It started as a holiday gift—handcrafted hard espresso—which Mario Grasso distributed among family and friends. With each bottle, he distilled the rich traditions of his Sicilian family, providing an opportunity for celebration and togetherness in each pour.
Today, Mario's legacy lives on through his son, entrepreneur Joe Grasso. Joe transformed this special recipe into Mario's Hard Espresso, which is now sold in five states at more than 350 locations.
I recently spoke with Joe, who shared with me the story of his family and Mario's Hard Espresso, the challenges he's faced, what sets his product apart, his advice for other entrepreneurs, and more.
Tell us about your family and connection to Sicily.
My grandfather and grandmother were from Linguaglossa, a small town at the base of Mount Etna. The town is known for an eruption in which lava flowed down the hill right toward it and literally went around a statue of the patron saint.
My grandfather left at the turn of the century when they were all starving for opportunity, and there wasn't much to be had. He came on a boat by himself at 19 to the U.S. through Ellis Island and settled in Rome, New York. He subsequently sent for his brothers and went back to Italy to marry my grandmother.
When they came to the U.S., he and his two brothers settled on farmland so black and rich it was referred to as "the muck." They each had a farm across the street from one another and down the block a little bit. They were blacksmiths, butchers, farmers, and toolmakers, but they were also insanely crafty, like most immigrants.
My family did everything themselves. They built their own homes. They were carpenters. They were brick layers. They opened a butcher shop. My grandmother and my aunts (her daughters) opened an Italian bakery in town. My grandfather made wine, and the others made all kinds of things. My father, Mario, was the same way; he grew up in that culture and transferred all of that to me. That's really the origin of our spirit.
I have this piece of railroad tie that's only about eight inches long, and I cherish it. It was given to me by my father, and it was given to my father by my grandfather. It's just an old chunk of railroad tie, but it's the one that my grandfather used to build and create tools on. He used to hammer on it, bend on it, and shape on it. It's all beat up from him doing all this work on it. And then my father used it, and now I have it, and I use it. It's a testament to them and that sort of mentality, and as I said, I cherish it.
What inspired Mario's Hard Espresso?
My father made his hard espresso every year as a gift, and he did it as far back as I can remember. He did a lot of other things. He made biscotti and wine cookies, but the espresso was particularly interesting. He had this recipe—I don't know its actual genesis; I assume it's part of everything else they did as crafty Sicilian immigrants. He'd only make about a dozen bottles for family and friends, and so it was very special. He'd put a handwritten label on it and seal it with masking tape around the top.
When I got a little older and started drinking, I was like, "Man, this is really good!" And so I was fortunate to learn the process and make it with him for the last few years of his life. It was something we did together.
When he passed away about 14 years ago, I wanted to continue the tradition in his honor. So I brought my son Aaron in, and every year, we would make a batch to honor my dad. We gave them out as gifts to family and friends, and we called it Mario's Hard Espresso because that's what it was: his recipe.
I've worked in the film business my whole life. That's been my profession. I've been a writer, a storyteller, a director, and a cinematographer. I've also been sort of entrepreneurial and gotten involved in a lot of things, some good, some not so good. One day, I read an article about contract distilling, which I had never heard about. The article was about Grey Goose Vodka and how Grey Goose is not a distillery per se; it's a brand, and they have the vodka distilled for them. And I said to myself, "You can do that?"
I started doing a little research into contract distilling. I thought, "I wonder if I could build a brand around Mario's and have someone make it for us per our recipe. Let's see what happens." So, I set out on a journey almost six years ago, whereby I just kind of chipped away at it every day. It took about two and a half years of designing the bottle, designing the labels, pulling photographs, and trying to tell the tale of my father and our family in a concise way.
Finding a contract distiller was very difficult because we insisted it had to be my father's recipe, and a lot of distillers wanted me to reverse-engineer it. They told me, "You've got to go to a flavoring company." I had no idea what that meant, actually, so I sent samples to a flavoring company, and then they started sending me samples back. They were fake and horrible with artificial ingredients. I learned very quickly what "flavoring company" meant, and I was like, "We are not going to do this." I mean, after all, it's my Dad on the label!
I finally found a small distillery in San Diego, and they agreed to make a small batch per my father's recipe. It turned out awesome. And we launched the brand in November 2021.
What challenges did you face bringing your product to market?
One of the things that's interesting about this recipe is that my father used 190-proof neutral-grain spirit, meaning pure-grain alcohol. It's illegal in California, so my father would drive to Nevada every year and buy 190-proof Everclear, and that's what he used as his base spirit. So because that was going to be an integral part of our recipe, I had to find a distillery that was capable of that. But the real challenge was producing the espresso in the amounts and the concentration we needed, finding real vanilla that fit the flavor profile that we could buy at scale, and then finding a distillery. The distillery was tough because it was during COVID, and a lot of distilleries had shifted their extra capacity to making hand sanitizer.
It was pretty difficult. I had never been in the spirits business, and every phone call was an educational event. So, I made some mistakes or went down some rabbit holes I shouldn't have. But I was just trying to discern what the path was going to be and what the best way to do this was.
When we finally found the distillery, we said, "Let's make 300 gallons." It was about 1,500 bottles, a very small batch, but without a distributor, I had no way to sell them.
I knew we weren't going to get distribution without any clients, so I got my wholesale spirits distribution license. In November 2021, I took those 1,500 bottles, put them in a warehouse, and hit the ground running in L.A.
It was a remarkable experience to see that first bottle on the back bar, see my father staring out, and know that it's our family brand. It's just humbling. And I'm always honored every time we get a new account. We basically did it by getting liquor to lips and through word of mouth from the ground up. Currently, we are in about 350 locations in five states and growing. So it's been a pretty remarkable three years.
What sets Mario's Hard Espresso apart from other coffee liqueurs?
You'll see the term cold brew thrown around. A lot of coffee liqueurs lean into cold brew. We are not cold brew; we are real espresso. So that's the main differentiator. It's more traditionally Italian of all the liqueurs on the market. There's one Italian brand called Borghetti that's extremely popular in Italy. From a flavor profile standpoint, it comes closest because it is also a true Italian espresso. So that really sets us apart.
The other thing is that we use 196-proof, triple-distilled grain-neutral spirit. It has a silky mouthfeel and a little bit of sweetness. It's corn-based, so it's naturally vegan, of course, and gluten-free.
What's great about the neutral-grain spirit is that because at 196 proof it's pure alcohol, we can use less of it to hit our 28 percent, which minimizes dilution and allows us to maintain the proper concentration of coffee and vanilla, which allows us to create a super-balanced profile.
When people try Mario's, they'll get really smooth notes of espresso and coffee flavors upfront, but it's never bitter. Then, some people will taste chocolate and caramel in the mid-palate, primarily from the combination of the coffee and the Madagascar vanilla. And then you get a little bit of heat on the back end and know you're drinking a spirit because it is 28% (alcohol by volume).
The Tasting Panel magazine scored Mario's Hard Espresso 95 points. They got a bottle and tried it, and we are so honored to get that score from them. They specifically called out the balance and lack of bitterness of the spirit, so that was awesome.
What are some favorite cocktails made with Mario's Hard Espresso?
In our family, we drank it straight. My Dad started this way before the espresso martini, so I didn't even know about them really when we launched the brand. I didn't really think that it could be so versatile. But literally, within the first week of bringing it to market, we met somebody who was a bartender at the time at Seven Grand in downtown Los Angeles. And he said, "Oh my God, I can imagine the things I can do with this."
So we went there, and he was making cocktails with whiskey. We never even thought of that. Subsequently, we've learned that it's an incredibly versatile spirit, primarily because we use a neutral-grain spirit that blends well with everything.
Of all our accounts, probably 200 are doing espresso martinis with Mario's, but we're also seeing espresso negronis and espresso old-fashioneds. Mario's is amazing with mezcal and tequila. In fact, we put together a recipe card filled with cocktails just to show the versatility.
We did a collaboration with Madre Mezcal and created an amazing mezcal espresso old-fashioned. We also collaborated with High West Whiskey on a "Cowboy Coffee." We blended half Mario's and half High West Campfire and garnished with a slice of orange. It's amazing—dangerously delicious, as we like to say.
We also created an amazing brunch drink we call a Boozy Julius. It's a take on the old Orange Julius. It's one part Marios, one part orange juice, and a little float of cream. It sounds crazy, but it tastes just like a creamsicle, and people love it.
Another drink we did as a slush in the summer is now being poured up as a type of dirty horchata espresso martini, which is our ode to L.A. We call it a 213, like the area code, and 213 is also the recipe. It's two parts Mario's, one part tequila, and three parts horchata. So you can shake it and pour it like an espresso martini. You can put it in a blender and make a frappe. And like I said, we'll put it in the slush machine during the summer. It's super good.
What advice do you have for other entrepreneurs?
First of all, you have to believe. You have to be as honest about it as you can. You've got to approach whatever project you're doing with as much integrity as possible. Be honest and put it out there; if you believe in it and work hard, hopefully, you'll be successful. That's the sort of mantra that I followed through this whole process and continue to follow every day.
I did a documentary project about eight years ago. I interviewed a bunch of different people who were living their best lives. We talked to them about the kind of work they did. One of the people I interviewed was Thaddeus Mosley, an amazing sculptor in Pittsburgh. He works in wood and makes massive sculptures that you'll see in large public spaces like hotel lobbies and airports.
Thaddeus was 85 years old or so when I interviewed him. I asked him, "These logs are huge, and you work alone; how do you even approach projects of this size?" He said to me, "Man, people ask me that all the time. And I just tell them, you've got to be like a termite. One little bite at a time; you don't eat the whole log all at once."
For me, that was like a bomb going off in my head. I said, "You know what? I'm not going to set an end time. I'm just going to take a little bite every day. That's all I'm going to do." And that little bite could be a phone call, reading an article, sending an email, or whatever. So long as I take a bite every day, eventually, I will eat the whole log.
That's what we do, and that's what I would tell anybody. Just take a bite every day. Don't make yourself crazy. Just learn. Learn and chip away at it; eventually, you will eat the whole log.
What experience do you hope to share?
Well, my father, Mario, made this hard espresso every year because nothing made him happier than people coming together to share a drink, tell a story, laugh, and have a human experience. And that is literally why we do it. It's what we lean into.
We make it ourselves now. We stopped the contract distilling because the volume just got to the point where we needed to control our inventory, quality control, and everything about it.
When we're in production, I tell everybody, "Look at each of those bottles; one of those bottles is going to end up on somebody's table." People are going to give them as gifts, they're going to go to weddings. They are going to be there for some of the biggest moments of people's lives, but also simple moments, like for people who take them skiing or camping. It's an opportunity to spread the love of my father. Telling this story and having people enjoy it is just the most amazing thing ever.
I got a call recently from a couple that was getting married. Her name was Ginger, his name was Mario, and they wanted to give all their guests special favors. She had found a little bottle of ginger honey for herself, and she wondered if we made a small Mario's Hard Espresso bottle. She told me, "When I found Mario's Hard Espresso, I immediately ordered a bottle. As soon as we tried it, we ordered three more." It was really, really sweet. And I said, "We don't make a small bottle, but for you, I will."
So we made 150 of them and sent them to them for their wedding. That's just something I wanted to do because it's the perfect celebration for people to experience and enjoy Mario's for themselves. We call it "Sharing the Love." It's what motivates us every day and is literally why we do what we do.
If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!
