By: Mark Colburn
Don’t underestimate the importance of the bar/beer tender as the initial brand ambassador which is a critical piece to your marketing and sales plan, it is highly recommended that these front-line employees be consistently trained and evaluated. I suggest providing sales training for this team including probing (for customer wants/needs), food pairing and a sales incentive based on volume.
To provide Off Premise Point of Purchase consumer recall, I also suggest a retail package display be situated in a high traffic area within the tasting room for immediate visual recognition (and take-home sales!).
Exploiting the Tasting Room
Several of my clients complain that their tasting/tap room sales and traffic are down or flat. As a result, they often try promoting with trivia or bingo nights in an attempt to generate patronage. These may help somewhat. An alternative to this, that I like, are car shows at the tap or tasting room, brewery, distillery, or winery. There are thousands of “Gear Heads” who have muscle cars and love to bring them to car events. By conducting a local car show featuring muscle cars and adding a band or music, you now have an event or platform to promote that will attract potential customers to your venue. Do not discount the Gear Heads and car club members either. They know dozens, if not, hundreds of people like them who love quality beverages. I always take care of participants with six packs and/or sufficient samples to thank them and ambassadorize them. You might consider allowing them to have their monthly club meeting at your venue on a slow day during the week. Their cars in your parking lot will attract incremental “traffic.” Let us look at some ideas I have successfully executed that significantly built sales in multiple channels.
While conducting a territory business review with a regional Walgreens director, I asked him if he thought the store and district managers would like to go on a “field trip” to a few craft beer tasting rooms and breweries to learn about the industry. He jumped at the idea, so I contacted three craft brewers – Pyramid (then in Berkeley, CA), 21st Amendment and Anchor Brewing. I knew their senior management teams and asked if they would pool their resources to rent a bus to take this group to their breweries and brew pubs. They were 100% in. So, I invited a full district’s store managers and three regional district managers. They all arrived on time in San Francisco where we took off to the 21st Amendment brew pub. While at 21A they met the owners and sampled a variety of their beers. We then set off to Pyramid where they got a full tour of the brewery and then sat down in the conference room for a presentation I made on the craft beer and cider industry. I fielded many questions from the group before breaking for lunch at the brewery.
There they got to meet the middle and senior sales management team from Pyramid. After lunch we headed back to the City to Anchor Brewing where they received a warm welcome, a historic tour, and a sampling of Anchor’s finest. The tour ended with a group photo high atop the brewery from Fritz Maytag’s private penthouse. This was truly a treat for the group as this is never open to the public. From the large penthouse cocktails were served from Anchor’s newest spirits division. Afterwards we returned to one of the main stores for off-loading.
The above concept served a variety of uses from educating and “ambassadorizing” critical individuals within the Off Premise channel to building key relationships with “players” who really make a difference. The tap room was the centerpiece for this effort. The results were excellent. All three brands received additional SKU placements throughout the large Northern California division while Anchor Brewing was able to negotiate a major pallet, 12-pack program resulting in thousands of cases in incremental revenue. Now, let us look at something less expensive.
Sales Ambassadors
As you most likely know, your distributor teams meet once a week for a sales meeting. I have run over eight hundred of these meetings in my career and can tell you that many can be downright “dry.” My suggestion to our suppliers was to use their tap room or brewery for a future sales meeting venue. This way, your team will have your coveted On and Off Premise salespeople as a captive audience, ripe for “brand ambassadorization.” Once you procure a date for a future meeting, PREPARE for this opportunity. Preparation and REHEARSAL are imperative for this rare chance to positively influence your audience. On preparation, I would have your best presenter give a detailed summary (10-12 minutes maximum) on your company’s marketing story. I caution against making this “dry” and am always in favor of what I call, “Fun-kifization.” This is a “Markism” that simply means to make the effort fun and creative. After your presentation I would introduce the sales incentive appearing in the next month’s plan (this needs to be pre-negotiated with the distributor sales management) and be certain they understand it and the expectations. I also recommend a first week “jump start” bonus that will get your incentive out of first gear and ahead of the multiple suppliers all vying for this sales team’s attention. The meeting should end with the announcement that each salesperson in attendance will receive a free six or four pack or bottle for them to sample at home at their leisure.
Speaking of Incentives
After your wholesaler sales team has sampled your nectars and experienced your “brand DNA” you are in a perfect position to further ambassadorize them a few months down the road with a unique incentive. I have written many supplier sales incentives that follow up on the tap room/brewer/winery/cidery/distillery experience. To further exploit the tap/tasting room I recommend creating a month-long sales incentive around distribution and/or volume increases for the winning sales division and their manager to be treated to a VIP session in your tap/tasting room. This VIP experience includes an intimate Q&A meet and greet with either the owner, brewer, distiller, vintner (or all of you!) and the winning division (typically divided into 4-5 salespeople and one division manager). The “pay out” includes a free dinner for each winner and assorted samplings of your nectars poured by one of your most senior sales team or owners. Recognize the unique opportunity this presents for your brand and future sales. A side benefit of this incentive is the “talk value” it has with the entire sales team as the winners will “brag” about their experience (at work) which keeps your brand top of mind post incentive while teasing the losers who will want to win and experience the next one. You will also benefit from word of mouth as the winning salespeople talk up your brand in their accounts. These people are influencers and are often asked where to go for a good drink. You can track this effort by training your bar staff to ask how a customer heard about your brand when they visit. The bar staff can record this and share in your weekly staff meetings.
Key Take Away
Always remember that people buy AND SELL for people and BRANDS that they like.
