Meet Arby Avanesian | Founder of empirical water

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

Hi Arby, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
This is a story that goes way back, and it all starts with what drives me.

I am propelled by my discomfort with ambiguity, my need for control, and my desire for “perfect” experiences. These are weaknesses in my personality that stem from childhood. Through compulsive self-awareness, I’ve used these weaknesses as motivation to ultimately create good things for people to enjoy.

So when I began drinking specialty coffee in 2017 (and fine tea in 2018), it was simply my default behavior to begin voraciously consuming information on the topic and attempting to master the medium from every angle.

Most of the angles for coffee optimization were relatively easy to understand – storage to preserve freshness, brewing with the right equipment and brew recipes to highlight tasty flavors in the coffee, etc.

But the water, which it turns out is the most impactful variable for targeting good flavors in the coffee… man, that was a mysterious and complex topic I didn’t understand at all. So I began trying out all the existing brew water products, and I noticed stark differences in my experience of coffee through each one.

And yet, none of them seemed all that great. They were riddled with flavor defects, so I never got the perfect experience I was looking for. And so, with no other options available, I decided to make my own mineral water from scratch.

Unfortunately, I ran into the exact same issue as with the pre-made brew water products. I was out of ideas, and basically gave up on my goal of brewing great coffee. I pretty much stopped brewing coffee, opting for tea instead – which is a lot easier to brew.

But over time, I became more and more aware of the limitations of my brew water, even for tea, and so in a last ditch effort, I resorted to a Google search to learn more. By some miracle, Google brought me to a blog called Tea Secrets. The author of this blog, a great guy by the name of Max, seemed to have it all figured out – making complete mineral profiles using natural minerals no one else was using at the time. I reached out, hoping to learn a bit more, and Max took me under his wing, mentoring me and passing on all the information he’d learned over the years.

At the time, I was completely overwhelmed by information overload. I found the knowledge gap so great between myself and Max, that I figured I could simply wait for him to figure it out so I could use his finalized recipe to brew coffee and tea for my own enjoyment.

But over time, as I became more acclimated to the subject of mineral water, my curiosity got the better of me and I jumped in head-first, replicating Max’s latest mineral water recipes and iterating on them myself to better understand the medium.

Soon, we began collaborating. Max’s approach was primarily explorative – covering vast ranges of different types of mineral profiles to learn more about the possibilities. My approach on the other hand, was iterative. This turned out to be an incredibly productive combination.

Together, we worked on creating suitable mineral profiles for tea – Sending each iteration out to the community to try for free, in return for feedback. Over time, the water got better and better.

In fact, it turned out that our tea-brewing water was downright wonderful for coffee as well. I was ecstatic. I’d achieved the goal I had set out to accomplish. I thought that was surely the end of that.

Until one day, Max suggested partnering up to do business – selling our mineral concentrates and splitting the profit. After all, we were the only ones on the planet producing brew water of this caliber.

We toyed around with the idea for a while, but eventually decided to start our own separate brands of brew water reflecting our unique approaches, and I began empirical water on my own.

Note: This was still merely a hobby for me, which allowed me to share my water with the community for the cost of breaking even. It wasn’t until my 6th year in university, bored half to death of my biochemistry program, that one day, I simply stood up in the middle of my chemistry lab, walked out, and never looked back.

I knew nothing about business, but I knew my product had the potential to improve the world’s experience of specialty coffee and tea. That was all I needed to know I made the right choice.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
I am most proud of my self-belief. It is undoubtedly my strongest quality and without it, I would never have contributed empirical water to the world. I am also proud that when it comes to things I care about, I just never throw in the towel. I stick with it until it’s done, and until it’s done right.

It was not easy. As a new entrepreneur, so new in fact that I’m barely comfortable calling myself one, I feel as though I’m in a constant loop of incompetence and competence, back and forth, back and forth, as I have to learn each new aspect of what it takes to succeed.

I have learned that fear holds us all back from our goals in life, and that to live without fear, or at least to live without being controlled by it, is to live without limits.

I would want the world to know that I try very hard to do a good job, and would not be offended if called a “tryhard”.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
I’ve become a bit of a shut-in who only really thinks about making the best possible brew water for coffee and tea. I don’t do much of anything else. I would be a terrible guide for the city of LA.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I dedicate my shoutout to Max Rosenzweig, author of Tea Secrets, who took me under his wing and mentored me into my role as a developer of nature-inspired mineral profiles for brewing specialty coffee and tea.

Website: https://empiricalwater.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/

Other: I offer a $350 value bundle, completely for free including shipping within USA, to help people brew the coffee they envision in their mind’s eye: https://empiricalwater.com/products/bundle

Image Credits
Photographed by Parker Coffman