Brewforia Beer Market

An open letter to America's Beer and Wine Wholesalers and Distributors:

In recent years you guys have expressed a great deal of worry and concern regarding the growth of online beer and wine sales.  This worry and concern has been so intense that you’ve spent millions upon millions of dollars lobbying state and federal governments to get laws changed to restrict or outright kill this growing industry.  You even went so far as to write a bill called HR 5034 that would make it impossible for any citizen to challenge a states alcohol regulatory system effectively enshrining yourselves as sole purveyors of alcohol.  Well I am here to tell you all that your worry is misplaced and your money could be better spent elsewhere.

As I understand it your concerns regarding consumers having the ability to buy beer and wine online center on the notion that when Bob Jones buys a case of beer online and has it shipped to him from a retailer outside your state or region then you just lost a sale.  You couldn’t be more wrong. 

I know you think that a guy buying a case of beer online is a case of beer that he didn’t buy from you but what you don’t understand is that that case of beer is beer he bought in addition to the beer he’s buying from you.  That special case of beer that came in the mail is one that he’s going to put in the cellar, or out in the fridge in the garage and he will occasionally crack a bottle from that stash to enjoy on special occasions or with friends.  He’s still buying the same beers locally that he’s been buying all along so don’t worry about loosing sales.  In the long run you’re actually going to sell a lot more beer and this is how you’re going to do it.

So going back to Bob and that case of beer he bought online.  As you know that case of beer was bought from a retailer and that retailer had to buy it from a local distributor.  So thanks to the internet retailer that local distributor was able to reach far outside his state or region where they are licensed to do business and get their product into the hands of someone who so prized it that they were willing to pay 2 to 3 times what it cost for that product locally.  And thousands of Bob’s all across the country and around the world are wanting to do the same thing, buy beer from this retailer and have it shipped to them from far away and this distributor is going to reap the benefit of those sales.

So here’s the really cool part, you’re that distributor.  Every single retailer in this country has products in their portfolio that are in great demand somewhere else in the country but due to the barriers of the three tier system, the lack of available retail shelf space and the limited capacity of the brewers they aren’t able to be everywhere with every product.  The internet to the rescue.  Internet retailers can take your inventory of product you have in excess and spread that out across the globe putting the beer people long for in their hands and putting lots of money in your pockets.  You shouldn’t be fighting against internet beer and wine sales, you should be going to all your retail accounts and telling they need launch sites of their own and start getting your beers out into cyberspace.

Pretty much the first rule of business is get your products into the largest market possible and there is no market larger than the entire planet.  The system you’ve been fighting so hard to protect, the three tier system has actually been the thing that has limited the growth of your business.  You’ve spent so much time looking over your shoulder at an imagined threat that you’ve failed to recognize the opportunities right in front of your face.

So all the money you spent trying to keep people from buying beer and wine online turns out to have been very very ill spent.  Had you instead embraced the internet and encouraged your retail accounts to launch sites of their own you could have been making money selling beer instead of spending money depriving consumers of their freedom of choice.  But don’t despair its not to late.  You can still do the right thing for your business and for beer lovers the world over.

Its time to embrace a new world order.  The role of the local distributor is never going away, you will always be who retailers and restauranteurs turn to supply their customers with the beer and wine they seek.  It’s time that you reversed course and became an advocate for consumer choice and helped grow a strong an vibrant online beer and wine industry.  After all, consumers aren’t the only ones that benefit from online beer and wine sales, ultimately the distributors reap huge rewards by expanding their markets beyond their local bars, restaurants and retailers and putting their beers in the hands of people everywhere.