It’s Official – Moonshiners: Whiskey Business
Our very own Devin Mills has been working with Tim Smith on this new “Moonshiners” spin-off for a while now – and it’s been Officially Announced by Discovery Channel!
Outlaw turned legal moonshiner, Tim Smith has worked hard to establish his legal brand of liquor, Climax and do his father proud. Now that he’s turned his moonshine business into the real deal, he is setting out restore four struggling distilleries, including Broad Branch Distillery, Old Nick Williams Farm & Distillery, Three Brothers Distillery and Bondurant Brothers Distillery into profitable businesses. Each week, Tim Smith will be joined by whiskey experts, Tim Jones and Devin Mills as they race against the clock to turn these businesses around.
We’re super excited to share this news and add the viewing schedule to our calendars. The first episode airs on Wednesday night, March 13th!
Millennials and the Tasting Room Model
Is your Direct-to-Consumer (DtC) model ready to change with the up-and-coming generation of millennials and their tastes? This story from Wine-Searcher has some nice insights as to why winery tasting room visits in Napa & Sonoma have been trending downwards in recent years. And how California wineries are now watching and taking note as tasting room visits in other locations like Oregon, Pennsylvania, New York and others are seeing double-digit growth!
These tasting room visits and DtC programs (like wine clubs and such) are especially important for small- to mid-sized wineries (and even the trend in Urban-wineries), as their DtC revenue & margins are an important part of their business model – even upwards of +75% of their total sales. In the story, for example, one of the wineries in the Willamette Valley area shared the stat that their DtC business-model accounts for only 30% of their total revenue, but that amount was almost 50% of their actual margins/profits!
Bringing in programs like educational sessions, yoga outings, dinner food/wine pairing events and more have been driving the taproom visits & growth in other parts of the country – so much so that the older, traditional wineries in California are starting to take notice. The younger Millennial generation is looking for something different from what their parents and grandparents had or experienced – so you should keep that in mind as you move forward on your winery project or as you look for ideas as to how grow your current business model!
Raise A Pint To Charlie
Relax, Don’t Worry, and Have A Home-Brew
It’s hard to believe that it’s been over 40-years since Charlie hit the American beer scene, bringing home-brew to all. But with his trademark phrase, he helped to usher in a revolution in American Craft Beer. The Brewers Association (the professional trade association that he headed, along with the consumer-side American Homebrewers Association or AHA) has put together a quick little tribute video to Charlie – and they went digging through the archives for some of this old footage.
As the charismatic President of the AHA since its founding in 1979, Charlie recently stepped down from the position in 2016 – but still remained the public face for so many in the industry. We here at BoozeWerks firmly believe that if it weren’t for Charlie leading the charge to bring Home-brewing back into the American households (after President Carter signed it into law in 1978), the Craft Beer industry that we are a part of now would not be where it is today. Charlie was instrumental in helping nurture the culture and inspire many of the major names in the American Craft Beer scene today.
So, we raise a Pint to you Charlie! And to many more to come!
Cheers
Craft Spirits Growth Continues
2018 was an active year in the American Craft Spirts industry! The data from the American Craft Spirits Association is starting to trickle out, and it looks like it was a growth market for American craft distillers.
According to the article in Wine Magazine, who were some of the first to report on it, the number of craft distilleries now operating in the US has eclipsed 1,800 – a growth over 2017 numbers of over 15%. In even better news, the total volume sales for the industry in 2017 had grown almost 24%, topping out at $3.7 Billion in totals sales. Though the craft segment only accounts for about 3% of the total market (in volume), this strong growth trend shows that the marketplace is still demanding more craft choices.
New distillers are trying to fulfill that current demand, but it seems like there is still plenty of room for new brands out there. Are you ready to take that next step? Reach out to us and let’s see if we can make the dream a reality!
And if you want to read up more on the data report, you can download the 2018 Annual Report from ACSA.
Let Label Simplicity Reign!
Hooray! Just this past week word started to come out from the TTB (US Federal Tax & Trade Bureau) that they might start simplifying the process for label & recipe formulation across all the US alcohol industries. This is great news for the entire ‘Craft Alcohol’ market since historically some of the requirements to package & distribute your products were pretty time-consuming and expensive.
It looks like they’ll be taking public comments on this proposed adjustments until March of next year (2019), but hopefully nothing really de-rails this new direction!