Welcome to Season 5 of The City Confessions! Before we get started with today’s guest, this episode opens up with a quick introduction from your host Mariann Yip about what she’s up to and what you can expect from this season moving forward. Instead of doing a solo episode as the introduction episode of the new season, we are joined by Reagan Petrehn, who is a a filmmaker, food and bev expert, and serial entrepreneur.
Before co-founding his first business –1900 Barker– at 21, he spent several years consulting with and training professionals across multiple disciplines within the coffee industry across the US, Mainland China and Hong Kong –then the fastest growing market for coffee globally. He has since consulted with dozens of coffee and food startups to create unique programming across various cultures and locales.
Today, 1900 Barker is recognized as a cutting edge and trend setting institution, despite its rural location in the Midwest, and has been nominated every consecutive year since opening for the James Beard award –a massive honor across the food and beverage industry.
In 2018, Reagan became a founding member at Felix Roasting Company in NYC. In addition to acting as Brand Manager and developing the guest experience, He created the unique (and often viral) food and beverage program that makes Felix stand out among foodies and coffee aficionados everywhere, and oversaw the meteoric rise in engagement from the press, tourists, and local New Yorkers.
Currently, Reagan is refocusing his energies into his creative studio, Kind Studio, with an aim to develop meaningful stories through film. He hopes to utilize his background in hospitality to help hurting food & bev businesses get a leg up during and after Covid.
Outside of his many professional pursuits, Reagan is an avid surfer, a distance runner, and is always looking for an excuse to play in the kitchen.
In this episode, Reagan talks about how he met his partner of Felix Roasting Company, which is a stunning cafe in NYC. He opens up about how the design concept and birth idea came into fruition and the struggles of trying to maintain afloat as the company struggled with COVID last year. However, as someone who is constantly working on a million projects, Raegan and his partner was actually able to open a new location in August of 2020 in Soho.
As a natural entrepreneur, Raegan explains how he got his motivation and confidence to start his string of businesses, especially in a city like New York. He acknowledges that he does experience impostor syndrome as is still trying to figure out how to redefine what success and happiness looks like to him. Raegan is also a talented photographer and is now actively pursuing that creative outlet. He closes this episode with a confession that you guys definitely won’t expect so have a full listen to see what that is!
Feel free to connect with Raegan on his below channels and follow along his journey to see all the amazing things he has in the works:
https://www.instagram.com/reagan.petrehn
https://www.instagram.com/felixroastingco/
https://www.instagram.com/1900barker/
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