Sean: 0:22

Well, welcome back to the Vero Beach Podcast. This is part three here with our interview with Sean from Tribe Coffee. And I'm excited to talk to you about what Vero. What do you love about Vero Beach? So go ahead, Sean, take us away. Vera has got everything. We've got the marina to keep uh, I mean, we've got wonderful, well uh preserved parks. We have a great um sheriff's department, we have great retail spaces, great restaurants, um, great people who we've met so many awesome people, you know, who come into the into the coffee, into the espresso bar. Um, we've got amaz people, we've got amazing local support, people who look out for for one another, you know, um who really go out their way to support local. We I mean Vera has pretty much has everything. You know, we're just on the road from Orlando. We've got access to Miami if you want to go. You can go to Jacksonville. I mean, Vera is just it's really, really, you know, we've got a great beach. We've got, you know, uh I it's just Vera has really, really um it has a it has a a lot to offer. As I was preparing for this discussion, I'm like, okay, what what are we gonna talk about with Vero? And we hear a lot about Vero about the community too. And again, like you're talking about like businesses supporting businesses, people wanting to support local. It's it's so rare these days, but it's very, it's a very strong community here. And when I was thinking about, okay, we're coming to tribe, I'm like, okay, well, uh, I talk like I've talked before about there's a difference between a tribe and a crowd. So tell me a little bit about what does the word tribe mean to you personally and how does that relate to Vero? Yeah, so well, we're in the Indian, we're in the Indian River County, and there's a tribe in the Indian River County, and and uh you know, we want to be a part of it and we hope to provide stuff for it. You know, we have a wonderful product and we have a wonderful um uh a vibe at Tribe, um which is a place where you can sit down, have a comfortable in a comfortable chair, have a great cup of coffee at at a fair price. Um, and uh at the same time, if you look at our icon, we have a triangle. Um and that that is like the shape of a tent. That triangle. It's also like the shape of a mountain. So it kind of has symbolically the the the the icon is the icon is actually an icon for tribe. And within the tribe and the lines inside that that that that triangle are the sevens are seven mountains, so the mountains that you know that that we've been involved in in the past, symbolic of climbing mountains, climbing another mountain, um, in a tent, um and at the same time, so tribe with those elements in the Indian River County is kind of how we we you know we we bring it all together here.

Brian: 3:18

And I actually was gonna say that. So I'm glad you brought that up about the vibe in here because I always like to describe what it feels like inside a place. And that's why we especially love coming to a location to do our podcast because we like being in your space with you, you know. And um, yeah, so something I love about here is, you know, it's a a small little area where you can sit and drink your coffee or your espresso, whatever you've ordered. And it feels very much like a living room. Yes. And every time that I've come here with time to sit down, I think I've been here three times where I actually sat down. Uh I've gotten in conversations with other people here. You can't help it because it feels like you're in a living room with somebody and you don't just sit there and not talk to someone in a living room, you know.

Shawna: 4:02

Exactly.

Brian: 4:03

And I I've met such interesting and sweet people here.

Shawna: 4:06

Awesome, Sean. Oh, that's great.

Brian: 4:08

So I love that. I love so there's um a few little sitting areas, couches and chairs and a coffee table. And then, Brian, you want to talk about the art.

Sean: 4:17

Yeah, I see like everywhere around is paintings and photos of yeah, because those are canvases. Canvases like paintings are of surfers. And so I'm I'm obviously I'm thinking you must have something to do with surfing or somebody in your family. This is all the work of the legend Frank Moore.

Speaker 3: 4:35

Oh, Frank Moore.

Sean: 4:36

You you need to speak to Frank sometime. Wow, you've got to have an interview with him. Yes, Frank is he is the one of the most dedicated. That's a picture of him there. Frank is one of the most dedicated visual artists you'll meet. He goes out early in the morning with his camera at no cost, and he goes out there and he photographs way. He loves the beach. And he's um, you know, he he basically he's involved in uh him and his brother still had this concept of cubism where they they do very this this kind of really saturated um treatment. And anyway, these are some of the locals at Sherry. Um, there's the uh some of the locals who come in here and they come and have coffee. We love surf. My kids surf, we surf, you know, in South Africa. I've surfed all my life. So but we we love surf is very much a part of our lives, but it's you know, and in here it's kind of um it's it's yeah, it's the surf vibe. Yeah, it's very chilled, it's very true. We're on the wave. Um, but all of this art, all this art in here is by Frank Boer. And he'd be a worthwhile guy. He's really, really an interesting guy to chat with. Like hook us up with him if you can connect us, like we'd love to. Like, and I'm I mean, I'm I look at these, and so that's a photo because it even looks like a painting on the side. Yeah, it's got oh that's so interesting. It's printed on the canvas, so it looks like yeah, and and so he gets involved with Tribe as well because he does all the uh he did all the photographs for for Amazon and for our website and stuff like that. And Frank is he's and uh so he's Frank's he he's done he's done all of this and he's just been in one in uh live in one of the magazines, live Frank Live Vero. Livero, oh yeah, yeah, and he was featured in there. Oh he's worth reaching out to and chatting to. He's a very interesting guy. I would love to, yeah. And he's just so dedicated. Seriously, he's out on the beach every day. He's out there. So that's that's the the history about it. That's amazing. That's amazing. So Sean, I would love to know. Like, so when you're when you're not working, what what do you like where do you guys like to go and spend your time doing like in the area, like or recharge here in Vero? What do you guys like to do? Um you you know, we we go down to the I take the kids down to the the beaches. Um uh um uh we uh my son's involved in the youth sailing foundation, and so is my daughter. Um the so they sail, they sell so we a lot of our time spent and dedicated to our kids, you know, their their uh recreation and um and then my daughter Rose, she's at Vera Rowing. Okay and then um and so between school, youth sailing foundation, rowing, and and keeping tribe afloat, um we we have yet to explore further afield. We we we we're gearing up for it, and next summer we'll be we'll we'll we we're thinking about you know uh but very I mean it's it's such a comfortable little community here, you know. You have everything and it's it's kind of it you don't need to go further. The beaches are right there, that's so true. You know, the the ICW is here, there's wonderful restaurants, um, you know, uh to you know to to go and have dinner, yeah, sushis. You got all the the great supermarkets, and yeah, so yeah, we we quite we sort of we we embed at home. We love home, yeah, and we spend a bit of time on the boat, and yeah, we go up to the Sebastian Inlet on the boat. Oh yeah. Yeah, and the but and being on, I mean, we rented a boat not too long ago. Uh Shauna's mom came into town and we rented a boat from I think it was Viro Beach, uh Viro Tactical. Yeah, so water sports, yeah. Water sports. Yeah, we're very good there. Rented a boat from them and we took it out, and that's when we first found out about all the islands, like all right there. Soil islands and the islands, like we, you know, yeah, with the anchor out. All the material that's taken out of the out of the RCW. Oh so the the the Army and Corps of Engineers. Yeah, what a job.

Brian: 9:16

Yeah, who was it that told us about that?

Sean: 9:18

I think that was Spencer from Dig Gardens.

Brian: 9:20

That yep, that's right.

Sean: 9:20

You know, you know, in the you know the RCW. So I mean one of the important things for me to do is to do my American captain's license, the merchant mariner's credentials. So I went and did that last year and um through the US Coast Guard. And what happened was with it was that I started learning about the ICW, okay.

Brian: 9:37

Intercoastal waterway that runs along there.

Sean: 9:39

Now, you know, in the ICW you have beacons. Yes, beacons. And when you're if you whether you you will see that there are red triangles, and then you'll see that there are green beacons, which are square beacons. Yep. When you see a triangle, all right, always remember that that is the land. Oh, okay. Oh, all right. So if you're going along and you see a beacon that looks like a triangle, know that you need to be on the seaward side of that because on the other side of that is the land, and you're gonna end up stuck. Stuck. All right. So if you see a triangle beacon, always be on the seaward side of it. Okay. That's good. One rule, because that's the mountain, all right? That is anyway. The point I'm I wanted to make about this was that those beacons that are put in place and maintained by the Army Corps of Engineers here, and the bridges, all right, and this whole system of the ICW, it's a worldwide phenomena.

Brian: 10:39

Wow.

Sean: 10:39

You know that every one of those beacons is perfectly maintained in the right spot. So when you're looking at a chart, so say you're coming up at night, because I do this often when I come back from the Bahamas, I come up the ICW at night, those beacons are spot on exactly in the right spot every time a coconut.

Brian: 10:57

Wow.

Sean: 10:58

They are maintained in exactly the same geographic position as what they are on the chart.

Brian: 11:03

Wow.

Sean: 11:04

So when you're coming up the ICW and you're looking at a chart at night, and it says there's a beacon coming up at 25 feet on your port side and right ahead, you can be a hundred percent guarantee because of the accuracy of the Army Corps of Engineers, that that beacon is there. And they maintain them. So this piece of water that stretches all the way from mobile, Alabama, the Great Loop, all the way around down the East Coast, I mean right across the Erie Canal, down the Hudson, all the way down the east coast of the United States and is maintained by the Army Corps of Engineers, all right? Hats off to that, yeah, those people who are running that show because they are amazing. The bridges, you come to a bridge, boop, the bridge opens. Where in the world do you get that?

Brian: 11:51

Yeah, it's so fun to talk to you too. Seriously, it's so fun to talk to you.

Sean: 11:55

It's like it's so efficient. Yeah.

Brian: 11:56

But see, like, we're so used to that. Like, we just I've never would have thought about it, like no, it doesn't seem like you would think it's like that all over the world.

Sean: 12:04

Everyone has the same kind of the bridges are falling over. Wow. And I never thought about like the beacons, like I was like, okay, they're there, like that's just where they're there. They're just there all the time. No, they they're specifically pegged, they are, and they are so crack accurate.

Brian: 12:18

That is so that is so interesting.

Sean: 12:20

But really, they do an incredibly good job of maintaining the RCW. And you see all of them, they're all in good condition. Yeah, sometimes they get bumped, and then they'll pull in, they come and correct them, they come up, they got their barges, they're moving up and down, dredging it, making sure that you that you know no boats. So it it's a wonderful facility. Um, in the you know, that that we have here. And look at all the wonderful life in there, the dolphins. Oh, yes, the the bull sharks that breed that you know, up the creeks, the alligators that are in there. We saw them what two manta rays jump all the way out of the water. The manatees, the manta rats amazing. Yeah, it's just wonderful. Oh, yeah. It's like the life is amazing. It's really we're so lucky here. Yeah, we really are. What is there? I mean, it's hard not to love Vero. Yeah, it's it's a beautiful area. Well, hats off to the society and to the community for everybody stepping up to that, yeah, looking after it and the environment. You know, I always my my friends will come from South Africa, you know. I mean, look, you know, where there's great grave poverty, there's always going to be a there's gonna be problems with crime, with with litter. But my friends, they come, I pick them up in Orlando. I said, if you see a piece of paper or a piece of litter on the side of the road between Orlando and Vero Beach, I'll give you this car. They look that they can't find any clean. Wow. Look around here. I mean, the road, the streets are, you know.

Brian: 13:43

Yeah.

unknown: 13:43

Yeah.

Sean: 13:44

We we live in it, we live in a place where, you know, there's where there's hurricanes and where there's lots of water. You know, if you're throwing litter out the car, is like honestly, I go to a lot of parts in the world, people just throw stuff out the windows. Right. And it blocks the stormwater drainage systems.

Brian: 13:59

Right.

Sean: 14:00

The place floods. Yeah. So what better reason to not throw litter on the floor than to stop blocking? In South Africa, the stormwater systems don't work. Everything floods because they just jammed it with litter. And it's a socioeconomic problem. People just throw stuff out the windows. It's like you're driving on the boat. This place is absolutely pristine, it's mint. The air is clean.

Brian: 14:23

Yeah.

Sean: 14:24

Wow.

Brian: 14:24

So you know what's interesting? I remember, I'll just tell this story really quickly. I remember when I was a kid. So I was born in 80, okay? And I remember littering used to be more of a problem. And of course, we didn't live in Florida, we lived in Ohio, right? But there was a big campaign, like a TV campaign, which was like do not litter. And so then people got almost you could almost say like deputized in a way, where they would go around, they would they would yell at you if you littered, you know? And so now it's like no one litters. It's cultural. If you see someone litter, you're like, what a terrible person. It's just like now it's ingrained in us. Yeah. But it's interesting how that got started. Like where littering, I remember my dad throwing things out the window, you know, he didn't think anything of it. He thought, I don't want this out the window.

Sean: 15:12

Yeah, I don't want it in the car.

Brian: 15:13

Yeah, I don't want it in the car. Exactly. And so it's just interesting how that can happen. But it takes like people getting bought in, doesn't it? Sure.

Sean: 15:21

You've got to, you know, it's it's it's your environment. Yeah. And what we've learned from coastal connections from interviewing uh Kendra.

Brian: 15:29

Kendra from Coastal Connections the community really cares about taking care of the environment here and keeping the litter picked up and once people started once people started realizing how detrimental to sea turtles plastic was, it started to make a big difference in even the products we use.

Sean: 15:46

So that's another great thing about the community, is the community cares about like it's educating. Like there's things that we've had to learn. And I think through education and learning more about this, I'm sure when people start learning more about how all the science behind coffee, they're gonna be like, we're going to try.

unknown: 16:00

Yeah.

Brian: 16:01

It changes the decisions you make, yeah.

Sean: 16:03

It changes our insults. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So there's no better way to I think than end this episode than just saying thank you to everybody in the community for being who you guys are and taking care of this amazing area. Yeah, it's a wonderful place to live. We we're very fortunate, you know, to kind of bond around a great place that's good, has great um features, great people living here, great, yeah. It's it's really a little slice of heaven.

Brian: 16:31

Yes, yeah, definitely. We agree.

Sean: 16:33

Well, you guys, thank you again, Sean, for giving us some of your time and sharing all this is amazing. More than what I expected out of this, out of all this discussion, but it's great meeting you. Uh, we love the coffee. We'll definitely be back.

Brian: 16:45

Of course. Thank you. It's definitely a pleasure.

Sean: 16:50

Well, you guys, thank you guys for tuning in. If you've enjoyed this episode, make sure you leave us a review and share this episode with some of your friends. And be sure to stop by Tribe Coffee right here in Vero Beach.

Shawna: 17:00

Get yourself some coffee, neighbor.