9 10 181 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/e62624fb1bdfebb2252e2ea132ab1d6e.pdf a47afc957202c225a5327331d4f153df PDF Text Text JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 Meyer: My name is Madeleine Meyer and I'm here today in the Kellogg Library interviewing Jay Franklin here at the California State University San Marcos for the Cross-Cultural Center Oral History Project. The date is Wednesday, April 12th, 2023, and the time is 2:16. Hi, Jay. Uh, why don't you go ahead and introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your early life and family. Franklin: Woo. Awesome. Jay Franklin, uh, associate director of new student and family programs. Um, early life, uh, let's see. I grew up military. My dad was in the Navy for 24 years, so every two to three years we moved around a lot. Um, but I was fortunate enough to stay for a significant amount of time in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Um, and then had the opportunity to move out to California in 1999. California is my birth state, so when that opportunity came up, I moved away from Virginia Beach. My entire family network is in Virginia, Virginia Beach, and I just wanted to start anew out here in San Diego. Meyer: Nice. So, what was your educational journey like? Franklin: The typical ”Go to high school and you should go to college”. So I, I tried that route, or that was my original plan. My senior year, my junior year of high school, I was fortunate enough to get into a program that allowed me to go to beauty school, uh, cosmetology school. So I was able to use those elective units or those blocks of time to go to cosmetology school. So, by the time I graduated high school, I already had my cosmetology license. So, I went, I did the apply for college, uh, went to a local community college, Tidewater Community College in Virginia Beach, Virginia. And, realized as a full-time hair stylist, I was doing a lot like that whole typical, like, how many hours -- should I work full-time, parttime, go to school full-time, part-time? And, I did full-time both, and, of course that doesn't work out. And I felt as though I, in one of my classes, I'll never forget, my sociology instructor—professor--was sharing like how much they made. And I'm like, you make that? And I'm like, and you got your doctor whatever! And it just really was jarring and shocking for me because here I am, a professional hair stylist, uh, working in a, in a salon and also doing hair on the side. I was pulling in basically what that faculty member was saying was their salary. So I was like, why am I here? And it just wasn't a good fit. Um, so I didn't go-- I. I dropped out eventually. Actually, I, uh, history shows that I have a whole bunch of “WU”s [Withdrawal Unauthorized]. So I did the first semester, did great. Got A's and B's and, and A minus or something? Uh, and, and then my second semester I was like, that was when I encountered my sociology instructor and was basically sharing their, their salary. And I was like, I need to get outta here. So I just thought, just not showing up, you're done with class, and the, the university would just disenroll you and yeah, of course I'll disenroll you with “WU”s, so, those are F’s. And so my second semester at Tidewater Community College had a whole bunch of F's. Fast forward many years, at least a decade, and I started to see the number “30,” my age was coming up as thirty. And I'm like, oh my gosh, it's time to actually go back to school and get a career. And yeah, I have a great job doing hair, but that's a job. I really wanted to finish what I originally set out to do and go to college and get my bachelor's degree, and did it. So I went back to school and was a nontraditional student. Uh, I didn't want to go to SDSU, um, and was very adamant in not being, “hey, number 262 in the back row.” Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 1 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 Meyer: Mm-hmm. Franklin: I wanted to be a person, and found out that, uh, Cal State San Marcos was a brand-new school, smaller class sizes, and I, I didn't wanna leave San Diego. Worked so hard to get here and stay here. So, at that time, my partner and I were looking around for houses or condos to buy, and we just couldn't find anything in San Diego, ‘cause it was 2004 and the prices were just going up and up and up. So, fortunately, fortunately the housing or condo prices in San Marcos were affordable at that time. So, and telling my counselor at City College, she's like, “Oh, yeah, that actually works out better for you when you apply because you'll be in the service area of Cal State San Marcos.” So it, it worked out. And I was able to come to Cal State San Marcos as an undergrad non-traditional student, in fall of 2005, been here ever since. I mean, I did leave for a little bit and, uh, I did my undergrad, my grad here, but there was a stint as soon as I finished my undergrad, I didn't wanna work in a salon and I wanted a job that leveraged my bachelor's degree and was lucky enough to get a job at Bridgepoint Education or Asher University, and was a matriculation coordinator-- basically a transcript evaluator. Um, did that for a couple months, I think almost a year. And then worked my way up to Articulation Specialist-- which is like assist.org, it's like your articulation specialist, uh, counselor transfer counselor 24/7-- and was able to do that for Asher University. And while at a Christmas party for an office at Cal State San Marcos-- my partner worked at Cal State San Marcos at that time, so I was attending his--- was a Christmas party and was sharing with the dean at that time what I did. And it just worked out that they were having an emergency position that they said, “Hey, you should apply!” And the rest is history, as I say, I apply and then have been here ever since. So I did have a, a gap in my Cal State San Marcos life of about a year and a half where I worked externally. But boomeranged back to come to Cal State San Marcos, Meyer: Everything comes back to-Franklin: Totally, totally. Meyer: So, during your time at, at Cal State San Marcos, when you were an undergrad, how did you become aware of and become involved with the Cross-Cultural Center? Franklin: I love it. Okay. So, um, in 2005, I was a non-traditional student, so I knew that yes, the, the university has the mission statement, vision statement, campus core values, and I, I moved up from Hillcrest, so I was very out and comfortable with myself and eagerly looked for the student organization for the LGBTQ+ community, and discovered it and found it and joined their group and was like, “Look, we need to have Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 2 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 some marketing. We need some banners, we need rebranding.” And I just, I just came, I, I wasn't a, a typical student. So I, I went to school and wanted to get the best out of my experience and basically became a marketing director for the student org, and then branded us and allowed us to get some visibility on campus because we wanted to increase our membership. And in that, I'm gonna say either that fall or early that spring, uh, our banner for our student org was stolen. And I thought it was very odd that a university would lose or allow something like that to occur. And, I thought it was really jarring to be called “faggot” on campus. And it was just really jarring. It was, it was very strange. It really reminded me of growing up in Virginia Beach, Virginia with the 700 Club in the background, Christian Coalition [of America]… campus, yes, is supposed to be inclusive, and I just didn't get that vibe. I also was very comfortable in my being gay and championing the LGBTQ+ community causes up here. And to have our banner stolen, I immediately, like, “Who do I go to?” And our student org was like, “Oh my gosh, what are we gonna do?” I'm like, the university has protocols, there's rules and policies, so we'll just work our way up to food chain to find out who's responsible for our safety and like, what, what can be done about this banner being stolen? And that was how I encountered Student Life and Leadership, because our student organization is founded out of Student Life and Leadership, so they were responsible for the student organization. And then it also allowed me to, out of SLL-- Student Life and leadership-- it also allowed me to encounter the Multicultural Programs Office or the Cross-Cultural Center, as it was slowly evolving into … So, that was my first encounter, was like, “Hey, what's going on?” Like, our student org didn't even know that the Cross-Cultural Center or the Multicultural Programs Office existed. So it was an opportunity for me to learn more about multicultural programs and the Cross-Cultural Center, but it also, uh, was allowed the student org to gain additional information and resources. So that's how we encountered it. That's how I personally discovered it. Meyer: So, what was the role of the Cross-Cultural Center at the time? I understand that it was like the university just starting out. Did it have more leeway or, or sway? Franklin: Um, I don't, I wouldn't say more leeway or sway. It was just a, to be honest, it was the reason why I was drawn into the space is there was, there were folks that looked like me, so it was predominantly Filipino or Asian, the folks that hung out in the center or the-- it was really a oversized closet, I want to say, like, as big as this room that we're in. So, it was a small closet, and a conference room, and it was filled with people that looked like me. We had the same conversations about our identity groups, and it was just a really welcoming environment. I was like, wow, it's refreshing to be in here versus the external campus. I mean, back then my hair was platinum or purple or pink or cheetah spots. It was whatever I felt like, I was a professional hairstylist so my hair changed often. It was like, see-through, iridescent, like— so, in that, in that space, I was able to just be myself. And then other students started sharing their stories and some students started coming out, and… it was… I, I wouldn't say there was like any sway or anything. It was just a spot that made me feel better. And then because I was in the center, more students were accessing the resources and, yeah. Our student org basically started leveraging the center-Meyer: Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 3 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 Mm-hmm. Franklin: For resources for the student org, because Student Life and Leadership has resources for student orgs, but so does—the Cross-- or the Multicultural Programs, Cross-Cultural Center has resources. So, once I knew that those things were available, our student org definitely started leveraging them and, and holding space and, and using resources. Like we made, we came up with marketing campaigns, events to help not just our student org professionally develop in leadership, but also sharing some of our lessons learned with other student orgs, like, Black Student Union, American Indian Student Association, MEChA [Movimentio Estudiantil Chicano de Azltlán], APIDA [Asian Pacific Islander Desi American], or-- I'm trying to remember all the other ones-- but Asian Pacific Islander student org, Vietnamese student org [Vietnamese Student Association]. So, all these different student orgs, their membership were students. And I felt really out of place because I was an older, non-traditional student, and I was pushing-- I wouldn't say pushing the envelope-- but I was just encouraging more leadership development, and sharing resources with students, saying, “These are things that you've paid for, you can leverage them and use them to the benefit of not just your student org, but for you professionally and get some-- grow your skillset.” Meyer: Mm-hmm. So, I understand you became a peer educator because you were so motivated to like, keep helping other students learn about the things they could utilize on campus. Um, could you talk a little bit about the peer educator program? Franklin: Yeah. So there were, I wanna say five of us. Uh, I'm looking at, let me look at my pictures. Meyer: No, that's totally fine. Franklin: There, there was Cheryl, Stephanie, Diana, myself, and Brittany, and that was May of 2007. I was just looking, referencing a picture of us as a group. As a peer educator, I kind of feel like, because I was a non-traditional student, I really looked at this as a job, as a-- I didn't know that student affairs was actually a career until encountering Student Life and Leadership in the Multicultural Programs. I was like, “This is a job?” Like, this is amazing! So, I was living the life as if I was already employed by the university and really took ownership and pride of being a peer educator… Um, but, of course I wanted to ensure that we all shared the, the workload. So, each of us had a specialization. Mine was LGBTQ specific, the four other peer educators focused on their areas. I just took a bit more ownership of like, making sure that… I, I wouldn't say I was a lead, but I just wanted to make sure that our, our projects were polished? And, when looking around at other student orgs and other peer educators on campus, I wanted to share all the resources, and the presentation of this is what Multicultural Programs or Cross-Cultural Center, this is the content we put Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 4 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 out. It's branded, it has a, a similar look and feel. It didn't look hodgepodge. Like, this was years ago before the advent of Canva. Everybody loves Canva right now because templates galore and it all looks professional. Back then we didn't have it. So, the peer educators basically came up with our own template that we said, okay, this is how we're, the conversation was like, how do we make it look professional and not student org, and not just disjointed from every event to the next event? There was some side sort of cohesion, a template that looked like when you looked at a, a flyer or a poster, you knew, oh, that's a Cross-Cultural Center event. Meyer: Hmm. What kind of support and programmings were, were offered for students that got involved with the CCC [Cross-Cultural Center] when the organization was still, you know, coming up when you were, when you were a peer educator. What kind of, like, outreach was taking place to the students? Franklin: Kinda outreach. Ooh, that's a good one. Uh, so the peer educators essentially were their own marketing machines. Meyer: Mm-hmm. Franklin: So, each of our groups, we were leveraged, uh, to dip into our own communities— Meyer: Mm-hmm. Franklin: So, when it came to marketing efforts and how do we reach the greater campus body-- I mean, there was, I wanna say 7,400 students on campus at that time? 74[00] to 8,000 students. So, by being already a student leader in the LGBTQ group, our and each of the peer educators being members of their own, identity group, student orgs, it really helped the marketing efforts target those communities. And it was cross-pollination essentially. Like, everybody-- we synced our events to ensure that we weren't overlapping anybody else's events, so that we could pull our communities to each one of them so we could be strategic in our marketing efforts. Meyer: How did the Cross-Cultural Center help you further develop that sense of community and help others find it? I know you've already touched on that a bit, but, um, yeah. Finding a community on campus-Franklin: How did it help me find a community? Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 5 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 Meyer: I mean, you, you already had, like you said, a community, but, how did-- how did you help bring other people into that in ways that they might not have been introduced to? Franklin: Perfect. Okay. Um, a good way of looking at it is ensuring that a lot of our events had food, because we knew that food draws students. So, one strategy was always going to the director of Student Life Leadership, was always asking for additional funds for <laughs> so we could buy pizza, hotdogs, to ensure our events had food, because we knew that food was the-- a driving motivator for students to attend anything. So, food was important. And then, money was another way of, of pulling in students that didn't leverage the Cross-Cultural Center or Student Life and Leadership was helping students-- like, we were doing workshops and helping students, obtain funding from-- the Cross-Cultural Center had funds, ASI [Associated Students Incorporated, student government] had funds, the Vice President of Student Affairs had funds, so there was like $500 pockets of money that you could apply for in fall or for spring, or for the entire academic year. So, we came up with workshops to help students apply for those programs, funding opportunities so that they could actually get money. So, we knew food was important and money was important. So, we held workshops, helped students actually like, oh, I've never applied for money before for student org. We're like, “don't worry, we can help you walk through this process.” So, food and money was one way to bring in students that never knew that the Cross-Cultural Center existed, or even Student Life and Leadership existed. Meyer: What is the overall significance, in your opinion, of having a space like that, that champions, uh, underrepresented students on campus and gives them a place to be themselves and hold space? Franklin: Yeah, it was, it was a family experience. For me, I, I really, uh, didn't, as I grew up military, so every two to three years would move around. So, I really didn't have this whole Asian, Filipino, identity experience. But hanging out in the center really helped me come, come to peace or come to terms with my halfFilipino, half-Asian background. And it helped me find space. And then by being comfortable, I guess others, seeing myself being authentic allowed them to just be themselves. Like, it was a really family experience in a sense that when you walked into the center-- I was looking at some of the pictures from back of the day. Some students just like took off their shoes. Like when you talk about a family or crosscultural experience, some at, when they go home, they take off their shoes before they enter their house. So, I thought it was the strangest and coolest thing. And, and looking back, I saw a picture where there was some students without their shoes on. I'm like, “Oh my gosh, I totally forgot about that.” So, I, it was a space for students to be themselves, and the more students that went into the Cross-Cultural Center to… it always felt like there was a party. Like, there was a sort of celebration in the center, like we packed the space and, and, and not just packing the space, it was always fun. And when we moved from Craven Hall, now the Administrative Building, it‘s that small little conference room that's as big as this space. We moved into the breezeway of the administrative building, and the door into the CrossCultural Center was in the breezeway where all the murals are at, at Cal State San Marcos. Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 6 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 So, whenever we were holding space and taking up space and having some dialogue, whenever the door was open, it echoed inside. I think it was like a strategic way of the director that time to put it in that space, because it was front and center. Everybody that walked through that hallway, the sound just increased because it was in a hallway-- a breezeway. And when people looked into the space and saw the fun you were having, it was-- the natural conversation was like, our question was like, “What's going on in there? And how could I join it?” So, it was always packed, it was always welcomed. The peer educators, as soon as somebody walked by, looked into the space, our, our goal was to engage with them immediately. So if you looked into the door of the Cross-Cultural Center, it was like, “Hi! Welcome into our space! We’ve got this and we've got that.” Just, it was always a welcoming and inclusive atmosphere, total family. Like if, if a student didn't know it was here, that meant they never visited Cougar Central or visited the Financial Aid Office. Like, in order to get to that, that office, that was one of the main thoroughfares at breezeway with the murals is where the party was happening. Meyer: Yeah. Yeah. It sounds like some of the activism efforts were just getting kids in the door so they could learn and, and, yeah-- enjoy, enjoy the space if they previously hadn't felt it on campus before. Can you recount in an instance when something you learned at the CCC, maybe it opened your eyes to something you hadn't thought about before, something just hadn't crossed your mind? Some-- um-maybe some issue you hadn't realized that underrepresented students were having on campus, that you just hadn't-Franklin: The, the food, the… definitely the food insecurity. <removing glasses> I'm, I'm not gonna be looking at my phone or a laptop. Food insecurity was a big one for me. As a non-traditional student, I didn't have that worry. I didn't have that concern. That was early conversations of like, “Where's our food pantry? Other campuses have food pantries, but not Cal State San Marcos.” So, for me, I thought that was really odd that here we are, we have a space for students, but we don't have, like, a food pantry to allow students to get access to it. So that was, goes back to my earlier response of like, have food and students will show up. So, knowing that students need food, and holding events to that had food was a major draw. But yeah, it was a big shocker to find out that food insecurity was a big deal back then. I mean, it still is now. There is a food pantry and there's food pantries all around. But, back then it was like, yeah, we know it's a problem, but that's so new and our campus is still growing, that we can only focus on this one space. And yes, the Cross-Cultural Center was one space, and there were other many spaces on campus, but because it was this Cross-Cultural Center and filled with-- the line back then was like first one in gets to own the space, so the Asian identified groups would pack the room and they're like, “This is the Asian Center!” And I'm like, “This is a Cross-Cultural Center.” Meyer: Mm-hmm. Franklin: Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 7 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 So, the conversation also started to get out where students were like, “Well, where's my center?” and “Where's my center?” and Pride Center of the-- like, LGBT community was like, “Where's our center?” And, it just started, “Where's the Women in Gender Equity Center?” So, because of the fun and the joy that was a party-like atmosphere, other, other students were like, “Uh, where's my space?” And, so, that was a bit jarring for a campus from my perspective to not have all spaces, but also no time and place-- like, the university was still pretty young. Like, campuses just don't pop up and have everything all at once. It has to be responsive to the community that evolves and grows there. And Cal State San Marcos has done that. Meyer: Right. Wait for the community to ask for what they need rather than just tell them what they need. Franklin: Yep. Meyer: What role do you see the Cross-Cultural Center playing as it coexists with these other centers? Franklin: I, it's-Meyer: It's a, it's a hard question, yeah-Franklin: Yeah. So, because they're all, all these different centers are very specific to an identity group. The CrossCultural Center is … I don't know if they would take the lead or, um, I don't know. It's a, it's a central hub that… and the first center that, it's been here. Just because it's been here the longest doesn't mean it has to stay that way. So, watching it evolve and grow, and how it collaborates with other centers has been really important. So, I don't know. I don't know if that answers your question. Meyer: Mm-hmm. No, it does. It does, yeah. Franklin: Once its role, its— Meyer: There's no right answer to the question. Yeah. Yeah. It's exactly… building off that, what direction do you think the CCC should grow in? What, what areas do you see room for improvement in students that could be better served, or maybe--- you know, yeah. Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 8 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 Franklin: Yeah. It's one of those, like… oh, it's almost like a innovation hub— Meyer: Mm-hmm. Franklin: And a business incubator. So, when you look at it from... I'm going, I'm gonna dip back into the marketing hat--- it starts off as an incubator group for students that want to form community, and, once that group has been given the energy and the resources that they need, and the-- the sense of, you can advocate for yourself and advocate…. and that advocation gets you, it doesn't get you a center, but it helps consolidate your voice so that you can move the students and empower the students to ask and request for space. So, yeah, I, I look at the Cross-Cultural Center as like a, a identity group incubation center. So, students leverage a space, become empowered, and then get what they need and go up to leadership or to student leadership— ASI--- and say, “Hey, look, where's our space? Why don't we have it X, Y, and Z? Like, we've been asking for it for this long.” Like, it's a, it's a great spot to start. Meyer: I understand you still work in--- of course, you work on Cal State San Marcos campus, and I just wanted to ask about what ways that your experience and your time with the CCC [Cross-Cultural Center] helped shape your outlook and your professional life? Franklin: Uh, without the Cross-Cultural Center, I wouldn't have known that student affairs was a job. Meyer: Yeah. Franklin: And, yeah, so Cross-Cultural Center really impacted my career trajectory. I, I didn't know that this, I didn't--- when I went to Cal State San Marcos, I did not know that you could work in higher education. And I didn't know that was even a major. And, there's an entire master's degree around student affairs, and I'm like, this is cool. I myself didn't go that route because I was already a non-traditional student. I came with a skill set that I would've already learned in the student affairs master's program. I stayed at Cal State San Marcos, and I got a master's of education and just made it my own and focused on LGBTspecific stuff. But, without the Cross-Cultural Center, I would not have known that there's a student affairs professional career. I wouldn't have known to actually work in higher education. And then this whole concept of like, you're a state employee. Like, I didn't-- like when I originally said, “Oh, gosh, I'm about to be 30,” it's--- “I need to look for retirement!” I didn't know that working for the state of California, the retirement is, like, this unicorn that doesn't exist anymore. So, like, private businesses Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 9 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 don't even offer half of which you get as a state employee. And, and that comes with a, a rub as well, because when you're a new professional in, student affairs or just in in higher education, you have to, you have to put in your, your dues and start at the bottom and work your way up, learn the skillsets, apply for another job if you see one that better fits you grow within your role. But all of those things I would've never known about had it not been for the Cross-Cultural Center. So, for me, it really had a huge impact on my personal life and professional career as well. Meyer: I understand that you and a lot of the peer educators became really good friends, and I was just wondering if either with them or with other students at the CCC [Cross-Cultural Center], if there's any like, great memories of the retreats or any of the events that you wanted to share, or just talk about. Franklin: Ooh, great events. Facilitating All People's Celebration was always a, fun-- just because it was a culminating award ceremony to recognize other student leaders on campus for various social justice awards. That was really cool. A big one for me was, and I still see it today, is my first professional role in the Cross-Cultural Center. There was a gap in between my undergrad and my master's program. There was a, a, a gap in professional service. So basically, the director or the co-direct, uh, assistant director at the time of the Cross-Cultural Center had left, no longer worked for the university. And the director of, Student Life, the leadership said, “Hey, uh, because you're super engaged as a peer educator and you finally finished your undergrad, we could-- there's this emergency hire position that we could hire you for three months or six months, but it ends at six months.” There's, there's no, we're--- we just need you to hold the spot, keep the seat warm, and keep the processes and the function of the Cross-Cultural Center moving forward because you know all the peer educators and you've been in this role-- and a lot of the peer educators graduated and a new set came in. But the ones that had didn't graduate that were there, it was a really good opportunity for a good three to six months to be engaged in the student work where I evolved from student to young professional. And a big event that I had to do was create this mural, and I don't know how many panels it was, but it was maybe a hundred different pieces. And it was this giant picture, and it was divided into little one-foot-by-one-foot squares, or 12-inch-by-12-inch squares. And it made this huge mural and one giant design, but everybody got a one-foot-by-one-foot portion of it, and they got to paint it and add their own flare to the image. Because, once pulled back together, it would show a, a great--- it was like a kaleidoscope of all kinds of different perspectives, even though we knew it was one giant mural but everybody had their own little one-foot-by-one-foot square to add their own flavor and to add their own, this is Jay's square, or this was Stephanie’s square. It was really a fun experience, to do a mural that's still on campus. And I see it, while it might not be in the Cross-Cultural Center, I've watched this mural move from office, or Dean's conference room to Dean's conference room, and it's being used as backdrops for, for pictures around campus. So I think it's just so neat to see, being a part of the start, that it doesn't end, like, the… I've left my mark, or the peer educators have left their mark, and that, that thing, that mural is still being leveraged today. It's just pretty awesome. Meyer: That's really cool. So you were, you were basically an interim director? For a little while? Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 10 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 Franklin: I, I wouldn't say a director-Meyer: Program lead or something? Franklin: Coordinator. Meyer: Coordinator. Okay. Franklin: And yeah, I like to say, “Well, the director, the associate director left on the…” of course, no. Titles mean nothing. Meyer: Yeah. Franklin: But it was-- I, I definitely enjoyed that first experience in Student Affairs. And once I got into Student Affairs and that six months ended, it coincided with me getting hired at Asher University. And… that is not student affairs, it was just transcript analysis. And then, coming back to Cal State San Marcos in fall of [20]09, working for Extended Learning, the self-support unit of the university, they don't receive any state funds. And it was ten-- a decade of my experience was in self-support. And then, when the pandemic hit, my skillset got repurposed, and off to Student Affairs I went, and now I'm back in Student Affairs. So it's like, really full circle again, like yeah. It's pretty wild. Meyer: Yeah. So, um, I know it's not related to the Cross-Cultural Center, but could you talk a little bit about directing Student Affairs during the pandemic? Franklin: Yeah. Uh, it was, I was basically supporting the director, the inaugural director of the Success Coaching Program and Office of Coaching Success. And, it was basically-- my skillset was leveraging a database to match 1500-plus students with-- I want to say-- eighteen success coaches? We’re a unionized environment, so, we had full-time staff, half-time staff and quarter-time staff. We had 1500 incoming first-year students that we needed to engage with and connect that student to Cal State San Marcos, even though we were in a virtual environment. So, leveraging technology appropriately. We sent text messages, of course, we called and sent emails, but as we know for sure, students or students in general don't read emails and they didn't know pick up calls from people that they don't know. So, sending Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 11 2023-05-01 �JAY FRANKLIN Transcript, Interview 2023-04-12 memes to students to get them engaged, and we knew what the life cycle was like, because there's only sixteen weeks in a semester and we knew of certain in intervals in the semester, students like need to fill out their financial aid, meet with an academic advisor, check in to see how you're doing, how are they engaging or finding a sense of community. So, it goes back to that community feeling. While it might not be a Cross-Cultural Center specific, engaging in with a student to help them find their, their sense of being, or their sense of place, or their sense of connection-- connecting to community was what we were able to do when the pandemic hit, helping the students find their place. Even though it was virtual. Meyer: It sounds like you've always been doing that. Yeah. It sounds like you've been doing that since the first day you set foot on campus, just helping other students find their place. That's really cool. Well, I just wanted to thank you so much for, for coming in and doing this interview and, yeah, that's all the questions I have for today. But, thank you! Franklin: That's awesome. Thank you for having me. Transcribed by Madeleine Meyer 12 2023-05-01 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcripts Description An account of the resource Written oral histories and transcripts are available for researchers that prefer the written word, or to see the whole interview in a document. Transcripts of <a href="https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/collections/show/5">audio and video files</a> are also available as part of those video files. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Franklin, Jay. Interview transcript. April 12, 2023. Description An account of the resource Jay Franklin was a peer mentor at the Cross-Cultural Center at CSUSM during the early days of the program and university. He was instrumental in the creation of many of the programs and early marketing campaigns for the center, and worked as a peer educator to provide what we would now call intersectional support for LGBTQ+ students. Eventually, he made his way back to CSUSM, where he now works in the Dean of Student Affairs office. This oral history interview was generously funded through the Instructionally Related Activities Fund at California State University San Marcos. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jay Franklin Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Madeleine Meyer Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2023-04-12 Subject The topic of the resource California State University San Marcos. Cross-Cultural Center California State University San Marcos. 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Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Judith Downie Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Jeff Bagby OHMS Object This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS Viewer) https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=BagbyJeffAndDande_DownieJudith_2018-02-21_access.xml OHMS Object Text This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka 5.4 Bagby, Jeff and Dande. Interview February 21, 2018 SC027-053 01:43:40 SC027 California State University San Marcos University Library Special Collections oral history collection CSUSM csusm Bagby Beer Company (Oceanside, Calif.) ; Brewers -- California -- San Diego County. ; Brewing industry -- California -- History. ; Microbreweries -- California -- San Diego County. Jeff Bagby Dande Bagby Judith Downie wav BagbyJeffAndDande_DownieJudith_2018-02-21_access.wav 2.0:|41(19)|72(13)|103(3)|151(11)|178(14)|221(15)|243(5)|289(4)|324(6)|347(16)|379(11)|410(7)|445(4)|482(14)|520(6)|552(9)|599(3)|638(13)|690(5)|734(8)|778(14)|816(6)|852(16)|878(9)|908(9)|934(6)|967(13)|1020(9)|1072(7)|1110(6)|1143(5)|1193(13)|1230(4)|1305(12)|1351(6)|1413(11)|1446(14)|1495(8)|1528(9)|1557(6)|1579(6)|1605(14)|1638(15)|1679(13)|1708(9)|1739(16)|1769(10)|1804(11)|1855(11)|1906(12)|1941(10)|1981(16) 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/a2147e643ec83629c21ffe9df0d387b8.wav Other audio English oral history Bagby Beer Company emphasizes traditional style beers, a craft cocktail program, and a restaurant menu to complement their beers. Over the years, Bagby Beer featured highly admired and hard-to-find American and European beers such as Bierstadt Lagerhaus (Denver, CO) and Brasserie d’Orval (Belgium) to complement their lineup. Built on the site of a former car dealership (among other businesses), the Bagbys closely oversaw the construction from the ground up which opened in 2014. The site was also host to the Brewbies® cancer awareness beer festival (2015-2022) and the Low and Slow Lager Festival among other fund raising and educational events. Bagby Beer sold to Green Cheek Beer Company of Costa Mesa, CA in early 2024. &#13 ; &#13 ; Jeff and Dande Bagby are the founders and owners of Bagby Beer Company in Oceanside, CA. Holly Sweat is Publicist at Katalyst Public Relations. &#13 ; &#13 ; Jeff Bagby’s role was as head brewer and leading the on-site Beerleaders brewing education program. Jeff’s brewery experience includes Stone Brewing, White Labs, and Oggi’s Pizza and Brewing. His last brewery before opening Bagby Beer was Pizza Port, leading brewing operations for the chain from the Carlsbad location. During his time at Pizza Port, he led the team to win notable awards and medals such as the World Beer Cup and the Great American Beer Festival’s brewery and brewer awards multiple times. He is one of the most awarded San Diego region brewers, notably garnering more GABF Alpha King Challenge awards for best hoppiest beer in the United States than anyone to date (2005, 2010 and 2011.) He left Pizza Port in 2011 to devote his energy to finding a site for a brewery/restaurant in the San Diego North County beach area. With the sale of Bagby’s to Green Cheek Beer, he remains as the brewer and continues to focus on lagers and traditional styles. &#13 ; &#13 ; Dande Bagby worked as Director of Operations including marketing and customer experience. She designed much of the building. Her employment background includes the San Diego Zoological Society, education, environmental science, restaurant and craft beer bar management, and marketing and finance responsibilities for multimillion-dollar budgets at a Fortune 500 company. She remains active in the transition to Green Cheek Beer Company at this time. &#13 ; &#13 ; In their 2018 interview, Jeff and Dande discuss their introduction to craft beer ; homebrewing ; introduction of craft beer to the region ; Jeff’s entry into the profession in the late 1990s ; challenges and responsibilities of founding and building a brewery ; packaging and distribution ; charity work ; competitions, judging, and awards ; consumer education. Holly Sweat: Is this my copy or is this your copy? (Sweat referring to printed list of questions.) Judith Downie: You can certainly have that because I am just going to let Jeff and Dande, you know, tell me what they want because that is just a list of ideas. You certainly do not have to address anything if you feel like it is giving away company secrets or you are just not comfortable or you just forget about it and tell me something else equally interesting and informative. That’s great. I love to record what I can get. So, you know, it sounds Dande like you maybe got into this a little after Greg did. Excuse me, Greg--I just said Greg. After Jeff did. So maybe we start with Jeff talking about how did he become interested in beer or how did he get into the beer industry and--? Jeff Bagby: Okay. Yeah, so let's see. I started liking bitter beer, I don’t know, at high school, younger age. It just was something that my friends and I found--a couple of friends--who really liked the flavors. Liked the idea-- Downie: Now, were you in this area or where were you--? J Bagby: Yeah, I was born and raised in Encinitas. So, San Diego native. Downie: Okay. J Bagby: So yeah, around here. And, actually when I graduated high school, I bought that friend in particular a homebrew set for his birthday. And so, we both messed around and that was my first homebrewing foray, whatever you want to call it. Downie: Now where did you find your supplies for homebrewing up? J Bagby: Yeah, that is what I was going to say. So, you know, that's the age before the internet and cell phones and things of that nature. So, there is no-- Downie: Do you want to give me an approximate year? J Bagby: Uh, (19)93. Downie: Okay. J Bagby: (19)92, (19)93, (19)94, somewhere in there. And, so we had known a little bit, we had heard a little bit, we had tried to go and fish beer from establishments even though we were not of age yet. But at homebrew shop you can buy anything without an ID. So, at least back then you could. So, we Homebrew Mart in Solana Beach. That's where I first met Yusef (Cherney) was actually the one that sold me the kit. Then he went on obviously to do his thing. So, kind of a cool connect there and then they kind of keep happening as time goes on. But, yeah, so we just messed around really. I mean, we re-read things, read books. Talked to brewers when we could, when we traveled, things like that. We ended up going to school together where we got more into it. We were doing all-grain batches and keeping a beer on tap at our house all the time, as well as beers like Sierra Nevada (Brewing Co.), Anchor Steam (Beer), Original Pizza, Wicked, Red Nectar, some of the Sam(uel) Adams beers. I don’t, what else we could get our hands on that we felt was better. (laughs) Downie: Now was there a bottle shop anywhere nearby where you could (unintelligible)? J Bagby: There was a few. There was in Encinitas and downtown there was Cork and Keg (Cork and Keg Liquors). There was a couple in sort of the Kearny Mesa area that were known for having, you know, hundreds of bottles and typically they were not very good. But we did not necessarily know that at the time (Downie laughs) because we didn’t know what we were tasting and not tasting. Downie: Right. Yeah. J Bagby: I did not know that some of these beers, well, they'd been sitting around on these shelves warm for, you know, a couple of years. Some of them survived perfectly fine. And most of them, you know, like, “Oh, that's what that tastes like, that's kind of weird”. So, when we can find fresh things or more exciting flavors, that was obviously a fun thing. And yeah, just like, I think anybody did back in the nineties, when you found a new bottle of beer, you kept it, or you kind of talked about it and told your friends, “Hey, I tried this, blah-blah-blah.” It was, you know, I was rating beer before there was the internet, before there was, you know, these things that we are so attached to. So yeah, that is kind of where the appreciation started and, you know, throughout college, like I said, wherever, I would go and travel, try to seek out breweries, brew pubs, if it was possible to talk to a brewer and get, you know, whatever information I could, you know. “What kind of grain did you use this? What kind of hops are in this? What is your process for this? And, oh, what size system do you have?” And, you know, it was fun to do. And I was fun to go to cities that had older, richer brewing cultures than San Diego, you know? Back then there was not even probably ten breweries in San Diego at the time. Especially none that we had real easy access to. The easiest one for, for me, ended up being Solana Beach Pizza Port (Pizza Port Solana Beach). Just because I had met people there and met the brewers there. I went there all the time and were buying homebrew supplies from down the street. So, as it grew, you know, I finished school, came back home. I worked summers at the YMCA in Encinitas running their summer camp programs. Youth summer camp programs. So, I was heavily involved in that. But I always really liked--still liked beer. Still went to festivals and— Downie: What was your degree in? J Bagby: It was communications, social science degree. You know, honestly, I just wanted to get done in the school. It is not really my thing. Downie: But you completed it, so “Yay” for you. J Bagby: Yeah, yeah, I can say I have a degree. Whoop. (Dande Bagby laughs) So yeah, came back home, worked that job or some aspect of it for a summer. And then I was hoping to stay on. I’d had several--I've worked there since I was fifteen (years old). So, I had years of experience, knew the program, knew everything and anything about it. So, it was hoping, well, maybe this will be a full-time job, because the program had grown and grown and grown in the time that I've worked there. But they didn't have a position. Good old nonprofits. So, I started just looking for a job. I was living in Cardiff with some friends and I needed money. I needed something to do. So, through the YMCA, I had a commercial driver's license to drive kids around, drive big old buses. So, I looked into driving jobs because they paid pretty well. And I could probably get one quick. Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: You know, the degree did nothing for me, so. (laughs) Dande Bagby: Well, it sounds like you didn’t really want it, too. J Bagby: Well, I mean, it's not like you go, like, what industry are you going to be like? “Yeah. I have a communications degree from UC Santa Barbara,” like there, so? How's that going to help us do blah-blah-blah. There was no technology jobs. There was no social media jobs. There was no— Downie: Exactly. J Bagby: (speaking at the same time) I was, I kept going into radio or like news or— Downie: (speaking at the same time) But it would have taken time to get employed, and you were saying you needed work now. J Bagby: Exactly. Downie: Which is certainly understandable. J Bagby: Exactly. D Bagby: So, think about that before we get the degree. (laughs) Just kidding. (laughs) J Bagby: So let's pay attention and talk about themselves once it’s their turn. (all laugh) D Bagby: Just saying! J Bagby: So anyway, let's see, let's see, oh, came across the job, driving job for Stone Brewing Company. And I remembered that I had been in Solana Beach the very first night they'd ever poured a beer and I'd met Greg (Koch) and Steve (Wagner) and tasted the beer. And I was like, “Oh, this would be great.” You know, I remember them, it's cool to see that they, you know, are still going and are making beer and need a driver. So, I just interviewed with Greg and told him my whole story. And he was like, “Well, obviously you're super overqualified. (Downie laughs) So, you know, you have the job.” And it was fun. It was interesting to see some side of the bar and restaurant and beer industry that I'd never seen before. Learning some of the weird rules that are still in laws that are still in effect today and delivered beer. Drove beer truck for three months. And Steve and I were at a festival. I would always hang back after I was done and talk with the brewers and see what they were making and see what was coming on and things like that. And Steve was like, “Well, we need another body in the brewery. We need somebody else.” And I was like, “Yeah, sure. I'd love to.” I was like, “Who do I give these truckies to?” (Downie and D Bagby laugh) So I actually found the guy that took my position as a driver. And he's still my Stone rep(resentative) today. Downie: Oh my gosh. J Bagby: Yeah. I still work for Stone in different capacity now, obviously. But yeah, he was a bartender at one of our accounts, he was actually at Pizza Port and he's like, “Oh, how's it going over there?” And “What's it like?” and I'm like, “Well, if you're interested, you could come check this out.” He was a bartender, so he could still bartend and do that. And so, yeah, he came over and I taught him the routes and boom, he was the driver and I moved into the brewery. So, I learned there, primarily from Lee Chase and Steve Wagner. Their methods to brewing, I'll say, which I still today, I think if you ask about mentors on here, definitely those two guys are some of the first. And they gave me a lot of introductions into people like Skip Virgilio, Yusef Cherney, Jack White, Chris White, Gina and Vince Marsaglia, where I spent hours in their restaurant. Several other people that are still working in beer today, and still active. And, you know, we all kind of, you know, kind of go, “Yep, you were there,” you know, when you have these people that have been open for five minutes. (Downie laughs) Not to say it's bad, but you know, it's nice to have that kind of a bond and that kind of a connection to people that remember when there wasn’t all the things that there are today. Downie: When it was a struggle. J Bagby: (speaking at the same time) Yeah, big time. Downie: (speaking at the same time) I mean, not that it isn’t a struggle now to run a business and to start having all that, just to be in the first, the forefront of things. J Bagby: Oh yeah, there used to-- Downie: There is still some special barriers. J Bagby: When I was living in Cardiff, in driving for Stone and then actually working in the brewery for Stone, we would go to events like every weekend. Every Friday and Saturday night, you know? Because the sales reps are like, “Hey, can you guys come down and help promote?” Or, you know, whenever we went to somewhere and be like, “Hey, do you have Stone beer on tap?” And they'd be like, “What the hell is Stone?” (Downie and D Bagby laugh) You know, and now you can't find somebody that doesn't know what that is. Downie: Right. J Bagby: And back then, it was totally different because people weren't paying attention. People didn't care. There was five tap handles and all five of them are taken up by mass-produced beer, you know? The Heinekens, Amstel Light, Guinness, New Castle, Bud, Bud Light, Coors Light, Miller Light, not Corona, it wasn't going on tap back then but it was in the bottle under the bar. So, it was tough. It was tough for them to gain ground and getting space. And because they came out with a Pale Ale, they were in an immediate competition with Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, which had already, you know, been around for ten years at the time. So, you had that battle. You have this well, “What's, what's different from you? These guys have been doing it for a long time. They make this Hoppy Pale Ale. We've had it on tap. What's the difference?” So yeah, a lot of early struggles, a lot of, you know, almost telling--I like to say this, like Stone told people what to drink. When they came out with a beer like Arrogant Bastard and they came out with a beer like Stone IPA, and it came out with Smoked Porter that came out with these beers that no one was used to drinking and they were like, “No, you're going to like this, because this is what we have to offer. And people would taste it. And I think combined shock, new flavors, new tastes, things they'd never had before, they really grabbed onto it. And they were like, “No, this is, this is cool. I really like this.” Not necessarily knowing why or knowing what about the beer that they were actually tasting. Just that it was exciting and it was new. So, I learned to brew on that, (laughs) professional thirty barrel, professional brewhouse pretty quickly. Helped create the first Stone Barley Wine, Old Guardian. Lee and Steve and I each did five-gallon test batches. And then we, we tasted them all and created a recipe. So, that was fun. And few anniversary beers, you know, when they were taking Stone IPA and Double Stone IPA and Triple Stone IPA for the anniversary beers. Those beers just blew people's minds back then because no beer had had that kind of aroma and power on the hop side, you know? And they're not unlike a lot of West Coast IPAs that are still made today. So that was exciting. The Y(MCA) came calling somewhere in that first year, year and a half that I was in the brewhouse. I got hired at Stone in September of (19)97. And I worked there through sometime in (19)99. Okay. I'm trying to remember exactly when, but I did go back to the Y full-time because they actually have a full-time job for me and they needed the help. So, over the summers I would work a hundred-plus hours a week because I’d work a full-time job at Stone Brewing. And then I would go back over to the Y and help them with everything that they needed for the next day or for the next week of things I hired and trained. Yeah, it was crazy. Monitored staff, bus drivers, all these things while I was still working at Stone. Left Stone to do the Y thing after one of the summers, because I was like, oh, it's too much. And they were going to give me a little bit more money at Y. So, I went and did that and then got stomped on over there. Got passed over. And I was like, “You know what? I'm done with this. I've given my life to you guys and saved you guys several summers and I'm over it.” So, went back to beer, got hired at White Labs (Brewing Co.) in San Diego. I had known--by this time I had known tons of people in the industry. I had done festivals for Stone. I had worked for them in all sorts of different capacities and also knew the Pizza Port people really well. Downie: So what year--when did you get hired on White Labs? J Bagby: That was probably (19)99? Downie: Okay. J Bagby: (19)99, 2000? I can’t—I’m not positive on that. But somewhere in there. Because I definitely left--I left both the Y I think the--right before the 2000 summer started because they had made some really bad decisions and it bothered me. (Downie laughs) So, let's see. I worked at White Labs for-- Downie: As a brewer? J Bagby: No, as a sales kind of yeast consultant. Answer questions for people, take orders, you know. Downie: Was this at their--where they are now? Candida Street or--? J Bagby: No, this was the location before that. (Silverton Avenue, San Diego location.) Downie: Okay. J Bagby: A little--it's kind of an interesting place like offices on front, warehouse in the back, but much, much smaller than where they are now. Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: But it was cool. It was definitely educational. It was neat to get to know Chris and Lisa (White) better as well as one of their other then-partners, Chris Mueller. I had already known all of them and met all of them so, it was kind of nice to get a job and work with them. And it was okay. It just wasn’t--it wasn’t exciting for me. And I wanted to get back into the brewhouse and I wanted to get back working with actual beer. So, kept in touch with Pizza Port and the people there, the whole time. I got hired at Solana Beach as an assistant brewer. And so, I was an assistant brewer there and bartender there-- Downie: And who was head brewer at the time? J Bagby: Tomme (Arthur), at the time. But we had become friends, gosh, right after he got hired there because I knew the brewer before him. And then they're like, “Oh, that's the new brewer.” So, I just like introduced myself and said, “Hey, I really like these beers here and blah-blah-blah” So we just got to chatting and hanging out and doing all sorts of different things. And you know, even when I was working for Stone, we connected just because it's, you know, another brewery in town. (laughs) And back then— Downie: Well, it shows the value of networking— J Bagby: Yeah. Downie: And knowing people, it makes a big difference. J Bagby: There's also a way to learn back then, you know? Steve and Lee were great and taught me a lot, but also learned a lot from Tomme. And I also learned a lot from a ton of other breweries that I met back in the late nineties and early two thousands. All across the state and even into Arizona. The guys at Four Peaks (Brewery Co.), still good friends of mine, even though they sold their company for who knows how much, they won’t tell anybody. (Downie and D Bagby laugh) Places like Marin Brewing (Company), Anderson Valley (Brewing Company), Russian River (Brewing) now, when he was still in Temecula back then. Downie: He was Blind Pig (Brewing) back then. J Bagby: Yeah, I had met him (Vinnie) and Natalie (Cilurzo) back then. Untold numbers of, you know, going to the Great American Beer Festival (GABF) for the first time was probably my biggest eye-opener to all of that and meeting more and more people because now there was the whole U.S. and all the brewers in the U.S. in one room and back then it was easy. You could go and talk to people. I was working for a brewery at the time and that was 1997. It was my first GABF. And I'll never forget going up to people and trying beers and went, “Oh my gosh, that's awesome,” you know? And just making that acquaintance. And I know a lot of those people still today that I met that year at that GABF. So really cool stuff. And that just kept building, you know? Every time I could go to a conference, every time I could go to another out-of-town festival. Meet more people. (laughs) So, you know, at Solana, I was there for probably two or three years doing assistant brewing and bartending. And then a position opened up. I had met Tom Nickel through all of this too. Because he was good friends with Tomme. He was a part of the early Ballast Point (Brewing Company) and Home Brew Mart. Tom and I are still very good friends today and Tomme. And so, he said, “Hey.” He was working for Stuft (Pizza and Brewing) at the time before it was Oggi’s. And then when it became Oggi’s, they had one in Vista that opened, their brewer was leaving. And so he's like, “Hey, if you want a head brewing job,” I was like, “Hell yeah.” (Downie and D Bagby laugh) So, took it. I had interviewed with a couple others. It was just, well I interviewed at Kona and just decided I didn't want to go and live on an island. (laughs) So, and there was an opportunity in my backyard, so, why not take that? So, did that for a while. That was fun. That was really the first time I got to see my influence on brewing, make a difference for somebody's beers or somebody's restaurant or somebody's beer culture, you know? It was the first time I'd won medals on my own with my own beers. You know, we'd done very well on Solana Beach. But this was cool because it was like my stuff. And worked with Tom (Arthur). He became their corporate brewer for a short time up in San Clemente. And I worked at that location for a while until Pizza Port Carlsbad had an opening for a head brewing position and that was a bigger brewhouse. That was more beer and it was more money and it was Pizza Port was kind of my first forte. So, I went back to that and ran, within a year, was running all the brewing operations on all of their pubs. Helped them open Ocean Beach. Hired, trained, promoted a ton of different brewers who are still in the brewing industry today. Yeah, you’ve got Yiga Miyashiro, the head brewer at Saint Archer (Brewing). Greg Peters, who's the head of Barrel Program there. Ignacio Cervantes, who was the head brewer of Carlsbad after I left and then took over (Pizza Port) Bressi Ranch and is now working for a new company in San Diego (Chula Vista Brewing). Noah Regnery, who also part of that company and Brandon Edwards is also a part of that company. All guys that were head brewers at Pizza Port went on to several different breweries and have all kind of come back together in one way. I'm sure there's other people. (laughs) Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: But it was a good experience and, you know, going all the way back to my Stone days, you know, Lee and I worked in this warehouse by ourselves, you know? Day in, day out. So, you get in these conversations, you're running, you know, a four head making bottling machine for eight hours while you're filtering a beer, you know? Like, you know? You are brewing, you get into conversations and you know, both of us were like, “Yeah, I really would like to own my own place at some point,” you know? And my thoughts at that time were, I'd really like to just have a beer bar or have a place because I've enjoyed that aspect of it. I enjoyed teaching people about beer, telling people about new styles and new things that were coming out or that the Pizza Port had just come out with. So, I said, “I don't know what, I just really want to my own place. And Lee was like, “Yeah, me too, me too.” So, it's funny that both of us have had that come true- Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: Over time. But in the Pizza Port years, having, you know, kind of pulled from my YMCA experiences with hiring and training people and building sort of a management approach to running the bars at the Pizza Port, they were, for lack of a better term, they were pretty chaotic and not very well managed. And the companies were, even though they were making money, hand over fist, they weren't making as much as they could because they were losing money, hand over fist because of their bar staff. So, I tightened up that. I taught their bar staff and what, you know, beer education programs, you know, you had to spend a day in the brewery with me, all of these things. And that carried on to all of the locations. And in doing that and forging that, that's when, you know, I started having conversations with Dande. We had met and I showed her--actually I was still working at Oggi’s when we met. And, you know, started talking about, well, “What do we want, what do you want to do with this? What would you do with this?” And I was like, “Oh, I want to open my own place.” And it was funny because people would come in while I was brewing in Carlsbad, say, “Oh, we're going to open a brewery.” And I was like, “Oh, cool.” Well, this is, you know, “I've been doing this for a really long time and I'm not ready yet, but you know, good on you.” Or somebody would come in who had just opened a brewery and I'd want to help support them. So, we had guest beers at Pizza Port, we would put their beer on tap and, you know? I would talk it up and everything. And then it was funny because by the time I left Carlsbad, I didn't have that approach. I was like, “Okay, bring your beers in and then I'll taste them and we'll see what we can do.” Yeah, “We'll give you some feedback or we'll see if we can get you into rotation or not,” you know? We have a big board, there's a ton of trends, and there's a ton of spots. They're almost always taken whatever the case was, but I wasn't as eager to just blindly accept the keg as I had been in the past, when there was, you know, “Let's promote local beer and let's get this scene going.” And it transferred all the way into here because now there's even more breweries. But now that I'm one of those people that's trying to sell beer to people. (laughs) D Bagby: Yeah. J Bagby: It's always so-- I get it. And, you know, hopefully, you know, the things that we had talked about before we opened and the things that we wanted to do is largely what you see today. When you come here and it's not just a beer aspect, it's a food aspect, it's a space and feel. It's also our cocktail and spirits program, wine program. All the things that we do here are things that we talked about ten years ago. Of course, it took us a very long time to get to that point. And I think we've surpassed many mountains in that process of getting to where we are, which is something that feels really good. But it's also a constant struggle when there's, you know, things that we deal with every day. And somebody asked me the other day, “Oh, would you go back and do it again?” Yeah, I would. Hopefully I know a little bit more. (all laugh) As Dande was talking about earlier with managing the construction, but it's been a crazy, crazy road. It's been fun to have been a part of San Diego beer, to have kind of put my efforts into not only just promoting the people that I worked for, but training other people into that and, you know, really teaching and promoting what good beer is and making sure that I did everything I could to make sure that San Diego was seen that way and perceived that way across the country and across the world. And I believe that I still do that today, even though there's one hundred and fifty or what odd breweries in town. I still make my efforts to make sure that that happens if that makes sense. Downie: Yeah, it does. J Bagby: Cool. Downie: So, what made you decide to basically take down Continental Motors? (J and D Bagby laugh) What made you decide on taking this piece of property and rather than taking over-- J Bagby: Good question. Downie--a building that you could just kind of refurbish? J Bagby: Yeah. Well, I kind of still ask myself that question a lot. (D Bagby laughs) D Bagby: Depends on how good the day is going. J Bagby: That 3,000 square foot warehouse looks pretty cool somedays. (laughs) No, we had a location in Encinitas that we were pretty fond of. I wanted to be the first person to make beer and Encinitas since there was one little tiny spot that was open for like nine months in downtown Encinitas called the Red Kettle. D Bagby: The (19)80s? J Bagby: And it was like (19)89 to (19)90, something like that, I think it was open. And sounded like the guy didn't know a whole lot about what he's doing. And it would be interesting to see if you find any more information on that. Downie: There’s very little on the Red Kettle. I’ve been looking. J Bagby: There's like one article you can still pull up online. Vince Marsaglia, I remember he'll tell me stories. He's told me stories about going in there and talking to the guy about brewing. But anyway, I wanted to be like, “No, I want to open up a brewery and want to, you know, it's not going to be a restaurant with the little kid in the back.” Like, yeah, I want to do that in Encinitas ‘cause Encinitas neighborhood made it look cool there. But building situation fell through. We had spent some time, even some money getting people together. We had met with everyone at the city of Encinitas. So, we knew it was going to be a bit of an uphill battle with what's going down there on the Coast. It was on Coast Highway in Encinitas, big, beautiful, gorgeous eighty-three hundred square foot building with a wooden barrel ceiling and twelve-foot brick walls. Gorgeous place. And the landlord--we had never actually spoke with the landlord. We had only spoke with his representative and he had edged us along the way. “Yeah, that's good. It's good. Yeah. That's no, he's, he wants to do this.” And we put in our LOI (Letter of Intent), you know, spent, like I said, I spent time with the city. This is what we're thinking about doing. Architects, all sorts of things. Structural engineering, because the building's old. It was an old Safeway or something, I think. D Bagby: It was a grocery store. J Bagby: Yeah, it was a grocery store at one time. That's why. And all of a sudden we just weren't hearing anything back from the rep. So, I just called them up and, “Dude, what's going on?” Like we were going forward, we think this is happening. We've heard nothing. And he just basically said, “No,” without, you know, I tried to reach out to the landlord. The owner said, “Hey, just meet me. Just--let's have a conversation.” Could never get there. And from what I hear, that guy's kind of a maniac, so I'm kind of glad we didn't get in that situation. (D Bagby laughs) But I do miss the idea of being there in that building and being in Encinitas. I think that would have been really, really cool. But-- Downie: As a hometown boy. J Bagby: (laughs) But, we took that setback. Or, yeah, it was a setback, because we were, you know, not that we'd put all our eggs in that basket, but we definitely— D Bagby: Several months. J Bagby: But, yeah, we spent several months of time on it. D Bagby: We kind of mentally moved into it too. You start to really put yourself there and how to Jeff, as you mentioned earlier, like, we had been talking about these ideas that you now see here for a long time. And so, you start to sort of layer those ideas over the space and figure out how things might go. And, it was really--it was a huge disappointment. J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: But we got over it pretty quickly and moved on and... J Bagby: Yeah. So, we decided to, not to stop, but to kind of regroup. We got married and after we got married, we decided to enlist the help of a commercial real estate. So, we, through some friends we found a really good broker. And he gave--started just giving me--I met with him--he gave me no less than I think a hundred properties throughout the county to look at. And we had already found out a little bit on our own through some other connections, you know. Basically, no one's going to give you any cash. If you're in a strip mall, you're going to be paying even though, your rent might be lower, you're going to be paying other fees that make that rent go back up. And they basically only take national conglomerate stores that have very, very deep pockets these days. Not too many private strip malls out there taking breweries and first-time owners and let alone, “Oh, you want to open a restaurant and a brewery? Okay, yeah. High risk, high risk. No, don't do it, all those things.” So, we sought out to find private owners and properties that started to fit what we what we had or what we wanted on there, which was coastal North County, enough space for a restaurant, enough space to have a decent sized brewery, and a space that will allow for indoor-outdoor dining. We love the aspect of letting people or giving the people the opportunity to eat outside in this gorgeous weather that we have almost year-round. So, I'd never thought about Oceanside, but I knew that anything in between Del Mar and Carlsbad was going to be extremely expensive and extremely difficult to find. Especially for the uses that we wanted to do. You know, we were trying not to have a conditional use permit. We're trying not to deal with the (California) Coastal Commission. We're trying to get into a spot where we could build or remodel, I should say, for the most part. Downie: Yeah (laughs). J Bagby: But pretty much ended up re-building. If you saw what we did to this place before we rebuilt it— Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: We basically tore it down. Anyway, he gave me a list of seven, eight properties in Oceanside here. So, I just grabbed my camera, my notebook, and my bike and rode them all. And I came across this one and it was--you could go all the way around it, but you couldn't see much. Where the brewery is now, were solid roll-down doors. It was their maintenance garage. Up front was a showroom, so, I could look in the windows there. That building to the south, you can kind of look in there too, but you couldn't tell what was exactly going on over here. You can see a little bit, all closed, looked like it had been, somebody had moved out. And so, in my head it just started clicking and I'm like, “Oh, what if that was there? And what if we put, you know, the brewery in here? What if we did this here?” I took, I don't know, fifty pictures of the place looked at the other properties and went home and told her. I'm like, “I found it.” And she's like, “What are you talking about?” D Bagby: You actually called me from the space. (J Bagby laughs) J Bagby: I’m like, “It's an old car dealership.” She’s like, “You're fucking insane.” I’m like, “Get in a car, come down here.” (all laugh) D Bagby: It’s basically what happened. J Bagby: (laughs) So, yeah, we just kind of went from there. We told our broker, “Hey, can you, you know—" super sensitive about contacting the realtor—realtor rep, landlord, anything like that. D Bagby: Because of our experience in the industry. J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: We wanted to make--just kind of proceed cautiously. And we did not have our hopes up. We had no idea what they would--what their response would be to any kind of inquiry. J Bagby: We obviously originally thought that they wanted car dealerships to take it over again. Just because they were set up that way. They have the lifts, they had the excess parking. They had, you know, frontage on South Coast Highway. There's seven other places, you know? So, we thought that's what they were going for. And they originally, they kind of said, “Yeah,” because use is that, it'd be easy for their somebody to just take it over. Downie: Right. J Bagby: And a couple of inquiries they had because the space was so big and nobody wanted it all. They would want just that building or just the parking lot, or just part of this main building, main parcel. So, I said, “Well, we're kind of interested in all of that.” (laughs) And so anyway, the original conversation with rep-between-rep, the idea of a brewery got brought up by the rep from here and unsolicited-- D Bagby: By their broker, yeah. J Bagby: Unsolicited from our broker at all. And I was like, “Yes. Okay, cool.” And so, I'm like, “Hey, can we get in it? Can we look around and see what's going on?” So, the very first day we came to look at it and the landlords was here, the owners were here. And they wanted to meet us and they wanted to hear about what we wanted to do. And if we thought the space would work. And they're still friends of ours today. They still come in here and eat. His father was from Bamberg, Germany, which is a huge brewing scene in Germany and malts. There's two big malt companies in Bamberg. Then I said, “Well, I buy malt from Bamberg.” (Downie and D Bagby laugh) So, we had this, you know, this back and forth. Their son is into beer. And he really liked the idea of the legacy of the property that his father had started going into another family business of some kind. I think that probably in the end was what attracted them the most to us. But we poured our hearts out like, “Hey, this is what we want to do. And we totally get it. Like, you know, we've never opened a business. This is a huge spot. We have to raise a ton of money.” All these things, but we really want to do it.” And they went for it. D Bagby: Much to their credit, honestly. J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: They took a big risk on us. And, it's a big point of pride for Jeff and I-- J Bagby: Definitely. D Bagby: -- to count them among legitimately among friends. And, we're just, we're so grateful to them for just being open-minded. It was their family's business that was here and then that they had to close and they still own the property. And they, you know, we have a long long-term lease and several options. So, we don't own the space. I'm sure the property will stay in their family forever, which I think is fine. It's perfect. But they just really--they were very interested in us as people and-- J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: --what our vision was and what we wanted to do and how we wanted to do it. And I think that aligned, even though they're totally different industries, it really aligned with their values. And, yeah, much to— Downie: Their European background. D Bagby: Yeah, definitely that that's probably part of it. (laughs) But I remember when they finally agreed, it was sort of like, obviously it's exciting, but it's also instantly terrifying. Downie: Yeah. D Bagby: You don't--And we didn't even realize at the time what we had just done, I don't think. (Downie D Bagby laugh) J Bagby: It took me six weeks to get the lease exactly where we wanted it. D Bagby: At least. J Bagby: And it's like, I think it's sixty pages of like, eight, nine-point font. It's like line-by-line and you just, you have to know, “Okay, what does this lawyerese mean?” And then go and read through and go, “Okay, no, that's what we don't agree with. Here's the change we need,” you know? And so, we just--the back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And then we start with contractors interviewing contractors, and that is a whole fiasco in and of itself because they're intense. And they realized that in the end, throughout this thing, I think they realized that their relationship is never going to be a great one, just because of the nature of the industry. D Bagby: It can’t. J Bagby: It just can't. There's too many variables and there's too much money and there's too much time involved for--I've never met anybody who was like, “Yeah, I loved my GC. My project went amazing.” They're full of shit. D Bagby: It’s like a disposable relationship in a weird way. J Bagby: Yeah, you just-- D Bagby: You need them, they you need but then it's over and we're done. We don't want to see you again kind of thing. It's terrible, but that's just kind of the nature of it. Downie: Now did your general have any background in building a brewery? J Bagby: (speaking at the same time) No, in restaurants. D Bagby: (speaking at the same time) In restaurants. J Bagby: Yeah, restaurants, and commercial or retail. But mostly restaurants and bars is what we were attracted to him for. D Bagby: Small company also--J Bagby: Smaller company. Had the reputation of being able to do something like thisD Bagby: Had worked with the architect— J Bagby: Yeah, he had worked with our architect on a project before and yeah, I mean the architect firm went down in flames pretty quick. (D Bagby laughs) I realized, oddly enough, we got an apology email from him last week, which was--D Bagby: A little late. J Bagby: Frustrating two years later. But, yeah, they just weren't equipped and we didn't know that they weren't equipped. D Bagby: We didn't know enough to know that. J Bagby: Yeah. And then, you know, I spent countless hours going to the counters at the city to talk to the engineers, to talk to the-- D Bagby: The building inspectors. J Bagby: The building inspectors and just going back and forth. “No, we need this. Okay.” So, because I'm trying to facilitate--we're trying to facilitate this project and keep it moving. And there's obviously no one in the world has any incentive, but, or the most incentive than us to get it done. And so, we're just, like she said, we just took it on. We project managed, we--every day, we'd come here and walk through and see what was done wrong or what hadn't been done or why isn't, so-and-so working today, you know? And part of that was on the GC, part of that was on their architect, and they both fell down. The architect first and then the GC. We went through five superintendents here on our project to the general contractor. Downie: Oh dear. J Bagby: And by the end I was like, “Him or no one else.” And so, we got this last guy just to get through and get our building final then and everything. But you name a discipline, you name a part or a section or a wall. I spent time on it. She spent time on it. It's--so now, you know, we're like, we're telling them, we're like, “You guys get to go, you guys get to pack up your shit and leave.” And we get to turn around and actually do what we wanted to do six months ago, or, you know, a year ago. D Bagby: When we started construction, yeah. J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: When we thought we’d be done, especially. J Bagby: We, you know, we need to spend time on--I mean, we're still taking on investors, but we have to start the project. We're still searching out for investors. We're still trying to find our key executive management team and how the hell we're going to run this place. I'm still trying to figure out how to get the rest of the brewery finished off and actually making beer because we didn't want to open without our own beer. And it was just, you know, just kept on, I didn't, I think I lost forty pounds and that last like six months of the other projects before we opened, just because I could never eat, I could never sleep. And I was constantly doing something on a project that sent my stress levels through the roof. So, it was very-- D Bagby: And then you get to operate your business. J Bagby: Yeah, and then you open and you know, there's five hundred people here on a Saturday and they all want food and beer. Downie: Excellent. D Bagby: Which is great, yeah. I mean, there is that question. I mean, you just, you don't know until it happens when you open the door for the first time. Is anybody going to be here? And I know that sounds ridiculous when you think of the size of this and even just people curious. Obviously, there will be people that are curious that are cruising by, but you really don't know. I mean, it is, you don't--you don't really let yourself think that because you can't. You just have to continue to stay true to your goal and your vision. And once you start, you can't stop. I mean, it's go time. And so, when you do finally open the doors, it's amazing. It is. It's kind of amazing that people are here. And I remember the first, like week we were open, it felt really strange that there were people here I didn’t know. I was like, “Who are these people? Oh, shoot. They're supposed to be here. That's right.” (Downie laughs) It was just very weird. And we had spent so much time here over the, you know, proceeding two years that it was--it was home. We were here three hours to one, the number of hours, or four hours to one, the number of hours we would spend at home for sure. And so, this was home. And so, we knew every contract, we knew every subcontractor. We knew everybody. And they knew us. And so, when it was time to let strangers in, (laughs) it was weird. But, you know, you get over that pretty quickly. J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: Because they are spending money. Downie: Of course, talking about the ‘curious’ issue, are you going to come back? D Bagby: Yeah, of course. Downie: Because just a one-time visit isn't going to keep you going. D Bagby: That’s right. Yeah, that's right. And that's still something that's, you know, on the operational side that we are always striving for. We want to be that place that people are like, “I can't wait to go back there.” We're still young though. And I that's the counterpoint to that is first of all, never stop trying. I mean, there's always something we can do better, always something we can refine. Always a better way or a more efficient way or a way that's going to make our guests happier. So, we are always pushing. We never, ever stopped. And I don't think we ever will. That's just our personalities. And luckily, it's the same--those personality traits are reflected our management team. So, they all feel the same way too. There's absolutely nobody on that team that is not completely there with us. Ready to just keep pushing and pushing and pushing. And our staff, it goes all the way to them. The people that are attracted to a place like this to work here. They, you know, they like that it's family. They liked that it's unique and different. They like that we're always pushing the envelope, trying to come up with cool new things or new ways or whatever the case. And so, it starts to draw in people who are naturally attracted to that. And so, they have a really kind of an inherent flexibility that is critical, but we couldn't have scripted that. I didn't really realize that, but it is true. We are--we ask a lot of them. We ask them to be very nimble and to do something very different one day than they did the day before, because we're trying to— J Bagby: Sorry, I’ve got to go downstairs and talk to them for a minute. D Bagby: Okay. Downie: Okay. J Bagby: Okay, I'll be right back. I got to set up a potential account with some tasting. D Bagby: Doing some tasting. Do you want to bring them upstairs for a taste? J Bagby: You did ask a question and that was what attracted us to this? Just going to finalize that and say the space. (Downie and D Bagby laugh) D Bagby: Yeah, the space for sure was the deciding factor. But when he called me from here and I've told this story before, and he said--I asked, you know, the data, like, how big is it? What's going on? And when he started to rattle off the statistics, I'm like, in my mind, “There's no way this is going to happen. (Downie laughs) There's no way.” And then every little hurdle you cross over, you knock that domino down and then pretty soon you're signing your lease. And it still doesn't really feel real until then. And then even then it doesn't feel real until— Downie: But you've been disappointed once already so-- D Bagby: Yeah. Downie: So it was kind of like you don't exactly want to get too invested— D Bagby: Once you sign the lease though, and you are a personal guarantee on that. It's yours. And so, then it's like, what do you do with that? Because there is a certain amount of money that if you just--even if you decide to never do anything with it, you're paying on your own personal account for that. So, and we knew that it was a big risk of the landlords, the owners. We knew that we wanted to not disappoint them too, as another layer in all of this. But I really didn't believe it was going to happen until it started happening. (laughs) And then the train was going and there was no stopping it, which is good. Downie: Yeah. So, what about your background, Dande? As far, as you know, you said you worked in a Fortune 500 company. Well, what's your path that got you here? And to actually be supportive of something that you could have very easily said, “No, I don't want to do this.” D Bagby: Yeah. I still do say that sometimes. No, I'm just kidding. No, my background is really weird. But somehow it all sort of feeds into to all the things that we do here. So, I worked in restaurants in high school and a little bit in college. I ended up working for a very small sort of family-run or just a couple of friends started the small kind of Mexican food chain. It was a kind of a spinoff from the Rubio’s chain. So, they had helped Ralph Rubio start Rubio's and they started their own thing. And so, I, you know, started working there my first restaurant job and worked my way up into management. And I'm still friends with the owners of that. They've since sold it all off, but it was really exciting to be a part of a small, very small and growing company. When I first was hired by them, they had one location. And then ultimately, I think they had seven or eight. Not when I worked there, but at the end of the sort of end of the line for them. And what happened though, was that they set the bar really high. I mean, they treated this little single location, you know, eight hundred square foot taco shop. They treated it as though it was a corporate--very, very organized, very dialed in, very high-quality, high standards when it came to customer service and food service and all of that. Even though it was a walk-up counter. So that was my only exposure to restaurants was that. And so, it really, it changed how I saw things, whether it was from a business perspective or from a restaurant perspective. And that was sort of, that became my benchmark, for how to be. How to be a manager, how to be managed, how to treat employees, all of that stuff began then. And it was my first real job was there. And I worked there for many years while I was--and then I went to school--my degree is in biology from Cal State San Marcos (California State University San Marcos). Downie: My goodness. (laughs) D Bagby: Yeah. So, I was a molecular cell biology major. But, before that, I wanted to be a zoologist. So, I started at Palomar and my very first class, my very first semester of college at Palomar, was as zoology class. And it was just life science, check the box, get that out of the way. And I fell in love with it and it was everything. I loved it. It was--my instructor was amazing. I don't think she's alive anymore. Dr. Jessup was her name. And she was a genius and I just wanted to absorb a hundred percent of everything she could teach me, I wanted to learn it. And so that kind of led me-- I worked for the Zoological Society of San Diego for about seven years. So, I left restaurants and did that and finished my degree at Cal State and left. And I taught biology and environmental science at the high school level. I taught labs--biology labs--at the junior college level for a few years. And then ultimately worked for SDG&amp ; E (San Diego Gas &amp ; Electric Company) in their Environmental Science Department. And, that's about when I met Jeff. So, I had done all of this sort of teaching and I hadn't worked in a restaurant in a long time. And when he and I first met, he had, like he said, he had beer on tap, both at Oggi’s in Vista where he had been the head brewer and at Pizza Port Carlsbad. And I had always liked beer, but I knew absolutely nothing about it. It was completely foreign to me. I didn't even--it didn't really occur to me that it was something that you could learn about. It just sort of was a thing that existed. And of course that's--couldn't be more wrong (Downie laughs) even then in 2005, even then. And so he's like, “Well come and let's taste some beer at in Vista.” So, we went out there and he just did the tasting, not a flight. I mean he pulled--we had tasters of every beer that was on tap. There must've been a dozen beers or more. And he kind of just lined them up how you would want somebody to kind of learn about beer. And he just was like, “Okay, what does it look like? What does it smell like? What does it taste like? Where do you think that's coming from? What is that? Did you do--?” you know? I remember specifically the hefeweizen he's like, “Do you think we added anything to make that taste like that?” And I was like, “Well, yeah, you probably added some fruit or you added some spice.” And absolutely not. Just from the yeast, and that tied into my biology background. Downie: Right. D Bagby: And understanding sort of a little bit about, you know, yeast chemistry, yeast metabolism. And then it started to click. I was like, “Okay, this is cool.” And then of course that led into ales and lagers and how they're, you know, metabolized differently. And all of the life cycle and all of that stuff. And so that really kind of itched, or what do you say, like “Scratch that itch” or whatever that science-y stuff. I really, really appreciated on the cellular level, which I had kind of departed from working in environmental science. So, that was a really huge eye-opener and that was kind of it for me. So, we tasted through all the beers and that created this sort of framework for me that I still rely on today. That's just sort of styles and, you know, parts of the world. And, you know, this is like this. And that's like, you know, whether it's hops in English IPA versus an American IPA and why and how, and, even just the physical I'm like, “I don't know what hop is. I have no idea.” So, he went and he grabbed a handful of hops and was like, “This is what they are. This is what they smell like. This is what they look like. This is where they're grown.” Of course, that led into hop harvest. And that led into fresh hop beer. And I remember specifically that season going down to-- because he still was bartending. So, he had, he left Pizza Port or--excuse me, he left Oggi’s and Vista and he was head brewing in Carlsbad and he was still bartending at Solana Beach. And I lived in Cardiff at the time. And so, I would go visit him on his bartend. I think he would work Wednesday nights and same thing. He'd be like, “Well, taste this, have a taste of this.” And I specifically remember fresh hop beers that season because it was unlike anything I'd ever had before. They were--it was just amazing to me. It was this bouquet of--it really tasted like drinking flowers. And that was really exciting. So, every new experience was just something to be learned. Unlike Jeff, I loved school, I loved being a student. I loved studying and I still do. I still love to learn. So does he, but even in that, even in an academic setting, I loved at all. And so it created this never-ending quest for information and knowledge and then that tied into experience. And so, when we would travel to whether it was in California or abroad or wherever, it creates this sort of, I don't know, structure, if you will. This kind of map or pathway for learning that, you know, whether it's about people or history or the ingredients and where they came from. And so that became, it became a passion of mine as well. And this was pretty close to right away. So, you know, within the first year or so of us dating, you know, we were going to events, we were traveling for beer. We were, you know, it just became part of our shared thing. But also, I loved learning from him too. And, yeah, and he's right. We started talking about opening a place, or that he wanted to open a place, pretty quickly. I mean, it was certainly not something that was going to be happening anytime soon, but it was again part of the discussion. And so, when you're traveling somewhere, you're going--his family, his father's side is from Northern Arizona, Prescott. Little town called Prescott. So, you know, we were traveling out there once or twice a year to visit his grandfather and kind of hang out and there's Prescott Brewing Company. So, we'd go there and just kind of talk about whether it was the beers or the styles or the hop choices or whatever to--do you think how’s the service? Is that are--what would we do differently? What about the glassware? Does this seem right? And--or how's the check presented? I mean, everything, it just became part of the fabric of what we talked about. And, yeah, that lasted and it's still true. It's still true today. And we go places and we look at how just the, how the operational side, how people are solving their own problems and you know, are those things we can borrow or are they things that we would never do because they don't fit with who we are. So that's how, that's the weird biology-biologist into brewery owner. Downie: Everybody comes from somewhere. D Bagby: That’s right. Downie: Actually, you know, like you say, the whole hops chemistry. You know, Jackie Trischman in Chemistry at Cal State (University San Marcos) is working with Stone investigating hops chemistry. D Bagby: That’s awesome. Downie: So, you know, Bonnie Bade (Cal State University San Marcos) in Anthropology is medicinal plants, Native American medicinal plants, and looking at how those can be incorporated into beers and things, so… D Bagby: Absolutely. Downie: So, it's--you can pull a whole lot of different disciplines and interests and experiences into-- D Bagby: Absolutely. Downie: The whole world of beer. D Bagby: Absolutely. And that, and the whole historical piece too, is something that both Jeff and I are really passionate about. And that's a big reason why we have such diversity in terms of the beer styles that we brew here. He brews here because of that. They, you know, a Belgian blonde brings us--brings us back to Brussels. It brings us back to visiting with our friend Yvan (De Baets) from (Brasserie) de la Senne, you know? That to us is a big reason why we wanted to do this also is to bring pieces of these experiences that we've had all over the world right here. And if somebody is able, isn't able, or doesn't know they want yet to go to Belgium or they don't know they want to go to Germany or maybe they never will, you know? If we can bring a little piece of that to them, that's whether it's the beer, the glassware, the, you know, a little bit of history lesson through our employees. That's all--that's a big, that's a huge piece of this for us. So having a big staff is a challenge. Per slight understatement. Downie: How many employees do you have? D Bagby: We have about sixty employees now. Yeah. Which is the smallest staff we've ever had. We--when we first opened and you always open with more than you need, but we had over a hundred employees at one point. Downie: Wow. D Bagby: Which is a big, huge thing. Lots of people. J Bagby: Through all of that, through all of the construction, through all of the opening and employees (unintelligible), I like to tell people that absolutely nothing surprises me anymore. D Bagby: No J Bagby: Nothing. D Bagby: No, no. J Bagby: I've heard it all, seen it all at all. Been through it all. Yeah. Downie: And you're still standing. D Bagby: Yeah. We are. Yep. Downie: So, you've already said that you really don't look to expand beyond this site and it seems like it's large and you have plenty of elbow room but— J Bagby: We could even expand onsite because we have a building that we haven't really even touched--(speaking at the same time) D Bagby: (speaking at the same time) Touched. Yeah. Downie: You’re kidding. D Bagby: Yeah. Downie: So you have expansion elbow room. J Bagby: (speaking at the same time) Yes. D Bagby: (speaking at the same time) Yes. Downie: But since you're not canning beers now, what are your plans for the future in, you know, distribution or canning or--? J Bagby: So, we've gone back and forth. What--we looked pretty seriously at purchasing a canning line. Mike Hess (Mike Hess Brewing) was selling theirs. So, I went down and looked at it, kind of ran some numbers and looked at it. But we wouldn't have been a good idea for cashflow for one thing. And the other was, we didn't have that output really. So, we'd have this really-- D Bagby: Beautiful. J Bagby: Nice canning line and it would be lovely to put a ton of beer in cans, but no output for it. Downie: Okay. J Bagby: Which, you know, cart before the horse or not, or whatever, it's sometimes you just have to jump in. And so, we decided not to at that point, but it is something that's on the mind, especially with a lot of our beers that tend to be growing in popularity and that we think would be really good in a package or in the proper package. So, that's still a possibility. But we haven't decided what step we're going to take first in doing that. So, there is a possibly of that in the next year or two, three. Other than that, I really want to continue pushing our draft distribution because it's something that we can do in the framework that we have. We have the beer, we have cooperage, we can get more cooperage very easily. And the capital outlay isn’t as much, and the space requirement is not as much or as intense as packaging. What else, what else? D Bagby: We one hundred percent self-distribute in California. So, we don't have a distributor anywhere. J Bagby: Out of state we have (unintelligible). D Bagby: Out of state, yeah, we (unintelligible). J Bagby: We’re not sending a lot out beer of out of state, yeah. (Aside to D Bagby, Forgot to tell you I talked to Matt Bonney yesterday about Washington.) D Bagby: Oh, okay, cool. J Bagby: So, we'll do some stuff up there, but anyway. (laughs) D Bagby: There you go. Heard it here first before I even heard it. (laughs) No, just kidding. J Bagby: And he called me during the party. D Bagby: Yeah. So self-distribution. We want to do that as long as we can. As a young business, (unintelligible), the margins on draft wholesale beer are already pretty, pretty low. So, you want to try to maximize as much revenue as you can at this stage of a business. There's also a lot of interesting things happening. I try to kind of dial into this a little bit as much as I can. There's a lot going on with this whole notion of hyper-local and, you know, being the kind of brewery that, and there are lots of them, that have these humongous, very ambitious goals to be in every state or to be in twenty states or to be all over the place right now. And I certainly don't disparage that, that's part of their business model and that's what they think is awesome. Go for it. But it's really feeling a lot like people are more, appreciating more and more, what's right near them. And you see certain breweries that are drawing back from that, that broad scale distribution more and more-- J Bagby: Or just staying where they are. D Bagby: Or are just staying where they are, yeah. They say steady is the new growth. So, I think we're just, we're kind of a cautious company. We don't take a lot of big risks. Maybe because we have such a gigantic property here and so much going on that we don't have to. I mean, we don't even have the energy really to make big plans. But, no, we do talk a about what's next and where, where are we going to grow. And I do think even locally--we, you know, Jeff said, when he tries to sell someone beer, we actually haven’t actively sold any beer. Every drop of beer that hasn't been sold over our bar here at the pub has been somebody coming and saying, “Hey, I want to have your beer on at my place.” So, they reach out to us either, you know, usually via email. J Bagby: That’s who I just met downstairs. And he is a friend, but they came to us to taste. More traditional sort of setup like, “Hey, can you send your rep by and bring some of your beers? I'd like to taste them on tap.” D Bagby: Yeah, we do not have a rep. (laughs) J Bagby: I'm the rep. D Bagby: We don’t have one of those. Yeah. (J Bagby laughs) Part of it is too--and so that’s, it’s kind of nice that that’s, because then we know the accounts that have come to us really already get it. They already understand what we do and appreciate that enough to reach out, but we do not, we understand that is not sustainable. And the growth that we really do want to realize on the wholesale side is only achievable with some outreach. And that’s something that is--we know, we both acknowledge that that’s really important. But we also, again talk about kind of risk aversion. We were—it's still too close to us. We don’t want to just hire a sales rep and tell them to go out in the world and sell the beer. It’s really hard to let go of it and to, you know, just be those, just say, “Oh yeah, go for it. Volume volume. Get it.” Because it still really matters to us who’s pouring it. How they’re pouring it. Are they taking care of the kegs? Is the glassware appropriate? Is it clean? Are the lines clean? All we need is somebody to have a beer like this Kölsch that I'm drinking that is so delicate. And such a light beer that, you know, if it’s not cared for it is going to be flawed. And you know, most people don't drink a beer and think that they don’t like and think that it isn’t the brewer (laughs) or the brewery. Most people do not say, “Oh, those lines must be dirty. That's why this does not taste right.” So, it’s just cautious and definitely overly cautious. I’ll say we are very careful. And, you know, that’s, at some point we're going to have to start peeling our fingers off those kegs a little more forcefully and get out there in the world and really see. We hear from time to time that people believe that we just don't have any beer to sell. Because we aren’t actively selling it, which isn’t true. We make a lot of beer and we sell a lot of beer over our own bars, but we definitely have some volume that could go out much more than it is. So, we’re working on it. Got our hands pretty full. (laughs) Downie: Now, this is something, you know, because you are both cautious people, but what if something happened and your landlord decided to sell the property? J Bagby: So, there's provisions in our lease that say that I can’t change our lease. Downie: Okay. Downie: It was very protective. D Bagby: Yeah. J Bagby: It was very protected line by line that thing to make sure things like that like they couldn’t say, “Oh, we are going to sell a parking lot to a developer for apartments.” They can’t do that, you know? So, if they sell it our lease stands. D Bagby: And we can buy it too, we have to be considered. J Bagby: We don’t have first right of refusal. D Bagby: Something else called that. J Bagby: Their landlord or their rep did not want to give that--our landlords have kids. I would not see them giving up this property to somebody unless we just came by and plopped the amount of money on them, which can happen. And, you know, I know that the people that own these shops kind of behind the alley-- D Bagby: West of us. J Bagby: The other side, are trying to develop it and turn it into apartments. J Bagby: I'm like, that is a six-year project. If Coastal Commission-- D Bagby: It’s the Coastal Commission. Downie: Yeah, it’s a coastal commission. Will even allow it. D Bagby: Yeah, if the city-- J Bagby: We are so lucky to avoid those things, you know? We don’t have a conditional use. It was in the beginning we had some neighbors that were complaining. And I think it was just because people were parking on the street. It’s public parking on the street. And they were just getting mad because they used to park in front of their house at a certain time of night. And it wouldn’t be a problem. You know, because we’re—anyway. Somebody came and complained and said, “Oh, well, I'm going to go to the city. And you know, I’ve already started signatures to get your conditional use removed and dah-dah-dah.” And I was like, “Well, that’s cool, but we don’t have a conditional use.” And (the city has nothing to do over what we do here as a business. Because we’re permitted as a right. So, (whispers) sorry about that. (laughs) D Bagby: Yeah, it was, we haven’t really, honestly, for being as close as we are to residential, we have had virtually no issues other than the first probably month we were open where people were kind of caught off guard maybe by the volume. But that’s, I mean, at least as far as I'm aware, we haven’t had any issues. We haven’t had any issues. J Bagby: I had a couple of things. There was that one guy that, you know, I think he just wanted to come in and kind of rant. And I was nice to him. I just let him go. And when I said, you know, “I want to work with you. I want to work with the community, but you got to realize that, you know, the streets are public parking and unless you get that changed, which you're perfectly willing to try to try to do, but I don't believe the city is going to let you just for your spot in front of your house. And you know, I want to help you. We have the required parking that we're supposed to have for the use that we have here per our agreements with the city. And, you know, really sorry if there's any incidents or things that, you know, please feel free to call us.” Like just, you know, kill them with kindness kind of thing. And you know, reminded him that he really could not do anything about it. D Bagby: Yeah, you live on a commercial zone, basically the boundary of a residential and commercial coming together. And that can be a challenge, especially because there wasn't anything here, no operating business for years. And even when the dealership was still going, I mean, they wouldn't--there wasn't so much parking demand. Yeah. That would have ever affected them. So, I get it. I would be upset too, probably, but— Downie: But yeah. And change is always going to have somebody not happy. D Bagby: Absolutely. That's true. Yeah. Sweat: I actually have to go. I'm overseeing an event in Encinitas here in a second, so I have to run. D Bagby: I hope you don’t run into any traffic. Sweat: We’ll see what happens. (laughs) Downie: It should be pretty good by now. Sweat: I'll follow up with you tomorrow just to make sure you have everything you need and just see what any next steps are. But, let me know in the meantime if you need anything. Downie: Thank you, Holly. D Bagby: Thanks Holly. Downie: I wish you a safe and easy drive. Sweat: Thank you, I know. D Bagby: I hope so too. Holly, we'll look at those pictures today, too. I know you guys are asking and we just have had a crazy few days. Sweat: Yeah, we know with your party. D Bagby: Yeah. (laughs) Sweat: It looked like a lot of fun. D Bagby: It was a lot of fun. Sweat: And honestly, if you are only able to decide on like, a few, I could do the ones of Jeff just to get them to see. D Bagby: Yes, I'll do that tonight before I leave. For sure. And how many do we need to give her? Total? Or selection? Sweat: It’s in the email, like, how many you guys agreed to pay for. D Bagby: I can’t remember. Sweat: It might be one or two or Jeff. D Bagby: Okay. Sweat: That we agreed upon. D Bagby: Okay. Sweat: But yeah. D Bagby: Thank you. Sweat: It’s nice to see you both. D Bagby: You too. Drive safe. Downie: So, if you can still give me a little more time. I know I had just an hour, so I don’t (unintelligible)--. J Bagby: Sure. I might check in on that account in a minute, but yeah, if you have some more questions, for sure. Downie: You both sound like you're very, very invested in education, you know, which is a wonderful thing. What would you say, I mean, do you support any charities or causes through the brewery that you feel like you want to talk about? Or, are there plans to expand your reach into, you know, goodwill gestures besides listening to irate neighbors? (all laugh) J Bagby: It's hard, you know? We get approached almost every day about some sort of donation for something. We have an outlet on our website where you can fill out a form and apply. And while we like supporting charities and the community, it's difficult because there are so many of them. And we like to look at the ones that either we've supported either personally in the past, or that we have a connection to through a family member or a very good friend. Where we can say, “Okay, you know, this is important to us because of this.” You know, while we like also doing this, we're also running a business. So, at some point you can't--you have to close the doors a little bit on it and say, “Look, we want to help you out. But you know, you're asking—" we could do it. The easiest thing for us to do is donate beer. But the hardest thing for us to donate is beer because of the licensing required for the nonprofit to actually get it. And they don't understand that. Downie: I’ve run into that. (laughs) J Bagby: And we always have to be the one that's like, well, “We'd love to help you out, but there's this, this, this, and this.” Downie: Yeah, and more education. And what Stone did—because I approached Stone about some beer to maybe put into a scholarship raffle that we do through the Society of California Archivists I belong to. And it was, “Well, what did the ABC (California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control say?” And then I ran into the ABC and I just went, for the permits we'd have to get, it's just, you know, it would eat up what little money we would make. So, and I understand that completely because (unintelligible). D Bagby: Yeah, we’ve seen it. But, with that said, we are involved. J Bagby: Yeah, I mean, we just had two weeks ago or, not this past week and the weekend before, we had a gigantic breast cancer benefit festival on our parking lot that a lot of our staff members donate their time to. We donate beer to, we donate food to—yeah, we donate space. And basically, we host the charity. And that was something that I started with the woman who founded the festival back at Pizza Port. Downie: Is that Brewbies? J Bagby: Yeah. Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: So that's the biggest one that we have. And then this one that we just had almost raised almost fifty thousand dollars for charity. Downie: Wow. Wonderful. J Bagby: And so, you know, knowing that and having been involved with this one for nine of them now, and being in the beer industry in general, I'm always getting asked, I'm very diligent about when we get a request for a festival because sometimes, first and foremost, sometimes the festival isn't necessarily great for the charity. There'll be a promotional company--excuse me, that we'll get out there, go up to a charity and say, “Hey, we can make you five thousand dollars if you pull the license for this,” you know? But they don't realize the potential risks involved or the insurance liability that they have to take on, different things like that. And the production company ends up taking the majority of the money because the proceeds. Now it's illegal because one hundred percent of it with that one day ABC license is supposed to go to the charity. Downie: Right. J Bagby: So, if someone squats, the ABC can say, “Hey, we need to see your books.” And then not only does the charity get in trouble, which they may not even be aware of. Downie: Right. J Bagby: But that promotional company, and even the breweries could get in trouble because they donated to it. Another thing is on our side, not only are we just donating beer but probably donating two people's full day’s worth of time to get the beer ready to go to the event, to get all the equipment together, to drive to wherever it might be to set up, to pour, take it all down and bring it all back home, clean it all. And so, people don't realize what really goes into it on our side when we're donating. We're not just donating a beer, we’re donating quite a bit more so we're pretty diligent about those. But that's really the easiest way for us to support a charity or a community event, unfortunately. Downie: But those are facts that, you know, people need to be aware of. And you both talked about how much learning you've had to do along this path. D Bagby: We’ve done some kind of other fundraisers, though. J Bagby: Yeah, we've done some onsite things. D Bagby: There have been a couple of military things that we've supported and— J Bagby: And the dogs, yeah. D Bagby: So there's a few things that we really, really kind of key into that mean a lot to us. But yeah, I think as a— J Bagby: Firefighter-- D Bagby: Pint Project. J Bagby: Yeah. A couple of onsite things that were pretty successful and, you know, we're just--you get back to this, like you can't do them all, you know? And as not nice as it sounds, it does need to benefit us in some way as well. Because we are offering up a lot when we do these things and why we want to help the community, we want to help these people that need help in some way, we just have to be careful. D Bagby: Yeah. Exactly. Downie: Yeah. Because, you know, I mean, not every charity is a 501(c ) or is required and you get into all kinds of thin ice. So, very understandable. But, no. D Bagby: Now that's one of the things that I think is a benefit to us as Jeff has made it his mission and his absolute business to know as much as he can about ABC licensing. Just any sticky situations that are pitfalls. The San Diego Brewers Guild (a nonprofit organization that promotes San Diego breweries) just hosted like a ABC meeting at a local brewery a couple of weeks ago. And I feel like we knew a lot of that stuff that was mentioned, but it's still great to go and be a part of that. J Bagby: It’s like a refresher course. D Bagby: It’s a refresher. But you can just see in the room, people— J Bagby And you get questions and hands go up. And you’re thinking “You can’t do that.” D Bagby: Yeah. yeah. So, it was really interesting to see people's reaction to these rules that many of not all--I've been really long standing for a long time, but if you don't know, you don't know. And I think there's a lot of ask for forgiveness later, which may have worked in the past, but as the ABC gets more versed, they get--there are certain things that they were getting very particular about as they should. Downie: Well, once they see it as a continual problem, that it keeps happening, they're going to start coming down and— D Bagby: Yeah, and it's, you know, it is--I believe that it is your job as if you're going to have a license that you should know how it works and what--it's a responsibility. And it's hard for us to sometimes see other breweries who don't know. And that's fair if you don't know initially, but that blatantly break these laws all the time. And you don't want to see them get in trouble, but you also don't want to set up. It sets expectations on the customer side it sets expectations on other breweries’ sides were like, well, “They did it, why can't I?” And so of course for people like us who, like I said, risk averse, we want to make sure that we're--I mean, our biggest asset, those are the alcohol license. That's why we're here. So, if something happens to that, it gets jeopardized that's--that is a bad thing. (laughs) Very bad. So, yeah, it's, it's been talking about education. That's something that I've learned a lot from Jeff. And we've offered up if anybody has questions certainly here locally, you know, we're always available. People want to bounce an idea or, you know, find out more, we're happy to help. Downie: So, you're active in San Diego Brewers Guild. Because I saw you at Guild Fest (SD Brewers Guild Fest) and you just mentioned a recent meeting. Are there any other organizations you're active in or are members of--? J Bagby: We’re members of the Brewers Association, the National, um— D Bagby: CCBA. J Bagby: And the California Craft Brewers Association. Also, the MBA, the Masters Brewers Association of America. D Bagby: I'm actually a board member on the— J Bagby: San Diego. D Bagby: Brewer’s Guild. But yeah, there's a lot of those little things like that. J Bagby: I think those are the main ones, but those are all, I mean, there's some international stuff, but yeah. Downie: Yeah. What are you going to get involved in? I mean, again, it's kind of like the finding the charities that are actually going to be beneficial. Is that going to benefit you? J Bagby: (unintelligible) international. Well, yeah. I was going to say the only benefit for us because, you know, they have incredible conferences and technical courses. (Downie laughs) That would probably be the only reason for us to really be a part of those. And there's some competitions, there's some, some bigger European competitions that are gaining a lot of speed and a lot more Americans are actually sending beer over and winning medals. So, it's something to watch. But yeah, it's not like, you know, where we're going to Brau and Nuremberg every year or something like that. Downie: Well, that does bring up. When did you start putting your beers into competition? D Bagby: Good question. J Bagby: That was back when I was at Pizza Port at Solana Beach. We entered beers at Stone, but they weren't really--I didn't have anything to do with the recipes of those beers. Downie: Okay. You were an assistant. J Bagby: I was just standing there, but when I got to Solana Beach and was working with Tomme, some of those were my ideas and my things where I brewed them, or we brewed them together. It's a bit more intimate and I was a little bit more involved. So, I would say there, really. And that's where, you know, won, our first, or my first time across the stage. (laughs) Downie: Have you kept a list of all the awards you've won (unintelligible)? J Bagby: She did quite a bit of work on that before our business case. Before we opened. But I think she ended up just tallying GABF awards and World Beer Cup awards. Because there's certainly other things, too. There's like Alpha King. I’ve won that three times. That's the Hoppy Beer Competition that they hold during the GABF, that’s not associated with the GABF. Some awards at San Diego International Beer Festival, what do you call it? Beer of the Year, three times there. And some various other medals in, you know, have we ever entered LA county? A couple of times. So, you know, some things here and there. IPA festivas up and over North and Hayward. Years ago, I won medal at the Alaska Beer and Barleywine Festival. Downie: Oh, Alaska. Wow. You've really reached out here. J Bagby: It's a very long running, very famous festival. Downie: I’ve heard of it, yeah. But it just seems very interesting to me that if somebody were keeping a list of what beers they had won awards for, I think that would tell a story about some of the changes in styles and some of the expansion of styles of beers. J Bagby: Yeah, yeah. Maybe, I don't know. I was talking to somebody. I was in Miami at a festival this past weekend. A friend of mine, his anniversary for his brewery. And he throws a festival that coincides with it. It's invitational. Anyway, he invited me and I was like, “Yeah, I've never been to Miami. I'll go.” So anyway, I was talking to another brewer friend who was there and he was like, “Oh, well, you know, you won lots of IPA (India Pale Ale) medals,” and you and I was like, “Boy, yeah, I won some of those,” but also won in Belgians and a lot of different stout medals. And, I even have a couple of German pilsner medals. Some other like, you know, Scotch Ales, like Brown Ales. It's kind of a wide gamut. So, I don't know if my medal history would necessarily tell much of a story in that way. Maybe. Downie: Yeah. Well, I think the more pieces of evidence there are, the more our story can be put together. But have you ever done judging? J Bagby: Oh yeah. Yeah. I've been a judge at the GABF (Great American Beer Festival) and the World Beer Cup for thirteen years. Thirteen, fourteen years now. I don't remember my first judge GABF. It was like 2003, I think. So, yeah. I've been doing that for a long time and I'll be doing that this year in National. Downie: Yeah. I've heard comments that GABF has gotten so big and so many categories that has just really become kind of overwhelming. How do you feel about that? J Bagby: I wished that they would, on the organization side, that they would grow the competition to represent the growth in the beer industry. I get what they're trying to do and what then they have limitations, but sometimes I think they're being a little harsh on the restrictions on their side. You know, there's almost eight thousand beers in there, in the GABF last year, and I'm sure the World Beer Cup will be around that. And I think there's seventy-nine categories. They haven't expanded the categories too much in the last five years. I think maybe ten years ago there might've been sixty-something categories. So, it hasn't expanded a whole lot, but what has is the entries, right? So, brewers used to be able to enter around eight beers per brewery, or brewhouse, location into the competition. They've changed that and they have several different categories in ways, you know, like a Pizza Port that has five locations. You know, what if all five locations enter beers? Well, they have stipulations on how many beers a corporation, or a set of breweries, that are under one ownership can enter. So, every year that we've been a brewery, we've entered the maximum number of beers that we can enter into the GABF. And that makes it difficult because you only have four shots, right? Like we're sending four beers to the World Beer Cup. So, it's a more difficult. But so does everybody else. And so, everyone else has to make the decisions and the kind of cuts in their mind of which beers they want to enter, which ones that they're going to pass on for this year or this competition or whatever it is. So, it's still very fair. I think it's still judged very fairly. Probably the most fair competition there is in beer because of the qualities, the qualifications of the judges, and their palates and their history and their tenure as judges judging beer. It's all judged blind. It’s done very, very well. The problems I see with it are the categories that are masked, or you have over two hundred beers in the category: American IPA, Imperial IPA. I think American Pale Ale is pretty high. Some of these other ones that they get close to, you know, that are well over one hundred beers. You're getting into a situation where the algorithm isn't--so, you know, when they're spitting out their initial rounds and the algorithm that isn't accounting for past medal winners. Or beers--so you could have a round that has eleven beers in it, say it's American IPA, and that round might not have a single beer that's ever been in the competition before, or all new breweries that have never been to a competition for it. Then you could have another set of eleven beers where every single one of those beers has won a medal in the American IPA category before. And they’re, as far as I know, they're not accounting for that. And to me, that changes the game a little bit. Because even if you're a judge and you, at which has happened before, you'll get around and you'll be like, “Man, it was tough to pass on three of those beers, really could have passed on two or even just one and save the judges down the road some tasting.” Well, they require you to pass on three. They really push you to pass on three. If you absolutely can't then they want to hear why and want to hear an explanation. And so, I just believe that in that sense, you know, well maybe it's okay, but in the other sense where they're like, “Man, we had eight good beers. It was really hard to only pass on three beers.” So, now you've got this thing where you might have a potential medal winner that gets knocked out early because it was in a round with all excellent beer. Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: So that's--if I had a complaint about them, I wished that they would account for that. Especially in those--there's only, I'm talking to a handful of categories where that is really something I think that comes into play. The only other thing might be, like I said, to have grown with the competition or with the industry and allow brewers to enter more beers. But that takes more time. It takes more judges. They try to get the judging done in three days. If they didn't, they'd have to get another day, which is paying more, but you have to pay to enter the competition. So, to me, there's some work that probably could still be done. And there is a lot of brewers out there that are like, “Oh GABF. It's kind of eh.” You know, I believe in what my beers are and I send them and either I don't win medals or other beers win medals in the category that I entered that I don't think are as good as my beer. I think you have people that feel like that. But having been a judge, I've been on the tables. I've never been in a case where I was like, “That beer should have won a medal and it's not in the top three,” you know? I've never had a case where there wasn't a lot of thought and a lot of time spent into the beers that actually win medals. They’re medal-winning beers. Downie: Okay. I had a question and it’s just completely slipped my mind. J Bagby: Sorry. I know. Downie: No, that's okay. It still had to do with this. Um, I don’t know. (laughs) J Bagby: With the competition, or--? Downie: Well, oh, I know what it is. The brewers themselves decide what style of beer they’ve brewed. Have you run into cases where you taste a beer and you go, “This has--should have been in this category, you know. What were they doing putting it in here?” J Bagby: Yeah. Yeah. And the BA (Brewer’s Association) is real upfront about that when they tell brewers, you know, read the style guidelines and make sure that your beer fits into those guidelines and they give you everything. They give you a verbal description of the bitterness, color, aroma, mouthfeel, text--you know, everything. And then they also give you actual numbers for alcohol range, color range. Those are the things you need to pay attention to. And I feel like there is brewers that still don't pay attention to that. I don't know how or why. Or if they've just mislabeled their beers or what happened. But, they're—it’s pretty upfront. Like, this is--the judges have this when they're sitting at their table and they're going to read this before they start judging your beer. So, why would you enter something that doesn’t fit? Downie: Yeah, because you don't know why. Because I was thinking, well, maybe it's just their taste buds are different? Or it didn't transport well. (laughs) J Bagby: Yeah. I think, you know, for instance, she (D Bagby) sent me a picture one day. She had a Kölsch earlier. I can't remember what brewery she was drinking at. But she sent me a picture and it was this hazy beer in a straight sided pint glass. And she wrote “Kölsch--?” And so of course I went, “What does it taste like? Where are you at? Blah-blah-blah.” But a lot of people would look at that and go, “Well, Kölsch should be bright,” you know? Any German from Cologne is going be like, “That's hazy,” that’s got--you know. Even chill haze shouldn't really be there in a Kölsch. Downie: Okay. J Bagby: And a brewer's interpretation is one thing of what they call it on their menu board versus, you know, what category they might enter it in GABF. So, a beer like that might be an entered in a Keller beer. Because it might be an unfiltered Kölsch. So, they might say, well, “Yeah, it's German style Kölsch,” but it's actually a Keller beer because it was brewed in the vein of a Kölsch, but Keller is a German style beer. Downie: And that’s “K-E-L-L-E-R?” J Bagby: Yeah. Downie: Okay. I'm still learning all the— J Bagby: Oh yeah, there’s tons. And that's-- Downie: There’s huge number of beer styles. J Bagby: Yeah, and there's, you know, historical beers that are becoming more popular and more rare, more obscure recipes and styles where there's a little bit more confusion or debate over what is actually correct. The Brewer’s Association does a good job of refining their categories and reviewing them each year. So, they take judge's interpretation—or judge’s comments on style descriptions. “No, no, this actually should be this way,” or “This should allow for this and this as well as this,” you know, so they do a good job of keeping up with that. But yeah, if you, you know, taste a brewer’s altbier at one brewery, and then he goes to another brewery and tastes another brewer’s altbier, they could be completely different beers. So, there that slide in judgment, but when you get into competitions, where's the category of your beer doesn't fit in it, then don't enter it. (laughs) Downie: Well, I mean, brewing is such a creative process. And there are as best as you can try certain factors like, you know, a Centennial hop may not be exactly the Centennial hop it was the year before due to the growing season, the factors there. So, it really is a creative process, but I've been kind of interested in the whole, you know, yes, I've seen some of these categories and descriptions and I'm like, “How can you always guarantee that those beers?”--well, obviously not. Not surprised. J Bagby: Yeah, there's interpretations of (unintelligible) category descriptions in different ways, for sure. Downie: Well, while you were meeting that account, Dande was telling me how, you know, when she first met you, how you were educating her into all the varieties of beers, you know? How she has found that to be so helpful. And then just the brewers I meet all seem to be that way as they to educate someone who--on the various styles that they're brewing or they're enjoying right at the time. Do you find that wearing? You know, continually trying to educate more people? J Bagby: I think when it's--if I was doing it every day, I think it might get—or the same exact set of beers every day or the same exact descriptions of the same person or the same, you know, whatever. I think I might get a little tired of it. But to me it's kind of exciting, especially when you have somebody that's open to it and isn't restrictive of themselves in their own palates. So, if you have somebody that's like, “I've never tasted German-style Weisse beer. I've never tasted American Red Ale,” which is kind of a better example. “I've never tasted Irish dry stout. I've never tasted—" you know? Whatever it may be. And if you can get five or six of those things in samples right in front of somebody, that's going to be a really cool conversation. Especially if that person's open to tasting and listening and identifying with what you're talking about in each one, you know? When you say, “Oh, what do you smell on that? What are you getting that? Okay.” Those types of things come from this ingredient or this timeframe or this hop or this malt and--or whatever other specialty ingredient might be there. And when the person identifies and goes, “Oh wow, that's really cool. I never thought of it like that.” All of the sudden you've got somebody who thought they hated German-style hefeweizen and going, “No, actually I'm going to order that the next time I'm out because I want to compare it or I want to see what it's like again, and kind of—"you know? I think people like, you know, connecting the dots in their heads. And if you've given them a little bit, just to even a little bit to bite on like English-style bitter, or an Extra Special Bitter, you know, what does that mean? What does that, it sounds, it sounds harsh, Extra Special Bitter. Well, no, there's actually some really nice malt depth in ESB (Extra Special Bitter) and it should be there. Well, it should have a firm bitterness, but what kind of bitterness? Well, it's not American piney, citrus, passion fruit, floral. And it's not that kind of hop it's the more herbal, spicy, earthy hop from the English varieties. And even just that much, and a person can go, “Oh, well, I really liked that.” Downie: And it makes it more accessible. J Bagby: And the next time, the next time I see it somewhere, I've got that connection in my brain to go, “Yeah, I know what I'm ordering it and there it is. Affirmation.” I'm drinking it. And it smells and tastes like I remembered. And I was told that it should. And I get that a lot where somebody will say, “Hey, you mentioned that, you know, this style beer can have this, this, and this. But I tried it over here and I got this, this, and this.” And that's sometimes where the brewer’s discrepancy is between styles or different ingredients or maybe just something is slightly different. But you can explain that away. And therefore, they've learned a little bit more and they have their file on whatever that beer was just got a little bit deeper in their head. So, the next time they try it and they connect the dots again. And I don't know, to me that's fun. That's exciting. And it's really exciting to see when someone's open to that and is engaging in that. It's kind of a little bit difficult when somebody says, “Oh, I don't like bitter beer,” or, “I don't like hops.” And you're like, “Well, you just haven't tried the right hops yet.” It's like, if you like beer and you're say you're a beer drinker, I believe--yes, you can have your favorites and the ones that you don't think are as great to you, but you got to try everything. You know, there's some newer, crazy styles out there I get, but the basics, ales and lagers, and the families within there, the style of families, if you say you're a beer drinker, you should know those or have a basic framework and understanding of what those are or have the desire to go, “I've never really tried that. I'm not really familiar with that, but I want to see. I want to see what it tastes like so that I know if I really like it, or I don't.” To like, find that out later, you know, like give yourself the chance to like it. Downie: It's like the three-bite rule with the kid and the vegetable. And then, you know, you got to at least try three bites of it. And then if you don't like it, we'll go from there. So that's a good way to do it. Now, do you have a favorite hop? Is there one that you like brewing with more than others? J Bagby: There’s definitely hops—plural--that I like using. We're a pretty classic traditional brewery. So, we stick to pretty traditional classic styles of beer. So, we're not using too many of the new, exotic, crazier hops. We're sticking to more of the classic American Pacific Northwest American hops and then the Nova varieties and then the English varieties. So, on the American side, you know, we're using a lot of Cascades, Centennial, a little Amarillo and Simcoe, and Columbus and Chinook. And that's kind of our core for the American side, but then the English ones are really wide and Noble hops as well. We use a lot of different varieties and again, not a lot of real new flashy ones, in part because of our contracts, we didn't know how and when our brewery was going to open. So, I bought a lot of hops because I was afraid that we weren't going to have any when we opened. So that drove that a little bit. The other part was just, yeah, I really liked those more classic American hops over some of the newer ones. Not to say that I don't like sprinkling a little of them here and there in brews, but I tend to favor those classic ‘C’ hops (referring to Chinook, Citra and other hops starting with the letter C.) Downie: And so you don't, from what you're saying, I'm hearing that you probably aren't planning on doing, you know, real strange and experimental beers either, you know? You're going to stick with the more--? J Bagby: No, I think if anything, I would pick some of the more obscure older styles. I’ve talking with some friends about a smoked wheat beer that used to be made that is actually--I believe it's actually a lager yeast and it's a fairly bright beer. But it has a smoked character to it, and a little bit of bitterness and wheat malt character to it. But I'm always afraid to brew smoked beer because I think, I always think that it's going to be me and like three other people drinking it. (Downie and D Bagby laugh) Downie: Yeah, it could be a big mistake if you brewed it on your big system. So, do you have a small system that you can do little test batches on? J Bagby: No, it’s— D Bagby: It’s all or nothing. Downie: Well, that goes to being risk averse again. J Bagby: Yeah, we have a little lager on right now. I think it tastes fantastic. I just think it doesn't--I just think it's not exciting to people. It's a Belgium style beer. If you're familiar with Belgian style dubbel, which is basically like a Belgian style brown ale, but it has a Belgian yeast character to it. So, it's a little spicy and dark fruit and things like that. Well, take that and cut it in a little less than half with alcohol and flavors and everything else. We dropped it down to only about four and a half percent. It still has a lot of those characters, they're just a lot more mild and it's not as big and it's not as heavy. But it's not selling at all. (laughs) So, even somebody even called it dark Bud Light in the online comment. Downie: Oh dear. (laughs) J Bagby: That was fun to read yesterday. (laughs) D Bagby: That’s alright. It’s not for everyone. J Bagby: Nope. And that's exactly. That's kind of how we thought about it. Downie: One person's interpretation. J Bagby: Exactly, exactly. Downie: But yeah, if you're seeing that it's not really selling then, you know? You kind of-- J Bagby: Yeah, we (unintelligible)-- D Bagby: We had a few beers like, but that's, I mean, unfortunately, a few of them were Belgian styles. J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: But, Bruges Cruise was on for a long time. J Bagby: Well, that's because it was over eleven percent. We had people that loved that beer. But, we sold that at eight ounces at a time. D Bagby: Yeah, but we had it on tap for a year, also. J Bagby: (Unintelligible). D Bagby: They do A12. They do A12. Which is good. Downie: So, do you have much of a barrel aging program? J Bagby: We started one. We had, uh, we did twelve barrels and then we did another set with a different beer of just four barrels. All, most, all of that is gone now. So, we just brewed up Imperial Stout and we're getting ready to purchase thirty barrels. Just deciding what other beers we're going to put in those barrels and talk with the broker about making sure we get them as fresh as possible and which barrels they'll have available at that time. So that we're not filling barrels that have been sitting around drying out for months. They were nice and fresh. Downie: Yeah, you want to be able to extract something out of those barrels. (laughs) J Bagby: Exactly. But it's fun. I like doing it. But we do all straight up beer. We don't use any Wild Geese (blended whiskey) or-- D Bagby: Cupcakes. J Bagby: Or anything like that. (Downie and J Bagby laugh) So yeah, that’s fun. That's, to me, that's--I don't know, that gets to the uber fun side of brewing. You're like, “Oh, I'm going to put this thing in here.” Well, we had that beer that she was talking about in there for eighteen months and I just served it in Miami last weekend and it tasted phenomenal. Downie: (laughs) Love it when something works. J Bagby: Yeah. And sometimes they're don’t. That’s true. Knock on wood, we were pretty lucky with our barrels. Yeah. Downie: Okay. Well, I think I've exhausted all my questions. I learned a lot from you both. I've very, very, very much appreciated your time. D Bagby: Oh sure, our pleasure. J Bagby: If anything comes up or you're going through things and just feel free to email me or her and follow up. Downie: Come back with something that didn't record or transcribe or something. D Bagby: Don’t hesitate, we're happy to happy to help and also believe in what you're doing, and also-- J Bagby: Definitely. D Bagby: And also love to talk about all this kind of stuff, people that-- J Bagby: Yeah, it’s fun. D Bagby: People that are interested in it. Because, you know, we work so close to it, it's our life. But we are still--we are very passionate about it. And hopefully that comes through a little bit, even in construction stuff, and crazy things like that. Downie: I definitely see you have a future as working as a brewery construction consultant. (J and D Bagby laugh) Because really, you have gone through a lot of effort to educate yourselves and to do it right. And that kind of knowledge really should be shared. I mean, that's something I admire about Mike Hess. He wrote that, you know, ‘starting up a brewery’ webpage, but that still doesn't tap on everything. And especially, you know, doing something like this, of course every situation is going to change with every city you’re dealing with. D Bagby: But there are some basics that I think we would have really benefited from big time. And I think we would have heeded, we would have paid attention if somebody was like, “Hey, we just did this. Here's our experience. I'm here’s just how you can, you know, maybe avoid some of the pain, some of the pain points.” J Bagby: Yeah, the building part and you know, the construction management. I mean, I think part of that goes a lot. Like I can use the comparison as somebody's going to buy their brewing equipment and calling up three different equipment manufacturing and saying, “I want to buy a ten-barrel system, give me a quote,” and get three quotes and then just choose which one they want and order the equipment and get it sent. Well, I went up to the equipment manufacturer’s warehouse and talked with the engineers for two days before they even started drawing plans for my tanks. And then when they were about to start doing the finishing and they connection piping and all the process piping, I went back up there and stood in my tanks and looked at all the cores and looked at all the valves were and told them where I wanted to move things moved or changed. And the different specs on all--every single tank, not just the, the brewhouse stuff, but the cellar as well. Because you might get your tank and go like, “Why the heck is it like that?” And I kind of compare that to construction. Like we could have probably sat around and worked on other things and let them take forever to build this place and would have had something in the end, that would have been, but it wouldn’t been us and it wouldn’t been right. And that's just how we operate. So, I think while we spend a lot of time on that and we feel that it was absolutely one hundred percent necessary, some other people might be like, “Well, he didn't really need to do that. You could of—” D Bagby: Get by. J Bagby: But it's not us. I guess that was what I was trying to say. Downie: You have invested heavily in this, so why not have it right? But, Plan Nine (Plan Nine Alehouse) over in Escondido, I was over there one day and they didn't have any of their own beers on tap. And I said, “Gee, you don't have any of your own, I thought you were brewery.” And he said, “Well, we got new equipment and we've had continual leakage.” D Bagby: Oh no. Downie: And they, you know, this was like nine months that they had been dealing with it. So, you were exactly right in going--and I mean, even if you have to stand in your tanks and (unintelligible)— J Bagby: Well, and it’s kind of fun too. (laughs) Downie: Yeah, yeah. They will say, “Hey, I stood in my tank.” (all laugh) But, yeah. D Bagby: That’s too bad. Downie: So, something like that can go very, very wrong. J Bagby: Yeah, looking at welds and not (unintelligible). D Bagby: And also not having the support, because if you--when, you know, when you got your, whatever it is, whatever contractor you have or manufacturer having--actually, we're just dealing with the meeting before you got here or talking to a new point of sale company. And part of the reason is just a sheer lack of support on our current system. There's no one we can call and say, “Hey, you know our business, you know how we operate. These are the problems we're having.” There's just no one. And so, this other company that's--you absolutely have a person. So having your tanks leaking, you're losing money. You're, you know, that's literally money down the drain, and frustrating if you're a brewery owner, you’re a brewer, you definitely don't want to see your beer going down the drain. Yeah. Do you have the support you need from the manufacturer? Who's going to back up their work and if not, then pay a few more bucks and get somebody who will. J Bagby: Yeah. Downie: Yeah. So, a lesson to live by. D Bagby: Yes, that’s so true. Well, thank you so much. Downie: Thank you. Yeah, let's see. Where's my stop button? (Downie and D Bagby laugh) https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en audio Property rights reside with the university. Copyrights are retained by the university. &#13 ; &#13 ; Please see the related “Preferred Citation note” for language on citing materials from this collection. &#13 ; &#13 ; Permission to examine Library materials is not authorization to publish or to reproduce the examined material in whole, or in part. 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The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=BagbyJeffAndDande_DownieJudith_2018-02-21_access.xml BagbyJeffAndDande_DownieJudith_2018-02-21_access.xml https://archivesearch.csusm.edu/repositories/3/resources/19 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Bagby, Jeff and Dande. Interview February 21, 2018. Description An account of the resource Bagby Beer Company emphasizes traditional style beers, a craft cocktail program, and a restaurant menu to complement their beers. Over the years, Bagby Beer featured highly admired and hard-to-find American and European beers such as Bierstadt Lagerhaus (Denver, CO) and Brasserie d’Orval (Belgium) to complement their lineup. Built on the site of a former car dealership (among other businesses), the Bagbys closely oversaw the construction from the ground up which opened in 2014. The site was also host to the Brewbies® cancer awareness beer festival (2015-2022) and the Low and Slow Lager Festival among other fund raising and educational events. Bagby Beer sold to Green Cheek Beer Company of Costa Mesa, CA in early 2024. Jeff and Dande Bagby are the founders and owners of Bagby Beer Company in Oceanside, CA. Holly Sweat is Publicist at Katalyst Public Relations. Jeff Bagby’s role was as head brewer and leading the on-site Beerleaders brewing education program. Jeff’s brewery experience includes Stone Brewing, White Labs, and Oggi’s Pizza and Brewing. His last brewery before opening Bagby Beer was Pizza Port, leading brewing operations for the chain from the Carlsbad location. During his time at Pizza Port, he led the team to win notable awards and medals such as the World Beer Cup and the Great American Beer Festival’s brewery and brewer awards multiple times. He is one of the most awarded San Diego region brewers, notably garnering more GABF Alpha King Challenge awards for best hoppiest beer in the United States than anyone to date (2005, 2010 and 2011.) He left Pizza Port in 2011 to devote his energy to finding a site for a brewery/restaurant in the San Diego North County beach area. With the sale of Bagby’s to Green Cheek Beer, he remains as the brewer and continues to focus on lagers and traditional styles. Dande Bagby worked as Director of Operations including marketing and customer experience. She designed much of the building. Her employment background includes the San Diego Zoological Society, education, environmental science, restaurant and craft beer bar management, and marketing and finance responsibilities for multimillion-dollar budgets at a Fortune 500 company. She remains active in the transition to Green Cheek Beer Company at this time. In their 2018 interview, Jeff and Dande discuss their introduction to craft beer; homebrewing; introduction of craft beer to the region; Jeff’s entry into the profession in the late 1990s; challenges and responsibilities of founding and building a brewery; packaging and distribution; charity work; competitions, judging, and awards; consumer education. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC027-053 Subject The topic of the resource Bagby Beer Company (Oceanside, Calif.) Brewers -- California -- San Diego County Brewing industry -- California -- History Microbreweries -- California -- San Diego County Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018-02-21 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jeff Bagby Dande Bagby Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Judith Downie Holly Sweat Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Oceanside (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener">In copyright</a>. Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. California State University San Marcos Brewchive(r) Women's experience https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/e6a0557324444a8c6a228b39903f5690.pdf a53157df08f2af558a0dc48546221b23 PDF Text Text JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 (Some early conversation deleted.) Sweat (00:05:30): Is this my copy or is this your copy? (Sweat referring to printed list of questions.) Downie: You can certainly have that because I am just going to let Jeff and Dande, you know, tell me what they want because that is just a list of ideas. You certainly do not have to address anything if you feel like it is giving away company secrets or you are just not comfortable or you just forget about it and tell me something else equally interesting and informative. That’s great. I love to record what I can get. So, you know, it sounds Dande like you maybe got into this a little after Greg did. Excuse me, Greg--I just said Greg. After Jeff did. So maybe we start with Jeff talking about how did he become interested in beer or how did he get into the beer industry and--? J Bagby (00:06:13): Okay. Yeah, so let's see. I started liking bitter beer, I don’t know, at high school, younger age. It just was something that my friends and I found--a couple of friends--who really liked the flavors. Liked the idea-Downie: Now, were you in this area or where were you--? J Bagby: Yeah, I was born and raised in Encinitas. So, San Diego native. Downie: Okay. J Bagby: So yeah, around here. And, actually when I graduated high school, I bought that friend in particular a homebrew set for his birthday. And so, we both messed around and that was my first homebrewing foray, whatever you want to call it. Downie: (00:07:01): Now where did you find your supplies for homebrewing up? J Bagby (00:07:03): Yeah, that is what I was going to say. So, you know, that's the age before the internet and cell phones and things of that nature. So, there is no-Downie: Do you want to give me an approximate year? J Bagby: Uh, (19)93. Downie: Okay. J Bagby: (19)92, (19)93, (19)94, somewhere in there. And, so we had known a little bit, we had heard a little bit, we had tried to go and fish beer from establishments even though we were not of age yet. But at homebrew shop you can buy anything without an ID. So, at least back then you could. So, we Homebrew Mart in Solana Beach. That's where I first met Yusef (Cherney) was actually the one that sold me the kit. Then he went on obviously to do his thing. So, kind of a cool connect there and then they kind of keep happening as time goes on. But, yeah, so we just messed around really. I mean, we re-read things, read books. Talked to brewers when we could, when we traveled, things like that. We ended up going to school together where we got more into it. We were doing all-grain batches and keeping a beer on tap at our house all the time, as well as beers like Sierra Nevada (Brewing Co.), Anchor Steam (Beer), Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 1 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 Original Pizza, Wicked, Red Nectar, some of the Sam(uel) Adams beers. I don’t, what else we could get our hands on that we felt was better. (laughs) Downie (00:08:29): Now was there a bottle shop anywhere nearby where you could (unintelligible)? J Bagby (00:08:34): There was a few. There was in Encinitas and downtown there was Cork and Keg (Cork and Keg Liquors). There was a couple in sort of the Kearny Mesa area that were known for having, you know, hundreds of bottles and typically they were not very good. But we did not necessarily know that at the time (Downie laughs) because we didn’t know what we were tasting and not tasting. Downie (00:08:51): Right. Yeah. J Bagby: I did not know that some of these beers, well, they'd been sitting around on these shelves warm for, you know, a couple of years. Some of them survived perfectly fine. And most of them, you know, like, “Oh, that's what that tastes like, that's kind of weird”. So, when we can find fresh things or more exciting flavors, that was obviously a fun thing. And yeah, just like, I think anybody did back in the nineties, when you found a new bottle of beer, you kept it, or you kind of talked about it and told your friends, “Hey, I tried this, blah-blah-blah.” It was, you know, I was rating beer before there was the internet, before there was, you know, these things that we are so attached to. So yeah, that is kind of where the appreciation started and, you know, throughout college, like I said, wherever, I would go and travel, try to seek out breweries, brew pubs, if it was possible to talk to a brewer and get, you know, whatever information I could, you know. “What kind of grain did you use this? What kind of hops are in this? What is your process for this? And, oh, what size system do you have?” And, you know, it was fun to do. And I was fun to go to cities that had older, richer brewing cultures than San Diego, you know? Back then there was not even probably ten breweries in San Diego at the time. Especially none that we had real easy access to. The easiest one for, for me, ended up being Solana Beach Pizza Port (Pizza Port Solana Beach). Just because I had met people there and met the brewers there. I went there all the time and were buying homebrew supplies from down the street. So, as it grew, you know, I finished school, came back home. I worked summers at the YMCA in Encinitas running their summer camp programs. Youth summer camp programs. So, I was heavily involved in that. But I always really liked--still liked beer. Still went to festivals and— Downie: What was your degree in? J Bagby: It was communications, social science degree. You know, honestly, I just wanted to get done in the school. It is not really my thing. Downie (00:11:04): But you completed it, so “Yay” for you. J Bagby (00:11:07): Yeah, yeah, I can say I have a degree. Whoop. (D Bagby laughs) So yeah, came back home, worked that job or some aspect of it for a summer. And then I was hoping to stay on. I’d had several--I've worked there since I was fifteen (years old). So, I had years of experience, knew the program, knew everything and anything about it. So, it was hoping, well, maybe this will be a full-time job, because the program had grown and grown and grown in the time that I've worked there. But they didn't have a position. Good old nonprofits. So, I started just looking for a job. I was living in Cardiff with some friends and I needed money. I needed something to do. So, through the YMCA, I had a commercial Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 2 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 driver's license to drive kids around, drive big old buses. So, I looked into driving jobs because they paid pretty well. And I could probably get one quick. Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: You know, the degree did nothing for me, so. (laughs) D Bagby: Well, it sounds like you didn’t really want it, too. J Bagby: Well, I mean, it's not like you go, like, what industry are you going to be like? “Yeah. I have a communications degree from UC Santa Barbara,” like there, so? How's that going to help us do blahblah-blah. There was no technology jobs. There was no social media jobs. There was no— Downie: Exactly. J Bagby: (speaking at the same time) I was, I kept going into radio or like news or— Downie: (00:12:28): (speaking at the same time) But it would have taken time to get employed, and you were saying you needed work now. J Bagby: Exactly. Downie: Which is certainly understandable. J Bagby: Exactly. D Bagby: So, think about that before we get the degree. (laughs) Just kidding. (laughs) J Bagby (00:12:36): So let's pay attention and talk about themselves once it’s their turn. (all laugh) D Bagby: Just saying! J Bagby: So anyway, let's see, let's see, oh, came across the job, driving job for Stone Brewing Company. And I remembered that I had been in Solana Beach the very first night they'd ever poured a beer and I'd met Greg (Koch) and Steve (Wagner) and tasted the beer. And I was like, “Oh, this would be great.” You know, I remember them, it's cool to see that they, you know, are still going and are making beer and need a driver. So, I just interviewed with Greg and told him my whole story. And he was like, “Well, obviously you're super overqualified. (Downie laughs) So, you know, you have the job.” And it was fun. It was interesting to see some side of the bar and restaurant and beer industry that I'd never seen before. Learning some of the weird rules that are still in laws that are still in effect today and delivered beer. Drove beer truck for three months. (00:13:40): And Steve and I were at a festival. I would always hang back after I was done and talk with the brewers and see what they were making and see what was coming on and things like that. And Steve was like, “Well, we need another body in the brewery. We need somebody else.” And I was like, “Yeah, sure. I'd love to.” I was like, “Who do I give these truckies to?” (Downie and D Bagby laugh) So I actually found the guy that took my position as a driver. And he's still my Stone rep(resentative) today. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 3 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 Downie: Oh my gosh. J Bagby: Yeah. I still work for Stone in different capacity now, obviously. But yeah, he was a bartender at one of our accounts, he was actually at Pizza Port and he's like, “Oh, how's it going over there?” And “What's it like?” and I'm like, “Well, if you're interested, you could come check this out.” (00:14:27) He was a bartender, so he could still bartend and do that. And so, yeah, he came over and I taught him the routes and boom, he was the driver and I moved into the brewery. So, I learned there, primarily from Lee Chase and Steve Wagner. Their methods to brewing, I'll say, which I still today, I think if you ask about mentors on here, definitely those two guys are some of the first. And they gave me a lot of introductions into people like Skip Virgilio, Yusef Cherney, Jack White, Chris White, Gina and Vince Marsaglia, where I spent hours in their restaurant. Several other people that are still working in beer today, and still active. And, you know, we all kind of, you know, kind of go, “Yep, you were there,” you know, when you have these people that have been open for five minutes. (Downie laughs) Not to say it's bad, but you know, it's nice to have that kind of a bond and that kind of a connection to people that remember when there wasn’t all the things that there are today. Downie: (00:15:33): When it was a struggle. J Bagby: (speaking at the same time) Yeah, big time. Downie: (speaking at the same time) I mean, not that it isn’t a struggle now to run a business and to start having all that, just to be in the first, the forefront of things. J Bagby: Oh yeah, there used to-Downie: There is still some special barriers. J Bagby (00:15:47): When I was living in Cardiff, in driving for Stone and then actually working in the brewery for Stone, we would go to events like every weekend. Every Friday and Saturday night, you know? Because the sales reps are like, “Hey, can you guys come down and help promote?” Or, you know, whenever we went to somewhere and be like, “Hey, do you have Stone beer on tap?” And they'd be like, “What the hell is Stone?” (Downie and D Bagby laugh) You know, and now you can't find somebody that doesn't know what that is. Downie: Right. J Bagby: And back then, it was totally different because people weren't paying attention. People didn't care. There was five tap handles and all five of them are taken up by mass-produced beer, you know? The Heinekens, Amstel Light, Guinness, New Castle, Bud, Bud Light, Coors Light, Miller Light, not Corona, it wasn't going on tap back then but it was in the bottle under the bar. So, it was tough. It was tough for them to gain ground and getting space. And because they came out with a Pale Ale, they were in an immediate competition with Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, which had already, you know, been around for ten years at the time. So, you had that battle. You have this well, “What's, what's different from you? These guys have been doing it for a long time. They make this Hoppy Pale Ale. We've had it on tap. What's the difference?” So yeah, a lot of early struggles, a lot of, you know, almost telling--I like to say this, like Stone told people what to drink. When they came out with a beer like Arrogant Bastard and they came out with a beer like Stone IPA, and it came out with Smoked Porter that came out with these beers that Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 4 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 no one was used to drinking and they were like, “No, you're going to like this, because this is what we have to offer. (00:17:15) And people would taste it. And I think combined shock, new flavors, new tastes, things they'd never had before, they really grabbed onto it. And they were like, “No, this is, this is cool. I really like this.” Not necessarily knowing why or knowing what about the beer that they were actually tasting. Just that it was exciting and it was new. So, I learned to brew on that, (laughs) professional thirty barrel, professional brewhouse pretty quickly. Helped create the first Stone Barley Wine, Old Guardian. Lee and Steve and I each did five-gallon test batches. And then we, we tasted them all and created a recipe. So, that was fun. And few anniversary beers, you know, when they were taking Stone IPA and Double Stone IPA and Triple Stone IPA for the anniversary beers. Those beers just blew people's minds back then because no beer had had that kind of aroma and power on the hop side, you know? (00:18:20) And they're not unlike a lot of West Coast IPAs that are still made today. So that was exciting. The Y(MCA) came calling somewhere in that first year, year and a half that I was in the brewhouse. I got hired at Stone in September of (19)97. And I worked there through sometime in (19)99. Okay. I'm trying to remember exactly when, but I did go back to the Y full-time because they actually have a full-time job for me and they needed the help. So, over the summers I would work a hundred-plus hours a week because I’d work a full-time job at Stone Brewing. And then I would go back over to the Y and help them with everything that they needed for the next day or for the next week of things I hired and trained. Yeah, it was crazy. Monitored staff, bus drivers, all these things while I was still working at Stone. (00:19:13) Left Stone to do the Y thing after one of the summers, because I was like, oh, it's too much. And they were going to give me a little bit more money at Y. So, I went and did that and then got stomped on over there. Got passed over. And I was like, “You know what? I'm done with this. I've given my life to you guys and saved you guys several summers and I'm over it.” So, went back to beer, got hired at White Labs (Brewing Co.) in San Diego. I had known--by this time I had known tons of people in the industry. I had done festivals for Stone. I had worked for them in all sorts of different capacities and also knew the Pizza Port people really well. Downie (00:19:54): So what year--when did you get hired on White Labs? J Bagby (00:19:58): That was probably (19)99? Downie: Okay. J Bagby: (19)99, 2000? I can’t—I’m not positive on that. But somewhere in there. Because I definitely left--I left both the Y I think the--right before the 2000 summer started because they had made some really bad decisions and it bothered me. (Downie laughs) So, let's see. I worked at White Labs for-Downie: As a brewer? J Bagby: No, as a sales kind of yeast consultant. Answer questions for people, take orders, you know. Downie (00:20:34): Was this at their--where they are now? Candida Street or--? J Bagby: (00:20:38): No, this was the location before that. (Silverton Avenue, San Diego location.) Downie: Okay. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 5 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 J Bagby: A little--it's kind of an interesting place like offices on front, warehouse in the back, but much, much smaller than where they are now. Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: (00:20:50) But it was cool. It was definitely educational. It was neat to get to know Chris and Lisa (White) better as well as one of their other then-partners, Chris Mueller. I had already known all of them and met all of them so, it was kind of nice to get a job and work with them. And it was okay. It just wasn’t--it wasn’t exciting for me. And I wanted to get back into the brewhouse and I wanted to get back working with actual beer. So, kept in touch with Pizza Port and the people there, the whole time. I got hired at Solana Beach as an assistant brewer. And so, I was an assistant brewer there and bartender there-Downie: And who was head brewer at the time? J Bagby: Tomme (Arthur), at the time. But we had become friends, gosh, right after he got hired there because I knew the brewer before him. And then they're like, “Oh, that's the new brewer.” So, I just like introduced myself and said, “Hey, I really like these beers here and blah-blah-blah” So we just got to chatting and hanging out and doing all sorts of different things. And you know, even when I was working for Stone, we connected just because it's, you know, another brewery in town. (laughs) And back then— Downie: (00:22:00): Well, it shows the value of networking— J Bagby: Yeah. Downie: And knowing people, it makes a big difference. J Bagby (00:22:06): There's also a way to learn back then, you know? Steve and Lee were great and taught me a lot, but also learned a lot from Tomme. And I also learned a lot from a ton of other breweries that I met back in the late nineties and early two thousands. All across the state and even into Arizona. The guys at Four Peaks (Brewery Co.), still good friends of mine, even though they sold their company for who knows how much, they won’t tell anybody. (Downie and D Bagby laugh) (00:22:30) Places like Marin Brewing (Company), Anderson Valley (Brewing Company), Russian River (Brewing) now, when he was still in Temecula back then. Downie: He was Blind Pig (Brewing) back then. J Bagby: Yeah, I had met him (Vinnie) and Natalie (Cilurzo) back then. Untold numbers of, you know, going to the Great American Beer Festival (GABF) for the first time was probably my biggest eye-opener to all of that and meeting more and more people because now there was the whole U.S. and all the brewers in the U.S. in one room and back then it was easy. You could go and talk to people. I was working for a brewery at the time and that was 1997. It was my first GABF. And I'll never forget going up to people and trying beers and went, “Oh my gosh, that's awesome,” you know? And just making that acquaintance. And I know a lot of those people still today that I met that year at that GABF. So really cool stuff. (00:23:29): And that just kept building, you know? Every time I could go to a conference, every time I could go to another out-of-town festival. Meet more people. (laughs) So, you know, at Solana, I was there for probably two or three years doing assistant brewing and bartending. And then a Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 6 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 position opened up. I had met Tom Nickel through all of this too. Because he was good friends with Tomme. He was a part of the early Ballast Point (Brewing Company) and Home Brew Mart. Tom and I are still very good friends today and Tomme. And so, he said, “Hey.” He was working for Stuft (Pizza and Brewing) at the time before it was Oggi’s. And then when it became Oggi’s, they had one in Vista that opened, their brewer was leaving. And so he's like, “Hey, if you want a head brewing job,” I was like, “Hell yeah.” (Downie and D Bagby laugh) (00:24:19) So, took it. I had interviewed with a couple others. It was just, well I interviewed at Kona and just decided I didn't want to go and live on an island. (laughs) So, and there was an opportunity in my backyard, so, why not take that? So, did that for a while. That was fun. That was really the first time I got to see my influence on brewing, make a difference for somebody's beers or somebody's restaurant or somebody's beer culture, you know? It was the first time I'd won medals on my own with my own beers. You know, we'd done very well on Solana Beach. But this was cool because it was like my stuff. And worked with Tom (Arthur). He became their corporate brewer for a short time up in San Clemente. And I worked at that location for a while until Pizza Port Carlsbad had an opening for a head brewing position and that was a bigger brewhouse. (00:25:14) That was more beer and it was more money and it was Pizza Port was kind of my first forte. So, I went back to that and ran, within a year, was running all the brewing operations on all of their pubs. Helped them open Ocean Beach. Hired, trained, promoted a ton of different brewers who are still in the brewing industry today. Yeah, you’ve got Yiga Miyashiro, the head brewer at Saint Archer (Brewing). Greg Peters, who's the head of Barrel Program there. Ignacio Cervantes, who was the head brewer of Carlsbad after I left and then took over (Pizza Port) Bressi Ranch and is now working for a new company in San Diego (Chula Vista Brewing). Noah Regnery, who also part of that company and Brandon Edwards is also a part of that company. (00:26:05) All guys that were head brewers at Pizza Port went on to several different breweries and have all kind of come back together in one way. I'm sure there's other people. (laughs) Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: But it was a good experience and, you know, going all the way back to my Stone days, you know, Lee and I worked in this warehouse by ourselves, you know? Day in, day out. So, you get in these conversations, you're running, you know, a four head making bottling machine for eight hours while you're filtering a beer, you know? Like, you know? You are brewing, you get into conversations and you know, both of us were like, “Yeah, I really would like to own my own place at some point,” you know? And my thoughts at that time were, I'd really like to just have a beer bar or have a place because I've enjoyed that aspect of it. (00:26:54) I enjoyed teaching people about beer, telling people about new styles and new things that were coming out or that the Pizza Port had just come out with. So, I said, “I don't know what, I just really want to my own place. And Lee was like, “Yeah, me too, me too.” So, it's funny that both of us have had that come trueDownie: Yeah. J Bagby: Over time. But in the Pizza Port years, having, you know, kind of pulled from my YMCA experiences with hiring and training people and building sort of a management approach to running the bars at the Pizza Port, they were, for lack of a better term, they were pretty chaotic and not very well managed. And the companies were, even though they were making money, hand over fist, they weren't making as much as they could because they were losing money, hand over fist because of their bar staff. 00:27:41) So, I tightened up that. I taught their bar staff and what, you know, beer education programs, you know, you had to spend a day in the brewery with me, all of these things. And that carried on to all of the locations. And in doing that and forging that, that's when, you know, I started having Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 7 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 conversations with Dande. We had met and I showed her--actually I was still working at Oggi’s when we met. And, you know, started talking about, well, “What do we want, what do you want to do with this? What would you do with this?” And I was like, “Oh, I want to open my own place.” And it was funny because people would come in while I was brewing in Carlsbad, say, “Oh, we're going to open a brewery.” And I was like, “Oh, cool.” Well, this is, you know, “I've been doing this for a really long time and I'm not ready yet, but you know, good on you.” Or somebody would come in who had just opened a brewery and I'd want to help support them. (00:28:32) So, we had guest beers at Pizza Port, we would put their beer on tap and, you know? I would talk it up and everything. And then it was funny because by the time I left Carlsbad, I didn't have that approach. I was like, “Okay, bring your beers in and then I'll taste them and we'll see what we can do.” Yeah, “We'll give you some feedback or we'll see if we can get you into rotation or not,” you know? We have a big board, there's a ton of trends, and there's a ton of spots. They're almost always taken whatever the case was, but I wasn't as eager to just blindly accept the keg as I had been in the past, when there was, you know, “Let's promote local beer and let's get this scene going.” And it transferred all the way into here because now there's even more breweries. (00:29:15) But now that I'm one of those people that's trying to sell beer to people. (laughs) D Bagby: Yeah. J Bagby: It's always so-- I get it. And, you know, hopefully, you know, the things that we had talked about before we opened and the things that we wanted to do is largely what you see today. When you come here and it's not just a beer aspect, it's a food aspect, it's a space and feel. It's also our cocktail and spirits program, wine program. All the things that we do here are things that we talked about ten years ago. Of course, it took us a very long time to get to that point. And I think we've surpassed many mountains in that process of getting to where we are, which is something that feels really good. But it's also a constant struggle when there's, you know, things that we deal with every day. (00:30:09): And somebody asked me the other day, “Oh, would you go back and do it again?” Yeah, I would. Hopefully I know a little bit more. (all laugh) As Dande was talking about earlier with managing the construction, but it's been a crazy, crazy road. It's been fun to have been a part of San Diego beer, to have kind of put my efforts into not only just promoting the people that I worked for, but training other people into that and, you know, really teaching and promoting what good beer is and making sure that I did everything I could to make sure that San Diego was seen that way and perceived that way across the country and across the world. And I believe that I still do that today, even though there's one hundred and fifty or what odd breweries in town. I still make my efforts to make sure that that happens if that makes sense. Downie (00:31:07): Yeah, it does. J Bagby: Cool. Downie: So, what made you decide to basically take down Continental Motors? (J and D Bagby laugh) What made you decide on taking this piece of property and rather than taking over-J Bagby: Good question. Downie--a building that you could just kind of refurbish? J Bagby (00:31:25): Yeah. Well, I kind of still ask myself that question a lot. (D Bagby laughs) D Bagby: Depends on how good the day is going. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 8 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 J Bagby: That 3,000 square foot warehouse looks pretty cool somedays. (laughs) No, we had a location in Encinitas that we were pretty fond of. I wanted to be the first person to make beer and Encinitas since there was one little tiny spot that was open for like nine months in downtown Encinitas called the Red Kettle. D Bagby: The (19)80s? J Bagby: And it was like (19)89 to (19)90, something like that, I think it was open. And sounded like the guy didn't know a whole lot about what he's doing. And it would be interesting to see if you find any more information on that. Downie: There’s very little on the Red Kettle. I’ve been looking. J Bagby: (00:32:07): There's like one article you can still pull up online. Vince Marsaglia, I remember he'll tell me stories. He's told me stories about going in there and talking to the guy about brewing. But anyway, I wanted to be like, “No, I want to open up a brewery and want to, you know, it's not going to be a restaurant with the little kid in the back.” Like, yeah, I want to do that in Encinitas ‘cause Encinitas neighborhood made it look cool there.(32:30) But building situation fell through. We had spent some time, even some money getting people together. We had met with everyone at the city of Encinitas. So, we knew it was going to be a bit of an uphill battle with what's going down there on the Coast. It was on Coast Highway in Encinitas, big, beautiful, gorgeous eighty-three hundred square foot building with a wooden barrel ceiling and twelve-foot brick walls. Gorgeous place. (00:32:58) And the landlord--we had never actually spoke with the landlord. We had only spoke with his representative and he had edged us along the way. “Yeah, that's good. It's good. Yeah. That's no, he's, he wants to do this.” And we put in our LOI (Letter of Intent), you know, spent, like I said, I spent time with the city. This is what we're thinking about doing. Architects, all sorts of things. Structural engineering, because the building's old. It was an old Safeway or something, I think. D Bagby: (33:23) It was a grocery store. J Bagby: Yeah, it was a grocery store at one time. That's why. And all of a sudden we just weren't hearing anything back from the rep. So, I just called them up and, “Dude, what's going on?” Like we were going forward, we think this is happening. We've heard nothing. And he just basically said, “No,” without, you know, I tried to reach out to the landlord. (00:33:48) The owner said, “Hey, just meet me. Just--let's have a conversation.” Could never get there. And from what I hear, that guy's kind of a maniac, so I'm kind of glad we didn't get in that situation. (D Bagby laughs) But I do miss the idea of being there in that building and being in Encinitas. I think that would have been really, really cool. But-Downie: As a hometown boy. J Bagby: (34:12) (laughs) But, we took that setback. Or, yeah, it was a setback, because we were, you know, not that we'd put all our eggs in that basket, but we definitely— D Bagby: (00:34:25): Several months. J Bagby: But, yeah, we spent several months of time on it. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 9 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 D Bagby: We kind of mentally moved into it too. You start to really put yourself there and how to Jeff, as you mentioned earlier, like, we had been talking about these ideas that you now see here for a long time. And so, you start to sort of layer those ideas over the space and figure out how things might go. And, it was really--it was a huge disappointment. J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: But we got over it pretty quickly and moved on and... J Bagby (00:34:51): Yeah. So, we decided to, not to stop, but to kind of regroup. We got married and after we got married, we decided to enlist the help of a commercial real estate. So, we, through some friends we found a really good broker. And he gave--started just giving me--I met with him--he gave me no less than I think a hundred properties throughout the county to look at. And we had already found out a little bit on our own through some other connections, you know. Basically, no one's going to give you any cash. If you're in a strip mall, you're going to be paying even though, your rent might be lower, you're going to be paying other fees that make that rent go back up. And they basically only take national conglomerate stores that have very, very deep pockets these days. Not too many private strip malls out there taking breweries and first-time owners and let alone, “Oh, you want to open a restaurant and a brewery? Okay, yeah. High risk, high risk. No, don't do it, all those things.” (35:49) So, we sought out to find private owners and properties that started to fit what we what we had or what we wanted on there, which was coastal North County, enough space for a restaurant, enough space to have a decent sized brewery, and a space that will allow for indoor-outdoor dining. We love the aspect of letting people or giving the people the opportunity to eat outside in this gorgeous weather that we have almost year-round. So, I'd never thought about Oceanside, but I knew that anything in between Del Mar and Carlsbad was going to be extremely expensive and extremely difficult to find. Especially for the uses that we wanted to do. You know, we were trying not to have a conditional use permit. (00:36:38): We're trying not to deal with the (California) Coastal Commission. We're trying to get into a spot where we could build or remodel, I should say, for the most part. Downie (36:47): Yeah (laughs). J Bagby: But pretty much ended up re-building. If you saw what we did to this place before we rebuilt it— Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: We basically tore it down. Anyway, he gave me a list of seven, eight properties in Oceanside here. So, I just grabbed my camera, my notebook, and my bike and rode them all. And I came across this one and it was--you could go all the way around it, but you couldn't see much. Where the brewery is now, were solid roll-down doors. It was their maintenance garage. Up front was a showroom, so, I could look in the windows there. That building to the south, you can kind of look in there too, but you couldn't tell what was exactly going on over here. (00:37:28): You can see a little bit, all closed, looked like it had been, somebody had moved out. And so, in my head it just started clicking and I'm like, “Oh, what if that was there? And what if we put, you know, the brewery in here? What if we did this here?” I took, I don't know, fifty pictures of the place looked at the other properties and went home and told her. I'm like, “I found it.” And she's like, “What are you talking about?” Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 10 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 D Bagby: You actually called me from the space. (J Bagby laughs) J Bagby: I’m like, “It's an old car dealership.” She’s like, “You're fucking insane.” I’m like, “Get in a car, come down here.” (all laugh) D Bagby: It’s basically what happened. J Bagby: (laughs) So, yeah, we just kind of went from there. We told our broker, “Hey, can you, you know—" super sensitive about contacting the realtor—realtor rep, landlord, anything like that. D Bagby (00:38:14): Because of our experience in the industry. J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: We wanted to make--just kind of proceed cautiously. And we did not have our hopes up. We had no idea what they would--what their response would be to any kind of inquiry. J Bagby: (00:38:21): We obviously originally thought that they wanted car dealerships to take it over again. Just because they were set up that way. They have the lifts, they had the excess parking. They had, you know, frontage on South Coast Highway. There's seven other places, you know? So, we thought that's what they were going for. And they originally, they kind of said, “Yeah,” because use is that, it'd be easy for their somebody to just take it over. Downie: Right. J Bagby: And a couple of inquiries they had because the space was so big and nobody wanted it all. They would want just that building or just the parking lot, or just part of this main building, main parcel. So, I said, “Well, we're kind of interested in all of that.” (laughs) And so anyway, the original conversation with rep-between-rep, the idea of a brewery got brought up by the rep from here and unsolicited-D Bagby: By their broker, yeah. J Bagby: Unsolicited from our broker at all. (00:39:20) And I was like, “Yes. Okay, cool.” And so, I'm like, “Hey, can we get in it? Can we look around and see what's going on?” So, the very first day we came to look at it and the landlords was here, the owners were here. And they wanted to meet us and they wanted to hear about what we wanted to do. And if we thought the space would work. And they're still friends of ours today. They still come in here and eat. His father was from Bamberg, Germany, which is a huge brewing scene in Germany and malts. There's two big malt companies in Bamberg. Then I said, “Well, I buy malt from Bamberg.” (Downie and D Bagby laugh) So, we had this, you know, this back and forth. Their son is into beer. And he really liked the idea of the legacy of the property that his father had started going into another family business of some kind. I think that probably in the end was what attracted them the most to us. But we poured our hearts out like, “Hey, this is what we want to do. And we totally get it. Like, you know, we've never opened a business. This is a huge spot. We have to raise a ton of money.” All these things, but we really want to do it.” And they went for it. D Bagby (00:40:34): Much to their credit, honestly. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 11 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: They took a big risk on us. And, it's a big point of pride for Jeff and I-J Bagby: Definitely. D Bagby: (40:41) -- to count them among legitimately among friends. And, we're just, we're so grateful to them for just being open-minded. It was their family's business that was here and then that they had to close and they still own the property. And they, you know, we have a long long-term lease and several options. So, we don't own the space. I'm sure the property will stay in their family forever, which I think is fine. It's perfect. But they just really--they were very interested in us as people and-J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: (00:41:13): --what our vision was and what we wanted to do and how we wanted to do it. And I think that aligned, even though they're totally different industries, it really aligned with their values. And, yeah, much to— Downie: Their European background. D Bagby: Yeah, definitely that that's probably part of it. (laughs) But I remember when they finally agreed, it was sort of like, obviously it's exciting, but it's also instantly terrifying. Downie: Yeah. D Bagby: You don't--And we didn't even realize at the time what we had just done, I don't think. (Downie D Bagby laugh) J Bagby (00:41:46): It took me six weeks to get the lease exactly where we wanted it. D Bagby: At least. J Bagby: And it's like, I think it's sixty pages of like, eight, nine-point font. It's like line-by-line and you just, you have to know, “Okay, what does this lawyerese mean?” And then go and read through and go, “Okay, no, that's what we don't agree with. Here's the change we need,” you know? And so, we just-the back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And then we start with contractors interviewing contractors, and that is a whole fiasco in and of itself because they're intense. And they realized that in the end, throughout this thing, I think they realized that their relationship is never going to be a great one, just because of the nature of the industry. D Bagby: It can’t. J Bagby: It just can't. There's too many variables and there's too much money and there's too much time involved for--I've never met anybody who was like, “Yeah, I loved my GC. My project went amazing.” They're full of shit. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 12 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 D Bagby: It’s like a disposable relationship in a weird way. J Bagby: Yeah, you just-D Bagby: You need them, they you need but then it's over and we're done. We don't want to see you again kind of thing. It's terrible, but that's just kind of the nature of it. Downie (00:42:53): Now did your general have any background in building a brewery? J Bagby (00:42:55): (speaking at the same time) No, in restaurants. D Bagby: (speaking at the same time) In restaurants. J Bagby: Yeah, restaurants, and commercial or retail. But mostly restaurants and bars is what we were attracted to him for. D Bagby: Small company also-J Bagby: Smaller company. Had the reputation of being able to do something like this D Bagby: Had worked with the architect— J Bagby: Yeah, he had worked with our architect on a project before and yeah, I mean the architect firm went down in flames pretty quick. (D Bagby laughs) I realized, oddly enough, we got an apology email from him last week, which was-D Bagby: A little late. J Bagby: Frustrating two years later. But, yeah, they just weren't equipped and we didn't know that they weren't equipped. D Bagby: We didn't know enough to know that. J Bagby: Yeah. And then, you know, I spent countless hours going to the counters at the city to talk to the engineers, to talk to the-D Bagby: The building inspectors. J Bagby: The building inspectors and just going back and forth. “No, we need this. Okay.” So, because I'm trying to facilitate--we're trying to facilitate this project and keep it moving. (00:43:57) And there's obviously no one in the world has any incentive, but, or the most incentive than us to get it done. And so, we're just, like she said, we just took it on. We project managed, we--every day, we'd come here and walk through and see what was done wrong or what hadn't been done or why isn't, so-and-so working today, you know? And part of that was on the GC, part of that was on their architect, and they both fell down. The architect first and then the GC. We went through five superintendents here on our project to the general contractor. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 13 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 Downie: Oh dear. J Bagby (44:30): And by the end I was like, “Him or no one else.” And so, we got this last guy just to get through and get our building final then and everything. But you name a discipline, you name a part or a section or a wall. I spent time on it. She spent time on it. It's--so now, you know, we're like, we're telling them, we're like, “You guys get to go, you guys get to pack up your shit and leave.” And we get to turn around and actually do what we wanted to do six months ago, or, you know, a year ago. D Bagby: When we started construction, yeah. J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: (00:45:07) When we thought we’d be done, especially. J Bagby: We, you know, we need to spend time on--I mean, we're still taking on investors, but we have to start the project. We're still searching out for investors. We're still trying to find our key executive management team and how the hell we're going to run this place. I'm still trying to figure out how to get the rest of the brewery finished off and actually making beer because we didn't want to open without our own beer. And it was just, you know, just kept on, I didn't, I think I lost forty pounds and that last like six months of the other projects before we opened, just because I could never eat, I could never sleep. And I was constantly doing something on a project that sent my stress levels through the roof. So, it was very-D Bagby: And then you get to operate your business. J Bagby: Yeah, and then you open and you know, there's five hundred people here on a Saturday and they all want food and beer. Downie: Excellent. D Bagby (00:45:53): Which is great, yeah. I mean, there is that question. I mean, you just, you don't know until it happens when you open the door for the first time. Is anybody going to be here? And I know that sounds ridiculous when you think of the size of this and even just people curious. Obviously, there will be people that are curious that are cruising by, but you really don't know. I mean, it is, you don't--you don't really let yourself think that because you can't. You just have to continue to stay true to your goal and your vision. And once you start, you can't stop. I mean, it's go time. And so, when you do finally open the doors, it's amazing. It is. It's kind of amazing that people are here. And I remember the first, like week we were open, it felt really strange that there were people here I didn’t know. (00:46:37) I was like, “Who are these people? Oh, shoot. They're supposed to be here. That's right.” (Downie laughs) It was just very weird. And we had spent so much time here over the, you know, proceeding two years that it was--it was home. We were here three hours to one, the number of hours, or four hours to one, the number of hours we would spend at home for sure. And so, this was home. And so, we knew every contract, we knew every subcontractor. We knew everybody. And they knew us. And so, when it was time to let strangers in, (laughs) it was weird. But, you know, you get over that pretty quickly. J Bagby: Yeah. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 14 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 D Bagby: Because they are spending money. Downie (00:47:14): Of course, talking about the ‘curious’ issue, are you going to come back? D Bagby: Yeah, of course. Downie: Because just a one-time visit isn't going to keep you going. D Bagby (00:47:21): That’s right. Yeah, that's right. And that's still something that's, you know, on the operational side that we are always striving for. We want to be that place that people are like, “I can't wait to go back there.” We're still young though. And I that's the counterpoint to that is first of all, never stop trying. I mean, there's always something we can do better, always something we can refine. Always a better way or a more efficient way or a way that's going to make our guests happier. So, we are always pushing. We never, ever stopped. And I don't think we ever will. That's just our personalities. And luckily, it's the same--those personality traits are reflected our management team. So, they all feel the same way too. There's absolutely nobody on that team that is not completely there with us. Ready to just keep pushing and pushing and pushing. And our staff, it goes all the way to them. (00:48:09): The people that are attracted to a place like this to work here. They, you know, they like that it's family. They liked that it's unique and different. They like that we're always pushing the envelope, trying to come up with cool new things or new ways or whatever the case. And so, it starts to draw in people who are naturally attracted to that. And so, they have a really kind of an inherent flexibility that is critical, but we couldn't have scripted that. I didn't really realize that, but it is true. We are--we ask a lot of them. We ask them to be very nimble and to do something very different one day than they did the day before, because we're trying to— J Bagby: Sorry, I’ve got to go downstairs and talk to them for a minute. D Bagby: Okay. Downie: Okay. J Bagby: Okay, I'll be right back. I got to set up a potential account with some tasting. D Bagby: Doing some tasting. Do you want to bring them upstairs for a taste? J Bagby: You did ask a question and that was what attracted us to this? Just going to finalize that and say the space. (Downie and D Bagby laugh) D Bagby (00:49:09): Yeah, the space for sure was the deciding factor. But when he called me from here and I've told this story before, and he said--I asked, you know, the data, like, how big is it? What's going on? And when he started to rattle off the statistics, I'm like, in my mind, “There's no way this is going to happen. (Downie laughs) There's no way.” And then every little hurdle you cross over, you knock that domino down and then pretty soon you're signing your lease. And it still doesn't really feel real until then. And then even then it doesn't feel real until— Downie (00:49:38): But you've been disappointed once already so-- Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 15 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 D Bagby: Yeah. Downie: So it was kind of like you don't exactly want to get too invested— D Bagby (00:49:44): Once you sign the lease though, and you are a personal guarantee on that. It's yours. And so, then it's like, what do you do with that? Because there is a certain amount of money that if you just--even if you decide to never do anything with it, you're paying on your own personal account for that. So, and we knew that it was a big risk of the landlords, the owners. We knew that we wanted to not disappoint them too, as another layer in all of this. But I really didn't believe it was going to happen until it started happening. (laughs) And then the train was going and there was no stopping it, which is good. Downie (00:50:16): Yeah. So, what about your background, Dande? As far, as you know, you said you worked in a Fortune 500 company. Well, what's your path that got you here? And to actually be supportive of something that you could have very easily said, “No, I don't want to do this.” D Bagby (00:50:31): Yeah. I still do say that sometimes. No, I'm just kidding. No, my background is really weird. But somehow it all sort of feeds into to all the things that we do here. So, I worked in restaurants in high school and a little bit in college. I ended up working for a very small sort of family-run or just a couple of friends started the small kind of Mexican food chain. It was a kind of a spinoff from the Rubio’s chain. So, they had helped Ralph Rubio start Rubio's and they started their own thing. And so, I, you know, started working there my first restaurant job and worked my way up into management. And I'm still friends with the owners of that. They've since sold it all off, but it was really exciting to be a part of a small, very small and growing company. (00:51:18) When I first was hired by them, they had one location. And then ultimately, I think they had seven or eight. Not when I worked there, but at the end of the sort of end of the line for them. And what happened though, was that they set the bar really high. I mean, they treated this little single location, you know, eight hundred square foot taco shop. They treated it as though it was a corporate--very, very organized, very dialed in, very high-quality, high standards when it came to customer service and food service and all of that. Even though it was a walkup counter. So that was my only exposure to restaurants was that. And so, it really, it changed how I saw things, whether it was from a business perspective or from a restaurant perspective. And that was sort of, that became my benchmark, for how to be. How to be a manager, how to be managed, how to treat employees, all of that stuff began then. (00:52:17): And it was my first real job was there. And I worked there for many years while I was--and then I went to school--my degree is in biology from Cal State San Marcos (California State University San Marcos). Downie: My goodness. (laughs) D Bagby: Yeah. So, I was a molecular cell biology major. But, before that, I wanted to be a zoologist. So, I started at Palomar and my very first class, my very first semester of college at Palomar, was as zoology class. And it was just life science, check the box, get that out of the way. And I fell in love with it and it was everything. I loved it. It was--my instructor was amazing. I don't think she's alive anymore. Dr. Jessup was her name. And she was a genius and I just wanted to absorb a hundred percent of everything she could teach me, I wanted to learn it. (00:53:07) And so that kind of led me-- I worked for the Zoological Society of San Diego for about seven years. So, I left restaurants and did that and finished my degree at Cal State and left. And I taught biology and environmental science at the high school level. I Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 16 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 taught labs--biology labs--at the junior college level for a few years. And then ultimately worked for SDG&E (San Diego Gas & Electric Company) in their Environmental Science Department. And, that's about when I met Jeff. So, I had done all of this sort of teaching and I hadn't worked in a restaurant in a long time. And when he and I first met, he had, like he said, he had beer on tap, both at Oggi’s in Vista where he had been the head brewer and at Pizza Port Carlsbad. And I had always liked beer, but I knew absolutely nothing about it. It was completely foreign to me. I didn't even--it didn't really occur to me that it was something that you could learn about. It just sort of was a thing that existed. And of course that's--couldn't be more wrong (Downie laughs) even then in 2005, even then. And so he's like, “Well come and let's taste some beer at in Vista.” So, we went out there and he just did the tasting, not a flight. I mean he pulled--we had tasters of every beer that was on tap. There must've been a dozen beers or more. And he kind of just lined them up how you would want somebody to kind of learn about beer. And he just was like, “Okay, what does it look like? What does it smell like? What does it taste like? Where do you think that's coming from? What is that? Did you do--?” you know? I remember specifically the hefeweizen he's like, “Do you think we added anything to make that taste like that?” And I was like, “Well, yeah, you probably added some fruit or you added some spice.” And absolutely not. Just from the yeast, and that tied into my biology background. Downie (54:58): Right. D Bagby: And understanding sort of a little bit about, you know, yeast chemistry, yeast metabolism. And then it started to click. I was like, “Okay, this is cool.” And then of course that led into ales and lagers and how they're, you know, metabolized differently. And all of the life cycle and all of that stuff. And so that really kind of itched, or what do you say, like “Scratch that itch” or whatever that science-y stuff. I really, really appreciated on the cellular level, which I had kind of departed from working in environmental science. (00:55:32) So, that was a really huge eye-opener and that was kind of it for me. So, we tasted through all the beers and that created this sort of framework for me that I still rely on today. That's just sort of styles and, you know, parts of the world. And, you know, this is like this. And that's like, you know, whether it's hops in English IPA versus an American IPA and why and how, and, even just the physical I'm like, “I don't know what hop is. I have no idea.” So, he went and he grabbed a handful of hops and was like, “This is what they are. This is what they smell like. This is what they look like. This is where they're grown.” Of course, that led into hop harvest. And that led into fresh hop beer. And I remember specifically that season going down to-- because he still was bartending. (00:56:17) So, he had, he left Pizza Port or--excuse me, he left Oggi’s and Vista and he was head brewing in Carlsbad and he was still bartending at Solana Beach. And I lived in Cardiff at the time. And so, I would go visit him on his bartend. I think he would work Wednesday nights and same thing. He'd be like, “Well, taste this, have a taste of this.” And I specifically remember fresh hop beers that season because it was unlike anything I'd ever had before. They were--it was just amazing to me. It was this bouquet of--it really tasted like drinking flowers. And that was really exciting. So, every new experience was just something to be learned. Unlike Jeff, I loved school, I loved being a student. I loved studying and I still do. I still love to learn. So does he, but even in that, even in an academic setting, I loved at all. (00:57:05) And so it created this never-ending quest for information and knowledge and then that tied into experience. And so, when we would travel to whether it was in California or abroad or wherever, it creates this sort of, I don't know, structure, if you will. This kind of map or pathway for learning that, you know, whether it's about people or history or the ingredients and where they came from. And so that became, it became a passion of mine as well. And this was pretty close to right away. So, you know, within the first year or so of us dating, you know, we were going to events, we were traveling for beer. We were, you know, it just became part of our shared thing. But also, I loved learning from him too. And, yeah, and he's right. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 17 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 (00:57:57) We started talking about opening a place, or that he wanted to open a place, pretty quickly. I mean, it was certainly not something that was going to be happening anytime soon, but it was again part of the discussion. And so, when you're traveling somewhere, you're going--his family, his father's side is from Northern Arizona, Prescott. Little town called Prescott. So, you know, we were traveling out there once or twice a year to visit his grandfather and kind of hang out and there's Prescott Brewing Company. So, we'd go there and just kind of talk about whether it was the beers or the styles or the hop choices or whatever to--do you think how’s the service? Is that are--what would we do differently? What about the glassware? Does this seem right? And--or how's the check presented? I mean, everything, it just became part of the fabric of what we talked about. And, yeah, that lasted and it's still true. It's still true today. And we go places and we look at how just the, how the operational side, how people are solving their own problems and you know, are those things we can borrow or are they things that we would never do because they don't fit with who we are. So that's how, that's the weird biologybiologist into brewery owner. Downie (00:59:15): Everybody comes from somewhere. D Bagby: That’s right. Downie: Actually, you know, like you say, the whole hops chemistry. You know, Jackie Trischman in Chemistry at Cal State (University San Marcos) is working with Stone investigating hops chemistry. D Bagby: That’s awesome. Downie: So, you know, Bonnie Bade (Cal State University San Marcos) in Anthropology is medicinal plants, Native American medicinal plants, and looking at how those can be incorporated into beers and things, so… D Bagby: Absolutely. Downie: So, it's--you can pull a whole lot of different disciplines and interests and experiences into-D Bagby: Absolutely. Downie: The whole world of beer. D Bagby (00:59:45): Absolutely. And that, and the whole historical piece too, is something that both Jeff and I are really passionate about. And that's a big reason why we have such diversity in terms of the beer styles that we brew here. He brews here because of that. They, you know, a Belgian blonde brings us--brings us back to Brussels. It brings us back to visiting with our friend Yvan (De Baets) from (Brasserie) de la Senne, you know? That to us is a big reason why we wanted to do this also is to bring pieces of these experiences that we've had all over the world right here. And if somebody is able, isn't able, or doesn't know they want yet to go to Belgium or they don't know they want to go to Germany or maybe they never will, you know? If we can bring a little piece of that to them, that's whether it's the beer, the glassware, the, you know, a little bit of history lesson through our employees. That's all--that's a big, that's a huge piece of this for us. So having a big staff is a challenge. Per slight understatement. Downie: How many employees do you have? Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 18 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 D Bagby: We have about sixty employees now. Yeah. Which is the smallest staff we've ever had. We-when we first opened and you always open with more than you need, but we had over a hundred employees at one point. Downie: Wow. D Bagby: Which is a big, huge thing. Lots of people. J Bagby (01:01:06): Through all of that, through all of the construction, through all of the opening and employees (unintelligible), I like to tell people that absolutely nothing surprises me anymore. D Bagby: No J Bagby: Nothing. D Bagby: No, no. J Bagby: I've heard it all, seen it all at all. Been through it all. Yeah. Downie (01:01:22): And you're still standing. D Bagby: Yeah. We are. Yep. Downie: So, you've already said that you really don't look to expand beyond this site and it seems like it's large and you have plenty of elbow room but— J Bagby (01:01:39): We could even expand onsite because we have a building that we haven't really even touched—(speaking at the same time) D Bagby: (speaking at the same time) Touched. Yeah. Downie: You’re kidding. D Bagby: Yeah. Downie (01:01:44): So you have expansion elbow room. J Bagby: (speaking at the same time) Yes. D Bagby: (speaking at the same time) Yes. Downie: But since you're not canning beers now, what are your plans for the future in, you know, distribution or canning or--? J Bagby (01:01:56): So, we've gone back and forth. What--we looked pretty seriously at purchasing a canning line. Mike Hess (Mike Hess Brewing) was selling theirs. So, I went down and looked at it, kind of Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 19 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 ran some numbers and looked at it. But we wouldn't have been a good idea for cashflow for one thing. And the other was, we didn't have that output really. So, we'd have this really-D Bagby: Beautiful. J Bagby: Nice canning line and it would be lovely to put a ton of beer in cans, but no output for it. Downie: Okay. J Bagby: (1:02:24) Which, you know, cart before the horse or not, or whatever, it's sometimes you just have to jump in. And so, we decided not to at that point, but it is something that's on the mind, especially with a lot of our beers that tend to be growing in popularity and that we think would be really good in a package or in the proper package. So, that's still a possibility. But we haven't decided what step we're going to take first in doing that. So, there is a possibly of that in the next year or two, three. Other than that, I really want to continue pushing our draft distribution because it's something that we can do in the framework that we have. We have the beer, we have cooperage, we can get more cooperage very easily. And the capital outlay isn’t as much, and the space requirement is not as much or as intense as packaging. What else, what else? D Bagby (01:03:23): We one hundred percent self-distribute in California. So, we don't have a distributor anywhere. J Bagby: Out of state we have (unintelligible). D Bagby: Out of state, yeah, we (unintelligible). J Bagby: We’re not spending a lot out beer of out of state, yeah. (Aside to D Bagby, Forgot to tell you I talked to Matt Bonney yesterday about Washington.) D Bagby: Oh, okay, cool. J Bagby: So, we'll do some stuff up there, but anyway. (laughs) D Bagby (01:03:40): There you go. Heard it here first before I even heard it. (laughs) No, just kidding. J Bagby (01:03:44): And he called me during the party. D Bagby (01:03:45): Yeah. So self-distribution. We want to do that as long as we can. As a young business, (unintelligible), the margins on draft wholesale beer are already pretty, pretty low. So, you want to try to maximize as much revenue as you can at this stage of a business. There's also a lot of interesting things happening. I try to kind of dial into this a little bit as much as I can. There's a lot going on with this whole notion of hyper-local and, you know, being the kind of brewery that, and there are lots of them, that have these humongous, very ambitious goals to be in every state or to be in twenty states or to be all over the place right now. And I certainly don't disparage that, that's part of their business model and that's what they think is awesome. (01:04:34): Go for it. But it's really feeling a lot like people are more, appreciating more and more, what's right near them. And you see certain breweries that are drawing back from that, that broad scale distribution more and more-- Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 20 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 J Bagby: Or just staying where they are. D Bagby: (1:04:55) Or are just staying where they are, yeah. They say steady is the new growth. So, I think we're just, we're kind of a cautious company. We don't take a lot of big risks. Maybe because we have such a gigantic property here and so much going on that we don't have to. I mean, we don't even have the energy really to make big plans. But, no, we do talk a about what's next and where, where are we going to grow. And I do think even locally--we, you know, Jeff said, when he tries to sell someone beer, we actually haven’t actively sold any beer. Every drop of beer that hasn't been sold over our bar here at the pub has been somebody coming and saying, “Hey, I want to have your beer on at my place.” So, they reach out to us either, you know, usually via email. J Bagby (01:05:41): That’s who I just met downstairs. And he is a friend, but they came to us to taste. More traditional sort of setup like, “Hey, can you send your rep by and bring some of your beers? I'd like to taste them on tap.” D Bagby: Yeah, we do not have a rep. (laughs) J Bagby: I'm the rep. D Bagby (01:05:56): We don’t have one of those. Yeah. (J Bagby laughs) Part of it is too--and so that’s, it’s kind of nice that that’s, because then we know the accounts that have come to us really already get it. They already understand what we do and appreciate that enough to reach out, but we do not, we understand that is not sustainable. And the growth that we really do want to realize on the wholesale side is only achievable with some outreach. And that’s something that is--we know, we both acknowledge that that’s really important. But we also, again talk about kind of risk aversion. We were— it's still too close to us. We don’t want to just hire a sales rep and tell them to go out in the world and sell the beer. It’s really hard to let go of it and to, you know, just be those, just say, “Oh yeah, go for it. Volume volume. Get it.” (01:06:42) Because it still really matters to us who’s pouring it. How they’re pouring it. Are they taking care of the kegs? Is the glassware appropriate? Is it clean? Are the lines clean? All we need is somebody to have a beer like this Kölsch that I'm drinking that is so delicate. And such a light beer that, you know, if it’s not cared for it is going to be flawed. And you know, most people don't drink a beer and think that they don’t like and think that it isn’t the brewer (laughs) or the brewery. Most people do not say, “Oh, those lines must be dirty. That's why this does not taste right.” So, it’s just cautious and definitely overly cautious. I’ll say we are very careful. And, you know, that’s, at some point we're going to have to start peeling our fingers off those kegs a little more forcefully and get out there in the world and really see. We hear from time to time that people believe that we just don't have any beer to sell. Because we aren’t actively selling it, which isn’t true. We make a lot of beer and we sell a lot of beer over our own bars, but we definitely have some volume that could go out much more than it is. So, we’re working on it. Got our hands pretty full. (laughs) Downie (01:07:57): Now, this is something, you know, because you are both cautious people, but what if something happened and your landlord decided to sell the property? J Bagby (01:08:08): So, there's provisions in our lease that say that I can’t change our lease. Downie: Okay. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 21 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 Downie: It was very protective. D Bagby: Yeah. J Bagby: (1:08:15) It was very protected line by line that thing to make sure things like that like they couldn’t say, “Oh, we are going to sell a parking lot to a developer for apartments.” They can’t do that, you know? So, if they sell it our lease stands. D Bagby: And we can buy it too, we have to be considered. J Bagby: We don’t have first right of refusal. D Bagby: Something else called that. J Bagby: (1:08:38) Their landlord or their rep did not want to give that--our landlords have kids. I would not see them giving up this property to somebody unless we just came by and plopped the amount of money on them, which can happen. And, you know, I know that the people that own these shops kind of behind the alley-D Bagby: West of us. J Bagby: The other side, are trying to develop it and turn it into apartments. J Bagby (01:09:07): I'm like, that is a six-year project. If Coastal Commission-D Bagby: It’s the Coastal Commission. Downie: Yeah, it’s a coastal commission. Will even allow it. D Bagby: Yeah, if the city-J Bagby: (1:09:17) We are so lucky to avoid those things, you know? We don’t have a conditional use. It was in the beginning we had some neighbors that were complaining. And I think it was just because people were parking on the street. It’s public parking on the street. And they were just getting mad because they used to park in front of their house at a certain time of night. And it wouldn’t be a problem. You know, because we’re—anyway. Somebody came and complained and said, “Oh, well, I'm going to go to the city. And you know, I’ve already started signatures to get your conditional use removed and dah-dah-dah.” And I was like, “Well, that’s cool, but we don’t have a conditional use.” And (the city has nothing to do over what we do here as a business. Because we’re permitted as a right. So, (whispers) sorry about that. (laughs) D Bagby (01:09:58): Yeah, it was, we haven’t really, honestly, for being as close as we are to residential, we have had virtually no issues other than the first probably month we were open where people were kind of caught off guard maybe by the volume. But that’s, I mean, at least as far as I'm aware, we haven’t had any issues. We haven’t had any issues. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 22 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 J Bagby (01:10:16): I had a couple of things. There was that one guy that, you know, I think he just wanted to come in and kind of rant. And I was nice to him. I just let him go. And when I said, you know, “I want to work with you. I want to work with the community, but you got to realize that, you know, the streets are public parking and unless you get that changed, which you're perfectly willing to try to try to do, but I don't believe the city is going to let you just for your spot in front of your house. And you know, I want to help you. We have the required parking that we're supposed to have for the use that we have here per our agreements with the city. And, you know, really sorry if there's any incidents or things that, you know, please feel free to call us.” Like just, you know, kill them with kindness kind of thing. And you know, reminded him that he really could not do anything about it. D Bagby (01:11:05): Yeah, you live on a commercial zone, basically the boundary of a residential and commercial coming together. And that can be a challenge, especially because there wasn't anything here, no operating business for years. And even when the dealership was still going, I mean, they wouldn't--there wasn't so much parking demand. Yeah. That would have ever affected them. So, I get it. I would be upset too, probably, but— Downie (01:11:26): But yeah. And change is always going to have somebody not happy. D Bagby (01:11:30): Absolutely. That's true. Yeah. Sweat (01:11:33): I actually have to go. I'm overseeing an event in Encinitas here in a second, so I have to run. D Bagby: I hope you don’t run into any traffic. Sweat: We’ll see what happens. (laughs) Downie: It should be pretty good by now. Sweat: I'll follow up with you tomorrow just to make sure you have everything you need and just see what any next steps are. But, let me know in the meantime if you need anything. Downie: Thank you, Holly. D Bagby: Thanks Holly. Downie: I wish you a safe and easy drive. Sweat: Thank you, I know. D Bagby: (01:12:00): I hope so too. Holly, we'll look at those pictures today, too. I know you guys are asking and we just have had a crazy few days. Sweat: Yeah, we know with your party. D Bagby: Yeah. (laughs) Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 23 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 Sweat: It looked like a lot of fun. D Bagby: It was a lot of fun. Sweat: And honestly, if you are only able to decide on like, a few, I could do the ones of Jeff just to get them to see. D Bagby: Yes, I'll do that tonight before I leave. For sure. And how many do we need to give her? Total? Or selection? Sweat: It’s in the email, like, how many you guys agreed to pay for. D Bagby: I can’t remember. Sweat: It might be one or two or Jeff. D Bagby: Okay. Sweat: That we agreed upon. D Bagby: Okay. Sweat: But yeah. D Bagby: Thank you. Sweat: It’s nice to see you both. D Bagby: You too. Drive safe. Downie (01:12:37): So, if you can still give me a little more time. I know I had just an hour, so I don’t (unintelligible)--. J Bagby (01:12:41): Sure. I might check in on that account in a minute, but yeah, if you have some more questions, for sure. Downie (01:12:50): You both sound like you're very, very invested in education, you know, which is a wonderful thing. What would you say, I mean, do you support any charities or causes through the brewery that you feel like you want to talk about? Or, are there plans to expand your reach into, you know, goodwill gestures besides listening to irate neighbors? (all laugh) J Bagby (01:13:15): It's hard, you know? We get approached almost every day about some sort of donation for something. We have an outlet on our website where you can fill out a form and apply. And while we like supporting charities and the community, it's difficult because there are so many of them. And we like to look at the ones that either we've supported either personally in the past, or that we have a connection to through a family member or a very good friend. Where we can say, “Okay, you Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 24 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 know, this is important to us because of this.” You know, while we like also doing this, we're also running a business. So, at some point you can't--you have to close the doors a little bit on it and say, “Look, we want to help you out. But you know, you're asking—" we could do it. The easiest thing for us to do is donate beer. But the hardest thing for us to donate is beer because of the licensing required for the nonprofit to actually get it. And they don't understand that. Downie: I’ve run into that. (laughs) J Bagby: And we always have to be the one that's like, well, “We'd love to help you out, but there's this, this, this, and this.” Downie (01:14:22): Yeah, and more education. And what Stone did—because I approached Stone about some beer to maybe put into a scholarship raffle that we do through the Society of California Archivists I belong to. And it was, “Well, what did the ABC (California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control say?” And then I ran into the ABC and I just went, for the permits we'd have to get, it's just, you know, it would eat up what little money we would make. So, and I understand that completely because (unintelligible). D Bagby: Yeah, we’ve seen it. But, with that said, we are involved. J Bagby (01:14:51): Yeah, I mean, we just had two weeks ago or, not this past week and the weekend before, we had a gigantic breast cancer benefit festival on our parking lot that a lot of our staff members donate their time to. We donate beer to, we donate food to—yeah, we donate space. And basically, we host the charity. And that was something that I started with the woman who founded the festival back at Pizza Port. Downie: Is that Brewbies? J Bagby: Yeah. Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: So that's the biggest one that we have. And then this one that we just had almost raised almost fifty thousand dollars for charity. Downie: Wow. Wonderful. J Bagby: And so, you know, knowing that and having been involved with this one for nine of them now, and being in the beer industry in general, I'm always getting asked, I'm very diligent about when we get a request for a festival because sometimes, first and foremost, sometimes the festival isn't necessarily great for the charity. (01:15:46) There'll be a promotional company--excuse me, that we'll get out there, go up to a charity and say, “Hey, we can make you five thousand dollars if you pull the license for this,” you know? But they don't realize the potential risks involved or the insurance liability that they have to take on, different things like that. And the production company ends up taking the majority of the money because the proceeds. Now it's illegal because one hundred percent of it with that one day ABC license is supposed to go to the charity. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 25 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 Downie: Right. J Bagby: So, if someone squats, the ABC can say, “Hey, we need to see your books.” And then not only does the charity get in trouble, which they may not even be aware of. Downie: Right. J Bagby: But that promotional company, and even the breweries could get in trouble because they donated to it. Another thing is on our side, not only are we just donating beer but probably donating two people's full day’s worth of time to get the beer ready to go to the event, to get all the equipment together, to drive to wherever it might be to set up, to pour, take it all down and bring it all back home, clean it all. (01:16:43): And so, people don't realize what really goes into it on our side when we're donating. We're not just donating a beer, we’re donating quite a bit more so we're pretty diligent about those. But that's really the easiest way for us to support a charity or a community event, unfortunately. Downie (01:17:03): But those are facts that, you know, people need to be aware of. And you both talked about how much learning you've had to do along this path. D Bagby (01:17:13): We’ve done some kind of other fundraisers, though. J Bagby: Yeah, we've done some onsite things. D Bagby: There have been a couple of military things that we've supported and— J Bagby (01:17:25): And the dogs, yeah. D Baby (01:17:27): So there's a few things that we really, really kind of key into that mean a lot to us. But yeah, I think as a— J Bagby: Firefighter-D Bagby: Pint Project. J Bagby: Yeah. (01:17:38) A couple of onsite things that were pretty successful and, you know, we're just--you get back to this, like you can't do them all, you know? And as not nice as it sounds, it does need to benefit us in some way as well. Because we are offering up a lot when we do these things and why we want to help the community, we want to help these people that need help in some way, we just have to be careful. D Bagby: Yeah. Exactly. Downie (01:18:07): Yeah. Because, you know, I mean, not every charity is a 501(c ) or is required and you get into all kinds of thin ice. So, very understandable. But, no. D Bagby (01:18:19): Now that's one of the things that I think is a benefit to us as Jeff has made it his mission and his absolute business to know as much as he can about ABC licensing. Just any sticky situations that are pitfalls. The San Diego Brewers Guild (a nonprofit organization that promotes San Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 26 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 Diego breweries) just hosted like a ABC meeting at a local brewery a couple of weeks ago. And I feel like we knew a lot of that stuff that was mentioned, but it's still great to go and be a part of that. J Bagby: It’s like a refresher course. D Bagby: It’s a refresher. But you can just see in the room, people— J Bagby And you get questions and hands go up. And you’re thinking “You can’t do that.” D Bagby (01:18:58): Yeah. yeah. So, it was really interesting to see people's reaction to these rules that many of not all--I've been really long standing for a long time, but if you don't know, you don't know. And I think there's a lot of ask for forgiveness later, which may have worked in the past, but as the ABC gets more versed, they get--there are certain things that they were getting very particular about as they should. Downie (01:19:31): Well, once they see it as a continual problem, that it keeps happening, they're going to start coming down and— D Bagby (01:19:37): Yeah, and it's, you know, it is--I believe that it is your job as if you're going to have a license that you should know how it works and what--it's a responsibility. And it's hard for us to sometimes see other breweries who don't know. And that's fair if you don't know initially, but that blatantly break these laws all the time. And you don't want to see them get in trouble, but you also don't want to set up. It sets expectations on the customer side it sets expectations on other breweries’ sides were like, well, “They did it, why can't I?” And so of course for people like us who, like I said, risk averse, we want to make sure that we're--I mean, our biggest asset, those are the alcohol license. That's why we're here. So, if something happens to that, it gets jeopardized that's--that is a bad thing. (laughs) Very bad. So, yeah, it's, it's been talking about education. That's something that I've learned a lot from Jeff. And we've offered up if anybody has questions certainly here locally, you know, we're always available. People want to bounce an idea or, you know, find out more, we're happy to help. Downie (01:20:46): So, you're active in San Diego Brewers Guild. Because I saw you at Guild Fest (SD Brewers Guild Fest) and you just mentioned a recent meeting. Are there any other organizations you're active in or are members of--? J Bagby (01:20:58): We’re members of the Brewers Association, the National, um— D Bagby: CCBA. J Bagby: And the California Craft Brewers Association. Also, the MBA, the Masters Brewers Association of America. D Bagby: I'm actually a board member on the— J Bagby: San Diego. D Bagby: Brewer’s Guild. But yeah, there's a lot of those little things like that. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 27 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 J Bagby (01:21:19): I think those are the main ones, but those are all, I mean, there's some international stuff, but yeah. Downie (01:21:26): Yeah. What are you going to get involved in? I mean, again, it's kind of like the finding the charities that are actually going to be beneficial. Is that going to benefit you? J Bagby (01:21:36): (unintelligible) international. Well, yeah. I was going to say the only benefit for us because, you know, they have incredible conferences and technical courses. (Downie laughs) That would probably be the only reason for us to really be a part of those. And there's some competitions, there's some, some bigger European competitions that are gaining a lot of speed and a lot more Americans are actually sending beer over and winning medals. So, it's something to watch. But yeah, it's not like, you know, where we're going to Brau and Nuremberg every year or something like that. Downie (01:22:08): Well, that does bring up. When did you start putting your beers into competition? D Bagby: Good question. J Bagby (01:22:14): That was back when I was at Pizza Port at Solana Beach. We entered beers at Stone, but they weren't really--I didn't have anything to do with the recipes of those beers. Downie: Okay. You were an assistant. J Bagby: I was just standing there, but when I got to Solana Beach and was working with Tomme, some of those were my ideas and my things where I brewed them, or we brewed them together. It's a bit more intimate and I was a little bit more involved. So, I would say there, really. And that's where, you know, won, our first, or my first time across the stage. (laughs) Downie (01:22:50): Have you kept a list of all the awards you've won (unintelligible)? J Bagby (01:22:55): She did quite a bit of work on that before our business case. Before we opened. But I think she ended up just tallying GABF awards and World Beer Cup awards. Because there's certainly other things, too. There's like Alpha King. I’ve won that three times. That's the Hoppy Beer Competition that they hold during the GABF, that’s not associated with the GABF. Some awards at San Diego International Beer Festival, what do you call it? Beer of the Year, three times there. And some various other medals in, you know, have we ever entered LA county? A couple of times. So, you know, some things here and there. IPA festivas up and over North and Hayward. Years ago, I won medal at the Alaska Beer and Barleywine Festival. Downie (01:23:45): Oh, Alaska. Wow. You've really reached out here. J Bagby (01:23:48): It's a very long running, very famous festival. Downie (01:23:52): I’ve heard of it, yeah. But it just seems very interesting to me that if somebody were keeping a list of what beers they had won awards for, I think that would tell a story about some of the changes in styles and some of the expansion of styles of beers. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 28 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 J Bagby (01:24:07): Yeah, yeah. Maybe, I don't know. I was talking to somebody. I was in Miami at a festival this past weekend. A friend of mine, his anniversary for his brewery. And he throws a festival that coincides with it. It's invitational. Anyway, he invited me and I was like, “Yeah, I've never been to Miami. I'll go.” So anyway, I was talking to another brewer friend who was there and he was like, “Oh, well, you know, you won lots of IPA (India Pale Ale) medals,” and you and I was like, “Boy, yeah, I won some of those,” but also won in Belgians and a lot of different stout medals. And, I even have a couple of German pilsner medals. Some other like, you know, Scotch Ales, like Brown Ales. It's kind of a wide gamut. So, I don't know if my medal history would necessarily tell much of a story in that way. Maybe. Downie (01:25:02): Yeah. Well, I think the more pieces of evidence there are, the more our story can be put together. But have you ever done judging? J Bagby (01:25:10): Oh yeah. Yeah. I've been a judge at the GABF (Great American Beer Festival) and the World Beer Cup for thirteen years. Thirteen, fourteen years now. I don't remember my first judge GABF. It was like 2003, I think. So, yeah. I've been doing that for a long time and I'll be doing that this year in National. Downie (01:25:33): Yeah. I've heard comments that GABF has gotten so big and so many categories that has just really become kind of overwhelming. How do you feel about that? J Bagby (01:25:43): I wished that they would, on the organization side, that they would grow the competition to represent the growth in the beer industry. I get what they're trying to do and what then they have limitations, but sometimes I think they're being a little harsh on the restrictions on their side. You know, there's almost eight thousand beers in there, in the GABF last year, and I'm sure the World Beer Cup will be around that. And I think there's seventy-nine categories. They haven't expanded the categories too much in the last five years. I think maybe ten years ago there might've been sixtysomething categories. So, it hasn't expanded a whole lot, but what has is the entries, right? So, brewers used to be able to enter around eight beers per brewery, or brewhouse, location into the competition. They've changed that and they have several different categories in ways, you know, like a Pizza Port that has five locations. (01:26:44) You know, what if all five locations enter beers? Well, they have stipulations on how many beers a corporation, or a set of breweries, that are under one ownership can enter. So, every year that we've been a brewery, we've entered the maximum number of beers that we can enter into the GABF. And that makes it difficult because you only have four shots, right? Like we're sending four beers to the World Beer Cup. So, it's a more difficult. But so does everybody else. And so, everyone else has to make the decisions and the kind of cuts in their mind of which beers they want to enter, which ones that they're going to pass on for this year or this competition or whatever it is. So, it's still very fair. I think it's still judged very fairly. Probably the most fair competition there is in beer because of the qualities, the qualifications of the judges, and their palates and their history and their tenure as judges judging beer. It's all judged blind. It’s done very, very well. (01:27:54) The problems I see with it are the categories that are masked, or you have over two hundred beers in the category: American IPA, Imperial IPA. I think American Pale Ale is pretty high. Some of these other ones that they get close to, you know, that are well over one hundred beers. You're getting into a situation where the algorithm isn't--so, you know, when they're spitting out their initial rounds and the algorithm that isn't accounting for past medal winners. Or beers--so you could have a round that has eleven beers in it, say it's American IPA, and that round might not have a single beer that's ever been in the competition before, or all new breweries that have never been to a competition for it. Then you could have another set of eleven beers where every single one of those beers has won a medal in the American IPA category Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 29 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 before. (01:28:49) And they’re, as far as I know, they're not accounting for that. And to me, that changes the game a little bit. Because even if you're a judge and you, at which has happened before, you'll get around and you'll be like, “Man, it was tough to pass on three of those beers, really could have passed on two or even just one and save the judges down the road some tasting.” Well, they require you to pass on three. They really push you to pass on three. If you absolutely can't then they want to hear why and want to hear an explanation. And so, I just believe that in that sense, you know, well maybe it's okay, but in the other sense where they're like, “Man, we had eight good beers. It was really hard to only pass on three beers.” (01:29:39) So, now you've got this thing where you might have a potential medal winner that gets knocked out early because it was in a round with all excellent beer. Downie: Yeah. J Bagby: So that's--if I had a complaint about them, I wished that they would account for that. Especially in those--there's only, I'm talking to a handful of categories where that is really something I think that comes into play. The only other thing might be, like I said, to have grown with the competition or with the industry and allow brewers to enter more beers. But that takes more time. It takes more judges. They try to get the judging done in three days. If they didn't, they'd have to get another day, which is paying more, but you have to pay to enter the competition. So, to me, there's some work that probably could still be done. (01:30:33) And there is a lot of brewers out there that are like, “Oh GABF. It's kind of eh.” You know, I believe in what my beers are and I send them and either I don't win medals or other beers win medals in the category that I entered that I don't think are as good as my beer. I think you have people that feel like that. But having been a judge, I've been on the tables. I've never been in a case where I was like, “That beer should have won a medal and it's not in the top three,” you know? I've never had a case where there wasn't a lot of thought and a lot of time spent into the beers that actually win medals. They’re medal-winning beers. Downie (01:31:15): Okay. I had a question and it’s just completely slipped my mind. J Bagby: Sorry. I know. Downie: No, that's okay. It still had to do with this. Um, I don’t know. (laughs) J Bagby: With the competition, or--? Downie: Well, oh, I know what it is. The brewers themselves decide what style of beer they’ve brewed. Have you run into cases where you taste a beer and you go, “This has--should have been in this category, you know. What were they doing putting it in here?” J Bagby (01:31:43): Yeah. Yeah. And the BA (Brewer’s Association) is real upfront about that when they tell brewers, you know, read the style guidelines and make sure that your beer fits into those guidelines and they give you everything. They give you a verbal description of the bitterness, color, aroma, mouthfeel, text--you know, everything. And then they also give you actual numbers for alcohol range, color range. Those are the things you need to pay attention to. And I feel like there is brewers that still don't pay attention to that. I don't know how or why. Or if they've just mislabeled their beers or what happened. But, they're—it’s pretty upfront. Like, this is--the judges have this when they're sitting at their table and they're going to read this before they start judging your beer. So, why would you enter something that doesn’t fit? Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 30 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 Downie (01:32:39): Yeah, because you don't know why. Because I was thinking, well, maybe it's just their taste buds are different? Or it didn't transport well. (laughs) J Bagby: (01:32:48): Yeah. I think, you know, for instance, she (D Bagby) sent me a picture one day. She had a Kölsch earlier. I can't remember what brewery she was drinking at. But she sent me a picture and it was this hazy beer in a straight sided pint glass. And she wrote “Kölsch--?” And so of course I went, “What does it taste like? Where are you at? Blah-blah-blah.” But a lot of people would look at that and go, “Well, Kölsch should be bright,” you know? Any German from Cologne is going be like, “That's hazy,” that’s got--you know. Even chill haze shouldn't really be there in a Kölsch. Downie: Okay. J Bagby: And a brewer's interpretation is one thing of what they call it on their menu board versus, you know, what category they might enter it in GABF. So, a beer like that might be an entered in a Keller beer. Because it might be an unfiltered Kölsch. So, they might say, well, “Yeah, it's German style Kölsch,” but it's actually a Keller beer because it was brewed in the vein of a Kölsch, but Keller is a German style beer. Downie: (01:33:46): And that’s “K-E-L-L-E-R?” J Bagby: Yeah. Downie: Okay. I'm still learning all the— J Bagby (01:33:53): Oh yeah, there’s tons. And that's-Downie: There’s huge number of beer styles. J Bagby: Yeah, and there's, you know, historical beers that are becoming more popular and more rare, more obscure recipes and styles where there's a little bit more confusion or debate over what is actually correct. The Brewer’s Association does a good job of refining their categories and reviewing them each year. So, they take judge's interpretation—or judge’s comments on style descriptions. “No, no, this actually should be this way,” or “This should allow for this and this as well as this,” you know, so they do a good job of keeping up with that. But yeah, if you, you know, taste a brewer’s altbier at one brewery, and then he goes to another brewery and tastes another brewer’s altbier, they could be completely different beers. So, there that slide in judgment, but when you get into competitions, where's the category of your beer doesn't fit in it, then don't enter it. (laughs) Downie (01:34:54): Well, I mean, brewing is such a creative process. And there are as best as you can try certain factors like, you know, a Centennial hop may not be exactly the Centennial hop it was the year before due to the growing season, the factors there. So, it really is a creative process, but I've been kind of interested in the whole, you know, yes, I've seen some of these categories and descriptions and I'm like, “How can you always guarantee that those beers?”--well, obviously not. Not surprised. J Bagby (01:35:28): Yeah, there's interpretations of (unintelligible) category descriptions in different ways, for sure. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 31 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 Downie (01:35:35): Well, while you were meeting that account, Dande was telling me how, you know, when she first met you, how you were educating her into all the varieties of beers, you know? How she has found that to be so helpful. And then just the brewers I meet all seem to be that way as they to educate someone who--on the various styles that they're brewing or they're enjoying right at the time. Do you find that wearing? You know, continually trying to educate more people? J Bagby: (01:36:06): I think when it's--if I was doing it every day, I think it might get—or the same exact set of beers every day or the same exact descriptions of the same person or the same, you know, whatever. I think I might get a little tired of it. But to me it's kind of exciting, especially when you have somebody that's open to it and isn't restrictive of themselves in their own palates. So, if you have somebody that's like, “I've never tasted German-style Weisse beer. I've never tasted American Red Ale,” which is kind of a better example. “I've never tasted Irish dry stout. I've never tasted—" you know? Whatever it may be. And if you can get five or six of those things in samples right in front of somebody, that's going to be a really cool conversation. Especially if that person's open to tasting and listening and identifying with what you're talking about in each one, you know? When you say, “Oh, what do you smell on that? (01:37:00) What are you getting that? Okay.” Those types of things come from this ingredient or this timeframe or this hop or this malt and--or whatever other specialty ingredient might be there. And when the person identifies and goes, “Oh wow, that's really cool. I never thought of it like that.” All of the sudden you've got somebody who thought they hated German-style hefeweizen and going, “No, actually I'm going to order that the next time I'm out because I want to compare it or I want to see what it's like again, and kind of—"you know? I think people like, you know, connecting the dots in their heads. And if you've given them a little bit, just to even a little bit to bite on like English-style bitter, or an Extra Special Bitter, you know, what does that mean? What does that, it sounds, it sounds harsh, Extra Special Bitter. (01:37:43) Well, no, there's actually some really nice malt depth in ESB (Extra Special Bitter) and it should be there. Well, it should have a firm bitterness, but what kind of bitterness? Well, it's not American piney, citrus, passion fruit, floral. And it's not that kind of hop it's the more herbal, spicy, earthy hop from the English varieties. And even just that much, and a person can go, “Oh, well, I really liked that.” Downie: And it makes it more accessible. J Bagby: And the next time, the next time I see it somewhere, I've got that connection in my brain to go, “Yeah, I know what I'm ordering it and there it is. Affirmation.” I'm drinking it. And it smells and tastes like I remembered. And I was told that it should. And I get that a lot where somebody will say, “Hey, you mentioned that, you know, this style beer can have this, this, and this. But I tried it over here and I got this, this, and this.” (01:38:34) And that's sometimes where the brewer’s discrepancy is between styles or different ingredients or maybe just something is slightly different. But you can explain that away. And therefore, they've learned a little bit more and they have their file on whatever that beer was just got a little bit deeper in their head. So, the next time they try it and they connect the dots again. And I don't know, to me that's fun. That's exciting. And it's really exciting to see when someone's open to that and is engaging in that. It's kind of a little bit difficult when somebody says, “Oh, I don't like bitter beer,” or, “I don't like hops.” And you're like, “Well, you just haven't tried the right hops yet.” It's like, if you like beer and you're say you're a beer drinker, I believe--yes, you can have your favorites and the ones that you don't think are as great to you, but you got to try everything. (01:39:24) You know, there's some newer, crazy styles out there I get, but the basics, ales and lagers, and the families within there, the style of families, if you say you're a beer drinker, you should know those or have a basic framework and Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 32 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 understanding of what those are or have the desire to go, “I've never really tried that. I'm not really familiar with that, but I want to see. I want to see what it tastes like so that I know if I really like it, or I don't.” To like, find that out later, you know, like give yourself the chance to like it. Downie (01:39:56): It's like the three-bite rule with the kid and the vegetable. And then, you know, you got to at least try three bites of it. And then if you don't like it, we'll go from there. So that's a good way to do it. Now, do you have a favorite hop? Is there one that you like brewing with more than others? J Bagby (01:40:12): There’s definitely hops—plural--that I like using. We're a pretty classic traditional brewery. So, we stick to pretty traditional classic styles of beer. So, we're not using too many of the new, exotic, crazier hops. We're sticking to more of the classic American Pacific Northwest American hops and then the Nova varieties and then the English varieties. So, on the American side, you know, we're using a lot of Cascades, Centennial, a little Amarillo and Simcoe, and Columbus and Chinook. And that's kind of our core for the American side, but then the English ones are really wide and Noble hops as well. We use a lot of different varieties and again, not a lot of real new flashy ones, in part because of our contracts, we didn't know how and when our brewery was going to open. So, I bought a lot of hops because I was afraid that we weren't going to have any when we opened. So that drove that a little bit. The other part was just, yeah, I really liked those more classic American hops over some of the newer ones. Not to say that I don't like sprinkling a little of them here and there in brews, but I tend to favor those classic ‘C’ hops (referring to Chinook, Citra and other hops starting with the letter C.) Downie (01:41:30): And so you don't, from what you're saying, I'm hearing that you probably aren't planning on doing, you know, real strange and experimental beers either, you know? You're going to stick with the more--? J Bagby: (01:41:43): No, I think if anything, I would pick some of the more obscure older styles. I’ve talking with some friends about a smoked wheat beer that used to be made that is actually--I believe it's actually a lager yeast and it's a fairly bright beer. But it has a smoked character to it, and a little bit of bitterness and wheat malt character to it. But I'm always afraid to brew smoked beer because I think, I always think that it's going to be me and like three other people drinking it. (Downie and D Bagby laugh) Downie (01:42:11): Yeah, it could be a big mistake if you brewed it on your big system. So, do you have a small system that you can do little test batches on? J Bagby: No, it’s— D Bagby: It’s all or nothing. Downie: Well, that goes to being risk averse again. J Bagby (01:42:27): Yeah, we have a little lager on right now. I think it tastes fantastic. I just think it doesn't--I just think it's not exciting to people. It's a Belgium style beer. If you're familiar with Belgian style dubbel, which is basically like a Belgian style brown ale, but it has a Belgian yeast character to it. So, it's a little spicy and dark fruit and things like that. Well, take that and cut it in a little less than half with alcohol and flavors and everything else. We dropped it down to only about four and a half percent. It still has a lot of those characters, they're just a lot more mild and it's not as big and it's not as heavy. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 33 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 But it's not selling at all. (laughs) So, even somebody even called it dark Bud Light in the online comment. Downie: Oh dear. (laughs) J Bagby: That was fun to read yesterday. (laughs) D Bagby: That’s alright. It’s not for everyone. J Bagby: Nope. And that's exactly. That's kind of how we thought about it. Downie (01:43:23): One person's interpretation. J Bagby: Exactly, exactly. Downie: But yeah, if you're seeing that it's not really selling then, you know? You kind of-J Bagby (01:43:31): Yeah, we (unintelligible)-D Bagby: We had a few beers like, but that's, I mean, unfortunately, a few of them were Belgian styles. J Bagby: Yeah. D Bagby: But, Bruges Cruise was on for a long time. J Bagby: Well, that's because it was over eleven percent. We had people that loved that beer. But, we sold that at eight ounces at a time. D Bagby (01:43:44): Yeah, but we had it on tap for a year, also. J Bagby: (Unintelligible). D Bagby: They do A12. They do A12. Which is good. Downie (01:43:58): So, do you have much of a barrel aging program? J Bagby (01:44:01): We started one. We had, uh, we did twelve barrels and then we did another set with a different beer of just four barrels. All, most, all of that is gone now. So, we just brewed up Imperial Stout and we're getting ready to purchase thirty barrels. Just deciding what other beers we're going to put in those barrels and talk with the broker about making sure we get them as fresh as possible and which barrels they'll have available at that time. So that we're not filling barrels that have been sitting around drying out for months. They were nice and fresh. Downie (01:44:38): Yeah, you want to be able to extract something out of those barrels. (laughs) J Bagby (01:44:41): Exactly. But it's fun. I like doing it. But we do all straight up beer. We don't use any Wild Geese (blended whiskey) or-- Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 34 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 D Bagby: Cupcakes. J Bagby: Or anything like that. (Downie and J Bagby laugh) So yeah, that’s fun. That's, to me, that's--I don't know, that gets to the uber fun side of brewing. You're like, “Oh, I'm going to put this thing in here.” Well, we had that beer that she was talking about in there for eighteen months and I just served it in Miami last weekend and it tasted phenomenal. Downie: (laughs) Love it when something works. J Bagby: Yeah. And sometimes they're don’t. That’s true. Knock on wood, we were pretty lucky with our barrels. Yeah. Downie (01:45:23): Okay. Well, I think I've exhausted all my questions. I learned a lot from you both. I've very, very, very much appreciated your time. D Bagby: Oh sure, our pleasure. J Bagby (01:45:31): If anything comes up or you're going through things and just feel free to email me or her, and follow up. Downie (01:45:37): Come back with something that didn't record or transcribe or something. D Bagby (01:45:41): Don’t hesitate, we're happy to happy to help and also believe in what you're doing, and also-J Bagby: Definitely. D Bagby: And also love to talk about all this kind of stuff, people that-J Bagby: Yeah, it’s fun. D Bagby: People that are interested in it. Because, you know, we work so close to it, it's our life. But we are still--we are very passionate about it. And hopefully that comes through a little bit, even in construction stuff, and crazy things like that. Downie (01:46:01): I definitely see you have a future as working as a brewery construction consultant. (J and D Bagby laugh) Because really, you have gone through a lot of effort to educate yourselves and to do it right. And that kind of knowledge really should be shared. I mean, that's something I admire about Mike Hess. He wrote that, you know, ‘starting up a brewery’ webpage, but that still doesn't tap on everything. And especially, you know, doing something like this, of course every situation is going to change with every city you’re dealing with. D Bagby (01:46:34): But there are some basics that I think we would have really benefited from big time. And I think we would have heeded, we would have paid attention if somebody was like, “Hey, we just did this. Here's our experience. I'm here’s just how you can, you know, maybe avoid some of the pain, some of the pain points.” Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 35 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 J Bagby (01:46:49): Yeah, the building part and you know, the construction management. I mean, I think part of that goes a lot. Like I can use the comparison as somebody's going to buy their brewing equipment and calling up three different equipment manufacturing and saying, “I want to buy a tenbarrel system, give me a quote,” and get three quotes and then just choose which one they want and order the equipment and get it sent. Well, I went up to the equipment manufacturer’s warehouse and talked with the engineers for two days before they even started drawing plans for my tanks. And then when they were about to start doing the finishing and they connection piping and all the process piping, I went back up there and stood in my tanks and looked at all the cores and looked at all the valves were and told them where I wanted to move things moved or changed. (01:47:40) And the different specs on all--every single tank, not just the, the brewhouse stuff, but the cellar as well. Because you might get your tank and go like, “Why the heck is it like that?” And I kind of compare that to construction. Like we could have probably sat around and worked on other things and let them take forever to build this place and would have had something in the end, that would have been, but it wouldn’t been us and it wouldn’t been right. And that's just how we operate. So, I think while we spend a lot of time on that and we feel that it was absolutely one hundred percent necessary, some other people might be like, “Well, he didn't really need to do that. You could of—” D Bagby: Get by. J Bagby: But it's not us. I guess that was what I was trying to say. Downie (01:48:25): You have invested heavily in this, so why not have it right? But, Plan Nine (Plan Nine Alehouse) over in Escondido, I was over there one day and they didn't have any of their own beers on tap. And I said, “Gee, you don't have any of your own, I thought you were brewery.” And he said, “Well, we got new equipment and we've had continual leakage.” D Bagby: Oh no. Downie: And they, you know, this was like nine months that they had been dealing with it. So, you were exactly right in going--and I mean, even if you have to stand in your tanks and (unintelligible)— J Bagby: Well, and it’s kind of fun too. (laughs) Downie: Yeah, yeah. They will say, “Hey, I stood in my tank.” (all laugh) But, yeah. D Bagby: That’s too bad. Downie: So, something like that can go very, very wrong. J Bagby: Yeah, looking at welds and not (unintelligible). D Bagby (01:49:03): And also not having the support, because if you--when, you know, when you got your, whatever it is, whatever contractor you have or manufacturer having--actually, we're just dealing with the meeting before you got here or talking to a new point of sale company. And part of the reason is just a sheer lack of support on our current system. There's no one we can call and say, “Hey, you know our business, you know how we operate. These are the problems we're having.” There's just no one. Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 36 2024-03 �JEFF AND DANDE BAGBY TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2018-02-21 And so, this other company that's--you absolutely have a person. So having your tanks leaking, you're losing money. You're, you know, that's literally money down the drain, and frustrating if you're a brewery owner, you’re a brewer, you definitely don't want to see your beer going down the drain. Yeah. Do you have the support you need from the manufacturer? Who's going to back up their work and if not, then pay a few more bucks and get somebody who will. J Bagby: Yeah. Downie (01:50:00): Yeah. So, a lesson to live by. D Bagby: Yes, that’s so true. Well, thank you so much. Downie: (01:50:04): Thank you. Yeah, let's see. Where's my stop button? (Downie and D Bagby laugh) Transcribed by Ernest Cisneros and Judith Downie 37 2024-03 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcripts Description An account of the resource Written oral histories and transcripts are available for researchers that prefer the written word, or to see the whole interview in a document. Transcripts of <a href="https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/collections/show/5">audio and video files</a> are also available as part of those video files. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Bagby, Jeff and Dande. Interview transcript, February 21, 2018. Description An account of the resource Bagby Beer Company emphasizes traditional style beers, a craft cocktail program, and a restaurant menu to complement their beers. Over the years, Bagby Beer featured highly admired and hard-to-find American and European beers such as Bierstadt Lagerhaus (Denver, CO) and Brasserie d’Orval (Belgium) to complement their lineup. Built on the site of a former car dealership (among other businesses), the Bagbys closely oversaw the construction from the ground up which opened in 2014. The site was also host to the Brewbies® cancer awareness beer festival (2015-2022) and the Low and Slow Lager Festival among other fund raising and educational events. Bagby Beer sold to Green Cheek Beer Company of Costa Mesa, CA in early 2024. Jeff and Dande Bagby are the founders and owners of Bagby Beer Company in Oceanside, CA. Holly Sweat is Publicist at Katalyst Public Relations. Jeff Bagby’s role was as head brewer and leading the on-site Beerleaders brewing education program. Jeff’s brewery experience includes Stone Brewing, White Labs, and Oggi’s Pizza and Brewing. His last brewery before opening Bagby Beer was Pizza Port, leading brewing operations for the chain from the Carlsbad location. During his time at Pizza Port, he led the team to win notable awards and medals such as the World Beer Cup and the Great American Beer Festival’s brewery and brewer awards multiple times. He is one of the most awarded San Diego region brewers, notably garnering more GABF Alpha King Challenge awards for best hoppiest beer in the United States than anyone to date (2005, 2010 and 2011.) He left Pizza Port in 2011 to devote his energy to finding a site for a brewery/restaurant in the San Diego North County beach area. With the sale of Bagby’s to Green Cheek Beer, he remains as the brewer and continues to focus on lagers and traditional styles. Dande Bagby worked as Director of Operations including marketing and customer experience. She designed much of the building. Her employment background includes the San Diego Zoological Society, education, environmental science, restaurant and craft beer bar management, and marketing and finance responsibilities for multimillion-dollar budgets at a Fortune 500 company. She remains active in the transition to Green Cheek Beer Company at this time. In their 2018 interview, Jeff and Dande discuss their introduction to craft beer; homebrewing; introduction of craft beer to the region; Jeff’s entry into the profession in the late 1990s; challenges and responsibilities of founding and building a brewery; packaging and distribution; charity work; competitions, judging, and awards; consumer education. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jeff Bagby Dande Bagby Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Judith Downie Holly Sweat Ernest Cisneros Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018-02-21 Subject The topic of the resource Bagby Beer Company (Oceanside, Calif.) Brewers -- California -- San Diego County Brewing industry -- California -- History Microbreweries -- California -- San Diego County Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Oceanside (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener">In copyright</a> Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. California State University San Marcos Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context BagbyJeffAndDande_DownieJudith_2018-02-21_transcript Brewchive(r) Women's experience Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral Histories Description An account of the resource Video and audio oral histories can be viewed here. Histories are listed alphabetically by last name. Individual histories are indexed and transcribed and can be searched. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <p>Rights to oral histories vary depending on the history. The library owns the copyright to some histories, and has license to reproduce for nonprofit purposes for others. Please contact CSUSM University Library Special Collections at <a href="mailto:%20archives@csusm.edu">archives@csusm.edu</a> with any questions about use.</p> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Seth Stanley Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Jennie Ruiz OHMS Object This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS Viewer) https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=RuizJennie_StanleySeth_2023-04-07.xml Interview Keyword This filed adds keywords to the Omeka Oral History item type. Keywords are included in the OHMS XML, this field in Omeka will allow for full data migration between OHMS XML and the Omeka Record. This field does not impact the OHMS / Omeka integration and is optional if you do not need to map the "keywords" field in the OHMS XML to the corresponding Omeka record. OHMS Object Text This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka 5.4 2023-04-07 Ruiz, Jennie. Interview April 7, 2023 SC027-029 SC027 California State University San Marcos University Library oral histories collection CSUSM This oral history interview was generously funded through the Instructionally Related Activities Fund at California State University San Marcos. California State University San Marcos. Cross-Cultural Center Education, Higher Human rights Student success Jennie Ruiz Seth Stanley mp4 RuizJennie_StanleySeth_2023-04-07.mp4 1:|40(5)|52(10)|66(9)|77(15)|94(11)|105(8)|118(2)|135(1)|148(7)|166(14)|186(3)|212(2)|223(3)|235(3)|255(3)|273(1)|282(3)|292(4)|304(7)|342(5)|353(8)|368(2)|378(4)|388(3)|399(13)|410(1)|457(10)|468(7)|486(7)|510(1)|519(10)|529(9)|539(3)|549(4)|595(6)|606(1)|621(8)|633(13)|677(3)|690(1)|699(12)|713(1)|723(1)|736(10)|753(7)|764(3)|775(1)|794(6)|817(2)|837(9)|847(10)|860(10)|874(5)|885(2)|895(3)|937(11)|957(9)|968(3)|982(2)|1003(2)|1015(12)|1026(3) 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/514cb50273b20f4b16cea6c5712830f4.mp4 Other video English 1 Introductions Introductions from Seth Stanley and Jennie Ruiz 34 Biographical/Educational Background Ruiz describes her personal and educational background. 85 Work During Education. Ruiz recalls working as a student and how it lead to her career in enabling student success in higher education. 187 Discovering Counseling Career Path Ruiz speaks about her beginnings of counseling as a career path and what led her to California State University San Marcos. 281 Experiences working for Student Success Ruiz recalls experiences supporting student success on campus, work as a peer mentor, the special-ness of the CSUSM student body, her work in the Dean of Students Office. CSUSM ; Student Success ; Student Success Coaching 555 Leadership Style and Experience Ruiz speaks about her leadership roles and leadership style in a university setting. CSUSM ; Faculty ; Leadership ; Staff ; Student Success Coaching 710 Network and Relationships on CSUSM Campus Ruiz details her networking skill and speaks about the relationships she's built at CSUSM CSUSM ; Faculty ; Networking ; relations ; Student Affairs 934 Relationships with Students and Building Rapport Ruiz speaks about her relationships with students on campus, building relationships with students and understanding their needs. CSUSM ; Faculty ; O-Team ; Orientation ; Student Relations ; Students ; Team-building 1162 Initial Experiences with the Cross-Cultural Center Ruiz speaks to her initial experiences with the Cross-Cultural Center, how she interacted with the CCC in her role overseeing student orientation, and what the center's physical space was initially like. C3 ; CCC ; Cross-Cultural Center ; CSUSM ; Jennie Ruiz ; SLL ; Student Life and Leadership 1260 Cross-Cultural Center's Change Over Time Ruiz recalls how the Cross-Cultural Center changed over time, how the space where the CCC was located in relation to other parts of Student Life and Leadership, and the center's move to the Commons Building, work on a collaborative mural, and then the move to the University Student Union building. C3 ; Cross-Cultural Center ; CSUSM ; Floyd Lai ; Jennie Ruiz ; SLL ; Student Life and Leadership ; Tukwut Courtyard 1791 Friendship With Sara Sheikh-Arvizu Ruiz describes her friendship with Sara Sheikh-Arvizu, former Associate Director of Multicultural Programs at CSUSM. CCC ; Cross-Cultural Center ; CSUSM ; Jennie Ruiz ; Sara Sheikh ; Sara Sheikh-Arvizu 2080 Favorite Memories From Cross-Cultural Center Ruiz recalls working at the front desk of the Cross-Cultural Center, and remembers a student with significant mental health challenges, who found refuge and friendship at the CCC. C3 ; CCC ; Cross-Cultural Center ; CSUSM ; Jennie Ruiz ; NSYCH ; Students 2344 How the Cross-Cultural Center Helped Her Develop as a Professional Ruiz speaks to the impact of the Cross-Cultural Center on her as a professional, her privilege, and centering voices in programming. Ruiz recalls a workshop with the campus Jewish community. CCC ; Cross-Cultural Center ; CSUSM ; intentionality ; Jennie Ruiz ; Privilege 2652 Memories from the Peer Mentoring Program Ruiz recalls some of her experiences with the creation of the Peer Mentoring Program and recalls an overnight retreat. CSUSM ; Floyd Lai ; New Students ; Peer Mentoring Program ; Retreats ; Sara Sheikh ; Team Building 2956 Thoughts on the Significance of Identity-Specific Spaces Ruiz speaks to the importance of having identity-focused university spaces like the Black Student Center, the Latin /x Center, etc, which champion underrepresented communities and assist with student success. ACE Scholars ; Community ; CSUSM ; Diversity ; EOP ; Equal Opportunity Program ; Identity-Specific Spaces ; Underrepresented 3354 Cross-Cultural Center and the Purpose of Identity-Specific Spaces Ruiz expands on why identity-specific spaces are necessary and what groups benefit from them. She also goes on to speak about the role the Cross-Cultural Center plays with the expansion of identity-specific spaces. APIDA ; C3 ; CCC ; Cross-Cultural Center ; CSUSM ; Identity Specific Spaces ; Jennie Ruiz ; Kamalayan Alliance ; Pacific Islanders Moving image Oral history interview of Jennie Ruiz for the Cross-Cultural Center Oral History Project on April 7, 2023. Biographical information about Jennie, how she started working for California State University San Marcos, her leadership and networking skills. Jennie’s friendship with Sara Sheikh-Arvizu and its impact on her. Her experience running the Cross-Cultural Center, and her thoughts about its role at CSU San Marcos. Seth Stanley [Interviewer]: This is Seth Stanley. Today I&#039 ; m interviewing Jenny Ruiz for the California State University San Marcos Cross-Cultural Center Oral History project. Today is April 7th, 2023, and this interview is taking place at the University Library. Hi Jenny. Thank you for coming. Jennie Ruiz [Narrator]: Hi, Seth &lt ; laughs&gt ; . SS: To start out, uh, can you tell me a little bit about your background and how that maybe has influenced your work in higher education? JR: Oh, goodness. Okay. Background. How far do you, how do you, how far do you want me to go? SS: As long as you want. JR: Oh goodness. Well, I was born, no, um-- SS: Go for it. JR: Background. Um, so I&#039 ; m born and raised in San Diego, um, from Mira Mesa originally, um, went to college up at Sonoma State. For my undergrad. And did, um, got my degree in sociology. So I did a few different majors, but then I landed on sociology cause I had a really great Intro to Soc[iology] professor who I really enjoyed. Um, and through my time at Sonoma State, I got involved in various things. I mainly had to work on campus just to pay bills and live and all that. So I worked in like different food service and I worked in retail off campus, and actually told the story last, it was, what was it, Tuesday at a session I led about my like, professional journey. But I had a, a job on campus where I was having to put up flyers across campus and I hated it. I would have like hundreds of flyers to post. Um, this is before lot. This is before like electronic signage and all of that. So I, um, and I was miserable but I saw a flyer for a job in the Career Center on campus and I&#039 ; m like, thank goodness no one else has seen this ad at this point &#039 ; cause I&#039 ; m putting the ads up, so I&#039 ; m gonna apply for this job, which I did. And that kind of took me into this path of, um, of higher ed and student affairs. It kind of opened me up into, like the orientation, you know, kind of world new student orientation, &#039 ; cause a lot of things were run through that area. Academic advising, I interacted with, um, the program called Freshman Seminar there, which is similar to our GEL program here [program geared towards first-year students and student success in academia]. So I served in various leadership roles. I actually got, uh, I was on the dean&#039 ; s list one semester. There, grades were never my thing, but one semester I got on the dean&#039 ; s list and I got an invitation to apply for leadership positions on campus. So that in conjunction with my job in the Career Center just kind of launched me into kind of the higher ed. like, oh, this is kind of fun! So I was an orientation leader. I worked as a peer mentor in our freshman seminar class. I was a student assistant [at the] Career Center. And then once I graduated, I was looking into kind of a counseling area. Um, didn&#039 ; t quite know what I was going to do and my dad, funny enough, got me a book called What to Do with a Sociology Degree, and I was reading it one day and there was a paragraph on college counseling and I was like, of course I could do this job for work! I had never even connected [that] the professional staff that I worked with were doing that as a career. So that kind of, you know, launched me and I applied for grad school. I went to USD [University of San Diego] for my master&#039 ; s in counseling with a specialization in college student development. Worked in my orientation, worked in the orientation program there as a grad assistant. And then after that, got a job at Stony Brook University in New York as a residence hall director. Um, my friend tipped me off to a job that was here at Cal State San Marcos to be Coordinator of New Student Programs. So I applied for that job and I thankfully got it. And, um, that started my career here back in 2006, back when, funny enough, C3 [Cross-Cultural Center] was literally, I think the size of this room when I first started on the fourth floor, third floor of, um, no, the administrative building past, then [named] Craven Hall. So, and then since then I&#039 ; ve just held a variety of positions and here I am. &lt ; laugh&gt ; . SS: [Inaudible] Tell me more about what motivated you to work in a specifically a college setting and specifically supporting student success. JR: Yeah. I think people go into higher ed or any of their professions for one or two reasons: either they had a really good experience or they had a really awful experience and didn&#039 ; t want that to be repeated for somebody else. In my case, I had a fantastic college experience. I had great mentors, I had really great opportunities. Um, so I felt very fortunate. And I just, you know, in my work as a peer mentor in the freshman seminar class, I was meeting individually with these first time freshmen, really working with them and, and you know, talking with them about just life and how to connect and find their place on campus. And I found myself really enjoying it and kind of becoming-- it was a natural thing to me. Um, and so I think I wanted to feel that in my career, be able to really take that with me. And, one of the great things about I think this campus, but just the CSU [California State University] is I think our students are just so special and just work so hard. Not saying that students don&#039 ; t work hard other places but that there&#039 ; s something about our students here. Um, there&#039 ; s a lot of gratitude, there&#039 ; s a lot of understanding, I think, of the privilege they have of being here and getting their degree and, you know, working with that population is really, really rewarding. So, you know, did I want-- I wanted to be that for other students moving forward. But I just loved the feel of being on a college campus. There&#039 ; s nothing like it. I now have a almost seven year-old and just, he&#039 ; s been able to be here since when, since he was born. And just knowing that-- he actually said the other night, he&#039 ; s like, &quot ; You go to college!&quot ; And I&#039 ; m like, no, I don&#039 ; t go to col-- I&#039 ; m not a college student, I work at a college. But he just, he associates college with me. And that&#039 ; s just, he&#039 ; s grown up in that environment. And then my mom also worked at USD for 30 years. So, I grew up going to campus with her and hanging out with college kids who, funny enough, seemed significantly older than they do now. So, it was just always a part of, you know, who I was. And so, I felt fortunate to find a place here. SS: And, now you&#039 ; re working as the Interim Director of Student Success Coaching, right? Can you walk us through your experiences as that at the job? JR: In the five weeks I&#039 ; ve been in the position, &lt ; laugh&gt ; , um, it&#039 ; s-- it&#039 ; s been, it&#039 ; s been really great. It&#039 ; s actually brought me back to I&#039 ; d say my roots here because I started here at CSUSM overseeing orientation and really working with new students and first year students and all that. So, it&#039 ; s been fun in the short time I&#039 ; ve been here to work with the team to really be creative about how we&#039 ; re gonna be engaging students who are coming in this next year. We&#039 ; re kind of in this two-- two paths right now. It&#039 ; s the finish this semester, but then let&#039 ; s think big and creatively for the incoming class who&#039 ; re gonna be here in fall [20]23. So just really, learning from the team and thinking about how impactful the work that they&#039 ; re doing can really be for the retention success of the first-time freshman coming in. So, I don&#039 ; t know how much you know about the program but it serves first-year students who are not in an otherwise specialized program. So who are not in the Educational Opportunity Program who are not in TRIO [Student Support Services], who are not in CAMP [College Assistance Migration Program], um, ACE Scholars who are former foster youth, and then athletes or international students. So, we kind of capture the rest of the students, so don&#039 ; t really have a home, you know, and we wanna be that contact for them to kind of have that, that person they can go to for any questions that they have just about college. Um, so it&#039 ; s going well. I&#039 ; m really enjoying it. I&#039 ; m able to be creative and think through things and plan, which is something I love to do. SS: So, I know you&#039 ; ve only worked there for, you&#039 ; ve only been working in this position for five weeks, but, um, could you tell me, tell me about, your leadership style and how you adapted to different situations and team members? JR: Yeah, I mean, I think I can relate it to, &#039 ; cause I was in my old position as associate dean for almost seven years. So I&#039 ; ve been in management leadership roles for over ten, twelve years now. But yeah it&#039 ; s been interesting because I joined a brand new team and so I really had the chance to kind of see how I was gonna adapt myself to them and how they were gonna receive me. And you know, it&#039 ; s funny, my first day I brought donuts and I said to them, &#039 ; cause this team right now doesn&#039 ; t have a permanent space. They&#039 ; re literally working in a temporary space right now. So my first thing was how do I provide them with a level of, you know, kind of stability and structure. So even in an absence of a physical, permanent location, they can kind of feel that stability. SS: Mm-hmm. JR: But I came in that first day and I was like, so I haven&#039 ; t started a new job in a very long time. So I said, I just ask for your grace. But I&#039 ; m as much as, as reasonable and appropriate, obviously it&#039 ; s just about the human first. These are all human beings who are working in a job and if you don&#039 ; t connect that piece and know what really matters to these people just in life, you&#039 ; re kind of missing the mark. So my goal was, and I told people &#039 ; cause they wanted to meet with me, people outside my team wanted to meet with me very quickly to like talk about coaching and how I could collaborate. And I said, I want the first month to be me focusing on the team, getting to know the team, building those relationships. And so meeting with them individually and getting to know their strengths and kind of where there&#039 ; s opportunities. But I, I&#039 ; d say I&#039 ; m very, I&#039 ; m all about personal connections and relationships and being collaborative. But I&#039 ; m also good about being, like, sometimes we just kind of have to do things and we can&#039 ; t bring everyone into the fold, but I want to be as transparent as possible, communicate, provide, make sure people are in the loop. &#039 ; Cause the less transparency there is, people then start to kind of worry and, you know create a narrative themselves. And so, but also humor. I like to approach things with humor. But Yeah. SS: Well, sounds like you&#039 ; re the right person for the job. &lt ; laughter&gt ; Um, I&#039 ; d like to ask, how have you leveraged your networks and relationships to support student development and success? JR: Oh gosh. SS: &lt ; laughs&gt ; JR: You know, it&#039 ; s-- so this talk I just gave on Tuesday, the Division of Student Affairs does, um, they just started this series called Conversations with Leaders. And they finally, they asked, they asked me to speak and I&#039 ; m like, okay, because part of me is like, &quot ; You want me to talk? Oh, that&#039 ; s fine!&quot ; So I talked a lot about this, but one of the benefits of my job, the job I had here when I first started with orientation: it&#039 ; s such just by the nature of the job, so highly collaborative that, that set me up for how I have literally done everything else in every other position I have here on campus. So, it had me working with event planning, with catering, with parking facilities, with advising, with, you know, leadership to student life. Like I work with every area on campus. And so through that, and I&#039 ; m asking people to do things when I don&#039 ; t have any leadership or jurisdiction over them. And so you very quickly had to establish this relationship with people so you can-- &#039 ; cause all I would do in that job is ask people for favors. It&#039 ; s just, &quot ; I need you to do this. Can you help with this?&quot ; And so, and I fast forward now, there&#039 ; s one of the colleagues I&#039 ; ve worked with, I met him my second day working, he works in advising and now I&#039 ; m meeting with him about coaching and how to collaborate. And it&#039 ; s just, we laugh now that I&#039 ; m like, talk about full circle and even doing training on some technology that we&#039 ; re gonna be implementing into the program. The person in IT [Information Technology], I worked with him when PeopleSoft was first coming on board. And so again, it&#039 ; s like &quot ; It&#039 ; s so fun to work with you again!&quot ; But, all that to say, it&#039 ; s been so key. And I think what has been very validating is when I&#039 ; ve come into this job, the, the reactions I&#039 ; ve gotten from people saying, &quot ; I&#039 ; m so glad it&#039 ; s you and I can&#039 ; t wait to work with you in this role.&quot ; And that&#039 ; s been really affirming and I feel like because of my relationships, I&#039 ; ve been able to, you know, there&#039 ; s credibility. I&#039 ; m able to connect the coaches with people that they haven&#039 ; t connected with before. And, you know, if they have a question, I&#039 ; m like, &quot ; Let me just ask this person directly, like what the answer is.&quot ; They&#039 ; re like, &quot ; You can just do that?&quot ; I&#039 ; m like, &quot ; Yeah, I just can chat whoever, or text whoever and vice versa.&quot ; So what I shared on Tuesday at the session was relationships is literally how I&#039 ; ve gotten everything done here on this campus. It&#039 ; s, it&#039 ; s been so, so important. So I don&#039 ; t think I answered the question? SS: No, I love that. I love that. I&#039 ; m so glad to see you [indistinguishable]. JR: It&#039 ; s been, it&#039 ; s very sweet. I&#039 ; m like, &quot ; Thank you!&quot ; It is very, because especially it&#039 ; s people that I&#039 ; ve worked with forever and you know, and you just want people who are collaborative and willing to hear you out and you can laugh with. And I actually said to somebody the other day on the call, I said, &quot ; You don&#039 ; t have to be diplomatic with me. Just tell me there&#039 ; s clearly something there. So just like, tell me how you&#039 ; re feeling so we can just deal with it.&quot ; And I think they appreciated it because with some people you have to be very diplomatic and be very discreet in how you&#039 ; re saying things. And I&#039 ; m like, just, &quot ; I&#039 ; ve been here long enough. Like, just tell me.&quot ; SS: [Indistinguishable] So I&#039 ; d like to ask, how do you approach building rapport with students and understanding their unique, needs? JR: Yeah. Um, so I&#039 ; ve had the benefit, I mean, since I&#039 ; ve started here to work directly with students. So in my orientation job, I supervised volunteers who are on orientation team. I supervise students who were paid staff. Like those were my direct reports. So I was directly supporting and working with students. I think very similar with how I just work with anyone. I-- it&#039 ; s so hard to describe something that I feel like just kind of happens, but I try to feel people out. You know, again, I approach a lot of things with humor, but obviously if this setting is not appropriate right, it&#039 ; s, you know, I&#039 ; m able to kind of feel that out. I feel like I&#039 ; m very intuitive. Like, I joke that my superpower is intuition because I can-- I can tell-- if I know someone, I can tell like when they walk in a room and be like, there&#039 ; s something going on or what&#039 ; s happening, and I&#039 ; ll just kind of give a look and be like, you let me know what you need. Like, but I just, I stop and I make efforts. I get to know people and with students, that makes, that makes a difference. You know just being visible and being authentic. Providing, you know, sharing with-- with discretion of course, but like my own personal life and connections and here and there. Um, but you know, in my old-- in my previous position, I was working with students in some really difficult circumstances &#039 ; cause I was overseeing student conduct. I was overseeing students who were really in a difficult situation within their life. Whether it&#039 ; s, they&#039 ; ve had very something very difficult happen to them and they&#039 ; re navigating it and how they&#039 ; re acting may not be the most appropriate in that setting. And just, um, I&#039 ; m really good about student[s] coming in and being like, &quot ; What is going on? Like, what&#039 ; s, what&#039 ; s happening?&quot ; And also good about being like, what we&#039 ; re doing here isn&#039 ; t working. So how do we, let&#039 ; s figure it out. So through the years I&#039 ; ve gotten very good at being direct, but in a supportive manner? Um, some, well, supervisor joked with me, she&#039 ; s like, &quot ; I&#039 ; ve never met somebody who could suspend a student, and in the same sentence, the student, thanks you.&quot ; &lt ; laugh&gt ; It&#039 ; s just, it&#039 ; s treating somebody as a human being. &#039 ; Cause, even if you&#039 ; re making a decision that&#039 ; s difficult, you can still do it with compassion. And humor too. I love to be sarcastic with students, like, especially O team [Orientation Team]. &#039 ; Cause I still have a connection with the students who are on orientation team. &#039 ; Cause my previous position, I was still in the same office and I would, they&#039 ; d be laying down on orientation day and I&#039 ; d just be like, &quot ; What are you doing?&quot ; They&#039 ; re like, &quot ; Oh, sorry Jennie!&quot ; And I&#039 ; m like, &quot ; Come on,&quot ; &lt ; laugh&gt ; &quot ; Get your, get yourself together. Don&#039 ; t be laying down on the job.&quot ; So. SS: All right. Um, finally we&#039 ; re gonna get into the Cross-Cultural Center Questions. JR: I know this is like, this is getting us-- getting me warm. Okay. SS: I Really love that. Yeah. I love, like, you&#039 ; re just a person people can trust, a conduit of stability. JR: Conduit of stability. Oh, that&#039 ; s deep. Okay. SS: Could you, anyway, could you describe what the Cross-Cultural Center was like when you initially began engaging with it? JR: Mm-hmm. What I remember about C3 is what we call it. Um, so when I first started, we had, and I imagine you&#039 ; re interviewing Alexis Monte Virgin, SS: Um, I&#039 ; m not sure, she&#039 ; s not one I&#039 ; m interviewing. JR: Yeah, he was the coordinator when I first started. Um, he&#039 ; s like a president of a university now. It&#039 ; s amazing. So he was, he was the coordinator. The, the interaction I had with C3 when I started-- because I oversaw orientation, the Student Life and Leadership Office at the time was this compacted space in, um, past known as Craven Hall. And so when I had on orientation days, we needed a place for Orientation Team to debrief the day. So we&#039 ; d go up to C3. So that&#039 ; s how, that&#039 ; s what I remember it as. We&#039 ; d go up to, we&#039 ; d go to C, we&#039 ; d be sitting on the floor. They had these big red couches, the red couches, the red chairs, and, it was small, but it was like, it was cozy. But yeah, we would just be having people sit on every surface possible and have our debriefing sessions there. And that&#039 ; s kind of my initial like, connection and, memory of how I first interacted. SS: This is a really big follow up, but, how did it shift over time? And did you have any role in this change? JR: Um, how it shifted? So, pretty quickly after I started, probably within the first year-- and I think the plans had already been happening, was we were gonna be moving spaces. We were gonna be moving, offices to the first floor, no, to the third floor [of the Administration Building]. So I don&#039 ; t know if you&#039 ; re familiar or not- where Ace Scholars is now, where the Tukwut courtyard is? That&#039 ; s where Student Life and Leadership used to be. So we were already, when I first started, kind of in this future planning, dream big mode of what can Student Life and Leadership look like. But at that time, C3 was under the purview of Student Life and Leadership. So figuring out where and how that space - because it was very important to have a designated space - not have it be interweaved into our office, but have a community building location for the Center. So, I am sure that I was part of conversations because we were doing like kind of physical planning of the office, figuring out where everything was gonna kind of be. Um, because I was overseeing orientation, the space back then it was, I had this massive cubicle-- Um and then around the corner through a door was where C3 was. So it was an office physically located like right off of the general Student Life and Leadership office. So, kind of talking through and brainstorming how we were gonna fit these red couches into that space. The space was kinda like a triangle. So doing the physical kind of puzzle pieces, you know, figuring out, um, you know, what to put on the walls and to create that space was definitely part of that conversation. So, but yeah I don&#039 ; t remember the nuances, but I would imagine because it was physically located there, we were all part of that &quot ; What does this look like?&quot ; conversation. So, um, how it&#039 ; s evolved since then? I mean, it was in that space. And then, if I remember correctly, I don&#039 ; t know what happened first, but a leadership program was created within Student Life and Leadership. It&#039 ; s called SLL [Student Life and Leadership]. And, the idea was to create a Tukwut leadership. Um, is it Tukwut Leadership Center? Yeah. I think I&#039 ; m remembering this correctly. So what ended up happening, I think a space opened up in the Commons Building directly across from Commons 206, I think is the room. And so the Cross-Cultural Center moved up there and then the [TLC], that [Tukwut] Leadership [Center] space, um, kind of a space for leadership programs and student organization meetings, stuff like that, moved into that triangle space on the third floor. So the space when it was up there was-- I mean, it was massive. It was, I mean, comparatively speaking, I mean there was, there were windows, um, there was like a welcome desk. There were the couches again, I believe. We had at one point, I don&#039 ; t know what the timeframe was, but we had painted this like collective mural where everybody had like, it was a, program that they had brought to campus with a muralist. And they pretty much gave us different pieces to draw and paint. And that was put together, I think it&#039 ; s still up in the C3 here in the Student Union, I wanna say. But that was up in the space and it was just bigger and more open. And I wanna say it was up there until the Student Union opened, which I wasn&#039 ; t in as much conversation about because at that time I had transitioned more into the Data Students Office-ish role. So I wasn&#039 ; t gonna be under the same umbrella. But I remember the conversations about the physical space in the Student Union and, the offices and having a balcony and having programming space and all of that. And so you see this space now. I mean it&#039 ; s just, it&#039 ; s just beautiful. And it&#039 ; s with the balcony. And we&#039 ; ve held some retreats in there and separate kind of staff meeting stuff. And Floyd&#039 ; s [Lai, Director of the CCC] great. He&#039 ; s always willing to host people. Um, so it&#039 ; s done a lot of trainings in there and stuff like that. So, that&#039 ; s kind of how the physical space has evolved. It&#039 ; s gone a long way from this sized office. SS: Thank you for that. JR: Yeah. SS: So many permutations. I love the red couches. JR: The red couches. I mean, that&#039 ; s the thing. And you probably will hear a consistent thing is this thread, the red couches is what C3 was. Like, that is what was, you know, the signature furniture there. SS: Yeah. [Indistinguishable] JR: Oh, I&#039 ; m sure you did. SS: Anyways, um, I knew that you were temporary temporal, sorry. Temporarily responsible for the Cross-Cultural Center during a transition between associate directors. Let me ask you, what led you to that position? JR: &lt ; laughs&gt ; SS: How&#039 ; d that Happen? JR: I don&#039 ; t know. You know, I think, when you&#039 ; re in a-- when you&#039 ; re leading a department right? And somebody leaves, you&#039 ; re kind of like, okay, who could kind of pick things up and keep them moving while we&#039 ; re doing a search, right? I think the reason I was kind of a natural person to jump into that position and I felt very grateful to do it, was because with my work with New Student Programs and Orientation, I had collaborated with, with Sara Sheik, who remains one of my dearest friends, we had collaborated on the creation of a peer mentoring program. So it was a orientation, New Student Programs and Cross-Cultural Center, um, Multicultural Programs, collaborative program. Where we focused on pairing up first-year students from underserved, underrepresented populations. So really it was, I forget the criteria but, primarily students of color, first gen[eration] students who weren&#039 ; t part of other specialized programs, which now I think about it, I&#039 ; m like, that&#039 ; s funny. That&#039 ; s the population I&#039 ; m working with again. So, because we had worked so closely on that and had, we&#039 ; re really working with the staff on creating that program, and we interviewed and hired the mentors and we onboarded the mentees and all of that stuff. I think when Sara ended up leaving, I was a natural kind of-- &#039 ; Cause I had already been working with the, with the directors and coordinators of the other, of the other centers. I had already been working with the staff in C3 on this program. So, it was kind of a natural, you know, &quot ; Can you just help with this for a little bit?&quot ; And so that way we, you know, can have some consistency? Um, so it was a fun- SS: Yeah, I tried to find how long you were in that position. I couldn&#039 ; t find it. How Long? JR: It was about a semest- I&#039 ; d say it was about a semester, if not an entire semester. It was a couple of months in the spring semester of-- oh gosh, I don&#039 ; t know what year it was. [20]10, [20]11, [20]12, around that time. Yeah, because it was before- &#039 ; cause I moved into the Interim Assistant Dean of Students position in January, 2013. So I would say it was probably nine [2009] or [20]10 possibly, but it was only a couple months while we worked on, hiring and getting Floyd. So. SS: Perfect. I don&#039 ; t wanna get too sidetracked but, I&#039 ; d like, if you&#039 ; re willing, I&#039 ; d like you to tell me about your friendship with Sara [Sheikh]. How is she? JR: God. Is this what she started crying about when she was asking about relationships? SS: I&#039 ; m not sure. &lt ; laughs&gt ; JR: Oh gosh, Sara, what a special human. Um, she texted me earlier. She&#039 ; s like, how was your interview? I&#039 ; m like, it&#039 ; s at three. So I&#039 ; ll tell her that you all asked about her. Um, I remember interviewing her because when we would bring candidates on for our department, you know, we&#039 ; d all have a chance to meet all the candidates and whatnot. She first off, she was not, how do? This is the diplomatic part of me. She was not allowed to reach her fullest potential here. Her skills and her talents were not as tapped as they possibly could have been here. She left before she should have. Um, but opportunities arose and she had to take it. But she is, we are so incredibly different, but she is a quiet, calm, intentional, just peaceful human being. Everything she does is with intention and purpose. And she&#039 ; s one of those people in my life, and I tell her all the time, and it&#039 ; s now her and her wife because they&#039 ; re, they&#039 ; re like cup filling people like you, you hang out with them, you spend time with them. And I&#039 ; m like, okay, my soul, has been refilled. Um, not to get into politics, but this is, this is related the day of the, the day after the 2016 election, there were various emotions. And she happened to be on campus that day. She, Sara was here, this was years after she&#039 ; d gone, but she happened to be bringing a group of students here to campus. And I told her, I said, you are the perfect and only person I would&#039 ; ve wanted to interact with on this day. Because she&#039 ; s so good at just like being in a space with and just allowing space and asking intentional questions. But-- and then her laugh is just so unique. Like when you get her laughing, it&#039 ; s just like, there&#039 ; s no laugh like it. Um, but she just, the students so highly respected her, and everything that she touched here, again she did with intention and purpose. And she makes everyone feel like literally you&#039 ; re the only person in the room. She has nothing else to distract her. It&#039 ; s a very intentional, like, you&#039 ; re hearing it a, a pattern like purposeful and intentional. She&#039 ; s just a good, good person. So, I remember, &#039 ; cause I tend to talk a lot and, um, and this isn&#039 ; t fair &#039 ; cause you&#039 ; re asking me to talk, so there&#039 ; s no, there&#039 ; s no judgment here. But I remember we were at a, we were doing a staff retreat and I had to get used to that. she would process. So, you know, somebody would ask a question and a prompt, and we had to give space for Sara because Sara needed time to kind of put all of the thoughts together and process and whatnot. And so, I&#039 ; ve always taken that with me. But, we&#039 ; ve, you know, she was at my wedding. I was at her wedding. She met my son when he was, you know just after he was born. I&#039 ; ve had the privilege to, I was there the day that, they officially adopted their son. I was taking pictures and just, just one of those people, you know? Just one of those people in your life that I&#039 ; m grateful for our relationship here. And just the connection and it, I, it&#039 ; s one of those things where I&#039 ; m like, thank you for allowing me to stay in your life. Because there&#039 ; s days where I&#039 ; m like, what do I bring to you? &lt ; laughs&gt ; Because she&#039 ; s just so fantastic. But she would just kind of, she would brush that off and be like you&#039 ; re nuts. So she&#039 ; s special. SS: I love that. That&#039 ; s incredibly great [indistinguishable]. That&#039 ; s amazing. I know we&#039 ; re in the little sidetrack here, but- JR: No, it&#039 ; s fine. it&#039 ; s all connected. SS: It&#039 ; s all oral history, its all about people, so. JR: It Is. SS: Back to the Cross-Cultural Center. Could you tell me about a favorite memory? Or not even a favorite, just a memory you have from the Cross-Cultural Center? JR: Hmm. &lt ; laugh&gt ; . SS: This is a little stumped [one]. JR: No, it&#039 ; s not stumped. I just, there&#039 ; s certain things that it&#039 ; s like, I just immediately remember and I&#039 ; m like, it doesn&#039 ; t have to be super deep, right? SS: Mm-hmm. JR: I remember there was a period of time, I don&#039 ; t know, I think it was before Sara left, but, um, there were ti-- I don&#039 ; t know if she was out, but, we needed to have physical presence in the Center. And so each of the SLL staff would sign up for shifts to sit at the front desk of the center. And, I remember, I love NSYNC. It&#039 ; s a boy band. Yeah. And I remember I was listening to Pandora at the time, it was Pandora. And I told them, I was up there, I had like a morning shift and I said, &quot ; If I am here at my shift, you are hearing NSYNC and boy bands.&quot ; And it just became a thing. They&#039 ; re like, &quot ; Oh, Jennie&#039 ; s here.&quot ; And I would just play that music. And, it was, that&#039 ; s the first thing that kind of came to mind. It was just kind of funny. They were like, &quot ; Oh God, Jenny&#039 ; s on shift.&quot ; But it was cool because it got us physically out of our own offices and I looked forward to that, you know, physical, that physical location change. But then to interact with students in different ways. Um, God, there&#039 ; s a lot of memories. I met a student, and I won&#039 ; t say his name for obvious reasons you&#039 ; ll learn shortly, but I first met him in C3 and I remember him &#039 ; cause he would walk in and he was always in military gear, but like not like he, he was like within the military, he was always just wearing like military-grade-- SS: Camo? JR: Yeah. He had like a, this military-grade backpack, like, the combat boots and just, and he was just the sweetest, kindest person. And I, that&#039 ; s he, that was the first time I met him was in the C3. And he would come in there all the time and that&#039 ; s where he would hang out and we would talk about life. And he quickly disclosed to me that he had dealt with some significant mental health challenges. And just, my brother has also dealt with some stuff and so he and I were connecting on that and just talking about life and making those connections. And I remembered he had gone away for a bit and then he had returned and he was, he was having some challenges as only a couple years ago. Unfortunately he passed away last year. But I always remember just that connection I had with him. And I realized, you know, a lot of other people on campus had that connection with him. He was just, he was just this unique soul. He was like an old soul. He dealt with so much adversity with mental and physical health, but he just always came with just a presence of kindness and just sh- like sheer gratitude. And when I-- when I changed, when I moved outta my office a couple weeks ago, &#039 ; cause I was in that office for nine years. One of the things I was, I was cleaning this stuff out and I found a thank you card from him. And I was like, wow, what a gift. And he had, it was after I was out of the role within relation to [C3], but it&#039 ; s a couple years ago when I helped him with some stuff and it just said, &quot ; Thank you for helping me in one of the difficult times in my life.&quot ; and I was just like, God, what a gift you just gave me. So, um, I don&#039 ; t know if I would&#039 ; ve had the chance to meet him had I not been in that, you know, in that physical space because I know that was a space of safety for him, which was I know the case for a lot of students, so. SS: Wow. JR: [Mm-hmm] &lt ; laugh&gt ; . SS: Sorry about that. JR: I know it&#039 ; s tough and yeah. Yeah. SS: [indistinguishable] It&#039 ; s remembering NSYNC Radio, at least. &lt ; laugh&gt ; JR: NSYNC Radio. But I think even with him, I still smile, you know, and um, yeah, &#039 ; cause again, he just exuded gratitude and it, um, yeah. So mm-hmm. SS: Well on a lighter note! Uh. JR: &lt ; laugh&gt ; , I know, sorry take these down. SS: No, no, no. It&#039 ; s perfect. It&#039 ; s perfect. I know you only worked there for a semester, but how might have your work at the Cross-Cultural Center helped you develop as a professional? JR: Massively. I mean, you know, as a, as a White woman, straight CIS woman, I bring privilege with me and I always am trying to learn and understand that what my physical presence may bring depending on the space and I&#039 ; m at right? And, the majority of the students who, who hung out in that space were, were students of color, primarily students who were of Asian Pacific Islander descent. But, it was something for me to be able to-- when I first got asked to kind of fill in the role, part of me was like I didn&#039 ; t want my own identity to be a detriment to their development. But I realize now me even just knowing that I think &lt ; laughs&gt ; makes a difference. That I&#039 ; m aware of how my identity impacts those around me. But there were some experiences that came up that I remember we were doing, we were doing some activities-- Oh we were doing a, an event and it was around, um, Judaism, and I don&#039 ; t remember what the content of the workshop was, but Hillel, which is still an active organization for serving and supporting Jewish students, but obviously non-Jewish students can be involved. There was some concern about us offering this workshop and possibly providing false information. And it was one of those things that in the moment you can get very defensive, right? You can be like, no, you know, we&#039 ; re not, we&#039 ; re not trying to do anything to whatever. But what it had me do was, you need to stop for a second and be-- again, the intentionality. It really taught me just you to think of anyone who could be potentially impacted, but also leveraging the voices that you have and collaborate and pull them in. Um, &#039 ; cause why wouldn&#039 ; t have we have collaborated with folks on campus who live that on, on a daily basis and could provide some additional you know, but I was advising students at this time and the student was just doing what he was told. He was creating these workshops kind of in a vacuum. But it was a really good lesson to, again, do things as intentionally as possible. Even if it means you have to move the workshop a few weeks later, if it means we&#039 ; re doing it the right way, let&#039 ; s do that. So that was a really good lesson and I think it ended up being fine. We ended up collaborating with them. Um, and then just--Trying to think. I mean, just working with all different types of people and interacting with students I probably normally wouldn&#039 ; t have just because they weren&#039 ; t involved in Orientation Team. Like this, this particular pocket of students who worked as student assistants, within all the other centers because there was kind of like this collective team they had of- at the time the Women&#039 ; s Center, the Pride Center, and the Cross-Cultural Center, those three centers ; our staffs would get together on a frequent basis. And there&#039 ; s folks from other staffs that I have connected with that I&#039 ; m still in, contact with that I probably would never have interacted with. And to be honest, they probably would never have even-- based on who I am and how I present and probably would never have even interacted with me. And so, it was a great opportunity to kind of make those connections. But, um, I learned some more things just about program planning. We, we planned some pretty big events and just again, how to honor history and culture and doing it in a meaningful manner while advising students who just wanna get things done. And it&#039 ; s like, how do you balance that? So that was, um, that was a good experience. SS: Yeah. That&#039 ; s great. Um, making connections. using your voices. Moving on, could you describe, and this doesn&#039 ; t have to be with the Cross-Cultural Center &#039 ; cause I know you worked a pretty short time over there. Could you describe a project or initiative you with that you are particularly proud of, or were a part of necessarily? JR: Hmm. Geez, just so many SS: &lt ; laughs&gt ; JR: I think I can discuss the peer mentoring program. Although it was short-lived, I think for what it was. It&#039 ; s one of those programs that no matter how good of a program you have, if you don&#039 ; t have the resources to continue it, you can only do so much. And so-- but it was, it was really cool because it was kind of a brainchild of Sara and then she came to me and said, &quot ; You work with new students, can we just do this connection?&quot ; And so we really got a chance to dig into the benefits of peer mentoring and we kind of, we created it really from the ground up. We recruited current students to be peer mentors, created that training for them. And because of my work with O-Team [Orientation Team], who is solely volunteers, you know, I had a training with them, a weekly training with them on, in the spring semester, and then we had retreats. And so I was able to really bring that component. Um, and then what Sara brought was really the, the pieces of how-- why we&#039 ; re serving this particular population because there is an equity gap that our white students are persisting at a higher rate and graduating at a higher rate than our students of color. So, and then there was research that showed that peer mentoring specifically helps to close-- is one of the most beneficial components that a student could have to have a peer to peer connection. So it was really fun to work with her on that and really create the curriculum, create the, the criteria for the mentors. And then I remember we had spreadsheets and we were divvying up the, the caseloads of like who, or not the caseloads-- of like who would be matched with certain mentors and stuff like that. Um, and so that was really fun. And then once Sara left and Floyd came on, um, I don&#039 ; t think it was a while, but he and I had the idea to do like an overnight retreat with this program. So what we did was we had them all come together. So we&#039 ; ve had the mentors and the mentees, this is before school even started, had them on a bus. We drove up to Julian [California] and we did kind of team-building activities. And it was really-- I remember we had this, we wanted to do a ropes course and we had, there&#039 ; s a ropes course at this camp. And I remember Floyd and I were brought in probably three days before the retreat. And our boss at the time said, we can&#039 ; t spend the money on this. And we&#039 ; re like, &quot ; What are we supposed to do?&quot ; So then he and I just like hunkered down and created like our own like, internal team-building exercises, but we&#039 ; re like, &quot ; What the hell are we gonna do?&quot ; But we figured it out. What&#039 ; s funny now is I think it was that year, one of the mentees is now on my coaching staff. SS: &lt ; laughs&gt ; . JR: So I&#039 ; ve known him forever and it&#039 ; s really cool. And then funny enough we, well it&#039 ; s not funny but, we had to buy a new car this past weekend, track me here-- and I, we go to San Diego County Credit Union because that, we had literally just paid our car off on Thursday and that&#039 ; s when our car died. So we went back to San Diego County Credit Union. Said we wanted to get a loan with you again. And as we&#039 ; re meeting with this loan officer, she&#039 ; s like, where do you work? I told her, she&#039 ; s like, &quot ; I knew you look familiar!&quot ; And my husband&#039 ; s always like, &quot ; I swear to God, she knows people everywhere.&quot ; And she said, &quot ; I was part of the peer mentoring program&quot ; and I remembered her &#039 ; cause she was assigned to, I would say was our best mentor &#039 ; cause some of our mentors left a lot to be des-- like, &quot ; Can you talk? Can you touch base with your students?&quot ; But this one -- and her last name was Ruiz as well -- and so we connected on that, but it was so cool to see this student who had been in the peer mentoring program and just being like, &quot ; I remember you!&quot ; And it was a nice little reunion. Um, but I thought it was a really cool framework to create. Um, unfortunately the resources just weren&#039 ; t able to keep it going. So. SS: Yeah. That&#039 ; s cool that you saw your, your one mentor--[indistinguishable] JR: It was so funny that, &quot ; I know you look familiar!&quot ; When I said I worked at campus, it was funny. SS: Yea I Know plenty of people working in the university space currently working with limited resources. Yeah, it&#039 ; s definitely challenging. JR: It is. Especially when it&#039 ; s such meaningful work like that. I mean, it&#039 ; s literally to support, but now I&#039 ; m in a space again to be able to do that same kind of work, which is exciting. SS: Mm-hmm. What is the significance of having a space that champions underrepresented students? JR: Um, I mean so much. And with underrepresented students, obviously that&#039 ; s such a large umbrella, right? And then every group and, and community that makes up that term needs different things and there&#039 ; s an intersectionality and all that and it can-- but you know what it really comes down to, it&#039 ; s about equity, right? And it&#039 ; s interesting having conversations with people who don&#039 ; t quite get it and there&#039 ; s people who make comments sometimes it&#039 ; s like, &quot ; What about a space for us?&quot ; And I&#039 ; m like, do you understand that any-- I can go somewhere and see someone who looks like me and understands my experience. I mean, generally speaking, pretty easily, if you have a student who comes to this campus and does not see anyone who looks like them during the day, does not have a faculty member teaching them who is from the same culture or community, to be able to have a space that a student knows they can go to. To have an experience that just physical and mental and emotional safety on a daily basis, for them to do homework and define that community will only help them to be better in all aspects of their life. That&#039 ; s why programs like EOP [Educational Opportunity Program] and ACE Scholars and those programs exist because they&#039 ; re-- every student should have access to the same level of services, right? First and foremost. But, if you look at certain populations and certain areas where students are from, they then need that much more support to get them to the same place that more majority populations are. So I think providing spaces like this is one step in providing that, that equity. Um, because I can imagine a student coming here and I&#039 ; ve never really experienced it, but being like, &quot ; I don&#039 ; t see myself here.&quot ; They&#039 ; re not gonna feel an emotional connection to the campus. They&#039 ; re not gonna feel like going to class because why would they care? I mean, there&#039 ; s some students who inherently they just have this intrinsic motivation and they&#039 ; ll go to school and it&#039 ; s fine. But you wanna have that, that community and sense of belonging. That&#039 ; ll just make it that much more just robust of an experience for them. And the community pieces is massive. So spaces like this, if done well, and intentionally and has good leadership and the resources it needs. Because the thing is these centers-- and people joke a lot of times are placed in the basements of buildings, they&#039 ; re placed in inaccessible areas that people don&#039 ; t necessarily know about. If you do it well and put &#039 ; em in high traffic areas like the USU [University Student Union], have staffing and resources to really support those students, then it goes well. But just historically spaces like that are just under-resourced and which is an issue. So. SS: Yeah. Um, I guess in that same sort of area of, doing it right. Are there any aspects of your time at the Cross-Cultural Center that you would&#039 ; ve approached differently if given the chance? JR: Mm. I, when I came in, because again, there was this like conglomerate of the three spaces. I would, and it was a really short period of time, but I got kind of sucked into their drama &lt ; laughs&gt ; , and I wish I would&#039 ; ve come in and I don&#039 ; t know if I had fully found my voice yet like if I, knowing what I know now about things and haven&#039 ; t gone through when I&#039 ; ve gone through now, I feel like I would be able to go in and be able to really help the students to be very-- To, you know to collaborate, but not necessarily be dependent on, I think, I wanted to collaborate with these other folks but I think there was almost a sense of like I had to defer to what they wanted kind of thing. And so probably it would be fun to go back in there now knowing what I know now and see how things would be different. But, I don&#039 ; t know. I think that the state of where I was at the time, you learn based on where you&#039 ; re at in life. And I got lessons, from it. I, um, there were-- I worked with my first student who I was aware of being undocumented at the time and just learning about that process and learning about that impact for her and just, I mean we literally, no one knew but she would, she would submit kind of a fake time sheet every month just to have this sense of normalcy and that nobody would question. And just, that was kind of my first, kind of opportunity to, to work with students experiencing those challenges. So. I can&#039 ; t think of anything glaring. I was still I think pretty early and young in my profession. Um, so, there&#039 ; s still days where I&#039 ; m like, &quot ; You wanted me to be in there?&quot ; But, it worked out. But I think those are the things I can, I can think of. SS: That&#039 ; s good. JR: Yeah. SS: More experience. JR: More experience. It&#039 ; s all, it&#039 ; s all experience. Yes. SS: Well, as we&#039 ; re wrapping-- winding down, I know you mentioned before that a lot of people that would go to the Cross-Cultural Center were um-- JR: Asian Pacific Islander. SS: Oh yeah. Asian Pacific Islanders. JR: &lt ; laughs&gt ; Yes. SS: I, a lot of questions are raised around like these cultural centers, like the Black Student Center and, the Latinx Center and stuff like that. And should there be an Asian student center? Should there be a white student center? What&#039 ; s your response to that? JR: &lt ; laughs&gt ; That&#039 ; s my response. &lt ; laughs&gt ; Um, I mean, I think I mentioned it before about the purpose of these spaces. Everyone, every student should have access to support and resources on our campus. I do not think inherently based on the setup of society, students at particular demographics are lacking spaces where they see others like them. SS: [Mm-hmm.] JR: Like I said, things need to be, do, done well. You need to have the staffing. I think it&#039 ; s always going to be met with some dissonance because there&#039 ; s gonna always be people who just don&#039 ; t get it. But the people who are the ones traditionally, and I know there&#039 ; s people who may identify as the same within that center and say, I don&#039 ; t think we should have, you know, separation or whatnot. But it depends where people are at on their identity development. And when you kind of go through identity development, you get to the point where you&#039 ; re comfortable enough in your space and your skin and your whatever to understand that everyone else is in a different space and that&#039 ; s okay. And that some students may be okay with it and some students may really need that space to be successful. And again, if having a Black Student Center allows one black man who goes to school here to have a physical space that he can go to feel safe, then I think that&#039 ; s been successful because otherwise where would he find that here? Right. I think the people who ask those questions about, why don&#039 ; t we have this? Why don&#039 ; t we have this? And it&#039 ; s like, I don&#039 ; t-- there&#039 ; s gonna always be people who ask those questions and they don&#039 ; t have an answer for it. They don&#039 ; t have anything to kind of back up, you know, you ask the question of, &quot ; Why do you think we need that space?&quot ; And they don&#039 ; t have any, you know, there&#039 ; s no research to back up the answers that they&#039 ; re hoping to get. It&#039 ; s just, they&#039 ; re there-- The questions are just being asked, I think to kind of stir things up. But again, the caveat is: you don&#039 ; t wanna just do it to do it to check off boxes. You need to do it as intentionally as possible. And I&#039 ; m far from being an expert on how to implement that. But if you don&#039 ; t have the resources and don&#039 ; t have the institutional support, you&#039 ; re only gonna be, you&#039 ; re set up to fail. SS: Mm-hmm. Perfect. Great. Um, yeah, I like that answer. If it helps. It&#039 ; s worth it. JR: Yep. Mm-hmm. SS: To conclude connecting to that question, uh, what role do you see the Cross-Cultural Center playing as it coexists with the expansion of identity-specific spaces? JR: I would imagine, I&#039 ; ll say Floyd specifically &#039 ; cause he has been the longest-tenured, um, director in there now. [Floyd] is probably been asked how he&#039 ; s gonna be-- What is the Cross-Cultural Center? How does the Cross-Cultural Center kind of stand apart from the other identity centers? I think with the Cross-Cultural Center, although other centers talk about intersectionality and you know, and that sort of thing, I think what the Cross-Cultural Center can really focus on is really that multiculturalism, how all the different identities intersect and kind of can help to facilitate those conversations and understandings and that sort of thing. I would imagine there&#039 ; s been conversations about-- do we have a space for, you know, our APIDA [Asian Pacific Islander Desi American] students? Because that tends to be the space that, that population tends to spend time. I think, there were conversations way back in the day where, &#039 ; cause they&#039 ; re Kamalayan Alliance, I don&#039 ; t know if it&#039 ; s a really big organization now, but Kamalayan Alliance was a massive student organization back in the day, and that was primarily the students who made up the space in the center and some people had issues with it. It&#039 ; s kind of like but this is not supposed to be just for Filipino students, but it&#039 ; s like, who defines that? You know? It depends on who has a connection here and who feels connected. So, I would imagine-- I know there&#039 ; s some campuses who have, I mean, tons of different affinity spaces and identity centers. And I&#039 ; m sure there&#039 ; s gonna be conversation about what, what is C3&#039 ; s role in that? Um, I don&#039 ; t know the answer I&#039 ; m not privy to those conversations, but I&#039 ; m sure the questions have come up of what is the space for this type of physical and identity space in the midst of adding all these different, identity spaces? Other campuses do it. It&#039 ; s just, I&#039 ; m sure there&#039 ; s a lot of conversations about what is the vision and mission and kind of, where&#039 ; s it gonna go, which can be exciting. Um, but I&#039 ; m sure there&#039 ; s also some pressure to be like, who are we? What is our, what is our mission here on campus? But, um, the current leadership can figure it out. He&#039 ; s [Floyd Lai, Director of the Cross-Cultural Center] good. He&#039 ; s good. SS: Yea, he is good. JR: He is good. SR: Anyways, thank you so much for coming here and-- JR: This was Fun. &lt ; laughs&gt ; . I don&#039 ; t know what I expected, But yeah. 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The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=RuizJennie_StanleySeth_2023-04-07.xml RuizJennie_StanleySeth_2023-04-07.xml https://archivesearch.csusm.edu/repositories/3/resources/19 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Ruiz, Jennie. Interview April 7, 2023 Description An account of the resource Oral history interview of Jennie Ruiz for the Cross-Cultural Center Oral History Project on April 7, 2023. Biographical information about Jennie, how she started working for California State University San Marcos, her leadership and networking skills. Jennie’s friendship with Sara Sheikh-Arvizu and its impact on her. Her experience running the Cross-Cultural Center, and her thoughts about its role at CSU San Marcos. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC027-029 Subject The topic of the resource California State University San Marcos. Cross-Cultural Center Education, Higher Human rights Student success Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2023-04-07 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Jennie Ruiz Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving image Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jennie Ruiz Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Seth Stanley Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Marcos (Calif.) Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener">In copyright</a> Cross-Cultural Center oral history project CSUSM history Women's experience https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/c5940d5103570c06601179277b230b8f.pdf 6501572b27876302ad6780f8f8a675fb PDF Text Text JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 Seth Stanley [Interviewer]: This is Seth Stanley. Today I'm interviewing Jenny Ruiz for the California State University San Marcos Cross-Cultural Center Oral History project. Today is April 7th, 2023, and this interview is taking place at the University Library. Hi Jenny. Thank you for coming. Jennie Ruiz [Narrator]: Hi, Seth <laughs>. SS: To start out, uh, can you tell me a little bit about your background and how that maybe has influenced your work in higher education? JR: Oh, goodness. Okay. Background. How far do you, how do you, how far do you want me to go? SS: As long as you want. JR: Oh goodness. Well, I was born, no, um-SS: Go for it. JR: Background. Um, so I'm born and raised in San Diego, um, from Mira Mesa originally, um, went to college up at Sonoma State. For my undergrad. And did, um, got my degree in sociology. So I did a few different majors, but then I landed on sociology cause I had a really great Intro to Soc[iology] professor who I really enjoyed. Um, and through my time at Sonoma State, I got involved in various things. I mainly had to work on campus just to pay bills and live and all that. So I worked in like different food service and I worked in retail off campus, and actually told the story last, it was, what was it, Tuesday at a session I led about my like, professional journey. 1 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 But I had a, a job on campus where I was having to put up flyers across campus and I hated it. I would have like hundreds of flyers to post. Um, this is before lot. This is before like electronic signage and all of that. So I, um, and I was miserable but I saw a flyer for a job in the Career Center on campus and I'm like, thank goodness no one else has seen this ad at this point ‘cause I'm putting the ads up, so I'm gonna apply for this job, which I did. And that kind of took me into this path of, um, of higher ed and student affairs. It kind of opened me up into, like the orientation, you know, kind of world new student orientation, ‘cause a lot of things were run through that area. Academic advising, I interacted with, um, the program called Freshman Seminar there, which is similar to our GEL program here [program geared towards first-year students and student success in academia]. So I served in various leadership roles. I actually got, uh, I was on the dean's list one semester. There, grades were never my thing, but one semester I got on the dean's list and I got an invitation to apply for leadership positions on campus. So that in conjunction with my job in the Career Center just kind of launched me into kind of the higher ed. like, oh, this is kind of fun! So I was an orientation leader. I worked as a peer mentor in our freshman seminar class. I was a student assistant [at the] Career Center. And then once I graduated, I was looking into kind of a counseling area. Um, didn't quite know what I was going to do and my dad, funny enough, got me a book called What to Do with a Sociology Degree, and I was reading it one day and there was a paragraph on college counseling and I was like, of course I could do this job for work! I had never even connected [that] the professional staff that I worked with were doing that as a career. So that kind of, you know, launched me and I applied for grad school. I went to USD [University of San Diego] for my master's in counseling with a specialization in college student development. Worked in my orientation, worked in the orientation program there as a grad assistant. And then after that, got a job at Stony Brook University in New York as a residence hall director. Um, my friend tipped me off to a job that was here at Cal State San Marcos to be Coordinator of New Student Programs. So I applied for that job and I thankfully got it. And, um, that started my career here back in 2006, back when, funny enough, C3 [Cross-Cultural Center] was literally, I think the size of this room when I first started on the fourth floor, third floor of, um, no, the administrative building past, then [named] Craven Hall. So, and then since then I've just held a variety of positions and here I am. <laugh>. SS: [Inaudible] Tell me more about what motivated you to work in a specifically a college setting and specifically supporting student success. JR: Yeah. I think people go into higher ed or any of their professions for one or two reasons: either they had a really good experience or they had a really awful experience and didn't want that to be repeated for somebody else. In my case, I had a fantastic college experience. I had great mentors, I had really great opportunities. Um, so I felt very fortunate. And I just, you know, in my work as a peer mentor in the freshman seminar class, I was meeting individually with these first time freshmen, really working with them and, and you know, talking with them about just life and how to connect and find their place on 2 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 campus. And I found myself really enjoying it and kind of becoming-- it was a natural thing to me. Um, and so I think I wanted to feel that in my career, be able to really take that with me. And, one of the great things about I think this campus, but just the CSU [California State University] is I think our students are just so special and just work so hard. Not saying that students don't work hard other places but that there's something about our students here. Um, there's a lot of gratitude, there's a lot of understanding, I think, of the privilege they have of being here and getting their degree and, you know, working with that population is really, really rewarding. So, you know, did I want-- I wanted to be that for other students moving forward. But I just loved the feel of being on a college campus. There's nothing like it. I now have a almost seven year-old and just, he's been able to be here since when, since he was born. And just knowing that-- he actually said the other night, he's like, “You go to college!” And I'm like, no, I don't go to col-- I'm not a college student, I work at a college. But he just, he associates college with me. And that's just, he's grown up in that environment. And then my mom also worked at USD for 30 years. So, I grew up going to campus with her and hanging out with college kids who, funny enough, seemed significantly older than they do now. So, it was just always a part of, you know, who I was. And so, I felt fortunate to find a place here. SS: And, now you're working as the Interim Director of Student Success Coaching, right? Can you walk us through your experiences as that at the job? JR: In the five weeks I've been in the position, <laugh>, um, it's… it's been, it's been really great. It's actually brought me back to I'd say my roots here because I started here at CSUSM overseeing orientation and really working with new students and first year students and all that. So, it's been fun in the short time I've been here to work with the team to really be creative about how we're gonna be engaging students who are coming in this next year. We're kind of in this two… two paths right now. It's the finish this semester, but then let's think big and creatively for the incoming class who're gonna be here in fall [20]23. So just really, learning from the team and thinking about how impactful the work that they're doing can really be for the retention success of the first-time freshman coming in. So, I don't know how much you know about the program but it serves first-year students who are not in an otherwise specialized program. So who are not in the Educational Opportunity Program who are not in TRIO [Student Support Services], who are not in CAMP [College Assistance Migration Program], um, ACE Scholars who are former foster youth, and then athletes or international students. So, we kind of capture the rest of the students, so don't really have a home, you know, and we wanna be that contact for them to kind of have that, that person they can go to for any questions that they have just about college. Um, so it's going well. I'm really enjoying it. I'm able to be creative and think through things and plan, which is something I love to do. 3 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 SS: So, I know you've only worked there for, you've only been working in this position for five weeks, but, um, could you tell me, tell me about, your leadership style and how you adapted to different situations and team members? JR: Yeah, I mean, I think I can relate it to, ‘cause I was in my old position as associate dean for almost seven years. So I've been in management leadership roles for over ten, twelve years now. But yeah it's been interesting because I joined a brand new team and so I really had the chance to kind of see how I was gonna adapt myself to them and how they were gonna receive me. And you know, it's funny, my first day I brought donuts and I said to them, ‘cause this team right now doesn't have a permanent space. They're literally working in a temporary space right now. So my first thing was how do I provide them with a level of, you know, kind of stability and structure. So even in an absence of a physical, permanent location, they can kind of feel that stability. SS: Mm-hmm. JR: But I came in that first day and I was like, so I haven't started a new job in a very long time. So I said, I just ask for your grace. But I'm as much as, as reasonable and appropriate, obviously it's just about the human first. These are all human beings who are working in a job and if you don't connect that piece and know what really matters to these people just in life, you're kind of missing the mark. So my goal was, and I told people ‘cause they wanted to meet with me, people outside my team wanted to meet with me very quickly to like talk about coaching and how I could collaborate. And I said, I want the first month to be me focusing on the team, getting to know the team, building those relationships. And so meeting with them individually and getting to know their strengths and kind of where there's opportunities. But I, I'd say I'm very, I'm all about personal connections and relationships and being collaborative. But I'm also good about being, like, sometimes we just kind of have to do things and we can't bring everyone into the fold, but I want to be as transparent as possible, communicate, provide, make sure people are in the loop. ‘Cause the less transparency there is, people then start to kind of worry and, you know create a narrative themselves. And so, but also humor. I like to approach things with humor. But Yeah. SS: 4 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 Well, sounds like you're the right person for the job. <laughter> Um, I'd like to ask, how have you leveraged your networks and relationships to support student development and success? JR: Oh gosh. SS: <laughs> JR: You know, it's… so this talk I just gave on Tuesday, the Division of Student Affairs does, um, they just started this series called Conversations with Leaders. And they finally, they asked, they asked me to speak and I'm like, okay, because part of me is like, “You want me to talk? Oh, that's fine!” So I talked a lot about this, but one of the benefits of my job, the job I had here when I first started with orientation: it's such just by the nature of the job, so highly collaborative that, that set me up for how I have literally done everything else in every other position I have here on campus. So, it had me working with event planning, with catering, with parking facilities, with advising, with, you know, leadership to student life. Like I work with every area on campus. And so through that, and I'm asking people to do things when I don't have any leadership or jurisdiction over them. And so you very quickly had to establish this relationship with people so you can-- ’cause all I would do in that job is ask people for favors. It's just, “I need you to do this. Can you help with this?” And so, and I fast forward now, there's one of the colleagues I've worked with, I met him my second day working, he works in advising and now I'm meeting with him about coaching and how to collaborate. And it's just, we laugh now that I'm like, talk about full circle and even doing training on some technology that we're gonna be implementing into the program. The person in IT [Information Technology], I worked with him when PeopleSoft was first coming on board. And so again, it's like “It's so fun to work with you again!” But, all that to say, it's been so key. And I think what has been very validating is when I've come into this job, the, the reactions I've gotten from people saying, “I'm so glad it's you and I can't wait to work with you in this role.” And that's been really affirming and I feel like because of my relationships, I've been able to, you know, there's credibility. I'm able to connect the coaches with people that they haven't connected with before. And, you know, if they have a question, I'm like, ”Let me just ask this person directly, like what the answer is.” They're like, “You can just do that?” I'm like, “Yeah, I just can chat whoever, or text whoever and vice versa.” So what I shared on Tuesday at the session was relationships is literally how I've gotten everything done here on this campus. It's, it's been so, so important. So I don't think I answered the question? SS: No, I love that. I love that. I'm so glad to see you [indistinguishable]. 5 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 JR: It's been, it's very sweet. I'm like, “Thank you!” It is very, because especially it's people that I've worked with forever and you know, and you just want people who are collaborative and willing to hear you out and you can laugh with. And I actually said to somebody the other day on the call, I said, “You don’t have to be diplomatic with me. Just tell me there’s clearly something there. So just like, tell me how you’re feeling so we can just deal with it.” And I think they appreciated it because with some people you have to be very diplomatic and be very discreet in how you're saying things. And I'm like, just, “I've been here long enough. Like, just tell me.” SS: [Indistinguishable] So I'd like to ask, how do you approach building rapport with students and understanding their unique, needs? JR: Yeah. Um, so I've had the benefit, I mean, since I've started here to work directly with students. So in my orientation job, I supervised volunteers who are on orientation team. I supervise students who were paid staff. Like those were my direct reports. So I was directly supporting and working with students. I think very similar with how I just work with anyone. I… it's so hard to describe something that I feel like just kind of happens, but I try to feel people out. You know, again, I approach a lot of things with humor, but obviously if this setting is not appropriate right, it's, you know, I'm able to kind of feel that out. I feel like I'm very intuitive. Like, I joke that my superpower is intuition because I can… I can tell-- if I know someone, I can tell like when they walk in a room and be like, there's something going on or what's happening, and I'll just kind of give a look and be like, you let me know what you need. Like, but I just, I stop and I make efforts. I get to know people and with students, that makes, that makes a difference. You know just being visible and being authentic. Providing, you know, sharing with-- with discretion of course, but like my own personal life and connections and here and there. Um, but you know, in my old- in my previous position, I was working with students in some really difficult circumstances ‘cause I was overseeing student conduct. I was overseeing students who were really in a difficult situation within their life. Whether it's, they've had very something very difficult happen to them and they're navigating it and how they're acting may not be the most appropriate in that setting. And just, um, I'm really good about student[s] coming in and being like, “What is going on? Like, what's, what's happening?” And also good about being like, what we're doing here isn't working. So how do we, let’s figure it out. So through the years I’ve gotten very good at being direct, but in a supportive manner? Um, some, well, supervisor joked with me, she's like, “I've never met somebody who could suspend a student, and in the same sentence, the student, thanks you.” <laugh> It's just, it's treating somebody as a human being. ’Cause, even if you're making a decision that's difficult, you can still do it with compassion. And humor too. I love to be sarcastic with students, like, especially O team [Orientation Team]. ‘Cause I still have a connection with the students who are on orientation team. ‘Cause my previous position, I was still in the same office and I would, they'd be laying down on orientation day and I'd just be like, “What are you 6 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 doing?” They’re like, “Oh, sorry Jennie!” And I'm like, “Come on,” <laugh> “Get your, get yourself together. Don't be laying down on the job.” So. SS: All right. Um, finally we're gonna get into the Cross-Cultural Center Questions. JR: I know this is like, this is getting us-- getting me warm. Okay. SS: I Really love that. Yeah. I love, like, you're just a person people can trust, a conduit of stability. JR: Conduit of stability. Oh, that's deep. Okay. SS: Could you, anyway, could you describe what the Cross-Cultural Center was like when you initially began engaging with it? JR: Mm-hmm. What I remember about C3 is what we call it. Um, so when I first started, we had, and I imagine you're interviewing Alexis Monte Virgin, SS: Um, I'm not sure, she's not one I'm interviewing. JR: 7 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 Yeah, he was the coordinator when I first started. Um, he's like a president of a university now. It's amazing. So he was, he was the coordinator. The, the interaction I had with C3 when I started… because I oversaw orientation, the Student Life and Leadership Office at the time was this compacted space in, um, past known as Craven Hall. And so when I had on orientation days, we needed a place for Orientation Team to debrief the day. So we'd go up to C3. So that's how, that's what I remember it as. We'd go up to, we'd go to C, we'd be sitting on the floor. They had these big red couches, the red couches, the red chairs, and, it was small, but it was like, it was cozy. But yeah, we would just be having people sit on every surface possible and have our debriefing sessions there. And that's kind of my initial like, connection and, memory of how I first interacted. SS: This is a really big follow up, but, how did it shift over time? And did you have any role in this change? JR: Um, how it shifted? So, pretty quickly after I started, probably within the first year… and I think the plans had already been happening, was we were gonna be moving spaces. We were gonna be moving, offices to the first floor, no, to the third floor [of the Administration Building]. So I don't know if you're familiar or not- where Ace Scholars is now, where the Tukwut courtyard is? That's where Student Life and Leadership used to be. So we were already, when I first started, kind of in this future planning, dream big mode of what can Student Life and Leadership look like. But at that time, C3 was under the purview of Student Life and Leadership. So figuring out where and how that space - because it was very important to have a designated space - not have it be interweaved into our office, but have a community building location for the Center. So, I am sure that I was part of conversations because we were doing like kind of physical planning of the office, figuring out where everything was gonna kind of be. Um, because I was overseeing orientation, the space back then it was, I had this massive cubicle… Um and then around the corner through a door was where C3 was. So it was an office physically located like right off of the general Student Life and Leadership office. So, kind of talking through and brainstorming how we were gonna fit these red couches into that space. The space was kinda like a triangle. So doing the physical kind of puzzle pieces, you know, figuring out, um, you know, what to put on the walls and to create that space was definitely part of that conversation. So, but yeah I don't remember the nuances, but I would imagine because it was physically located there, we were all part of that “What does this look like?” conversation. So, um, how it's evolved since then? I mean, it was in that space. And then, if I remember correctly, I don't know what happened first, but a leadership program was created within Student Life and Leadership. It's called SLL [Student Life and Leadership]. And, the idea was to create a Tukwut leadership. Um, is it Tukwut Leadership Center? Yeah. I think I'm remembering this correctly. So what ended up happening, I think a space opened up in the Commons Building directly across from Commons 206, I think is the room. And so the Cross-Cultural Center moved up there and then the [TLC], that [Tukwut] Leadership [Center] space, um, kind of a space for leadership programs and student 8 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 organization meetings, stuff like that, moved into that triangle space on the third floor. So the space when it was up there was… I mean, it was massive. It was, I mean, comparatively speaking, I mean there was, there were windows, um, there was like a welcome desk. There were the couches again, I believe. We had at one point, I don't know what the timeframe was, but we had painted this like collective mural where everybody had like, it was a, program that they had brought to campus with a muralist. And they pretty much gave us different pieces to draw and paint. And that was put together, I think it's still up in the C3 here in the Student Union, I wanna say. But that was up in the space and it was just bigger and more open. And I wanna say it was up there until the Student Union opened, which I wasn't in as much conversation about because at that time I had transitioned more into the Data Students Office-ish role. So I wasn't gonna be under the same umbrella. But I remember the conversations about the physical space in the Student Union and, the offices and having a balcony and having programming space and all of that. And so you see this space now. I mean it's just, it's just beautiful. And it's with the balcony. And we've held some retreats in there and separate kind of staff meeting stuff. And Floyd's [Lai, Director of the CCC] great. He's always willing to host people. Um, so it's done a lot of trainings in there and stuff like that. So, that's kind of how the physical space has evolved. It's gone a long way from this sized office. SS: Thank you for that. JR: Yeah. SS: So many permutations. I love the red couches. JR: The red couches. I mean, that's the thing. And you probably will hear a consistent thing is this thread, the red couches is what C3 was. Like, that is what was, you know, the signature furniture there. SS: 9 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 Yeah. [Indistinguishable] JR: Oh, I'm sure you did. SS: Anyways, um, I knew that you were temporary temporal, sorry. Temporarily responsible for the CrossCultural Center during a transition between associate directors. Let me ask you, what led you to that position? JR: <laughs> SS: How’d that Happen? JR: I don't know. You know, I think, when you're in a-- when you're leading a department right? And somebody leaves, you're kind of like, okay, who could kind of pick things up and keep them moving while we're doing a search, right? I think the reason I was kind of a natural person to jump into that position and I felt very grateful to do it, was because with my work with New Student Programs and Orientation, I had collaborated with, with Sara Sheik, who remains one of my dearest friends, we had collaborated on the creation of a peer mentoring program. So it was a orientation, New Student Programs and Cross-Cultural Center, um, Multicultural Programs, collaborative program. Where we focused on pairing up first-year students from underserved, underrepresented populations. So really it was, I forget the criteria but, primarily students of color, first gen[eration] students who weren't part of other specialized programs, which now I think about it, I'm like, that's funny. That's the population I'm working with again. So, because we had worked so closely on that and had, we're really working with the staff on creating that program, and we interviewed and hired the mentors and we onboarded the mentees and all of that stuff. I think when Sara ended up leaving, I was a natural kind of… ‘Cause I had already been working with the, with the directors and coordinators of the other, of the other centers. I had already been working with the staff in C3 on this program. So, it was kind of a natural, you know, “Can you just help with this for a little bit?” And so that way we, you know, can have some consistency? Um, so it was a fun- SS: 10 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 Yeah, I tried to find how long you were in that position. I couldn't find it. How Long? JR: It was about a semest- I'd say it was about a semester, if not an entire semester. It was a couple of months in the spring semester of… oh gosh, I don't know what year it was. [20]10, [20]11, [20]12, around that time. Yeah, because it was before- ‘cause I moved into the Interim Assistant Dean of Students position in January, 2013. So I would say it was probably nine [2009] or [20]10 possibly, but it was only a couple months while we worked on, hiring and getting Floyd. So. SS: Perfect. I don’t wanna get too sidetracked but, I'd like, if you’re willing, I'd like you to tell me about your friendship with Sara [Sheikh]. How is she? JR: God. Is this what she started crying about when she was asking about relationships? SS: I’m not sure. <laughs> JR: Oh gosh, Sara, what a special human. Um, she texted me earlier. She's like, how was your interview? I'm like, it's at three. So I'll tell her that you all asked about her. Um, I remember interviewing her because when we would bring candidates on for our department, you know, we'd all have a chance to meet all the candidates and whatnot. She first off, she was not, how do? This is the diplomatic part of me. She was not allowed to reach her fullest potential here. Her skills and her talents were not as tapped as they possibly could have been here. She left before she should have. Um, but opportunities arose and she had to take it. But she is, we are so incredibly different, but she is a quiet, calm, intentional, just peaceful human being. Everything she does is with intention and purpose. And she's one of those people in my life, and I tell her all the time, and it's now her and her wife because they're, they're like cup filling people like you, you hang out with them, you spend time with them. And I'm like, okay, my soul, has been refilled. Um, not to get into politics, but this is, this is related the day of the, the day after the 2016 election, there were various emotions. And she happened to be on campus that day. She, Sara was here, this was years after she'd gone, but she happened to be bringing a group of students here to campus. And I told her, I said, you are the perfect and only person I would've wanted to interact with on this day. Because she's so good at just like being in a space with and just allowing space and asking intentional questions. But… 11 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 and then her laugh is just so unique. Like when you get her laughing, it's just like, there's no laugh like it. Um, but she just, the students so highly respected her, and everything that she touched here, again she did with intention and purpose. And she makes everyone feel like literally you're the only person in the room. She has nothing else to distract her. It's a very intentional, like, you're hearing it a, a pattern like purposeful and intentional. She's just a good, good person. So, I remember, ‘cause I tend to talk a lot and, um, and this isn't fair ‘cause you're asking me to talk, so there's no, there's no judgment here. But I remember we were at a, we were doing a staff retreat and I had to get used to that. she would process. So, you know, somebody would ask a question and a prompt, and we had to give space for Sara because Sara needed time to kind of put all of the thoughts together and process and whatnot. And so, I've always taken that with me. But, we've, you know, she was at my wedding. I was at her wedding. She met my son when he was, you know just after he was born. I've had the privilege to, I was there the day that, they officially adopted their son. I was taking pictures and just, just one of those people, you know? Just one of those people in your life that I'm grateful for our relationship here. And just the connection and it, I, it’s one of those things where I’m like, thank you for allowing me to stay in your life. Because there’s days where I’m like, what do I bring to you? <laughs> Because she's just so fantastic. But she would just kind of, she would brush that off and be like you’re nuts. So she's special. SS: I love that. That's incredibly great [indistinguishable]. That's amazing. I know we're in the little sidetrack here, but- JR: No, it's fine. it's all connected. SS: It’s all oral history, its all about people, so. JR: It Is. SS: Back to the Cross-Cultural Center. Could you tell me about a favorite memory? Or not even a favorite, just a memory you have from the Cross-Cultural Center? JR: 12 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 Hmm. <laugh>. SS: This is a little stumped [one]. JR: No, it's not stumped. I just, there's certain things that it's like, I just immediately remember and I'm like, it doesn't have to be super deep, right? SS: Mm-hmm. JR: I remember there was a period of time, I don't know, I think it was before Sara left, but, um, there were ti-- I don't know if she was out, but, we needed to have physical presence in the Center. And so each of the SLL staff would sign up for shifts to sit at the front desk of the center. And, I remember, I love NSYNC. It's a boy band. Yeah. And I remember I was listening to Pandora at the time, it was Pandora. And I told them, I was up there, I had like a morning shift and I said, “If I am here at my shift, you are hearing NSYNC and boy bands.” And it just became a thing. They’re like, “Oh, Jennie's here.” And I would just play that music. And, it was, that's the first thing that kind of came to mind. It was just kind of funny. They were like, “Oh God, Jenny's on shift.” But it was cool because it got us physically out of our own offices and I looked forward to that, you know, physical, that physical location change. But then to interact with students in different ways. Um, God, there's a lot of memories. I met a student, and I won't say his name for obvious reasons you'll learn shortly, but I first met him in C3 and I remember him ‘cause he would walk in and he was always in military gear, but like not like he, he was like within the military, he was always just wearing like military-grade-SS: Camo? JR: Yeah. He had like a, this military-grade backpack, like, the combat boots and just, and he was just the sweetest, kindest person. And I, that's he, that was the first time I met him was in the C3. And he would come in there all the time and that's where he would hang out and we would talk about life. And he quickly disclosed to me that he had dealt with some significant mental health challenges. And just, my brother has also dealt with some stuff and so he and I were connecting on that and just talking about life and making those connections. And I remembered he had gone away for a bit and then he had returned and he was, he was having some challenges as only a couple years ago. Unfortunately he passed away last year. But I always remember just that connection I had with him. 13 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 And I realized, you know, a lot of other people on campus had that connection with him. He was just, he was just this unique soul. He was like an old soul. He dealt with so much adversity with mental and physical health, but he just always came with just a presence of kindness and just sh- like sheer gratitude. And when I… when I changed, when I moved outta my office a couple weeks ago, ‘cause I was in that office for nine years. One of the things I was, I was cleaning this stuff out and I found a thank you card from him. And I was like, wow, what a gift. And he had, it was after I was out of the role within relation to [C3], but it's a couple years ago when I helped him with some stuff and it just said, “Thank you for helping me in one of the difficult times in my life.” and I was just like, God, what a gift you just gave me. So, um, I don't know if I would've had the chance to meet him had I not been in that, you know, in that physical space because I know that was a space of safety for him, which was I know the case for a lot of students, so. SS: Wow. JR: [Mm-hmm] <laugh>. SS: Sorry about that. JR: I know it’s tough and yeah. Yeah. SS: [indistinguishable] It's remembering NSYNC Radio, at least. <laugh> JR: NSYNC Radio. But I think even with him, I still smile, you know, and um, yeah, ‘cause again, he just exuded gratitude and it, um, yeah. So mm-hmm. SS: Well on a lighter note! Uh. 14 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 JR: <laugh>, I know, sorry take these down. SS: No, no, no. It's perfect. It's perfect. I know you only worked there for a semester, but how might have your work at the Cross-Cultural Center helped you develop as a professional? JR: Massively. I mean, you know, as a, as a White woman, straight CIS woman, I bring privilege with me and I always am trying to learn and understand that what my physical presence may bring depending on the space and I'm at right? And, the majority of the students who, who hung out in that space were, were students of color, primarily students who were of Asian Pacific Islander descent. But, it was something for me to be able to-- when I first got asked to kind of fill in the role, part of me was like I didn't want my own identity to be a detriment to their development. But I realize now me even just knowing that I think <laughs> makes a difference. That I'm aware of how my identity impacts those around me. But there were some experiences that came up that I remember we were doing, we were doing some activities… Oh we were doing a, an event and it was around, um, Judaism, and I don't remember what the content of the workshop was, but Hillel, which is still an active organization for serving and supporting Jewish students, but obviously non-Jewish students can be involved. There was some concern about us offering this workshop and possibly providing false information. And it was one of those things that in the moment you can get very defensive, right? You can be like, no, you know, we're not, we're not trying to do anything to whatever. But what it had me do was, you need to stop for a second and be-- again, the intentionality. It really taught me just you to think of anyone who could be potentially impacted, but also leveraging the voices that you have and collaborate and pull them in. Um, ‘cause why wouldn't have we have collaborated with folks on campus who live that on, on a daily basis and could provide some additional you know, but I was advising students at this time and the student was just doing what he was told. He was creating these workshops kind of in a vacuum. But it was a really good lesson to, again, do things as intentionally as possible. Even if it means you have to move the workshop a few weeks later, if it means we're doing it the right way, let's do that. So that was a really good lesson and I think it ended up being fine. We ended up collaborating with them. Um, and then just…Trying to think. I mean, just working with all different types of people and interacting with students I probably normally wouldn't have just because they weren't involved in Orientation Team. Like this, this particular pocket of students who worked as student assistants, within all the other centers because there was kind of like this collective team they had of- at the time the Women's Center, the Pride Center, and the Cross-Cultural Center, those three centers; our staffs would get together on a frequent basis. And there’s folks from other staffs that I have connected with that I'm still in, contact 15 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 with that I probably would never have interacted with. And to be honest, they probably would never have even-- based on who I am and how I present and probably would never have even interacted with me. And so, it was a great opportunity to kind of make those connections. But, um, I learned some more things just about program planning. We, we planned some pretty big events and just again, how to honor history and culture and doing it in a meaningful manner while advising students who just wanna get things done. And it's like, how do you balance that? So that was, um, that was a good experience. SS: Yeah. That's great. Um, making connections. using your voices. Moving on, could you describe, and this doesn't have to be with the Cross-Cultural Center ‘cause I know you worked a pretty short time over there. Could you describe a project or initiative you with that you are particularly proud of, or were a part of necessarily? JR: Hmm. Geez, just so many-SS: <laughs> JR: I think I can discuss the peer mentoring program. Although it was short-lived, I think for what it was. It’s one of those programs that no matter how good of a program you have, if you don't have the resources to continue it, you can only do so much. And so… but it was, it was really cool because it was kind of a brainchild of Sara and then she came to me and said, “You work with new students, can we just do this connection?” And so we really got a chance to dig into the benefits of peer mentoring and we kind of, we created it really from the ground up. We recruited current students to be peer mentors, created that training for them. And because of my work with O-Team [Orientation Team], who is solely volunteers, you know, I had a training with them, a weekly training with them on, in the spring semester, and then we had retreats. And so I was able to really bring that component. Um, and then what Sara brought was really the, the pieces of how-- why we're serving this particular population because there is an equity gap that our white students are persisting at a higher rate and graduating at a higher rate than our students of color. So, and then there was research that showed that peer mentoring specifically helps to close-- is one of the most beneficial components that a student could have to have a peer to peer connection. So it was really fun to work with her on that and really create the curriculum, create the, the criteria for the mentors. And then I remember we had spreadsheets and we were divvying up the, the caseloads of like who, or not the caseloads-- of like who would be matched with certain mentors and stuff like that. 16 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 Um, and so that was really fun. And then once Sara left and Floyd came on, um, I don't think it was a while, but he and I had the idea to do like an overnight retreat with this program. So what we did was we had them all come together. So we've had the mentors and the mentees, this is before school even started, had them on a bus. We drove up to Julian [California] and we did kind of team-building activities. And it was really-- I remember we had this, we wanted to do a ropes course and we had, there's a ropes course at this camp. And I remember Floyd and I were brought in probably three days before the retreat. And our boss at the time said, we can't spend the money on this. And we're like, “What are we supposed to do?” So then he and I just like hunkered down and created like our own like, internal team-building exercises, but we're like, “What the hell are we gonna do?” But we figured it out. What's funny now is I think it was that year, one of the mentees is now on my coaching staff. SS: <laughs>. JR: So I've known him forever and it's really cool. And then funny enough we, well it's not funny but, we had to buy a new car this past weekend, track me here-- and I, we go to San Diego County Credit Union because that, we had literally just paid our car off on Thursday and that's when our car died. So we went back to San Diego County Credit Union. Said we wanted to get a loan with you again. And as we’re meeting with this loan officer, she’s like, where do you work? I told her, she’s like, “I knew you look familiar!” And my husband's always like, “I swear to God, she knows people everywhere.” And she said, “I was part of the peer mentoring program” and I remembered her ‘cause she was assigned to, I would say was our best mentor ‘cause some of our mentors left a lot to be des-- like, “Can you talk? Can you touch base with your students?” But this one -- and her last name was Ruiz as well -- and so we connected on that, but it was so cool to see this student who had been in the peer mentoring program and just being like, “I remember you!” And it was a nice little reunion. Um, but I thought it was a really cool framework to create. Um, unfortunately the resources just weren't able to keep it going. So. SS: Yeah. That's cool that you saw your, your one mentor—[indistinguishable] JR: It was so funny that, “I know you look familiar!” When I said I worked at campus, it was funny. SS: 17 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 Yea I Know plenty of people working in the university space currently working with limited resources. Yeah, it's definitely challenging. JR: It is. Especially when it's such meaningful work like that. I mean, it's literally to support, but now I'm in a space again to be able to do that same kind of work, which is exciting. SS: Mm-hmm. What is the significance of having a space that champions underrepresented students? JR: Um, I mean so much. And with underrepresented students, obviously that's such a large umbrella, right? And then every group and, and community that makes up that term needs different things and there's an intersectionality and all that and it can-- but you know what it really comes down to, it's about equity, right? And it's interesting having conversations with people who don't quite get it and there's people who make comments sometimes it's like, “What about a space for us?” And I'm like, do you understand that any-- I can go somewhere and see someone who looks like me and understands my experience. I mean, generally speaking, pretty easily, if you have a student who comes to this campus and does not see anyone who looks like them during the day, does not have a faculty member teaching them who is from the same culture or community, to be able to have a space that a student knows they can go to. To have an experience that just physical and mental and emotional safety on a daily basis, for them to do homework and define that community will only help them to be better in all aspects of their life. That's why programs like EOP [Educational Opportunity Program] and ACE Scholars and those programs exist because they're-- every student should have access to the same level of services, right? First and foremost. But, if you look at certain populations and certain areas where students are from, they then need that much more support to get them to the same place that more majority populations are. So I think providing spaces like this is one step in providing that, that equity. Um, because I can imagine a student coming here and I've never really experienced it, but being like, “I don't see myself here.” They're not gonna feel an emotional connection to the campus. They’re not gonna feel like going to class because why would they care? I mean, there's some students who inherently they just have this intrinsic motivation and they'll go to school and it's fine. But you wanna have that, that community and sense of belonging. That'll just make it that much more just robust of an experience for them. And the community pieces is massive. So spaces like this, if done well, and intentionally and has good leadership and the resources it needs. Because the thing is these centers-- and people joke a lot of times are placed in the basements of buildings, they're placed in inaccessible areas that people don't necessarily know about. If you do it well and put 'em in high traffic areas like the USU [University Student Union], have staffing and resources to really support those 18 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 students, then it goes well. But just historically spaces like that are just under-resourced and which is an issue. So. SS: Yeah. Um, I guess in that same sort of area of, doing it right. Are there any aspects of your time at the Cross-Cultural Center that you would've approached differently if given the chance? JR: Mm. I, when I came in, because again, there was this like conglomerate of the three spaces. I would, and it was a really short period of time, but I got kind of sucked into their drama <laughs>, and I wish I would've come in and I don't know if I had fully found my voice yet like if I, knowing what I know now about things and haven't gone through when I've gone through now, I feel like I would be able to go in and be able to really help the students to be very… To, you know to collaborate, but not necessarily be dependent on, I think, I wanted to collaborate with these other folks but I think there was almost a sense of like I had to defer to what they wanted kind of thing. And so probably it would be fun to go back in there now knowing what I know now and see how things would be different. But, I don't know. I think that the state of where I was at the time, you learn based on where you're at in life. And I got lessons, from it. I, um, there were-- I worked with my first student who I was aware of being undocumented at the time and just learning about that process and learning about that impact for her and just, I mean we literally, no one knew but she would, she would submit kind of a fake time sheet every month just to have this sense of normalcy and that nobody would question. And just, that was kind of my first, kind of opportunity to, to work with students experiencing those challenges. So. I can't think of anything glaring. I was still I think pretty early and young in my profession. Um, so, there's still days where I’m like, “You wanted me to be in there?” But, it worked out. But I think those are the things I can, I can think of. SS: That’s good. JR: Yeah. SS: More experience. JR: More experience. It’s all, it’s all experience. Yes. 19 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 SS: Well, as we're wrapping-- winding down, I know you mentioned before that a lot of people that would go to the Cross-Cultural Center were um-- JR: Asian Pacific Islander. SS: Oh yeah. Asian Pacific Islanders. JR: <laughs> Yes. SS: I, a lot of questions are raised around like these cultural centers, like the Black Student Center and, the Latinx Center and stuff like that. And should there be an Asian student center? Should there be a white student center? What's your response to that? JR: <laughs> That's my response. <laughs> Um, I mean, I think I mentioned it before about the purpose of these spaces. Everyone, every student should have access to support and resources on our campus. I do not think inherently based on the setup of society, students at particular demographics are lacking spaces where they see others like them. SS: Mm-hmm. JR: Like I said, things need to be, do, done well. You need to have the staffing. I think it's always going to be met with some dissonance because there's gonna always be people who just don't get it. But the people who are the ones traditionally, and I know there's people who may identify as the same within that center and say, I don't think we should have, you know, separation or whatnot. But it depends where 20 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 people are at on their identity development. And when you kind of go through identity development, you get to the point where you're comfortable enough in your space and your skin and your whatever to understand that everyone else is in a different space and that's okay. And that some students may be okay with it and some students may really need that space to be successful. And again, if having a Black Student Center allows one black man who goes to school here to have a physical space that he can go to feel safe, then I think that's been successful because otherwise where would he find that here? Right. I think the people who ask those questions about, why don't we have this? Why don't we have this? And it's like, I don't-- there's gonna always be people who ask those questions and they don't have an answer for it. They don't have anything to kind of back up, you know, you ask the question of, “Why do you think we need that space?” And they don't have any, you know, there's no research to back up the answers that they're hoping to get. It's just, they're there-- The questions are just being asked, I think to kind of stir things up. But again, the caveat is: you don't wanna just do it to do it to check off boxes. You need to do it as intentionally as possible. And I'm far from being an expert on how to implement that. But if you don't have the resources and don't have the institutional support, you're only gonna be, you're set up to fail. SS: Mm-hmm. Perfect. Great. Um, yeah, I like that answer. If it helps. It's worth it. JR: Yep. Mm-hmm. SS: To conclude connecting to that question, uh, what role do you see the Cross-Cultural Center playing as it coexists with the expansion of identity-specific spaces? JR: I would imagine, I'll say Floyd specifically ‘cause he has been the longest-tenured, um, director in there now. [Floyd] is probably been asked how he's gonna be-- What is the Cross-Cultural Center? How does the Cross-Cultural Center kind of stand apart from the other identity centers? I think with the CrossCultural Center, although other centers talk about intersectionality and you know, and that sort of thing, I think what the Cross-Cultural Center can really focus on is really that multiculturalism, how all the different identities intersect and kind of can help to facilitate those conversations and understandings and that sort of thing. I would imagine there's been conversations about-- do we have a space for, you know, our APIDA [Asian Pacific Islander Desi American] students? Because that tends to be the space that, that population tends to spend time. 21 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 �JENNIE RUIZ TRANSCRIPT, INTERVIEW 2023-04-07 I think, there were conversations way back in the day where, ‘cause they're Kamalayan Alliance, I don't know if it's a really big organization now, but Kamalayan Alliance was a massive student organization back in the day, and that was primarily the students who made up the space in the center and some people had issues with it. It's kind of like but this is not supposed to be just for Filipino students, but it's like, who defines that? You know? It depends on who has a connection here and who feels connected. So, I would imagine-- I know there's some campuses who have, I mean, tons of different affinity spaces and identity centers. And I'm sure there's gonna be conversation about what, what is C3’s role in that? Um, I don't know the answer I'm not privy to those conversations, but I'm sure the questions have come up of what is the space for this type of physical and identity space in the midst of adding all these different, identity spaces? Other campuses do it. It's just, I'm sure there's a lot of conversations about what is the vision and mission and kind of, where's it gonna go, which can be exciting. Um, but I'm sure there's also some pressure to be like, who are we? What is our, what is our mission here on campus? But, um, the current leadership can figure it out. He's [Floyd Lai, Director of the Cross-Cultural Center] good. He's good. SS: Yeah, he is good. JR: He is good. SR: Anyways, thank you so much for coming here and— JR: This was Fun. <laughs>. I don’t know what I expected, But yeah. SS: Anyway, I’m gonna end the recording. JR: Okay. 22 TRANSCRIBED BY SETH STANLEY 2023-04-23 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcripts Description An account of the resource Written oral histories and transcripts are available for researchers that prefer the written word, or to see the whole interview in a document. Transcripts of <a href="https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/collections/show/5">audio and video files</a> are also available as part of those video files. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Ruiz, Jennie. Interview transcript April 7, 2023 Description An account of the resource Oral history interview of Jennie Ruiz for the Cross-Cultural Center Oral History Project on April 7, 2023. Biographical information about Jennie, how she started working for California State University San Marcos, her leadership and networking skills. Jennie’s friendship with Sara Sheikh-Arvizu and its impact on her. Her experience running the Cross-Cultural Center, and her thoughts about its role at CSU San Marcos. This oral history interview was generously funded through the Instructionally Related Activities Fund at California State University San Marcos. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jennie Ruiz Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Seth Stanley Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2023-04-07 Subject The topic of the resource California State University San Marcos. Cross-Cultural Center Education, Higher Human rights Student success Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Marcos (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Jennie Ruiz Type The nature or genre of the resource text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RuizJennie_StanleySeth_2023-04-07_transcript Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener">In copyright</a> Cross-Cultural Center oral history project CSUSM history Women's experience https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/5868aa45dc8ccb68d1cca5ba5329a1e3.pdf 4e18141c7775f6da6c315856ef7b7159 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcripts Description An account of the resource Written oral histories and transcripts are available for researchers that prefer the written word, or to see the whole interview in a document. Transcripts of <a href="https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/collections/show/5">audio and video files</a> are also available as part of those video files. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Macchia, Jerry. Interview transcript, May 13, 1992. Description An account of the resource Interview conducted May 12, 1992 by CSUSM Library Dean Marion Reid with Green Tiger Press owner/publisher Jerry Macchia. In his interview, Macchia speaks to his experience in taking over Green Tiger Press in 1986; his work before taking over Green Tiger Press with a forklift company in Michigan; shifting from a printing house to a publisher model; the Press's original owners, Harold and Sandra Darling and Harold Leigh; and the general history of the Press, its logo and name, and business operations. Macchia delves into the sale of Green Tiger Press to Simon & Schuster in detail, and discusses his involvement in leasing the San Marcos, California former Green Tiger building to California State University San Marcos, where the university's Foundation operations were housed, as well as overflow shelving for the library. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jerry Macchia Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Marion Reid Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1992-05-13 Subject The topic of the resource California State University San Marcos California State University San Marcos. Foundation California State University San Marcos. University Library Green Tiger Press Simon and Schuster (Inc.) Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Diego (Calif.) San Marcos (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived SC060: Green Tiger Press collection Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Property rights reside with the university. Copyrights are unknown. Please see the related “Preferred Citation note” for language on citing materials from this collection. Permission to examine Library materials is not authorization to publish or to reproduce the examined material in whole, or in part. Persons wishing to quote, publish, perform, reproduce, or otherwise make use of an item in the Library’s collections must assume all responsibility for identifying and satisfying any claimants of the copyright holder. The researcher assumes full responsibility for use of the material and agrees to hold harmless the University Library, and California State University, against all claims, demands, costs, and expenses incurred by copyright infringement or any other legal or regulatory cause of action arising from the use of the Library's materials. In assuming full responsibility for use of the material, the researcher also understands that the materials they examine may contain Social Security numbers, other personal identifiers, and/or sensitive material on potentially living and identifiable individuals (e.g., medical, evaluative, or personally invasive information). The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context MacchiaJerry_ReidMarion_1992-05-13_transcript https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/8c75101abfa91c6d35fa317a91448fb7.pdf d312abf762d2c1644c0b3566f6ab710e Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcripts Description An account of the resource Written oral histories and transcripts are available for researchers that prefer the written word, or to see the whole interview in a document. Transcripts of <a href="https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/collections/show/5">audio and video files</a> are also available as part of those video files. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Macchia, Jerry. Interview transcript (ADA), May 13, 1992. Description An account of the resource American Disability Act accessible transcript of interview conducted May 12, 1992 by CSUSM Library Dean Marion Reid with Green Tiger Press owner/publisher Jerry Macchia. In his interview, Macchia speaks to his experience in taking over Green Tiger Press in 1986; his work before taking over Green Tiger Press with a forklift company in Michigan; shifting from a printing house to a publisher model; the Press's original owners, Harold and Sandra Darling and Harold Leigh; and the general history of the Press, its logo and name, and business operations. Macchia delves into the sale of Green Tiger Press to Simon & Schuster in detail, and discusses his involvement in leasing the San Marcos, California former Green Tiger building to California State University San Marcos, where the university's Foundation operations were housed, as well as overflow shelving for the library. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jerry Macchia Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Marion Reid Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1992-05-13 Subject The topic of the resource California State University San Marcos California State University San Marcos. Foundation California State University San Marcos. University Library Green Tiger Press Simon and Schuster (Inc.) Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Diego (Calif.) San Marcos (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Property rights reside with the university. Copyrights are unknown. Please see the related “Preferred Citation note” for language on citing materials from this collection. Permission to examine Library materials is not authorization to publish or to reproduce the examined material in whole, or in part. Persons wishing to quote, publish, perform, reproduce, or otherwise make use of an item in the Library’s collections must assume all responsibility for identifying and satisfying any claimants of the copyright holder. The researcher assumes full responsibility for use of the material and agrees to hold harmless the University Library, and California State University, against all claims, demands, costs, and expenses incurred by copyright infringement or any other legal or regulatory cause of action arising from the use of the Library's materials. In assuming full responsibility for use of the material, the researcher also understands that the materials they examine may contain Social Security numbers, other personal identifiers, and/or sensitive material on potentially living and identifiable individuals (e.g., medical, evaluative, or personally invasive information). The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context MacchiaJerry_ReidMarion_1992-05-13_transcriptADA Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral Histories Description An account of the resource Video and audio oral histories can be viewed here. Histories are listed alphabetically by last name. Individual histories are indexed and transcribed and can be searched. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <p>Rights to oral histories vary depending on the history. The library owns the copyright to some histories, and has license to reproduce for nonprofit purposes for others. Please contact CSUSM University Library Special Collections at <a href="mailto:%20archives@csusm.edu">archives@csusm.edu</a> with any questions about use.</p> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Marion Reid Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Jerry Macchia OHMS Object This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS Viewer) https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=MacchiaJerry_ReidMarion_1992-05-13.xml OHMS Object Text This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka 6.0 Macchia, Jerry. Interview, May 13, 1992. SC060-01 00:56:55 SC060 Green Tiger Press collection CSUSM csusm Green Tiger Press Simon and Schuster (Inc.) San Marcos (Calif.) San Diego (Calif.) California State University San Marcos California State University San Marcos. Foundation California State University San Marcos. University Library Jerry Macchia Marion Reid .wav MacchiaJerry_ReidMarion_1992-05-13.wav 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/3a1e78779fdcbc6ca72de2300690f56c.wav Other audio English Interview conducted May 12, 1992 by CSUSM Library Dean Marion Reid with Green Tiger Press owner/publisher Jerry Macchia. In his interview, Macchia speaks to his experience in taking over Green Tiger Press in 1986 ; his work before taking over Green Tiger Press with a forklift company in Michigan ; shifting from a printing house to a publisher model ; the Press's original owners, Harold and Sandra Darling and Harold Leigh ; and the general history of the Press, its logo and name, and business operations. Macchia delves into the sale of Green Tiger Press to Simon &amp ; Schuster in detail, and discusses his involvement in leasing the San Marcos, California former Green Tiger building to California State University San Marcos, where the university's Foundation operations were housed, as well as overflow shelving for the library. NOTE TRANSCRIPTION BEGIN 00:00:00.685 --> 00:00:06.504 Publishing because you've done a lot of other things. Can you tell me how this came about? 00:00:06.504 --> 00:00:37.384 Well, very easily, I think Marion, um, I had been involved in heavy industry for all my life and worked for a large corporation back in the Midwest. And, in 1977, at that time I was a corporate vice president traveling the entire world for Clark Equipment Corporation. 00:00:37.384 --> 00:00:38.000 These are forklifts? 00:00:38.000 --> 00:00:39.000 Forklifts. 00:00:39.000 --> 00:00:40.000 The forklift manufacturer? 00:00:40.000 --> 00:01:40.075 Yes, that's, that's correct. And, the dealership or the franchise, whichever you choose to call it for the forklift division, became available in San Diego. And having worked for a large corporation for twenty-some years, you kind of become immune to a lot of things, and I was at that stage where I was ready to blossom into something, do something I--because I was at the stage in my life where I felt I could go to a management meeting and stand in the corner on my head for two hours and nobody would know if I was there or not. So the dealership became available and I've always had somewhat of an entrepreneurial feeling. And I thought, well, this is an opportunity for me to do what I really wanted to do. So I went over and talked to the vice president of marketing, who was a good friend of mine, and he said, "If you want it, it's yours." I was on an airplane in a week and I bought the franchise in San Diego. 00:01:40.075 --> 00:01:41.495 So you came here from Michigan? 00:01:41.495 --> 00:02:36.224 I came here from Michigan, uh, took over the franchise in 1977 with a forklift division. Unfortunately six months after that, I was stricken with a spinal cord disease that was certainly unknown to me and unknown to anyone else. It was just something that just came out of the blue and apparently was there from birth and something triggered it. I woke up paralyzed one day, and I'd had this company for six months. And anyway, to make a long story short, because I don't wanna bore you with all that, I kept that company for four or five years and then the doctors decided it was best for me to retire and try to get my body back together because they said, "You're never gonna walk again," and all these kind of crazy things. 00:02:36.224 --> 00:03:48.675 So I sold the company. And I retired for two years and became bored to death, and planted tomatoes and rose bushes and, you know, swam every day and just tried to keep myself physically able to move and decided it was time to go back to work. And having been on both sides of the fence, having worked for someone and then having worked for myself, I decided the only thing for me was to work for myself, which meant I had to find a company. And I went to a cocktail party one Sunday afternoon, ran into a banker friend, and he said, I do happen to know of a company that's for sale. And unbeknownst to me, it wasn't for sale, it was about to go down the tube &lt ; laugh&gt ; , but I found that out very soon. But anyway, that's how I bought the Green Tiger. It, uh, it was told to me by a friend. I went there the next week. I had several meetings with the former owners and we came up with an arrangement that was compatible to both of us. And that's how I acquired the Green Tiger Press. 00:03:48.675 --> 00:03:55.014 So you and your family worked with this new business. How did you learn publishing? 00:03:55.014 --> 00:04:59.475 I never did learn it, and I'm not sure I know it today, to be honest about it. Uh, perhaps I'm a little unique in my thoughts about business. Most people feel that when you're in business, you're in a specialty, whatever that business is. If you're selling yogurt, you gotta be a specialty in yogurt. If you're selling, you know, JCPenney shoes, you gotta be a specialty in shoes or whatever. I don't happen to feel that way. I feel that the basics of business are the basics of business and they apply to all businesses. And therefore, I feel that you can run a forklift dealership or you can run a publishing company if you know the basics of running a business. And that's my philosophy, and that's what I did. I said, "I don't need to know the publishing business. I need to have people that know the publishing business." I need to know how to run the business. They need to know how to publish something and make it sell. And so that's the philosophy that I carried into the publishing company. 00:04:59.475 --> 00:05:10.005 Well, this seems to have worked well because between 1986 and 1990, you very much turned the company around. 00:05:10.005 --> 00:05:10.016 Yeah. 00:05:10.016 --> 00:05:16.485 And, and I don't know more than doubled the profits or the earnings. 00:05:16.485 --> 00:05:25.785 We did that. We did both. We doubled the sales and we doubled the earnings. We took the company out completely out of debt. And so it did work well. Very well-- 00:05:25.785 --> 00:05:32.932 But what kinds of things did you do that caused it to change it--well, first of all, did you keep the same people? 00:05:32.932 --> 00:08:14.000 There were a lot of--there were a lot of pluses at the Green Tiger when I bought it that I will not take credit for. That were there. But they were laying dormant. They were just laying there and nobody was doing anything with them. For example, the product line was wonderful. The name had already been established, which was also wonderful because the name was, was well known all over the world and a good name. It had carved a certain niche in the marketplace that was there, and they had good people, but they were not utilizing them. So all I really did was took advantage of what was--what was there. I did not create anything. I didn't do anything. I just said to myself, it's all right there. So all you've gotta do is use it. And, the other thing that was very important, and probably attributes a great deal to the sales activity, to the marketing, to the increase in sales was in the publishing business, at least in that one--and in most--you use independent sales reps. You, never have your own sales force unless you're a huge, huge corporation like Simon Houston. Most small publishing houses do it through independent representatives. And that's what we did. The Green Tiger had maybe sixty or sixty-five (sales reps) at the time that I acquired the company. The problem was that the sales reps were not really sales reps because they were not representing the line. 'cause they were not being paid commissions. When they did sell something, they never got paid for it. So as a result, they were a sales rep in name only. So one of the very first things I recognized, because if I have a somewhat of a marketing background, I recognize the first thing you gotta do is get somebody out to sell your product. It can be the best product in the world, but if you have no one to sell it, it's not gonna go any place. So we had a--we called all the sales reps to San Diego. We had a special sales meeting, and as they came in, we presented them with a back commission check. So they were all paid right up to that moment. They were paid for all the products that they had sold that they never got paid for. That tended, of course, to-- 00:08:14.000 --> 00:08:15.845 Get their attention-- 00:08:15.845 --> 00:10:01.000 --boost their confidence in the future. We showed them what our plans were for the future. We showed them some new products that we had developed that they became very excited about. And as a result of that, we got, uh, I guess what you could say, as much attention as you can get from an independent rep, because they usually represent 30 or 35 companies. So we got their attention, I think, that way. And then what we did is, we decided that we really needed to double the sales force. So we ended up with a 160 sales reps rather than--well, we did better than double because we only had sixty-some--we ended up, when I sold the company to Simon & Schuster, we had over 160 and we went international, in addition to that. We went into England, we went into Australia, we went into Japan. We were about to go into Mexico, but we didn't. But we would have if we hadn't sold. So we did go international to some degree, and we would've gone further inter international because there was there was a lot of opportunity there. So that pretty much tells the story of doubling the, you know, the sales volume. We took advantage of the expertise that was there of some of the people, the editorial people, the--some of the marketing people were very good. We had telemarketing people that were good, but they were not being utilized. 00:10:01.000 --> 00:10:22.294 And we literally, from that point, cleaned house. And then we got rid of all the people, all the things that we didn't need, and that were really just kind of consuming, if that's a good word, they were consuming a lot of the good things, and they were really draining profits, draining resources with no results. 00:10:22.294 --> 00:10:25.575 Would doing the actual printing be one of those? 00:10:25.575 --> 00:10:46.995 Well, doing printing was certainly one of 'em and that's one of the very first things I got rid of. Was we got rid of the printing press, we got rid of the printers. We jobbed all of that out. We became, in the true essence, we became a publisher rather than a printing house. Which made a tremendous, tremendous difference in overhead. 00:10:46.995 --> 00:10:53.000 I read in one of the articles that you had people vote on--in order to select the manuscript. 00:10:53.000 --> 00:10:54.000 Yes. 00:10:54.000 --> 00:10:55.664 Who voted? 00:10:55.664 --> 00:14:30.000 Well, that's a very unique situation also. And we were not the typical public publishing house because most publishers have an editorial staff and they have editors just like a newspaper. We did not, we had an editorial committee which was made up of employees. And that committee rotated, and we would've committees, we would've people serving on that committee's from accounting, for example. We would have people on that committee that could have been from the warehouse, that could have worked in the, let's say in the customer service group, could have worked in marketing, could have worked almost any place in the business. And we would put them on the editorial staff. And that was made up of as many as seven or eight people at a time. And I chairmanned that particular committee, myself, and my wife sat on that committee. Uh, my son sat on it, and we used to receive--and this, uh, this is somewhat of an astounding number, and I still have trouble with it--but we used to get in the mail unsolicited over two thousand manuscripts a year. Now that's a l--that, you know, that would fill this room very easily. From floor to ceiling, and from wall to wall. And we of course could not read all of them. And we would read--we would scan/read as much as we possibly could. And the ones that we knew were not Green Tiger at all, because we had a certain image, we ha a certain niche, we knew what we were looking for all the time. And so probably 90% of them either went back to the person that submitted it or they just got thrown away. Uh, if someone sends something to you and requested to come back and they send you the postage, then you're obligated to send it back to them. If they just send it to you and say, please read my manuscript. if you're interested, let me know. Those we would just throw away. So what we would do is, as we had time, as people had time, as the employees had time that were on this committee, they would take manuscripts and they would read and they would just do that &lt ; inaudible&gt ; . They would throw 'em this way or throw 'em this way or throw 'em away or send them back. Or they would put 'em in a save pile. The save pile was then, you know, given to others on the committee. "I think this has got merit. Read it." So every night people would go home with stacks of manuscripts, and then we would have editorial meetings, and each person would say, "I think this has merit." And we'd end up with certain group, then we would all take those and read them, and then we would narrow those down. Then we'd get down to maybe fifteen or twenty, because we couldn't afford to publish any more than that in a year because publishing a book is very expensive. So we would then get down to a point where we would actually have to vote. And we did a secret ballot vote so that no one would influence the other party. And then after the vote was taken, we would publish it (the vote) and say, "Okay, we've got seven that wants this book. We've got three that says no, we got two that says yes, we got one that says doesn't care." You know? 00:14:30.000 --> 00:14:31.225 Yeah. 00:14:31.225 --> 00:15:03.695 Those kind of things. Then we would get into a discussion stage about a particular book, and some would get scrapped and some would get maybe boosted up. And that's the way we selected what we were gonna print. And if it got to where it had to be a tiebreaker, I would usually be the tiebreaker. And we got to where we would publish twenty books a year in that fashion. And we did the same with note cards and calendars. 00:15:03.695 --> 00:15:11.825 So the manus--did the manuscripts include the calendars and the note cards or that was additional? Did you get the same kind of over the transom-- 00:15:11.825 --> 00:16:44.924 Well, we did get quite a few note card-things over the transom. We didn't get too many calendars. We pretty much did that ourselves. We knew what we wanted to do. Uh, note cards, we used to get a tremendous amount of the actual images. We didn't get the verses. We'd get the images, "can you use these images in your note card line?" We'd get a lot of that. And we used them. We used quite a few, but we, we did something that probably no other publisher's ever done and probably never will do. We figured that we could get, you know, more bang for the buck, so to speak, if you take images from the books that you've already published, and if the book is successful, you can use that same film and you can use the same image and it's all you have to do is put a verse with it and you've got an note card. So we--We just kind of thought we were a little smarter, I guess. Maybe we weren't, but we thought we were smart to do that because it saved us, and we--not only did it save us, but we were able to keep our card line fresh in that manner because we already had the images and then it's all we had to do was for someone sit down and very cleverly write a little verse to go with that. Or as you probably know, we published a lot of cards that were blank. And people could write their own image. They were all message, I should say. 00:16:44.924 --> 00:16:53.075 What can you tell me about the original publishers, the original owners of Green Tiger? I assume you, you met with them. 00:16:53.075 --> 00:16:54.830 Oh yeah. 00:16:54.830 --> 00:16:56.585 And there were three. 00:16:56.585 --> 00:17:04.733 There were three. What's that? &lt ; inaudible&gt ; then there were three, then there were two &lt ; laugh&gt ; . Anyway, there were three. Uh-- 00:17:04.733 --> 00:17:06.394 And Harold and Sandra Darling-- 00:17:06.394 --> 00:17:55.018 Harold and Sandra Darling were the, were the driving force of the editorial and the creative. And she still is in the publishing field and she's very successful. And so is he. And they now have a company called the Blue Lantern Studio. It's in San Diego. She is the author and the artist of the Carl series, the "Good Dog, Carl" series. I don't know if you know that book. Well, they did a whole series of Carl books now, She's done three or four of that book. We did the first one. And-- 00:17:55.018 --> 00:17:57.194 That's where I know it &lt ; inaudible&gt ; on the lift. 00:17:57.194 --> 00:18:38.434 Yeah. The Good Dog, Carl. And that's become very successful. And her whole series of that has become very successful. So, and now they have--they started this Blue Lantern Studio to assist other publishers as consultants and that kind of thing. They branched from that into, back in publishing and their now publishing their own books again. And I--and they are selling books to people like Farrar Strauss and people like Simon & Schuster. And so they're back on the road for recovery again. 00:18:38.434 --> 00:18:40.275 Well, Harold Lee. 00:18:40.275 --> 00:18:40.625 Harold Lee. 00:18:40.625 --> 00:18:42.983 What kind of function did he have? 00:18:42.983 --> 00:18:46.000 Well, Harold Lee, Harold Lee's function basically was the financial-- 00:18:46.000 --> 00:18:47.694 Money. 00:18:47.694 --> 00:19:11.994 He was the money guy. He's the guy that had the money. Uh, he believed very strongly in their talent, which he certainly was correct. He believed in the ability to sell the product. So he did fund it, and he funded it to the tune of like 80 or 85% as I remember the numbers. 00:19:11.994 --> 00:19:17.545 Okay, so back in 1970, he contributed that. And had they had a bookstore, or? 00:19:17.545 --> 00:19:44.454 There's--there's somewhat of a, of a blank in my mind about that, Marion. They had, they started, as I understand it, with a card line. No, that's not correct. They started, I believe, with what was called the Unicorn Theater. 00:19:44.454 --> 00:19:46.275 Okay. 00:19:46.275 --> 00:22:48.674 Which was a small little theater in La Jolla that they rented, and they served European foreign teas, cookies and things of that nature. And they showed European films, and they gathered quite a following. And this was back in the, like you say in the seventies. They gathered quite a following. And, I understand it was--I've never been there and didn't know anything about it, of course. And never seen it. But I understand it was quite unique. And what they did was very unique. And they'd had people coming there every night to watch these foreign films, and they would drink foreign coffees and foreign teas and that kind of thing. And they branched out from that, I believe, to the card company. And then they branched into a company, I believe it was called the Mithras, I think it was the Mithras Book company or something like that, up in, I think it was up in the Hillcrest area. And they started being a book publisher. And so they started publishing books and only a couple. And they started, as you know, with the old and antiquarian-style books. And they used, for the most part, they used public domain material. But they did gather a few artists and authors that were more current that they needed to pay royalties to. And they started publishing in that manner, and they did quite well. And, I don't really know what happened to them financially. I really can't respond to that too well, except that in 1986, they were pretty well down and out and ready to close the doors. And that's when I was told about this company. And that's when I contacted the Darlings and with Mr. Lee and I had meetings with them. They had a consultant at that time running their company. They were not running it. They were, they were doing their little creative thing. Unfortunately, Harold Lee and the Darlings physically, verbally parted ways. They became, what you might even say bitter enemies. And he went his way and picked up his toys and went home. And they stayed and tried to run the business, and he just withdrew himself from it entirely. And he did not, of course, would not fund any more money to it. Uh, as a result, it just went downhill, downhill, downhill. They didn't pay commissions, they didn't pay salesmen. They, as I understand, some of the staff, they did not make payroll. Some of the people left, some of that were very loyal, stayed. And that's kind of when I entered the picture. 00:22:48.674 --> 00:22:50.479 Oh, I'll turn the tape over. Oh, this is fine. 00:22:50.479 --> 00:22:57.993 But I don't mean to ramble, but some of these things come into my head. I'm sure you're not gonna use all this material, but-- 00:22:57.993 --> 00:23:01.214 Oh, we'll use what you choose &lt ; laugh&gt ; 00:23:01.214 --> 00:23:05.785 And what you choose, because I think that it should be a joint effort here to make it what you want. 00:23:05.785 --> 00:23:12.000 With the logo. I read something that indicated that the logo was somehow related possibly to the Detroit Tigers. 00:23:12.000 --> 00:23:13.535 Yes. 00:23:13.535 --> 00:23:18.184 The logo being a big Tiger head and then green-- 00:23:18.184 --> 00:23:20.000 Well, that's not the logo, that's the name. 00:23:20.000 --> 00:23:21.934 Oh, that's the, okay. 00:23:21.934 --> 00:23:23.625 The name Green Tiger. 00:23:23.625 --> 00:23:24.875 Okay. 00:23:24.875 --> 00:24:38.000 And Marion, I'm not gonna swear that this is true because I don't know and it's always been a mystique because I could never get anybody to tell me the truth. And I shouldn't say the truth. I could never get anybody to really tell me where it really did come from. Because everybody I talked to said, I don't know if this is for sure, but this is what we think. This is what we heard. And the predominant story was, and is to this day, that Harold Darling, who was the founder with his wife Sandra, was and still is a very avid baseball fan. My understanding is that his favorite team at that time was the Detroit Tigers. And I was born and raised in Michigan, which was only a few miles from Detroit. And I was a Detroit Tiger fan. He is a little bit younger than I, but I don't ever remember the Detroit Tigers wearing green and white striped uniforms. But I was told that they did. Now, whether they did or not I can't say, but at any rate, I was told that that's where he came up with the name Green Tiger. 00:24:38.000 --> 00:24:39.424 Okay. Okay. 00:24:39.424 --> 00:24:58.000 And from that point on, it was called the Green Tiger Press. And they developed the logo was developed, I believe, by a man by the name of Richardson. It was called a Richardson Tiger. And it was green and White tiger. And that's where that logo came from. Which you've probably what you've seen on his catalog. 00:24:58.000 --> 00:24:59.755 Yeah, on catalogs, okay. 00:24:59.755 --> 00:25:12.535 And so I adopted that as our corporate logo when I acquired the company. And I just said, I think this ought to be the corporate logo. So I copyrighted it and had it as our corporate identity. 00:25:12.535 --> 00:25:22.829 Now, I understand that the Green Tiger Press had not only the printing presses back when the Days had it--the Darlings-- 00:25:22.829 --> 00:25:23.973 Darlings. 00:25:23.973 --> 00:25:31.345 Darlings. But it also had antiques. And did they have a children's book collection as well? 00:25:31.345 --> 00:25:34.674 Yes. They had a very, very large children's book collection. 00:25:34.674 --> 00:25:35.000 What kind of antiques-- 00:25:35.000 --> 00:25:36.000 Very old-- 00:25:36.000 --> 00:25:37.000 --do they have? 00:25:37.000 --> 00:26:35.000 Well, let's take them one at a time. The book collection, Harold Darling is a collector. By nature, I mean, that's his--that's just him. He's a collector. He collects everything. He has a great, great fondness for children's books. And when this started in his life, I don't know, but he collected children's books for many, many, many, many years, and still does to this day. He probably has the largest, most valuable children's book library in the city of San Diego. Maybe in the entire world for all I know. The last count I knew he had well over 5,000 volumes. And these will run the gamut from, you know, you name it, Wizard of Oz all the way on up to whatever you want to talk about. And, uh, original titles. And he just acquired them from all over the world. 00:26:35.000 --> 00:26:36.021 And he still has them? 00:26:36.021 --> 00:28:03.384 And he still has them. That's correct. He still has them. Now, that was an asset of the Green Tiger. However, the library being really his, he collected it, and part of his contribution to the Green Tiger was to give that to the Green Tiger as, as a monetary contribution. And it was to be used to take material from that library, and they redid many of those old books that were in the public domain. You go back to Little Red Riding Hood, for example, if that's over fifty years old and he had the original, they would redo that book. Or they would take images and make note cards from those old books. Uh, in the negotiations, we structured it so that the library really would go back to him because it really was his, and it was more, let's say, it just meant more to him than it meant to me. I looked at my role in the Green Tiger as a business venture, and although I had a great love for books also, but--and still do--but not like his. And so the really--the library should have gone back to him, and that's where it did go. And he has it today. 00:28:03.384 --> 00:28:05.958 Did the antiques come with the press? 00:28:05.958 --> 00:29:05.714 The antiques were--you're talking about tangible physical furniture type antiques, and there were many of them at the Green Tiger Press, and they all stayed with the Green Tiger press. When I sold the company to Simon & Schuster, many of them went to Simon & Schuster. The ones that they chose that they wanted, the ones they did not want, I retained, and I still have some of them today. We did call the Darlings and tell them what was left there, and if they had any fondness, they wanted something, some sentimental value, to come and take them. And they did. There were a lot of old things that were there and that I felt should have been in their hands rather than in mine. And there were some lots of signs that she had painted and she'd, you know, hand drawn, and there were some old, old cabinets and old antique pieces that they wanted, that they took. 00:29:05.714 --> 00:29:09.484 How did you come to move to San Marcos? To move the company to San Marcos? 00:29:09.484 --> 00:29:16.000 Well, I don't know if you know where we were located or not, or downtown-- 00:29:16.000 --> 00:29:17.000 C and India. 00:29:17.000 --> 00:29:19.234 Yeah. Right next to the trolley. 00:29:19.234 --> 00:29:20.000 Next to the trolley. 00:29:20.000 --> 00:30:24.000 Yes. The trolley--well, actually the trolley started on Ketner and C, and India was the next corner. And we were on the corner of C and India. Well then when the renovation of downtown started, they decided to build that huge great American Plaza building on the corner of Ketner and Broadway. As a result of that, the trolley station had to be moved a block eastward, and as a result, trolley station then ended up right opposite our building. Which forced us literally to completely turn around our entire operation. We couldn't use the side doors. We couldn't because the tracks were there and they put, you know, the stations there and everything. So we literally had to do a lot of things. They were chewing up the sidewalks. The big Shapery building went up. Have you been downtown? 00:30:24.000 --> 00:30:25.974 Mm-hmm &lt ; affirmative&gt ; . Yes. 00:30:25.974 --> 00:30:41.000 So, you know. The big Shapery building went up. And in the meantime, after I acquired the company, it was owned by an elderly Chinese family. And-- 00:30:41.000 --> 00:30:43.000 The building was? 00:30:43.000 --> 00:32:29.000 The building was. And unbeknownst to me--and this is my own error--and I have no one to blame, but myself, I did not look at the lease thoroughly enough. I read the lease, but I didn't look at the bottom line. And the bottom line, there were no signatures. Meaning that the former owners never signed it. So--and there was a first option to buy the building. Well the option was valid--or it was voided because it was never signed. So I lost the opportunity to buy the building, which I would've done, but I lost that opportunity because it was not signed. And so the YMCA, which was right on the corner of Broadway and India, they, at that time, their mode was to buy that entire block. They wanted the entire block. And their purpose was, was well-founded. They wanted to build a high rise hotel, to take care of servicemen and their families and that kind of thing. So they wanted that, that Green Tiger building very badly. So they ended up buying it from this--from the elderly Chinese man that owned it. And so we entered into a lease with the YMCA. Well then the renovation of downtown started. And all these buildings, these highrise buildings were going up all around us. I mean, literally around us. Front, back at each side. Trolley was here, the big highrise here, big highrise here, another big highrise here, and then this big brand new great American Plaza going right across the street. Trolley going underneath. The sidewalks were being torn up. The jackhammers were going every day. The pile drivers were going every day. It was absolutely, it was terrible. 00:32:29.000 --> 00:32:31.000 Constant hassle. 00:32:31.000 --> 00:34:20.844 Constant. It was awful. We lost all our parking facilities. We lost our water every day. We lost our electricity every day. Our computer went out every day. It was just, it was just godawful. And as a result of that, I just said, I've gotta get us out of here. And living in North County, I naturally wanted to, to move to North County. And maybe that was a selfish motive on my part. Uh, I don't know. But with my handicap, driving to San Diego every day was certainly not easy. And because that was an hour and 15 minutes every day and every night. And that was not an easy thing. And no place to park. I had a handicapped parking place that I negotiated with the city, and then they finally tore it apart by--because they even tore the sidewalk up, you know? So I had no place to park my car. It was awful. Anyway, make a long story short, I found this building and--I looked and looked and looked and looked--and I found this building in San Marcos. That was the building that we're talking about. And, it was just a shell. There was no interior at all. It was just a shell. And the man that had--that developed that whole business park went into bankruptcy. And as a result of that, that building was foreclosed on as well as others in there. And so I negotiated a purchase for that building. And fortunately, like I say, it was not built out inside, so we were able to design it ourselves. So we designed the entire inside of the building ; the upstairs, downstairs. And we bought the building. My wife and I bought it independent of the Green Tiger, and we leased it back to the Green Tiger. 00:34:20.844 --> 00:34:25.000 So what functions did you put on the two different levels? 00:34:25.000 --> 00:34:51.934 Okay. The, the upstairs level was all office. Accounting was upstairs, the computer systems were all upstairs. The receivables, you know, all of the accounting functions, the editorial functions were upstairs. The sales functions, marketing functions were upstairs. Customer service was upstairs. The mail room was upstairs. 00:34:51.934 --> 00:34:54.614 So how many people had-- 00:34:54.614 --> 00:35:15.000 We had that pared down when we moved, we had it paired down to thirty-five, I think. In that, from that area, the balance, um, was all warehouse functions done in the warehouse. And, warehouse: we had racking, of course, from floor to ceiling and all our inventory-- 00:35:15.000 --> 00:35:16.000 In the warehouse. 00:35:16.000 --> 00:36:32.065 In the warehouse, Proper. We did all our receiving, did all our shipping, all our warehousing, we did all of our quality control. We did all of our manufacturing. We did some manufacturing of cards. We built--we made all our own cards, except print. We didn't print them, but the hand-tipped cards, I don't know if you recall those or not, where you would just get a blank card that would open up like so, and on the inside would be a hand-glued image. Those were called hand-tipped cards. And we had a group of Thai ladies from Thailand, and we had six or seven of them. And they did all the quality control, and they did all the hand-tipped cards. And the quality control, they literally would go through every page of every book and we would not put a book in inventory that had a blemish, a nick in the corner--it was very, very strict on quality control. And that was one of the things that the Green Tiger image was excellent. And it was there when I bought it, and we did not let that go down, that state. 00:36:32.065 --> 00:36:42.000 What heavy equipment did you have it--on the first level? There's some heavy duty electrical outlets there. 00:36:42.000 --> 00:36:49.094 Heavy duty, well, we had our computer, for one, which was a large mainframe computer. 00:36:49.094 --> 00:36:50.735 But on downstairs-- 00:36:50.735 --> 00:36:52.000 Oh, downstairs. In the warehouse. 00:36:52.000 --> 00:36:53.000 Yeah. 00:36:53.000 --> 00:37:00.804 In the warehouse we had all the racks and they're heavy duty, of course, because they went from floor to ceiling. 00:37:00.804 --> 00:37:03.435 And those had books and paper. Books on them. 00:37:03.435 --> 00:37:05.000 Books. All books. No paper because we didn't do any printing. 00:37:05.000 --> 00:37:06.000 Okay. 00:37:06.000 --> 00:37:10.000 Um, occasionally we'd buy paper, but, but, but very rarely-- 00:37:10.000 --> 00:37:12.114 Stock of cards, group of cards-- 00:37:12.114 --> 00:37:17.000 All the cards. All the cards. All the books. Finished product now we're talking about. 00:37:17.000 --> 00:37:18.000 Yeah. Right. 00:37:18.000 --> 00:38:04.000 Uh, always boxed, very heavy. So with the racks were heavy and, and loaded, of course, they were very heavy. We had lift trucks. We had a, what was called a shrink wrap machine, which was over backed in behind the staircase. And we had the shipping department, which was consisted of a lot of heavy, you know, heavy tables and things that nature ; scales, automatic scales, that type of thing. Nothing extremely heavy. And the computers, like I say, were upstairs. And then we had a large, that large huge carousel. I don't know if you ever saw that. 00:38:04.000 --> 00:38:05.000 I did. 00:38:05.000 --> 00:38:06.000 You did see that? 00:38:06.000 --> 00:38:07.000 Yes. 00:38:07.000 --> 00:38:20.000 Yeah. Well, we had that and I--beyond this, of course, I was--I was hoping that you could find a use for that, because it was so beautiful, I thought, but you couldn't. And I still have it, so-- 00:38:20.000 --> 00:38:21.000 Uh-huh good. 00:38:21.000 --> 00:39:00.074 We didn't, we just couldn't let it go. We still got it because it was--we designed it and we built it. We still have it. But there wasn't anything any heavier than that upstairs, except we had an old antique press that was probably--probably close to a hundred years old or older. Manual operated press with a great big huge wheel that was tremendously heavy. That was upstairs. And we had some old antique church pews and things of that nature upstairs. And, uh, nothing really heavy. Nothing beyond the press. 00:39:00.074 --> 00:39:06.000 How did you decide to sell to Simon & Schuster when you did? 00:39:06.000 --> 00:43:18.494 Well, that's an interesting, a very interesting story, Marion. I really did not have the company for sale. The company was not for sale. I felt like we had a long ways to go before we were ready to try to sell the company. And besides, we were having fun and I didn't really want to sell it. There were days that I wanted to sell it because of, basically because of my disability, because it was very hard for me some days. And, especially when we were downtown, it was extremely hard. But as I say, the company was not for sale. And one day, I guess it was in '89, might've been latter part of '88, I had a call from Simon & Schuster, and it was from the Vice President of Acquisitions from Simon & Schuster. And I don't know if you know much about the Simon & Schuster Company or not, but anyway, they are the largest publisher in the world. Book publisher in the world. They grew to be that way by a lot of acquisitions. They bought a lot of companies, although they were a large publisher to begin with. They're owned by Paramount Studios in Hollywood. And Paramount, I'm sure you know, with what Paramount owns, and they own about everything you see on television practically. And they own Simon & Schuster. Well, anyway, the vice president called me and just said that they have been looking over my shoulder for four years, and I didn't know that, of course. And they said, we like what we see, and we'd like to come out and talk to you about a possible purchase. And naturally, I was taken aback by that. And I just said, "Well, I'm really not interested in-- not in the selling mode right now. And, you know, maybe a year from now or two." And they said, well, that's fine, you know, but we're in San Diego often, and, you know, could we get acquainted and could we maybe have dinner or whatever. Well, one thing led to another, and one thing led to another. And after probably eight or nine or ten dinners, we were pretty well-acquainted. Marvelous company, uh, marvelous people and wonderful people to do business with. And, it reached a point where they just wanted the company really bad. And I guess that I had to make a business decision, and the business decision said, sell it. And so that's what I did. And, I think in the long run, I made the right decision because I think it would've--well, timing wise, it certainly was right. And I had no magic, you know, I didn't have any magic ball to look into or anything. I didn't know the recession was coming, but from a timing point of view, it was a good time. And I think from a health point of view was a good time because it was harder for me every day. And I don't think that--I don't think we could have gotten an offer like we did from anyone else for a long time. And I can't think of a better company that could have it. And because they're doing well with it. They, they've carried on, I think is as much of the Green Tiger image is as could be expected in a large corporation. Because a lot of it, a lot of the little things got lost. Uh, but everything, I know that it's being carried on pretty much the way it was. 00:43:18.494 --> 00:43:30.835 I'm gonna change the tape again. Okay, now. Well, what do you know about what's happened to the employees who worked for you for Green Tiger? 00:43:30.835 --> 00:44:15.000 Quite a bit actually. I could probably give you names of everyone that I, but I won't do that. But, there were four employees that I recommended to Simon & Schuster that they hire, because their intent was to move the company to New York, which they did. And I knew that the Green Tiger would lose all its image if some of the people didn't go. So I recommended four people. They interviewed all four people, and for various reasons, only one decided to go. 00:44:15.000 --> 00:44:16.295 But one did. 00:44:16.295 --> 00:46:49.764 But one did. And probably the most important one, the sales manager, a young lady, uh, twenty-seven, twenty-eight years old. Young lady, Rita Eggers is her name. And she's a very high energy girl and very bright girl, knows the publishing business very, very well. Uh, she know--knew how to put on trade shows. She took care of all the reps. She served on the editorial staff. She did a little bit of everything. And if she needed to go down and wrap the pack and the shipping department, she would do that. I mean, she was that type of person. So they got a very good employee with her. And I understand she since has had a promotion and she's doing quite well. She's running the Green Tiger division, as well as a couple of other smaller divisions that are associated with children's books. So she's doing well. And I think they did well by hiring her. The others, the other three that I recommended for their own whatever personal reasons, just didn't want to move to New York or whatever they were. I don't know that. The others, um, one of them who was kind of my general manager, went to work for Hardcore Brace downtown in San Diego. The controller still works with me. And, the most of the people in the warehouse kind of scattered and they all landed on their feet because they were all young people. They were all thirty-five or less. There was two elderly gentlemen, that I understand, did--they did both get jobs, out, I think even better for them because they both lived out in the East County so they didn't have to drive down that way. And the Thai ladies, I understand some of them went back to Thailand. I understand one of 'em went to Los Angeles and works now with a relative up there. And then I think a couple of them, from what I heard, went to work in Thai restaurants. So, they're going to school in addition to that. So I think most, for the most part, um, everybody just landed on their feet and came out fine. 00:46:49.764 --> 00:47:04.804 You mentioned before we started the tape that the card portion of the business did not, well, Simon & Schuster bought it, but didn't do anything with it for a while. What has happened to it? Where did it go? 00:47:04.804 --> 00:47:59.954 Well, they decided, I think after a few months that they did not want the card business. They'd never been in it. And they decided, you know, why should we do this? It's small, it's really not worth their--they're a billion-dollar corporation, so why mess around with a little three or $400,000 card business? And, so they just left it all with me. They left it in the building and they left all the inventory there. They left everything to do with the cards, and they put it up for sale. And it took a little longer, I believe, than what they had anticipated to sell it. But they finally sold it to a company in Santa Barbara, a young company--a young couple. Husband, wife--and I'm sorry. I can't, I just can't think of their names. 00:47:59.954 --> 00:48:03.000 So did you then send, ship the things--stock to them? 00:48:03.000 --> 00:49:32.114 Oh yeah. Oh yes. In fact, I was instrumental in helping sell the company. I worked with Simon & Schuster very closely on it. I took the people to the building. I showed 'em the inventory, showed 'em the film. Showed 'em the catalogs, you know, counseled them with everything that I knew about it. And they ended up then negotiating with Simon & Schuster. And they ended up buying the company. And then we helped them get everything shipped and moved. And it's there. And I understand that they just came out with their first line, I think. I think in fact, I believe it's this month. Come to think about it, it's May. And, I think they'll do well with it. I think they made a good purchase. I don't know what kind of whether--I don't know anything about the economics, so I don't know what that means, but knowing Simon & Schuster, I'm sure it was a fair transaction. And, these people were in the card business and they were very enthusiastic, and I think they'll do well with it. They were Green Tiger fans, and that's how they found out about it. So they had a lot of the books at home with, for their kids, and they had a lot of cards. And so they were kind of in that niche that buys Gold Tiger so they knew a little bit about it, and so I think they'll do fine. 00:49:32.114 --> 00:49:44.000 How long did it take to vacate the building itself? I assume Simon & Schuster didn't buy everything inside like the racks. I don't know, did they? No. 00:49:44.000 --> 00:49:48.775 No, no. Oh, yes! They did buy the racks. Yes. I'm sorry. Sure. They did. Yes., they bought the racks. 00:49:48.775 --> 00:49:51.114 So all of that was literally shipped to New York? 00:49:51.114 --> 00:51:12.914 All of it was shipped to New York. They--they bought the company in December of 1990. By March, by the end of March, everything that they wanted, with the exception of the cards, was gone. The racks, everything. We--well, one exception, the lift truck stayed until the cards because we needed the lift truck to load and everything. So the cards, when once the cards were shipped and everything was gone, then we sent the lift truck to New York. And that took to I believe October. Uh, so Simon & Schuster literally rented the building from me for almost a year. For close to a year. They rented--I shouldn't say the building, they rented partial. You know, I just, it was square done with a square footage thing, and they rented just enough square feet to keep the cards there. And there was some, there's some machinery to do with the cards, but just little things. And, so we rented that portion and then the building sat until we rented it to the university. 00:51:12.914 --> 00:51:16.255 And how, how did that happen? I know you-- 00:51:16.255 --> 00:51:16.755 The university-- 00:51:16.755 --> 00:51:21.454 You and Dick Rush got together and talked about this. And eventually the foundation has leased it. 00:51:21.454 --> 00:52:43.414 Yes. The Foundation actually leased it from me. Yes. And not the university, but the foundation. Uh, the way it really happened, Marion, I have a good friend that's on your board. In fact, I have two good friends that's on the board, the foundation board. But Bill Daniels and Tony &lt ; inaudible&gt ; , and Tony just mentioned to me one day that he would--that he had come out of a board meeting. They were looking for more facilities. And one was--I think he said something to do with books or warehousing catalogs. He didn't know. But he just said, "I think your building would fit them very nicely." And I always sat in my office and I'd look at up, and I could see the university right from my window. And I could say to my myself, gee, that they--they ought to use this. They need this building for something, you know, surely they've missed something up there, &lt ; laugh&gt ; . So anyway, I called Dick. He (Tony) told me, gave me name, a number, and he said, "Call Dick and talk to him." And so I did. And my wife and I went out and met Dick for lunch. Took him to the building and he just thought it was perfect for what he wanted. And then he--I think he had a few hurdles to cross, as you can, as you know-- 00:52:43.414 --> 00:52:44.565 We're a state agency. 00:52:44.565 --> 00:53:27.344 Yeah. He said, "I'll get back to you." And I said, "Okay, Dick, when will that be?" And he said, "Well, you're dealing with the state." And, you know, it took a few months. But anyway, then he got over the hurdles and they decided the best way was to lease it to the foundation, not to the university. And then he turned it over to Pat Parris. And I dealt with Pat, who was a wonderful person. And she has a wonderful staff also. And so I worked with Pat and then we got--we finally got it done. And then we had--we went through the hurdle of the god-ever-loving fire marshal, the State Fire Marshal. You probably know that whole story. 00:53:27.344 --> 00:53:29.085 Oh yes, I know--I know some of it. &lt ; Laugh&gt ; 00:53:29.085 --> 00:53:44.855 So we finally did that. And then they said, well, you gotta put in some doors and you gotta do this, and you gotta do that. And you probably know all about that too. So we put in those two new doors in the front, and then we just finished putting two new doors in the back. And I--in fact, I hope they're done. Do you know, are they? 00:53:44.855 --> 00:53:46.414 I don't know. 00:53:46.414 --> 00:53:57.264 I hope they are, they were supposed to have been done, I think last week. But anyway, all that got finished and I think you guys took the building over in January. 00:53:57.264 --> 00:54:02.324 Yes. We had computer equipment coming for the library the week of January 6th. 00:54:02.324 --> 00:54:03.324 I remember that. 00:54:03.324 --> 00:54:08.000 Yeah. And Pat was very concerned about it right before Christmas. 00:54:08.000 --> 00:54:11.436 Because she knew she had to have a place to put those computers. 00:54:11.436 --> 00:54:20.655 Right. And it turned out they sent them to us, to our current location, and they sent them early. So we stacked them up when somebody went away on Christmas vacation. 00:54:20.655 --> 00:54:22.295 Oh, I didn't know that. 00:54:22.295 --> 00:54:26.000 And they were already there, so that Pat had an extra week. So it just worked. 00:54:26.000 --> 00:54:28.875 Worked out. 00:54:28.875 --> 00:54:35.934 Yeah. Because we had computer installation on the 14th. The morning of the 14th. And training on the afternoon. 00:54:35.934 --> 00:54:52.264 Yes. Because I was in the building. In fact, I was there. I don't even know why I was out there. I was there for something. I guess it had to do something with the doors or something. Because we had to put that one door in the base, in the warehouse on the side. By the steps. 00:54:52.264 --> 00:54:53.635 Right, right. 00:54:53.635 --> 00:55:02.684 And I don't know what I was there for, but anyway, I just happened to go upstairs and everybody was up there in the training program. Yeah. Yeah. I remember that. Well. 00:55:02.684 --> 00:55:05.514 Well, I thank you very much for-- 00:55:05.514 --> 00:55:06.494 Did we cover everything? 00:55:06.494 --> 00:55:14.655 --everything. &lt ; inaudible&gt ; , I think we have been through all of the questions. Is there anything else you'd like you ask to add? 00:55:14.655 --> 00:55:45.000 Uh, the only thing I would add, Marion, is that I've done on, I've been in business--well, I'm 62 years old, let's put it that way. And I've been in business a long time, and I've met people all over the world and I've done business with people all over the world and all I can--what I'd like to say is, and I don't know what you wanna do with this, or maybe nothing, but I'd like to just say that I've never met a finer group of people than what you have. 00:55:45.000 --> 00:55:46.000 Oh, thank you. 00:55:46.000 --> 00:55:54.824 They really have been wonderful, everybody. This one fellow that, was involved with the fire marshal, Al. 00:55:54.824 --> 00:55:55.744 Al Amato. 00:55:55.744 --> 00:56:11.445 I'll tell you. He was wonderful. But of course, everyone has been. Pat and Dick and Bill Stacy and--we've had lunch a few times together--and all of them. And you're the most recent and you're not--you're wonderful too. 00:56:11.445 --> 00:56:13.744 &lt ; laugh&gt ; . Well, thank you very much. 00:56:13.744 --> 00:56:43.000 But really, I do mean that sincerely. It's been a real pleasure for me. Well, and I just hope that we can have a long--you know, I'm not a big founder, but I'm a founder, and I feel very proud of that. I feel proud of the fact that I'm associated with the university because I think it was desperately needed, and it's gonna be more needed in the future, I feel. And I just hope that nothing, God forbid, I hope nothing happens that slows the progress. 00:56:43.000 --> 00:56:44.614 Well, we appreciate your support. 00:56:44.614 --> 00:56:51.335 Well you've got it. And I'm out beating bushes for Dick right now. In fact, that, that's one of the reasons I was in here today. NOTE TRANSCRIPTION END ]]> In copyright. audio Property rights reside with the university. 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The researcher agrees not to record, reproduce, or disclose any Social Security number or other information of a highly personal nature that may be found. 0 https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=MacchiaJerry_ReidMarion_1992-05-13.xml MacchiaJerry_ReidMarion_1992-05-13.xml https://archivesearch.csusm.edu/repositories/3/resources/41 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Macchia, Jerry. Interview, May 13, 1992. Description An account of the resource Interview conducted May 12, 1992 by CSUSM Library Dean Marion Reid with Green Tiger Press owner/publisher Jerry Macchia. In his interview, Macchia speaks to his experience in taking over Green Tiger Press in 1986; his work before taking over Green Tiger Press with a forklift company in Michigan; shifting from a printing house to a publisher model; the Press's original owners, Harold and Sandra Darling and Harold Leigh; and the general history of the Press, its logo and name, and business operations. Macchia delves into the sale of Green Tiger Press to Simon & Schuster in detail, and discusses his involvement in leasing the San Marcos, California former Green Tiger building to California State University San Marcos, where the university's Foundation operations were housed, as well as overflow shelving for the library. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC060-01 Subject The topic of the resource California State University San Marcos California State University San Marcos. Foundation California State University San Marcos. University Library Green Tiger Press Publishers and publishing -- California -- San Diego -- History Simon and Schuster (Inc.) Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1992-05-13 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jerry Macchia Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Marion Reid Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Diego (Calif.) San Marcos (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In copyright</a> Community history CSUSM history https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/b7e2e7222d260ca5443d68b16165a3cd.pdf 906ec8914dc64d4d28d2752d91f3e08a Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcripts Description An account of the resource Written oral histories and transcripts are available for researchers that prefer the written word, or to see the whole interview in a document. Transcripts of <a href="https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/collections/show/5">audio and video files</a> are also available as part of those video files. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Macchia, Jerry. Interview transcript, May 13, 1992. Description An account of the resource Transcript of interview conducted May 12, 1992 by CSUSM Library Dean Marion Reid with Green Tiger Press owner/publisher Jerry Macchia. In his interview, Macchia speaks to his experience in taking over Green Tiger Press in 1986; his work before taking over Green Tiger Press with a forklift company in Michigan; shifting from a printing house to a publisher model; the Press's original owners, Harold and Sandra Darling and Harold Leigh; and the general history of the Press, its logo and name, and business operations. Macchia delves into the sale of Green Tiger Press to Simon & Schuster in detail, and discusses his involvement in leasing the San Marcos, California former Green Tiger building to California State University San Marcos, where the university's Foundation operations were housed, as well as overflow shelving for the library. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jerry Macchia Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Marion Reid Sean Visintainer Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1992-05-13 Subject The topic of the resource California State University San Marcos California State University San Marcos. Foundation California State University San Marcos. University Library Green Tiger Press Publishers and publishing -- California -- San Diego -- History Simon and Schuster (Inc.) Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Diego (Calif.) San Marcos (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In copyright</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SC060-01 MacchiaJerry_ReidMarion_1992-05-13_transcript Community history CSUSM history https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/files/original/b180c3edcbc49ffa0dfcf47128e107e3.pdf cd2ab238d19462ca59858d0d63ae7f4e Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcripts Description An account of the resource Written oral histories and transcripts are available for researchers that prefer the written word, or to see the whole interview in a document. Transcripts of <a href="https://archivesoralhistories.csusm.edu/collections/show/5">audio and video files</a> are also available as part of those video files. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Carr, Jim. Interview transcript, September 26, 2017. Description An account of the resource Jim Carr spent 24 years at California State University San Marcos working for the Distribution Services team and was instrumental in implementing the first barcoded inventory tracking system for the University. Jim discusses his time working for CSUSM as part of Distribution Services and how his education and background led to him this job. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jim Carr Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Judith Downie Robert Sheehan Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-09-26 Subject The topic of the resource Barcoding Distribution Services California State University San Marcos Fixed asset tracking San Diego State University Sustainability Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Diego (Calif.) San Marcos (Calif.) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available California State University San Marcos University Library Language A language of the resource English Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener">In copyright</a> Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. California State University San Marcos Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context CarrJim_DownieJudith_2017-09-26_transcript License A legal document giving official permission to do something with the resource. <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/</a> CSUSM history