A behind-the-scenes story: messy, real, human.

A few weeks ago, my daughter looked at me and said something that stopped me in my tracks:

“People don’t want to just hear about the Coffee Trail.
They want to hear how you’re making it, what the process was.
They want you to be real with them.”

And she was right.

People see the polished pieces, the website, the shops joining, the map forming, but they don’t see the actual process. The part that is messy. The part that is human. The part that explains why something like this has not existed until now.

So this is the real story.

Not the polished version.
Not the highlight reel.
But the truth of how The Kentucky Coffee Trail™ came to life,
and why it almost didn’t.

Because nothing about this was easy.

From the outside, it looks like this came together fast.

From the inside...not even close.

This Trail was built the hard way. It was bootstrapped from day one, fueled by sleep-deprived nights, ADHD hyper-focus, sheer belief, and a whole lot of stubbornness.

My coworker Natasha always jokes that when I get locked into this mode, I can do 40 hours of work in two hours.  And honestly, that is exactly what it took.

But even with that level of focus, here is what most people do not realize...

People loved the idea, but not in the way that actually moved it forward

Early on, almost everyone who heard about the Trail said:

“This is amazing.”
“I love this.”
“Why hasn’t anyone done this yet?”
“Let me know how we can support you.”

But nearly all the support offered was:

✨ moral
✨ verbal
✨ emotional
✨ symbolic

None of it was financial, which was the type of support the Trail actually needed.

People loved the concept.
People believed in it.
People wanted it to happen.

But when it came to the hard parts, the infrastructure, the printing, the legal filings, the cost of building a statewide tourism project, things got quiet.

And suddenly, the question everyone kept repeating made perfect sense.

“Why hasn’t anyone done this yet?”

Now that I am the one doing it, I can finally answer.

Because it is not easy.
Because it is not cheap.
Because it demands more grit than anyone expects at first.

Launching without waiting for permission

Nothing about this project followed the normal order.

There was no committee.
No board approval.
No state endorsement.
No perfect timing.
No investors.

The Trail exists because I stopped waiting for those things.

I launched the website.
I opened shop signups.
I started building regions.
I created the framework.
I pushed it into the world with no guarantee that anyone would follow.

And people did follow. Not because it was perfect, but because Kentucky was ready for something like this, even if they did not realize it yet.

The embarrassing moment I will never forget

This part is almost funny now. Almost.

Early on, after a stretch of slow momentum, I received an email  response from an organization that sounded incredibly enthusiastic.

They used warm phrases.
They mentioned next steps.
They complimented the concept.

And in my hopeful, sleep-deprived state, I sincerely believed:

“This is it. Our first regional sponsor.”

So I replied with a confident, detailed message:

• requesting logos

• outlining recognition lines

• referencing invoices

• preparing for press

• thanking them excitedly

And then came the reply. It was clear, direct, and very much not what I expected:

“Just to clarify, we are not agreeing to sponsorship.”

I felt my soul try to leave my body.

But here is what that moment taught me...

When you are building something that does not exist yet, you will sometimes move faster than people are ready for.
You will misinterpret enthusiasm.
You will get ahead of yourself.
You will learn.

And then you keep going.

I bootstrapped every single piece of this project

There was no grant.
No investor.
No funding waiting quietly in the background.

It was just me.

Signing shops up.
Building the framework.
Paying for the website.
Covering trademark filings.
Trying to figure out how on earth I was going to come up with 30,000 dollars to print 10,000 Coffee Passports.

Spoiler Alert: I did not have a spare 30,000 dollars lying around.

And yet, I kept building.

SOAR believed in the vision early, and that mattered

When the Trail was still rough and very much in the idea stages, SOAR saw the potential.

They encouraged me.
They validated the concept.
They helped refine the pitch.

They made connections.

They believed before the momentum appeared. They gave me the tough love to take the first leap.

Their support did not erase the challenges, but it helped carry me through them.

And now, something incredible has finally happened

After months of building this by hand,
bootstrapping, believing, refining, learning, adjusting, and refusing to quit,
we officially have our first Regional Sponsor.

A partner who believes in the Trail.
A partner who sees the vision.
A partner who is investing in small-town Kentucky alongside us.

We will be sharing who it is very soon, and we could not be more excited or more grateful.

And soon, something else will happen:

People across Kentucky will hold the first 10,000 Coffee Passports in their hands.

They will flip through the pages.
They will recognize familiar towns.
They will discover new ones.
They will start planning trips.
They will visit shops they never knew existed.
They will take their first sip of a small-town latte that never would have found them otherwise.

And when that moment comes, I will remember worrying about how I would ever find 30,000 dollars to print these.
And I will know the truth.... Because I figured it out ...one step at a time.

The Kentucky Coffee Trail™ was not handed to me.

I built it, bootstrapped and sleep-deprived, fueled by hyper-focus and pure determination, and somehow still standing.

And this is only the beginning.

The best chapters are ahead.