Hey all, I don't post much, but figured I'd reach out to the community on this one. I live in a small area with no bottle shops (yes, there is such a thing). My local brewery is Southern Tier and is a few minutes drive away, but they have really went downhill recently and also have never heard of doing something limited or local only to really interest me. I find myself driving out of town to bigger places to go to bottle shops and well as trading. Most locals drink domestic or just go to Southern Tier and think it's the greatest thing there is because they haven't gotten to experience some of the amazing beers out there like I have. I find myself looking up anything to do with beer when I plan vacations haha. Last year, a local small store owner got in Sucaba and big bottles of Allagash, which is unheard of around me. The only other place that sells craft beer is a Wegmans grocery chain, but the biggest thing they get in is Stone Enjoy By (where the Wegmans in Buffalo and Rochester areas get KBS, Bourbon County offerings, etc). I talked to the owner and at the time he said he would continue putting in orders for unique beers and was glad he was getting and selling them to customers like myself and a few other local beer guys. Well fast forward a year later and he still gets things from time to time, but said the distributor has now told him that the stuff he wants is reserved only for larger stores and that he can't purchase it anymore. He's tried ordering more of the special Firestone Walker bottles (Sucaba, Parabola, Anniversary, etc), Maine Lunch, Grapefruit Sculpin cans, just to name a few. During the release times these have been on the order list, but each time he has asked he said he was told no. I understand this distributor probably has a large part of NY to supply, but why can't they give a few bottles to a paying customer trying to bring a nice selection to a small town? What changed from last year getting some of the hard to get things to this year? I'm not bashing anyone, just wondering thoughts on this or maybe someone who is a distributor or store owner can chime in with their input. I'd think since this guy orders from this distributor all the time that he could order what he wanted since he's a loyal customer, but I'm not really knowledgeable in this. I appreciate any input on this.
I'm sure the rep is just making sure the accounts who buy from him all year round at quantity and not just limited releases get taken care of. InBev is doing that with GI releases. It sucks, but not unheard of. It be nice to get some once in awhile, but I see where the rep is coming from. Maybe the store owner could buy more yearly products from FW, MBC and BP. That might get the ball rolling.
Sorry - not trying to go off topic. But Southern Tier have gone downhill? In what way? Re small store / distributor - I don't work in the business, but I guess that's the way this goes
I don't know how it works but i'm guessing the distributor saves the limited stuff for the stores that buy the most beer total so unfortunately the smallest guys get left out
From when Southern Tier was smaller across the street (amazing) to now they are average at best. Beers I used to like are way off these days (Hop Sun, Mokah, Live to name a few). Everyone has their own opinion, but mine is that I'll pick up anything over them when I can. Live was one of my favorite beers and then got a recent bad keg and also bought a six pack that was bad. I'm not the only local who says that and I also know many local bartenders who have swayed people when ordering. You're free to like what you want, it's just an opinion. As for the store owner, he buys all year round from the same person and all regular stuff. Two-hearted, Sculpin, DFH, All Stone, Southern Tier, Lagunitas, Anderson Valley, Firestone, the list goes on. Why not let the guy buy one of the 3 pack cases of Firestone special release or a few bottles of Lunch when he buys from you all year? I would think they would like that and he's not trying to clean them out, just get a few specials.
This is becoming standard practice among distributors - they allocate the limited beers to the stores that shift the most volume of that breweries regular beers. To put it in perspective, all the big liquor stores near me (part of the same chain, biggest by far in Chicago) carry the full line of Firestone products year round. They shift 3-5 cases a week of Firestone stuff (or more sometimes), and they only got 18 bottles of Parabola this year. 2 or 3 smaller stores near by got 6 bottles, but most got none. They only make 3,500 6 bottle cases of Parabola and the like (Sucaba, etc...) and they distribute to 20 or more states - there just isn't enough to go around, so they focus it on their best customers. Goose Island this year is pushing all the stores by me to have big Goose Island displays. The new Fulton Street Blend (coffee blonde ale) is stacked up high - must be half a pallet per store of the stuff - and it is all displayed on top of a used Bourbon County barrel. The beer buyer told me that the deal is they need to shift as much GI beer as they can in order to maximize their BCBS allocation. Founders does the same thing with KBS (well the distributor does) and they are even more focused with kegs of CBS - met the Founders rep once at a CBS tapping and he told us that they only give a keg to those bars that have at least 2 or 3 Founders beers on tap year round
Typically they do it based on volume of the same brand / brewery - shift the most Firestone year round, get the most Parabola
The beers you mentioned them not being able to get are fairly limited and these allocations are often based on overall sales of that respective brewery's portfolio. Parabola/Sucaba: How much Union Jack and Double Jack is the store moving? Grapefruit Sculpin: How much regular Sculpin or Wahoo are they selling? Lunch: Are they selling the rest of the Maine beers consistently? Sometimes there are exceptions, but generally the limited beers go to accounts that are moving the year round lineup. It seems pretty fair to me. As far as why they got certain things last year but not this year I can only speculate. I'm guessing its either increased demand, or they were sending the special stuff to this account as sort of a introductory enticement/incentive hoping they'd sell more of a certain brewery's other beers (but failed since they didn't get the limited stuff this year)
Guess so Hadn't heard of them giving it out as an intro / teaser, but that totally makes sense - here is some of the good stuff - now shift the rest of our beers or none next year!
This is pretty much what is happening, except that it's not "becoming" standard practice, it has been standard practice for years. But as demand goes up access gets tighter and it gets more noticeable to more people.
I work in distribution. You are correct in the assumption that the rep/salesman is taking care of his highest volume / best selling accounts first. The problem is distributors are out to please everyone. I'm sure they'd love to take care of the little guys too. Unfortunately money will always follow money and the big guys get love first. Another issue with allocation is when specialty beers are sent to a small account (such as your bottle shop I presume) and the product sits because there isn't enough local demand to support that allocation. This isn't good for distributors; having product sit where it could have been already sold and it's not good for the breweries either because most likely some of the product will sit until it's past code and since it is in a small shop there is a good chance that it will be sold past code. This makes both the distributor and brewery look bad for having a past prime product sell to a customer. I'm not sure there is anyone to blame but the general public. The more awareness the average beer drinker has about craft beer and the variety of choices and specialty offerings, the better chance you'll have seeing those special beers.
Thanks for the insight, everyone. That makes sense now. I wasn't thinking the round of specials last year could have been teasers or samples to see how the regulars sell. I'm doubting he comes close to to selling cases and cases of the regular offerings from certain places and that's probably where the issue lies. I'm just not familiar with the whole thing in general so I'm glad I could reach out and get answers that make sense. After reading through I understand now how it works. I was thinking from a consumer mindset instead of the whole selling and distribution mindset. It's hard since I don't have bottle shops so options are limited an it was nice to have the one local guy trying to get variety.
Odd because I see the exact opposite here in AZ. They're deliberately giving the special releases to the "cool" smaller places that most likely have less volume sales than Total Wine and similar. Money doesn't always follow the money and big guys get taken care of first. They're going to sell out of the limited stuff anyway and they're giving it to their preferred list of retailers. Big guys like Total Wine don't have as much leverage as you might think, and they're so big with so little beer knowledge sometimes that they don't even know that various special releases are in the market but only sold at the little guys' stores. In some cases, I don't think they care.
I couldn't agree more with your statement. A lot of these big places don't know much about craft beer in general. The Wegmans always has stuff WAY past date or code sitting out, but they don't know the beer enough to know anyone who would buy that isn't going to when a Captain Lawrence IPA or Bells Two-Hearted is 6 months to a year old. The employees there are always very helpful and I've asked them when they will be getting their Stone Enjoy By bottles in (during release times obviously), but when I ask about Stone Enjoy By they say "huh, what in the world is that"? Then I explain things and the one guy always goes into the system and gives me a good idea when it will drop so I can buy myself a couple bombers (as I love this beer and it's somewhat accessible). Many of the bigger places are going to have people there who think Bud, Miller, Coors, etc. when you ask about beer. Some of these little stores have owners and employees who know and love craft beer so one positive is they're going to move the product and let people know about what they got in. I can fully agree with the other posters saying it's about volume and how much is moved though. It does make sense and as I said, I was thinking from pure consumer thinking and not about the fact that the big store is going to move 10X more of the regular beers from these breweries than the little guy does (although, he does seem to move and sell plenty of regular beer there).
