Latest / Ready To Drink Podcast / Four Loko, Convenience Channel & Distributor Trust: Eric Rogers on Building Beverage Brands That Last

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Four Loko, Convenience Channel & Distributor Trust: Eric Rogers on Building Beverage Brands That Last · Ready To Drink Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_03: Name is Eric Rogers.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_03: I work for Fusion Projects and I'm one of the national account managers for the convenience channel.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: So let's uh let's jump in a little bit on the top level and kind of tell us about what Fusion Projects is and some of the different brands that you kind of work with on a day-to-day basis.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so if you're not familiar with Fusion Projects, the the br the biggest brand that Fusion has is the Four Loco brand, which I've been in the industry, much like yourself, been in the industry 20 plus years.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_03: And when it comes to this industry, I think the industry at its core is about connecting with distributors.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_03: And I don't think there's any other brand that's done that better than Four Loco.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_03: If you go back to the history of that, they got out there, they built the brand through hustle with distributors, they had to pull the brand, and they had to rebuild the brand again.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: So I um it's it's both uh it's both one of the funniest stories when it first came out because I was that age, I was the target demo and I was everything, you know, when it came to the Four Loco in the very beginning.
• 0:54
  unknown: Yeah.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_01: And then when it when everything recame back and then they had to kind of came pulled out of the market, it became something where it was like the crazy thing, you know what I mean, that everything was trending.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: But then from the backside of being in the industry, it became one of the most powerful stories of how to reposition yourself and strengthen your relationship.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: So I really appreciate the fact that that's what you opened with because that's how I tell the four loco stories.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: Is it got way out of control and everything got really wild, but they're one of the first brands that was able to rein it in, reposition, and be successful moving forward.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_03: And one of the things I've noticed, so I've I've spent some time with medium-sized breweries, large breweries.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_03: I spent some time with the startup.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_03: Um, and that really taught me specifically in the kind of the smaller startup world nowadays, is that a lot of these entrepreneurs they don't really know beer distributor dynamics per se.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_03: And so that gave me a lot a lot of respect for for the owners of Fusion Projects when I came on board, just knowing that they they built that credibility with distributors and they still have it today.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's um it's something that we talked not enough about sometimes on this show, and I'm I'm happy to talk to you about it uh because a lot of founders and startups, and I I've dealt with that's all I work with most of the time, is very very small startups and founders getting through that expansion and leveling up stage.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not a knock on them, but it is a very misunderstood thing as far as what meet what it means to be in distribution, what it means to be in wholesale.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: And we dealt with it like 15 years ago with craft gear, where these brewers were producing great products and they had these tasting rooms and they were getting a lot of positive feedback from everybody in the tasting rooms, but then when they were not doing well on the shelves and they didn't have the ROS that they wanted, they were always brilliant in the distributor.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: And at that time, I was in the brand manager role, so I had 37 different craft breweries every day, either being happy about what was happening or complaining at me.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: So it's one of those.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: I used to have the wall where I taped up all the emails of the threats that I would get.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: And then when people came into my office, they could look on the wall and be like, just don't make it on that wall.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: Like just and I, you know, it's one of those things though, I I want these founders to understand, and let's talk a little bit about that world of the wholesale world.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_01: And because it's one of those things for four loco, you know, there's not a four loco cafe that people can go to to have a direct consumer experience.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: So you constantly have to be mobile and you have to meet consumers where they are in order to build that brand.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: And talk a little bit about what you mean when you say a strong relationship with distributor, because I want a lot of founders and startups that listen to this to understand what it means from a legacy standpoint, because that should be what they aspire to have.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_03: Right, right, right.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_03: Um, when it comes to distributors, you know, this is at this industry at its core, it's about connection, it's about relationships.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_03: Distributors want to know that you're in it with them.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_03: So, for example, I had a startup that I worked with, and I don't want I don't want to say the the company, but they had launched a few markets about six to a year prior to me starting, and they launched the markets by a couple crew drives, and then they hadn't been in the market since that time period.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_03: So they're they kind of left the distributor hanging.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_03: Distributors need to know that you're in it with them.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_03: So there's different expectations, I think, some distributor side to the supplier side, they probably expect more from big brewers, but for smaller, smaller size suppliers, they still want to see some presence in the market.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_03: They still want to know that you're in it with them.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_03: And that's the biggest thing I could I can advise some of these smaller startups on.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: And it's the term the term crew drive is one thing that I I have a I have a mixed emotions about.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: And it's that it's that crew drives can be the best asset for a brand, but they can also be the biggest waste of time if they're not done correctly and there's no there's no middle road.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_01: Like there's no middle road to crew drives because if crew drives are done right, they're they're the best.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so what is an effective crew drive from your standpoint?
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's a good point.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_03: There's got to be some preparation ahead of time.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_03: This is kind of where that brand manager will come into play.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_03: If you sit down with them and kind of align with the brand manager or whoever that may be at the distributor, trying to identify what channels you want to be in, what accounts you want to be in.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_03: They, those distributors, they're the local knowledge.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_03: They can help you target those accounts, and that can be the accounts you go after during those crew drives.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_03: And then from there, it's lining up POS, trying to free up the manpower.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_03: You really want to be in the accounts with some of those distributor sales reps, if you can, because they're the ones that are going to know the buyers.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_03: And so it's really just about identifying the right accounts, making sure that the manpower is available so that you can go out with the right people in the market.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: When uh let's say you want to you have a sales goal, like you're the market manager for a brand and not fusion.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: Let's just say you're your opinion.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_01: You're let's pretend you're a consultant in this conversation.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: The brand, the distributor calls you and says, Hey, we got to hit these numbers.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: Can you come down and help us out in February?
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: Distributor says, We don't have any manpower because we're tied up on all these other things.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: Is it good?
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: Is it a good idea to sit back and wait until the next time they're available?
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: Is there a good time to just roll up your sleeves and start introducing people cold, go meet a stranger for the first time in your life?
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_03: 100% you need to go out in the market cold.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_03: Like, that's a great point.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_03: Like a lot of the time, the distributors are not going to have to be able to, they're they're busy, they have a lot of brands, they're not going to be able to give you the manpower.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_03: The ultimate goal is to get out there with their sales rest.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_03: But if you can't, they can still point you in the right direction in terms of which accounts you should be you should be going to see.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_03: If you align with them and let them know kind of what your target audience is, your consumer, and what accounts may capture that consumer's.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_03: And if you go out in the market by yourself and you roll up your sleeves and you get it done without them, that gives you more credibility to be honest with you.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_01: When we uh in Pennsylvania, we have some unique laws within the alcohol industry, and one of which is that in-state brewers and distillers and wineries and sideries can deliver and can self-distribute as well as join the other network if they want to.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the things that a lot of smaller brands would be blown away at when I was a brand manager was they come in and they'd be like, Well, can you how much can you sell for us?
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: And as soon as they say, How much can you sell for us?
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: the relationship has a really big uh hurdle that we have ahead of us.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: So we already have the speed bump in the first right up the jump.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: And then the next the next thing is I said, Have you ever climbed in a bar basement before?
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: And they said, No, why the hell would I do that?
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I would then say, Have you ever had a keg roll on top of you while your driver helper uh was raining and he slipped over on the top of the grate on the sidewalk and the and the cops are standing behind and they're yelling at you because you're double parked.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: Well, no, why the hell would I do something like that?
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: That sounds idiotic.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: I said, All right, why don't you go back, buy yourself a van, go to enterprise, rent a van for 30 days, go deliver to five accounts, and then come back to me and let's talk about what the go-to-market strategy is.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I worked for um Perseer Nevada for about seven years.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_03: And I worked for them during the time when COVID hit.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_03: And that was kind of a weird time to be on the sales side for the supplier side because there was, you know, we weren't allowed to be close to people.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_03: And it was like, what do we do now?
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_03: So one of the things we did down here in Florida was our distributors were still out servicing these accounts, still delivering the beer.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_03: We just, we literally just got out with the distributors, helped them throw orders, even if it wasn't our product, just to show them, just to earn that credibility, roll up the sleeves, get in there with them during a time that was tough for everyone.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: It's um it's one of the I'm glad you brought that up because the amount of suppliers that would come in with donuts and pretzels, and we would just we would just laugh because we're like, that's great for lunch, but where how are you gonna really help us?
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_01: And that's yeah, that's the thing.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: I so I think I won't harp on this as much as I want people to understand that if you if you're new to this industry, it is as simple as the personal relationship.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_01: And find out if this was your friend, what would you do for your friend?
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: Because at the end of the day, these are relationships that you're not selling to them and they're the retailer and they uh sell at the end.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: They're and they just because they have a lot of bodies and you don't, it doesn't mean that you don't have any work to do in those markets.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: And the set it forget it, the set it and forget it, stack them high, watch them fly, those days are so far gone.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_01: Right that anybody that uses that as a phrase has already become a dinosaur in my mind.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, it's really uh it's some things to kind of work out.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I appreciate you taking the time to talk about this part, but now I want to jump into I want to jump into your story a little bit.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: You mentioned Sierra Nevada, and I used to work with Sierra Nevada for a long time with the Reglio and Ace.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: So uh what was your what was your territory and your roles with uh Sierra Nevada?
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Sierra Nevada was uh so I was early on with them when they started really expanding their national account team to really get focused on the convenience channel.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_03: So I called on major convenience retailers like Circle K, 7-Eleven, Racetrack, Wawa.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_03: And that was during a time when when you walked into the convenience store, you didn't really see a whole lot of craft single serves.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_03: So that's really when they started jumping the game.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_03: So I was kind of in the early stages of that, just trying to align with the buyers and distributors from that aspect.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_01: When um what do you see now?
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: Like I'm actually interested.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I don't get to a lot of convenience stores uh as far as this just because the way our market is with alcohol and and the hemp beverages that we have in the portfolio.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: But um, what is where are what's the consumer, what is that consumer looking like now as far as like the beer industry and different types of alcohol?
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_01: Like are what kind of formats are they grabbing?
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: Are there any specific you know, flavors or categories or gravitatory towards?
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think specifically with convenience, you got to know that 60 to 70 percent of the of the units that go through a register is a single serve.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_03: So when it comes to single serve segment as a whole, that is convenience right there.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_03: Um, I know that you've really been an advocate for hemp-based beverages, and that's one thing we're starting to see in some of the bigger retailers like Circle K.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_03: I'm sure you've seen it on the news.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_03: They've they've really expanded in that.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_03: Um, they've they've they've they've featured it on suction cups, they've put shelving in there.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_03: I'm curious to see what that will do for the category.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_03: But flavor still remains the largest single serve segment.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_03: So you know, we've seen declines.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_03: You know, I'm sure you've seen the reports at the end of last year.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_03: Total beer's been down, total wine's been down, total spirits have been down.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_03: RTDs within those three major segments is still up.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_03: So you're seeing this explosion in RTDs, but you're still seeing the big, the big beer brands are still the base of the of the of convenience stores.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_03: I validate a lot of sets and I still see the movements on a lot of these items.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_03: And it's crazy to see brands like 4 Loco, Twisted T, Mike's Hard Lemonade still averaging you know four to 10 units a week in some of these stores.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's it's definitely the uh you can just you can tell if you're a nerd like me and you look at planagrams all day long, just as a consumer, you can watch the shrinkage and the expansion of the shrink and expand, and and uh it's always focused on those products.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: So that's why I was really excited also to get you on.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, because as much as like everybody jokes around like, why I get so excited about certain stuff?
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: You've been sober for three years.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, it's the industry, man.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: You don't always get yeah, you don't get to literally talk to you know, for loco, people don't realize like selling for loco successfully is so different than everything else.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and and and that's that's the uniqueness of it.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_01: It's not easy, you know.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: It was it was back in the day, like when I was selling Mike's Hard Lemonade and I was selling Pete's Wicked Ale and all that stuff.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, people are like, Oh, that's so easy, everybody loves it.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: Like you love it and you attach to it, but it it has to transcend and it has to be a commercialized scale that is a wider audience than a niche little thing.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I I think that the tough thing for these buyers nowadays is they still have to account for the core of their beer cooler, which is a lot of the bigger brands, but at the same time, they got to account for these growing segments like THC, um, non-alk.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_03: And it's like, how do you make sure that you have the days of supply, you invest your inventory in the right inventory, but still account for some of these segments that may not have as high of a turn rate for the growing segments, you know?
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's it's um, I think that we're at a at an inflection point of the industry where the we're where like retail buyers, distributors, as well as suppliers have never had to do so much real estate math before.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, okay, if I'm gonna dedicate 30 inches of this shelf, what's the rate of sale?
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that like I've always kind of I'm a nerd like that, so I always like present it.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's how I sold things.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_01: I sold things as houses, and I kind of was like, these are mansions, these are Cape Cobbs, these are single series, you know, you know, all that stuff.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I think now it's that's happening at scale where people are like, if I'm gonna dedicate 30 feet, what is the rate of sale?
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: But then here's the part of the kicker is back in the day, a box was a box was a box.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: Right now, one box is$10 GP, one box is five dollars GP, one box is one dollar GP, and then you have to add an accelerated rate onto the inches that you're giving on the shelf.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: And now Matt's getting a little now.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_02: We're figuring out who is uh a mathematician and who's uh pencil.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, there's there's there's way more involved in it.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_03: Like uh the probably the biggest ask, at least from a convenience store perspective, is is days of supply.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_03: Like how much days of supply do you have on hand?
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the other thing people didn't realize.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: There's not a lot of basements in these convenience stores.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, and they don't have they only have so much manpower at the stores to build the shelves, you know.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's um I didn't learn until we started opening up grocery stores and convenience, which is relatively new, obviously, in Pennsylvania.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: And then when we first started doing those load ins and we were building the gondolas and and everything like that, and I was like, all right, well, where's your backstock?
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: And they're like, it's right here, and there were 12 cases in the corner.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: And they were like, Well, you guys deliver every day, right?
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, What the hell's going on?
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: And eventually we got the laws passed where they could store it in another area where they actually could house pallets.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: But the first couple weeks, they were working out of a broom closet, like every single grocery application.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_03: But it's but it's interesting.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_03: I so I worked for Sierra, but but my my first stint in in craft beer, my my career was built in craft beer.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_03: I got on with the Red Hook brewery pretty early on, which that was at I'm probably gonna show my age here, but iconic brand.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_03: It's an iconic brand.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_03: But when you go back to them, they were really the first craft brewery that sold out to a big to a big brewer.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_03: But that and that gave them the rights to all the Annezer Bush distributors, and that really taught me how important those relationships are from distributors to just national accounts and anyone in the market because we leaned into our Annezer Bush distributors every single day just for those relationships.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's um in Pennsylvania with this uh hemp beverage bill that we just we got together and uh in the next few days here we'll be going public with actually the language and everything like that.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_01: And uh how'd that go last week?
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's been going really well so far.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: Like we're we're moving right along.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: We have bipartisan support, and our governor last week just uh on his uh budget for 2026, he said he wants to recreationalize cannabis, and that's also part of it.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: So he's in the governor's in full support, and we have bipartisan support.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: We also met with a lot of the distributors, all the beer distributors, because we want the product going in the beer distribution network.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: Because in Pennsylvania, if you're not on the beer trucks, then you're in the state store, and the state store doesn't have trucks running back and forth.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: So if a bar is if a bar in Pitts Pittsburgh needs something that's only in the location in you know Pitston, then you know they're not gonna get the product for six days, and you know the story.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um but for those those that are out there and listening that that aren't aware of that, um, there's a there is a very specific scalpel that needs to be done, and this is very surgical in finding the right distribution path.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_01: Because a lot of times, if you look at the data and you let the data show you, those states while where it makes sense, like, oh, it should be in a dispensary because it's a cannabis product.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_01: Well, when you look at the other states in the past five years, every time a beverage brand goes into a state dispensary system, it fails.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: And then the dispensary, what do they do?
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: They call the supplier, supplier just got to buy it back, they got to pick it back, they got to transfer it back, and all those touch points.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: And the distributor, the dispensary is all good because the dispensary didn't have to worry about anything.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but the problem with that is that it doesn't work.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_01: And we're we have some people, once we got to sit down with them and explain to them that the difference, those lawmakers are like, okay, we get it.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: Because at the end of the day, it's not about personal opinion, it's about simple rate of sale and distribution and logistics.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: And you can't create an industry and then and then and then chain down the the X access to distribution.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and that's really at the end of the day, that's what it is.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: And so, anyway, my point is we talk to these distributors and they're so excited.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: And what I see as a sad part about across the country is that this there's this division of like alcohol versus cannabis versus all this stuff.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm having such a unique experience in Pennsylvania because everybody sees it as a bolt-on to what they're doing.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: And everybody sees it as a collaboration.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: And our when our campaign rolls out publicly, everybody will see it's gonna be brewers on there, it's distillers on there, it's distributors, yeah.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: And it's one of those things that we're we're I want to set a ripple out to the rest of the country, which is you keep fighting, nothing's gonna go anywhere.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: And and and at the end of the day, it's it's a I'm gonna, I'm not a I'm not a family-friendly show, so I'm gonna say it as a shit or get off the pot moment, is where we are right now.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_03: It's it's so it's I find hemp derived beverages so interesting.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_03: Like I we we had a fam, we had a gathering Saturday night, and we had a few of our friends that were drinking some, and they were they were they're not people that are looking to get away from alcohol specifically, they just wanted something different, they didn't want to drink alcohol that night, and they're not THU THC users in general, so this is their intro into it.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_03: So I thought it was really cool.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_03: The distributors in Florida, for example, the distributors in Florida are all on board with it.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_03: The one distributor that I think would change the game nationally that's not on board with it just because of the legislation, I believe, is Reyes distributing.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and and when they get on board, that will change the game completely.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: And there and and honestly, uh, I'm gonna I I can call it here on the record.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: It's not it's not an if, it's a when.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: And the when will be when just a little more risk is mitigated, and that'll be in the next few weeks or months.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_01: It won't be years from now.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_03: That's very cool.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_03: Very cool.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so it it's uh it's funny you said that about Florida too, because I just had two meetings with two different distributors today uh in Florida, and it was it was exactly the same as Pennsylvania.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's just like they see it, they're golden cases.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we always talked about craft beer was the golden cases.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: Well, they're not as much a golden case anymore.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: With certain brands, they are, but we have to accept that.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_01: And these are the new golden cases.
• 18:42
  unknown: Yeah.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um, let's talk how about you for a little bit?
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: Like what year did you start at Sierra Nevada?
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and where what territory were you?
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: Any chains across the across the nation and national?
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so I was I started in 2015 and I was in the southeast.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_03: I've always been in the southeast when I was early on in my career with uh with Red Hook, which eventually turned into Crack Brew Alliance.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_03: I spent some time in California, Las Vegas, but I'm from Florida.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_03: That's kind of where home is for me.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_03: So with Sierra Nevada, I was in started with them in 2015.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_03: I departed them in 2022.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_03: But my major retailers that I've gotten to know really well through the years and still call on them is Circle K Wawa Racetrack.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_03: I love Wawa by by the way.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_03: I know you're a Pennsylvania guy.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: Big plug of Wawa.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: And Runners and Sheets, don't offend, you know.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: Turkey Hill.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we gotta get we gotta make everything.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: We gotta pay the limit.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I should clarify.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_03: Circle K is my biggest account.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_03: I love Circle K.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um working in that area.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: So prior to Sierra Nevada, what were you doing in your career past prior to 2015?
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_03: 2015.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_03: So I was with I was with I was with Craft Brew Alliance from 2008 to 2013.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_03: And then I had a small stint with Mike's Hard Lemonade.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_03: But right before then, I was with uh Mike's Hard Lemonade.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_03: Go back to your question.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_03: So I was in Tampa.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_03: I called on uh one of our bigger Miller Core distributors here in Tampa, JJ Taylor, which you probably familiar with.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um for the craft beer, uh the craft beer association's uh annual distributor of the year award.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: I was always nominated next to them, they always beat me.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_01: They're good.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_01: The three years I was on, they always won and I didn't.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_01: So I do know them very well.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_03: So I was with I was that's where I was at right before this.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_03: And but before that, I was my last stint at Craft Brew Alliance, I was in the mid-Atlantic area in Virginia, where I called on Total Wine, the military accounts, and giant giant foods.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_01: The um when you were uh working with Red Hook and everything like that, did you ever go out or were you out there in the Pacific Northwest and everything like that often?
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: Or every once in a while did you ever get to go out there?
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_03: Every once in a while.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_03: I love I love the brewery out there, yeah.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's what that's what exactly I was gonna say was that back in our day when it was a hot prey, and I I definitely I went there twice and it was a lot of fun.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um because believe it or not, I was doing blogging and vlogging in the beer industry under the under the name the beer's.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_01: I went out there for a uh bloggers' conference back in like 2010, 2011, and they hosted us there, and they were like using it as a perfect opportunity before they did the launch in the Anna's push where they had all the influencers in one room.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: And today we look at it as like a common nature, but back then it was very strategic, it was very behind the scenes, and it was like a hundred of us in a room, and the it was just looking back, it was like the best propaganda opportunity.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: It was like just get them all boozed up, yeah, send them home and let them put up content, you know what I mean?
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_03: Yep, that was the industry back then.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: So it was cool.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: It was it's uh it was cool for what it was, but it's also very different.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it's um I like where we're going because it were more business focused now.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: And it's like we allow the consumers to have the fun, and I think a lot of times back then, me admittedly as well, there's a reason I'm so had more fun I think sometimes and it could be interesting.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_03: Definitely early on in my career I would say that.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_03: When I was with Red Hook, probably my my favorite time with Red Hook is is when we launched the Kona brand.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_03: So we launched Kona in Florida and it was really cool to launch that brand and see it resonate and see how big it is today.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: Kona Kona is a is a is a beautiful story to be honest with you about Woodmer as well and and all those guys but especially when you go up to the Pacific Northwest I think while all the different pockets of the country have their certain uniqueness that area has a real uniqueness that doesn't kind of doesn't transcend anything else.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_01: And if anybody up there is into craft beer or anything like that, like if you think craft beer is dead in your town or anything like that, you just need to go up there.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah because it's like every corner bar has the best lineup of craft beer and and I remember driving through Black Butte Mountains going up to work with Deschutes and Rogue.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah you would just stop over at like the dingiest corner bars in the middle of the woods where there's nobody for 20 miles and they've got a better lineup than we did in Philadelphia at the time you know yeah it's it's good to hear that I haven't been up there in a in a while and it's good that good to hear that it's still alive up there because you see it makes me sad on LinkedIn when I see all these breweries like Rogue closing down and some of these other that is happening yeah that's for sure happening and that's that is the unfortunate part of the maturity of the of the industry too you know yeah at the same time like I love rogue I love rogue and I love them all to death but I what you know one of those things that you work with companies that are so creative sometimes that I think sometimes the creativity can outstretch the business acumen and things like that and sometimes you get in trouble in certain ways you know yeah yep.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_01: So but um but let let's kind of look a little bit about like you for uh I'm gonna do what I usually people have been enjoying me uh in the sense of let's go to 18 year old Eric.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: I've been using this question a lot lately and I love the responses I'm getting okay yeah so where where are you geographically and what's going on and and you just let's say you just turned the cap and you just graduated high school what's going on what's the aspirations of Eric at that point?
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_03: Wow that's a that's a fantastic question and one I haven't thought of too much recently.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_03: And don't worry this is the response I'm getting from everybody yeah yeah um 18 year old Eric did not know what was going on had no clue what I wanted to do I was just happy to get into college I'll put it that way um but you know I got into so I was I was I was very much a C student right I grew up playing tennis so at a young age I played competitive tennis at around 13 or 14 I kind of got burnt out of the sport and I stopped playing competitively so I was kind of like just good enough I was good but not good enough to get like a scholarship for men's tennis but what I did know I knew the I knew the women's tennis coach at the community college here in Tampa and I got a full scholarship as the manager on the women's tennis team for two years at my community college and I just love telling that story and I usually tell it as I got a full athletic scholarship.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_01: Eric I gotta embarrass myself with you I have the same story for college so I spent my entire high school career on academic probation and couldn't get into a single college and my guidance counselor told me that you're never going to college and I said I have to go to college that's the only thing my parents have asked me to achieve in this life.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah and he says I said here's my top five and he says you're never going to go to Drexel University and I said no I'm going to Drexel University and he goes you're not you don't have the grades you're not that good of a wrestler blah blah blah fast forward a year I end up head to head with this other guy in the 215 and heavyweight matches we keep seeing each other every other week at tournaments I win one he wins one I win one he wins one we hang out in the hallway after in between matches and tournaments and so we become friends.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_01: Mad and Tosha hat's off to you I think he's still in the Navy and he's like a commander or something very high right now.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: So kudos to this story.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: But the uh his mom is a nurse a nurse I think she's a nurse at this moment and she I something happened with me like I twisted my ankle or something like that.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: And she comes over and she's talking to me and she just happens to say hey what are your college aspirations you know you're going into your senior and all this stuff and I was like I've gotten decline from everybody like all my friends are early decision.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: I'm still sitting here in wrestling season like no idea what to do I just went to a recruiting trip to University Southern Maine.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: That was an ice tundra I don't want to wrestle there and I'm I'm bugging out when I'm telling her this and then all of a sudden she goes where else did you apply and I said Drexel University and I'm really surprised I didn't get in and she goes well I'm I run the nursing program and admissions at Drexel University.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: She's like why don't I go to admissions and just make sure like you're you know see what they thought because you didn't get a letter I didn't get a letter back I didn't get a rejection so my non-closed loop mind was going nuts.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden I get a call and an email a week later and she goes Nate I want to tell you um number one you you submitted the wrong year for your application so you were accepted for next year's admissions class.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: Oh okay um so congratulations on that but you didn't you weren't gonna be notified in about six months.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah and she goes on the flip side uh we had an actual we had we still had some space this year and since you're already accepted I shifted your admission over for one year and welcome to the class of 2008 it's all about who you know right and it's so funny because people look at that and they say that comment and I'm like do you really think that was any of that was strategic like I could see that if I like was like I scouted her out and I saw her at a convention and I wanted to talk to her.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_01: No it was my dumbass rolling my ankle and then fumbling over somebody you know but um but no I love I love that story because you're right though it is it is about who it is actually moving forward like it is everything about that and it is everybody you know and it's not oh I can get this job over somebody else but it also is the trust.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I think I want to circle back as we kind of close out and really focus on the beginning part we talked about which is that brand trust with your distributor and the brand trust with your retailer.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: Talk a little bit about what do you do how do you let me give you a scenario actually for somebody as a closing kind of advice all right you sign up with a distributor you're no names or anything like that and the distributor's not necessarily doing what you think the brand should do what is like the first thing that you would analyze to try to figure out the breakdown of the brand because like let's say you see it growing in other markets really well what are some what are kind of some of the analysis and not a blame game type analysis but what are some of the things you want to start poking into to kind of see what you can fix and rectify in that scenario.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_03: I think you got to take some personal ownership in terms of what types of conversations have you had with the distributor in terms of what your expectations are.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_03: And I think you got to ask yourself did I really get some alignment there and revisit that conversation and that may that could solve it on its own.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_03: But maybe it's it it's an issue and it's going back to distributors want to know that you're in it with them.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_03: So revisiting that aspect of it too are you in the market with them?
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_03: Can you invest in samplings?
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_01: Can you show them that you're in it with them and you're there to support them so that's that's the perfect answer Eric uh it's uh I use the metaphor with people when I'm in the beer industry is it's like when somebody calls you and you have a foamy keg you know you don't start blaming the bartender you check the temperature you check the gas and 99% of the time there it is it's done.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah like you know what I mean and that's you're exactly right first call first call is not a call of defense first call is not a call of attack first call is actually a call to yourself.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_01: And and you're right.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_01: And and what people I want people to feel comfortable moving forward because our audience has a lot of a lot of startups and a lot of founders that get nervous and they get scared and they overestimate things and I want everybody to realize like you're gonna make mistakes and you don't run away the second something's hard.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_01: And I think a lot of times we get people that fall apart the second there's a challenge because it wasn't as smooth as their full-time job.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: And what they forget is your full-time job has a lot of buffers and barriers and benefits that are put into it that allow this the efficiency.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: And when your job is to build your own job that that involves something else.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I'd say that to you is you're I look at you as an entrepreneur.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_01: I think a lot of people don't realize that national accounts guys are really entrepreneurs.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of different things it's not the standard process and procedure that involves in in the street work and everything like that.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_01: So I want to thank you Eric for kind of coming on here and and as we close out I want to kind of give anybody any any talk uh any ways to find you or kind of where they can find anything and anything you guys might have this year that people want to check out.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah well you can find me on LinkedIn yeah so but I'll I'll finish with this like you you you you mentioned national accounts how we're kind of like the people that kind of connect the dots here.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_03: A lot of times people think of us in national accounts as just calling on buyers and meeting with buyers while that's true the other aspect of that is getting our distributors to kind of tell the same story that we do.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_03: And a lot of times when they do that that's more validating than us telling that story.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_03: So that's my advice to some of the startups out there is just don't assume that your distributor is going to do it all for you and kind of walk them through it.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_01: I appreciate you using the term story because a lot of times that we worry about sales and we worry about sales but again back to what is the common core problem when the sales aren't there most of the time the story's been broken.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah and it's like we don't actually sell things like show what we sell and if the if the story is right they'll buy right if they're not buying when you tell the story you're not gonna push it on them isn't gonna work.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_01: Right, right right right perfect well hey Eric I'll close out and uh I want you to I want to tell you again I say this to everybody but I mean it to every single person that comes on here.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: There are no scripts there's no agenda and you did not have any questions in advance and we didn't go out to dinner and yuck it up and plan this out and that involves a lot of courage and we live in an absolutely chaotic beautiful destructive world right now and courage is something that's lacking at scale in this society.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_01: So I want to publicly commend you on that and tell you that there's a lot of people that do decline offers to this because they want the questions and they don't come on.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_01: And we call that the asshole meter and if you don't if you don't want to come on here because you don't have questions you're probably lying about what you do.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah and that's kind of that's our simple filtration system.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_01: So publicly I want to thank you and to the audience I want to remind everybody there's no script there's no agenda there's no questions Eric came on here as a blank slate took the took the leap and told us his story told his brand story of who he's worked with and knows in the past and I want to remind everybody as well same thing I said to the last episode and same thing to Eric is when you're walking on the street, look a person in the eye, hold the door for somebody male, female, German shepherd it doesn't matter.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_01: It's stop being a piece of shit.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_01: Ask your friends and ask a stranger how they're doing today and pause and wait and actually care about what it is that they're gonna say to you in response.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_01: We have a wild crazy world that we live in and we're all in this together and there's more there's a lot more that we have in common than there is different so I I I really appreciate you taking the time today Eric.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah and likewise I appreciate you giving me this opportunity you couldn't have said it better this this world this industry is about connection and by all means if you're down in Florida Tampa hit me up I'd love to hook up for a beer.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely man you take care buddy all right thanks Nate all right take care