Ep. 539 Nicole Brassard | Get US Market Ready with Italian Wine People

Thanks for tuning into my new show. Get US Market Ready with Italian wine people. I'm Steve Ray, author of the book How to get US Market Ready. And in my previous podcast, I shared some of the lessons I've learned from thirty years in the wine and spirits business helping brands enter and grow in the US market. This series will be dedicated to the personalities who have been working in the Italian wine sector in the US, their experiences, challenges, and personal stories. I'll uncover the roads that they walked shedding light on current trends, business strategies, and their unique brands. So Thanks for listening in. And let's get to the interview. Hi. This is Steve Ray, and welcome to this week's edition of how to get US market ready with Italian wine people. This week, I'm very pleased to have joining me is Nicole Brasser Jordan, who's the, deputy director of the New Hampshire liquor Control Commission. And she's on right now. So Nicole, why don't you, give us a a brief bio of you and we can dig into it. Well, good morning or good afternoon, Steve. As you said, my name is Nicole Brassard Jordan. I I've been working with the liquor commission for thirty three years. I'm currently the deputy commissioner. And prior to this, I was a director. Of marketing sales warehousing and merchandising. Very honored to be on this podcast with you, and I look forward to the topic of Italian wines. It's one of my favorites. Good. So let's talk about the liquor commission and and give us kind of an overview of the philosophy of why it exists and how it stands out in the scheme of all the other control states. Okay. Well, you know, listeners may or may not know that there are seventeen controlled states left in the US. From Prohibition, New Hampshire being one of them. I mean, we do have a couple of others surrounding us Vermont as well as Maine. And these are where the alcohol sales are actually managed by the individual states. New Hampshire has sixty nine outlets that we operate throughout the state. And our philosophy is really simple. We want consumers to have an outstanding shopping experience. Great selection and outstanding savings, which is why we call it an outlet. We service about twelve million customers annually. And last fiscal year, we ended at about seven hundred and fifty million dollars in sales, and we expect to eclipse that this year to just under eight hundred million. I think that's really significant. The size of it is it's not astonishing, but it's significant. And for a lot of people, not from the US, they're thinking about, you know, grocery chains and or chains like total wine and so forth. But the control states, in many cases, dwarf those. They do. And, you know, I say it because I work for the New Hampshire Sugar Commission, and I'm part of it. But you know, we are the number one controlled state in my mind. And a lot of other controlled states look to us for best practices and visit New Hampshire to get some ideas on how they can enhance their stores or have better communication with their customers. They've been to many of our events. There's just a number of things that we offer some best practices for for other controlled states. And I could support that. I've I've been to, well, mostly highway stores, but I've been there a lot. I shop there. And, and I've been to pretty much every other control state, and I think you guys do the best job in terms of merchandising. I guess the easiest way to say it, you look like a regular liquor store, not a control state store. And that's what we hope. We hope that consumers see us as a national retailer when they come here. You know, we've we've spent an awful lot of time renovating and relocating our stores and enhancing the shopping experience as I talked about. So thirty of those locations have been done in the last, let's say, nine years, and though we're not stopping there. We have many more in the queue for this coming year, and we'll have many more in the future until we get to all of our stores being renovated and relocated or updated. When I think about control states, one of the key benefits I stress to clients that I consult with is the consistency in that you can get from a control state that you cannot get in an open state. So if you do a deal with control states to have x number of displays or this kind of promotional support or particular shelf positioning, it's pretty much guaranteed that it will get executed exactly and in full. There's no way you can make that happen in the open states. The you're kind of reliant on the distributor and the individual retail stores. Take New York. That's really difficult to do. That's correct. They're basically knocking door to door. And, you know, when they come to us, we're talking about, you know, sixty nine locations throughout the state. So, yes, we execute products really well. It's very clear. We partner with our suppliers and wineries and distilleries that wanna work with us. You know, and we have many opportunities for their brands to be successful, but it's a partnership. And and and we really look at it that way. And that's very refreshing. I'm not gonna say it's rare, but we don't often hear that that much in open states simply because there's no one person in charge. I mean, if you're just talking to the state liquor authority, they're usually lawyers trying to tell you that you can't do whatever it is you're calling gas. Can I do this? I mean, that's been my experience. But one of the issues of retail stores in general is the ability to staff it with people who are knowledgeable enough to help the consumer, ask questions, answer questions, and learn things. And then the role of in store point of sale, shelf talkers, case cards and those kinds of things. If your goal is to work collaboratively with the producer to make a better experience for the consumer, what kind of support do you guys rely on to extend what the individual people in the stores can provide? Well, let me just first say that all of those key things that you had mentioned are very important, and we do educational training. We have a designated educator in wine, and he also does spirits for our staff in the stores. So That is a big component of that. Obviously, we do a number of events throughout the year, and we have a spirits week that's designated in November, and we also have Wine Week, which is designated in January. And those have been going on for many years. And our staff go to those events to learn and meet the producers themselves. And that's what we pride ourselves on is to have a lot of those producers come to those events so that they can talk not only with our staff, but also the consumers that they that purchase their products. So they're building brand ambassadors within the state or, you know, let's just say there's probably an awful lot of people from Massachusetts and as you are from Connecticut coming up to these events that also spread the word when you go home, that you've met them, and you've tried their wines, and you're really excited about them, and you tell all your friends, which is, which is a great position for our producers to be in, to be able to talk to them and tell them the stories because that's so important when it comes to really reaching consumers. You know, we've we've got great relationships with with many producers in Italy, and they are ambassadors and wanna come here every single year for our events for that reason. They wanna they wanna talk those consumers, and they see results. That's the other part of this. Those events really do show results for these producers, and consumers show that they're purchasing those those products right through and well after those events. That raises a question. What level of data is accessible by suppliers? We supply all of the data to the broker who is in state that works on behalf of the supplier. We do have a broker community, and it's very important. And the reason that I say that is, you know, we're running a wholesale business as well as a retail business. You need to have people on the streets for these specific brands, which is why they work with local brokers. So they'll go to the restaurants. They will do events at restaurants. They will also bring point of sale materials to us and other off premise accounts that sell those products. So, you know, it's very, very important to have that broker community and those boots on the street regarding those various suppliers and producers. And then speaking about Italy, in particular, you said you've been to in Italy. How many times and how recently? Yes. My last trip was in two thousand seventeen. Started in two thousand and twelve. So I was five consecutive years of in Italy. It's a great experience, and it's, it's amazing to be able to not only see in Italy for the for what it is. And, you know, the booze They are not your typical boos that you would see in, you know, a home show or anything like that. They really are works of art, and it's it's it's it's stunning to go. But then to be able to meet the people and be entrenched in the culture, is is just amazing, and it really brings things to perspective. You know, I've said to consumers for for many, many years that we take it for granted. We open that bottle, and we don't realize how much work has gone into providing that bottle for us to have at our dinner tables or in celebration. So it brings it into a whole new perspective when you go to wine country and you see farming aspects and then the winemaking aspects and then to go to bottle and then go to market, which is very difficult to reach those consumers. So it's a challenging business for everyone. So in addition to having gone to the Italy, have you had the opportunity to travel in any of the wine growing regions? Either through, like, Eche or the Natalie sponsored trips or anything on your own? No. I haven't. But we we do go to various areas. We did go to Mexico purchasing tequila for many years in a row. Our spirits buyer also or goes out to Kentucky to purchase bourbon, wine buyers, and myself being a wine buyer in the past for us went out to California pretty much every single year to purchase for our power buy program, which is a a a very big program of bringing great wines to consumers at, you know, half off their normal retail prices. So when you were a wine buyer, you did go to Italy five times, but the question I asked, I think was, have you been to any of the individual wine countries? Is that something you would be interested in for you or your staff? Because maybe we can make something happen. Well, thank you. We do get offered that many times. Just so you know. Okay. Good. Good. Good. We are a state entity, and we do we do look at those things. They are educational, of course, but there's also opportunities for purchasing. And that's kind of the big thing with Van Italy differentiating it from anything that happens in US, either Napka, which is National Association of Beverage Control Associations or centralization, alcohol control associations, which is a control state organization and also at WSWA. And the difference in America is we don't really get the retailers involved except insofar as with Napka, their retailers are, like New Hampshire and Pennsylvania, by default. So when you go to the Italy as a buyer, what kind of things are you looking at and looking for? And how do you qualify and quantify? What you're looking for? Well, you know, Vinidley is so big and very overwhelming. I always we always went with a plan. We would set up all the appointments, and we would know exactly where we needed to be on what day. Of course, you were always late. Because the previous appointment would always go over, but we were always And it was a mile away when you're done. And it was a mile away because this is a very large event, and and people really don't realize until you get there, how large it is. I could tell you my feet were killing me every single day, and I am an avid, cyclist and runner. So it's not like I'm not afraid to be on my feet. It's a big, big event. But, yeah, we have to go with a plan, and we're looking for opportunities for our power program, as well as new opportunities in new areas or varietals that we think are important. And how do you make those judgments power by area? Is it just, as an example, is that just by accelerate price or are you looking for the combination of story support and excel or price. You know, I'll just say that every single one of those power buys are tasted. They have to meet that criteria first. We want those products to over deliver for the price that we're selling and be fifty percent off the retail that they would normally sell for. And, you know, we do that because we wanna offer consumers something that they couldn't otherwise get. And what we all need to remember is the wine businesses, you know, it it can be difficult. And they have to manage inventory levels of wine. You know, there may be, you know, a very high tonnage vintage that once it comes out of tank needs to go into bottle and, you know, that can vary by many, many, many cases. And then they have to make room. If they don't sell it all through, they have to make room for the new bottling. So, you know, these are opportunities that we take advantage of in working with those business partners to bring to our consumers. By having those products at those really great prices, but yet they are stellar wines and they over deliver. And a lot of them, I'll honestly say the twenty to fifty dollar range are the ones that sell the most. For us. Yeah. When I go there, that's what I buy. So That's great. For for just that reason. So thinking about Italy, again, give us an example of some things that you guys have brought in. I realize you're not a buyer anymore, but you're certainly aware what's coming in that represent trends for Italian wines in the US. I mean, we know about prossecco and some of those things, but talk a little bit about that. Yeah. Certainly prossecco has definitely taken off. We've seen that for a number of years. Lambrusco has has come in. It's still a very small category, you know, but people are starting to warm up to it. It's really funny because, you know, when it comes to Italian wines, and I'm just gonna go back to a producer that we worked with and we actually wrote a label for because when we said to him, You have really great wines, and we want New Hampshire consumers to try an entry level wine with the varietal on the front of the label. And we wanted to say San Giovanni. And long defaults. Which they can't really do, though, because of a DOC requirements. We did. Yeah. We did do it. We did do it. So we had a producer, and we wrote the back label copy so that it was what do you pair it with and all those things and where it was from. But in this particular case, to put San Giovanni on the front label, it was off the charts. It was off the charts. So New Hampshire was the the beta test for it, and now he's selling it throughout the United States. So it's just something that, you know, Italian producers may not understand that the US market doesn't understand the village concept or the town concept. Us and the wine business do understand it. We understand that you have to know those things and you have to know the varietals within those areas, but this particular case, we wanted to show consumers that here's the varietal and it's right there, and you can't miss it. And by the way, this is by a producer that you really know and you've purchased their lines and you can really enjoy this wine out by the campfire, having pizza, out by the barbecue, really, and it sounds like you really don't like that wine. No. That's great that you're in support of it. I mean, you're it's it's great to hear because, you know, the first thing I hear from people when I talk to them about coming to the US is, you know, they make they say, I make a really great wine. And it's almost like, I'm stipulating that everybody makes wine. Technically, nowadays, you shouldn't be offering wine for sale that isn't great for whatever it is. Either the the price or the style or or the the target audience. So the quality of the wine itself is one very important part, but and the foundation, but it's not necessarily the shiny part. And that it people need a direction and the direction is what's in it. And if you yeah. As you say tuscan wine, how can you relate to it? Alright. What's in it? What's in it? Where is it where is it from? Yeah. A couple of things that I've been and I'm curious to have your point of view on that I've traveled to these areas and been really impressed. And we're only seeing some pickup in the US. Two in particular are Trento Doc and, sparkling wine made in the traditional manner, if you will. With second fermentation in the bottom. And the other one is Kyretteo, which is the, Rosay wine of valpolicella and the Veneto. Have you had any experience with those? Have they been pitched to you? What's your reaction to those? Yes. We've had some. We've had some. Not a lot, but we have had some. And, you know, we have to be selective, you know, depending on how many how many products we get in small niche areas. Do we think we can actually sell those products? But something that I talked about is we have to partner with these people. So if they're willing to come to New Hampshire, do events, meet consumers, talk about their wines, that's certainly going to help them Of course, point of sale materials is always very, very important at the point of purchase, but we also offer a number of other things. We have in store televisions. We have in store radio. We have advertising on our websites. We have in store digital advertising in certain locations. So there's many opportunities as well as a print publication for them to market their product. Let's move on to we've talked about this that, you know, there's the on premise, there's the off premise, and now everyone's talking about the e premise. Can you talk about how you guys are getting involved in that? And that that incorporates not only e commerce itself, but also the concepts of in store curbside pickup and where in New Hampshire is and where you guys are going. Well, of course, the onset of COVID, it made us have to accelerate the things that we were working on. And we did put a curbside in in store pickup in place in the spring of twenty twenty to help consumers At the same time, we work we've been working on a whole new POS system and also, website. We launched the new website in September, which also included our curb side and in store pickup, but you purchase online. You pay for it online, which is not something we could do with the old system. So when we went live with the curbside and in store pickup in the spring, people couldn't pay for it online. They they actually paid for it when they arrived at the store at their car on the curbside or they came into the into the store and purchased it at that time. So now we've transitioned. We now have fifteen stores that are up and running with curbs side and in store pickup, you go right on our website, and you can purchase the products, and consumers will go to one of those stores to pick it up, either like we said, curbside or in store. And since we actually have launched that new online purchasing, we've done one point five million in a very short period of time and done over eight thousand various orders. So We're very excited about that opportunity. We think it's, you know, it's the wave of the future. And the next thing that we're going to be doing, we're hoping to launch in the spring of twenty twenty one will be in state delivery. So Yeah. We're we're we're fast tracking things. It's pretty progressive for, for a controlled state. I wanna know if that's pretty progressive for a retailer, national retailer. Fair enough. One of the programs that you have segueing away from e commerce is, program with EHA, the Italian trade commission, ICE, and sometimes also called ETAITA. Can you tell us about that relationship? Yeah. You know, as we talked about, Vin Italy was was part of that. I mean, you know, we went to Vin Italy, but not only were we just meeting with producers that we set up appointments with. We did events with the Italian trade commission And one of them just like your book was going to to the market in the US. So we had a we were on a panel and a lot of small producers were asking us questions. We had meetings with various producers that just wanted to ask questions one on one. So we made ourselves available for the Italian trade commission to have us talk to producers that they felt strongly about. One point you made when we had our initial conversation here is You made a comment about, building relationships and working together so that everyone makes money. I think to a degree, the experience of many producers from outside the US is it's just function of price. And, you know, how low can you go. And it sounds like you have a you guys have a more holistic, if you will, perspective on that. That is more than just buying cheap. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, in the end, the consumer is going to dictate what they're gonna pay for our product, you know, and, our partnership has to get us to the fair price. And, also, when we're going to put those items on sale and, you know, regular programming, So the consumers can see that, you know, we're willing to put some money behind these brands. So, you know, there is there is an approach where you have to all work together. So whether it be the POS, you know, we'll we'll need ratings, you know, we'll need all of those things that help sell wine. And, of course, the story is right behind them. You know, the the other thing that that COVID made us do as a as a retailer is that we had to pivot a lot of these events to, you know, online and social media. So we're doing a lot of Facebook lives. I mean, a lot. On a weekly basis, and we we had replaced our major events, the two that I talked about spirits week and wine week with the ninety days around the world. And it was meant to bring the consumers and the producers together to taste and talk about wine together. So we would give them the list of wines that would be talked about, and then they could purchase them prior to their Facebook live. They'd sign up to be able to go to that. And then, of course, we gave them some discounts on those wines after they participated. So, you know, it it is a partnership, and we're all gonna give a little. And but we all do need to make money. So, you know, at some point, we have to decide, is this is this product gonna make it, or is it not gonna make it? How are we gonna what are we gonna do to help it make it? And then we just have those conversations about, alright, what's next? Where do we go? Well, that's great. And and my understanding of the way that the, virtual tastings work is when we think about traditional fam trips, you know, where journalists or buyers are brought on trips and, you know, you're there for a week and you do four or five wineries a day, and it becomes a buzz. You know, you might be able to bring over twenty, max forty. I've been on a couple that are that large, but my understanding of the way the virtual events are, you can have hundreds of people participating in these things. You absolutely can. So the reach is better. Right? So it's The reach is better. The reach is better. The reach is better. And, you know, we've had hundreds of people on some of these events, but, you know, those stay there. So we actually keep them on our website so that consumers can go back and watch them. And we've had thousands and thousands of people go back and watch these events. That's cool. I think it's analogous to something else I see. There's a couple of stores that I know that have extremely, capable writers and who are posting, like, maybe three or four times a week long form and many, many thousands of buyers. And these are people who buy pretty much not exclusively, but specifically from that particular store. So in terms of the power of communications getting involved and associated with a major retailer, like the New Hampshire liquor commission, is, a win win for everybody. Sure is. Sure is. And and we do have a very experienced wine writer on our staff as well. So he's he's putting out he's the educator, of course. So he's putting out an awful lot of information on our behalf. And, you know, our store folks love it, but also the consumers love it. He had a column in one of our our publications that we've done away with and replaced with something else, but he had a fan following like you wouldn't believe. Did you wanna give him a shout out? Gordon Hines does a great job for us. Okay, Gordon. Thank you very much for that. Yeah. One of the major strengths of a big retail network with many, many stores is the ability to strike deals for products that are not just the existing brands that are in the bottles. You wanna talk about that? Correct. Yeah. So on some of those trips that I I had mentioned, in the case of spirits, I talked about Mexico. So our spirits buyer had gone to Mexico and and has gone for a number of years. Either sometimes he goes, sometimes he does doesn't go, but we we taste a bunch of samples of actual single barrels that he selects for our consumers. So we have an entire section dedicated to New Hampshire only Spirit buys, and these are single barrels. So you get to taste them. You purchase them. You have them once. You'll be lucky to go back and find the same bottle for any period of time because when it's gone, it's gone, and you have to wait until the next barrel buys come out. But we do offer a lot of that. We're coming to the end of, of our time allotment, but one of the questions, I wanna ask is the big takeaway. What people who are listening this wanna know, okay. I used to call these when I was, a journalist wrench stories, meaning if you're in the agricultural business that you could read the article, go out and fix the tractor. Right? What is the big takeaway from some of the things that we talked about from you about how people might be able to work with New Hampshire? I think people just need to know that we're open. We're open to have conversations to look at the products that are being offered, determine whether or not it's viable in our system and understand what type of opportunities they have to help us sell these products. So I think that the partnership is really the most important part that we are willing to have, and we're not we're not close my name. We're not going to just say, this is the number, this is the number without you know, talking about how, you know, we think it would best go to market in our market. And as far as consumers go, you've gotta come to New Hampshire and shop if you haven't seen our stores because they're amazing I mean, how many other retails across the United States have a thirty three thousand square foot store dedicated to wine and spirits with an educational center? Yeah. The range of of products that are on offer are significant. Thank you. I think we we buried the lead and you just said it. New Hampshire, the simple way to think about it is it's the open control state. There you go. I love it. You said it. It it was, I I think it's a fabulous line, fabulous line. And and as I think about it, that really makes a whole lot of sense. Without calling anyone to task, there are some other states that, you know, make it a little bit harder to work with because I I know what the the remit is. You've it's also controlling sales of alcohol and preventing abuse and all those kinds of things. So I get that both of those things are important. And that's something that I actually maybe make one last comment if you would about the challenges of promoting drinking the products that you have offered to sell and yet the mandate for the commission itself. Is. Yeah. I mean, you know, we want everyone to consume responsibly. Period. That's, you know, that's how that goes. We want we we definitely have to do both. So we're a retailer and we do enforce the liquor laws but we want people to be responsible and we want to allow them to enjoy it responsibly. I would call that enlightened. I did wanna point out a a couple of things. The the New Hampshire Liquer Commission site is w w w liquor and wine outlets dot com, and they have a bunch of, resources there that you can check out. And there's also a great video on Vimeo. I'm not gonna read the number because no one will retain it, but if you go to Vimeo and look up New Hampshire liquor commission, you'll be able to see it. And see some of the things that they the state commission offers to the trade. So is there anything else you want to, make mention of? You know, we talked about the websites and stuff, but, anything you want to, can I talk about bait and switch? I'd love to hear it. We do not bait and switch. So our programs, you know, the power buy program was put together to, as we talked about, deliver consumers really great products at really great prices and fifty percent off their normal retail price. This is unlike some other retailers that that decide to do private labels. In the case of private labels, you don't necessarily have a sense of place. And when it comes to our power by program, there is a sense of place, and you can tie you can target it to a specific winery and a specific story of that producer. Private labels, sometimes it's very difficult to do because they don't want actually their name out there. So that's some of the programs that New Hampshire has to offer our consumers, and we want we want people to know that we definitely do not bait and switch. We do not get them in with a low price on, let's say, titos, and turn you over to another brand that is close to that specific product. So the New Hampshire Way is let's do the brands. Let's talk to the talk and let's make sure that people understand that we're offering products that are a sense of place and there's people behind them. That sounds like a real New England sense of values. Okay. Thank you to Nicole Brassard Jordan, Deputy Director of New Hampshire liquor Commission. Wonderful to have you along. I think it was a great conversation. I personally enjoyed it immensely. And, I look forward to, seeing you the next time I head up towards near Concord. Likewise, I hope you do reach out, please. You have my email. Let me know when you're coming. Okay. Thanks a lot, Nicole. Alright. Take care, Steve. This is Steve Ray saying thanks again for listening on behalf of the Italian wine podcast.