June National

Putting Some Personality in

Bloody Marys By Alexandra Zendrian

e all know that phrase “I’ve got a guy.” Typically, it’s knowing a mechanic or someone with another specialized skill. W For Stephen Murphy, that skill was making the best Bloody Marys among his friends and people around him. Murphy’s family has been making tasty Bloody Marys for generations. He became “the guy” among his friends who would be asked to bring his Bloody Mary mix to tailgates, parties and special occasions. He joined a beach club after he got married and, in the morning, made a batch for the people in the cabana. Murphy heard several times that he should bottle this, so he decided to review what the category looks like in the grocery store. The category included maybe three brands, collecting dust at the bottom of the shelf, in plastic, cheap-looking bottles in Murphy’s estimation. They had a thin, pinkish hue with preservatives galore. That’s when he decided he could do better with a glass bottle and something that tasted and looked good. If Murphy was going to do this, he was going to do it his way though, by injecting some personality and having fun. Thus, The Murph’s was born in 2006. Murphy, who also works in retirement planning, was bit by the entrepreneurial bug with this engaging, witty, charismatic brand. At its height, The Murph’s was in 33 states, but after COVID when grocery stores were asking for much higher rates for marketing, that was pulled back to about a dozen states up and down the East Coast.

Because The Murph’s started out as a family recipe with fresh ingredients (which is also vegan), Murphy began having customers telling him how they used his Bloody Mary mix to make gazpacho and as a marinade for chicken wings. From there, Murphy created recipe cards to show people the true utility of his product, which can be used for soups, dips, sauces and marinades. That solved the issue of what a person does with their Bloody Mary mix when they only wanted a certain amount but still had some left in the bottle.

“[It’s a] Bloody Mary first, but look what it can do,” Murphy said.

Page 32 I HOSPITALITY NEWS JUNE