Ott (33:18)
Right.
KC Hensley (33:25)
And then the next day we went to that competition and we actually won it. um, so, so, so it was that from that moment forward, I knew it wasn't just my own taste buds. wasn't subjectively good. was objectively good for others. so then I just started serving it to patrons at my bar and stuff for
Jessie Ott (33:32)
Holy smokes, bro. That is awesome.
KC Hensley (33:54)
I guess it would have been about a year and a half before COVID happened. Also shortly before COVID, I got tracked down by someone from Whole Foods. They were like a forager or a buyer or something like that.
looking at adding a Michelada mix and they had heard that ours was really good. So they wanted to test the waters and see if we were ready. We were not ready. We didn't even have that in consideration. But that was another case point where I'm like, okay, this is really, really good. Objectively, this is good. People.
Jessie Ott (34:29)
Yep.
When a buyer from Whole Foods comes to your bar. I mean, that's pretty amazing.
KC Hensley (34:33)
Yeah, yeah, so that
created a pretty strong itch that in the back of my mind, I wanted to scratch that itch. And then pandemic happened, eventually lost my job. My wife was a bartender, she lost her job and then...
So I just like, workshopped it for a little while trying to come up with like, what should, what should I do next? it'd be cool if me and my wife could do something together.
And then I tried to come up with different names and Momo's, Michelatimix just kind of struck and I was like, okay. And then I took it to my wife and I was like, guess what? We're going to start a Michelat of business. And bless her heart. She's always like, when you're the partner of an entrepreneur, you're kind of
unfortunately the unpaid labor. So she was like always helping me with different events and she was helping me at the ticket counter for events that we would do and she would help me moderate my community that I started and
Jessie Ott (35:38)
Yeah.
KC Hensley (35:53)
And yeah, so what I essentially want to do is like, look, I'm bringing you to the forefront. You're the queen bee, I'm the worker bee. We're going to make this brand and it's going to be ours and we're going to work together. And so that's kind of how it all.
Jessie Ott (36:11)
Did you get the card
of the buyer from Whole Foods so you could show it to him?
KC Hensley (36:17)
No, but I've been in touch with them a couple or they've been in touch with me a couple times. We got some sodium benzoate in our mix, which is not, which is on their no-no list for ingredients. So, and that's the one thing that's keeping us from whole foods. So we're trying to replicate our recipe without it and make sure that we have the shelf stability and the, and what
Jessie Ott (36:30)
Okay.
KC Hensley (36:43)
to be able to go into Whole Foods and if we get that right then we'll just we'll just have a nicer cleaner ingredients list. Our mix is already pretty it's got a clean label.
Jessie Ott (36:53)
Yeah.
KC Hensley (37:00)
Basically everything on there you can buy from the grocery store. So it's not made in a science Lab or anything like that it was made by a bartender and and
are two bartenders and she is more well versed in culinary and stuff like that. So cooking and stuff like that. Ultimately together her and I created a better version than that original one that I won that competition with. And that's what we went to market with. starting, we just started in our kitchen.
Jessie Ott (37:36)
Gotcha.
KC Hensley (37:39)
five gallon buckets and a half a pallet of glass bottles and taking them to a farmer's market. And now we have statewide, Texas distribution and we're top rated mix on Amazon. And heck, there's Michelin star restaurants making micheladas with momos now.
Jessie Ott (38:04)
Yay! That's awesome!
KC Hensley (38:05)
The
Cowboys golf course carries it and really cool hotels have it in their hotel amenities, their mini bars and stuff like that.
Jessie Ott (38:21)
That's great. That's awesome. So do you have any mentors or resources that you want to mention or talk about that helped you on this journey?
KC Hensley (38:30)
I can't know what.
Basically from I get the most from going to podcasts honestly, like there's a few that I Would that come to mind that I would mention? Like Startup CPG is is great Startup to Scale Is another good one I love people like Gary Vaynerchuk and
Jessie Ott (38:39)
Same.
Yep. Everybody loves Gary.
KC Hensley (38:55)
Grant Cardone and those guys
Jim Rohn, OG. I love what Tony Robbins says but I can't stand the way he says it so I don't listen to Tony Robbins too much but he's pretty cool.
And on a local level, I've got a couple people that have really been helpful, like Daniel Barnes. He's done a lot. He was involved with Waterloo, Seltzer's, the Lady Bird soda and mixers is a kind of a new brand.
Jessie Ott (39:29)
wow.
KC Hensley (39:35)
Tridioke, Whiskey, and Waterloo Gin, to name a few. And he's been really helpful. And another one is the CEO of Super Coffee, Jimmy DeCicco. Jimmy's been helpful. ⁓ But yeah, there's a lot of...
Jessie Ott (39:51)
Nice.
KC Hensley (39:55)
people that have helped us along.
Jessie Ott (40:00)
That's great. That's great. What about any pain points that you've been able to overcome that you want to
KC Hensley (40:07)
Oh, that's every day. Every day is a break, right? So we're trying to do it a non-typical way. We're trying to do it as bootstrapped. What we've kind of learned to understand is if you start raising money, you become a fundraising business.
Jessie Ott (40:09)
Yeah, being small, startup, it's tough.
KC Hensley (40:32)
and we are trying to keep our business a We want to grow we want to be profitable But we also want to be set in our core values and design our life the way on our terms So we're bootstrapped we're constantly there's never never money to do the things that we want to do as far as like
Jessie Ott (40:32)
Yes.
KC Hensley (41:01)
buying new packaging or hiring professionals that have been there, done that. I love our like, our first couple hires are great, but they were green and they are still learning, but they are starting to become a lot more effective and efficient with their time.
their results and stuff like that. So it's just a constant pain point trying to, do everything, anything and everything that we can to bring attention to ourselves and just kind of just try to get people to try our product. because that's really our philosophy is talk is cheap. So just try.
Jessie Ott (41:26)
Yeah.
Just taste
it.
KC Hensley (41:47)
Just taste like I'm doing all this
rambling all this talking. You'll be a believer once you taste it So yeah any particular I'd like to come up with like at least one example
Jessie Ott (41:54)
Try it.
KC Hensley (42:01)
I want to say something that I'm proud of us is we have stayed true to our standards. there's been instances in our early days, our refrigerator stopped working and we had no idea how long our lemon juice was in there at a non-cold temperature. And we basically threw away.
what at the time felt like a crippling amount of lemon juice away because it couldn't be trusted. And I could see other people just like winging it and saying like, it'll probably be fine. Just like trying to...
Jessie Ott (42:33)
Yeah.
Hahaha!
KC Hensley (42:46)
trying to sometimes the decisions you make are hard but listen to your your gut and and recognize what your standards truly are in that moment.
Jessie Ott (42:50)
Yeah.
Yeah. Yep. 100%. So what's your outlook for Momo's? What's your next steps?
KC Hensley (43:05)
Well, the mission is to become the high quality standard of Michelada's. So what that means is we want to be behind every bar as their Michelada option.
We don't want to replace the Bloody Mary because you're just doing the same thing in reverse. A Bloody Mary is a Bloody Mary and a Michalada is a Michalada. In a pinch, you can use both our products for the other side, but if you want to put the best foot forward for Michaladas, use Momo's, use your Bloody Mary option for your Bloody Marys.
Jessie Ott (43:24)
Yeah.
KC Hensley (43:42)
Are we going to be in every bar in the next year? No, I don't think so. We just want to continue to grow and bring on good quality stewards of our brand and get to profitability and hire a few more people and that's kind of business as usual. This next year we
Jessie Ott (44:00)
Yeah.
KC Hensley (44:05)
We are probably going to step back from doing so many in-person events, do more in-store tastings, and we're going to attempt to figure out how to do well on TikTok. TikTok shop. We got invited into an incubator program, thanks to our friend from Super Coffee.
Jessie Ott (44:20)
There you go. You got to hire those young kids to do it for you.
KC Hensley (44:31)
He had some friends at TikTok and they brought us into basically a fast track to be successful on TikTok. So we just got to dedicate our efforts towards it and trust the process. So in a year, look for us on TikTok shop.
Jessie Ott (44:34)
That's cool.
Yeah.
All right. One thing I meant to ask you is what kind of place or a lot of like this younger generation, are they educated on what a michelada is or is there a lot of people that don't know what it is?
KC Hensley (45:10)
Yeah, so let's look at the full Michelada market pie. Seven in 10 people don't know what it is, have never tried it before. Three in 10 people know what it is, have tried it, and who knows whether they enjoyed it or not. Those are the numbers that I've been able to get.
The younger crowd, I'd say our palette, our market really kind of starts to develop around 25 years old. Generally, they're kind of out adulting, doing their own thing
They've been there and tried a lot of different things and a lot of them will open their mind to try and michelada's and stuff. So in general though, I've noticed big brands like Modelo and Dos Equis with commercials on, you know, different streamers. And like I saw one during the Superbowl.
Jessie Ott (45:58)
Yeah, good.
KC Hensley (46:15)
for their canned chaladas and stuff. I just think it's, obviously we know the Latin Hispanic market is growing and all that influence is spreading. So yeah, I think people are becoming more aware of meat chaladas and with
I don't mind having a blank slate when I first ⁓ encounter someone because I find it very difficult to see someone moving from momos to like a styrofoam michelada cup or the other michelada mixes that are on the market.
Jessie Ott (46:39)
Yeah.
Yeah.
KC Hensley (46:57)
Yeah, no shade to any other mix out there. It's just, they're a lot more Bloody Mary than Mechalata in my subjective opinion.
Jessie Ott (46:57)
Gotcha.
Gotcha. Well, as Howard would say, KC, you've come on and you've said it all.
Do you want to play a rapid fire game?
KC Hensley (47:13)
Okay. All right.
Jessie Ott (47:13)
These are easy. Okay. If
you were a cocktail, which one would you be?
KC Hensley (47:19)
I'm not gonna go with what's obvious, you know. I would be a whiskey soda bitters.
Jessie Ott (47:21)
Right. Okay, good.
Nice.
KC Hensley (47:28)
Just a high ball with
some bitters and a little... lemon wedge
Jessie Ott (47:32)
That sounds good. What's your favorite movie?
KC Hensley (47:34)
It's, yeah.
Labyrinth.
Jessie Ott (47:38)
You have a favorite movie line?
KC Hensley (47:40)
nothing, nothing, tra la la, or smells bad. That's from my favorite character, Ludo. I actually, here's a fun fact about KC, which I don't know if I'll be able to do it, but if you're watching, you can see that I have a labyrinth tattoo.
Jessie Ott (47:54)
yeah.
KC Hensley (47:58)
I got Hoggle on one side and I have David Bowie as Jareth on the other side.
Jessie Ott (48:04)
That's awesome. That's really cool. Awesome. Awesome. What's, what about your favorite food?
KC Hensley (48:08)
It's either Tirmisu or Greek Euros.
Jessie Ott (48:10)
Mm.
Good, good choices. Favorite place to travel?
KC Hensley (48:16)
Half Moon Bay California
Jessie Ott (48:19)
I'd love to get out there one day. That is cool. Yeah.
KC Hensley (48:22)
my fave There's a
lighthouse that we stay in. it's magical. It's like a hostel and it over looks the water. Of course, it's a lighthouse and that's where I need to go for a reset.
Jessie Ott (48:39)
Yep. Reset. Yeah. It sounds lovely.
Especially in Texas. Texas heat in the summer and all the rain. is there anything else that you want to say that you haven't said? Maybe your website where they can buy your product?
KC Hensley (48:51)
You can we would appreciate all the follows on social media. So at Momo's me chill outa You're not you're leaving off the mix for the social media But momosmicheladamix.com will take you to our website There's a store locator map that's
in our hierarchy of where we want you to buy momos, we want you to either buy it from a store, buy it from our website, or in worst case scenario, buy it off of Amazon. If you do buy it on Amazon, please leave a review so we can maintain that top rated michelada. What would that be? ⁓
Jessie Ott (49:31)
Rating, validation.
KC Hensley (49:32)
⁓ validation that's my validator
yeah we're in we're in it's best to go to our store locator because when I say we're in Total Wine we're not in every single Total Wine
Jessie Ott (49:35)
you in liquor stores as well as grocery?
Every single one, yeah.
KC Hensley (49:48)
We're not
in every single Albertsons or Tom Thumb, Goody Goody, Central Market. So chances are like if you put your zip code in on our store locator, you'll see what's closest to you. ⁓ But those are some of the stores that carry it. Specs, if you live in Texas. Twin, there's a few of those that carry it.
Jessie Ott (49:53)
Yeah.
You'll find it. Okay.
Cool. All
right, KC, I'm extremely excited for you and your wife. And I love the product as you know how much I love it. And it was really fun hearing the story and talking to you and we made it. Somehow we made it before July 12th. So we can post it in time for Mechalada Day, which is, you said July 12th? Okay.
KC Hensley (50:33)
Yes, July 12th.
Go get yourself a michelada. It doesn't even have to be momos. Just spread love and drink micheladas together. Invite more people to your table to enjoy cocktails. All right.
Jessie Ott (50:47)
There you go.
I love it. I love
it. All right, KC, I'm going to let you get back to it, but ⁓ take care. Thanks again. I really appreciate it. Okay. Bye bye.
KC Hensley (50:57)
Thank you. Now's our...
