THE REORDER 03/15/21

To sell, or not to sell

To sell, or not to sell, that is not the question.

If the idea of “selling” motivates you, then live in that frame. Invest in the sales mentality as a competitive fire to continue to drive you. This pursuit is in itself not a bad thing. But be careful to avoid idolizing the number or that big case drop of wine or case stack of spirits that goes out. It’s a trap.

Selling is a result of philosophy and connection artistry – real craft.

The most important question in the beverage game today is how well you can connect.

Connection artists make waves. Salespeople make sales.

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THE REORDER 03/01/21

Ground Game Defined

If you connect people to wine/spirits and you don’t just send email offers all day hoping someone will respond, your ground game will define your career. It is the difference between the professional and the passable/mediocre in the artisan practice of sales.

Unfortunately, typical management practices in the beverage business have created a debauched sense of what is best practice by asking for recaps, appointment counts and god knows what else with the mere goal of making sure people are doing their jobs and not emboldening a team to make waves.

The Strong Ground Gamer

Strong Ground Gamers observe and act by simply noticing.

They don’t “desktop surf” the marketplace, they walk the marketplace.

They don’t covet appointments, they promote dialogue.

They don’t show an ocean of wine to see what sticks, they get specific by putting themselves in their customers’ shoes.

They are led by truth and not by number. They are never dishonest in the pursuit of shipping an allocation.

They ask better questions, listen more intently and dance with the marketplace devil that will never be tamed or fixed, it will always be moving.

How do buyers know the difference? They know the difference as much as you know the difference between an artful buyer that creates a narrative in what they buy and offer and the hackneyed or self-interested.

Mostly it is in between the rests. The unsaid. But over time, you will always know who has Ground Game and who doesn’t.

The kicker is that the folks with real Ground Game don’t get caught up in the comparison – they just hone their craft on the daily.

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THE REORDER 02/15/21

One Routine that Always Wins

I only know of one routine that always wins in this business – I used to call it my pre-meet routine.

Before every meeting there were three things I would do –

Imagine what it is is like to do the job of who I am meeting with.
Review my notes on the last few meetings – not just what we tasted – but what we talked about.
Think about what I can offer that is beyond what we are tasting together.

Without fail, I practiced this routine for more than a decade before every meeting and it has never failed me. It is a grounding exercise.

Do the above, while breathing and listening and you will make waves.

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THE REORDER 01/15/21

Of Price and Then…

Selling wine and spirits using the price to drive sales is almost always a bad idea.

When this tactic works, the result can be exhilarating – everyone likes to make a big sale. That number that gives a super dopamine hit. Here’s the rub: someone out there has a comparable product with a lower price.

If you do choose this path, make sure you have other arrows in the quiver besides price. Anchor on story. Lean into on dependability. Or – just be thankful and use it to move forward into other things you can connect to the buyer that aren’t reliant on price.

One thing to note: In the extremes of the commodity side of this business (collectible or giant production products), selling on price can be especially effective, but remember – commodities are a volatile sector – and for good reason. Approach with caution.

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THE REORDER 11/16/20

The Art of the Progression

Outside of the very few most talented wine tasters I have been around, the order in which wines are tasted has a massive impact on the context, tone, and experience of every wine in the lineup. Each wine sets the tone for the following wine tasted.

The tasting experience is shaped by the progression. This concept can be less vivid with spirits for a multitude of reasons (like proof, for instance), but the tasting order definitely comes into play.

Incredibly, I rarely see professionals think twice about order progression. This is a colossal error. Look no further than Ye Olde Robert Parker to see where a standard lightest to fullest progression can lead. It ain’t pretty.

EX: Taste a muscadet followed by a white burgundy with oak and the oak will appear to be accentuated – even if the burgundy is balanced like a top.

In the best case, a tasting is like a concert where the songs flow together and follow each other well, and in the worst case, it’s a disjointed set.

When there is a jarring shift like Muscadet to Burgundy, I find that elegant storytelling, an acknowledgment of the difficulty, or a pause can ease the “difficulty” in the transition from one wine to the next.

Bottom line: Don’t underestimate the importance of the order in which you present wines or spirits – next level tasting and presentation pay attention to the progression. It goes well beyond light to full, low tannin to high tannin, austere to broad – standard practice can lead you astray.

No rules truly apply – except (of course) experience.

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THE REORDER 10/15/20

Which Bucket, Again? The Cliff Noting of Wine

There is comfort in putting things in neat little categories.

That perfect bucket that this producer or wine fits into sure does save a lot of exploration.

It feels good to Good Will Hunting the answers. Placing that Barolo perfectly into that traditional producer bucket sounds good. Drawing a deep line in the sand by saying everybody else cheats in Sancerre except the producer you are passionate about is fun and creates tension.

Declaring that wines or producers belong in these categorical buckets fits perfectly into a 5-second pitch may seem like the viable tactic, and everyone does it. But ultimately these categorical buckets lack stuffing and only create a whisper of context at best.

Before you throw out that shorthand and place that producer or wine in the bucket of the moment, I might ask this question: Why?

Why is that producer traditional or natural or trendy or allocated or modern?

Become a student of these tidy categories thrown about on the regular but look past the veneer, go deeper and you will make many more waves.

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THE REORDER 10/01/20

Sustainable Sales Success Lessons

Tradecraft: Sustainable Sales Success Lessons in the Beverage Arena

Very early on, I was lucky enough to run into some of the truly great Jedi salespeople in NYC. These craftspeople knew that longevity didn’t mean Foreau, foie gras, and four negroni lunches. They helped me succeed with simplicity.

Take these to heart and go make waves.

“Don’t take this too seriously.” – Dan Lerner

Wine taken too seriously is a farce and beyond boring. Dan Lerner said something like this to me at the Core Club in 2008 and it was an over-the-shoulder bullseye. Remember this: If you make beverage sales your life, it will take your life.

“Take care of your relationships at home. It’s a lot harder if that isn’t working.” – John Coyle

If you do not give care to your home relationships, your family, and those around you in your daily life, the beverage game gets incredibly hard, super fast. Imagine being out to dinner with buyers of the opposite sex and not having trust at home. It will crush you. I actually have come to take this as a credo in life in general. Chaos without care at home makes everything harder.

“That isn’t real wine.” – Michael Wheeler

I was out on a tear one night and I ended up at Blue Hill in Manhattan during their last call and I ran into Wheeler and Phil Sareil. I bought a bottle and Wheeler said it wasn’t real wine – as in, it wasn’t a wine of substance, terroir, or nature. Whether I believe he was right or wrong (he was most likely right) is of no importance. Wheeler taught me at that moment that putting wine in buckets is a hard habit to break. I had put the wine in question into a box that I believed he would agree with and I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Context matters. Understanding comes with experience and seeing wine as more than the tech info checklist or tribe that promotes it is vital. It’s easy to like what other people like. But it may be a bucket of fake frosty cake that may not be what you think it is.

“Never open a bottle for a closed mind.” – Robert Chadderdon via Christopher Russell

I think about this one often. You don’t need to push, you need to connect. A lot of wine has been wasted on folks that will never give it the time of day in the name of the appointment or the new sales blitz. To have a strong, curious perspective about what you present and don’t present is empowering. Put yourself in the shoes of the buyer.

“Why would we want to do what everyone else is doing?” – Naomi Rosen

You don’t have to be like everyone else. You don’t have to say what everyone else says. Naomi has her own style, sense of clarity, curiosity, and immense charm. She approaches her work as a meaningful specific. Consider doing your own personal version of this as a practice.

“Orders only matter if you have dialogue, and philosophy over numbers.” – Looper

You need a philosophy.

I once realized that I had sold 175k in a week with no connection whatsoever. Zero dialogue. I could have been an order machine. Avoid this dynamic at all costs. Find a philosophy that you can hang your hat on every day no matter how much or little you sell and you will find much more clarity in what you do.

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