When a tale of success is simply a ‘cold’ story

Luigi Nuñez has a story to tell.

Grab a chair. Or a bottle of beer, if you wish; make it BBZ, Beer Below Zero. And listen how success, which tastes sweet to many, feels like a freezing slush for this young entrepreneur.

It was like a literal Ice Age discovery for Luigi and his friends Vinson Co-Say and Jay-jay Angala when they stumbled upon the idea of freezing beers. They developed a technology — though it did not come that easy — called BBZ or Beer Below Zero. BBZ is a business venture that deals with a beer refrigeration system. Think freezer. But beer bottles that come out of this BBZ freezer “are served the coldest possible state before they freeze.” At -8 to -13 degrees Celsius.

“Funny how we started with this business. Usapang lasing,” says Luigi, the president of the Global Beer Zero Inc. Funny, too, how they laugh their way to the bank now, so to speak, with what they earn from their invention. But that’s going ahead of the story.

“It was like a school experiment,” the boyish Luigi notes when he and his partners started in 2008. “We just knew that those who loved to drink beer wanted their bottle served really, really cold.” With that as their thesis statement, the trio experimented with the help of chemists, refrigerator experts and engineers.

Materials needed: a freezer each for Luigi, Vinson and Jay-jay and pooled resources of P150,000 cash. The freezers they bought at Anson’s appliance store, charged to their respective credit cards, at zero-percent interest, 12 months to pay. The P150,000 (the amount the investors could afford to lose in case their project failed) was used to bankroll the project — payment for the R&D team and staff, rent, marketing.

Methodology: having a heart that can deal with hits and misses and a mind that can deal with slow success. “There were hits and misses,” Luigi says. But when they did hit the bull’s eye, it felt like their thirst for their innovative invention was quenched right away by the coldest beer. After six months, eureka moment came and the team cracked the problem. “The solution: a technology that freezes beer at minus 8 to minus 13 degrees Celsius, said to be the best temperature to enjoy the brew,” Luigi says.

Cracking the problem is all together a different story from selling the solution, the technology for that matter. So, Luigi — armed with the guideposts he learned from his dad: “If you want to earn more, you have to work longer hours;” and from his mom: “Do it!” — made sure there would be no abridged version to success. He worked longer hours with his partners to sell the technology. On top of that, Luigi is the president and CEO of Global Media Consultants, which is the official marketing arm in the Philippines of international networks like CNN, Fox and National Geographic and magazines like Time and Fortune.

When they launched Beer Below Zero freezers in May 2008, right away there were five clients who signed up. The Grilla Bar & Restaurant, which Luigi co-owns, became the first guinea pig, so to speak. “I had to convince the board of Grilla that the BBZ technology would be advantageous to the establishment,” he recalls. His group even had the bar as their “office” as they would bring clients to Grilla to showcase BBZ. They were successful — as they proved that having Beer Below Zero would have a positive impact on the sales of the establishment.

“Because customers love to drink cold and nice beer, establishments that serve BBZ see a 38-percent increase in beer sales on average. Not only that, the bars and restaurants also see an increase in their food sales if the staff pushes beer-food pairing,” notes Luigi, who finished Hotel and Restaurant Management from UP Diliman.

Beer Below Zero president Luigi Nuñez.

 

From five establishments in the Philippines that first had the BBZ freezers in their establishments, the technology, with local and international patents, is now enjoyed by more than 1,500 establishments here and abroad. The technology  has become a game changer in bar and restaurant scenes. BBZ is now in Guam, Hawaii, US East Coast, US West Coast, Spain, Chile, Brazil, Vietnam, Bangkok, Phuket, Hong Kong, Singapore among other countries.

Luigi says their company earns from leasing the freezers, the P5 share they get for each bottle sold at the establishments and from the outright sale of the BBZ freezers.

Now, he and his friends own Monkey Eagle Brewery “because we cannot resist the growing market for craft beer.” They have also launched Beer Ice, yes, ice made from beer — and it’s a hit! They have the beer, the ice and the freezers — so they put up their own bar called BBZ Bar in Makati, which also serves mouthwatering steaks and the yummy and exotic BBZ ice cream.

The success of their business is not only all about the BBZ freezers. It’s also about the after-sales component as F&B value-added service. Because they are businessmen, they also serve as consultants of the different establishments that need help with menu improvement, staff training and other aspects of running the food business. 

“The foreigners I meet in Manila ask me: ‘Do you have BBZ in my country?’ People are spoiled now because of BBZ,” says Luigi. The BBZ technology he and his friends developed might as well be a source of national pride. What started as a backyard passion is now a global phenomenon.

Yes, BBZ is a tale of cold success. Let’s drink to that.

(For your new beginnings, e-mail me at bumbaki@yahoo.com.

I’m also on Twitter @bum_tenorio and Instagram @bumtenorio. Have a blessed Sunday!)