Distributor relations

Seems like it’s a sore subject for most wineries. I’m new to it, having started up with a couple in the last year. What I’m running into with both is an unwillingness on their part to share any information about where they’ve placed the wine. Is that normal? This is in the context of “I’m in town for Pinot Days and I’d like to be able to tell consumers where they can find the wine when they ask.” Most of us also have “Where to buy” links on our websites that might help steer consumers to distributor’s accounts and move boxes for them. It seems counterproductive to be secretive on this point.

If I had to guess, they’ve probably placed more wine at retail than at restaurants, and are worried you’ll be angry when you find out.

I work at a shop (off-prem), and while obviously I can’t speak for all distributors, I believe many of them feel that if you’re asking for a list, you’re looking to shop your brand to other distributors. Require a quarterly or semi-annual list in your contract.

Universal problem - you are not alone. Even difficult in franchise states when the distributor knows you won’t be moving. Try asking your rep if there is someone in the office that you can ask to run a placement report for you. Sometimes the reps are too busy (sometimes just lazy also).

Stewart, I own a beer distributor and we get asked about 30 times a month for the same report from different suppliers. Unless you are at a big house that runs SAP or similar software the report is not exactly easy to produce unless you are asking for a specific SKU. If you have multiple SKUS the report has to be run once per sku or the distributors has to have someone handy with custom reports. In summary it is time consuming. We addressed it is by running it for all suppliers once per quarter. In my experience most distributors share data openly if they feel that it is for the mutual success of the business.

Stewart, you might also look at subscribing to VIP reporting. They have amazing software that automatically produces those reports for you.

Some distributors are great with monthly depletion/placement reports. But most just won’t give you the info unless you go directly to the rep in that territory. It is extremely frustrating from a supplier side. I’m actually working on a business plan to manage this more effectively between the two.

Thanks folks. I’d wondered if they thought I was trying an end run on them. The scale here pretty small – both theirs and mine – so I don’t know if the hassle of occasional reporting would be on a par with what Carlos finds.

Our distributor is a larger one, but we have access to a full depletion report monthly showing all accounts sold (by sales rep). It shows the classification of accounts- on-sale or off-sale. It’s an open book- no secrets. All I have to do is get access to their website for suppliers (ask for a username and password).

We also have our own software to access this information- we used to use Darwine but are switching to Diver. I realize this option may be cost-prohibitive to many.

In my supplier experience back on the east coast, I had access to my distributor’s Supplier Diver port showing this info. I can’t imagine doing business with a distributor without it.

Some are remiss to feed you information, when that happens I’ll just ask for a place to steer customers and will get a handful of names.

One thing I do know is that the harder you work for their sales the better off your long term relationship will be.

I couldn’t agree more.

I think it has more to do with the fear of you leaving for another distributor in the future and then all the leg work is already done for them. Advice -

get friendly with one of the reps and see if they can pull some info for you.

Make sure you are keeping track of things you have made in roads to - I know this will get me in hot water but there are a lot of winemakers out there who do not keep track of the personal placements they have made or are always looking to get with the hot somm and forget the ones that were there from the start. Keep track and touch base every now and then.

Hound the distributor until they get you the depletions.

Look for a new distributor and make that part of your new deal.

Use FB and twitter – always!

I’m in the spirits business, not wine, but my distributor provides us access to a supplier interface that shows us inventory reports that are updated in real-time (as a sku is scanned out) and placement reports that are updated nightly…plus lots of other data.

I dump their data to Excel and wrote a script that auto-populates a bunch graphs for top level and by sku analysis and analyzes new placements vs time to monitor placement targets that I’ve established with the distributor. The placement data is invaluable for following up personally with a bar/restaurant too.

The data is out there and as others have said, it’s well worth pushing to get.

We get updated sales reports every Monday (unless there is a holiday). We input into our own running data and use it to update our website. My advice- when you first consummate a relationship with a distributor get to know everyone in the office. There is always someone there that is the gateway to all of the info you want. If you build a relationship in the beginning and ask for simple things your life will be really easy.

As an outsider to this (I did own a retail shop/wine bar for several years but sold it) I’ve got to wonder how a winery wouldn’t want to have some degree of control over where their product ends up. I suppose that price influences that, but is the distributor free to place your wine in a 7-11 or or a strip club if you don’t want that association? Admittedly my earlier background was in apparel, but this just seems pretty basic to me.

In many states if you have money and a license, a distributor MUST sell you product.

Never forget that alcohol is a controlled substance…