The Zac Clark Show - The Future of Drinking | How Family Alcoholism Led Joe Chura to Build Go Brewing

Episode Date: June 30, 2026

Joe Chura is the founder of Go Brewing, one of the fastest-growing non-alcoholic breweries in the country, now available in more than 8,000 locations. Before launching Go Brewing, he built and sold a marketing technology company in a deal valued at more than $200 million. But long before building successful businesses, Joe grew up in a home shaped by alcoholism. He shares the painful reality of living with an alcoholic father, becoming a young parent, struggling with depression and his own relationship to alcohol, and the unexpected experiences that changed the trajectory of his life. We also dive into the explosive growth of non-alcoholic beer, why more people are choosing to drink less, the stigma surrounding sobriety, and whether NA beer can be a helpful tool for people looking to reduce or eliminate alcohol from their lives. Whether you're in recovery, sober-curious, or simply rethinking your relationship with alcohol, this conversation offers an honest, nuanced perspective on drinking, but also healing, resilience, entrepreneurship, and what it means to build a healthier life. In this episode: Growing up with an alcoholic father Trauma, mental health, and resilience Building and selling a successful marketing company Why Joe founded Go Brewing The rise of non-alcoholic beer Sobriety, moderation, and stigma Entrepreneurship, purpose, and second chances Follow Joe Chura: Website: https://gobrewing.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gobrewing/   LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joechura/ Connect with Zac https://www.instagram.com/zwclark/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/zac-c-746b96254/ https://www.tiktok.com/@zacwclark https://www.strava.com/athletes/55697553 https://twitter.com/zacwclark If you or anyone you know is struggling, please do not hesitate to contact Release Recovery: [phone] releaserecovery.com @releaserecovery Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I can't imagine how close I was to death and no one knew. One time I remembered vividly, I mixed a bottle like an eighth of liquor with like Kool-Aid and I downed the whole thing. And I woke up a day and a half later. And that was like, man, do I have a problem with this? Joe Chura, he started a non-alcoholic beverage company, Go Brewing. His product is a tool for those people who are questioning their relationship with alcohol. You can have those same things and those same experiences without the alcohol.

You gain way more than you lose. And when you completely go away from it, in three to four weeks in, I started to see measurable benefits. But more importantly, I had this amount of clarity that I never had before. Joe is here today. We dive into his thoughts around getting sober. We dive into his personal story. We talk about his dad and his brother who both took different paths.

My dad's an alcoholic, and one day we got in a big argument and he was drunk. And he comes to me with this night, I put my hand and it's bleeding and I'm like, I just got stabbed. I'm really excited about this conversation. I am someone that my listeners know is sober. And the way that we define sober is changing. I acknowledge that. And the thing I just want to say before I say hi to you, Joe, is like, I don't necessarily drink NAA beers because I am very fearful of the trace amount of alcohol. and how that might set me off on a path that I don't really want to go down.

And I am just so proud of the movement that is taking place right now. And you're a huge part of that in terms of healthier lifestyle, people that do use non-alcoholic beverages to live better, get sober, however they define it. So welcome, Joe. Thanks for having me. I'm excited you're here. Is it, you might if I ask you question about that? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Is it the trace amount of alcohol or is it the taste of a beer? So in AA, like where I went to rehab and I got sober and it was drilled into me. Like I don't even really like eating food that's cooked with booze because I believe for me, this is one man. If I ingest a little bit of alcohol, it could trigger something. in my brain that, you know, I go on a run and I end up drinking real alcohol and then I end up doing drugs. I end up in the same cycle that I was in for many, many years. So that's really it.

Got it. I did some research on this because we would get that question often, like how much, you know, 0.5 percent. Some, I guess I'll ask you in a second here, but how you feel at 0% rate or it's nothing. But 0.5% is equivalent to the alcohol in most juices. pretzel bonds. Like there is actually alcohol in every, and many things we consume. I think what, what I've hear more times than not, it's kind of what you said is like if you're knowingly ingesting this thing that taste like it or it kind of brings back a memory, then it's something

I see people stay away from. But the alcohol itself, it's kind of interesting that it's like all around us and we're consuming it unbeknownst to many of us. Right. Yeah, I mean, I don't, know that so that's helpful knowledge and and and like I'm not sitting here saying I mean I might pop a go brewing like right after this like you know so it's just it's it's just been a personal choice of mine for many years yeah it's why I'm excited you're here I totally respect that like we have I've been in situations where people have come up to us and it might be their first beer since they got out of rehab and I would steer them away said are you sure you want to have this right on because I think the triggering effect is the taste. It's the, oh, well,

if this is okay, then I feel great, then I could do the next thing. And the next thing is what led them to have the issue. So I see that a lot. But you and I talked about this a few minutes ago, alcohol is such a spectrum. It's very complicated, right? And we all have our stories like DNA and no two stories, no two spectrums are the same. And where we live on those, it fluctuates over time. And I've seen people on every part of this spectrum, you know, where they should never have a sip of anything to where they really use NAA as a tool for moderation or to just stay sober.

100%. And I'm with that. Like, I'm with that. I support that. I'm with it. I mean, I've helped young guys get sober who swear by just the element of stigma, right? when you think about stigma and these guys are going out and socializing for the first time in many,

many months and they feel more comfortable sitting at a bar with friends watching a game, having an NA and not feeling like an outcast. You know what's so crazy too? When we first launched, I would often say we got some news media early on because we launched in very end of 22. I say 23 because it was like November. people would ask us, you know, like, why are you doing this? Are you crazy? And, you know, I mean, you just, you just saw people's reaction to this idea. And they, and I came off the success of having a tech company. And they would look at me like, oh, that's a good idea. And I know they would walk away and kind of mumble under their breath. When I identified the market, it had nothing to do with, folks that were sober. Like, I honestly didn't even realize that that was such going to be such a

market until we opened. And the day we opened, we had a line of about 100 people. I would say 80 people in that line were sober waiting for us to open what I thought was the first one in Illinois. And it comes to find out we were the first true non-alcoholic brewery in the country with programming, music, certainly athletic, and a few others had a tap room or a tasting room, but we had a full-out brewery with eight beers on tap that were all in a and a wine creating this like really good curated experience for folks that wanted some place to hang out. And I didn't even, in my business planner idea, did not even consider that. So it was like really surprising to me to see, and I was happy about it, but because of

everything you said and my brother having the issues he had and my father dying of alcoholism and all of those things like it didn't even occur to me that that would be a market which is wild because it was so it was in your home right and you didn't even think about it yeah we're going to get in all that but i can you talk a little bit like you're in town for high rocks yeah and there's a huge push right now i mean we're seeing it endurance athletes high rocks i mean it is having certainly a moment can you share like what athletes have shared with you about why this is great for them because they can celebrate with something that's not going to necessarily affect them or make them feel sluggish the next day? Yeah.

I think for any athlete, Alexi Poppice is another great example, right? When you're training for those who don't know who she is, she was an Olympian runner, a mutual friend of ours, Greek world record, just an amazing person, but she trains a lot for certain things. and anyone who's consumed alcohol, they know like you're not taking steps forward. You're usually making bad decisions as you drink. And certainly it doesn't give your body the time to recover. That's why often you wake up in the middle of the night. You have shitty sleep.

Your heart rates elevated. Like none of those are like a good way to train for anything. So if you're serious about competing, people, typically do not drink. They might drink after and celebrate, but they're not drinking during serious training periods. Yeah, I mean, it allows beer for how many years in this country has been a celebratory beverage. Yeah. And it allows you to celebrate without feeling like shit, which is awesome. Cheers, man. Awesome. Good good stuff for you. So let's get into your story a little but I understand and I've read and you've shared briefly, can you just paint a picture of the home

you grew up in in Chicago and kind of your dad and your brother? I assumed, I mean, I got to be on I assume that that was the reason Go-Browing was founded, but it's not. So let's hear it. Well, yeah, I think in many ways that's accurate. But how we got to this point is just really unique. So I would say that up until I was like 13, and it's funny like talking about my childhood right now in my 40s, but I was until I was like 13. I had a fairly normal childhood. I was an athlete. I went to a school called Mont Carmel in Chicago. Good hoops, right? Good hoops. I was on the same squad as Donovan McNabb, Hanswan Walker. Oh, I'm a diehard Eagles fan. So McNabb. I was always sticking up for McNabb.

was an amazing human too. And I was, as a freshman, I was, I was the only, like, white kid in our slam dunk contest. Like, I could jump out of the gym. I was a skateboarder. And I remember, like, the whole crowd at Mount Carmel, like, they were circling around, like, this small basketball gym. It's in the movie Blue Chips, too, if everyone remembers that movie. It's a really small gym. You know, all these kids from Beverly in the Chicago area. And I just, I went up and just, like did a simple flush with one hand. Donovan goes up, dunks from the free throw line, or it seemed to be Donovan, or Antoine Walker goes and does some windmill. This guy, Willie Jones, was like, I probably not well known by swear he touched the top of the backboard, or at least in my

mind you did. And I lost first round, but I could always tell that story. So that was like my life. That's all I did is play basketball. I was like, thought I was going to be in the MBA. I had skills and talents. I was nowhere I wouldn't say I was anywhere near as an athlete. He was Donovan, per se. He would do that. He played volleyball like no one really knew that. And then he would play quarterback, obviously. But it was good.

I get called to the principal's office my sophomore year. My parents were going through a divorce and weren't paying tuition. And I was embarrassed. And they were like, you know, we need to figure this out. Otherwise, you can't go to school here. And as a teenager, like that's, that was just a very embarrassing moment for me. So I went home and I said, just let me enroll in a public school. And I rolled in a school called T.F. North in Calumet City, which is just outside Chicago.

And that's when my life kind of changed. My love for basketball was slowly diminishing. I started hanging out with the wrong crew. and my parents had split and my dad started spiraling. He was the president of my family's business at the time, which is no longer around. What was the business? It was called Hollomatic, and it was a food manufacturing. They made machines to make like hamburger patties and presses and grinders and things you'd find in butcher shops and like jewel.

And up until this point your dad is kind of your hero? Is that fair? Not really. You like I did he it's it's hard to even like because like many things with relationships they're complex. There is more moments than not. I would I would have anxiety when I saw his big van and truck pulled up in front of our house because he was an alcoholic and he would he would get crazy at times. But deep down inside I know he was like a good human, a great salesperson. Like he was, but he was just letting alcohol take the better of them.

and then that was probably the reason my parents got a divorce. His drinking. His drinking. So then I end up going to this school and then my mom remarries and all of a sudden there's rules on the house. I'm like, I'm going to go live with dad. My dad moved to Chicago, which was like, I know, three miles away from where I was at, not far.

There was nowhere for me to sleep. His girlfriend stayed in the front apartment. He stayed in the back apartment. It was a place my grandfather owned. So I literally like stayed on a futon mattress on a screen porch in the back. And that's how. And then I would take the PACE bus, which is our public transit bus in the Chicago area, to school every day. And that was better than having rules and be in this household with, you know, a new kind of, you know, soon-to-be stepfather that I didn't know.

and as a cocky, arrogant, okay, that seemed like the right move for me. Well, long and short, my dad and his girlfriend break up, and I end up taking the front apartment. And then I'm hanging out these new friends. Everyone knows Joe has his own apartment, and it turns into, like, a shit show. Like, party central every night of the week. people going, climbing through the window. So, and this is like Chicago. So Chicago police would come by all the time.

And then that turned into a place where people would bring drugs and have stories with, like, guys that were involved in the cartel, like, sleeping there. It was just turned into like this crazy, crazy time that just so fortunate that I had enough friends that were wanted to make something of their life. you gave me to graduate, to be able to graduate high school. Did that mimic the home? Like, was your home when you were with your mom and dad? Was it chaotic?

It was not really. My mom was stable. My mom was very solid. She did not have an alcohol burn. She actually couldn't drink alcohol. So she didn't, she didn't consume at all. She saw the impact that my dad was having on us and our kids. two brothers, Billy and Bob, it's Joe Billy Bob. I'm like, why did you name us that mom?

And it was just like this, he would, he would just drink a lot and then he would have these rages and then, you know, paddle would come out and, you know, we just had like, it was borderline abusive but not to the extent of, like today, for sure would be like alarm bells would go off right back then. It was just like, okay, this is just like a. harsh punishment for being a smart ass, but given by someone who's an alcoholic. So it was completely different because I do think just on that point, like, our world is giving guys our age permission to kind of talk about it now, which is interesting. Yeah, man, I think like. Because at that time, you're right.

Like, like, even the idea of, like, get down and give me 20 pushups. I mean, that now is probably found, you know, and like, that was very normal in my hat. My dad's like, you know, you didn't do your homework. You're going to work out. Totally. Like you can, yes. I mean, that's the way it was. And then your, his father was even stricter.

So you just, you kind of see. And then it's just getting softer and softer as we, as we grow. But when I moved with him or that front apartment, I, I hardly saw him at that point. Like he literally at one point, I had a fridge with no food in it. And he would lock the door in between our apartments. And in between there was this, there was a washing machine that took like quarters in it. And I would learn to take his door off hinges just to get access to food. But then, you know, my friends would, and I would go scrounge around the neighborhood and we would, we would go to my friend's uncle's house and all the eye and take frozen pieces out of his freezer.

Like, just to have food. Like that's, but some of it was like self-inflicted because I did have, I could have went back to my mom under these rules. But this was a better alternative. And now I was like this super popular kid, like hanging out with, you know, everyone and would have parties all the time. And sometimes, you know, do you remember back in the day you have keggers and you would charge five bucks to get in? Red Sookup, five bucks. I don't even know if that's a thing anymore. Like, but yeah, that's how we would make money.

I pay my buddy trade to be a bonster at the door, you know. And that's how we roll. And that's how we grew up. And I had my friend group, I had probably like seven. and close friends and only one other one, my best friend to this day, his name's Todd, graduated high school. Wow. Yeah.

And what is your relationship to alcohol and drugs at that point? I was definitely experimenting with drugs. I felt like I still had like a decent head on my shoulders, but there was periods of time when if I had some alcohol, I would binge drink. I was never the person that woke up, and I'm fortunate to say this, because I know a lot are including my brother, would wake up and crave alcohol. I would actually have the opposite effect, but as it would get closer to five or six o'clock and on weekends, I have these massive cravings. And then I started to do like dumb shit. And one time I remember vividly, I had some

people over and, you know, you kind of have those friends that aren't really friends. They're people that are they're around you because you can offer them. In my case, like I'd this trans, he's transient roommates, you know, that didn't have a place to live and they were constantly like in my house and they were like, I'm going to be on. Or one thing led to another and I mix a bottle like an eighth of liquor with like Kool-Aid and I down the whole thing and I woke up a day and a half later on the floor. And I can't imagine how close I was to death and no one knew like my father, no one, there's no one around, all those people that were there were just gone. And that was like,

when it really hit me, like, man, do I have a problem with this? Like, can I control it? And I was watching the demise of my father too. He would bring home cocaine. He would, at one point, I think I had told you about this, but like, they offered me mushrooms and I ended up doing mushrooms with my dad. with my dad. And is there at any point? Because I've heard this story a lot. Dad's an alcoholic, mom's an alcoholic, so I don't, I'm not going to drink. Like, I'm going to go the other way.

Does that thought come into your mind? Not then because, I mean, I was like 16 years old, right? I'm the life of the part. I'm like the guy. People, like girls were, girls would break in my house. I'm not kidding. I didn't clean it. And I'd come home and there'd be candles lit.

And because I lived in Chicago, it was a different group of girls. It wasn't just the high school girls. So now the high school girls would come over and they're like, who are those girls? So it was like surrounded by that kind of environment where I was just like, you know, there was it. Like I would literally try to like hide and close the window. There's no lock in my window. And I would say, okay, can we get through a night without someone crawling through the window? And we couldn't.

Like people would come in all the time. But also at the time, and it's far different than like how my kids grew up today. people there wasn't a curfews there was no like it or it didn't feel like that didn't feel like anyone had any rules uh and i'm sure they did and they had more uh stable homes than i had but it was just like non-stop like like part yeah i mean i would imagine you experience that a little bit with i mean you're having success in business and you're there's probably times and you question like do people want me here or do they want the thing you know like this thing that you have to offer, which at that point in time was a place where kids could hang out and get drunk.

Yeah. And that's confusing. Yeah, it was confusing. But somehow I like had a little bit, still a little bit of how to my shoulders because it could have went insane. I'd unlimited access to everything. Like, like there'd be drugs in there like crazy. And I would stay away from them for the most part. And then there'd be times when I would experiment with things.

but in hindsight doing it then was actually almost like a benefit to me because when I did go to college I know we're skipping a little bit I'll go back but when I did eventually go to college for a brief period everyone in the dorm was starting to do that for the first time and I was just like I've been there and done that I don't want to do that right now you know it's not like I didn't drink I just didn't need to be like oh yeah like it wasn't that big of a deal it wasn't this right a pass it you'd already had it Exactly. Right, right, right, right. Did your dad ever seek help?

Did he ever try to get sober? Not really. He would, I would have conversations with him as I started to mature a little bit and just see things vividly. We went to actually therapy together. So I gave him credit. Like him and I, like this was back in the day, right? We actually saw a therapist to work on. our relationship together.

And those were the best days because he would leave there letting me take his minivan and I would drop him off the bar. And he's like, go have fun and he would give me money because at the end of those sessions, I think he felt guilty. Right. And so I would go and do whatever. I'd come back and I'd pick him up later and I didn't have a car or anything. I literally just had his like minivan, which he didn't really own.

It was his company one. And that's kind of the way it was. All right. Now tell the Mushner story. mushrooms with your dad. I mean, this is. Yeah, so we've done a lot of dumb shit like me and my friends. And one time my dad comes home with, with, you know, a bag of mushrooms.

And he's like, do you want one of these? And I was like, sure. And I take a mushroom and I'm feeling like pretty good. The girls that I mentioned from the Chicago native. neighborhood are happen to be like at my house and they're there and we're playing like truth or dare and one of the dares is they have to go in front of the window and they have to like lift up their top and put their boobs in the window like this sounds so crazy now right but this is what happened well at the time my girlfriend pulls up and sees and sees this happening you know and I didn't

have a view of this girl she just did this stare in the window and you were you were innocent innocent bystand yeah innocent um but But yes, but it was just like those like, those those like shenanigans were going on. And she pulls up and comes in and starts like, like, who's that girl like yelling me? I'm like, and I was just like out of my mind. And I was like, I don't know who that is. And or like I probably said something like, oh, that didn't happen. Or you know, just like kind of tried to like go away from the accusation of what really happened.

And I like ended up, I had this like, what would be a screen door instead of the screen, it's glass. And I end up like hitting it, like thinking like it wouldn't break or anything. And it ended up breaking and then literally cutting my arm here, a vein in my arm. And blood just starts squirting out everywhere. And now I'm like tripping on mushrooms. My dad's in the other room. I think at the time he was dancing on a table in his underwear playing records. he hears this is happening.

People are like, oh, my God. So everyone's screaming. I'm trying to hold my arm and blood's squirting through it. I mean, you can see the scar right here. Yeah. And the only thing you think of is call, you know, the paramedics. So we call the paramedics. Paramedics come.

And I'm just like lit, but kind of like laughing too at the same time. He comes out. He's like kind of smiling. And they're like, what is that? wrong with you guys. Luckily, there was like coherent enough people, including my girlfriend, to be like, hey, you need to go get help. So I go in the ambulance and they're like, hey, you know, do you have insurance? I'm like, no. And like this will be, you know, $500 or so. And then my dad goes in there. He's like, I'll just take you to the hospital. So he takes me to the hospital.

I'm like laying down and getting stitches. And he's like just high on his mind on psychedelics. Like it was. Yeah. One of one of many sources. And is that scar? I mean, you see it every day. You see it every day. Does it remind you? Does it have any meaning or is it? That this one doesn't, this reminds me just to being fucking stupid. Like dumb, like, like, where were you doing?

The scar that I look at often is the one where he lunching me with a knife and he tried to attack me. And at the time, my dad was like six, four, 300 pounds. Like, he was a big dude. And at the time, I was in boxing. And I was learning self-defense. And I was just ripped. And I was, like, really kind of in shape outside of, like, being a partier. And I would go.

And I was doing that for some of it for self-defense. So when he came at me one day, we got in a big art. argument and he was drunk and he came out with a knife and this is after like there's you know we skipped over like some serious like abuse of him like jumping on me and like punching me and like doing things at another point in time period of that so I was scared of him and and he comes in with this knife and I block it with my hand and I was cut here and I turned and I punched him in the eye and and that room in between the two apartments as I was mentioning there was like a washer and there with like coins in him. And he went back and hit his head on the washer. And I just took off

running. So I take off running. I remember vividly. I'm in Baltimore Avenue. It's called Hague, which is like the east side of Chicago. And I'm like, don't even have shoes on or anything. And then I hit this corner and there a gang comes out like a street gang. And, and it's a street game. And it's late and they're like, what's up, man? You know, what are you doing getting harder me? You know, getting harder. And I was like, and they look at my hand and it's bleeding. And I'm like, I just got, you know, got stabbed or got like, you know, cut.

And then they turned like to be advocates. And then they're like, who was it? Who was it, man? And I'm like, I'm like, never mind, you know. Yeah, next thing you know, they're in your apartment taking down your dad. So the crazy thing is this happened like three days before Thanksgiving. So we ended up going to Thanksgiving dinner still at my grandmother's house. My dad's at the table with a black eye, puffy.

He goes to my brother. He's like, should I hit him? Like at Thanksgiving. It was like that kind of like crazy, right, where we just had this tumultuous relationship. And it's too bad because these are all like the negative things about him, right? And like about the things that happened. But it was how alcohol and substance abuse changed him. Because he was otherwise such a dynamic, great human.

And unfortunately, like as in life, you just remember the negative things. And you remember this, right? I don't remember the positives that had happened. You kind of like block those out, which is unfortunate. So those are like the vivid memories I have of him. But they were all like lessons that I learned that it took to better my life as I grew older and more mature. And I looked back at those moments. and I looked at how he made these series of decisions after the divorce to prove my mom right.

My mom got a divorce from him because he was an alcoholic and he was abusive. Well, there's two ways you can go about that. You can be successful and you could say, no, you were wrong or you can prove her point and he proved her point. You mentioned therapy earlier. Have you done your own work? around this or is this? I don't want to hop around too much. I know we're spending a bit of time on this story and we have only, you know,

I fixed amount of time to talk about this. But I did end up in this behavioral treatment at the time. It was like a mental health center. But that was for something else entirely. But certainly like these scars live on, not just on my hands, but inside. Right. It's trauma. Yeah.

But I look at it as like, you know what happens when you have a scar and it heals. It gets tougher. And I take these as like, like this right here is the toughest part of my hand for a reason. You know, so I take all these lessons and I'm like, how do I apply those to actually learn something from them? Yeah. It's beautiful. It's beautiful. And then we lost him in 2005, right?

I mean, he passed. Yeah. Okay. Did that, was there relief in that? So he had moved to a trailer park with his with this friend. And he started, he had diabetes, had multiple heart attacks. So he was just not taking care of himself. So when I got the call, I was at a kind of my new career at the time.

I got a call. I was like outstate Illinois that he passed away. It wasn't a shock, but it was just like like anything. Like you're not surprised that that could happen, but you're surprised it did happen. Right. You know, so it wasn't a relief. It was just like sad. Yeah.

The father-son relationship is a sacred one. You know, it's a sacred one. And my dad, I'm going to celebrate his 84th birthday tomorrow and, you know, we've had our moments, but it's all good. It's all good. That's awesome. So tell me what happens from there and like, like bridge the gap from that moment in time into this powerhouse entrepreneur and just,

just this life that you've built with kids. Yeah, this is kind of crazy. Yeah, right. Go from that's what I'm about to say. And it's amazing, yeah, I mean, it's amazing how you, for me, escaped substance abuse. Like, it didn't catch you. In fact, you've built something really special that's helping a lot of people. Oh, thank you.

So from there, as I mentioned, one of my friends and me graduated high school. So we decided to go to college together and be roommates. But I was dating this girl for a few years prior, probably two years prior. So I went away to school. I was immediately like missing her and all that stuff. And then I didn't have any money for anything. So I was just like constantly broke. People would go out and I was trying to get a job.

I couldn't for other reasons. And I was just like struggling even though I was like struggling. even though I was like thriving in this new environment. Like I was, I don't, I didn't have a hard time making friends. Like I was, you know, liking where I was. I was just like really missing this girl. So I decided after a semester, my roommate also got kicked out of my dorm from doing dumb shit. So now my best friend's gone.

And, uh, and it was just like a, just a whole different environment and feeling. And I, I didn't feel like I should be there. So I go home. next thing I know I get her pregnant and I'm like 19. Wow. So at the time when I was home, I literally was living on a hammock. I lived in now I lived in Hammond, Indiana, which is not far from, where Chicago is like the intersection. Right.

Of all, you know, that area. And I'm living in a hammock in my friend's apartment in a corner. and I found out when we'd be a father. And I'm like, I can't even take care of myself. I, like, dyed blonde hair. I was just like this, not that that's like an indication of anything, but like it was, it was just like a complete mess. And I remember thinking, I just need a good job.

I need to, like, get health insurance. And I remember those moments where I didn't have it. And I have to, I have this now, this responsibility, and I have to grow up. at the time i mean my friends were some of them were just like trying to finish high school my other friends like continuing this journey in college and i'm sitting here and i'm like her parent both her parents worked at the four chicago assembly plant which coincidentally was like down the street from that apartment in haggish that i went in so uh long story short uh through them i was

able to interview and apply to work on the assembly line at that plant and got in. And working on the line there, I was, this was the 1998 Ford Taurus. That's what we rebuilt. And I remember going down to the trimmed department in this huge factory with 2,000 people that would work on the cars from the beginning to the end, like putting metal on to trim to chassis to the final, final like assembly areas, right?

So the car going out. And they put me in the trim department, and my job was to put on fasten seatbelts, put on door rubbers. It's called a B-pillar scuff place, like all the plastics on the car, but fasten the seatbelt as well. And I didn't know it at the time, but the cars like don't stop in front of you. They just go really slow. It's 72 cars per hour.

So it's one every like 52 seconds. So they'd throw me on the line. I figure I'm trying to keep up to put on these parts. I'm like, I don't even know how I'm going to make it here. I mean, I was like physically fit, but I just could not like catch on. And the issue is if you're too slow, the cars keep moving. Well, you have hoses. The hoses only go so far.

So they call like, they call that getting in the hole. So you get in the hole and then you have to work your ass off to get out of the hole to even be able to keep up. And the minute that that line goes down, people go crazy because you got to think every 52 seconds, they are every, yeah, 72 cars a minute. So, or per hour. So every hour, they're turning out 72 cars at the time is like $30,000, let's say. Right. So it goes down for a minute. Like, that's a big deal.

A lot of money. So they have a lot of people come and swarm you and they would help you. And I was like, I don't even know if I'm going to make it here. Anyway, long story short, I would go on these breaks then. They gave you like very regimented breaks. You could barely get a bathroom break. I haven't been in jail, but I can't imagine. It's very, very strict.

Like you don't have freedom to do much. And on my breaks, you get a 30-minute launch and like another 18 minutes throughout the day. So on lunch, I would go to people and I would talk to them. And I started to notice something. Everyone would talk about how much time they had left. until they got their full pension. I call it the count on. So it's like I have 30 years left,

or at the time I had 30 years left. So you walk up to people and that's the first thing anyone would say, yeah, I have 18 years left, I have five years left, I have 27 years left. And I could not fathom I would be there that long. But I wasn't unmarkedable. I couldn't do anything. So after a while, I started to get better at the job.

And instead of being in the hole, I would get ahead a little bit. So I found myself with a few seconds, against despair and I would go and I'd like, you know, look at a magazine or something like that and and I go quickly back to the car. Well, at the time, I was just like, I have to figure out something here. So decided to enroll in school and I was working nights at the plant. Sorry, like 3.30, I got it at like midnight and we could work overtime to like 2 a.m. and then enrolled in school and I started bringing to my textbooks.

And I then realized like this time that 15 seconds, I started just to go and like read a little paragraph at a time. I would go back and I would put on my parts and I read a paragraph at the time. And I would go back and I constantly did that. And I did it for 72 cars per hour, eight, ten hours a day for four years. And it was the best retention method for my pre-social media ADHD brain, the 15 seconds to be able to understand what I was reading, comprehending it, and instead of being a human robot, take those learnings

and then do something with them. So I started acing all these tests. And I started like getting all A's. And I'm like, I'm not an idiot. Like I started to really like get smarter about all of all the things that I was learning. And I was like, this is incredible. And I graduated magma cum laude from college after four years

from the plant, St. Xavier University. And at the time, I'm going to be able to be able to university. And at the time, I would on breaks every single day, I would approach supervisors. And you're raising a kid. Yeah, I'm raising a kid. However, like this is where kind of the other behavioral and mental health story comes into play. Very soon after, and what triggered me going to school, I should say, was right after I, right after I had. my girlfriend and I broke up.

And it was a bad breakup. And I couldn't eat. I couldn't eat or drink things. I couldn't sleep. I was so messed up, primarily because I found myself at this plant in a job I didn't like. It's now a kid that I had to be there to support. And I didn't really have anything.

anything. So I was just like, this is my life now. Like, I'm in this like pseudo jail for like the next 30 years. So the point where I started to get like a little like really depressed. Right. So my mom sees this. Her and I established enough of a relationship. So she started to get worried about me. She said, you should go see someone. I check into this behavioral health clinic and me doing that and spending a week there changed the trajectory of my entire life. And the reason why is because the first day I'm there, I'm meeting this peer group. And I should preface this by saying that stress is very relative to all of us. Stress could be like me and you were run out of cash for the business.

That could be the same stress as my wife grabbing a remote control and not being able to turn on the TV. So when I make this comment, I want everyone to understand, I fully understand that. However, at the time, I'm sitting here telling the story in this group, and I'm talking about why I'm there. Well, as soon as, and it's basically like I broke up with this girl, I can't eat, I just had a kid. The next person says, I just got diagnosed with HIV. This is, there's no cure for HIV at this point. I'm like, whoa. The next person, my husband shot himself in front of me and my kids.

The next person, and it kept getting worse and worse. And I'm sitting here like, what the fuck am I doing in here? Like, these people have real problems. But in my mind, my problems were just as bad as this. Your problems, right? Your problems, which is. So that, Zach, that week, by the end of that week, I found myself as a coach for these people. I was talking to them.

I was befriending all of them. And I go to pick up my child on that Friday. Now at this point, we had like, it was every other weekend type thing. I go to pick her up and her mom comes out of the house with this smirk on her face, like kind of sassy, you know, like, like a fuck you kind of smirk. In the song, Everybody Hirts comes on the radio by RRiam. And I don't know what happened. The sun started shining in the car and I just started smiling.

I have no idea why. I had no idea. And I said, this is going to be okay. This is going to be okay. And I swear to God, that was that moment. I went back to the plant and I was like, I'm going to do this. It gave me enough energy and enough power to finish school and graduate and press my way through getting out of the plan into the marketing. sales division at Ford, which was a big moment that changed another thing that changed the

trajectory of my life, of being able to get out of that environment. And the only thing I'll say about that, because I could talk a lot about it, was at the time, my goal wasn't even to get out of the plants. My goal was to be a manager or supervisor at the plant because my dreams and my aspirations were constrained to the environment I was in. They were no bigger than what was inside. the walls of that plant because that's the only thing I ever saw. So that's the only thing I wanted to do is be a supervisor, walk around with a radio and command respect and do that. It wasn't until I got out and started meeting like car dealers and started meeting like entrepreneurs that were outside these walls. I was like, holy shit, there's more to life than the plant. It's a small wins.

It's a small wins. And I think I can relate to that story. I hope our listeners can relate that story because so many people struggle until they don't, you know, and it's like that moment of surrender where you realize, like, yes, this is my problem and there's actually a way out. And that smile in that car, change your life. Yeah, it really did. And every time I hear that song, I smiled to you. I love that. I want to get in, because I want to spend enough time here on just this NA movement, go brewing, what your experience has been. Our listeners come here for a variety of different reasons. Where did the idea, because I know you end up having some success at Ford,

you then go start like, was it a tech business at some point? I assume have an exit or that ends decent. And then you start. Yeah. Yeah, tell me about go brewing. Yeah, to just quickly set up the backstores for 30 seconds. Yeah. So Ford in talking to car dealers really led me into my passion for digital marketing and

understanding the internet. It was at a great time where I had to convince car dealers the internet wasn't going to be a bad. This is like 2010 or this is like early 2000s. Okay. That the internet wasn't going to be a fad. Like they were all of a sudden not getting faxes. They were getting like people emailing and not as many phone calls and they're like, what

is this stuff? And I became this like pseudo expert, expert loosely. I just knew more than other people in the room about where I thought the internet was going. Right. So that led to this huge passion. I still have this day for digital marketing and tech. Anyway, 2011, 10 years at 4, I end up creating a marketing company, which then create a software company from there, bootstrap them, grow them to 375 employees within five years and selling to public company, cars.com, for over $200 million.

Wow. Yeah, it was like insane. And it was all like self-taught, building a good team, building a good culture, really inspired by podcasts and books. And just would learn everything I could from those mechanisms. Well, after I sold, they wanted me to stay on for three years. They weren't going to buy the company unless I stayed on. So I decided to, well, I stayed on as the CEO, ended up. tripling the growth.

We were at 40 million when we sold. We got to like 120 million ARR. And still was the CEO, but now I had 1,000 employees, literally 1,000. COVID hit, first time ever. We had to do furloughs. It was like really hard on me. But then I started to slowly get depressed. And I'm like, why the fuck am I depressed?

Like, this is like, I'm living the American dream. Like, I cannot imagine this. for a million years. Why am I not happy? And I started to realize that, which led me into drinking more into doing things. And I started to realize that it wasn't until I started to work on goat brewing, which I'll get into in a second. So I started to get this energy again, this, the feeling of creating something.

When you have a thousand people in the company at the time, we had 6,000 car dealers across the U.S. You're not innovating. Like, you're dealing with fires. The calendar's a mess. You're dealing with fires. I hated one-on-ones. Anything like calendar, I would just like, it would just, I started to do like fuel on it.

It's like, is this fueling me or is this, is this draining me? And more times than now it was draining me. And it was a slow burn. The only way I could explain it is oxygen is getting slowly sucked out of my atmosphere. And I didn't know why. And I was slowly dying, not physically dying, but like, there's no time for anything else other than work. Right.

And when you thrive on creation, you thrive on innovation, you thrive on taking an idea to reality. And you can't do any of those things anymore. But it happens slowly. Like, you don't really realize it, you know? Well, there's also no time to think about what's next.

Like, you're so in it that how do you even- So in it. Yeah. So I was looking for this next thing. And I had this event called Go. And it was, it piggybacked off. this other event, this philanthropic event I had called Refuel, where I would invite speakers out.

I had Gaggins there, Tony Hawk, Jesse, it's where all the people that we know, right? And I have them out and we do runs together and we have this great, great day. But it was like largely people in a church hearing words and motivation, not doing anything. So I was like, I have an idea for a different type of conference called Go. people have to start it by a 5K obstacle race and they don't know what's happening. I love that. Then they get to hear a speaker and then they have to do martial arts training. And then they get to hear a speaker and then they get to do yoga and meditation.

And so I decided to create it. And this is like right after COVID and I invite our mutual friend Rich Rollout as the keynote speaker. Well, at the end of this event, I didn't want to hand out, I don't want to hand out beer. I don't want to hand out alcohol. It felt weird. So we handed out non-alcoholic beer. Rich is sober. Rich is sober and just like it was such a healthy day.

It would be odd to be like, okay, now let's like drink alcohol. That also came after. My wife and I did this challenge called 75 Hard in the high of COVID. I've seen that go both ways. Yeah. This, this changed my life, really. Well, 75 hard for those you guys don't know. You're basically what?

You're like reading an hour a day. You're working out twice a day. Like whatever it is. Yeah. What I found hard from that. And at the time, I was 250 pounds. I was not in shape. My wife was more out of shape than she wants to be, but nowhere near as bad as I was. But we had, we had the hardest thing to do is to stop something. I realized not to start something. It's easy to start a thing and get momentum. It was very, very hard to stop drinking. We learned that in business, right? You'll have a Monday meeting, Monday meeting, Monday meeting.

It gets canceled one week and then it's gone. Yeah. consistency. Yeah. So I, my wife and I just decided to stop and urge it to do it. And the first week, as you can imagine, it was extremely hard. I would be running through my little downtown area and run past this like burger place that had, you know, I could smell the beer. I couldn't even smell the burger. So I just like getting pulled in there. I would come home and and I would have an any beer and it really helped me curb my craving. And I was like, wow, there's something here. And he did it again and again. And I realized after two weeks, I'd been under the cloud of

alcohol pretty much since I was 15, you know, meaning I didn't take more than a week or a few days away from drinking. And when you, a lot of people, what I found is a lot of people will, well, maybe you drink a couple times a week, right? But you're still under this cloud of alcohol and you don't realize it until you completely go away from it. In three to four weeks in, I started to see measurable benefits. My skin looked better, my wrinkles under my eyes there. But more importantly, I had this amount of clarity that I never had before. So I had that. experience as well of like, wow, there's something here. And NAB really helped me as a tool.

I have this event with Rich called Go. And so I have these two things that happen. The final thing that kind of drew me to the idea was we sub-leased our space. I had 30,000 square feet. And post-COVID no one's coming in the office. Sub-leafed our space to the cidery, the cidery abandoned where they were at, which is perfect for a startup non-alcoholic brewery. And that's, and I was just decided to go for.

work, but I knew nothing about how to brew beer. I never brewer my life. Didn't know anything about how to get into retail, but I knew how to sell online. I knew how to build a brand and build a team. And I just felt this energy. I didn't feel since I started the first company. How did you, I mean, how did you, well, first, I'm going to ask a question about alcohol. What have you learned about the negative effects of alcohol since going on this journey the last four or five years? I think it's pretty clear now, and I give credit. People ask me, like, what do you think causes? I think it's like folks like yourself, right?

People are speaking out. But really it's like, if you think about like 2020, 2021, it's like Hubermans had like one of the top podcasts on the internet. Rich had one of the top podcasts about alcohol consumption and what it does to you. So the facts are author of obviously what it does and how we really shouldn't have any, right? Because even now one drink is bad, essentially. And before it was like, yeah, you can have up to, you know, two per day. Those are the guidelines. So those shifted quite a bit.

So because of, I think, those voices that were not really heard before from like someone who's like can influence younger people, all of a sudden, it just started to create this movement. And then people started to piggyback on it. And more and more research started to come out independent of the. the federal government and it started to become a thing. Like, yeah, this is a real thing. If you want to optimize for performance, health and wellness, like you really shouldn't drink.

And if you are, it's not the guidelines that the federal government says, says, you know, that you can have two drinks a day. It's far from that. So do you, I saw a stat, 54% of U.S. adults drink alcohol, which is the lowest in 90 years. do you consider are you selling alcohol no what are you selling i would say well we're selling a non-alcoholic beer what does that mean and that's right that's the answer to the question that's that's the question i want you to answer because i think that's the question that i want people to hear the answer too yeah i mean like a corge n a or what was the big one i think like hyniquin had like

an like like growing up right like you go to you go to thanksgiving oh duels you go to thanksgiving and, you know, grandpap, you having no duels because he's been drinking too much. That always carried a very negative connotation for me. Having. An odules, I was like, you know, Pop-op's sick, so he's having an odules because he can't handle his liquor. I think it represents a lot of things. Number one, the most obvious, it's a tool for folks. It's a tool for when you want to reduce drinking, but you like the taste of beer.

And I'm specifically talking about beer here because there's a lot of non-alcoholic beverages out there that do something similar. But beer is one of these things that you can get to taste almost identical, if not identical, or better than, let's call it the real thing, even though it's made pretty much exactly the same. And that tool helps millions of people reduce drinking. And if you think about it as a percentage, let's just say, like you heard a zebra striping, right? maybe you're used to having four drinks a day a day when you're going out. And now if you consume two of those that are non-alcoholic, you're still having four drinks. You're not missing a beat.

And the next day you're significantly better off. You reduce your calorie consumption by a ton. And you're probably not making decisions to go get a burrito at midnight because you're making better decisions. It also represents a feeling in a movement that you're not missing anything. There's nothing to be missed here. The reason why we grab those drinks and we develop the taste for alcohol is because it's so habitually ingrained in us in our heritage, in our history, in the family gatherings

and the Uncle Bob stories of drinking and culture. You can have those same things and those same experiences without the alcohol. So we're selling that experience just minus the alcohol. You don't miss a beat. you gain way more than you lose. Well, and for me, from my perspective, as a behavioral health care professional, and I love the experience you had in that center, there's a big push right now for medication-assisted treatment, which is basically medications that are being used, if you're an opioid addict,

you can go on to what's called Suboxone. And Suboxone is, you know, basically it's cutting off some of the receptors that opioid's effect, so you can't really get that high. But in truth, a lot of these medications are replacing. the drugs in a safe way. And I would never call your product a medication, but in some ways, it has that same effect. I don't know what the difference would be for the people that need it. Like, what is medication? Like, what's the point of it? To help people live better. Yeah. So why wouldn't it be to those people? Yeah. And you're also consuming something that in many, like,

we have gluten-free beers. We have beers that, like, have, we had, we had, Some with Elthianine and Aschagana in it. You know, we have, so you can do things today that you couldn't do before. And beer is going places it's never gone before. And we're coming out of some really innovative stuff that I'm excited about that has never been done in the NA space. That, you know, you can have this really nice, you know, good tasting beer, but have this functional benefit as well on top of it.

How is, how are you interacting with the government? How are you interacting with policymakers? Are they fans of yours? Are they not? Or does you not pay no attention? Yeah, I would say the THC, the microdose, or the hemp drive THC market is the one that's really being scrutinized. That's the easy man?

Is that? Yeah, easy man. So we basically created a separate entity because we figured out a way how to make something tastes like beer, but put microdose THC in there for hemp drive THC to get this, you know, a feeling of what you would otherwise have. That's, you know, I would say that it's not as intense as a gummy or something like that, but it has kind of that same effect. And it was one of those where I thought we could be, if in fact the laws and the regulation

gets modernized, I would say. Because if you think about the negative effects of that compared to alcohol, it's bananas, is how much worse alcohol is. But because it's so ingrained and there's so much power behind it as far as lobbying and big companies out there, it's really hard to get the facts out there about hemterived THG, right? Anyway, the long short of it is there's an opportunity to be a market leader in something that tastes like a non-alcoholic, but also gives you this effect similar to what a gummy does, which helps a ton of people.

Yeah, I mean, I would, look, I think I'm confusing to people at times because I don't love marijuana. I don't love what it's doing to our youth. I know the effects it has on a young person's brain. I also have a group of friends who I grew up with that are 40 some odd years old that don't want to drink anymore. And they still want to go out and have a, have a good time. They're not alcoholic. They don't have a substance abuse problem.

So a THC infused beverage that they're not going to wake up feeling hung over from is like a really nice solution from them. I wouldn't give that to someone who's in recovery from marijuana usage, but there's got to be, there's a lot of common sense and there's a lot of nuance to this conversation. It's like what's fucking better. Right. Vivance, like, you know, all these other drugs? No way. No way. I had back surgery and I could tell you having Percocet almost like probably would have killed me if I.

hadn't had surgery and had a fix for pain. Like, there's no way that that is better for you than some of, some of these other things that people are using as medicine because they want to be healthier. But to your point, like, there's no way that that's, that it's meant for everyone, but nothing. Like, what is? And to your point you made earlier, which I love, like this, this idea of it being

almost like a scale or a spectrum, right? Like, and I'm over here. I'm an IV heroin user. I ingest any mood or my mind. mind-altering substance. Chances are you're not going to see me for a couple weeks. Like, I'm all the way at the other end of it. And I know that, right?

I've had to accept that about myself. But there are people that are here that maybe they've had a couple bad nights. Maybe they've made some dumb decisions while drinking or drugging. But the truth is, they're not addicts. Correct. They're just not, right? They don't have the thing. They don't have the same thing that I have.

And so you can also be in access. other things. Like, I'm addicted to running. I said it earlier. Like, I, I was high this morning. I ran 10 miles. I felt so good. Like, assume me, you know? Or, like, even there's even more negative things. Like, like, living in this world of AI, like, I get immersed. Like, I'll spend 18 hours a day building code that's, like, on air because you're just like, oh, my, I got to take advantage of this now. I have to win. I started to get cross-eye. I started to get a little, yeah. So, like, that's not healthy. Right. I was sedentary, you know, like, could easy man or could something like that help with that? It absolutely does. Why? Because it quiet your mind,

like better than medication. So there's, to your point, everyone's on the spectrum. I would not put any beer or anything in front of someone that just came out of rehab, including my brother, who did. And then over time, if it's your choice, you want to graduate into that. But I was, but a surprising stat is like, we sold 100,000 plus customers online. We collect data from day one. And I can tell you definitively, 63,000 of those still consume alcohol. The rest are in some state of sobriety or they just don't drink. The other thing that's important to call out here is it's self-defined. Sobriety, it's not cancer.

You don't have it or you don't. You know, like it's not diabetes. You don't have it or you don't. There are levels of sobriety. And, you know, I have some strong opinions around. how certain folks should approach that. And I also know there is a whole world of human beings that you are helping in a tremendous way

by offering products that allow people to have these experiences but not suffer from the setbacks. And that's what keeps me going. Building a business and doing your own manufacturing is extremely tough. You know this. You're building two businesses, right? If not more, two I know about.

And having manufacturing and making your own product is extremely capital intensive. And it's really, really challenging at times. But I can tell you when I get those emails saying that we help someone stay sober or it changed their life. And you'll look at those and be like, really? But once you get one and then you get another and another and now it's like hundreds of messages of people saying how, Our products, give them what they need to not have either any alcohol or as much alcohol, is the fuel for this business. Well, and I think about your dad, you know, like not to say that this would have been his cure-all,

but like if there was a world where your dad could have picked up a non-alcoholic beer and had a little bit better of a life there, we would have signed that contract yesterday. Yeah, or give yourself the time to make those decisions to, like I mentioned earlier, Like he chose a path to say to make my mom right. My whole goal after that moment in my car was I'm going to, I'm going to prove my girlfriend at the time we were never married wrong. Like I'm going to be successful. Yeah. And that's why I started smiling.

And then success is such a funny word because it changes daily. But the reality is that at the time gave me enough motivation to take those steps. It's an amazing story, Joe. I hate that I have a heart out because I would love to kind of like dig in more. Maybe we'll have to bring you back. I know that your brother is five years or sober now. And I'm sure he's just so proud of you. And dad, I'm proud of him.

Yeah. It's like what he's been through and the fact that he's been able to overcome this. I mean, you should see his before and after pictures. He went from a 300 pound almost dead guy to like a bodybuilder that looks incredible. and is really living his life. Yeah, and some of the stories you're creating won't be that dramatic, but they're happening. They won't be that dramatic, right?

Like, they won't have the, for me, the transformation pictures. But some of them might, you know, like some of them might. And that's really cool. How do we find you? How do people find you? How do they buy the product? The best way to buy the product is at retailers. We're seeing in New York.

We're sold in New York at restaurants, bar. Wegmans is a big chain that we're at. We're in all the Kroger's, almost all the Kroger's across the country. So look on our website for that. That's number one. If you can't find anything, you want more variety on our website, on Amazon as well.

GoBrewing.com. Amazon, just Google, non-alcoholic beer, we should show up. Or not Google. Put in Amazon that. And then me personally, jojura.com. You could find some more of my story.

And yeah, looking forward to hearing from people. I'm certainly going to promote it. I'm certainly a fan. You have a fan in me. And I just, I'm grateful for your time. I know you're running around with high rocks and everything. And I have a feeling this won't be our last conversation. And thank you for everything you're doing.

It's incredible. And I'm so fortunate to have met Greg and your friends to really see the impact that you're making because it's truly amazing. We're in it together, bro.