Brewbound Podcast: Columbia Distributing Leaders On Building a Next Gen Pipeline of Beer Leaders

[00:00:00] Justin Kendall: Heading to CBC? Kick things off the day before at Brewbound's meetup at Love City Brewing in Philly, Sunday, April 19th from 5 to 7 p.m. Connect with beer industry leaders, grab a drink, and catch up with the Brewbound team. It's free to attend and walking distance from the convention center. Head to Brewbound.com slash lovecity.rsvp. And don't forget to catch the Brewbound team at booth 956 during CBC. How do you set up the next generation for a career in beer? Find out next on the Brewbound Podcast. Hello and welcome to the Brewbound Podcast. I'm Justin Kendall.

[00:00:48] Jessica Infante: I'm Jessica Infante.

[00:00:50] Zoe Licata: And I'm Zoe Licata.

[00:00:51] Justin Kendall: And how are we doing on this post Labor Day Tuesday? Which might be Thursday by the time you're listening to this.

[00:00:59] Jessica Infante: We are doing, I think. I'm sad. I don't want summer to be over. It's not for like three more weeks. Yeah.

[00:01:07] Justin Kendall: It lives on in your heart.

[00:01:11] Jessica Infante: The real summer was the friends we made along the way.

[00:01:15] Zoe Licata: people who have small children.

[00:01:18] Justin Kendall: One that just started school.

[00:01:20] Jessica Infante: Yeah. Welcome to the school life, Justin. I really hope you're taking vitamin C supplements.

[00:01:26] Justin Kendall: Yeah, right.

[00:01:27] Jessica Infante: You're going to need them.

[00:01:28] Justin Kendall: I like how, you know, we're talking about careers and stuff. She's three years old. She has no idea. Her thing that she wants to be when she grows up is nothing.

[00:01:39] Jessica Infante: And to contextualize this, Justin shared a photo of Sophie on her first day holding her first day of school board and under what I want to be when I grow up. She literally had nothing.

[00:01:48] Justin Kendall: It was great. The word nothing.

[00:01:51] Jessica Infante: An icon. Yeah. Frankly, me too, Sophie. Yeah.

[00:01:57] Justin Kendall: So how were your Labor Day? Did you do anything special? I feel like Don Henley's playing in the background here, like the boys of summer, you know, like nobody on the beach.

[00:02:10] Jessica Infante: Do you need me to tell the story?

[00:02:11] Justin Kendall: Yeah, let's do it.

[00:02:12] Jessica Infante: Well, I feel as though on this space, you've previously heard me say I really wanted a solo beach day. And a little bit before that, earlier in the summer, when Zoe and I were talking about mass whole lager, I talked about how much I love seagulls. this weekend I discovered they don't love me back. I finally got my solo beach day on Sunday. This Sunday was like the most Sunday Sunday of all time. August is the Sunday of months to start with. And then have August 31st be on a Sunday and September 1st be the day after. Oh, it was just like kind of cruel. But I went to the beach. I was very excited. I pre-ordered a sandwich at this cafe I had been wanting to try. Customized the sandwich. It was really good. It was like roasted chicken on sourdough with avocado. Whatever, whatever. Sitting on the beach, listening to a podcast about a scammer influencer, minding my own business, having a great day. It was a beautiful day. Start to eat the second half of the sandwich. I pick it up. I'm about to take a bite. And all of a sudden, like my beach chair, like it's like hit. And I was, oh, did somebody throw a football at me? And then all of a sudden I felt like my index finger gets scratched. And I said, what is this? And then I realized it was the seagull. dive-bombing me from behind, taking the sandwich half from my hand, and then flying. He landed on the ground right in front of me. And then all the other seagulls started fighting over it. And the worst part is I was alone, which was the best part about the beach day. But there's a group of people sitting in front of me, a group of people sitting behind me. You know when something awkward happens to you when you're by yourself, you trip and you don't know what to do? Because if you have someone with you, you can laugh about it. But these people are like, Oh my God. And I was like, Oh my God. But then I had no one to talk about it with. I was alone dealing with the thievery of my sandwich and how I like, I thought I was going to die out there. I like really, I have a scrape on my finger and my, like told my family about it via a voice note, as I've just done for you guys. And my brothers and sisters-in-law told me it was the most they had laughed in maybe years. And then I sent a picture of my finger and my mom was like, you should get a tetanus shot. I'm still here. It doesn't appear infected. I think I'm okay. How do you feel about seagulls now? You know what? Respect the game. It was a good sandwich.

[00:04:34] Justin Kendall: Did you have the other half of the sandwich?

[00:04:36] Jessica Infante: No, I'd eaten the first half. So this was half two. If I didn't get any of sandwich, I would be really mad.

[00:04:43] Columbia Distributing: Rightfully so.

[00:04:44] Jessica Infante: Right? Shout out to Googan's Galley of Essex, Massachusetts. Your sandwiches are good. I only wish I'd gone to eat more of it.

[00:04:52] Justin Kendall: Seagull approved.

[00:04:54] Jessica Infante: Seagull approved. I mean, let's be real. They would eat trash. I've seen them eat trash. You know what? Like honestly, if I can contribute to the health and wellbeing of the seagull population of Ipswich, Massachusetts, then they don't eat plastic. I guess I did a good. Is that a good thing? Can you just say a good blank out of the mouth? I think you can. I'm just thinking about how that sandwich cost like $15. And those seagulls stole $7.50 from me. Oh my God. And that's seagull story time. I'm sorry for your trauma. Thank you. I appreciate it. Somebody else was like, how has this never happened to you in your life? And I was like, well, usually I'm pretty good about this. Like I know they go into empty chip bags or abandoned chip bags. This sandwich was actively being consumed. It was in my hand, about to enter my mouth. I'm lucky I have all 10 fingers.

[00:05:50] Justin Kendall: It's a bold move by the seagull.

[00:05:53] Jessica Infante: How are your weekends? Not as dangerous and risky, I guess.

[00:06:02] Zoe Licata: The usual annual block party and cornhole tournament. Me and my partner did terrible this year. We were out within two games.

[00:06:11] Jessica Infante: Oh, that's random pairings, right?

[00:06:13] Zoe Licata: Yeah. Yeah. But it was also, I was rusty. I haven't played a single cornhole game all year. So I am definitely partially to blame for our performance.

[00:06:22] Jessica Infante: What were the people drinking?

[00:06:24] Zoe Licata: A lot of suncruisers, which was a new addition this year. Still a lot of high noons and a decent amount of make old shows instead of Bud Lights.

[00:06:36] Jessica Infante: Is that driven by the culture or is that just driven by the tides? It's a good question.

[00:06:42] Zoe Licata: I think it has a lot to do with the make old show marketing of like this is kind of a little bit better for you, more premium product, won't make you feel gross type stuff. Yeah. It seems everyone is maturing a little bit to Milk Ultra instead of the Bud Lights of their even younger youth. Not any like political stances. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:07:05] Justin Kendall: Yeah. I saw weapons.

[00:07:08] Jessica Infante: Weapons?

[00:07:10] Justin Kendall: Weapons.

[00:07:11] Jessica Infante: Yeah. I could have used one on the beach.

[00:07:15] Justin Kendall: I saw the movie.

[00:07:20] Zoe Licata: not weapons weapons, but did you go to a gun fair?

[00:07:27] Justin Kendall: I mean, it's possible in Iowa.

[00:07:28] Zoe Licata: Yeah. How was weapons? The movie was good.

[00:07:32] Justin Kendall: It's really good. I don't want to say anything that would spoil it because I went in spoiler free. Even the commercials don't really give away what's going on here. So you just kind of know that these kids have disappeared, but you don't know what's up.

[00:07:48] Jessica Infante: What is your movie snack?

[00:07:51] Justin Kendall: Popcorn for sure. We got M&Ms. Normally I would probably get Twizzlers. That's my movie snack. What do you take?

[00:07:59] Jessica Infante: Oh, popcorn and a Diet Coke.

[00:08:01] Justin Kendall: Yeah.

[00:08:02] Jessica Infante: Lots of butter on mine. Oh, totally. Do you know about the straw trick? Uh-uh. Oh, so get your popcorn bucket, get a straw, put it into the popcorn. And then when you go up to the butter dispenser, pour it into the straw and then it gets to the bottom and then move the straw around and it gets all over.

[00:08:18] Justin Kendall: Look at that pro tip.

[00:08:20] Jessica Infante: I am full of them. I'm a great fat kid.

[00:08:23] Justin Kendall: I've been waiting to see this movie, so I'm very happy that I got to see it before it got spoiled for me. Yeah. That was my end of summer, you know, preparing a three-year-old for preschool that she didn't want to go to.

[00:08:36] Zoe Licata: And what's the verdict? Is it good?

[00:08:39] Justin Kendall: I mean, she came out bawling. We'll try again in two days.

[00:08:44] Jessica Infante: Yeah. She'll be fine. Yeah.

[00:08:46] Justin Kendall: She said she had fun. Good. They don't play the music she likes, but she likes Pink Pony Club.

[00:08:51] Zoe Licata: Yeah, I don't know if all the parents would be into Pink Pony Club No, obviously not Kids do love Pink Pony Club though.

[00:09:03] Justin Kendall: Yeah Yeah, they're big into the Chapel run hot to go. Oh, I'm playing hot to go at preschool Definitely not on the corner here in Iowa Hopefully she isn't too scarred from preschool day one.

[00:09:18] Jessica Infante: She'll be fine.

[00:09:19] Justin Kendall: Yeah. Yeah, I Well, we have some guests this week. Zoe, you did an interview. And why don't you bring us up to speed on who's going to be joining us?

[00:09:29] Zoe Licata: Yeah, we have three esteemed guests on the podcast this week. We had a fun conversation with Chris DeFonsi, who is the President and CEO of Columbia Distributing, who has been doing this program for over 10 years now called their Beer Careers Program. It's a paid internship program. where they bring on like around six students a year to work at Columbia. They kind of go throughout the different business areas of the company and learn what it's like to work in the beer industry, to operate a beer distributor. And joining Chris for that conversation was two people who've participated in that program. Chris Watzig, who was a part of the 2015 class. He is now the VP of sales for Columbia's Portland division. So he continued on with the company afterwards. And then Rebecca Logan, who was a part of this most recent 2025 cohort. So the three of them got to talk about what the program is like, what the process of getting into the program is like, which is quite an intense process. They go through this big, almost like a shark tank style process, and they go through numerous panels pitching who they are and what they can do. Chris talked about this one test he does where he basically just puts a water bottle in front of them and says, here, sell me this water bottle. And Rebecca, who is from Ireland, said, I can sell you a Guinness. And so she basically pretended it was a Guinness. Portland Chris said that kind of sealed the deal. So it's a cool program that is trying to basically encourage people to get into the beer industry. And there's been a lot of folks who have stayed on through that program. So we had a fun conversation about why Columbia's even interested in investing in this and how the students who've participated in it, how their knowledge of the industry has changed and how it's kind of benefiting Columbia more recently because of that. So he said there's a lot of information that students know now more about just data and analytics that have been really helpful to the company because that's just such a larger part of what they're learning in school now. So fun chat that you'll hear later on in this episode.

[00:11:43] Justin Kendall: Stay tuned for that. We also have Brewbound Live that's coming up December 10th and 11th in Marina Del Rey, California. Tickets are available now, so head over to brewboundlive.com. You can see who's going to be speaking so far this year. We're adding speakers pretty much every week at this point, and we'll have a lot more information on that very soon. Let's hop into the news before we get to that featured interview. Sierra Nevada shared its distributor meeting last week, and we got a look at their strategy for 2026, as well as some new brands coming to market very soon. And they are running on a core four philosophy with Hazy Little Thing being the top priority. Pale Ale, of course, is right up there with it. And then they've got their burgeoning non-alc portfolio with trail pass and hop splash, and then pills, which launched this year on draft is rolling out in package. Now that was specialty. What is it like 8.4 ounce cans?

[00:12:46] Zoe Licata: Yeah. Delicious beer, or at least the iteration that they shared without telling us the name last year at their distributor meeting was very delicious.

[00:12:55] Justin Kendall: Very jealous, very jealous. Probably have to wait till NBWA to try it, but it's rolling out in a lot of retailers with the fall resets. They have a lot of chain retailers, a lot of grocery focus, some convenience in there, of course, Total Wine. Yeah, we talked about new products they have coming modern West coast IPA. That's coming in four packs of 16 ounce cans. And it's hitting those core markets where that package type really performs well. So Zoe and Jess are likely to get it in new England. Me in Iowa, not so much. I'm guessing.

[00:13:38] Jessica Infante: I'm sorry for your troubles.

[00:13:39] Justin Kendall: Yeah, I was very, very, very shocked that West ghost was a name that I mean, we talked to Ellie Pressler and price green now on Tuesday morning. And we mentioned that during the call, and they said they've been using this in the taproom for quite a while.

[00:13:58] Jessica Infante: Yeah, Ellie said they had trademarked it, so yeah, that's why you've never seen it. But Price, fan of the pod, shout out to him.

[00:14:05] Justin Kendall: Yeah, I love the branding on this. You know, it's got the the ghost, the 1980s nostalgia and neon feel. We're heading into spooky season.

[00:14:14] Jessica Infante: It doesn't look anything like anything else that they make.

[00:14:18] Justin Kendall: Exactly. And I think that's a fun thing because they're going after, uh, a new area they've never played in, uh, eight and a half share of craft is in that format. I thought that that was an interesting play, but they're also doing a lot of IPA too, with the, this sort of innovation cycle following pills. It's spring fest. IPA is going to be their new spring seasonal. That's, uh, going to be a bit of a tribute to farmers.

[00:14:48] Jessica Infante: Yeah. It was interesting to me to see that in your coverage of all of their stuff. And then we didn't get to it when we talked to them, but Q1 for seasonals is so hard. It's so hard to figure out like a beer and a theme and a message that can play across the whole country. So I'll be interested to see how this one does because they're able to do it without really acknowledging the season, you know, it's hard to make people who live in warm weather want a winter beer. And it's hard to do the opposite too.

[00:15:18] Justin Kendall: They do so well with the other seasonals that they have, you know, Oktoberfest, Celebration. I want to say Summerfest, right? their other lager beer. I mean, those are all staples. In a time where seasonals are really struggling, that portfolio is doing well. So if they're able to tap into spring, which as you laid out, we have seen many companies like try and fail in spring.

[00:15:45] Jessica Infante: Yeah. Well, you know, like we, something we've seen this year is that Allagash's seasonal portfolio is doing really well, which is great, but they don't even bother with the spring because how the heck do you do it? Which I think is smart too.

[00:15:57] Justin Kendall: I want to say that Sierra Nevada stepped back from spring. I think they did. Maybe I'm memory blocking something, but it feels like it.

[00:16:06] Jessica Infante: Well, and seasonal is also like the second biggest craft style after IPA. So it makes sense to have something in there. You're not just seeding it to your competitors.

[00:16:17] Justin Kendall: Seasonal has become even more challenged, though, with everything that's gone on at Walmart with the UPCs and just having a major retailer not want to have rotators on there.

[00:16:28] Zoe Licata: Yeah.

[00:16:28] Justin Kendall: Just makes it even more challenging.

[00:16:30] Zoe Licata: Yeah. I am most excited from all the Sierra news that their non-elk Bruweza is going to be in a standalone pack. I have been begging for this to happen since I tried it last year, and it's only been available in their variety pack. So it's finally happening next year and I'm ecstatic.

[00:16:48] Justin Kendall: And she is not lying because that's the first thing that she said after we were talking about some of the new products coming out and said something about Ruveza being in a standalone. I was like, well, you're in luck. There are six packs on the way.

[00:17:02] Zoe Licata: Very excited. It's a non-alcoholic Mexican inspired beer and it is delicious. I think about it quite often.

[00:17:09] Justin Kendall: That's high praise. They've got a juicy IPA that's coming to that portfolio as well. They mentioned on the call that they have become the number two craft non-ALK portfolio. That happened within the last week or so, or by the time you're hearing this, a couple of weeks, but they said that they have around a 6-6 share. It's pretty close after that. I mean, we're talking decimal points separating folks. And then ahead of that is a monster hill to climb with Athletic and their 50 plus share. Wild. Yeah. Well, we will have more from Price and Ellie on Brewbound.com this week. You can look for that. You can look for our previous coverage of this. We've got two stories already out on the distributor meeting, so we'll have that follow up like I mentioned, but We also have a story up on Constellation's lower guidance, and we don't have to go into the whole numbers of what's up, what's down, but this is pretty significant coming out from one of the top brewers out there who has definitely been challenged with everything that's going on in the macroeconomic environment with tariffs. as well as just the crackdown on immigration and raids and just the amount of fear that is out there that has led to a reduced number of occasions and shopping trips.

[00:18:33] Jessica Infante: Yeah, this was really interesting to come back to from my week away, hanging out with my toddler. But yeah, Constellation's revising their guidance and we're two months out from their Q1 earnings report in which they, Zoe, you very helpfully called out and you wrote it in your story about it back then. But they said that they were very confident in their guidance back then. So obviously things have changed. The timing of this press release hit in the morning before their CEO Bill Newlands and CFO Garth Hankinson speak at the Barclays Consumer Products Conference, which is going to be like right now, basically. So more to come on this for sure. just bad stuff. They are projecting down 4% to down 2% for beer net sales. To hear that from Constellation should be jarring, because Justin, you talked about all of the things that are affecting one of their biggest consumer constituencies, but also they've been pretty insulated from the rest of the beer industry's declines. So now they've got that plus what's going on with immigration rates and all of that. Like these are two pretty big storms for this beer portfolio to handle. And yet they're still gaining volume share.

[00:19:43] Justin Kendall: Which tells you the state of the category.

[00:19:46] Jessica Infante: Exactly. Yeah.

[00:19:49] Justin Kendall: Constellation Brands long been a bright spot within the beer category. And the fact that their headwinds this year are mostly created by an administration coming into power. I mean, you look at tariffs, you look at immigration, you look at crackdowns there. I mean, it is absolutely affected what had been one of the top five brewers, top two, who was actually growing.

[00:20:18] Zoe Licata: Yeah. I mean, I remember when, during their last earnings call, when they had kind of doubled down on their guidance, they had mentioned The reason why they were still confident in it is because they didn't see significant changes in consumer behavior enough to have that big of an impact on their guidance. And it seems like that's not really the case anymore. It seems like any of those consumer behavior changes, whether it's Hispanic consumers or just consumers overall, are actually sticking and they're not a temporary thing. It's something that really plagued Constellation Brands a lot of beer companies through Q2 and continued through the summer.

[00:20:55] Justin Kendall: You can read all about that. We'll have additional coverage, as Jess said, of the Barclays back to school meeting. Is that what they call it? Back to school? Yeah. That's how it feels. They do call it back to school. I love that. Yeah. Barclays back to school. I'm almost certain of it. Oh, cute. With that, let's get to our featured interview with Columbia Distributing.

[00:21:18] Zoe Licata: We have a handful of guests with us on this episode that are going to be talking about a really exciting program that is trying to encourage people to get into the beer industry, learn about what's going on in the industry and give people opportunities to start Beer Careers. This is something that I learned about earlier this year, and we've been plotting and planning to have this conversation for a few months now. So finally excited to get this all out to you. So first joining us is the President and CEO of Columbia Distributing, Chris Steffanci. Welcome, Chris.

[00:21:50] Brewbound Podcast: Thanks for having me, Zoe.

[00:21:52] Zoe Licata: Yeah. Portland Chris is here with a couple of folks who have participated in Columbia's Beer Careers program. We're going to talk about what that is and what that entails. But first, a former member of that program is Chris Watzig, who is now VP of sales for the Portland area. Welcome, Chris.

[00:22:11] Columbia Distributing: Hey, Zoe. Happy to be on here.

[00:22:13] Zoe Licata: And then we also have a participant in one of the most recent rounds of the internship. So someone who can talk about what it looks like now and what people even think about the beer industry in 2025. So welcome, Rebecca Logan. Welcome, Rebecca. Hi Zoe, thank you for having me. Thank you guys for joining. I think the best place to start is I am familiar now with what this program is, but most people listening don't. Chris, do you want to give us just kind of the quick elevator pitch? What is this Beer Careers program that Columbia started?

[00:22:47] Brewbound Podcast: Yeah, absolutely. You know, we as a distributor have really two things that matter the most to our business. We have brands, right? We have this awesome portfolio of brands and beer, wine, spirits, and non-alcoholic products. And then we have people. Those are really the two big assets that we have. We value both of them. And several years ago, really about 12 years ago now, we started thinking about how do we continue to look at a people strategy that will continue to elevate our organization, continue to allow us to bring in great talent, How do you start seeing who the next future leaders are going to be in the organization. And you know we thought actually starting this kind of Beer Careers internship program was an awesome way to really go out and interact with young men and young women coming out of college. Great opportunity to get a fresh perspective. You know those of us who been in the industry a long time, like myself. Sometimes you get a bit jaded. Always nice to have a fresh set of eyes. And having people coming directly out of school, right, they're highly engaged. By the way, they're newer consumers for our brands. They're really high into technology and IT. They really understand that world. You know, I didn't grow up with social media when I was their age and, you know, dating myself. But it really is a great opportunity. And they really infuse this awesome kind of new young energy into the business. So we thought it was a great opportunity. We kind of tested it for a year. We love the model. We love the people we interacted with. And I think, you know, having both Chris and Rebecca Logan this program give a great view of somebody who's went through the program. Chris has had an amazing amount of success coming out of your careers. I mean, one of the most talented individuals in our whole company. I had the chance to sit on one of the panels that interviewed Rebecca. She was awesome, an absolute star in the interview process, which is a long day. And she just came off of an awesome internship with us, and she did incredibly well.

[00:24:40] Zoe Licata: Yeah, there is a cool part of this, right, where it's not just giving an internship to folks that maybe want to start Beer Careers. You're getting some benefits too as a company. It's helping improve your operations as well, which is a really fun part of it. Chris Watzig, you did this program 10 years ago now. How did you even discover what this program was and made you want to participate in it?

[00:25:05] Columbia Distributing: Yeah, yeah, it's been 10 years. It's funny. I've been on the panels ever since. Chris was actually on my panel 10 years ago interviewing me, which by the way, from the get go is pretty cool that, you know, you get into this intense 10 panel interview, you go through 10 rounds, we take really more seriously than maybe some executive searches, to be honest, for trying to find the best of the best out of colleges. But, you know, 10 years ago, I actually stumbled on it. It was kind of funny. We actually were I was interviewing out of Portland State for a procurement job with a company called Columbia, which at first I thought was Columbia Sportswear. You know, I'd never heard of Columbia Distributing the beer company being from Portland Chris thought this might have been a sportswear gig. I got through a couple of rounds of interviews to be a buyer on the procurement side, having a supply chain degree out of Portland State. I remember after getting through a couple of those rounds of interviews, a recruiter from Columbia actually said, hey, we have another program going on in a month that you might want to take a shot on. It's going to require you to move to Seattle. You're in Portland Chris now. You've got to move into Seattle. It's this rotational internship program. No guarantee on a job afterwards. However, the best of the best through the program get a role. So you have this buyer position in front of you, or you could take the jump and move to Seattle. What do you think? I thought about it, and I jumped. I went up to Seattle, and I actually hopped on a plane basically the next day, did a 10-panel interview with 10 different folks, got through that, and eventually landed a spot in an operation-sided six-month internship called Beer Careers. And at that point, it was relatively new. I think it was only a year or two into the program at that point, so still being developed at that point in time. But 10 years later, I am so glad that I made that leap of faith up into Seattle. Back in Portland Chris days for a variety of different roles over the last 10 years, starting mostly in operations, floating through a lot of different roles in the organization, and now I'm ending up on the sales side as Vice President of Sales. It's been a pretty cool career. A lot of it, though, I take back to, had I not been in that six-month rotation at the start of my career to build a strong network, interact with all the sides of the business before really jumping into a final career, I don't think I'd be where I'm at today. So I feel super fortunate.

[00:27:08] Zoe Licata: Yeah, Chris, you really have kind of like a storybook, just years following of just like the ideal journey from starting that internship to where you are now and just continuing to be throughout this industry. And we're going to dive into that more in a little bit. But I would like to hear from Rebecca, too. How did you find out about this program?

[00:27:27] Chris Steffanci: So I went to Oregon State and every year they have the career fair so it was during the winter and I knew I wanted to get an internship for the summer. I studied business administration so it's a little bit more open because I thought if I want to go into the business world but I don't know really what I'm good at so I wanted to be more broad. and then I saw them at the career fair and I heard about this 9-10 week program and it really stood out to me because you got to experience all parts of the business so I thought with my degree it would let me get a taste of everything and yeah it really did so yeah I did the panel interview and it was a lot but it was a really really good experience to be interviewed by a lot of people and yeah it was great.

[00:28:10] Zoe Licata: Chris Steffanci, can you walk us through what this panel that we're talking about is? What is that process like for folks trying to get into this program?

[00:28:18] Brewbound Podcast: Yeah, you know, it's having never been on the other side of it. I like being the interviewer, not the interviewee. As Chris Wassick said, it is a long day. So basically what we do is we bring in all of our senior team. So our top executives, our VP level. And honestly, it's something that, you know, typically there's things we have to do in our job on a regular basis. Sometimes you kind of hum and haw, it's not your favorite. This is one of my favorite things to do in the year. And by the way, we get everybody to volunteer. So we either all ascend on Portland Chris Seattle. We kind of alternate every other year and we bring in all of the candidates and we set up literally different rooms with panel interviews. So we have anywhere from three to five interviewers in a room and kind of look at it like speed dating a little bit where literally you're going from room to room. And the way we set it up internally is we have each room focus on kind of different capabilities, right? So we'll have one room that'll specialize in talking a bit more about kind of your background, what are some of the activities you did in school, what defines you as a person. We may have another room that really dives into culture and leadership and asks a lot of questions about that, right? The interesting thing about the panel process is because you have young people coming right out of school, there's not a lot of work experience, right? Most of them have, you know, anywhere from 20 to 23 years of life experience. And so that's the part I actually really like, because it's not a stereotypical, you get the people who are overly coached in an interview. And, you know, when you ask them about strengths and weaknesses, they turn a weakness into a strength. That's all the normal interview stuff. The life experiences that these young people have are amazing. And I love it, right? How they've, decisions they've made and where they've had to live. You know, some come from military families and why they made decisions to go to certain colleges. So for me, it's really interesting. And so they'll spend the entire day rotating around all of those panels. I'm sure it's very nerve wracking because it's only about 15 minutes or 20 minutes per room. And then they go out and then we go through, literally at the end, we go through a draft. We put up people's pictures. We talk about, we rate them all on scores. So we score them on all of these different skill sets and capabilities. And then we have our senior ops and sales people in the room. And honestly, our candidate pool usually is so good. We have people actually fighting over different candidates. I can tell you both having interviewed both Chris and Rebecca, they were two that were definitely one of the highest rated. And one that a lot of people were fighting over of kind of who which department was going to get access to kind of help mentor them through the program. So it is not for the faint of heart. It's a long day. Some people manage it really well. Some come in sweating bullets nervous. We try to calm people down. I never really say my title. I don't want to make anybody I'm more nervous. I'm not a big title person anyway. I'd rather be kind of one of the group, but the way they manage it and the way they actually go through it and how they handle the questions is even more important than actually what they say or what they use for examples.

[00:31:17] Zoe Licata: Chris and Rebecca, what was that process like for you? Not to put you on the spot in front of Stefansi over here, but how were you feeling during that whole process?

[00:31:27] Columbia Distributing: I guess I'll take it first. You know, I remember 10 years ago, Chris was sitting in the corner office. So there was no mistaking whose room I was walking into. However, you know, I kind of had a feeling this was going to happen. I, at the time we sold the cider called six cider and it was intense. He, he pulls it, throws it in front of me. He says, sell me this bottle of cider. And I'm like, Oh my God, here we go. Every room is different though. And you know, I remember I can still remember my pitch. I won't give it right now, but I still remember that pitch. And by the way, I think Those different interviews that we did over that course of the day have really stuck with me, just not only from being able to network day one with not only Chris, who runs the whole organization, but folks in IT, folks in routing, folks in sales. It was an intense day, but afterwards, you build a bond with that interview panel that lasts with you the rest of your career. I still think about that bottle of six cider every once in a while when I talk to Chris.

[00:32:18] Chris Steffanci: Yeah, for me, I was definitely nervous. There was like, I think three or four rounds that day. So I was in the first round and there was about eight of us. So yeah, you can tell everyone was a bit nervous. But yeah, going around each room, we were interviewed about a different topic. And again, yeah, the first one, I was very nervous. But the more you got to talk to people and hear more about Columbia, and I really liked the like team aspect and everything of it all that like I left. Although I was nervous and everything I left like I would love to have this internship and yeah I remember when Chris interviewed me he again threw a bowl of water in front of me and was like Salas to me but I said could I pretend it was a Guinness or something else and I pitched him a Guinness.

[00:32:59] Brewbound Podcast: Which by the way is my favorite beer of all time.

[00:33:02] Zoe Licata: There we go. That's why you got the job. So the reason why we were really interested in talking about this is because there's a lot of things going on in the beer industry right now, but one portion of it is just getting people interested in working in the industry, in potentially just learning more about the industry, why they should be involved in it. Krista Fonsi, how have you seen the people who are coming in for this internship, their knowledge of just the industry in general evolved through the program? What did it look like when you were first starting out? What does it look like now in 2025?

[00:33:38] Brewbound Podcast: Yeah, it's changed a lot. I'll give you an example. I graduated college and wasn't really sure what I wanted to do. I had the opportunity to go work for Gala Wine. And I think for me, coming out of school is like, oh, well, I knew what I was good at in college. Drinking was one of them. Thought that would be a great opportunity to do something. People say, go do things that you're good at. I was like, I'm pretty good at this. So I'm going to go give it a shot. I think where it's evolved, Zoe, a lot is, I mean, again, young people coming out of college right now, right? Not only the level of, interaction with social media. They're so much more worldly now than when I came out of school because of what they're exposed to. So it really is night and day different 20 years later where, you know, while I think certainly there's a little bit of the joke aspect of, hey, I love to have a beer, this will be really fun. But they're way more inquisitive about how the overall industry works. They come in understanding the three-tier system, certainly way more than I ever did, right? And really understanding what a distributor really does And then ultimately how product comes from a brewery or a winery or distillery, the role that a retailer ultimately plays. So the thing I'm most impressed with is because of the access to information now through social media, they're so much more educated about what this industry really is. I came in completely blind to not really understanding any of it. And I think it really kind of set me back. I had to kind of, you know, really dig in in a really different way. And because of this access to information, I think it's great. You know, I love this industry. I've been in it my whole career. And one of the things I find really well with our interns that are really successful, like both Chris and Rebecca, the socialization part, Zoe, as you know, of this industry is the best, right? You know, our brands and products get to bring people together in a social way that not a lot of other industries really get to do, right? There's this really great social interaction that really plays well in the Columbia culture as well. So it is just so different watching the evolution of people coming into this industry, the excitement you see, and again, the experience and information they have allows them to actually get up and running a lot quicker in our organization, I think, than a lot of us did, you know, 10 or 20 years ago.

[00:35:46] Zoe Licata: That's pleasantly surprising to hear. I don't think you would necessarily expect that folks would be super familiar with kind of the crazy world that is the three-tier system at all and to know that people are aware of it. It was really cool to hear. Chris Watzig, what was your knowledge base of what the beer industry was like when you first started?

[00:36:08] Columbia Distributing: You know that was 10 years ago. And I think gosh like I said I think I was originally thinking I was applying for Columbia Sportswear 10 years ago. Oh what's this. You know Columbia to shooting thing. And again this was before we even had a major social media presence. So I remember like Googling what this whole thing was and you know very quickly being able to kind of see what that history was back going going back to the 1920s. Not a ton. I remember telling my friends like, hey, I'm working for a beer distributor. And they're like, that sounds cool. But what is that? Yeah, these days, it's not quite the same. A lot of the folks coming into your point, Chris is, you know, they've got a lot more knowledge around what distribution is from the folks that are coming through the program. We found a lot more like supply chain background, a lot more analytics background. I remember 10 years ago, I was one of maybe the only one that actually have call it an ops focus. Generally, we got a lot of sales folks coming in through the program and hearing about it through their colleges and things. I was one of few ops focused folks that were coming into the program. These days, it's almost 90% ops and 10% sales. So I think just what people are studying in college these days have also shined a bit more of a light on what distribution is versus even 10 years ago.

[00:37:17] Zoe Licata: Rebecca, you obviously had the business knowledge from what you're learning in school, but what did you know specifically about how the beer industry worked or how beer distribution worked before?

[00:37:28] Chris Steffanci: Yeah, well, I came, I'm from Northern Ireland. So we do it like a little bit different. But yeah, moving to America, I noticed everything's done differently. But yeah, I definitely I knew that you couldn't just sell it like directly to like a bar restaurant, because I would always see, I live in Corvallis, I'd always see these Columbia trucks going by and I was wondering what they were. But yeah, I definitely had to do more research in what goes actually into the three-tier system. But yeah, again, we do a lot more like supply chain classes and stuff in school. So I was able to learn more of that in my class.

[00:38:03] Zoe Licata: Back to you, Chris Watzig. You stayed within Biera. You now have had this evolution throughout the company. What made you want to continue to work in Biera after you were done with the program?

[00:38:16] Columbia Distributing: Yeah, 100 percent. I mean, again, It starts with the culture of this organization. I mean not only just the industry but you know coming in. I'd had a couple of different internships before this. You know going to college a couple of different jobs that worked in the hotel industry for a little while while I was in college. You know immediately just attracted just such a strong and connected culture of Columbia specifically. And once you get exposed to what the broader industry looks like I mean If more people knew about this, I'm telling you, we would have more people in the pipeline, right? That's one of the things about a B2B business like the one that we're in, it's hard to find folks. Everyone thinks Nike or Columbia, or again, as you think about Portland specifically, a lot of B2C, but boy, there's so much to offer. not only just within the culture of Columbia, but within career tracking. Now, if you kind of think about the career track that I've taken, starting off by being able to see all the departments within the organization and what kind of opportunities you can pivot to, we are a wide organization with a lot of opportunity. And I think I'm an example of that, right? Having started in basically an internship, moving into a day warehouse supervisor role, moving into night warehouse leadership roles, Moving into Portland a couple of years after that as a warehouse director and then in 2023 getting a chance taken on me to move over into the sales organization as a general manager and eventually a VP of sales. I don't think you see that in normal corporate America. That's something that Columbia has to offer and I think other distributors have to offer within our category that you don't see anywhere else. As I talked to a lot of my friends that graduated with me 10 years ago, they're, you know, in their first or second role still, still kind of grinding it out. Whereas I've been able to really see a lot of different parts of the business and elevate very quickly. It's been amazing. I mean, this is definitely a lifetime role for me, hopefully.

[00:40:01] Zoe Licata: Rebecca, you were kind of nodding your head and agreeing when Chris was talking about just the knowing about how this actually operates. What did you learn once you started this program that maybe surprised you or that you were just excited to see how all these things operate?

[00:40:16] Chris Steffanci: Yeah, I was like, taken back of how much actually gets, goes into getting it on the shelf, like all the different departments we got to work with, and like so many people telling us what goes into it. And yeah, we got the hands on experience to like understand why sales does that or why routing does that. And again, yeah, I don't think a lot of people understand like, what goes into these roles and because like even my friends and stuff are doing internships they hear what I was doing every day and they were like so jealous of all the different experiences I got to have and yeah working even like with the supplier side and yeah it's visiting accounts and the warehouse everything that went into it I was blown away.

[00:40:58] Zoe Licata: Chris Steffanci, a lot of people are probably listening to this and thinking, oh, this is really cool, but how do you get folks to stick around once you've kind of invested this much time in teaching them how things work and giving them this knowledge? What have you found really motivates people to have almost like that loyalty afterwards?

[00:41:18] Brewbound Podcast: Yeah, listen, it's hard. I mean, I'd love to be able to say everybody's went through this program. It's worked out great. We hired them. I mean, this is a massive investment on our side. And we still, you know, at the end of the day, more people don't either come to work here or more people leave than stay. But the way we view it is if you can get a Chris Wasick, you can get a Rebecca, it makes up for those, you know, who either decide it's not the right fit, right? Listen, those of us who are in this industry, Zoe, as you know, love this business. A lot of us stay in it a really long time. But like anything else, it's not for everybody. Listen, these internships, they're not easy. These guys are coming in and they're working night warehouse. They're on trucks at 4 a.m. It's not glamorous. I joke a little bit where, you know, people think they're going to come in and sit in executive meetings and go to nice lunches. This is real hard work. This is roll up your sleeves. You're putting cases away on shelves. You're working 4th of July weekend. It's really, really busy. So, you know, we get a great group of people in. It doesn't work out for everybody, but those where it does work out, as Chris said, you can have this awesome career opportunity. So, you know, for us, it's kind of a game of percentages. We invest a lot of money. Some people decide either self-select out. We've had people who've worked here three or four years who've done really well, who then either, by the way, some go and stay within the industry, go work for one of our suppliers. That's really cool too, right? We're kind of help train them. We're totally okay with that. And other people get decided to go do something else. And we're okay with that too. It doesn't at all put a blemish on the program. Because again, if you look at Beer Careers Portland Chris is just one, we have several examples. of incredible people who continue to move up. And our goal, as Chris said, is we build a relationship from the interview process with senior managers across the business. I mean, this is really important to me. I get updates on how our interns are doing. Those who get hired on after Beer Careers, I want to meet with them for lunch. I want to make sure that I can provide any support they need. And listen, not everybody moves at Chris's kind of rocket pace, but that's the cool thing about the company. You can move at a pace that works well for you. And our goal is to always give the Beer Careers group an opportunity to continue to move up in the organization. And, you know, my goal and my dream would be, you know, that someday either Chris or Rebecca Logan one of their peers is literally sitting in this chair. For me, that would kind of be the coolest moment of why Beer Careers actually was successful.

[00:43:41] Zoe Licata: I'm going to ask a bit of a selfish question, but based off what you're saying of just the commitment that some of this program requires, it sounds like there are Gen Zers that are willing to put in the work and dispel some of the myths that are out there about the youngest working group of folks. Is that accurate to say?

[00:44:00] Brewbound Podcast: I think it's accurate. Listen, I, you know, I always laugh, right? Every generation has some stereotype, right? And, you know, for me, a lot of people want to look at the exception and not the rule. We have an incredible group of Gen Zers that we interact with. Listen, it's like any other, you know, I always say people sound old when they start saying, well, you know, in my generation and, you know, I'm getting older, but I don't quite go down that path yet. But we prove it every day. I mean, we have a lot of Gen Zers who are coming into this company who want to work hard, willing to roll up their sleeves. And the cool thing is, you know, they have the opportunity to do this year and kind of prove those those of us in older generations a bit wrong. And every generation has people who want to work hard. And I can tell you, there's plenty of people in my generation when I started working who are lazy. and didn't want to work and wanted to stay at home. And so, you know, I think the overall black cloud of Gen Z, we don't see it. I mean, we have proof through our Be Your Careers program, but it is hard work. And the cool thing about this job and this industry is you get to use your brain and you get to really kind of think through problem solving, but you also get to roll up your sleeves and work, you know, side by side with others and kind of feel like you're part of a team and something a little bit bigger.

[00:45:10] Zoe Licata: Yeah, it is really cool to have an opportunity where I feel like a lot of times, especially a lot of people are potentially working from home these days, or you're working for a really large company, you don't have as many of those intimate or personal connections with an employer as much as possibly in the past. And so to have that access is rare and really, really important to someone's development. So it's really cool to have that platform for people.

[00:45:37] Brewbound Podcast: I always say any success you've ever had, right, you got to thank others who gave you the path along the way. And every one of us have needed a hand up, right, in Beer Careers. And I think that's the best thing you can do, especially as you get into leadership roles, the more support you can provide others. And I mean, there are people who took huge bets on me in my career, you know, probably jobs I didn't think I was ready for. And so I think the one thing you can do in a leadership role is provide that same support. By the way, I think it really helps with culture. And when people see that, I think it kind of generates this incredible positive attitude and ability for people to actually see what their long-term career path looks like. And when they visualize it and see it and realize it, then I think you're going down the right path for having a really good culture, which by the way, great culture leads to great business success. Those things go hand in hand.

[00:46:29] Zoe Licata: Great. Well, Chris, Chris and Rebecca, thank you so much for chatting with us and I hope we'll get to connect with all of you again in the future. Thank you.

[00:46:35] Brewbound Podcast: Thanks, Zoe. Thanks, Zoe.

[00:46:37] Zoe Licata: So that's our show this week. Thanks to Chris, Chris and Rebecca for joining me. Thanks to Jess and Justin, as always, for helping Brewbound do its thing. Thanks to Joe and the rest of the BevNET and Brewbound audio team for making us sound as great as possible. And thanks to you all for listening. We'll be back next week.