The suppliers you've used for years probably don’t sell No & Low drinks – but Tom Proctor and Daniel Stiller do. Francoise Mathis and Adrian Needham would like to, one day. James Morgan explains why the wrong choice of supplier can cause a traffic jam!

Where can non-alcoholic drinks be bought? 

The suppliers you've used for years probably don’t sell No & Low drinks – but Tom Proctor and Daniel Stiller do. Francoise Mathis and Adrian Needham would like to, one day. James Morgan explains why the wrong choice of supplier can cause a traffic jam!

Shops, bars and restaurants are all expected to have a good selection of alcohol free drinks nowadays, but it’s not always clear where to buy them.

The wholesalers that supply the trade rarely have much choice of No&Lo – if, indeed, they have any.

Most producers sell their products to the directly to the trade, but buying that way isn't necessarily the best thing to do.

Without the right supply chain in place, problems will arise, from admin costs to traffic jams

We talk to two non-alcoholic drinks specialists on either side of the Atlantic, and find out how they are combining selling to consumers with supplying the trade: d2c meets b2b

Guests: 

Daniel Stiller is CEO of the American online Low & No retailer Better Rhodes. https://www.betterrhodes.com

Tom Proctor founded and is Director of online Low & No retailer Alcohol Free Co. https://thealcoholfreeco.co.uk 

Adrian Needham is London & SE Sales Director of Hallgarten Novum Wines https://www.hnwines.co.uk/contact-us

Francoise Mathis recently joined Indigo Wine as Commercial Director https://www.indigowine.co

James Morgan co-founded the No & Low consultancy Brimful Drinks after a 25-year career in hospitality. He also has a background in both art and research. He has worked with clients including Distill Ventures, Travers Smith, Nine Elms No.18, Better Rhodes and Hakkasan Group.

Contact:

Please DO get in touch. We'd love to hear your comments and questions:

Chrissie Parkinson: chris@brimfuldrinks.co.uk

James Morgan: james@brimfuldrinks.co.uk 

Adrian Needham 01:58Just given what's been going on over the last 12 months, we had a sort of programme new things we want, you know, new ones, we wanted to bring it in. And it's obviously been much more of a struggle than the lightest given the circumstances logistically. So I think yeah, I mean, as much as things like that might well be on the radar, I think it's certainly one to be, you know, looking at maybe next year rather than anything we're focusing on at the moment, but it's, you know, certainly wouldn't be off the radar, I'm sure.

And now here is Francoise Mathis of Indigo wine.

No, no. So we, we obviously started trading as most well businesses back in April. And we found ourselves we focused on to the immediate needs of a customer dealing with supply chain, which to these days, still very problematic. So that demand has been pushed back. But I think we'd be foolish not to consider something that the market is clearly first you about if we find the right products, yes, it's probably something we'll consider in the future.

James Morgan 03:15delivery slots into central London are at a premium so the goods in team would you know have a queue on any given day, of vans trying to drop off supplies for both the bars and the sommeliers and the kitchens. Also, there is a cost attached. one of our colleagues that Hakkasan worked out but there was a it was approximately five pounds per invoice in admin costs.

Chrissie Parkinson 04:34as far as I can remember the high minimum drop meant we ended up having to store some of the drinks off site. And am I right there were some issues with products going out of date as well.

Chrissie Parkinson 05:25Another problem, of course, is that a lot of hospitality businesses have limits on how many suppliers the beverage team is allowed to use. That becomes a major issue when you find a great product, but the only option is to buy it directly from the producer. The pandemic setback a lot of plans, but not everyone had a bad lockdown. Here's what happened to Tom Proctor.

Chrissie Parkinson 06:14Tom is the director of the alcohol free company. It's a fairly new type of drink supplier. Tom doesn't sell alcohol at all. And he trades entirely online, mainly d2c. Other similar companies in the UK include Dry Drinker and Wise Bartender. These online businesses were created to target consumers, but they're realising there's another opportunity: the hospitality industry. Here's Tom again,

Chrissie Parkinson 07:45I asked Tom if this was changing his business model at all. Tom Proctor 07:48Yeah, I mean, we plan on changing the way we work it next year. We've got some more interviews tomorrow and Thursday, just to basically bring someone into the fold to help us with that transition and manage our trade customers a bit more.

Chrissie Parkinson 08:09I'd like to say a big thank you to Nine Elms, our sponsor for this episode. Nine Elms number 18. Ruby Velven is an excellent new type of non-alc drink that works equally well as an aperitif or with a meal. It has lovely red fruit and herbaceous flavours reminiscent of a dry red vermouth. There's real complexity too, so it's an ideal match for many different foods. Nine Elms Ruby also works as a vibrant and refreshing spritz served on ice with a splash of tonic.

Dan Stiller 08:58Hello, everyone. My name is Daniel Stiller, and I'm the CEO of Better Rhodes. And we are a direct consumer online marketplace for non alcoholic and alcohol free beverages in the United States. And soon to be launched in Canada as well. We knew there were a lot of great producers out there. But somehow they weren't getting connected. The major retailers weren't picking up the banner, because they would have to displace something else on their shelf. There wasn't really a place in in the standard setup of it, of a Total Wine or of a traditional retailer to celebrate alcohol free. So there's this demand to bring together producers and these these customers out there. We tried to create a solution for that. We're entirely online. We sell across the country but online and we've started to wholesale, enter that wholesale market because there's a lot of restaurants, a lot of hospitality, that's looking for a easy solution to this growing demand around alcohol free. It is very much a different customer and also a high education piece as well, we have to make it very easy for them. It's very much a different model. But it's that one-to-many opportunity that we have. And that's a part of our business that we're going to continue to expand. We've we've seen some of that pushback, as opposed to the consumer where they're willing to take a flyer and try something different, that we've seen that the pushback from the hospitality industry, so I'm excited about the opportunity, but recognise that it is it's definitely a challenge.Chrissie Parkinson 10:37Dan made some interesting comments about new types of drink, and how bars and restaurants don't always show much enthusiasm for them.Dan Stiller 10:46For our customers on the website, especially it's a very analogue relationship, I usually drink red wine, there's an alcohol-free red wine, we see that with the spirit industry as well, I usually drink tequila, here's an alcohol-free tequila. But what I get excited about is these new flavours, these new approaches. And we've seen that with Three Spirits, with Bonbuz, all these great functional drinks in this kind of better for you, a new approach a completely new approach to distilled products. And I get really excited about that, I will tell you, it's a much harder sale because it's so easy for our customers to say, I like this, I want the alternative to it. We've found in the feedback we've gotten from bartenders is they like to experiment with new things. And then on the hospitality side when it comes to wine, they don't want to experiment with new things. But when it comes to actually creating cocktails they want to so it's it's an interesting conundrum, where I see the growth in the industry being in this these kind of better than versions of products as opposed to just these kind of analogue replications of products.Chrissie Parkinson 11:50A huge thank you to Daniel, Tom, Francoise and Adrian. And of course, James. In the next episode, I'll be talking to Bethan Wallace Higson of Mother Root about switchel, and why vinegar matters. Until then, let's hand back to Dan Stiller for the last word.