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Learn more about Jen Gilhoi

https://sparktrack.com

https://www.instagram.com/zeroproofcollective

Jasna Burza
Excited. And Jen, welcome to Business all clients.

Jen Gilhoi
Thank you Jasmine I’m happy to be here

Jasna Burza
is saying, you know, I was just telling you earlier, I’m like I miss you. I used to see you all the time and modern. Well, it was like this, you know, modern world is just such a place where everyone knows your name. And you’re always just a beacon of light, you’re aware, there will always be a great smile, and always super welcoming. So it’s just so good to see you again.

Jen Gilhoi
Yeah, you as well. Yeah, I love the modern world community. So that’s, you know, cool that we connected there. And I still continue to go there. And it’s all about the community. Right?

Jasna Burza
It is, which is why we’re having this conversation, you know, I feel a richer for knowing people like yourself, or people in the community in general, who are doing amazing things. And I feel like post COVID What I’m hearing is that people are either struggling or they’re pivoting, starting something new, but in the noise, when we don’t have enough bandwidth to promote it. So we want for him to be about you know, talking about those things that matter. Be locally, I feel like when we know each other, and we support one another, and we work and hire one another. Oh my god that is like that makes me so so darn happy. And you might serial entrepreneur, you have been doing so many different projects, you’ve been running SPARC track for what over a decade. So what are you working on these days? Because you’re an author and a coach, a leader and a speaker? Like what are you focusing on these days that people should know about?

Jen Gilhoi
Yeah, thank you, Jasmine for that wonderful intro. Yes, Spark track is 10 years old. And that’s my marketing, communication business. And through that just collaborated and have collaborated with so many wonderful people that the ideas always just keep flowing, you know, you’re like, I’m responding to and creating a lot of new kinds of ideas around what we’re surrounded by, right. So fast forward, like years and years of this kind of serial entrepreneur attitude. I’m sharing my sober story, I have eight years of sobriety started sharing that more intentionally, probably for some years ago. And now I feel like I’m in the position at this time for what is happening as a movement for sober curious, and people to become more curious about their relationship with alcohol. And so I found myself in this moment coming out, sort of moving out of the pandemic, where people may have experienced more alcohol abuse, you know, isolation, all of these things, mental health crisis, all of these things are happening. And at the same time, there’s an explosion of people, makers who are creating these amazing non alcoholic beverages that the world doesn’t even know about. I mean, we’re all still drinking club soda and ordering a water or a soda as our non alcoholic options. So it’s a convergence of so many things happening right now. And I just feel like, I’m going to insert myself right into that space, because I believe that is my purpose. And I was born to do something to elevate this movement. So fast forward. Now, since May, we have launched zero proof collective. And I’ll tell you about that. You want to hear about that. Okay, so it’s interesting, Jasmine, because the name itself is a collective, which I just feel like I’ve been doing that at modern, well, I’ve been exposed to women like you who have been bringing other women together, empowering them and doing that through community. So it made sense to me when I saw what was happening in the space to actually say, let’s bring all of these people together. And they’re, they’re kind of in silos. So you have, you know, bars and restaurants kind of trying to figure out the NA menu, you have makers who have amazing products, but they’re one person and trying to get their product out. And then you just have a whole host of people, sober coaches, you know, life coaches that care about this, but we’re not all necessarily talking to each other, and the language and the space around what that movement looks like, is still kind of TBD. So I saw an opportunity to get all of those like minded people together that normally would never connect. And it has been so much fun. We host monthly meetings and just the ideas that have come out of that group and the community already is just lighting a fire at me. I’m like this is exactly what we need to be doing.

Jasna Burza
is really what’s in the name zero proof.

Jen Gilhoi
Yeah, yeah. So zero proof collective and I’ll just read the mission because it’s we’ve been honing and crafting it. Zero proof is for business leaders and those interested in the non alcoholic beverages industry. to thoughtfully connect, collaborate and share resources to advance the zero proof options, experiences and social spaces. So that backing that up to your question zero proof is beverages that have 0% Alcohol. Oh, I’ve never heard that before. Oh, yes, you have.

Jasna Burza
Yeah, cave so no,

Jen Gilhoi
I know. Well, no, just I’m so glad you say that because there’s there’s all this terminology that I’ve been as a sober person navigating social spaces so familiar with for so long that I need a reminder, not everyone knows. And there’s, there’s also na so you hear me roll na option off the tongue that is non alcoholic?

Jasna Burza
Oh, you know, we don’t think about all feel like there’s so much of our culture like the happier culture. Yeah, David. And right now there’s this girl boss movement with all the seltzers coming out, where it’s like spiked a little bit like just, you know, cool, but is still alcohol. And recently, I talked to someone who had a, you know, a very devastating journey with alcoholism and drugs. And, you know, he’s starting to talk more about his own journey. But how prevalent it is for women to open a bottle of wine at noon, twice about it?

Jen Gilhoi
Absolutely. I mean, I think the pandemic has worsened bad. And alcohol really has targeted women more so than ever, and we see it reflected on our Instagram feeds. And in fact, we don’t even know what’s you know, that person might be holding in their glass, but we assume it’s alcohol. And there’s this romantic notion around Oh, I’m a girl boss. I’m like getting stuff done and work hard. Play hard. I’m going to have that wine as a cue to like, either relax or distress. And oh, by the way, everyone tells me I need it. So it’s okay.

Jasna Burza
It’s fascinating. Well, full disclosure in my Minnie Mouse. I am a coffee addict. So I have sometimes three because I don’t need it. But I profoundly enjoy it. But there is the same with also with coffee or with wind is I think glamorized, right. And so much it is socially incorporated into the, what we see into our feeds, and then we want to be part of that. So I’m curious, what is your you know, what, what do you specifically want to achieve? With this? I mean, are you coming out with your own? Like, tell me what your dreams like? Tell me about? Yes. So we can? Where do we find them? And how do we also help promote the movement? If we’re if it’s really important to us?

Jen Gilhoi
Yeah, absolutely. A lot of questions there. Let me start with just the idea that zero proof really is not about solely about people in recovery, although it does benefit them hugely myself being one. But what the movement is, is more about acceptance around anyone who chooses not to drink for whatever reason. So there’s a whole spectrum within that, that need to kind of, I think, benefit from just questioning why am I using alcohol? If you don’t understand that, it is a really important question to ask. And most commonly those answers are, it’s paired with celebration, it’s paired with winding down after work. So there are really some simple things you can do to just ask yourself and be truthful about, you know, what is my relationship with alcohol. And that gray middle is what we would love to just see, make some non alcoholic choices, occasionally, maybe, you know, it’s, it’s just opening it wide up, you could have your alcoholic drinks, and then switch to non alcoholic after. So we’re trying to kind of create experiences like that, that say, this is what we want. This is what we want to tell our bars and restaurants, we want offerings, we want events, to not push alcohol on people to have decent, thoughtful, crafted na options. So there’s just a lot of room in that space to start talking about. This

Jasna Burza
is such an important conversation. And you know, nothing is important to you until it’s important to you. Yeah, for sure. It’s like, well, if people have a glass of wine everyday isn’t a concern. But it was you said two things that I thought were very important. A, that we almost need an excuse not to drink, it’s gonna explain why I’m not drinking, which is or, you know, I’m in sobriety, like, That’s ridiculous. It just is in number two, it brings me to this question of like, well, you know, with alcohol, people tend to drink more because of their feeling right. And the lack of control and to alcohol will bring in more revenue for these businesses. What will be their incentive to

Jen Gilhoi
absolutely

Jasna Burza
zero per drink?

Jen Gilhoi
Yes, that is what we are up against. And so that’s why we have the collective to talk about we need to change our social space. CES and the construct of them and we need to, you know, move away from solely like anticipating that someone would come to a bar and stay there for the evening and have eight drinks, and you look at that revenue, if they’re drinking non alcoholic, you know, they might only be having a couple. So the idea of bringing bars, restaurants and social spaces on board for that is huge. And I think it’s coming, I’ve seen really amazing examples of people’s willingness to pay for non alcoholic cocktails actually, as a sober person, when we split the bill with a group of normies, which are, you know, people who can drink, take it or leave it normal, I now can say my cocktail is equal to your amount, and we just split the bill. And before it would be like, well, I might have a soda. So you know, it gets into all these weird things. But it just, it levels up the game, when you start thinking about what people are really willing to pay for. And the experiences that we can create without alcohol at the center. So that’s usually a term that I always reference to, we can have alcohol in these spaces, but doesn’t have to be the center of everything. Can we decentralize that and bring in other you know, adult experiences that encourage community and connection and actually some clarity, you know, around our experiences and alcohol just clouds that

Jasna Burza
it really does. Oh, you know, I didn’t anticipate we’re going Oh, yeah. For for someone who really just learning about this, and all of a sudden, once you have an awareness about something you become a little bit more respectful in tune. concerned, is, you know, is part of is my job or love a responsible citizen or supporting by asking a zero proof drink. When I go to a restaurant, you know, like, the story of toothpicks, how toothpicks came about? No one wanted them, the guy, the guy who invented toothpaste, the restaurant owners would laugh at him. But then he hired people to go into these restaurants, and ask for toothpicks. Right? And all of a sudden, he will come back two days later. He’s like, Oh, someone asked, how about you know, and that’s how seriously

Jen Gilhoi
jazz now? Yes, yes, that’s

Jasna Burza
something that we need to start asking in the masses, because they’re going to please us because we’re

Jen Gilhoi
absolutely and what’s currently happening, or what’s happened, at least in my experience, as a sober person is, I have felt to either intimidated to ask or I have been experienced after experience just offered a soda or lemonade. And you you kind of get you almost don’t want to ask, you’re just like you go into one of those spaces, and it’s not on the menu, and you just don’t ask. So we are hoping that there are so many things we can do, we can create a separate non alcoholic cocktail menu, that’s fantastic. The server, you know, leads with that and, you know, kind of makes it accessible for everyone. And then to be able to see exactly how many people are choosing that now. Because right now, you might not even know that a restaurant has a decent na option from looking at their website, they kind of keep it hidden. Because to your point, the revenue generation has typically been in how many alcoholic beverages can we sell. So we need to flip a lot of things. And the more that we can also a zero proof collective give people the language to go into those spaces, because usually a restaurant might feel like they’ve you know, they have some any offerings. But we really want to just have an amazing and a menu for anyone that has at least five decent options, right? So we’re talking low sugar, or no sugar and amazing products that all these makers have created. So yeah,

Jasna Burza
I love that. And like you said, you can make really beautiful na drinks or zero proof drinks that are so yummy. I used to make Bucha with things because I don’t drink very, very often. I would have like really fancy Kabuto drink and I drink it in a in a wineglass. Yes,

Jen Gilhoi
the glass, the drink ware is so

Jasna Burza
different, but it would taste absolutely scrumptious. And just wonderful. And I that I’ve seen some of those cocktails that you arrived, the cost can be the equivalent that of alcoholic which could be really in I think the incentive for the restaurants and bars to start offering that.

Jen Gilhoi
Yeah, for sure. I think there’s such truth in that. And back to your earlier point about the question around and you know, having an excuse to drink. So why aren’t you drinking? And that question is the foundation of my TED Talk that I’m going to be giving at TEDx Edina October 29. Yes, right around the corner. But that’s the foundation of it. Like why do we have to make excuses or feel unincluded in nearly every adult social experience because we’re not drinking like, are we not fun? Like what is it So I also kind of started this, this hashtag called sober, not somber, which is about the attitude and the mindset. And I think what you were asking earlier to just any person can join in this movement by becoming aware of, you know, out their relationship with alcohol. And once you understand personally kind of what that looks like, you can be more empathetic to people that, you know, like myself who are in recovery or choosing not to drink for whatever reason, I can’t tell you how many pregnant women will just be like, Oh, my goodness, I have had all the experiences, I never knew that a sober person had to navigate.

Jasna Burza
Isn’t that interesting? Wow. That’s, well, how can people find out more about the movement or you where can we follow all the other ventures that you’re working on? Yeah, yeah. So

Jen Gilhoi
I would say, Jen belhaj.com, my website is a great place to find me. And that’s je n Gil HMI. And that is going to be stories. So I’m a writer, I’ve got written about my relationship with alcohol. And then also have been on several guests podcasts, podcasts as a guest really just talking about all different areas of alcoholism and what that means. So that’s a great place. And then also Instagram. My handle is John Gilroy. And then I also with zero proof collective, right now you can go to zero proof MSP soon that will be changing over to the collective and you can find some of our content there. And soon, we’ll be rolling out some exciting stuff like zero proof collective happier hours, which is ultimately going to be you know, moving around to different Twin Cities venues and highlighting amazing non alcoholic experiences.

Jasna Burza
This is such a powerful, powerful moment that I did not even knowing

Jen Gilhoi
Oh, I’m so glad I surprised you a little. I am in

Jasna Burza
love because which compassion, you know, for not having had anything to drink for six years while I was either pregnant or nursing. Yes. And it completely removed myself from from this whole conversation that yet I am very painfully aware of what a big problem it is. Especially among stay at home moms. Oh, yes. You know, people who are at home right now. It’s just so easy the last two hours before work to pour yourself something that no one can see. And it’s the silent epidemic that no one is talking about because it can be hidden and Bravo, bravo. Thank you the personal story becomes such a such a great teaching moment. Thank you so much for joining me today. Yes, sharing your story. And this really incredible initiative.