Per his very official, very serious out-of-office email, actor and Aviation Gin owner Ryan Reynolds' July looked something like this:
"I will be out of the office celebrating Canada Day (July 1), World UFO Day (July 2nd), Tom Cruise’s Birthday (July 3rd) and July 4 (July 4). It’s also National Picnic Month so let’s just reconnect in August, shall we?"
Come August, though, he was ready to get down to business ... despite his OOO remaining the same well into the month. Office etiquette is hard, ya know? This week, Ryan held an "employee orientation" for media in New York, where he shared the story of how he came to own Aviation Gin, one of the top-rated gin brands in the world (it scored 97 points from Wine Enthusiast, the highest in the gin category).
All jokes aside — see: "Like a lot of people, I'm inspired by George Clooney (fellow actor-turned-liquor-savant); I take my inspiration from Batman and Robin, thats a big one" — Ryan is straight-up obsessed with the product: "It's the best gin on the planet," he said.
Ryan came across Aviation about a year and a half ago while in his hometown of Vancouver. As he told his new employees, he kept going back to the same restaurant for a Negroni, and didn't know why it was so good. When bartenders told him the common denominator,"I realized I didn't need the Negroni, I just needed the gin."
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Fast forward to February 2018 and Ryan bought the company. And despite proclaiming "I still know nothing," about gin, he knows what he likes, and he's using that knowledge to do some serious leg work for the brand: meeting buyers in Dallas, FaceTiming into board meetings, and continuing to tell people how much he loves the product. "I think thats how you build it," he said of the "unsexy" part of his job. Plus, as he put it, "I'm a great introduction to the product, but then the product can speak for itself."
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