Apart from both being responsible for the livelihood of hundreds of people, the two subjects I’ve featured this month have something else in common: they need each other in order to function properly. Laura Spencer needs John Saputo’s beverages to fill her tumblers, and John Saputo needs Laura Spencer’s tumblers as a receptacle for his beverages. Yes, I know you can just as well drink the beer distributed by Gold Coast Eagle straight out of the bottle and that you don’t need a Tervis Tumbler for it. But then my fabulous opening paragraph would be moot, and you’d turn the page to see what Di Schultz or Debbie Benedict have been up to, or look at all the fabulous people I’ve photographed. You can do that later. For now, let me give you a small insight into two of our community’s corporate humanitarians, Laura Spencer and John Saputo.

Laura Spencer, CEO Tervis Tumbler
I’d long wanted to meet Laura, because ever since I’ve been in Sarasota, I’ve driven past that big red and white sign of Tervis Tumbler’s factory store on Route 41 in Osprey, and have always wondered about the organization behind it. I had seen Laura in TV commercials, and EDC boss Kathy Baylis had always told me what a great community partner Tervis Tumbler is. Truth be told, I actually went to that factory store on 41 first of all, thinking I’d meet Laura there, but was soon set straight by the friendly staff that the main building was in Nokomis on Triple Diamond Boulevard. Tervis’ Media Marketing Manager Jennifer Bement welcomed me as I entered the building, which stands alone in the corner of a sparsely developed industrial park.

CR: Sorry I was a little late — I went to the factory store on Route 41 by mistake!
LS: When a lot of people think of Tervis, they think of our factory store in Osprey, and that’s where they head. It’s a great location; we’ve been there since 1968, so people come there year after year and look for that big red sign!

CR: Please tell me a little about the company history.
LS: The tumbler was invented in 1946 by two engineers, Cotter and Davis. They took parts of their name - the T-E-R from Cotter and V-I-S from Davis - and came up with the word Tervis. In the late 60s, the company was purchased by the Winslow family, who brought it down to Osprey. It’s been in the family ever since.

CR: Were these people scientifically oriented that they thought about heat insulation and coldness, or was it a purely commercial venture to sell something to drink out of?
LS: I think the insulation was important from the start, but the Winslows were really just entrepreneurs. The family owned all kinds of businesses, and for many years the tumbler company was one of the smaller ones. Over the last 15 to 20 years, it has really grown into the company you see today. All the tumblers are manufactured right here in this facility.

CR: How many employees do you have?
LS: About 200.

CR: Has Tervis Tumbler been affected by the economic downturn?
LS: Over the last four or five years we’ve had really strong growth and were growing in the 20, 30, 40% range. Our growth has declined somewhat, but we’re actually up 17% for the first quarter of the year, which is incredible. We haven’t had any layoffs either, and we’re obviously really happy about that.
CR: Where were you born?
LS: Actually, I’m pretty close to being a native Floridian. We moved to Venice when I was three, and then to Sarasota when I was 11 years old. I ended up going to the University of Florida. My husband is from Sarasota as well, so I’m definitely a Sarasota county girl!

CR: How did you become involved with Tervis Tumbler?
LS: My degree was in Accounting, so I started as a CPA working with Kerkering, Barberio & Company for many years. Tervis was one of our clients, and 11 years ago I decided to come and work for Tervis as its Controller.

CR: Who are your customers?
LS: Everyone and anyone. We’re really well-known in the Southeast, because our roots are here and it’s really geared towards outdoor use. However, we market our product in many different channels, including the golf industry, or as premium products for corporations.
Tervis Tumbler manufactures insulated drinkware. Today we offer six sizes of tumblers, along with an ice bucket, and an expanding selection of original designs, licensed artwork, wraps, colors etc. They keep your hot drinks hot, your cold drinks cold, and they’re guaranteed for life!
Our classic product has actually had a long life span, but we have introduced new ones along the way. In this world of “Super-Sizing” we came out with a 24 oz tumbler that still fits in your car. Another thing that we’ve done is to develop travel lids, because everyone is taking their drinks “on the go.” We have straws and colored tumblers, which appeal to a lot of people. We’re trying to keep current, but at the same time our product is timeless, and people continue to love it year after year.

CR: When I interviewed Kathy Baylis, Executive Director of the Economic Development Corporation, she told me that Sarasota is very proud to be the home of Tervis Tumbler, and of what Tervis Tumbler has achieved. Do you feel that?
LS: I definitely feel that we’re loved by the community, and I think that any diversification of the economy is great; the fact that we’re a manufacturer, and Norbert Donelly, the current President and Owner of the company, cares a lot about the employees, really comes through in the company. People love our product, which helps them love the company as well.

CR: How has technology helped Tervis Tumbler over the last 10 years?
LS: A great deal. One of our key values, which we think helps us keep our competitive advantage, is being able to produce either one tumbler or complete orders of 10,000. We’ve been able to use our ERP system to make small orders efficient, and it’s the one thing that has helped us serve the smaller customer well, while also still being able to serve the big customer.

CR: Can you give us an idea of your sales?
LS: Our sales totaled $ 34 million last year, $ 4 million more than the year before.

CR: How far afield have you found Tervis Tumblers?
LS: We give a lifetime guarantee with our tumblers. Should your Tervis Tumbler become defective in any way, simply send it to Tervis for immediate and free replacement, even if it’s been over 40 years since you purchased it!
I’ve seen people with our products when I’ve gone on vacation, so we know that people take them with them. They even take them to parties! It would be a great interactive contest to ask people to send us photos of themselves with their tumblers from wherever they are!
We’re really keen on adding fresh, new looks to our designs, as well as developing new products. Our focus for the next few years is to add new key licensers; we had the NFL this past year, and our collegiate is a really big program. We also work very closely with our key accounts. Working with major department stores will really help us expand geographically throughout the country.

CR: How important to you is the Tervis Tumbler website?
LS: Very important - we see it as a huge growth opportunity for us. Tervis.com allows us to connect directly with our customers, demonstrates the myriad uses of our products and, of course, provides complete access to our entire product line 24/7. I really feel that it’s a huge growth opportunity, and we are continuing to focus and market our website. Visit us at www.Tervis.com!

CR: What about manufacturing plants?
LS: We manufacture everything right here. We only moved in here three years ago and have lots of room to expand. We also own the land adjacent to us, so we’d like to stay here.
We own four factory stores. The biggest and best known one is in Osprey. We also have a store in North Fort Myers, one in North Palm Beach, and one in the Villages in Ocala. We’re also considering opening new ones in the future.

CR: How does Tervis Tumbler like to give back to the community?
LS: In a couple of ways. We make a lot of product donations and also sponsor events and activities. Our owner feels a strong responsibility to give back to the community.
We’re involved with both the Venice and the Sarasota Chambers of Commerce, and our employees contribute to a wide variety of organizations, such as Habitat for Humanity. We support Junior Achievement. Also, a percentage of the sales of our pink ribbon tumblers goes toward breast cancer research.
Tervis Tumbler employs a lot of talented people, and I’ve also met so many wonderful business partners in this area — everyone is really willing to share what works for them. It’s a great place to be in business!

John Saputo, President/Owner, Gold Coast Eagle Distributing – Anheuser-Busch/Corona & 160 Other Fine Craft & Imported Beers
Even before I drove out to the spanking new headquarters on Wireless Court in Lakewood Ranch, John Saputo’s Marketing Assistant Andrea Conklin, or “A.C.” as she is affectionately known, had equipped me with a stack of John’s personal data; Boston College summa cum laude, military medals and combat citations, and military letters of recommendation from his service in the US Marine Corps from no lesser persons than U.S. Lt. General Michael DeLong and Gen. Tommy R. Franks. John spent three years on active duty and over 29 years on reserve duty. Among his many other achievements, John attained the rank of Colonel and received the Bronze Star with V for Combat Valor. He was deployed to Panama, Australia, the Philippines, Honduras, Germany, and Bangladesh, and commanded a Company of Marines in Operation Desert Shield and Desert Storm in 1990. General Franks and US Central Command sent him on missions to Qatar and Baghdad. His last combat assignment was to patrol the streets of Baghdad and gather valuable intelligence to use in the early fight against AlQuada. Gen. Franks cited him for his leadership and courage.
John Saputo’s company, Gold Coast Eagle Distributing, has 165,000 square feet of building that sits on 23 acres of land. It has been there since July 15, 2008. It was built by Halfacre Construction Company (owned by John’s son-in-law Jack Cox) in record time — expectations were 26 months to build, but due to the recession it was completed in 13. The entire project was carried out by local contractors, local architecture firms, local everything — and it kept a lot of subcontractors working last year. The old Budweiser building  off Highway 301 was made of metal. The new building is constructed with poured concrete. The walls are 23 inches thick with a ton of energy-saving insulation. Despite the fact that while the old building was 90,000 square feet and they expanded to 165,000 square feet in the new building, its power bill is almost exactly the same as it was in the other building. This demonstrates how far along some of the energy-efficient air conditioning and cooling units are compared to how they were years ago in the older building.

CR: John, how many actual beverage brands do you distribute?
 JS: We have 160 brands from all over the world and craft beers from Maine to California. My favorite is Michelob Light, by the way. We sell products from China. We have brews from Seattle and Portland, Oregon. We have Tiger Beer from Singapore, wine coolers from Seagram’s. We import Tennent’s of Scotland. We recently received a product from Prague called Staropramen, La Divine from France, Estrella Damm from Spain, and Toña from Nicaragua. I discovered that one when I was observing the training of guerrillas in Central America as they fought against the Communists during the Sandinistas’ War.
We have beers from the Florida Brewing Company in Melbourne, FL: Hurricane Reef, Beachside Beer and Kelly’s Cider. We have Kirin from Japan. A lot of non-alcoholic specialty drinks and water such as Mountain Valley and Icelandic Glacial Water from Iceland. We have organic beers like Stone Mill and Peak’s from Maine. We also have a product called Redbridge made from sorghum for people with Celiac Disease. There are 15,000 people suffering from gluten intolerance in Sarasota and Manatee counties, and this is the beer for them. We’ve got a craft beer from Hawaii called Kona, a blueberry lager called Wild Blue, and true Belgium Wheats called Shock Top and an imported wheat beer from Germany called Konig Ludwig Weiss. The number one import, with 45% share of the import market, is Corona. Of all imports, this is our import big gun. Corona’s theme is basically “Vacation in a Bottle.” It’s very laid back and beachy, so it fits the lifestyle that we have here in Florida. We do extremely well with it. My bread and butter beers are the Budweiser, Bud Light, and Michelob Ultra brands. They account for about 55 out of every 100 beers sold in the market. The Michelob Family of Beers, especially Michelob Ultra and Michelob Light – are very popular brands in the Super Premium market. Then you have the brands that have made us “recession resistant”: the Busch and the Natural Light brands. These are popular, economically priced brands, and they’ve saved the day. Their sales surge in the Recession have kept all hands working with no layoffs. Beer is a very affordable luxury; it’s something that people don’t really give up even during a recession. It’s still an inexpensive way to maintain your old lifestyle. You may have to give up your half a million dollar house and your BMW, but you still can afford the pleasure of a good beer every now and then!
We have a market share of 69% of everything that is sold in the market. 69 out of every 100 beers sold comes out of this warehouse and we are grateful to our retailers and loyal consumers. We have 150 employees, and most of them are very, very long-time employees. This is a place where you can start your career as an 18-year-old warehouseman and work your way up to general manager; like my G.M. Tom Weatherholt. All of my people are up from the ranks. You cannot lead in this business unless you understand leadership by example! Everyone has done his street work on a route truck.

CR: How long have you worked in this business, John?
JS: Since I was eight. First job I ever had was in my grandfather and father’s tiny beer distributorship in South Detroit. Grandpa was an old Italian, an immigrant, and he worked in a steel factory by day, and during the Prohibition he made a little wine and made a little beer in his basement. After Prohibition he was assigned a little distributorship. I worked for him washing trucks and cleaning bathrooms. As a teenager I had every job in the business – warehouse loader, forklift operator, and route salesman. Grandpa and Dad insisted that we all go to college and we paid for it by working route trucks in the summer and during holidays.

CR: Are you from a big family?
JS: I had four brothers and sisters. We all started out working in that small distributorship, and then we all kind of went our separate ways. After I graduated from college, I went to Boston College, and then I took a commission in the Marine Corps. I was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the Marine Corps on active duty. I was married about eight months after I was commissioned. After active duty I went to work in the beer business in Detroit, and within a couple of years I had the opportunity to buy my first little distributorship in Raleigh, NC. Then I bought a bigger one in Rocky Mount, NC and then my last purchase here in Sarasota. In between, I was partners with my younger brothers in Detroit and the Hudson River Valley, N.Y. distributorships.

CR: Was it an easy decision to come to Lakewood Ranch?
JS: Well, there wasn’t very much choice although the Ranch is a premier business address. It took me three years to find this property, because there was no commercial property available to buy at the size I needed and with the proper zoning. There’s no support system to make it happen, except for our Economic Development Corporation, they were extremely helpful. During my career I’ve built six beer warehouses in different states: New York, Michigan, North Carolina, and Florida – but this one was the most difficult project I’ve ever done in my entire business career. I hate to say it, but this is probably the most unfriendly commercial environment that you could be in – property taxes, high impact fees, and the bureaucracy to get things approved. If it hadn’t been for our county commissioners Shannon Staub, John Thaxton, Nora Patterson, Joe Barbetta and Paul Mercier, I don’t know if this building would have ever been built.
The new building also serves as a disaster relief facility for my employees in the event of an emergency. I have a generator that can power half of this building, and we’re about to contract a second one to run it all. Once I do that, I’ll have one of the few buildings around here that has its own power supply in the event of an outage. I have 17 showers in here, washing machines, dryers, as well as our own fresh water source. We have a well that we dug for our own fresh water source. We are completely self sufficient. We are working with Sarasota and Manatee County Sheriffs Departments, the City of Sarasota, and Longboat Key to be a disaster relief headquarters for these important first responders. Plans and Letters of Understanding are being developed.

CR: What about giving back to the community?
JS: We’re involved in over 400 charities a year, and we’re very proud of that. Our employees pick out which ones we’re going to be affiliated with, and that’s a tough decision in a recession. I want to give a lot of the credit to my employees and the people who do the budgeting around here; they know how important it is to support the community, and we make sacrifices of our time and money so we can still be a part of that. It’s tough to be able to support that many local charities, but I have found that what I’ve given, comes back two-fold in loyalty and new friends.

CR: I see you also have an area on the grounds for entertaining and hospitality?
JS: Yes, we have a Hospitality Center and Tasting Rotunda, complete with an large Beer Garden and a large conference room. I wanted something resembling a Tuscan winery or a Bavarian brewery. A place where community, customers and consumers could gather for events. My wife and I went over to Italy, and we visited several breweries in Germany. We stole some general ideas from them and then found a winery in Tuscany that we really liked. My wife, my son-in-law, my daughters and I had great fun designing the building. We’ve had some great parties in the Rotunda and Beer Garden. The next event we want to do is a kind of an arts festival, where artists bring their paintings and sculptures here and sell them. Then I’ll kill two birds with one stone: I’ll take them into the Hospitality and Tasting Rotunda and maybe get them passionate about one of my beers!
We also use the community room for political functions, and we’ve hosted the Ohio State and University of Michigan Alumni, EFest and Homebuilders events. My daughters are all involved in Junior League, so we’ve hosted some huge beer and food pairing parties here and have raised a lot of money. So far, this building has raised over $150,000 for charity just in the seven months we’ve been here. We’ve hosted over 6,000 people here at different events and meetings. Our retail customers come here for training and conferences. We invite our customers to taste our products, just like it’s done in small European wineries and European breweries. Introducing a new brand, new import, or new craft is like announcing the birth of a new child!

CR: How long have you been married?
JS: My wife Denise and I celebrated our 36th wedding anniversary last month. I knew her when we were in high school. We met on a lake in northern Michigan. We have four daughters, two of whom are twins. Daughter Sarah Mackie is an optometrist and owns a practice with her husband in Bradenton called the Eye Center. Her twin sister Katie Tanner works at the Life Blood Bank in Gainesville. We have one daughter, Andrea Cox who was my VP of Marketing and is now raising her two children. My youngest daughter Bethany has a great little photography business here in Manatee and Sarasota Counties.

CR: Where did you serve when you were in the U.S. Marine Corps?
JS: Desert Shield, Desert Storm in Kuwait. I had six tanks and 53 armored personnel carriers under my command, a total of 275 men. I was a Major then. In 2003, just after Saddam Hussein’s statue was pulled down by Marines in Baghdad, I was a Colonel and Chief of Current Operations at U.S. Central Command. I volunteered for a cherry assignment early into the war. I volunteered to patrol the streets with a Battalion and report on the enemies’ asymmetric warfare techniques and tactics. When I tell other Marine senior officers that I retired as a full Colonel, and that my last duty was patrolling the streets of Baghdad with our young kids with a helmet, flak jacket, 9 mm pistol and a fully loaded M-16, they’re very envious. You don’t usually get to end your career at the “Tip of the Spear” chasing bad guys. That’s what I loved about the Marines – leadership by example. I miss The Corps and the camaraderie of my Marines.

CR: Where’s the most interesting place you’ve ever been to, and why?
JS: I’d say Bangladesh. I did disaster relief over there with my Marines. It was probably the most disturbing thing I’ve ever seen in my life. First of all, it’s a very, very poor country, about three feet above sea level. About six rivers converge into a mass marshland where thousands live. Our Regiment got there two or three days after a huge typhoon had killed 120,000 in 1991. There were still human bodies floating in the water, just like dead fish during our Florida Red Tide. We spent two weeks just burying bloated and decaying bodies. You can never forget the smell and the dazed looks of the survivors. People were contracting cholera from contaminated water. The average American just doesn’t know what life is like in a poor country like Bangladesh. The average life expectancy is 43 years, and the average person there makes less than $140 per year. I was so proud of my Marines – 2 months before they were locked in combat with Saddam’s Republican Guards and then they did an about face and showed the world that Marines are “No better friend – no worse enemy” as I watched them bury the dead with dignity, feed children, and save cholera victims.

CR: When young professionals need advice and feedback, what are some of John Saputo’s life-rules? What do you abide by?
JS: I tell them that life is very short, and you can’t waste time finding yourself or experimenting. Pick a career path, get on it! Put your nose to the grindstone! You won’t succeed unless you’re willing to work at least 12 to 14 hour days and on weekends. Get involved with your customers, your employees, and your community. Work and People – it’s the only way to become a success in this country.

CR: If we were to ever elect a mayor, would you go up as a candidate?
JS: Absolutely not. I think I am a much better political agitator than a politician. I’d be so frustrated with some of the constraints on politicians, and if I couldn’t get things fixed very quickly and at my speed and pace, I don’t think I would last very long before the paparazzi and I would be locked in hand-to-hand combat. If there was a personality profile for me it would probably read that I’m “Type A.” I’d probably be much more successful as a benevolent dictator of a small South American country or a utopia like Camelot where I command a Battalion of Knights to slay my Country’s dragons, not a constituency looking for my government to fix all their whining problems.
CR: If I asked Denise about your weaknesses, what would she say?
JS: She’d probably say that I have a big heart and that it’s going to take me a long time to get out of debt, because it’s very hard for me to say no to worthy causes and to people who are truly trying to make this city a better place to live. I grew up with Jesuits and a Marine Corps philosophy that you have to be “A Man for Others.” With that comes a lot of responsibility and a lot of caring for people other than yourself.

CR: Are you a good judge of character?
JS: I think I’m an excellent judge of character. I’ve raised enough young men in the Marine Corps and watched enough young people come through the doors of my businesses. I’ve seen a lot of people waste their lives. Most of the people who work for me here now are overachievers. We’ve created an environment here that is conducive to superstars. And it’s fun for me to observe my associates grow and achieve great accolades from Anheuser-Busch, Corona and our other brewer partners. Watching young people develop into mature, productive members of our economy is a real treat for me.

CR: Are we heading into better times economically?
JS: Yes, I was the first to feel the recession, the first to feel the lack of building going on in the county, but I’ve also always said that I’m also going to be the first to feel us coming out of it. Over the last five months we’ve had some very small sales increases, and I think we’ve turned the curve. We can do nothing now but go up, I’m convinced of it. Our problems stem in part from the fact that during this Recession, we lost some of the youthful heart and soul of this community. We lost over 17,000 young people who left to find jobs in other states. The only way we’re going to get those young people back is by diversifying our economy. I know that’s a cliché, but diversification means that we’re going to have to find ways of making it much easier for new businesses to want to relocate here – to want to open up an electronics type firm, a pharmaceutical firm, a software firm, or a research firm. We’re educating our children here, and then we send them off to some of the best colleges and universities that we have in this state, but then there’s no place here for them to return to work. I have numerous friends whose children are working in Chicago or New York or Washington DC, because there’s nothing to keep the young talent here. We can’t live off of hotel jobs, beer distributor jobs, car dealership jobs and home building jobs. As we head into the future, we have to diversify this economy. And we’ve got to get on it now.

CR: What do you and Denise like about Sarasota in particular?
JS: The weather. When we were young and dating, we hated the cold Michigan climate. One Labor Day weekend at the end of one summer, we were sitting on her father’s dock knowing that we had to go back to school, back to the cold weather and snow. Denise said: “Someday, if we ever get married, get me out of Michigan!”
Well, we got married in 1973, but we only moved here 12 years ago, so one of her classic lines now is: “You screwed up the first 24 years of my life with moving me from city to city and war to war, but the last 12 have been really great in Sarasota, Florida! Thanks!”