Meet Logan Brown

Today we’d like to introduce you to Logan Brown. 

Logan, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I started working in Hospitality when I was 16 for gas money. What began as a part-time job grew into a full-fledged passion for taking care of others by my early 20s. Especially once I started to learn the world of bartending, which captivated me as a way of learning about other parts of the world through their spirits. You can learn so much about another country and its people through what they drink, so now I try to run globally-minded spirits programs to help share those cultures with other people here in the Midwest. 

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back, would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Is it ever a smooth road? This is a hard industry and requires a lot of self-discipline to learn and grow while simultaneously frequently failing to provide much mentoring. It’s much easier to find a place of employment that will simply exploit you rather than help you grow and make sure you’re taking care of yourself. Hospitality is a rare industry that’s filled with some people who are here because they don’t want to do much else other than cash a paycheck and party – and people who are trying to do incredibly innovative things and truly want to take care of others. If you’re not careful to surround yourself with people who share similar goals and will hold you accountable this can’t quite literally easily be a deadly industry. I am happy that over the last several years there’s been a great shift in more people pushing for equality, mental health, and the overall health of our industry. It’s one of the dynamics that has made me most happy to see change and come about. 

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
While I know that I’m not the only one in this industry who feels this way I do think one of the things that drives me differently than a lot of other people in bars is that my passion and focus is Hospitality and I happen to do that through food and drink. Do I want to make great drinks? Of course. But if I have to choose between somebody leaving my bar and saying, “that was the best drink I ever had” and “I just had the best time at that bar,” I’ll take the latter every time. We do our best to learn every guest’s name and cater to them individually rather than having them come in and get forced into a cookie-cutter experience that we want to force on everybody. The driving theme behind Watershed is television. Our ‘seasonal’ cocktail menu focuses on a different television show each menu and uses that for our inspiration in the cocktails. Our current season is Community, and we move into our Sex and the City menu in December. 

Is there anyone you’d like to thank or give credit to?
So many people. First and foremost, Watershed wouldn’t exist as it does right now if it weren’t for two of the best people, I’ve ever had the pleasure of working for, Craig Garafolo and Andy Poch. They care as much about their employees as they do about the business itself, and they’ve fostered an incredible work environment. The entire team they’ve hired are wonderful people and it’s rare to get to work in a place where people are happy to be there every day. Morgen Hare deserves all the credit for the incredible design work she’s done for us, from the menu to the DVD cover art she does for our check presenters, which are DVD cases. 

My mom, Darlene, is who instilled a spirt of hospitality in me. Our family holidays were never about ‘family’ in a sense of DNA, everybody who was a friend or needed a place to go during a holiday was invited and welcomed. It didn’t matter if it was Thanksgiving, Christmas, or just a casual Sunday evening sitting around a fireplace. Everybody was always welcome and made to feel wanted at my house, and that’s something that I’ve done my best to bring to my programs. 

In the bar world, I have to give a shout-out to Cincinnati’s one and only Downtown Scotty Brown [no relation] who has always been the closest thing I’ve had to a mentor in this industry, despite having never actually worked with/for him. 

Lastly, all of my friends who have come to visit me at the bars I’ve worked at over the years and show love and support, whether it was a dive bar serving pizza by the slice or a fancy restaurant serving esoteric food. 

Pricing:

• Cocktails are all $15
• Beers are $8 and up.
• Wine is around $12-16 a glass
• We have a tableside beverage cart for vintage spirits starting at $40 an ounce.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.watershedbar.com
• Instagram: @watershed.chicago