Selling through a distributor in Tennessee?

Wine Pimps
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I’m in Nashville most of the time now, trying to navigate the 3Tier system here… Got some great restaurants - one nationally recognized top tier - wanting my wine for their list. So I need to find the middle-man to give a cut. I don’t mind, but… I only know about the big guys, and have attempted to reach out; my experience has been they are typically not interested in small producers.

Back in the day, I worked for Windsor Vineyards in CA, they had this remarkable network of wholesalers who basically bumped the dock for (then) a few bucks a case. Producer did all the sales work, that’s fine by me. There’s LibDib, but it does not yet operate in Tennessee… Of course, a real distributor would be great, they might very well like the wines and sell too!

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Reach out to AOC, they do well with smaller producers. Run right past anyone with major wine or spirits suppliers, that’s the easiest way to get lost and end up on an aged inventory report.

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Talk to the restaurants that want your wine and ask for referrals of small distributors they work with and like.

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Haven’t heard of them, THANK YOU. Will do.

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Thank you. That was my initial strategy. Both restaurants so far, and both are very high-end places, have tried this via their reps. Presumably the rep who wants to take care of their client has sent the information up the ladder, but no progress. And I know fall is rapidly approaching… Distributors do not like to add wineries late in the year; they do what they do each season.

YOU WOULD THINK that the somm at the likes of Husk Nashville throwing her rep a bone by getting her firm a new winery and a guaranteed sale is a nice pay back to a rep that she likes but on the other hand, it’s asking my buyer to do more work than say “yes,” which is all she has to do with a competitor who has a wholesaler’s list to order from. So I don’t want to be the winery that takes too much work and weigh on the excitement…

I do offer something different; namely, aged wines. Both these restaurants LOVE that. A distributor will rarely have access to library vintages, but alas, most get freaked out by anything over 3 years past harvest…

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In NY and many other regions there is the typical refrain that Q4 is all about selling and the summer is the time when restaurants are not buying. Buyers often tell reps in the summer they’re not looking to add new vendors in the slow summer months. Then one summer day a buyer at one of the better restaurants in town said “I’m always buying” and that kind of changed my mindset as to how I approached things. Sure, some places slow down or the program may switch towards beer or cocktails in the summer but the fact is good places do move wine all year long and many buyers just use the ‘slow season’ to get vendors out of their hair.

In Q4 the same buyers will often say their list is set until the new year because they are so busy with the holiday season that they don’t have time to change the list, train the staff on new wines, etc. It’s all a perpetual cycle of excuses.

As a former importer/distributor I know that if someone- resto, store, distributor- is interested in a wine, they’ll take it any time of year so don’t allow the seasonality excuse to slow you down too much. There are many reasons why a wine might not be a good fit for a distributor. I had wineries approach me saying they had restos in my area that wanted to carry the wine but if the wine otherwise did not seem a good fit, there was no sense in going through all the bureaucracy and other expenses involved with it.

I would just keep approaching as many of the better stores and restaurants that you know in the area and asking them which distributors they would suggest that might be a good fit for the type of wines you offer. Not sure if you have worked with distributors before other than what sounds like on a quasi-consignment basis. Be careful to work with someone that can not only move boxes but also, probably more importantly, pay their bills. I used to have a distributor that is now in TN but I am reluctant to suggest them since they were over a year late in paying. Good people, but just because they mean well doesn’t mean they run a good business.

On a related note about the back vintages: I guess it all depends on various things. I am reminded of a friend that was the first in the US to import Lopez de Heredia. At that time and for years afterwards the winery had a very deep library of back vintages in bottle. Lopez just wasn’t selling all they made each year not by choice but because of lack of demand. As the wines have gained in popularity and demand in the US that old stash has practically dried up. When Polaner first carried Lopez in NY they had to close out them out the first year (or even two years??) because there was so little demand. Of course that is all history now.

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Good chat.
I was with Domaine Select in NY/NJ. Maybe still am able to sell through them, don’t know if you fall off completely or they just stop selling your brand and taking your calls when your inhouse promoter quits. A very enthusiastic young salesman met me randomly in Napa Valley, fell in love with the wine, got it on the roster and did wonderful placements.

I came to NYC during a blizzard in 2012, stayed in midtown, poured at their annual portfolio shindig and then stayed a few days to eat at all the restaurants that had ordered my wine, and visited the retail store ASTOR Wines, tickled pink. First stop was Andrew Carmelini’s The Dutch (OMG, best meal ever, roast pork, southern greens with 2007 Virage after oysters and bubbles). Loved that place. Cozy environment, great service, great food. I went to Lafayette the next day, heard chef was over there, and got lunch and his cookbook signed. We have the same palate… delicious food. Thankful all my cookbooks survived the fire. Weirdly that’s about it.

Then The Nomad Hotel, absolutely magical experience, they did not actually have the wine on the list at that time, but they put us at an amazing table in the middle of the atrium and treated us like royalty, starting with their signature vintage champagne - my customers from NJ who met up with me in the City were blown away… The next day we went to a neighborhood place whose name has slipped from memory… Now that’s going to bug me for days… Small cozy place looked like a nice menu. I went in there all jazzed, to thank them for being the first to take my wine. Well it’s a big deal! In Nashville, if HUSK serves it, most people would assume it’s good. Anyway, they had no idea what I was talking about, sat us somewhere, nobody came to serve us. Eventually we gave up and left. I was really proud to be part of The Dutch, to order my wine off their list with an old Wall St friend I used to work with, to have such a memorable meal.

Anyway, I know how to work with distributors in general. Worked in executive capacity in wine marketing businesses before Virage. Learned a lot. Don’t offer a DA after an SPA… haha. These are big brand things. With THIS wine in THIS city, I’m very clear that I’ll have to do all the sales. Nashville is a GREAT food town. And a great cocktail and beer town. Wine is behind. Most restaurants are all about Caymus or Jordan cab… or obsessed with Orange Wine. But for the orange places, feels kind of like Los Angeles in the 1980’s. A lot of things here feel like Los Angeles in the 80’s. For starters we’re listening to 80’s music everywhere, then there’s billboards, trash, loud cars… Lol.

All I want is an organization that can take an order and get a delivery executed promptly and issue an invoice. And, yes, they better PAY. Since they’ll get a cut for doing only the admin work. If a rep at the place takes a liking to my wines and wants to drag me around with him/her, or not, they are very welcome to ride on the tracks I’m laying, and sell more accounts. Works for me, but I expect absolutely nothing but effecting the transaction. And I’m fine with that. It’s FUN to eat out here. And I am older and calmer, and not trying to GROW the brand. I want an excuse to eat in all these great restaurants and bring in a bottle and see if I can make something happen.

I like to say, being a winemaker in Nashville is like a musician in Napa.

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A friend in the biz in Sonoma was distributed through Peaceful Planet. Maybe that’s who you are thinking about whose in financial trouble? He said they were passionate and talented but might not have had business sense. They seem to have evaporated.

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Off the top of my head, look up AjaxTurner.com, Advintage Distributing, maybe Lipman Brothers who have coverage in Tennessee. All seem to have solid wine portfolio of smaller producers you might find a good fit with.

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It’s great that you have interest from a top-tier restaurant! For smaller producers, boutique or regional distributors might be a better fit than the big guys, as they often work closely with niche brands. You could also ask local sommeliers or restaurant owners for recommendations on distributors who value unique wines. Keep at it there are definitely people out there who appreciate what you bring to the table. Good luck!

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I wish that were true! I give up.

They are all horrible.

They clearly love the wines you drive to them and pour for them to taste and share all your unique selling propositions that resonated with local buyers—and then they string you out for weeks (now months) saying they’ll send their proposal over, but it never comes.

Score for them, I guess, to taste the competition for free—and go try to sell something already in their portfolio. I’m so over distributor abuse. Such small minds that cannot see a special/different wine as ADDITIVE to what they already offer. Zero respect for your time. And $200 in samples every round.

I have been pouring and selling my own brand for a decade. Nobody can fake that they “get” or like these wines. The last group, AOC, was great—they got three team members together and we talked through all kinds of strategies for selling together. It was productive and fun.

So I thought!

There was no question they loved the wines and the price point. We first met in August or early September. It’s Thanksgiving week—after my followup hoping to get deliveries going sooner than later, as OND is the strong season, they apologized on Oct6 that they made me wait so long for their proposal/contract, promising to send it “in a day or two.”

Crickets.

And no response to communication now. Now that they’ve delayed me long enough no wholesaler would take a call.

My brand comes with a free salesperson (me) and that still doesn’t get them off their ass. So I have to tell a sommelier from a James Beard restaurant, operating 2 miles from my house, I cannot fulfill her orders… beyond depressing.

She wanted three wines and my 2010 as her Christmas dinner pairing…. Just shoot me…

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this sounds really really rough. Sorry for the crucible, Emily.

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Sorry to hear. I left the retail/wholesale sphere mid 2023. Aside from retail sales had been dipping down, we were noticing some of our favorite sales reps leave the biz here in Austin and even higher ups at very solid small distributors were dropping the ball on their books/long-time accounts. Professionalism and up-to-date communication was suffering. The Crickets vibe is the worst. I suspect some of the hassle/pain of waiting for timely diecision/communication is a generational divide/disconnect.

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I use Advintage in Tennessee. I was quite happy with them for about 6 months then orders started to trail off. I’m hoping I can get a market visit in early next year to increase sales.

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