Creative Distillation

Welcome to Episode number 100 of Creative Distillation! We’re still in San Francisco at the fantastic Pagan Idol tiki bar. We’ve moved from the secret back room to the main deck of this magic vessel, where Brad and Jeff are joined by two guests: Tom Dean, a professor in the Department of Management at Colorado State University and previous guest on the podcast; and Bob Eberhart, Associate Professo...

We are excited to be coming to you from the golden shores of California, the City by the Bay, and one of the tiki capitals of the world: San Francisco. This is Episode #99, the first of three conversations in Creative Distillation’s 100th episode celebration, which kicks off with Brad finally joining Tiki Time with Jeff to speak with Maggie Sanders, General Manager of Pagan Idol. Maggie describes...

CDEP98: JEFF’S JET PILOT AND BRAD AND JEFF’S TIKI ANALYSIS PART 2 Welcome back for Part 2 of Brad and Jeff’s Tiki analysis, a look at the major eras of tiki through the lens of Martin and Rebecca Cate’s book, Smuggler’s Cove. In part 1, over a Three Dots and a Dash stirred up by Jeff himself, our co-hosts dive into the mythic-but-true history of Don the Beachcomber, founder of the first tiki bar i...

We have a lot of fun in store as we round the final turn of Creative Distillation’s seventh season, and build toward our 100th episode. Martin and Rebecca Cate’s book, Smuggler’s Cove, has served as the roadmap and bible for this season’s journey into tiki, and in this episode, fortified by a Three Dots and a Dash expertly mixed by Jeff himself, our fearless explorers start charting the course and...

This “hybrid” episode of Tiki Time with Jeff and Creative Distillation was recorded in April 2025, during the early days of Jeff’s tiki odyssey. Trader Vic’s in Munich — the oldest remaining Trader Vic’s location — is the setting for Jeff’s interview with Prof. Dr. Claudia Doblinger, Professor of Innovation and Technology Management at Technical University of Munich. Over a shared Rum Cup served i...

On this episode, Brad and Jeff continue their field research at Pits & Stems, a real live speakeasy located somewhere in Boulder. They’re still joined by host and proprietor Ethan Decker, who contribrutes his wry insights as he keeps the libations flowing, and MJ Yang, Assistant Professor of Strategy, Entrepreneurship and Operations at CU Boulder’s Leeds School of Business. The conversation shifts...

This time, we return to perhaps our all-time favorite establishment, one that’s so special we can’t even tell you where it is because it's an actual, modern-day speakeasy located somewhere in the wilds of central Boulder. We first visited Ethan Decker and his wonderful establishment, Pits & Stems, on episode 63, way back in March 2024, and then again for episode 70. For our third time back, we’re...

This Tiki Time with Jeff episode was recorded in April 2025 -- months before our Tiki Time with Jeff Primer was recorded (see episode 84). — On this voyage, Jeff speaks with Russell Thoede. In 2014, he and his wife, Elizabeth, co-founded Lei Low in Houston. Russell is not just the owner of what is now one of Jeff’s favorite tiki bars; he’s the maker of Jeff’s new favorite tiki drink, The Pearl Div...

For this last, lingering, “holidayesque” episode of the season, we return to Dry Land Distillers in Longmont, Colorado, where Brad and Jeff continue their discussion with CU’s Ethan Poskanzer and Isabel Schoeberl, a visiting doctoral candidate from the Technical University of Munich. As if the handcrafted libations shaken and stirred by Dry Land aren’t enough, Jeff smuggles in a bottle of his home...

91: Nan Jia (USC): Nora's Craft Cocktails and AI's Effects on Employee Creativity by Creative Distillation

In what’s quickly becoming an annual holiday tradition at Creative Distillation, we return to one of our favorite research locations: Dry Land Distillers in Longmont, Colorado. It’s our third on-location recording (plus one on Zoom during Covid), making Dry Land our most-visited venue, and puts its founder, Nels Wroe, in contention for most frequent Creative Distillation guest. Further adding to t...

It seems like forever since we’ve had Jeff AND Brad on the same episode, hunkered down in a dimly lit bar, discussing entrepreneurship research over cocktails. As such, we’re delighted to have them reunited at long last at Nora’s, an honest-to-goodness speakeasy located a couple flights of stairs beneath downtown Louisville, CO. Joined by guest academic researcher Nan Jia, Brad and Jeff speak with...

This week we revisit an episode that revisits several previous episodes; call it a Creative Distillation Rewind. Originally recorded at the Rayback Collective as Episode #66, Jeff and Brad take a look back at their Top 5 episodes to date. Whiskey washing away the research; Producer Joel being attacked by rats; and lots of pumpkin beer — those greatest hits are all included here, plus vivid recaps...

This episode finds us once again talking to LSU Professor of Entrepreneurship and Information Sciences, Ted Waldron, over tiki drinks at the magnificent Lotus Lounge in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Jeff visited the site to conduct further field research for Creative Distillation’s recurring Season 7 podcast-within-a-podcast, Tiki Time With Jeff. While talk of tiki is never far away, the bulk of this co...

This is our first true Tiki Time with Jeff episode, recorded earlier in 2025 -- and months before our Tiki Time with Jeff Primer was recorded (see episode 84). — This one was recorded on location at the Lotus Lounge in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Jeff and his special guests, LSU professor “Tiki” Ted Waldron and PhD student Sonya Strano, speak with CC Pike, the Beverage Director at Lotus Lounge. She wa...

For this episode we convene at Jungle, a Boulder rum bar and burger shack inspired by the Tiki tradition. Jeff, as you learned in our Season 7 premiere, is an avid tiki afficionado, and here he lets his passion for big fruity drinks and the culture and lore behind them stand out like the loudest aloha shirt. Sadly, Brad was unable to join us at Jungle, but we’re fortunate to have Jeff’s good frien...

Season 7 of Creative Distillation opens with a special dispatch from the palm trees: it’s Tiki Time with Jeff, an exploration of the history, legends, entrepreneurial exploits and — of course, the cocktails, yes, the cocktails — of the tiki tradition. — On today’s episode, we gather at the seriously secret Tiki Dungeon, where Jeff mixes up a round of Mai Tais and then fills us in on the roots of t...

Season 6 closes on a strong note, with a panel discussion held in front of a live audience during Boulder Startup Week. This recording just happened to take place on the 13th anniversary of the opening of T|Aco, the downtown Boulder staple that graciously hosted this lively, illuminating and fun conversation. Our panelists represent a wide swath of the Boulder entrepreneurial eco-system: •Stan Hic...

This episode, our last from “GURK,” the Global Enterepreneurship and Innovation Research Conference held in Boulder in June 2024, features a conversation with another one of Jeff’s academic heroes and GURK founder, Mike Lenox. He's a Professor of Business Administration at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business, of which Jeff is an alum. Mike’s influence helped Jeff focus his inter...

This time out, Jeff and Brad properly set the tone for the Global Entrepreneurship and Innovation Research Conference, which took place in Boulder in June 2024, with a roundtable of original “GEIRC” founders including: - Janet Bercovitz, Professor of Strategy & Entrepreneurship here at Leeds - Matthew Grimes, Professor of Entrepreneurship and Sustainable Futures, at Cambridge University’s Judge Sc...

For this episode, another in our series of recordings from the Global Entrepreneurship and Innovation Research Conference, which took place in Boulder in June 2024, we welcome Elvira Sojli, Associate Professor in the School of Banking and Finance at the University of New South Wales in Australia. Elvira’s not a drinker, so this time out, Boulder-made Rowdy Mermaid Kombucha is on the menu. As it ha...

On this episode recorded in June 2024 at the Global Entrepreneurship and Innovation Research Conference in Boulder, Brad and Jeff speak with Jay Habegger, a CU grad now pursuing his PhD at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business. Jay’s story is unique because, after over 20 years as an entrepreneur and two-time founder, he’s now studying entrepreneurship and trying to contr...

With this episode, we segue seamlessly from the Reversing the Arrow Conference to the Global Entrepreneurship and Innovation Research Conference — affectionately known as GURK — held in Boulder in June 2024. Our transition is eased by our location: the sunny rooftop of Avanti Food and Beverage on the Pearl Street Mall in downtown Boulder. On this gorgeous and scorching afternoon, Brad and Jeff spe...

Our penultimate episode from the Reversing the Arrow conference features a classic sit-down interview with Kathy Eisenhardt, Stanford W. Ascherman, M.D., Professor in the School of Engineering at Stanford. Kathy, as you’ll hear, is a legend in entrepreneurship education. Her trailblazing approach to researching how entrepreneurship really works makes her one of Jeff’s heroes. And the Eisenhardt Me...

Our series from the Reversing the Arrow conference, held in June 2024 at Boulder’s Chautauqua Park, continues with a Lightning Round, in which each of our three guests talk about their recent published research in less than 45(ISH) minutes — all while enjoying a refreshing summer saisson from Denver’s TRVE Brewing. Virginia Tech Assistant Professor of Management Katie Brownell leads off with The T...