Meet Andy Zirger | Bar Crawl USA Owner

We had the good fortune of connecting with Andy Zirger and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Andy, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
I had the capability of starting Bar Crawl USA business as a side hustle while working my corporate full time 10 years ago. I started Bar Crawl USA because I had attended a few very unorganized events and just felt there was a better way to do this. I was in the hospitality industry, was fairly new to Atlanta. I knew there were people like me looking to meet new people, check out new bars, and have some organized fun along the way. People work way to hard Monday thur Friday to end up attending some money and time wasting event, so I was looking to fix that (and have a little fun along the way)

If you find yourself with an idea and an opportunity to start your own business I would 100% take that risk. This doesn’t mean you quit your fulltime job and dive right in. You’ll need to be able to do both to make sure that your passion/side hustle can become a real thing. Once you can see the vision and that your “side hustle” can succeed you’ll know it is time to pull the trigger to make it a full-time hustle.

There is nothing like working for yourself. The flexibility of schedule and the ownership of knowing you control you own destiny. Every minute worked and every dollar earned will be for you, not someone else. In addition, as time passes you’ll no doubt be busier in life than you were when you first thought about starting your business. There is no better time than now to make that leap. I never wanted to look back 5-10-15 years from now and wonder had I just pursued it a little harder could it have been a thing? Could I have made it a business? Made it my full time job? Would I still be in this job if I had started my own business?

It is better to have tried and failed than to have never tried at all. I know it is another standard saying but there is a reason it is said a lot, because it is true.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
I am most proud of the fact we did it the right way. We would sell out our small events in the beginning just to make sure the attendees, the bars, and everyone involved had a great time. We would get amazing reviews & a lot of repeat crawlers that a lot of them I call friends today.

It would of been easy to have been tempted to sell a couple hundred more tickets and potentially overdo it and offer a lesser experience to our attendees to just make a few extra bucks. In the long run that would have derailed our business and had people looking elsewhere to go do fun events with.

I feel like the lesson learned if you are going to do something. Do it the right way, stick to why you started it and stick to what separates you from the competition.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I mean if it isn’t one of our bar crawls 😉 then I would hit the beltline and do our own food & booze walking tour to show them the city. Would hit up a concert or a ballgame and probably take them to Johnnys Hideway to end the night.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
It would be my wife Caroline who is also a 50/50 partner and co-owner in Bar Crawl USA. 10 years ago when I started this we were just dating and after 3 years it had grown a pretty big business scaled over 10 different cities. We were engaged, I was still working my full-time job, and we were set to be married in April 2017.

She pushed me to make that leap. She was the one a few months before our wedding that said if you don’t do this you’ll regret it. I had my two weeks typed up for probably a month, I would change the date the next day, go to work, be too nervous to do put my two weeks in and return home.

I have Caroline to thank to make that push to finally go all in on the side hustle that is our business today, Bar Crawl USA.

I also have a lot of friends that were crawling with us from the beginning including my brother Dan who would drive to cities on the weekend with me to help run the events. If it wasn’t for a good group of friends (sorry I can’t name you all), my brother, and my supportive wife I probably never take the official leap.

Website: www.barcrawlusa.com

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