Brewbound Podcast: The Hazy Aftermath of Brewbound Live

[00:00:00] Jessica Infante: Next on the Brewbound Podcast, we recap last week's Brewbound Live event. Hello and welcome to the Brewbound podcast. My name is Justin Kendall and I am the editor of Brewbound and I'm joined by Jessica Infante, the managing editor of Brewbound. Hello, Jess.

[00:00:25] Brewbound Live: What's up? How are you?

[00:00:27] Jessica Infante: Just, you know, living that jet lag life. Also living that life is Zoe Licata, Brewbound reporter extraordinaire, Generation Z consultant. How are you doing, Zoe?

[00:00:38] Zoe and Justin: I'm hanging in there. A mixture of excitement on how well Brewbound Live was and just exhaustion.

[00:00:46] Jessica Infante: There's not enough coffee right now to to keep me going. So this is going to be, I think, a short episode. We'll find out. But we mentioned it at the top of the show. We're going to recap Brewbound Live. And that is not something that the three of us really haven't had much time to debrief on at all other than living in the moment. So I'm just going to start and say the thing that stood out the most to me was Carrie Yonker, Bell's Brewery EVP, her keynote speech, which received a standing ovation. The first that I've ever seen at a Brewbound Live event. So Carrie really discussed, you know, what it's like to build a people first organization and she knocked it out of the park.

[00:01:32] Brewbound Live: Yeah, Carrie was absolutely excellent. I particularly enjoyed her showing us photos from back when she was just a wee baby temp receptionist at Bells. But yeah, she really sounds like she's done so much work there to really make sure that the focus is on all members of the team. One question that she said is so important to make sure you always ask is to, you know, turn to people and ask them what they think. because sometimes people don't want to speak up. Maybe they don't feel comfortable. Maybe they don't think their opinions are going to be heard or valid. And just by, as a manager, showing that you care about their input just by directly asking it for them is huge.

[00:02:07] Jessica Infante: So Zoe, I'll start with you. What was one of the highlights for you?

[00:02:13] Zoe and Justin: Oh boy. really putting me on the spot here.

[00:02:16] Jessica Infante: Well, one of my other highlights, I'll say, was you doing so much work and doing less work.

[00:02:22] Zoe and Justin: Thank you.

[00:02:23] Jessica Infante: You taking more stage time was fantastic.

[00:02:26] Zoe and Justin: Yeah, that was a lot of fun to do more this year and host a couple panels and be more into the process this year. And it felt different. this year, I think, because last year was also it wasn't only my first Brewbound Live, but it was only like my second beer related conference ever, I believe. I had done CBC and that was about it. So this year I was just seeing mostly familiar faces and knowing how the whole process works and just being really excited about it the whole time. And it was fun. I liked it a lot. and got so much good feedback from everybody just on content and the speakers that we had and the questions that we asked. And it was all just a very positive experience. And it's hard to pick what was my favorite or some of the highlights. Actually, I take that back. I think the thing that stood out after Carrie for me the most was getting to do that cider panel because we got so many comments afterwards about how both good the panelists were and just the fact that we had cider at a beer conference and we're talking and trying to break some of the myths about beer or about cider within beer. So we had a great panel group with folks from yonder and two towns and artifact and shilling and just got to say, you know, regional craft cider is actually doing really well, even though it's not really showing up in the numbers. And there's just overall just an exciting conversation of like, here's a segment that's actually could be moving in a different direction. So I love that one a lot.

[00:04:07] Jessica Infante: Jess, what stands out for you?

[00:04:08] Brewbound Live: So, sorry, Zoe, I'm going to take a completely different tack here. I think we heard from a lot of people that in 2023, they are bullish on craft beer. And that I think was really exciting to hear because that's not really a theme that we've heard in the last couple of years. What with, you know, Seltzer and RTDs, you know, we heard it from Mary Giver, Principal beer buyer for Whole Foods. We heard it from Danelle Cosmal, who is the VP of Research for the Beer Institute. We heard it from Jessica Muskie, who's the VP of Craft and Innovation for the Raised Beer Division. It was really nice to hear how many people are stoked on craft beer next year, and not part of Brewbound Live, but happened while we were still at the Lowe's Santa Monica. The interview I had done with the leaders of AB's High End, which I know, but their priorities for next year are also really beer focused, not beyond beer, not anything else. So it makes me feel really good because I think we've had a lot of doom and gloom in the craft beer space to hear that everybody else is starting to feel positive about it.

[00:05:11] Jessica Infante: Yeah, that was also one of the things. Did you mention Jamie Carawan from Buffalo Wild Wings?

[00:05:17] Brewbound Live: I did not. Jamie, I'm so sorry. Yeah, Jamie's really psyched on craft beer next year for B-dubs.

[00:05:24] Jessica Infante: Yeah, our retailer panel of Mary and Jamie, both sort of down on hard seltzer, which not surprising, but very, very candid, I would say in their responses to it with Jamie saying that they can't give it away. And Mary saying, you know, she doesn't want to hear a pitch on another hard seltzer. So.

[00:05:42] Brewbound Live: Yeah. Yeah. It was interesting to hear Jamie say that they do have a draft line dedicated to hard seltzer and it's just not moving and for a bunch of reasons, but he brought up logistics of serving. Do you put it over glass? Do you give them a straw? What do you do? So I got that. I mean, I like drinking seltzer over ice because I'm a weirdo, but I get that maybe other people don't. And I don't know that if I'm going to a B-dubs to sit down and have some wings, I don't know that I want a hard seltzer to go with that.

[00:06:09] Jessica Infante: It's not going to offset that heat, right?

[00:06:12] Brewbound Live: No. No, it's just a weird combo. I don't know. Maybe it depends on flavors. I'm not really sure, but the giraffe line that they have is truly wild berry. And I don't know that that pairs with my preferred medium hot buffalo wings with blue cheese.

[00:06:25] Zoe and Justin: I remember Steve Fetchheimer and Cary Yonker were the first ones to actually introduce me to, you know, put a seltzer in a glass with Fruit Smash and it changed my world. It does. It's like such a different experience. Right. But I think seltzer already has this, I don't know, the expected experience for it that it's kind of hard to break out of that. This is what you drink at home in a can type thing. Exactly.

[00:06:48] Jessica Infante: I think one of the other themes that sort of came out of this and, you know, we know that 2023 is going to be challenging and that's a little bit of what Bart Watson sort of got to the heart Zoe and Justin very candidly also saying that Fed Chairman Jay Powell is going to do everything to slow down this economy, you know, try and get a grasp on inflation. So I hadn't heard that from Bart yet, and maybe I haven't seen enough Bart talks recently, but that stood out to me.

[00:07:17] Brewbound Live: Yeah. And I remember when Bart was talking about, you know, if the current economic conditions mean that people are going to trade down. And he shared that slide that I tweeted a picture of. So if you're curious, you can go find it. But that basically called out the fact that Kraft is not really being affected by trade down because Kraft has been on the decline on its own without, you know, the current conditions. So I know it seems silly to say that after I just said, I'm so excited that everyone's excited about Kraft, but.

[00:07:41] Jessica Infante: Well, and Mary even said, you know, people are still buying $25 four packs.

[00:07:45] Brewbound Live: Yeah, which is wild to me, but I mean, you can see, you know, I mean, I know the Brewbound Live award winners, you know, are selected by us, but, you know, I think that's the story that we told with some of our, you know, award recipients is that they are dedicated to craft beer. You see it in the success that both Georgetown and Fiddlehead have found is just absolute dedication to the craft of beer.

[00:08:07] Jessica Infante: Yeah, I am stoked on this year's award winners and those two really stand out to me. Also Schilling stands out, Schilling Hard Cider as, you know, Beyond Beer Company of the Year. When you open up the playbook on that award, I think there's a lot of interesting things and companies that we can feature there. And Schilling is one of those.

[00:08:28] Brewbound Live: For sure. And then our innovation of the year, I think, I think was an intelligent selection, but New Belgium's, you know, fruit, Jesus, that's not right. Juice Force. Juice Force. New Belgium, New Belgium Voodoo Ranger Juice Force. Most successful launch in craft beer history. So to pull off something like that in a year that craft has largely been down and be able to buck those trends, I think is huge. So congrats to them.

[00:08:53] Jessica Infante: Yeah, absolutely. So what else do we want to cover?

[00:08:58] Brewbound Live: We should talk about our Pitch Slam winner, Sunboy.

[00:09:01] Jessica Infante: We should talk about Pitch Slam.

[00:09:02] Brewbound Live: Yeah.

[00:09:03] Jessica Infante: Take us there.

[00:09:04] Brewbound Live: Yeah. Sunboy started out, as Zoey mentioned, founder Yair Tagil. Yair, I'm so sorry. I'm so screwing up your name. But Yair and his co-founder started out by serving coconut cocktails at various events across New York City, including like, you know, black market dance parties on the Brooklyn Bridge, which is awesome. And then they transitioned into, they found a way and created a machine that brands coconuts. So then different Bev-Owl companies were hiring them to brand coconuts for them, like Ciroc and Bacardi, which is super cool. They brought some brew-bound branded coconuts to Santa Monica, which you can check out on their social media feeds. And during the pandemic, they shifted focus and they figured out a way to make spiked coconut water. which, you know, it's 5% alcohol by volume, 130 calories, three grams of sugar, three flavors, passion fruit, tangerine, pineapple. Gayeur made a really great point about how you should know if you're, you know, in the business of producing alcoholic beverages, you're not allowed to make specific health claims about a product, but people know that coconut water is healthy. And a lot of, you know, the people who would be their drinkers were already drinking, you know, non-alcoholic coconut water, you know, the day after perhaps a large celebration, which they'd consumed a decent amount of you know, alcohol and people, you know, associate it with being something healthy. So they don't actually have to make those claims. People just kind of make them on their own. So this really plays in a few different popular consumer trends, ready to drink products, better for you.

[00:10:35] Jessica Infante: And they're paying that price. They're willing to pay that price for it, too. They're already paying six bucks for a bottle. So what's, you know, another four?

[00:10:44] Brewbound Live: Yeah, one of his great quotes from his pitch in the final round was, quote, choosing retail targets is easy for us. One of our off-premise cheats is to target accounts that already sell a lot of coconut water. We know our customers are there and it's easy for us to sell a four-pack of Sunboy for $10.99 when consumers are already used to paying $6 for a single bottle of coconut water in the same store. So what a great strategy. You got a ready-made target account list right there by figuring out who's selling regular coconut water. They're in, I think, about a hundred accounts in New York City.

[00:11:12] Zoe and Justin: I like that he also called out that there are like some of the big spirits brands that have already said they're going to get into spiked coconut water. And he said like, we welcome that, like bring it on. I think it speaks a little bit to kind of like what Bill Shufelt has said with athletic before too. Like we encourage competition because it just increases awareness for the segment.

[00:11:35] Brewbound Live: So yeah. A rising tide lifts all boats, particularly one that has very deep marketing budgets. Yes, indeed. Yeah, so congrats to them. They are, their prize is, you know, a industry awareness package from us at Brewbound Live at $10,000. Free registration to next year's Brewbound Live. And thanks to this year's presenting sponsor of the pitch, Tellium Ollie, which is the next glass company, the parent company of Untappd. They'll get a 12 month subscription to Untappd for business.

[00:12:01] Jessica Infante: Yeah, congrats to them. And you know, I if it sounds like we're not doing a very good job recapping the event, it's because we're all exhausted and we're fresh off planes. And, you know, it's it's been a week.

[00:12:16] Zoe and Justin: So we haven't even processed anything that's happened yet. It all was in a blur. And now we have to go back and figure out what actually happened.

[00:12:25] Jessica Infante: Exactly. And, you know, it's it's cool to see the other trades covering what we do and much respect for them for doing that.

[00:12:38] Brewbound Live: Yeah. Shout out to David Simon from Beer Marketers Insights for joining us. Always a great time to see David in person.

[00:12:43] Jessica Infante: Yeah, I enjoyed having dinner with him and hanging out with everybody at Shea Jay and in the backyard even this year.

[00:12:51] Zoe and Justin: Oh my God, best kept secret.

[00:12:53] Jessica Infante: Yeah.

[00:12:55] Zoe and Justin: Totally new experience.

[00:12:56] Jessica Infante: So the video replay is pretty much all available to Brewbound insiders. Now you can go to Brewbound.com and just watch whatever you want at this point. And we'll be recapping things in the coming weeks. I'm not going to over promise here because when you got 15 or so things going on stage, you know, it's a lot to cover. So plus, you know, the regular news and that doesn't stop, you know, and you know, Zoe, you covered the saucy acquisition of cartridge. That's up on our site right now. We've got news from Anheuser-Busch's High End and Brewers Collective on their 2023 plans. So yeah, the news hasn't stopped. There's the story about Coop Ale or Coop Beverage Works, excuse me, and their new fourth category partnership with Tampico. So, lots of stuff that we're covering while we're trying to do our own event.

[00:14:01] Brewbound Live: Yeah, the Tampico story is an interesting one because that, I think, to me, marks a bit of a departure for where that space is going. Tampico, if you don't know, is a very successful non-elk juice brand, and they're partnering to make Hard Punch. But this Hard Punch, instead of playing in that four or five to 5% bracket, is 8% ABV and selling in four packs of 12-ounce cans, as well as 24 ounce single serve cans. So we'll see. I think, you know, people decided they've, you know, I think there's probably some consumer data out there that indicates people have had enough of that 100 calorie 5%. And there are some people who are looking for more flavor and more indulgence.

[00:14:41] Jessica Infante: Yeah, I think I probably said this while we were out was, you know, there's been a lot of talk about struggles of hard Mountain Dew recently and what's Boston beer love to do. They love to reformulate and if that happens and that's a big if because that's not even in every market and there are reasons for that. But if it does reincarnate, I imagine we'll see a higher ABV fuller flavor version coming at you.

[00:15:08] Brewbound Live: Yeah. I mean, if there's any brand to do that with, it is 5,000% Mountain Dew.

[00:15:14] Jessica Infante: And they might spin it off anyway. They might keep the regular and who knows, we're talking about things that aren't even happening. Which is in the fog of doing this entire event. But we had so many great speakers. There's so many great conversations that everybody can go to Brewbound.com and check out. And just a huge thank you again to just our entire team for taking care of us and doing everything behind the scenes and all of our speakers for making the trip, making the time, doing the prep work with us and, you know, getting on stage and sharing their knowledge. And then, you know, thanks to everyone who came out to Brewbound Live, you know, made the trip, networked, hung out, you know, it's such a great experience. It is absolutely, I think, the most challenging yet rewarding and fun thing we get to do every year.

[00:16:16] Brewbound Live: Yeah, absolutely. Great times. Can't wait for next year.

[00:16:20] Jessica Infante: I do truly mean that. We are, we are beat down, but, and thank you to you both for all you've done. You know, you friends have all the charisma.

[00:16:32] Brewbound Live: I think I embarrassed myself several times on that stage, but it seemed to pay off people. I think appreciated. It was well received.

[00:16:40] Jessica Infante: Well, with that, we're going to get out of here and get some sleep or, you know, wait for the next news story to hit right when we fall asleep or something.

[00:16:50] Brewbound Live: So thank you. Thank you for this.

[00:16:52] Jessica Infante: Yeah.

[00:16:53] Brewbound Live: Yeah. You're going to write that.

[00:16:56] Jessica Infante: I know because I'm going to, what I'm going to do is after I. Edit the insider newsletter. I'm going to go get me some fast food and then I'm going to pass out so yourself. You deserve it. Where you going? The Bebops, which is a double drive through Iowa burger chain like 1950 style. I'm going there because it just opened in my the town where I live.

[00:17:23] Brewbound Live: Love this for you.

[00:17:24] Jessica Infante: Yeah, it's going to be glorious. I don't need this, but I do need this, and it's going to happen.

[00:17:31] Brewbound Live: Well, we didn't get in and out while we were all here, so.

[00:17:33] Jessica Infante: Actually, I did not either, but very close proximity to it, and people will probably go off the rails on this, and we've clearly gone off the rails already. There's a place I think called Betcha, or something like that. the Southwest Terminal at LAX. And I thought it was a very close proximity to In-N-Out. I don't know, I could be wrong. People are probably gonna tell me I'm an idiot, so that's fine.

[00:18:02] Brewbound Live: No, good to know.

[00:18:04] Jessica Infante: So with that, that's our show. Thanks for listening. We'll be back next week. We'll have a lot more energy and we'll be alive. And maybe we'll talk about Brew Brown live again because we'll remember what happened. So talk to you then.