Carl Radke's Soft Bar Is Officially Open

US Weekly

Transcript

00:00Carl, thank you for having us weekly at SoftBAR.

00:02Thanks, Sarah.

00:03Congratulations. How are you feeling?

00:04I'm feeling good. You know, it's been a process, but as you can see, it's come together.

00:09Excited just to get our doors open and have people trying drinks, hanging out,

00:13just coming to see this whole thing. So yeah, it feels really good. And thank you for being here.

00:16I'm so happy to be here. I confirm everyone. It's gorgeous. It's real. It's all happening

00:20this week. SoftBAR, it's opening September 18th.

00:24Yep. September 18th, which is this Thursday. Our doors will be open in the morning.

00:29Business as usual, come on in. You can come for coffee. Or if you don't drink coffee,

00:33we have matcha or tea, other specialty coffee drinks. And then during the day,

00:38we've got our bartender, Jamie, who's whipping up amazing soft cocktails. Also functional drinks

00:43that provide like a vibe or electrolytes or hydration or focus or calm. So it's more than

00:49just non-out here. And Jamie, you are making us today a mint condition. Is that correct?

00:54Correct. All right, Carl, tell me about this drink.

00:56So we actually here at SoftBAR, we don't do mocktails. And what I mean by that is we're making

01:01intentional soft cocktails. And the soft cocktail program we have here is really intentional. It

01:08starts with specific ingredients. Jamie actually does a lot of pre-batching and prep work before

01:12the drink even reaches your hand. And what he's doing is advanced bartending. So either milk punching,

01:18fat washing, clarifying our drinks with different ingredients and filtering them. He's also adding on

01:24additional functional ingredients. So the mint condition actually, it's more of like a basil

01:28grapefruit with a little bit of vanilla and black tea. One of the most Googled questions about SoftBAR

01:33is, is SoftBAR only for sober people? Which we did address a little bit, but I feel like it's worth

01:38touching on even more. No, SoftBAR is for everybody. Now, we obviously love our sober people. We want our

01:43sober community to come, but we also want people that are looking to take a break, people that are sober

01:47curious, people that don't know how to describe their relationship with alcohol. I think this is a great

01:51place to stop for an hour, 20 minutes and just experience a non-alph drink and see if they are

01:57for you. Um, you know, I think my association with the business, of course we want our sober folks

02:03coming, but what I really set out to create was something that's for everyone. There are some bars

02:07out there that are sober bars. I've gone to them, but I do feel like even me going there, I feel like,

02:13am I welcome here? Is this, and some of it feels very exclusive and I wanted to be inclusive

02:19here. So to answer your question, yeah, I mean, this is not a sober bar. SoftBAR is a mindful

02:26consumption bar and cafe. Oh, I love that. I love that term. Has there, this has been a journey for

02:30you, both your sobriety on TV, both doing this business, you know, for, for better or for worse,

02:37we've seen it all. Um, has there ever been a moment in the last probably year or two that you

02:42doubted that this would be a reality? Absolutely. Caitlin, who's sitting right over here. She,

02:46she's amazing and helps us on our PR and comms. I was like breaking down at one point, you know,

02:52it's stressful. Um, you know, there's a lot of moving parts. There's things out of your control,

02:56you know, just building construction, the city leases, uh, tariffs actually was a huge thing for

03:03us this past, uh, summer and spring. There's been moments where, yeah, you have doubts where like,

03:09oh, is this going to work? Is it going to get open? Um, like, like a lot of my life, it's all about

03:13one day at a time. I've worked with the really good people. So my bartender team, my barista team,

03:19I also have an operations and managing management team that comes from another amazing bar and

03:25restaurant here in New York. So I've really put together a great team of people to help me bring

03:28this to life. So when I'm struggling or feeling down, I call them and they were like, Carl, this

03:33is totally normal. Right. So some of it is me being new in this space. Totally. Um, I'm also just

03:38incredibly passionate. So I've had many nights where I wake up in the middle of the night. I'm like, wait,

03:41what color is the bar? What color is this? What color is that? But just keep trusting the team

03:45and just keep doing it one day at a time. What do you say to the people who maybe doubted you

03:50or didn't believe that this bar, this, these doors would be open? Um, everyone, I mean,

03:55these, you have a lovely fandom, but there's always going to be those people that love to just be the

04:01negative ones or, or choose to choose to not necessarily have faith. But what would your message

04:05be to the, to the doubters that now that we're here? No, I mean, I think anybody who's out there

04:09starting a business, the nose you get, and that the feedback you get is actually the best thing

04:14ever. I've had a lot of people like, dude, that's amazing. Go for it. But like that not as always as

04:19helpful as someone saying, no, I don't like it. Or did you think about this? Or I don't like that

04:24idea. So I've taken a lot of the feedback that I've gotten, and it's honestly helped make my idea.

04:29I think stronger. I've gotten, you know, feedback early on that I was like, okay, you're right. Like,

04:33let's go back to the table. Um, I think a lot of people that are doubting it maybe haven't worked in this,

04:38you know, hospitality or bar cafe world, and that's fine. Um, but if people are talking about

04:43it, that's usually a good sign. So I'm very lucky that yes or no, it's been people talking about it.

04:49And I think what I'm doing, yes, it's a newer thing. Did I invent anything? No, I'm just taking

04:54what I really believe is needed. And I'm adding some of these ingredients to it. And I'm also trying

04:59to amplify it because I really believe we need a space that doesn't serve alcohol. That's cool.

05:03It's elevated that you can come anytime of day and hang out and have a great experience.

05:07Um, so people that doubt that I'm never going to win you over, but you know, I think what we've

05:13delivered and what we have right now, I hope anybody that's doubted it, come on in my drinks

05:17on you. If you don't like it, that's cool. But here we are. And they might see you here,

05:22right? You'll be popping in and out. I'll be here a lot. You know, I'm not going to be behind

05:25the bar like Jamie. That's why we leave the professionals. Um, but we have our offices upstairs.

05:30We have a green room and studio. We have a podcast space. So we have creators coming

05:34in to record episodes. I'm also going to be recording stuff. Um, but I will be upstairs

05:39a lot. I will be downstairs a lot, but you know, I'm going to be not necessarily here every

05:44single minute of the day, but I live in the neighborhood. So you'll find me here a lot.

05:48Awesome. One more cheers. Cheers. Thank you, Sarah. Thank you. Thank you.

05:51Us Weekly. Appreciate you guys.

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