From previous experience of working with brands, how do they actually select the venues where they want to sell? Do they just go out there kinda like randomly, or do you feel they actually do their homework before entering your city?
Krista Schubert Silva:So So it really depends on the brand, and I've seen both cases happen where there are some brand reps that will kind of go out there willy nilly and not really have a strategy, and they'll just go into the accounts where they have friends. Right? And they're not really selecting them based on a strategy per se. They're just going into where they know people, and it might not be the best fit for the product that they're trying to sell. Now there are some brand ambassadors and sales reps out there that do their research, and they scour the web and they do online desk research before they go out to try to find some good accounts that would fit their brands.
Krista Schubert Silva:The people that come to us to use Overproof, they're able to create target account sets with our software. And that's obviously the easier way to go about it because it saves you a lot of time. It's based on our database and artificial intelligence. So that will save you tons of time doing desk research.
Chris Maffeo:Nice. You know, the brands you work with, obviously, they want to do their homework because otherwise they wouldn't get in touch with you in the first place. But Mhmm. How do they usually select? You know, like, do they go by, I don't know, like, outlet typology?
Chris Maffeo:I talk a lot about segmentation, for example. No? And, you know, on trade segmentation, and there's different ways of segmenting outlets in my opinion. Like, you know, you can take the more kind of like traditional way where you go like pubs, bar, steakhouse, burger joint, Italian restaurant, Chinese restaurant, whatever, and then you name it. Or you can actually go by by target or more like by target occasion.
Chris Maffeo:So, you know, in Italian, not all Italian restaurants are the same. You know, some places have a bar with a terrorist that you can never, I don't know, an aperitivo. Some others are more like kinda like this white and red checkered table cloth with the grandma cooking in the kitchen. Right? So do they have different takes or how do they do that?
Krista Schubert Silva:Yeah. So they might be interested in going to use the Italian restaurant for an example. Right? The strategy let's say I have a gin brand. Right?
Krista Schubert Silva:And I'm trying to get into Italian restaurants that have Negronis on the menu. So I might wanna go into all the Italian restaurants in the area where I know they serve spirits because a lot of Italian restaurants only sell, you know, wine and beer. Right? So Yes. I'm going to create my strategy based on the Italian restaurants that sell spirits.
Krista Schubert Silva:Now that's gonna require me to do a lot of account visits to Italian restaurants, and some people will go about it that way, like going into the field, doing their account visits, or you can, you know, create an account set using a technology where you know exactly where to go before, you know, going into a bunch of Italian restaurants.
Chris Maffeo:So do you see it, let's say like at two kind of tier, you know, like the the first level that, you know, some brands stop at is, okay, Italian restaurant is already enough because I'm not going to steak houses. So I've already streamlined my selection, so to say. And then there's another level when they actually go for, okay, I've got a vermouth brand, so I want to go where Negronis is sold. Yeah.
Krista Schubert Silva:And they might even go a step further to see what other brands are on that menu. Right? So they might be going into accounts and analyzing the menu themselves to see, okay, my competitor, for example, might be Hendrix. I'm going to see if there are any Hendrix gin mentions on this menu before I speak with the, like, beverage director, for example. Right?
Krista Schubert Silva:I wanna see if there are any other modifiers on this menu that go well with my spirit to know if it would be a good fit. Right? So there are different ways that they would go about analyzing the menu to figure out if that restaurant or that bar, that steakhouse, whatever it is would be a good fit for their brands.
Chris Maffeo:And actually, there is a tendency, you know, some bars are are actually happy to to mention brands on the menu. You know, they may use it to elevate the experience of the guests. It's like, okay. I'm not I'm actually mentioning which gin, which vermouth, which bitter is actually going to the Negronis to that example. But then some others don't, you know, they they rather say gin, Negroni, sweet vermouth or whatever, red vermouth.
Chris Maffeo:What's your experience on that? Can you say something about who does or who doesn't? Is it like a premiumness mainstream kind of level of things depending on what which is which, or does it vary?
Krista Schubert Silva:Yeah. It definitely varies depending on, like, what kind of product you're trying to sell and, like, what kind of accounts you're trying to get into. And not only would you be looking at the menu, but you also wanna take a look at their back bar too to see what they have on the back bar. And also what are they serving in the well? Like, that's also important to take into account.
Krista Schubert Silva:Even if they don't have specifically mentioned on the menu, maybe they have branding on the bar. So maybe they have bar mats or branded bar tools for a specific brand. So that can also give you an idea of who their like main supplier is. And that will give you a good pulse on what's what's happening in that account.
Chris Maffeo:It's almost is, but when I enter a bar and I try to check the back bar and try to figure out who are they working with. You know, do they work with a specific wholesaler or do they work with actually like a leading company? You know, do they have a wall of a certain brand? And then you see, okay, what's the next one? And then what's the other one?
Chris Maffeo:And then sometimes like, you know, you almost get there and then it's like, I think it's Bacardi. And then, you know, you you start seeing brands that don't make any sense for Bacardi. And then it's actually, you know, it could be whatever, Brown Forman. But it's interesting because then you can ask educated questions to the bartender, you to understand, okay. How do you make your selection?
Chris Maffeo:It looks like you're working with these guys. What you do and how how you go about it. Right?
Krista Schubert Silva:Correct. And not to, like, toot our own horn or anything, but the beauty of, like, the overproof app is that you would be able to take a photo of the menu and get a real time menu analysis done for you on the phone that will show you who the top suppliers are on that menu, the beverage program breakdown in terms of cocktails, single spirits, modifiers, and, of course, all the brands that are mentioned on that menu broken down by percentage. So you actually get all of that data right there when you walk into that account. Just take a photo of the menu and you can also take note of any branding that you see on the back bar too.
Chris Maffeo:Wow. Okay. This is like a me at 100%.
Krista Schubert Silva:Basically, we took your brain and we put it into our software.
Chris Maffeo:I love that. How does this work? I saw some articles from overproof on LinkedIn some time ago, and I was very interested in getting your view on how cities. Strategies differ from each other, right? Because you know, you may pick different routes.
Chris Maffeo:And I remember when we had our meeting, like a year ago, I can't remember now. Like you could pick some brands and fight against it or escape from it. Right. And what is the most common thing that the brands do in your experience? Do they go and say, like, hey.
Chris Maffeo:I want to be where Hendrix is, or is like, I don't wanna be where Hendrix is?
Krista Schubert Silva:I've seen a toss-up. Honestly, it's it's a bit of both. So some of our brands that we work with are more competitive than others, and some of the smaller brands might wanna go into accounts where there's not a huge competitor already there because they are trying to go away from, like, the bigger fish in the pond. So it really depends on the brand. It goes down to that level.
Krista Schubert Silva:And you mentioned how things might vary across different cities. I think a good example of that would be a California market. So I'll just take LA versus San Francisco as an example. And the top three cocktails on those menus are very different. For the San Francisco market, we have the margarita, which is leading, then the martini, and then the Negroni.
Krista Schubert Silva:But then in the LA market, you have the margarita leading followed by the old fashioned and the martini. So the Negronis is not even popular in Los Angeles whereas it is the second most popular in San Francisco. Now in the LA market, Negroni isn't even in the top 10. So that kinda gives you an idea of how different it is based on city even though they're in the same state.
Chris Maffeo:That's crazy. I would never think that. I would assume that there's more consistency at city level. Right?
Krista Schubert Silva:There is more consistency in other states. So for example, in the Florida market, Miami and the overall Florida market are pretty similar. However, California is very different and depending on, you know, Northern versus Southern California. And it really comes down to the different cultures and the different traditions, the different types of people that are living in those areas, you know?
Chris Maffeo:And this is one of the things that it's always fascinating for me because I'm I'm a big history lover, like my my listeners know that. And I like to always take one category and and take the historical aspects of it. No? Because there's always a traditional occasion and a more modern take on the occasion. No?
Chris Maffeo:So I always use the example, like, a tequila brand starts in a Mexican kind of like heritage environment. So Mexican restaurants, like it's it starts originally from there, like an like an Italian amaro or an Italian aperitivo would be a typical Italian kind of occasion consumption occasion. And then they get elevated and they become like a 5th Avenue or San Francisco kind of like Bay Area drink on a terrace, on a skyscraper. Right? But I feel that very often brands kind of like neglect that historical aspect because they don't want to get too tied to certain traditional occasion.
Krista Schubert Silva:Mhmm.
Chris Maffeo:So you don't want to be perceived like that and you won't automatically go into the fancy cocktail thing. But then like listening to you, you see how it's interconnected and intervined into the culture of each city that you may go for a certain cocktail or may not go.
Krista Schubert Silva:Correct. And I think it is very important to adapt to the local taste even if you wanna do it subtly. Maybe there's a new cocktail that you can create that considers the local taste and the local tradition, the local culture. But, you know, make a twist on it that still honors the tradition of your own brand and maybe the premiumness of your brand, for example.
Chris Maffeo:And how do you see the brands you work with? What take do they take on this? So for example, like if I say my strategy, my target occasion is being in Negronis all across the country. Mhmm. And then I come to you and I speak to you and then all of a sudden you give me this data that in LA Negronis is not a thing.
Chris Maffeo:What do brands do usually? Like, do they take the okay. Like, I'm gonna be the first brand pushing Negronis in LA or do they actually say, no, let's scrap it. You know, let's let's focus on San Francisco. LA is a waste of time.
Krista Schubert Silva:Yeah. So it depends on the mindset of the brand owner. The ones that have, like, a more bold take or a more bold approach on things, they will go for that method of going into a different type of cocktail or even a different market. But if they wanna stick with the Negroni, we might recommend, hey, like Negronis are more popular in San Francisco market. So maybe you should spend your efforts in that market as opposed to another one where there is no popular Negronis, right?
Krista Schubert Silva:So it depends on the brand owner and really what their approach is.
Chris Maffeo:And how do you see, I don't know if you have that data at hand, but like how does it different between if you take like for example, New York versus LA and San Francisco, is New York, in your experience, more similar to LA or more similar to San Francisco or, like, totally different? Like, it's a third kinda, like
Krista Schubert Silva:I I would be able to, look up that data in our market analysis dashboard and share it with you after. Off the top of my head, I don't know.
Chris Maffeo:We can leave it as an additional LinkedIn when we'll post the episode. We'll leave a little bit of a teaser for our listeners because that's it's always fascinating for me how, you know, like what is what, you know, like, terms of occasions. And because at at some point, like, does it happen to you that it's even like at kinda like neighborhood level? It changes, like, I don't know, Brooklyn versus Manhattan or
Krista Schubert Silva:Even within the five, I think it's five boroughs in New York, there is differences in the cocktails. And, like, with the overproof database, not only do you see, like, the main cocktail family, you can even see, like, the cocktail variations. So for example, within like the martini family, you might have an espresso martini, you might have a porn star martini, dirty martini. Right? There's all kinds of different variations that you can see where the differences lie between the different cities, the different regions.
Chris Maffeo:The level of data that you can find. And I mean, I'm a big fan of, you know, the term like niching down and really like going into detail because especially like on craft brands, but also, I mean, on big brands now they all fight each other and there is such proliferation of brands all across the world that you have to be known for something because otherwise you cannot be a jack of all trade because it's just going to be another gin brand, another tequila brand. So you have to differentiate on taste, liquid profile, proposition, pricing, so on. And I think this thing that I'm hearing from you, it's a great way to actually segment it and really go, okay, this is the best, whatever, vodka for espresso martini. You know, to that extreme, enable the conversation kind of thing.
Chris Maffeo:And it doesn't mean that you cannot sell it outside the espresso martini, but you have something to talk about. It's like a foot in the door conversation. And do you feel that they do that? You know, like brands go in that level of depth or they stop much earlier?
Krista Schubert Silva:Yes. And I'm gonna give you the perfect example. So the brand that I was speaking with this morning actually, they have this Earl Grey vodka and it goes well in espresso martinis ironically, right? That's like their target cocktail for that particular vodka product, right? And so they are going into accounts that have espresso martinis, and they're interested in speaking with them and regarding putting their their vodka, their Earl Grey vodka into the espresso martinis.
Krista Schubert Silva:And that just happens to work really well for that one product. So they went in today to an account. They had them make an espresso martini with it and they absolutely loved it. So like and you can get down in in the overproof software to that level, to the espresso martini level and also to the zip code level. So if you wanna create like, an account set of places, venues that have espresso martinis in a certain neighborhood, you can do that.
