For a change of pace on today’s episode, Mike and Emma talk amongst themselves weighing in on what it takes for International Wines to have a presence here in the U.S. Their combined multi-years of experience is well worth a listen. Be sure to pay attention!
Transcript on International Wines in the U.S.A.
Michael Wangbickler:
Hello and welcome to Hit the Bottle podcast. This is Michael Wangbickler your host. And of course, I’m joined by my partner in crime, the caramel to my joe, Miss Emma Criswell.
Emma Criswell:
Hello.
Michael Wangbickler:
Hi Emma. So today we’re actually doing kind of a solo podcast. It’s just Emma and I, and we’re going to talk today about international wineries and beverage producers who would like to have a better presence in the United States. We work with a lot of international clients at Balzac, and this is something we’ve done for almost 30 years now.
So, we have quite a few kind of key takeaways for it for international wineries and beverage producers who are interested in in selling their wines in the US.
So today, I think we’ll kick it off with some of the things that that Emma and I think, are important to consider before selling wine to the US.
So, where we’d start is with distribution. So, first of all, if you’re an international producer, you obviously have to have an importer or two or three…
Emma Criswell:
Or seven.
Michael Wangbickler:
…or seven, depending on where you are and the markets that you want to cover. It’s important that obviously the wines are here in the US before you start any kind of marketing program, you know, often enough times we’re approached by clients who are interested in the US market, but they don’t actually have a presence here yet. So, it actually makes it pretty much impossible for us to actually do work with them.
So, Emma, I mean, you’ve worked with many international clients both here and elsewhere.
Emma Criswell:
Yeah.
Michael Wangbickler:
And so, what are your what are your thoughts regarding distribution and, you know, some of the thoughts that people should think about when we’re looking at that?
Emma Criswell:
Yeah, I mean, I’ve been on both sides of it and I feel like definitely reaching out to something like a U.S. agency in the beginning to say,” we’re not distributed, do you have any thoughts on that?” Is a good thing, especially if you’re not in the U.S. all that much, because there are just so many different laws in different states and it doesn’t always make sense to be in every single state to start out with, and that gets really expensive, and there are a lot of paperwork on the back end there. So, I mean, having the conversation of where you want the wines to be is always a good first step. And then you can interview distributors. I mean, it might not always be a good fit.
Michael Wangbickler:
Yeah. You know, and to that point, you know, I think that there’s generally kind of two schools of thought for international producers. And what I suggest is that actually that somewhere in the middle. So, the two kind of two to kind of distributors that that international producers often look for are like the big boys. So Southern and Republic, you know, they’re hoping that by having a large distribution company that they’ll have a greater reach.
Emma Criswell:
Yeah.
Michael Wangbickler:
Which at its heart, it makes sense. However, the fact is, is that, you know, especially if you’re on the smaller side as a producer, you’re just not going to get the attention from those folks because they’ve got literally thousands and thousands and thousands of SKUs in their book.
And they have no reason to actually sell your wines, you know, unless you give them one and then the other the other way that a lot of international producers choose to come into the US is going through like smaller like small distributors and importers.
Maybe they’re like specialty distributors. Maybe they specialize in Hungarian wine, for instance, and maybe like a mom-and-pop shop.
And the problem with those sorts of distributors and importers is that they don’t have the same kind of reach that some of the larger distributors do. And often times what happens is you find yourself in kind of niche locations, so let’s say you’re a, you know, Spanish producer and you want to import into the US and you’re going with an importer that specializes in Spanish wines. Great.
You know where your wines are going to end up in? Spanish restaurants…
Emma Criswell:
Spanish restaurants…
Michael Wangbickler:
right
Emma Criswell:
in the city where the distributor is.
Michael Wangbickler:
Yeah, exactly. Which is great if that’s if that’s all you want. But if you want to have greater reach, then you need to consider something in between those two types of distributorships. So, you know, there’s more kind of regional distributorships. Maybe they specialize in one particular state, you know, we work with a company called IDN, which is… What does it stand for, Emma? Independent Distributor Network…
Emma Criswell:
Independent Distributor Network
Michael Wangbickler:
right, Independent Distributor Network
Emma Criswell:
This is why I’m the head of client relations.
Michael Wangbickler:
Yeah, exactly right. I’m the brains of the operation, couldn’t figure it out.
Emma Criswell:
[laughing]
Michael Wangbickler:
So, yeah. So, you know, they specialize in working with more regional family-owned distributorships in this kind of collective that they’ve developed. So, you know, that’s possible option for folks.
But, you know, the one thing is, is that I think there’s a perception by many international clients of ours that if they get a distributor signed up, that their work is done.
Emma Criswell:
Yes, right. And there’s a lot more that goes into it. You know, you have to especially if you’re at a smaller distribution house, you have to come to the market. You have to remind them that you are part of the book. You have to have education, staff education, and it takes a lot of work and it takes a lot of focus. And it’s… With the pandemic, you know, I feel like that’s why this is such a good topic for us to discuss right now, is because you can’t physically be here to do the work withs, and the ride alongs, and the tasting events that so often get people to purchase your wine, so you have to think outside the box now.
Michael Wangbickler:
True. When we do get back to normal, hopefully that, you know, I assume that that’s going to kind of pick up again because there really is no substitute for meeting face to face with potential clients.
Emma Criswell:
Absolutely.
Michael Wangbickler:
And the fact is, is that as an international producer, you can’t expect your distributor, or your importer is going to do the work for you. In fact, you’re going to have to be here at market when you’re able to, to help them to sell your wines. It’s just the reality of the situation.
Emma Criswell:
Yes.
Michael Wangbickler:
But that said, as to your point, you know, not right now you know, people can’t travel here or, you know, we can’t travel elsewhere as well.
So, you know. We’re looking at things like brand building exercises to help promote the wines here in the US that could include things like digital social right now because we’re not able to meet face to face, you know, it makes sense for people to focus on some of the digital aspects of what they do and leverage those.
Emma Criswell:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, one of my favorite things I’ve seen come out of the pandemic is Instagram Lives with people in the trade, like, you know, Jeff Harding or people the other sommes who have been out of work that are brilliant people, and they know all the winemaker’s and they’re giving them the opportunity to be in their vineyard and show us that they’re pruning and show us that they’re doing the crush or what they’re bottling. And it’s an opportunity to reach not only the audience of that person’s Instagram, Facebook, what have you.
It also is an opportunity to save that for the future and show that to consumers, if you wanted to repackage it in some specific way or put it into your email campaigns and it just gives another opportunity for video, which we always recommend. Clients have the budget for video anyway.
Michael Wangbickler:
Yeah. Now, nowadays, you know, video is becoming more and more important to our marketing programs because, you know, you know, if a picture is worth a thousand words, a video is worth a million or so, you know, you can convey a lot of information in a very short period of time.
And you can do it visually, which is a huge advantage, especially considering that there’s so many other wineries out there that are trying to, you know, court the same people.
Emma Criswell:
Right.
Michael Wangbickler:
So, you know, using some of these digital programs helps you to engage with your customers more directly. You know, you don’t have to rely on the distributor or the importer to be your connection with customers. You can actually use these tools to help [something] contact. And that includes social, it includes website, and it also includes email marketing. You know, we’re big proponents of email marketing and how effective that can be.
And then, you know, you’d mentioned before we hopped on, Emma, about more samples.
Emma Criswell:
Yeah, yeah. Another thing that we can do is we have a lot of good contacts at the media and the magazines that put out all of the scores, you know, and that is where it can get really important to consumers, especially – like consumers, not like you and I are consumers, but, you know, somebody who works at the post office or what have you.
Michael Wangbickler:
We are not the market.
Emma Criswell:
No, no.
Michael Wangbickler:
We know entirely way too much about wine.
Emma Criswell:
Yeah, I’ve gone into wine shops and been told “Oh, you’re being shady, you’re acting like you don’t know anything about this industry when you’re asking me questions.” It’s really funny, especially being in Columbus, just seeing the other side of it is hysterical, but it also gives me some really great insight that I can give to our clients.
But circling back to sample submissions and getting in front of the media, like larger grocery stores that rely very heavily on scores and critics and media reviews, put those out on their shelves, and grocery stores are where the majority of the wine is being purchased right now. Even people aren’t going to restaurants and people don’t want to go to a specific wine shop or maybe their wine shop isn’t open, tasting rooms haven’t been open, that’s a way that you can give a lot of your information to a consumer without them having to ask a lot of questions or feel intimidated.
Michael Wangbickler:
Well, to that point, you know, if you have good reviews and scores, it makes it a lot easier to sell your products to distributors, you know, because the distributor they’ve got like I said, they’ve got thousands of thousands of SKUs in their book.
You know, what is going to make your standout is a good score, right? Because it’s easier for them to sell the product if they’re well regarded.
Emma Criswell:
Yeah, and one thing we do a lot of times for clients is we put together both a press and a sales kit, and we update the accolades in the sales kit, and we can just send those off to whatever distributor our clients want us to send them to, and it’s another way to be more top of mind there.
Michael Wangbickler:
Well, to that point, you know, press kit, sales kit, those are materials that we create for our clients, it’s important for all of these producers to have education materials. Background materials that they can share with not only, you know, the distributors, but also with the marketplace in general. Because, again, you know, there’s only so much you can garner from the label…
Emma Criswell:
Yeah
Michael Wangbickler:
…of a wine and…
Emma Criswell:
Sometimes you can’t garner anything.
Michael Wangbickler:
Right. So, I mean, if you’re if you’re on a grocery store shelf, you know, there’s not much opportunity there to differentiate yourself from your competitors.
But, you know, if you are engaging with consumers online, you’re doing you’re doing sample tastings, you’re getting those reviews, those are ways for you to connect with your potential client.
And we often… I often say that wine doesn’t sell wine, stories sell wine.
Emma Criswell:
Yes.
Michael Wangbickler:
You know, it’s important for you to have something, a story behind you that will differentiate you from your competitors, but also, you know, interest of the party, whether that’s a high-end Sommelier, whether it’s a retail manager or, you know, it’s a consumer, you should have a story that can be told that’s engaging and will interest people to purchase the wines.
Emma Criswell:
Right.
Michael Wangbickler:
Because if it’s because really, if all they wanted was wine, you know, they can buy a two-dollar bottle and that’s it. But if you like, wine is wine is an aspirational product, right, so we’re often looking for that kind of luxury in the bottle know, affordable luxury…
Emma Criswell:
Yeah…
Michael Wangbickler:
So, the wine delivers on that in many ways. So, OK, so let’s say you’re an international producer and you want to break into the US market. You don’t have a distributor yet; you don’t have an importer yet. Or maybe you do, and you maybe just start with them and you need to get the word out about things, you know, what do you do as a producer? Well, I would say you hire us. I mean, you hire an agency, right?
You know, it’s one of those things where, you know, we’re the experts in this marketplace, we have the connections, we have the relationships, we know what’s going on…
Emma Criswell:
Right
Michael Wangbickler:
…in the US market, so as an international producer, having somebody who is an expert in the market is – if not critical, it is quite important. And it just makes things a lot easier and more profitable in the long run, honestly.
Emma Criswell:
Yeah.
Michael Wangbickler:
Because if you’re if you’re spending all your time spinning your wheels, trying to make inroads into the U.S. market without much success, a local agency can really help you in that regard.
Emma Criswell:
Absolutely. And even if it’s something as simple as updating the language to U.S. vernacular, even if it is coming from an English-speaking country elsewhere, people can tell if it’s something coming from Italy and there are some verb tenses that are incorrect, you know?
Michael Wangbickler:
Well, there’s that, but there’s also just the different spellings.
Emma Criswell:
Yes.
Michael Wangbickler:
Right? You know, American English is weird and basically, it’s like gone its own way.
Emma Criswell:
Lots of V’s for some reason.
Michael Wangbickler:
Yeah, well, and just like, you know, the ‘or’ versus ‘our’, in flavor or color.
Emma Criswell:
Yeah.
Michael Wangbickler:
You know, those are different in Canada, UK, Australia, New Zealand, they’re everywhere but the US. So just like things like that to kind of regionalized things to your point makes a lot of sense. So, what else?
Emma Criswell:
Besides hiring us? What else could they do?
Michael Wangbickler:
Well, you know, there’s it’s important, like I said, to make sure that you have a presence here in the U.S. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to have a permanent presence here, there are actually quite a number of international producers, especially like for Bordeaux or Champagne, for instance, who have local representation in the US to have a US office.
Emma Criswell:
Yeah.
Michael Wangbickler:
You know, sales office, marketing office, whatever it is, you know, not everybody can afford to do that, but, you know, for those that do you see you absolutely see the impact that it has, you know, in in more placements and more recognition, you know, and frankly, in higher sales volumes than if you didn’t have a presence here. Now, let’s say you can’t have a permanent presence here – again, that goes back to the agency where we have presence here, and then also just making sure that, you know, once covid is over, hopefully people will be able to travel more.
That just kind of being here come for several weeks, come for a month, you know, a couple of times a year, so that you can actually have a presence here and that people will start to recognize your commitment to the market. I mean, that really is what it comes down to, is that distributors and importers will pay attention to you if you are committed to helping them in the market.
Emma Criswell:
Yeah. If you come in and it’s really important to you to be here and to make the U.S. a priority. That makes a difference.
Michael Wangbickler:
Yeah, and frankly, you know, if you hire a local agency, that also helps you get that distribution because it demonstrates to importers, distributors that you are you are committed to the market, that you’re making the investment.
Right, and so, you know, for instance, like public relations, you know, they want to know that you’re sending out samples and getting scores and getting reviews. They want to know that you’re advertising. They want to know what kind of social programs you’re working on because that all helps them.
Emma Criswell:
Contrary to popular belief, PR does help sales.
Michael Wangbickler:
Yeah, it’s one of those things where, you know, it’s hard to track…
Emma Criswell:
Yeah, and make it tangible.
Michael Wangbickler:
Yeah, but there is there are a lot of intangibles, you know, when it comes to that, and over time, you know, it’s one of those things that builds over time. The more reviews you get, the more scores you get, the more people are talking about it, the more… It starts to penetrate into the psyche of your potential customers.
Emma Criswell:
It snowballs.
Michael Wangbickler:
Yeah, I mean, there’s an old adage that you have to you have to have connect with somebody like nine or more times in order for them to actually make a purchase decision. So, you know, the more that the more that you can get in front of them through various means, various channels, the more likely you are to score more clients and customers.
So, to our international friends and colleagues, we hope this has been useful to you. If there’s any other questions or you’d like us to discuss any other particular topics on air, please let us know. You can get a hold of us at mike@HTBpodcast.com, or emma@HTBpodcast.com. Also, don’t forget to like and subscribe, and you can find us at HTBpodcast.com on the web, and of course on social, we’re @HTBpodcast. So, thanks again for listening. Emma, always a pleasure.
Emma Criswell:
Always.
Michael Wangbickler:
And we will talk to you next time.
Emma Criswell:
Bye.
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