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Welcome to another episode of the Creator Wood Podcast. Today we have a very special guest in Maggie Beeler, who is the creator of this incredible product called TropeTales. So TropeTales is a cocktail book for readers.
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Essentially, it's a cocktail book all about trope-inspired cocktails. Very, very cool. But the recipe book is just the beginning. Maggie actually has created a cocktail mix drink brand.
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So essentially a powder mix, and it actually, using that powder mix, you can make the cocktails that she writes about in her book.
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So in this podcast interview, I'm gonna be talking to Maggie all about how she did it, how she actually made her own powder mix brand. And then what's really cool is
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she was actually the first episode ever that I did of the Beyond the Book podcast.
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The Beyond the Book podcast has morphed into the Creator Wood Podcast, which we are super grateful to have you all here in the Creator Wood Podcast. So really Beyond the Book,
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and this conversation with Maggie, got all this started. Like Creator Wood wouldn't be here if I didn't start asking the question on how can we turn our stories into more than just books?
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How can we take our stories into things beyond the page, beyond the book, as we say, into movies, film, games, and even drink mixes. Of course, Creator Wood's here to help you turn your story into a film with AI.
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It's an amazing platform. I hope you join it. You can get the link in the description to join below.
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We have a streaming platform where you can even host your shows and movies, have direct relationship to your fans, keep heaps of your revenue, and we're gonna be on TV soon, which is super special.
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And then the Movie Machine, you can literally just upload your book, and we turn it into a script, storyboard, full characters, all their voices, and more. It's truly magical.
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And what's happening in self-publishing books, where it got accessible for anyone to now publish, is happening in film. And we hope you join us inside. But with all that said, this podcast can be really special.
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I hope you enjoy it.
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And what you'll find is that Maggie is actually running a Kickstarter now, and you can actually support and back her Kickstarter so that she can get her first huge shipment of powders in for TropeTales.
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So you can support the Kickstarter down below. And with that said, I'm gonna see y'all soon at the end of the podcast. Welcome to a very special episode of the Beyond the Book podcast.
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And why this is very special, because I'm here with my amazing friend Maggie, who- Yeah... was our first guest ever on the Beyond the Book podcast.
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You were actually there as Beyond the Book was birthed, which was very wild. Mm. 'Cause Scott Walker, I had a call with him, and he mentioned the words, like, "I think you help authors go beyond the book." Mm.
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And then we started talking about it, then about what you could do beyond the book with TropeTales. We're gonna talk all about. But this weekend we had our little Beyond the Book retreat at the Barbie House.
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How did you like it? It was great. Very inspiring experience. You're around a bunch of authors who are going to such great lengths to grow their brands. And you're one of those authors. Yes.
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[laughs] In fact, you are the world's first author to launch a CPG brand, which for those who don't know what CPG stands for, it's consumer packaged goods. And what is these packaged goods that you have developed?
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I launched my first line of instant powder drink mixes based on different book genres for my TropeTales brand. By the way, love, love the shirt. Gotta show the bottom. It says, "We get bookworms buzzed." It's great.
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What a great tagline. It's what we do. Cocktail drink mixes. Yes. Crazy. Tell me about the what, the why, the how, all of it. You've just successfully funded your Kickstarter. I did. So it's funded successfully.
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It's happening. Yes, it's happening. It's happening 100%. I'm gonna have 1,500 units of powder in my 700 square foot apartment very soon. Will it take up your apartment? [laughs] It probably will be the entire apartment.
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I have to actually think about the logistics of that soon. I don't know. Well done. Figure it out. It's like the thing. Authors, you figure it out. That will happen. Yeah. Yeah. How do you make this? Like- Yeah...
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you're not just like cooking up drink mix powders in- No... your house. Like what even precipitated the idea?
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'Cause like when we talk about Beyond the Book, right, it's about how can you turn your stories and IP into something that readers can buy and experience beyond just the book. Yeah.
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There's obviously movies and shows with things like Creator Wood. There's translations. There's different media formats like games. There's merch. Yeah. There's physical products.
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But what I love about what you're doing is it's something that people can come back and buy- Correct... again and again. Yeah. But it's not easy to make something like that.
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So how did you land on this idea, and how did you start actually developing it? I was like where can I go with this brand?
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Sure, I can make like different iterations of the book, which I've done and have done well, but then you have the problem of people buy a book one time and then never again.
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Unless they're buying it for a gift, so that kind of happens sometimes, but it's not entirely- Do you have a copy of your book here just to show people? Yeah, I do. Should I grab it? Yeah, grab it. I was gonna grab it.
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Ooh, TropeTales. So I've created different iterations of the book, which has been fun, but theoretically people buy a book one time and move on.
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So this is actually the holiday edition of the book, which has been fun, and it's something I just wanted to do for kicks and giggles for the holiday season and just see how well they sell. But
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the problem with the books is there's no sort of repeatability, and the average order value is only theoretically for most authors pretty low.
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So I was talking with Michael back in January, and it's like where can this brand go beyond just like having a book?
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And at that time, my customers were saying like, "The cocktail books are great, but buying all these different ingredients to make just one cocktail one time is just not the best."
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Unless you have a wet bar at your house, you're not gonna be like buying bazillions of ingredients to make-... a specialty cocktail. We spoke and it was, like, instant powder drink mixes.
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Or at first it was, like, instant drinks, like some sort of, like, liquid form, and it was, like, running into the issues of, like, shipping liquid and that stuff.
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So settled on the powder mixes, and yeah, I went headfirst into figuring out how to make that happen. Completely new industry. Had to learn all about what... Like, how do you even make a powder mix? I don't know.
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At the time I didn't know, but I know now. So that was, like, where I was in January. Then obviously today I have launched the Kickstarter for it. So I have a manufacturer.
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I had formulated three flavors, three unique flavors for the brand, hired a designer to create the packaging design, contracted a packaging company overseas to make the packaging.
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The actual powder itself is made in the country. And then, yeah, put together a Kickstarter campaign and launched it. This is important. We talked a lot about, like, validating product ideas.
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I put up a ghost listing for the powders on my website, ran a couple ads to them, got a couple sales at higher dollar pricing, 'cause I was just curious, like, what people would pay for these things, and they were selling.
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So turned off the ads, went full speed into the Kickstarter, and I'm using that to fund my initial print run of the powders for 1,500 units. So yeah, it'll be interesting. [laughs] And that was the v- why 1,500 units?
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Yeah, so that's actually the MOQ. Most manufacturers, minimum order quantity, have, like, an MOQ for production. If you're a smaller company,
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they can sometimes try and work with you to, like, lower that MOQ, but yeah, that's what my m- manufacturer had. So 1,500 total, 'cause I have three flavors. And how much is that costing you? It's about...
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It's, like, a little under or around, like, $5 a bag with the cost of the powder and then the cost of the packaging. So that's, doing a math here, $7,500. About, yeah.
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When I did it, it was around, like, 6,000. Okay, so it's more like $4 each bag. Yeah, it's like u- it's under five. Under five, but over four. I think it was, like, 4.40. Okay, so that's...
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Yeah, so first of all, makes sense to be doing a Kickstarter with that, 'cause if you need 6K just to get off the ground, really- Yeah... you validated that there was something there- Yeah...
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through the ads, but you don't wanna necessarily be spending that much money on ads to get you that much amount of sales- Right... without... Yeah, it, it doesn't make sense. You need to go do a Kickstarter.
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When you actually were working with manufacturers- Yeah... I, I wouldn't know even where to begin to try and find someone who could make me a drink mix. Yeah. So how did you go about that process?
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Honestly, just started searching online for, like, powder mix manufacturers. And, like, initially, way back then, I was... This is... It's crazy to think about, 'cause I almost forget about this right now.
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I was reaching out to all these manufacturers. I put a little, like, proposition text together and was sending it out along the lines, "Hey, I'm an author.
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I have this, like, cocktail line, line of books, and I'm looking to get a powder mix made for my brand. I wanna do 50 initial flavors." At the time, that's what I was asking for, which was crazy.
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And yeah, I was just- 50 initial flavors... literally reached out to them a- and just said that, and I had a lot of, like, interesting calls with, like, different manufacturers. A lot of them were not good fits.
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A lot of them had, like, incredibly high, like, price premiums to, like, formulate flavors.
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And I even ended up going, like, pretty far with one manufacturer that ended up not working out, because they weren't, like, entirely in love with the idea that I was running a Kickstarter, which I was like, "Okay, whatever."
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But yeah, I talked to a bunch of different manufacturers just literally, like, searching, emailing.
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I probably emailed about, like, 50 to 60 different manufacturers to set up meetings with them, and that all happened in the month of February.
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It's just, like, back-to-back calls with manufacturers, trying to understand, like, the industry more.
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I was pretty upfront with them that I literally had no idea what I was doing, which I think actually helped my case a little bit, 'cause I don't know, I feel like honesty is always the best policy, and I'm like, "I don't know what I'm doing.
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This is new to me. Can you help me understand, like, the industry?" 'Cause it is very interesting to make a product that's not a book. You have to find a manufacturer.
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You have to find someone who's gonna work within your constraints, and I ended up finding a manufacturer that was really great to work with.
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They sent me a couple rounds of samples for the formula that I wanted, and did some iterations, and then ended up happy with the final round, and I'm going forward with them.
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It feels overwhelming at first, because you have no idea what the heck you're doing. Like, you're just like, "I wanna do this, but how do I get it?"
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Honestly, when people ask you how, I'm just like, "Just start looking online." It's really not as complicated as it seems. Like, you can literally make any- anything.
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Also, Alibaba is a great resource for manufacturers too. You could just... You don't even have to reach out to people on there. You could just post a listing and say, "This is exactly what I want." Crazy.
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[laughs] Then manufacturers will contact you. So that's what I did for my bags, 'cause I was like, "I don't..." There's, like, a bazillion bag manufacturers.
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I don't really care about the bag as much, because it's, like, the container of the product that people are actually consuming. So there's not much variation in terms of, like, bags.
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So it's like, that didn't matter as much to me. So I posted a listing on Alibaba, and then had a bunch of people reach out to me with quotes. Always have samples. They sent samples, and then, yeah. So that's...
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It's really actually, like, quite straightforward to do. So anyone can do it, it's just you have to get on the ball and start doing it. Yeah, so here's the steps I'm hearing.
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One is pick a product that you want to do beyond the book. Yep. And in your case, you picked a drink mix because, one- Trope Tales. Yeah... literally your book is Trope Tales. Yes.
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And two, a drink mix as opposed to an actual drink- Yes... because it's just way less complicated- Yes... with regulations- Yep... and shipping- And weight... and all these things. Yeah.
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Pretty much all around, it's just simpler. It's, yeah. So you thought, "What is the simplest version-Of the way I can go beyond the book. Yeah. I guess this...
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And maybe one day you will start your own, like, wine or cocktail mix- Yeah... like actual cocktail brand. Yeah, yeah. Or you could start a bar. Who knows? Yeah, yeah. But that's all way more complicated. Yes.
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But that is the simplest version of it- Correct... that can solve the problem of how do we get- Yeah... bookworms buzzed. Path of least resistance and also, like, listening in on what people are saying, 'cause it's...
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No one explicitly told me, other than, like, we were having a conversation about it, but no one explicitly was like, "Do a drink mix." It was like, "I want more accessibility to fun drinks.
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I don't necessarily love alcohol in all my drinks. I don't wanna have inventory, powder mixes." It solves all of those problems, and that's what my audience was implicitly asking for, isn't it? Implicitly- Yeah...
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because, yeah, they're buying a book- Yeah... that is about making bookish cocktails. Yeah. So the whole thing is it's like the classic do it yourself, done for you, or done with you. Like, you could- Yeah...
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do it yourself and read the Tropetails book and then make the cocktails. Yeah. You could do it with you, which you could hire Maggie to actually teach you a class- Yes... how to make bookish cocktails. Yep.
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Or you can have it done for you, where you just pay for it- Yeah... shipped to your house. So essentially- Yeah... you're already solving the same problem- Mm-hmm...
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just in a slightly different way to someone who wants it done for them or done with them. And you have to think- Yeah... about, like, the journey or psychological problem- Yeah... a lot of your stories solve, because...
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Now- Yeah... step one was figuring out the product. Step two then is- Taking action. Research... is, is researching to then find the manufacturer. Yeah. Pretty much. Pick the product,
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research the product, and then start reaching out to people. And then how did you nail down on... So it makes sense to me that 50 flavors would be hard. Oh, yeah.
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But why did you do three flavors versus one, and then why did you do the three flavors you did? Because there's- Yeah... clearly lots of different options. So I ended up...
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My book is split into different sections based on genres. And when I was talking about the 50 different flavors, that's when the MOQ conversation came up. It was like 50,000...
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Sorry, 50 flavors would be about, like, just, like, a bazillion units. Like 50 times 500, like, it's, like, 25,000 units or more. 250,000? I don't know math on the spot. 25,000. Yeah.
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[laughs] That's, like, math on the spot for Maggie. But it just became abundantly clear to me that was probably not something that I would be able to do, like, logistically right now.
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Most companies actually don't initially [laughs] launch with 50 flavors. They build up to it.
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So I'll just do flagship three flavors to hit three different popular cocktails, quote unquote, 'cause each one is based off, like, a drink that you could have with a certain liquor if you choose to add it in there.
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And since my book was split into different genres, that kind of just felt like in my head, I was like, "Okay, so we're not gonna do 50 different tropes." There's, like, about five or six different genres in my book.
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Let's just start with three, and I picked, like, the three top-selling genres on the market right now, which is fantasy, romance, and horror. So I went with those.
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And initially I was like- Those are the fantasy, romance, horror? Number three. I... Horror is my favorite genre. I, I- So I'm like [laughs] it's top in my heart...
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wait, horror, horror is your favorite genre, yet you are scared to even go into a haunted house? Correct. Yes. I'm a big baby. I will not go into a haunted house, ever. I did not know horror was your favorite genre. Yes.
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'Cause I knew you were scared to go into haunted houses. I like horror and thriller, so it was a big toss-up between horror and thriller, but for me- Horror, I feel like, has a little bit more- Yeah...
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you can have more fun with it. When I was launching them in the fall- No offense to horror...
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I was gonna launch them a little bit earlier than I ended up launching them, so I was like, "Okay, this is perfect for Halloween."
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But now it's looking like this will be perfect for Valentine's Day [laughs] 'cause it's romance. So yeah. Oh, yeah. It was an interesting thought process behind that. Wow. Okay. So I see how it all came to be.
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But I still, like... Okay, so you talked to the manufacturer. They, "Okay, Maggie. We'll make 1,500 of these things, but these mixes- Yeah... for this amount of money." Exactly, yeah. Oh. Then what... How does this work?
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Do you... Who has the rights to this? Do they have the rights to the product? Do you have the rights to the product? Is it joint rights? Who owns this? It's joint rights.
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Yeah, they own the flavor, but I own the IP of the flavor, if that makes sense. They own the formulation, you own the branding?
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Yeah, because it's like I didn't want any liability in case, like, someone were to get sick, I don't want any liability. So in order for that to happen, they have to own it.
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I can't have the ownership of it or else I'm liable for- Oh... if someone gets sick. Oh, interesting. And, like, as a smaller company, I can't... I don't... They have a lot of, like, brand power.
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Um, is this what happens? Meaning, is this common for brands to do what you're doing as far as in terms of not actually taking on the risk themselves? 'Cause I'm thinking to myself- Yeah...
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part of me I'm like, "Yeah, that makes sense." But is that, is the formula itself valuable to your enterprise value in the long run? Eventually. Could this be damaging your business? Event- It will be valuable.
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But right now, starting out, I want to reduce the risk as much as possible, personally. That's, like, what I thought was the best idea. But obviously there's room for negotiation down the line of, "Hey, I wanna own this.
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I'm gonna take all responsibility." Who has more leverage as time goes on, you think? 4X revenue is what a business would be m- uh, m- valued at. So if you make a million or so a year, you might be valued at 4 million.
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Mm. This is million top line. Yeah. Not a million profit. So million top line. But I'm just trying to think, like, a business that doesn't ha- own the formula, is it worth 30% less, 40% less?
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Like, how big does this problem- Mm-hmm... become to you? Is this a- Yeah... because a million dollars is not crazy to think.
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A million dollars, how many of these sh- mixes would you need to sell to make a million dollars in revenue? Selling them at 30. So you'd need to sell 30,000. Yeah. If the average customer purchases three in a year- Mm...
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you'd need 10,000 customers. Yeah. That's not too far-based. Yeah. So if you're making a million dollars a year, you have a business worth $4 million. What does that make up on the EV? Yes.
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And then in term of leverage standpoint, is it easy for you to swap out formulas and move to someone else because a similar formula doesn't matter? Yeah.
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Or is the formula itself actually a really important part of the product? Like, the Coke formula is clearly very important. I would sayAt this point, it's almost the brand is more valuable than the formula
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I would be curious to see, do you know how other companies in the space whose scale- have scaled similar to you, have done it? There's only a few. There's, like, Craft Mix, Batch and PAX are, like, the three main ones.
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But I don't think Batchwell is in operation still. Craft Mix dominates the market, and they do all the manufacturing in-house. They started in-kitchen and went and do their own manufacturing plant. Fascinating. Wow.
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Okay. So then obviously 1,500 is a lot to order. Yes. Have you, at this point, like, how does, like, samples work? Can you get samples? I remember when I, I published my first book, like, I got the author copy. Yes.
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And it was the best feeling. Yeah. Is there, like, an author copy equivalent for drink mixes? Yeah. So I got, like, initial samples from my manufacturer when I was formulating it.
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They sent me about a pound of each flavor, which I'm still working through. It lasts a while. And then they actually ended up sending- A lot-...
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a half a pound more of each flavor recently, 'cause I'm sponsoring a fantasy party with my drinks, so. They've actually been great to work with, but it's because of the relationship I built with them early on.
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You've called them. Yeah. There was a period of time where I was talking to their, like, sales rep, like, every other day, just, like, trying to understand.
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Like, I sent them about 20 questions or more in the beginning when I was trying to understand more about, like, how to work with them, which I have the document.
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I mean, I don't remember many of them because that was back in February, but I had this whole, like, document list of questions to ask, and he was super helpful, like, guiding me through each of them and explaining- With us Yeah.
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I will. With us. Yeah. I definitely still have it. It's in the, it's in the draft. Let's put it in the description of this podcast. Yes. You send it to me and I'll put it in the description. Yeah, I will.
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And then if it's not in the description, y'all can get mad at Maggie. Yes. I will send it. It will be good. There's a lot of questions about...
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They're very specific to the powder industry though, but I think they would also be applicable to other stuff, like asking questions like these to manufacturers for other stuff. So you got the samples in.
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Did you like them the first go-around or no? I liked the strawberry lavender one for sure.
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I definitely made some iterations on the coconut mango and cherry orange 'cause I didn't feel that the flavors were as potent as they should be. But other than that, everything was pretty good. They did a great job.
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Strawberry lavender was the top-tier one though, and that's actually... It goes back and forth between that and the coconut mango for people's favorites, so. I love it. That's great.
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Did you get anyone else to try it with you? What do you mean? The samples. Oh, like, initially? Yeah. Yeah. So I actually did.
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I live in Cincinnati, Ohio, which is a huge, like, CPG city, so they have a bunch of pretty much like trade shows but for CPG products.
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So they basically allow you to table at this event, put out samples of your project, product, and then retailers from around the area, and, like, Kroger, and Meijer, and all the big names were there too, Target, they all come around and, like, sample everyone's products, and they can, like, wholesale them on the spot.
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And I, at the time, obviously this was back in like April, so I didn't have the physical, like, bags, like, the nice designs, and I still don't yet, so I'm looking very much forward to that.
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But I emailed the person in charge of the event just on a limb. It was, like, a couple days before the event actually, [laughs] 'cause I hadn't heard of it before, and then I saw an ad, whatever. I reached out.
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Always reach out. You never know if people will say yes. And I was like, "Hey," I'm like, "I don't have any formal packaging.
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I don't even, like, really have the product yet, but I have these samples, and I'd love to see if it's a possibility for me to set up a table and just get feedback on them.
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Like, I'm not really trying to sell them yet, but I would love to get feedback on them."
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And the person who was running it responded and was basically like, "Yeah," like, "we'll let you pop up a table at the happy hour and just, like, sample them. Like, you won't...
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Don't even have to pay for a table 'cause you don't really have the product yet. Like, just come in and sample them." Wow. Yeah.
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So then I got to be a part of this, like, huge CPG, like, sampling event, and it was really fun.
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Made a lot of connections with, like, retailers in the area, and then got some, like, feedback from people that weren't, like, obviously friends and family. So that was super helpful.
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If there's anything I've learned from you, Maggie, it's that amazing things can happen in life if you just ask. Yes. Just ask. Honest to God, like, I'm always... Like, I don't...
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If they say no, like, nothing changes for me. So it's like you might as well ask, and then they could say yes.
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And most of the time, like, if you're pretty honest, like I said, being honest about your situation, "Hey, I'm new. I'm really trying to break into this space. Can I...
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Is there any way I could participate in this," or, "Is there any way, like, we could talk about this?" Whatever. People are generally very open to helping other people, I've found. It's- Yes.
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You make people feel important. That's the number one step... lo- low- lowering your own status to raise their own- Yes... is like psychologically does that.
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Yeah, because then they feel like they're helping you, and then they feel good. But it's also, like, a win-win for everyone because they are growing their vendor count, and I get to get some feedback on my samples.
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And what was the feedback? It was great. I actually brought, I brought all the flavors. I made, like, a little, like, mock-up, like, wholesale sheet that I was giving out to retailers too. At the time, I really...
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I just threw it together. I had no idea what I was doing. But I got a lot of really good feedback on it too, and yeah, it was great. People were super nice, and I definitely have some contacts from...
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that I'll be reaching out to when I get the actual samples. So couple stores in downtown Cincinnati are really excited to carry these, so that- Oh, wow... definitely felt really nice. Now, where do you see this going?
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You have three flavors that are coming out. You have this Kickstarter. How are you gonna be selling it and marketing it beyond Kickstarter? Yep. And is there going to be more products in this Trope Tales universe? Yeah.
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So after the Kickstarter, I will be putting them up on my online store. I actually have a couple people who've reached out to me about using them for book boxes.
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I have a horror book box that actually wants 1,000 sample units, so I'm like, yeah, this is, like, crazy actually.
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[laughs]For 1,000 of them, yes, I'll do that, and I would charge them, like, $5 a sample, and they're getting back to me on that, so fingers crossed on the quote I gave them.
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But yeah, so I have a book box that's already reached out to me about them to put into their box. So if anyone has a book box, I'm always open to talking. And yeah, so I'll do that. I'll hit the retail space hard.
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I'll be obviously selling them at my book signings, running ads to them, and yeah, just trying to get them all over.
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So I ran the Kickstarter for them, and I actually put a tier on there for whoever backed it gets to help me formulate the next flavor in the Trope Tales family, and someone backed it, so yes, there will be more flavors.
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[laughs] I love it. Yeah. Do you see yourself, like, in your future beyond the book, do you see yourself continuing to develop some more flavors? You wanna hone in on a few? Yeah. Do you see yourself going into, like,
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from drink mixes to drinks? Do you see yourself going into, like, ancillary products? Could you-- Would you go into bars? Like, I, I don't know what you s- Yeah...
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or right now, is it just- I totally forgot about this too. So there is a brewery that wants to use these as, like, ready-made cocktails too. Amazing. And I got to tour the brewery last...
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or two months ago or last month, and they have this, like, whole system set up already to use them.
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So yeah, maybe going into bars and pitching it as, like, an idea for a ready-made cocktail for, like, busier nights so that their bartenders can focus on other stuff.
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When bars are swamped, this is, like, a huge problem for them, so having something, like, ready-made is, like, a very large selling point for them. I already have a bar that wants to do it, so we'll see.
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If it's a bar related to a bookstore or a bookstore winery- Yeah... there's a few of those now. Right. Feels 100% they should be carrying them. 100%.
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So just there's so many options of where to go with it, and I'm definitely, like, I have a list of plans of action to take.
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But yeah, I'll get the powders in February, and I think definitely, like, summer will be a huge, like, drive for it for sure. Yeah. This is amazing, Maggie. It'll be fun.
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I hope it does-- It's already doing well, so I hope it continues to do well. What would be your advice to other authors who want to go beyond the book like you have this year? Honestly, just do it.
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Start taking the steps. Do it. Nothing is impossible that doesn't defy the laws of physics. Someone said that. I don't know who. But I think you actually said-- Some- an article you sent me said something like that.
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It's like, "If it doesn't defy the laws of physics, it's entirely possible." And definitely just ask questions and don't be afraid of being told no or...
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And yeah, if you have an idea for something, it's entirely possible to make it come true. Like, anything, literally anything. Just post about it on Alibaba, and there is someone out there who will make that something.
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Like, it's actually insane how many possibilities we have to bring products to life these days. It's not like it was, like, 15, even 10 years ago, where you need to know all these people.
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There's a whole marketplace out there dedicated to putting product ideas out there and having people bring them to life. It's actually so much easier than you would think it is. I'm not anything special.
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You can definitely do it too. So just think big about if you have a romance book, you could maybe do a coffee line of romance stuff. There's so much. Like a condom line maybe. I don't know.
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Someone's gonna do it and be successful. Plot armor. Pl- yeah, literally, I've been telling people for so long. I'm like, "Just romance authors, please, God, just do it. It's gonna be a gold mine, or I'm gonna do it."
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[laughs] I think there's just so many product ideas that you can, like- I'm gonna be the ultimate beta tester. Yes, you will. Like that's- [laughs] That's pretty true. Yeah, I'll do it...
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there's so many ideas for different genres. You just have to think about, like, your unique story and what makes sense for your brand. Is it-- I don't know.
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Is fantasy-- Like, i- i- it's unique to your story, so you have to really think about what you can do for your brand. And this just made the most sense for me for my brand. Th- there's an endless list of possibilities.
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And I'll announce this here as the first time I'll ever say this. I'm probably gonna regret saying this. Oh, God. But we're gonna, we're gonna be doing another Beyond the Book retreat at a castle- Oh, boy... in Ireland.
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Okay. That sounds like fun, so I'm here. [laughs] So we did our Barbie House retreat this last week when we brought everyone together to go Beyond the Book.
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If you wanna be part of that again, we do these things at cost just to have fun and create memories. It was very fun.
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Um, then there might be a link somewhere down below, or there might not be if I don't have my shit together. Castle in Ireland, Beyond the Book Castle Edition. And I will be dressed up as a knight at one of these.
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In shining armor with the plot armor. Potentially, if one of y'all pulls it off, I'll be a knight with plot armor down below. That'd be awesome. Oh, my God. So that's your incentive to then start- Yes...
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a brand Beyond the Book. Maggie, this was incredible. Where can we find you- Yeah... and actually get buzzed with some Trope Tales?
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I am at tropetails.com, T-R-O-P-E-T-A-I-L-S.com, and I'm also running a Kickstarter currently until November 21st at midnight. So look up Trope Tales
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Instant Cheers, and you will find it on Kickstarter. So lots of fun going on there. Maggie, you are a legend.
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You are writing yourself into this, the indie author history and doing something that has not been done before. I hope you all follow her path and chart your own- Yes... as we go Beyond the Book.
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Repeatability, average order value, the most important things to remember. Yes. This is-- If you look back at the first podcast Beyond the Book, we talked about all this. Yes. Now she did it. Yes. It's amazing. You rock.
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Our rockstar, Maggie. As always, everyone watching, don't forget: together, we are boundless. See y'all soon. All right, that's it for this episode of the podcast. Thank you so much for listening.
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You can find the Kickstarter down below, as I mentioned. It's an amazing Kickstarter. Maggie's an amazing person, and I really hope you support her.
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Now, I'll say full disclosure that Maggie's now actually a part of the Creator Wood team, which is funny now that it's all transpired.
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We started off as friends and now working together, so I'm very grateful to have her on the Creator team. You've learned something in this podcast about the adventures that can happen when you go beyond the book.
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Me and Maggie just being great friends, it's so cool to see what can happen in less than a year, and we both respectively go on our own journeys beyond the book and collaborate and work together along the way, and I think there's gonna be some of you in this community listening
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who do the same thing. With all that said, I hope you have an amazing rest of your day. And as always, don't forget the new motto at the end of this podcast is storytellers rule the world.
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Welcome to another episode of the Creator Wood Podcast. Today we have a very special guest in Maggie Beeler, who is the creator of this incredible product called TropeTales. So TropeTales is a cocktail book for readers.
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Essentially, it's a cocktail book all about trope-inspired cocktails. Very, very cool. But the recipe book is just the beginning. Maggie actually has created a cocktail mix drink brand.
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So essentially a powder mix, and it actually, using that powder mix, you can make the cocktails that she writes about in her book.
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So in this podcast interview, I'm gonna be talking to Maggie all about how she did it, how she actually made her own powder mix brand. And then what's really cool is
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she was actually the first episode ever that I did of the Beyond the Book podcast.
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The Beyond the Book podcast has morphed into the Creator Wood Podcast, which we are super grateful to have you all here in the Creator Wood Podcast. So really Beyond the Book,
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and this conversation with Maggie, got all this started. Like Creator Wood wouldn't be here if I didn't start asking the question on how can we turn our stories into more than just books?
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How can we take our stories into things beyond the page, beyond the book, as we say, into movies, film, games, and even drink mixes. Of course, Creator Wood's here to help you turn your story into a film with AI.
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It's an amazing platform. I hope you join it. You can get the link in the description to join below.
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We have a streaming platform where you can even host your shows and movies, have direct relationship to your fans, keep heaps of your revenue, and we're gonna be on TV soon, which is super special.
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And then the Movie Machine, you can literally just upload your book, and we turn it into a script, storyboard, full characters, all their voices, and more. It's truly magical.
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And what's happening in self-publishing books, where it got accessible for anyone to now publish, is happening in film. And we hope you join us inside. But with all that said, this podcast can be really special.
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I hope you enjoy it.
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And what you'll find is that Maggie is actually running a Kickstarter now, and you can actually support and back her Kickstarter so that she can get her first huge shipment of powders in for TropeTales.
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So you can support the Kickstarter down below. And with that said, I'm gonna see y'all soon at the end of the podcast. Welcome to a very special episode of the Beyond the Book podcast.
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And why this is very special, because I'm here with my amazing friend Maggie, who- Yeah... was our first guest ever on the Beyond the Book podcast.
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You were actually there as Beyond the Book was birthed, which was very wild. Mm. 'Cause Scott Walker, I had a call with him, and he mentioned the words, like, "I think you help authors go beyond the book." Mm.
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And then we started talking about it, then about what you could do beyond the book with TropeTales. We're gonna talk all about. But this weekend we had our little Beyond the Book retreat at the Barbie House.
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How did you like it? It was great. Very inspiring experience. You're around a bunch of authors who are going to such great lengths to grow their brands. And you're one of those authors. Yes.
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[laughs] In fact, you are the world's first author to launch a CPG brand, which for those who don't know what CPG stands for, it's consumer packaged goods. And what is these packaged goods that you have developed?
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I launched my first line of instant powder drink mixes based on different book genres for my TropeTales brand. By the way, love, love the shirt. Gotta show the bottom. It says, "We get bookworms buzzed." It's great.
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What a great tagline. It's what we do. Cocktail drink mixes. Yes. Crazy. Tell me about the what, the why, the how, all of it. You've just successfully funded your Kickstarter. I did. So it's funded successfully.
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It's happening. Yes, it's happening. It's happening 100%. I'm gonna have 1,500 units of powder in my 700 square foot apartment very soon. Will it take up your apartment? [laughs] It probably will be the entire apartment.
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I have to actually think about the logistics of that soon. I don't know. Well done. Figure it out. It's like the thing. Authors, you figure it out. That will happen. Yeah. Yeah. How do you make this? Like- Yeah...
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you're not just like cooking up drink mix powders in- No... your house. Like what even precipitated the idea?
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'Cause like when we talk about Beyond the Book, right, it's about how can you turn your stories and IP into something that readers can buy and experience beyond just the book. Yeah.
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There's obviously movies and shows with things like Creator Wood. There's translations. There's different media formats like games. There's merch. Yeah. There's physical products.
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But what I love about what you're doing is it's something that people can come back and buy- Correct... again and again. Yeah. But it's not easy to make something like that.
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So how did you land on this idea, and how did you start actually developing it? I was like where can I go with this brand?
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Sure, I can make like different iterations of the book, which I've done and have done well, but then you have the problem of people buy a book one time and then never again.
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Unless they're buying it for a gift, so that kind of happens sometimes, but it's not entirely- Do you have a copy of your book here just to show people? Yeah, I do. Should I grab it? Yeah, grab it. I was gonna grab it.
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Ooh, TropeTales. So I've created different iterations of the book, which has been fun, but theoretically people buy a book one time and move on.
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So this is actually the holiday edition of the book, which has been fun, and it's something I just wanted to do for kicks and giggles for the holiday season and just see how well they sell. But
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the problem with the books is there's no sort of repeatability, and the average order value is only theoretically for most authors pretty low.
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So I was talking with Michael back in January, and it's like where can this brand go beyond just like having a book?
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And at that time, my customers were saying like, "The cocktail books are great, but buying all these different ingredients to make just one cocktail one time is just not the best."
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Unless you have a wet bar at your house, you're not gonna be like buying bazillions of ingredients to make-... a specialty cocktail. We spoke and it was, like, instant powder drink mixes.
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Or at first it was, like, instant drinks, like some sort of, like, liquid form, and it was, like, running into the issues of, like, shipping liquid and that stuff.
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So settled on the powder mixes, and yeah, I went headfirst into figuring out how to make that happen. Completely new industry. Had to learn all about what... Like, how do you even make a powder mix? I don't know.
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At the time I didn't know, but I know now. So that was, like, where I was in January. Then obviously today I have launched the Kickstarter for it. So I have a manufacturer.
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I had formulated three flavors, three unique flavors for the brand, hired a designer to create the packaging design, contracted a packaging company overseas to make the packaging.
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The actual powder itself is made in the country. And then, yeah, put together a Kickstarter campaign and launched it. This is important. We talked a lot about, like, validating product ideas.
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I put up a ghost listing for the powders on my website, ran a couple ads to them, got a couple sales at higher dollar pricing, 'cause I was just curious, like, what people would pay for these things, and they were selling.
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So turned off the ads, went full speed into the Kickstarter, and I'm using that to fund my initial print run of the powders for 1,500 units. So yeah, it'll be interesting. [laughs] And that was the v- why 1,500 units?
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Yeah, so that's actually the MOQ. Most manufacturers, minimum order quantity, have, like, an MOQ for production. If you're a smaller company,
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they can sometimes try and work with you to, like, lower that MOQ, but yeah, that's what my m- manufacturer had. So 1,500 total, 'cause I have three flavors. And how much is that costing you? It's about...
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It's, like, a little under or around, like, $5 a bag with the cost of the powder and then the cost of the packaging. So that's, doing a math here, $7,500. About, yeah.
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When I did it, it was around, like, 6,000. Okay, so it's more like $4 each bag. Yeah, it's like u- it's under five. Under five, but over four. I think it was, like, 4.40. Okay, so that's...
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Yeah, so first of all, makes sense to be doing a Kickstarter with that, 'cause if you need 6K just to get off the ground, really- Yeah... you validated that there was something there- Yeah...
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through the ads, but you don't wanna necessarily be spending that much money on ads to get you that much amount of sales- Right... without... Yeah, it, it doesn't make sense. You need to go do a Kickstarter.
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When you actually were working with manufacturers- Yeah... I, I wouldn't know even where to begin to try and find someone who could make me a drink mix. Yeah. So how did you go about that process?
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Honestly, just started searching online for, like, powder mix manufacturers. And, like, initially, way back then, I was... This is... It's crazy to think about, 'cause I almost forget about this right now.
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I was reaching out to all these manufacturers. I put a little, like, proposition text together and was sending it out along the lines, "Hey, I'm an author.
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I have this, like, cocktail line, line of books, and I'm looking to get a powder mix made for my brand. I wanna do 50 initial flavors." At the time, that's what I was asking for, which was crazy.
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And yeah, I was just- 50 initial flavors... literally reached out to them a- and just said that, and I had a lot of, like, interesting calls with, like, different manufacturers. A lot of them were not good fits.
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A lot of them had, like, incredibly high, like, price premiums to, like, formulate flavors.
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And I even ended up going, like, pretty far with one manufacturer that ended up not working out, because they weren't, like, entirely in love with the idea that I was running a Kickstarter, which I was like, "Okay, whatever."
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But yeah, I talked to a bunch of different manufacturers just literally, like, searching, emailing.
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I probably emailed about, like, 50 to 60 different manufacturers to set up meetings with them, and that all happened in the month of February.
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It's just, like, back-to-back calls with manufacturers, trying to understand, like, the industry more.
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I was pretty upfront with them that I literally had no idea what I was doing, which I think actually helped my case a little bit, 'cause I don't know, I feel like honesty is always the best policy, and I'm like, "I don't know what I'm doing.
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This is new to me. Can you help me understand, like, the industry?" 'Cause it is very interesting to make a product that's not a book. You have to find a manufacturer.
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You have to find someone who's gonna work within your constraints, and I ended up finding a manufacturer that was really great to work with.
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They sent me a couple rounds of samples for the formula that I wanted, and did some iterations, and then ended up happy with the final round, and I'm going forward with them.
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It feels overwhelming at first, because you have no idea what the heck you're doing. Like, you're just like, "I wanna do this, but how do I get it?"
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Honestly, when people ask you how, I'm just like, "Just start looking online." It's really not as complicated as it seems. Like, you can literally make any- anything.
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Also, Alibaba is a great resource for manufacturers too. You could just... You don't even have to reach out to people on there. You could just post a listing and say, "This is exactly what I want." Crazy.
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[laughs] Then manufacturers will contact you. So that's what I did for my bags, 'cause I was like, "I don't..." There's, like, a bazillion bag manufacturers.
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I don't really care about the bag as much, because it's, like, the container of the product that people are actually consuming. So there's not much variation in terms of, like, bags.
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So it's like, that didn't matter as much to me. So I posted a listing on Alibaba, and then had a bunch of people reach out to me with quotes. Always have samples. They sent samples, and then, yeah. So that's...
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It's really actually, like, quite straightforward to do. So anyone can do it, it's just you have to get on the ball and start doing it. Yeah, so here's the steps I'm hearing.
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One is pick a product that you want to do beyond the book. Yep. And in your case, you picked a drink mix because, one- Trope Tales. Yeah... literally your book is Trope Tales. Yes.
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And two, a drink mix as opposed to an actual drink- Yes... because it's just way less complicated- Yes... with regulations- Yep... and shipping- And weight... and all these things. Yeah.
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Pretty much all around, it's just simpler. It's, yeah. So you thought, "What is the simplest version-Of the way I can go beyond the book. Yeah. I guess this...
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And maybe one day you will start your own, like, wine or cocktail mix- Yeah... like actual cocktail brand. Yeah, yeah. Or you could start a bar. Who knows? Yeah, yeah. But that's all way more complicated. Yes.
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But that is the simplest version of it- Correct... that can solve the problem of how do we get- Yeah... bookworms buzzed. Path of least resistance and also, like, listening in on what people are saying, 'cause it's...
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No one explicitly told me, other than, like, we were having a conversation about it, but no one explicitly was like, "Do a drink mix." It was like, "I want more accessibility to fun drinks.
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I don't necessarily love alcohol in all my drinks. I don't wanna have inventory, powder mixes." It solves all of those problems, and that's what my audience was implicitly asking for, isn't it? Implicitly- Yeah...
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because, yeah, they're buying a book- Yeah... that is about making bookish cocktails. Yeah. So the whole thing is it's like the classic do it yourself, done for you, or done with you. Like, you could- Yeah...
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do it yourself and read the Tropetails book and then make the cocktails. Yeah. You could do it with you, which you could hire Maggie to actually teach you a class- Yes... how to make bookish cocktails. Yep.
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Or you can have it done for you, where you just pay for it- Yeah... shipped to your house. So essentially- Yeah... you're already solving the same problem- Mm-hmm...
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just in a slightly different way to someone who wants it done for them or done with them. And you have to think- Yeah... about, like, the journey or psychological problem- Yeah... a lot of your stories solve, because...
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Now- Yeah... step one was figuring out the product. Step two then is- Taking action. Research... is, is researching to then find the manufacturer. Yeah. Pretty much. Pick the product,
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research the product, and then start reaching out to people. And then how did you nail down on... So it makes sense to me that 50 flavors would be hard. Oh, yeah.
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But why did you do three flavors versus one, and then why did you do the three flavors you did? Because there's- Yeah... clearly lots of different options. So I ended up...
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My book is split into different sections based on genres. And when I was talking about the 50 different flavors, that's when the MOQ conversation came up. It was like 50,000...
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Sorry, 50 flavors would be about, like, just, like, a bazillion units. Like 50 times 500, like, it's, like, 25,000 units or more. 250,000? I don't know math on the spot. 25,000. Yeah.
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[laughs] That's, like, math on the spot for Maggie. But it just became abundantly clear to me that was probably not something that I would be able to do, like, logistically right now.
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Most companies actually don't initially [laughs] launch with 50 flavors. They build up to it.
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So I'll just do flagship three flavors to hit three different popular cocktails, quote unquote, 'cause each one is based off, like, a drink that you could have with a certain liquor if you choose to add it in there.
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And since my book was split into different genres, that kind of just felt like in my head, I was like, "Okay, so we're not gonna do 50 different tropes." There's, like, about five or six different genres in my book.
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Let's just start with three, and I picked, like, the three top-selling genres on the market right now, which is fantasy, romance, and horror. So I went with those.
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And initially I was like- Those are the fantasy, romance, horror? Number three. I... Horror is my favorite genre. I, I- So I'm like [laughs] it's top in my heart...
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wait, horror, horror is your favorite genre, yet you are scared to even go into a haunted house? Correct. Yes. I'm a big baby. I will not go into a haunted house, ever. I did not know horror was your favorite genre. Yes.
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'Cause I knew you were scared to go into haunted houses. I like horror and thriller, so it was a big toss-up between horror and thriller, but for me- Horror, I feel like, has a little bit more- Yeah...
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you can have more fun with it. When I was launching them in the fall- No offense to horror...
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I was gonna launch them a little bit earlier than I ended up launching them, so I was like, "Okay, this is perfect for Halloween."
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But now it's looking like this will be perfect for Valentine's Day [laughs] 'cause it's romance. So yeah. Oh, yeah. It was an interesting thought process behind that. Wow. Okay. So I see how it all came to be.
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But I still, like... Okay, so you talked to the manufacturer. They, "Okay, Maggie. We'll make 1,500 of these things, but these mixes- Yeah... for this amount of money." Exactly, yeah. Oh. Then what... How does this work?
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Do you... Who has the rights to this? Do they have the rights to the product? Do you have the rights to the product? Is it joint rights? Who owns this? It's joint rights.
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Yeah, they own the flavor, but I own the IP of the flavor, if that makes sense. They own the formulation, you own the branding?
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Yeah, because it's like I didn't want any liability in case, like, someone were to get sick, I don't want any liability. So in order for that to happen, they have to own it.
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I can't have the ownership of it or else I'm liable for- Oh... if someone gets sick. Oh, interesting. And, like, as a smaller company, I can't... I don't... They have a lot of, like, brand power.
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Um, is this what happens? Meaning, is this common for brands to do what you're doing as far as in terms of not actually taking on the risk themselves? 'Cause I'm thinking to myself- Yeah...
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part of me I'm like, "Yeah, that makes sense." But is that, is the formula itself valuable to your enterprise value in the long run? Eventually. Could this be damaging your business? Event- It will be valuable.
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But right now, starting out, I want to reduce the risk as much as possible, personally. That's, like, what I thought was the best idea. But obviously there's room for negotiation down the line of, "Hey, I wanna own this.
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I'm gonna take all responsibility." Who has more leverage as time goes on, you think? 4X revenue is what a business would be m- uh, m- valued at. So if you make a million or so a year, you might be valued at 4 million.
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Mm. This is million top line. Yeah. Not a million profit. So million top line. But I'm just trying to think, like, a business that doesn't ha- own the formula, is it worth 30% less, 40% less?
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Like, how big does this problem- Mm-hmm... become to you? Is this a- Yeah... because a million dollars is not crazy to think.
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A million dollars, how many of these sh- mixes would you need to sell to make a million dollars in revenue? Selling them at 30. So you'd need to sell 30,000. Yeah. If the average customer purchases three in a year- Mm...
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you'd need 10,000 customers. Yeah. That's not too far-based. Yeah. So if you're making a million dollars a year, you have a business worth $4 million. What does that make up on the EV? Yes.
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And then in term of leverage standpoint, is it easy for you to swap out formulas and move to someone else because a similar formula doesn't matter? Yeah.
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Or is the formula itself actually a really important part of the product? Like, the Coke formula is clearly very important. I would sayAt this point, it's almost the brand is more valuable than the formula
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I would be curious to see, do you know how other companies in the space whose scale- have scaled similar to you, have done it? There's only a few. There's, like, Craft Mix, Batch and PAX are, like, the three main ones.
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But I don't think Batchwell is in operation still. Craft Mix dominates the market, and they do all the manufacturing in-house. They started in-kitchen and went and do their own manufacturing plant. Fascinating. Wow.
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Okay. So then obviously 1,500 is a lot to order. Yes. Have you, at this point, like, how does, like, samples work? Can you get samples? I remember when I, I published my first book, like, I got the author copy. Yes.
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And it was the best feeling. Yeah. Is there, like, an author copy equivalent for drink mixes? Yeah. So I got, like, initial samples from my manufacturer when I was formulating it.
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They sent me about a pound of each flavor, which I'm still working through. It lasts a while. And then they actually ended up sending- A lot-...
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a half a pound more of each flavor recently, 'cause I'm sponsoring a fantasy party with my drinks, so. They've actually been great to work with, but it's because of the relationship I built with them early on.
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You've called them. Yeah. There was a period of time where I was talking to their, like, sales rep, like, every other day, just, like, trying to understand.
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Like, I sent them about 20 questions or more in the beginning when I was trying to understand more about, like, how to work with them, which I have the document.
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I mean, I don't remember many of them because that was back in February, but I had this whole, like, document list of questions to ask, and he was super helpful, like, guiding me through each of them and explaining- With us Yeah.
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I will. With us. Yeah. I definitely still have it. It's in the, it's in the draft. Let's put it in the description of this podcast. Yes. You send it to me and I'll put it in the description. Yeah, I will.
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And then if it's not in the description, y'all can get mad at Maggie. Yes. I will send it. It will be good. There's a lot of questions about...
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They're very specific to the powder industry though, but I think they would also be applicable to other stuff, like asking questions like these to manufacturers for other stuff. So you got the samples in.
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Did you like them the first go-around or no? I liked the strawberry lavender one for sure.
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I definitely made some iterations on the coconut mango and cherry orange 'cause I didn't feel that the flavors were as potent as they should be. But other than that, everything was pretty good. They did a great job.
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Strawberry lavender was the top-tier one though, and that's actually... It goes back and forth between that and the coconut mango for people's favorites, so. I love it. That's great.
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Did you get anyone else to try it with you? What do you mean? The samples. Oh, like, initially? Yeah. Yeah. So I actually did.
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I live in Cincinnati, Ohio, which is a huge, like, CPG city, so they have a bunch of pretty much like trade shows but for CPG products.
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So they basically allow you to table at this event, put out samples of your project, product, and then retailers from around the area, and, like, Kroger, and Meijer, and all the big names were there too, Target, they all come around and, like, sample everyone's products, and they can, like, wholesale them on the spot.
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And I, at the time, obviously this was back in like April, so I didn't have the physical, like, bags, like, the nice designs, and I still don't yet, so I'm looking very much forward to that.
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But I emailed the person in charge of the event just on a limb. It was, like, a couple days before the event actually, [laughs] 'cause I hadn't heard of it before, and then I saw an ad, whatever. I reached out.
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Always reach out. You never know if people will say yes. And I was like, "Hey," I'm like, "I don't have any formal packaging.
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I don't even, like, really have the product yet, but I have these samples, and I'd love to see if it's a possibility for me to set up a table and just get feedback on them.
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Like, I'm not really trying to sell them yet, but I would love to get feedback on them."
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And the person who was running it responded and was basically like, "Yeah," like, "we'll let you pop up a table at the happy hour and just, like, sample them. Like, you won't...
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Don't even have to pay for a table 'cause you don't really have the product yet. Like, just come in and sample them." Wow. Yeah.
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So then I got to be a part of this, like, huge CPG, like, sampling event, and it was really fun.
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Made a lot of connections with, like, retailers in the area, and then got some, like, feedback from people that weren't, like, obviously friends and family. So that was super helpful.
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If there's anything I've learned from you, Maggie, it's that amazing things can happen in life if you just ask. Yes. Just ask. Honest to God, like, I'm always... Like, I don't...
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If they say no, like, nothing changes for me. So it's like you might as well ask, and then they could say yes.
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And most of the time, like, if you're pretty honest, like I said, being honest about your situation, "Hey, I'm new. I'm really trying to break into this space. Can I...
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Is there any way I could participate in this," or, "Is there any way, like, we could talk about this?" Whatever. People are generally very open to helping other people, I've found. It's- Yes.
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You make people feel important. That's the number one step... lo- low- lowering your own status to raise their own- Yes... is like psychologically does that.
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Yeah, because then they feel like they're helping you, and then they feel good. But it's also, like, a win-win for everyone because they are growing their vendor count, and I get to get some feedback on my samples.
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And what was the feedback? It was great. I actually brought, I brought all the flavors. I made, like, a little, like, mock-up, like, wholesale sheet that I was giving out to retailers too. At the time, I really...
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I just threw it together. I had no idea what I was doing. But I got a lot of really good feedback on it too, and yeah, it was great. People were super nice, and I definitely have some contacts from...
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that I'll be reaching out to when I get the actual samples. So couple stores in downtown Cincinnati are really excited to carry these, so that- Oh, wow... definitely felt really nice. Now, where do you see this going?
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You have three flavors that are coming out. You have this Kickstarter. How are you gonna be selling it and marketing it beyond Kickstarter? Yep. And is there going to be more products in this Trope Tales universe? Yeah.
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So after the Kickstarter, I will be putting them up on my online store. I actually have a couple people who've reached out to me about using them for book boxes.
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I have a horror book box that actually wants 1,000 sample units, so I'm like, yeah, this is, like, crazy actually.
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[laughs]For 1,000 of them, yes, I'll do that, and I would charge them, like, $5 a sample, and they're getting back to me on that, so fingers crossed on the quote I gave them.
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But yeah, so I have a book box that's already reached out to me about them to put into their box. So if anyone has a book box, I'm always open to talking. And yeah, so I'll do that. I'll hit the retail space hard.
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I'll be obviously selling them at my book signings, running ads to them, and yeah, just trying to get them all over.
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So I ran the Kickstarter for them, and I actually put a tier on there for whoever backed it gets to help me formulate the next flavor in the Trope Tales family, and someone backed it, so yes, there will be more flavors.
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[laughs] I love it. Yeah. Do you see yourself, like, in your future beyond the book, do you see yourself continuing to develop some more flavors? You wanna hone in on a few? Yeah. Do you see yourself going into, like,
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from drink mixes to drinks? Do you see yourself going into, like, ancillary products? Could you-- Would you go into bars? Like, I, I don't know what you s- Yeah...
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or right now, is it just- I totally forgot about this too. So there is a brewery that wants to use these as, like, ready-made cocktails too. Amazing. And I got to tour the brewery last...
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or two months ago or last month, and they have this, like, whole system set up already to use them.
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So yeah, maybe going into bars and pitching it as, like, an idea for a ready-made cocktail for, like, busier nights so that their bartenders can focus on other stuff.
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When bars are swamped, this is, like, a huge problem for them, so having something, like, ready-made is, like, a very large selling point for them. I already have a bar that wants to do it, so we'll see.
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If it's a bar related to a bookstore or a bookstore winery- Yeah... there's a few of those now. Right. Feels 100% they should be carrying them. 100%.
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So just there's so many options of where to go with it, and I'm definitely, like, I have a list of plans of action to take.
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But yeah, I'll get the powders in February, and I think definitely, like, summer will be a huge, like, drive for it for sure. Yeah. This is amazing, Maggie. It'll be fun.
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I hope it does-- It's already doing well, so I hope it continues to do well. What would be your advice to other authors who want to go beyond the book like you have this year? Honestly, just do it.
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Start taking the steps. Do it. Nothing is impossible that doesn't defy the laws of physics. Someone said that. I don't know who. But I think you actually said-- Some- an article you sent me said something like that.
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It's like, "If it doesn't defy the laws of physics, it's entirely possible." And definitely just ask questions and don't be afraid of being told no or...
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And yeah, if you have an idea for something, it's entirely possible to make it come true. Like, anything, literally anything. Just post about it on Alibaba, and there is someone out there who will make that something.
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Like, it's actually insane how many possibilities we have to bring products to life these days. It's not like it was, like, 15, even 10 years ago, where you need to know all these people.
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There's a whole marketplace out there dedicated to putting product ideas out there and having people bring them to life. It's actually so much easier than you would think it is. I'm not anything special.
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You can definitely do it too. So just think big about if you have a romance book, you could maybe do a coffee line of romance stuff. There's so much. Like a condom line maybe. I don't know.
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Someone's gonna do it and be successful. Plot armor. Pl- yeah, literally, I've been telling people for so long. I'm like, "Just romance authors, please, God, just do it. It's gonna be a gold mine, or I'm gonna do it."
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[laughs] I think there's just so many product ideas that you can, like- I'm gonna be the ultimate beta tester. Yes, you will. Like that's- [laughs] That's pretty true. Yeah, I'll do it...
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there's so many ideas for different genres. You just have to think about, like, your unique story and what makes sense for your brand. Is it-- I don't know.
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Is fantasy-- Like, i- i- it's unique to your story, so you have to really think about what you can do for your brand. And this just made the most sense for me for my brand. Th- there's an endless list of possibilities.
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And I'll announce this here as the first time I'll ever say this. I'm probably gonna regret saying this. Oh, God. But we're gonna, we're gonna be doing another Beyond the Book retreat at a castle- Oh, boy... in Ireland.
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Okay. That sounds like fun, so I'm here. [laughs] So we did our Barbie House retreat this last week when we brought everyone together to go Beyond the Book.
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If you wanna be part of that again, we do these things at cost just to have fun and create memories. It was very fun.
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Um, then there might be a link somewhere down below, or there might not be if I don't have my shit together. Castle in Ireland, Beyond the Book Castle Edition. And I will be dressed up as a knight at one of these.
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In shining armor with the plot armor. Potentially, if one of y'all pulls it off, I'll be a knight with plot armor down below. That'd be awesome. Oh, my God. So that's your incentive to then start- Yes...
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a brand Beyond the Book. Maggie, this was incredible. Where can we find you- Yeah... and actually get buzzed with some Trope Tales?
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I am at tropetails.com, T-R-O-P-E-T-A-I-L-S.com, and I'm also running a Kickstarter currently until November 21st at midnight. So look up Trope Tales
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Instant Cheers, and you will find it on Kickstarter. So lots of fun going on there. Maggie, you are a legend.
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You are writing yourself into this, the indie author history and doing something that has not been done before. I hope you all follow her path and chart your own- Yes... as we go Beyond the Book.
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Repeatability, average order value, the most important things to remember. Yes. This is-- If you look back at the first podcast Beyond the Book, we talked about all this. Yes. Now she did it. Yes. It's amazing. You rock.
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Our rockstar, Maggie. As always, everyone watching, don't forget: together, we are boundless. See y'all soon. All right, that's it for this episode of the podcast. Thank you so much for listening.
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You can find the Kickstarter down below, as I mentioned. It's an amazing Kickstarter. Maggie's an amazing person, and I really hope you support her.
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Now, I'll say full disclosure that Maggie's now actually a part of the Creator Wood team, which is funny now that it's all transpired.
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We started off as friends and now working together, so I'm very grateful to have her on the Creator team. You've learned something in this podcast about the adventures that can happen when you go beyond the book.
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Me and Maggie just being great friends, it's so cool to see what can happen in less than a year, and we both respectively go on our own journeys beyond the book and collaborate and work together along the way, and I think there's gonna be some of you in this community listening
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who do the same thing. With all that said, I hope you have an amazing rest of your day. And as always, don't forget the new motto at the end of this podcast is storytellers rule the world.
