Keeping up with industry news and trends is one of the most underrated disciplines in beverage alcohol. It’s a frightening habit, admittedly — slowing down long enough to read or at least skim several articles every day when the return on investment takes months or years to materialize.  When sales are down, it’s human nature to scrounge for the fastest wins available. In our desperation to keep the lights on, we abandon most eagerly the very practices that would lead to longevity and profitability for our business. The inconvenient timing of these insights — namely, that the best articles and industry reports tend to circulate precisely when everyone has checked out for the holidays —only intensifies the competitive advantage up for grabs by those who are paying attention. An up-to-date understanding of consumer preferences and behavior can inform our production, focus our messaging, and align sales & marketing so that everything from tasting ro

Afternoon Brief: Washington Welcomes It's 21st American Viticultural Area

On October 29, 2024, the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) published the final rule for the Beverly, Washington appellation to officially define it as a designated wine grape-growing region...

With 2023 in the rearview mirror, it seemed like a perfect time to fire up Excel and do some number crunching! We started by looking at just one RedChirp feature first: webchat. What is a RedChirp webchat anyway? When it comes to letting customers ask questions and connect with your business —from your website — most people think of traditional in-the-browser webchat. But that model just isn’t a good fit for DTC teams; you’re too busy! Because you don’t have the staff to sit there and man it all the time, those leads go cold and become completely useless. After all, consumers stay on your website for less time than ever, and once they leave, you can’t reach them in the browser anymore. RedChirp webchat is different. It starts on your website, but then transitions the conversation to text message when you’re able to reply. That makes it a whole lot easier for your team to administer. You can text customers even (long) after they’ve left yo

 Want to grow your business and build customer loyalty and advocacy? Become more customer-centric. Get in the mindset Ask yourself: Am I providing a positive customer experience at every stage of my customer journey? Base business decisions on the positive outcome they have on your customers. Build Strategies Think of marketing and sales strategies tailored to individual customer needs. Anticipate your customers' needs. Communicate and listen to feedback. Make things easy for them. Personalize offers and communications. Practice proactive customer service. Use the right tools Is your sales system customer-centric? Activ8 Commerce is a true single-sales solution, for all your sales channels and digital marketing needs. You’ll finally have secure customer-centric accurate data, to grow your business on. With best-in-class customer communications digital tools, customer service, and CRM features, your customer will feel like VIPs. Even better: create personalized offer

If COVID taught us anything, reoccurring sales are crucial to survival, and customers are surprisingly resilient and creative with changes in channel or delivery methods. The post-COVID conversations around alcohol distribution include the so-called “fourth tier” of instantaneous delivery (Instacart) and online options like buying online now and picking up in-store later (BOPUIS).  At the same time as these channels evolve, the elasticity of the traditional Wine Club is stretched as well. It is now estimated that the average person is a member of two re-occurring subscriptions, and 35% belong to three or more. Why are we moving so swiftly into a subscription economy? For wine, it’s a perfect storm of three factors. 1. OUR CULTURE OF CONSUMERISM IS CHANGING. The mindless and haphazard consumerism of old gives way to thoughtful and curated purchases where the brand and its products add value to our lives. This significant change in consumer thinking and behavior h

Happy 2022! As we roll into the new year, the LibDib team has begun to implement our latest plans which always includes a focus on the trends for the upcoming year. In the same tone as 2021, Tequila, RTD’s and Whiskey will continue to be the category winners. Champagne supplies will be short. These are the trends that everyone is talking about.  What else is the beverage alcohol industry, and more importantly wholesale distribution, going to see in 2022? Here are the LibDib predictions for 2022 challenges and opportunities. Supply Chain shortages will continue. The Challenge: This past OND, LibDib had a number of wine and spirits Makers with out of stocks. Unfortunately, no end is in sight. Bottles wouldn’t show up. Labels were three weeks late. Boxes. Corks. Foils. Everything was late. If you know anything about bottling as a small Maker, it’s very challenging if all the materials are not there on time. Labor is scheduled for the day. Sometimes there is a m

I was reading an article about early-spring gardening tasks, and they were suggesting that May was a great time for maintenance. The types of things recommended, such as cleaning and sharpening tools, checking bulbs and seeds for moisture or mold, mulching existing flower beds, and planning for new ones, all made sense and almost inspired me enough to get off the warm couch and go out to my shed to investigate. But, because I’m a nerd, my mind immediately followed the theme to a digital correlation.  Websites are a virtual “garden.” Their goal is to appeal to customers, draw them in and create an inviting setting so they may stay awhile. We design new sections within them, like adding blogs or recipes, we plant new products and SKUs and prune old ones no longer available. Sometimes we get tired of the entire thing and change the color scheme and layout with new pictures or templates. Like a garden, we should tend to our websites because if we let them sit over t

Creating and executing an effective growth strategy is where a lot of successful Makers hit a stumbling block. Their wine and spirits products are selling well, there’s demand and room for expansion, but what do the next steps look like? LibDib’s Director of Maker Experience, Tanya Riesbeck, has the answers. Step one is simple: “Get out from behind the still, get out of the cellar and BE the Seller,” she says. “We know that buyers want authenticity and more than ever, people want to support small and local wine and spirits producers who pour so much into their craft.”  It’s sound advice--just as much as it’s fun wordplay. Putting a face to the name of the brand is helpful: it shows passion and pride and adds a grassroots sensibility.  Look at the recent success of Ryan Reynolds’ Aviation Gin. Of course, it certainly helps that he is the famous movie star Ryan Reynolds… but the point still stands. It wa

This year we've weathered a pandemic, riots, double-digit unemployment, a contentious election year, a labor shortage, and now the most expansive fire in California history. If what doesn't kill us makes us stronger, then we should be Ironman by now. It's enough to make you crawl into your cellar and lock the door. But, we need to pay the bills, harvest the fruit, and sell our wine. With the context and focus of our marketplace changing weekly, what can we do to be culturally sensitive, faithful to our brands, but continue to market our products? Here, we've assembled our suggestions for addressing your marketing approach during this fall.  Realign your goals, but keep setting them. Remember back in December when you set your 2020 sales goals? That seems like a long time ago. Many of us started careening off course in March and just let it ride, hoping that we'd adjust when things returned to "normal." By now, we've realized this is "the

Did you know that by segmenting your audience into universal “buckets,” or like-minded groups, you can better target your messaging and get better results from your print and digital marketing projects? “Buckets” is a helpful term that describes grouping your customers into categories that reflect common wants, needs, and purchase motivators. By assigning each recipient to the appropriate bucket(s), you can target your message more precisely. Here are five basic ways to do that:   1. Geography. Where do your targets live? Are they grouped into neighborhoods or geographic regions that share common characteristics and needs?  2. Company Profile. If you’re doing B2B marketing, companies with common characteristics, such as being in the same market vertical or being of similar size, tend to share common challenges and pressure points. You might have a bucket for each vertical market, as well as the number of employees, annual revenues, and