BuzzBallz CEO talks entrepreneurship at UTRGV
From teaching business to making business, Merrilee Kick, founder and CEO of BuzzBallz, captivated the UTRGV community Wednesday with the story of how a moment of inspiration blossomed into the creation of BuzzBallz.
As part of Global Entrepreneurship Week, which is celebrated from Nov. 18 to 24, the Collegiate Entrepreneurs’ Organization hosted an Entrepreneur Talk with Kick via Zoom.
BuzzBallz is a distillery, winery and brewery manufacturing company in the Dallas area that specializes in making ready-to-drink cocktails.
The company sells in all 50 states and is expanding internationally to 29 countries.
Since establishing BuzzBallz in 2009, Kick has continued to lead the company alongside her two sons: Alex Kick, who serves as president, and Andrew Kick, as vice president.
Before starting her own business, Kick was a business teacher at Plano West Senior High School.
“I started the journey about 14 years ago when I was a high school teacher and I was about to get a divorce and I didn’t have any money,” she said. “I made $55,000 a year, had two children that were in high school, and they were getting ready to go off to college. … So, I was worried about paying for their college and worried about not having to live in my car.”
One day, while grading papers by her pool, she craved a cocktail in a durable container. This moment of inspiration came from a glass votive and a can of tennis balls, leading her to design BuzzBallz’s distinctive spherical shape.
After earning her Master of Business Administration from Texas Woman’s University, Kick secured a loan to launch her business with family support.
“In the U.S., when you sell alcohol, there’s only three choices you can sell it,” she said. “You can make a beer, you can make a wine, or you can make a spirit. And I exist in all three categories. … So, that was kind of the reasoning behind that, so I could sell to any state, any time, any place and be able to not be blocked.”
Kick said it was never a straight line of growth for her. It was always a staggered approach.
“It’s never been just easy without any trouble,” she said. “When I first started out, I couldn’t get a loan from anybody and I didn’t have any money to start the business. What I quickly learned was that if I had a buyer, then it was easier to get a loan. So, I went out and I created my prototype, which was the BuzzBallz. … I went out and I got a buyer and I showed them the product and … they placed an order. That first order was $75,000 worth of product, which was more than I made in an entire year being a teacher.”
When Kick got her $178,500 loan she was “terrified” about not being able to pay it off.
“It was very risky,” she said. “But I took the chance and did it. And I had to believe in myself. Like some of you, when you’re up against the wall, you kind of either lean in and you go for it or you get scared and you run. And I had to lean in and go for it, and I had to trust my gut and I had to trust my instinct and I had to work really, really, really hard to make sure that I didn’t fail.”
Kick told the audience starting a business can be difficult because you have to learn about managing, staffing and production.
David Salinas, president of the Collegiate Entrepreneurs’ Organization at UTRGV, asked her about her entrepreneurship journey and her most challenging learning experience.
“One of the things that I had to learn was I had to be really good at sales and I had to figure out where those sales were going to come from,” Kick replied. “So, one of the things I did was to get a list of who could purchase my stuff and I had to go hunt and pack and find that, you know. There might be a public database somewhere or there might be some way that you can extract the data. Get that company’s name and address and send them a letter.”
When she started her company, she made sure to connect with different customers.
“That was one of the things that helped me sell my business because I couldn’t possibly be at 17,000 locations in Texas alone to sell face-to-face,” Kick said. “I had to have a way to leverage that.”
Andrea Perez, an attendee, asked the entrepreneur what made her choose the beverage industry over any other industry.
“I was trying to think of what kind of business would not fail,” Kick replied. “… So, that’s why I chose that, because I thought that it would be a profitable and lucrative business. I pitched my ideas to many people and most of the people in the alcoholic beverage space said, ‘Oh, yeah, that’s already been done. That’ll never work.’ But I did it anyway. And it worked. So, sometimes you just have to trust your gut and you have to be your biggest promoter as well.”
