Life Is Beautiful’s Beverage Experience Raises the Bar

If you went to Life Is Beautiful in any of the first three years, you may have noticed the very wide array of hard beverages available—far wider than the average cheap booze and soda-gun mixer selection you get at many festivals. But what you probably didn’t realize is what a massive effort goes into the drink selection. It involves nearly a year of planning by a team of world-class mixologists, sommeliers and beer experts from Breakthru Beverage; then a huge team comes together for three days to create what is in effect one of the world’s busiest bars. And somehow, everyone survives. Senior team leader (alongside Drew Levinson) Andrew Pollard—who’s also a former president of the United States Bartender’s Guild—gave us the lowdown on how it all happens.

We’re going into the fourth year of Life Is Beautiful with your team [originally Wirtz Beverage, now Breakthru] running the beverage program. What have you learned?
Year over year, we’ve tried to express the benefits of having an elevated cocktail program in a festival—from the extreme of 50 cocktails, which we’ve refined now to about two dozen—still maintaining the culture of the festival, taking an edgy and esoteric approach, fun niche-y cocktails, while offering approachability for people who might not be as well versed. Rather than reinventing the wheel, we’re making it go significantly faster, focusing on mirrored solutions, draft and frozen cocktails, and a few other surprises you’ll just have to come see for yourselves!

Is there any simple way to sum up the scale of the beverage program at Life Is Beautiful?
We serve over 50,000 cocktails a year. Last year, we did over 10,000 Moscow mules alone, and we are at about a 30 percent increase year over year. Spirits significantly outsell beer, in terms of revenue at this festival. There are so many layers and elements involved. It’s not just, “Let’s do fun, cool drinks.” You’ve got frozen drinks, draft cocktails, and recipes that have to be functional and repeatable. That’s probably logistically the most difficult part to capture: How do we do this the best way in order to execute? That’s really the science of a craft cocktail program on this scale, which is something we’ve refined year over year.

There are big cocktail events around the country, like Tales of the Cocktail, Nightclub & Bar Show, and so on. For your team, is this event a similar experience to something like that?
Unlike the majority of consumer/trade-focused events that are typically hosted with provided sample portions for a certain amount of hours, this is managed as a three-day, revenue-generating bar operation servicing 120,000 people. We have a precise system—in collaboration with our production team of Leo Degroff and Andy Seymour—to ensure quality, consistency and efficiency. This includes nearly 30 people in a full back-of-house commissary doing batching, juicing, production, dishwashing, bottling lines, 30-foot refrigerated trucks, portable walk-in refrigeration, inventory management, etc.

How are things going to be organized this year?
Our core sponsors include Effen Vodka, Bacardi rum, Jack Daniel’s, Milagro, and Fernet-Branca. Each brand will have its own activation area, with two to three featured cocktails, in VIP bars and general concession areas as well. We have a half-dozen “festival champion” cocktails, like the Effen mule. And we’re going to have two focused craft areas that will have a selection of craft brands: St. George vodka, Death’s Door gin, Cana Brava rum, Fernet-Branca, and some local love with H&C Nevada Smoke Wagon bourbon.

Breakthru Beverage is a distribution company, not normally a service operation business. What’s the reasoning behind you guys taking on this effort, year after year?
For us, it’s really the opportunity to have a sense of community, especially in the emerging downtown culture, and to put our name on something that was of such significance to the community. It’s something that has never been done before, and has now taken notice by other festivals. It’s definitely a growing trend.

For those who aren’t in the cocktail mood, can you give us an idea of what beers you’ll have?
We’ve got Ballast Point Sculpin IPA and Grapefruit IPA, 21^st Amendment Hell or High Watermelon and Down to Earth Session, Oskar Blues Dale’s Pale Ale and of course Mama’s Little Yella Pils, Rogue Dead Guy Ale, Stiegl Grapefruit Radler, Saint Archer Blonde Ale and Hoppy Pils, Trumer Pils, local favorite Tenaya Creek 702 Pale Ale, Seattle Cider, Left Hand Good JuJu Ginger pale ale, and I can’t forget Belching Beaver Me So Honey.

And what about vino?
To start with, we have a range of Taittinger champagnes, including the La Francaise brut, Prestige Cuvée Rosé, Comte de Champagne Blanc de Blanc and Rosé and others (and Billecart-Salmon Rosé, if you’re in a cabana). For still wines, we have chards and cabs from Anthony’s Hill, Bonterra (in VIP), J Lohr, Chalk Hill, and Sebastiani, as well as Guenoc Pinot Grigio and Notorious Pink Rosé.

With so many offerings, is your team conscious about making sure people don’t overindulge?
Yes. We gather all the supporting bartenders working throughout the festival and ensure they are well versed on the protocols we’ll be expecting them to uphold. We also work in tandem with the concessionaires to manage quality control and service consistency.

We know your reputation as a dynamo, but still, we’re pretty sure you can’t do everything alone. Along with Leo and Andy, wanna shout out a few of your crew?
Just to name a few: Drew Levinson, Dan Dufek, Eric Hay, Mike Doyle, Layla Linn, Jody Lawrence, Melissa Nguyen, David Forst, Michael Shetler, and the rest of the Breakthru wrecking crew that makes this machine move.

If you could design your perfect bar crawl at LIB, where would it start and end?
I’d start and finish at the Fernet activation. The “Don’t Be Bitter” strawberry-infused Fernet-Branca luge is not to be missed!

Here are the cocktails we are most excited about trying:

Rum in the Coconut (in the coconut)
Bacardi Coconut Rum | fresh coconut water

Piña Verde (frozen)
Milagro Silver Tequila | Melon liqueur | pineapple | fresh lime juice | mint

Mint Eastwood (frozen)
Branca Menta | Templeton Rye | Crème de Menthe | coconut cream

Craft Brands:

Skin That Smokewagon
Smoke Wagon Bourbon | Dow’s Ruby Port | fresh lemon juice | vanilla | bay leaf | black pepper

I’ll Have Another
Death’s Door Gin | Giffard Pamplemousse Rosé | fresh lime juice | source tonic water | cardamom

VIP Bars:

Kiss My Melons
Milagro Silver Tequila | Chareau Aloe Liqueur | fresh watermelon + lime juice | agave nectar | basil

Dark n’ Stormborn
Fernet-Branca | Zaya Rum | fresh lime juice | Barritt’s Ginger Beer

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