Today in our ongoing Meet the Maker series, we’re excited to introduce you to a wonderful gal we’ve affectionately dubbed the Queen of Butter: Elizabeth McBath, who along with her husband runs Banner Butter, a line of small-batch cultured butters out of Atlanta, Georgia. Yum!
LBC: What inspired you to take your leap as an entrepreneur?
Elizabeth: My husband and I had been saving to start our own business for years. While the timing didn’t seem exactly right — we have two young children — I just became tired of saving, but not doing. So, really, the inspiration came from frustration! But also from a desire to reclaim something we had lost during the day-to-day work routine we were living: to slow down and see the beauty around us in the simple things. As a Southerner and lover of good food, butter is a nice, small symbol of the bigger things.
LBC: When you first got started, how did you envision your business would be defined?
Elizabeth: We have always wanted Banner to represent what we were missing in our lives: simplicity and taking the time to recognize the beauty in the small things around us. We have embraced the local food movement, and the slow food movement, and that has made our personal lives richer.
LBC: How would you describe what you create?
Elizabeth: Banner Butter creates small batches of cultured butters. Most butter in America is what’s known as sweet cream butter. We make butter the way our great grandmas used to, and the way that butters are still made in parts of France and Italy. Our way lets the cream ripen for many hours, so that good cultures form before we churn the cream. The result is a traditional product that is creamier and more delicious than any other butter you’ve probably ever had (we’re a little proud of our product!).
LBC: Where can we find your products?
Elizabeth: Whole Foods and Fresh Market in Atlanta; Whole Foods in Franklin and Nashville, Tennessee; Whole Foods in Hilton Head, South Carolina; various gourmet markets throughout the Southeast; farmers markets throughout Atlanta; first-class Delta international flights; and online!
LBC: Walk us through your typical work day.
Elizabeth: Our typical work day involves setting the cream in the morning to ripen, so that good bacteria forms. After the ripening process completes, we then churn the cream in small batches. After that, we hand package our butters in rounds. In addition to making the butter, we also work hard at marketing and in-store demos.
LBC: What are 3 things makers should think through when they initially decide to start a business?
Elizabeth: What type of life do you really want for yourself? What are you willing to sacrifice to get that life? And will your vision get you that life?
LBC: When you’re overwhelmed, what brings you back to focus?
Elizabeth: When you surround yourself with the right people, whenever you become overwhelmed, they can take the reigns for a bit and lift you up. You, in turn, do the same for them. Nothing great can be built by one person alone.
LBC: Tell us about a few of the best business decisions you’ve made to date.
Elizabeth: When we initially started our company, we purchased butter already made from a local farm, and then we added ingredients to it to make compound butters. We simply assumed that the market on “regular” butter was already taken. It was only while working the farmers market circuit that we realized that people were genuinely longing for a good, healthy, traditionally made butter. So we changed our focus, traveled, studied, bought a churn, and now make our own butter. Best business decision we’ve made.
Second, both my husband and I have kept our day jobs while getting Banner off the ground. While this has not been easy, it has allowed us to fail at times, and then brush ourselves off and start again, because our finances didn’t have a strict timeline.
Finally, we have surrounded ourselves with positive, excited people who make our lives, and this company, better.
LBC: Is there a cause or organization that you contribute to that you’re particularly passionate about?
Elizabeth: We are committed to the local food movement, and are partnering with Truly Living Well — an urban farm — to create certain Seasonal Compounds. We also support different fundraising events throughout the city of Atlanta, including schools and libraries.
LBC: What are 3 essential resources in your business toolbox that you can’t do without?
Elizabeth: 1) I loved reading the E-Myth revisited. It’s helped me focus.
2) Positive, passionate people.
3) Passion for what you’re doing.
LBC: Suppose we had a time machine. If you blasted ourselves forward a few years, where would we see your company?
Elizabeth: Hopefully, nationwide, but sourcing locally in each area of the country where we sell.
LBC: What’s one thing you would eat, if you could only eat one thing for the rest of your life?
Elizabeth: Um, bread and butter!
LBC: Your musical playlist is full of…
Elizabeth: Allison Krauss.
LBC: Share one of your guiltiest pleasures.
Elizabeth: Reality TV.
LBC: If you could hire someone to do just one thing that you sort of loath doing, what would it be?
Elizabeth: Quickbooks!
LBC: What’s your spirit animal?
Elizabeth: It’s sort of a cross between the honey badger and the cow.
LBC: Tell me a few of places on your travel “bucket list”.
Elizabeth: Just a few? I could go on and on. So for today, let’s just leave it at: Croatia, Chile, and Iceland. Also, an amazing man in Italy hand-made a machine for us, and we’d love to meet him! And two amazing butter makers live in Australia (Naomi Ingleton) and Ireland (Allison Abernathy), and we would love to have some face-to-face time with them too.
LBC: What’s your favorite quote and who said it?
Elizabeth: “I went to the woods because I meant to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” -Henry David Thoreau
LBC: What’s your best recipe?
Elizabeth: Bread and butter. Because it just doesn’t get any better than that.
LBC: Have you ever held an odd job or one you weren’t particularly fond of?
Elizabeth: Assembly line work at Mary Kay Cosmetics one summer.
LBC: If you were given a million dollars, but were not allowed to keep a single penny for yourself friends or family, how would you spend it or give it away?
Elizabeth: I’d say, start a foundation. It keeps on giving.
Thank you, Elizabeth, for sharing your talent with us! We absolutely love your work and we look forward to all the wonderful things ahead for Banner Butter. We’re cheering you on…
Want to see your brand featured in our continuing “Meet the Maker” series? Drop us a line: hello AT luckybreakconsulting.com. Please use “MEET THE MAKER” as the subject line and be certain to include your web address. We look forward to hearing from you!