Episode 15
How NOT to Market Your Brewery
"If you build it, they will come" is a lie. Gary Arndt, Allison McCoy, and Bobby Fleshman discuss the critical importance of marketing for a new brewery. They share their personal experiences and lessons learned in the marketing journey of McFleshman's Brewing Company, emphasizing the necessity of strategic promotion and the impact of community events like Mile of Music and Lager Fest.
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Hosts:
Music by Sarah Lynn Huss
Recorded & Produced by David Kalsow
Brought to you by McFleshman's Brewing Co
00:00 Introduction and Hosts
00:14 The Importance of Marketing
00:40 Early Marketing Mistakes
01:30 Hiring Stephanie Harvey
05:06 Community Events and Foot Traffic
08:13 Mile of Music and Lager Fest
14:02 Live Music and Partnerships
17:12 Air Wisconsin Collaboration
21:51 Marketing Lessons Learned
23:38 Conclusion and Wrap-Up
Transcript
Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of Respecting the Beer.
Gary Arndt:My name is Gary Arnett and with me as usual is Allison McCoy, Bobby Fleshman of McFleshman's Brewing Company.
Gary Arndt:And we've been talking about business a little bit, but today I want to zoom in on what might be the most important part of it.
Gary Arndt:And that is marketing and promotion.
Gary Arndt:You can build all your fermenters and make the best beer in the world.
Gary Arndt:But the fact is, if nobody knows about it, you're not going to sell any.
Gary Arndt:And in the movie "Field of Dreams," there was always this thing.
Gary Arndt:Like if you build it, they will come, which doesn't work at all in business.
Gary Arndt:So how, what was your guys marketing journey?
Gary Arndt:You put all this effort into your business plan.
Gary Arndt:You open this place up.
Allison McCoy:It's funny.
Allison McCoy:You should ask that question because we had a vision, which was.
Allison McCoy:You know that movie, Field of Dreams, that if you build it, they will come.
Allison McCoy:Turns out that fails.
Allison McCoy:So bad.
Bobby Fleshman:When we started writing the plan, there were 2,000 breweries.
Bobby Fleshman:There are now 10,000.
Allison McCoy:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:We were like, Oh, we don't need to advertise.
Allison McCoy:People will just know that we are open and oh my God, we were so stupid.
Allison McCoy:That's all.
Gary Arndt:Oh, no.
Gary Arndt:I, as a podcaster.
Gary Arndt:I've, I knew this right.
Gary Arndt:I haven't having been through this many times.
Gary Arndt:I realized right away, it's like you can have the best thing in the world, but maybe people will eventually discover it, but it's going to be very slow.
Gary Arndt:And at some point you have to spend money to bring people in to make money.
Bobby Fleshman:We had an employee, Stephanie Harvey is
Allison McCoy:so incredible.
Allison McCoy:She has since been did our
Bobby Fleshman:branding and marketing.
Bobby Fleshman:And she said this to me all the time.
Allison McCoy:Oh, and I think I, before we had Stephanie, We didn't really have anyone that had a marketing background.
Allison McCoy:We have one of our it's weird to say workers.
Allison McCoy:He's he, staff, Alex Schultz.
Allison McCoy:He, he's such an artist.
Allison McCoy:He's a, he's a designer, so he can do like the labels and the designs and stuff, but he's not necessarily an artist.
Allison McCoy:It like comes up with the, with the picture.
Allison McCoy:He's an artist.
Allison McCoy:He is, but, but in terms of like the marketing part of getting your brand out there we hired Stephanie.
Allison McCoy:I don't want to say on accident.
Bobby Fleshman:I mean, she, no, she was a fan of ours.
Bobby Fleshman:And actually we, I made an offer a week before COVID hit.
Bobby Fleshman:And then we reformatted her job.
Allison McCoy:But we got, we, we, we crossed paths kind of accidentally because she was doing some mural work for the Trout Museum.
Allison McCoy:And we had some doors that they were like, Hey, the Trout Museum has a class and they can, do you want to have a mural put on it?
Allison McCoy:And we're like, great.
Allison McCoy:So if you look outside of our both the back door and the side door that goes up to the prohibition room, there are these really nice murals.
Allison McCoy:And it's like, Oh, that's fun.
Allison McCoy:And it was Stephanie.
Allison McCoy:And she's like, Oh, Hey guys.
Allison McCoy:I like your beer, by the way.
Allison McCoy:And we just got to talking to her.
Bobby Fleshman:And if you go anywhere in craft beer in Northeast Wisconsin, you're going to meet Stephanie Harvey.
Bobby Fleshman:She's everywhere.
Bobby Fleshman:And she sells for still make,
Allison McCoy:We hired her of course, then COVID hits, but then she just kind of took over and she showed us that we had no idea what marketing was because she just all of a sudden started to market us and we were like, Oh, that's how that works.
Allison McCoy:Oh, because we are science nerds who do beer stuff.
Allison McCoy:We don't necessarily do that.
Gary Arndt:I want to say as academics.
Gary Arndt:You've done a pretty good job with the business.
Allison McCoy:Well, that's fair.
Gary Arndt:It's kind of a, kind of a backward compliment.
Gary Arndt:I guess it's, yeah, I know.
Allison McCoy:But we, we, I think that was probably the marketing is the, of the biggest, if I could go back and start over and slap the shit out of Allison back then, I would have be like, you know, embrace, embrace a marketing person.
Bobby Fleshman:Earlier than you did running joke between me and Stephanie was cursive font because there was a time where I tried to give her some feedback on a label and
Allison McCoy:I Stephanie was given, an opportunity to go to a bigger brewery.
Allison McCoy:She's now at Stillman Brewing Company in Green Bay.
Allison McCoy:Who could really, really, I mean, really use her skills.
Allison McCoy:Cause we were like, we just do have so much to do.
Bobby Fleshman:And Brad's also from a marketing background.
Bobby Fleshman:So they really are driving up the brand.
Allison McCoy:I've kind of taken over where Stephanie left off.
Allison McCoy:And it's kind of put together.
Allison McCoy:And we're trying to hire someone to come in and help us now.
Allison McCoy:but no,
Bobby Fleshman:But we, but we now know what we didn't know.
Bobby Fleshman:Not to say that we, we, we know what we don't know.
Allison McCoy:We still don't know a lot,
Bobby Fleshman:But we know we don't know it.
Bobby Fleshman:That's the difference.
Gary Arndt:So you have known, unknown, not unknown, unknown.
Bobby Fleshman:Right.
Bobby Fleshman:Exactly.
Allison McCoy:Wait, what are we, I don't know what we're talking about.
Allison McCoy:And so I think that, but you know, Gary, as you said, it's, it's very slow if you do the build it and they will come approach.
Allison McCoy:But now I think that we've got, especially that the, the gates are back open.
Allison McCoy:COVID is over ish.
Allison McCoy:and people are coming back out, like so many more people know who we are.
Allison McCoy:I mean, I think we're up to 7, 000 followers on social media, well, on Facebook at least.
Bobby Fleshman:That's all the old people.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:That's all of us.
Allison McCoy:Well, and our brand is not necessarily conducive to the 21 year olds.
Bobby Fleshman:Give them some credit.
Bobby Fleshman:I think there's a pocket in the middle that missed us, but they're catching back up.
Allison McCoy:That's fair.
Allison McCoy:That's cause mom and dad are here.
Allison McCoy:But I, I think, I think we are seeing that growth, but it's very slow.
Allison McCoy:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:So what do you, you guys do a lot in terms of events, taking place in bigger community events.
Gary Arndt:There are things you do here to bring people in the door.
Gary Arndt:What are, what are some of the more successful things that you've done?
Gary Arndt:That Help marketing and help, you know, bring in foot traffic.
Allison McCoy:I think there's two kinds of foot traffic.
Allison McCoy:There's the foot traffic of, I'm just going to come once a year.
Allison McCoy:We have a lot of folks that come just for mile of music and we spend about three or four months planning for mile of music.
Allison McCoy:In fact, our first Mile of Music planning session is coming up in a couple of weeks.
Bobby Fleshman:And that's a credit to Mile of Music.
Gary Arndt:Yeah, that's, that's there.
Gary Arndt:And just so everyone knows, this is an event that's held in the city.
Gary Arndt:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:There are, you know, musicians that are scheduled up and down the main street here in Appleton Wisconsin.
Gary Arndt:It's, it's a big event.
Gary Arndt:Hundreds of thousands of people show up.
Bobby Fleshman:Ian Thompson and Dave Willems are behind.
Allison McCoy:Oh, and those two are brilliant behind it.
Gary Arndt:And having been here, this is your biggest day of the year.
Bobby Fleshman:It's every business that participates.
Allison McCoy:Thursday through Sunday, the first weekend in August.
Bobby Fleshman:And we actually have, we start Wednesday so it's Wednesday through Sunday here.
Allison McCoy:Yes.
Allison McCoy:Trial mile.
Allison McCoy:It's trial mile.
Allison McCoy:But it's, I mean, it's all hands on for our staff.
Allison McCoy:It's all hands on deck.
Allison McCoy:I mean, we, we probably sell four hours of
Bobby Fleshman:sleep a night, maybe, maybe that.
Allison McCoy:But the, the kill shot at the end is how many kegs we go through.
Allison McCoy:And we've gotten now to where we're not even like, as soon as one keg is empty, we just go back, fill it up from the front and we put it back out there.
Bobby Fleshman:It's the same beer.
Bobby Fleshman:We're refilling that keg.
Bobby Fleshman:Just out of
Gary Arndt:curiosity.
Gary Arndt:Let's, let's call this one week of the year.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:How much of your revenue compromises that one week, you mean that's a one would be about...
Bobby Fleshman:Annual, it's probably 10 percent in that one week of our entire annual, if not more.
Allison McCoy:I would say is what we would normally make in a May is 15 percent in four days.
Bobby Fleshman:Which works out pretty close.
Allison McCoy:And that's a month total, including distribution?
Bobby Fleshman:No, it's more than two months.
Bobby Fleshman:Oh, it's two months.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Two months of revenue
Bobby Fleshman:In one weekend.
Allison McCoy:So anyway, so it's that much work here.
Allison McCoy:That's huge.
Allison McCoy:There are, oh God.
Allison McCoy:And there are folks that come just, they come to the tap room just for mile of music and they never come any other time of year.
Allison McCoy:But then there are those that we try and do events to like, okay, you're gonna come once a week.
Allison McCoy:And just become our regular on that particular day.
Allison McCoy:And I think of the knitting group.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:We've, collaborated with Casting Honesty Yarn Store on the other side of the College Avenue.
Allison McCoy:Great group.
Allison McCoy:Dear friend of mine, or friends of mine who own it.
Allison McCoy:We have this big group called Hanks and Hops on Sundays from 1 to 3.
Allison McCoy:Bring your knitting and for every 4 hanks and hops you get a free pint.
Allison McCoy:And there's a little punch card.
Allison McCoy:Basically it's just a little knitting circle.
Allison McCoy:A bunch of folks knit and, or crochet, craft of some sort, and drink their craft beer.
Allison McCoy:But it's actually, that group has saved our Sundays.
Bobby Fleshman:It's a slow build, but these kinds of groups are huge to the bottom line.
Allison McCoy:And then we've got, Appleton Historical Society will do some stuff here.
Allison McCoy:We've got the Pollenablers, so we've got those kinds of groups.
Allison McCoy:So those are like the smaller events.
Allison McCoy:I mean, they're very small and they're almost like not necessarily private events, but they're, they're ones that we like to foster in addition to like the big milet music or Oktoberfest types of days.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:And, and logger fest comes up.
Bobby Fleshman:We do a logger fest.
Bobby Fleshman:We shut our street down in front of our brewery the first Saturday every year of October.
Bobby Fleshman:And a ticket that event out, it's really good for the brand.
Bobby Fleshman:I don't think bottom line, it's sort of a net zero affair, but, but it's a really good marketing stunt for us.
Bobby Fleshman:And it's not just a stunt, we believe in it, but it, it gets our name out there.
Bobby Fleshman:We've got some really good breweries and this is what's great about Lagerfest.
Bobby Fleshman:I have brewers reaching out to us.
Bobby Fleshman:To be involved that didn't get an invite.
Bobby Fleshman:And if you're a brewer, you know why that's weird?
Bobby Fleshman:Because we get asked three times a week to do a beer fest and we're running from those emails.
Bobby Fleshman:We don't want to deal with any more of those.
Bobby Fleshman:So it's a compliment, I think, to the event itself being a brewer's, type of, of beer fest.
Allison McCoy:It's the time of the season where it's, it's around the big October fest, but for Appleton also has a very large October fest where there's.
Allison McCoy:There's 200, 000 people who all go downtown and they shut down the street and it's a lot of people, but it's mostly sponsored by some larger brewing establishments.
Bobby Fleshman:And the event itself does a lot for the community.
Allison McCoy:That's true.
Allison McCoy:Oh, they raise so much money for charity.
Bobby Fleshman:The beer side...
Bobby Fleshman:We're, we're kind of on the other side of the beer side because we have the right wholesaler, but it is, it's, it's a tough one to get involved with.
Allison McCoy:But in, in, if you want to come and enjoy.
Allison McCoy:An Oktoberfest experience.
Allison McCoy:That's more kind of trying a bunch of different types of lager beers.
Allison McCoy:Oktoberfest is not going to be what you want.
Allison McCoy:So we will change that a week later.
Gary Arndt:So Myla music, Oktoberfest, these are community things that you just happen to piggyback on because of your location.
Gary Arndt:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:You're right near the main street here.
Gary Arndt:Logger fest is your own thing.
Gary Arndt:That's something you want.
Gary Arndt:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:What was the.
Gary Arndt:Impetus behind creating that
Bobby Fleshman:because of like
Gary Arndt:You're selling you sell tickets to it.
Gary Arndt:Yep.
Gary Arndt:And so it's what 50 a ticket
Bobby Fleshman:I think yeah, we got a VIP and we have the different options
Allison McCoy:Yeah, and it's at this point you can check out our website for it But at this point it's like I think it's about 50 get you a big beer stein And infinite beer to fill in said stein from all 20 different breweries.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah, and these are not I mean, we make sure it's called Fox Valley Lager Fest, so it better have the Fox Valley brewers there.
Bobby Fleshman:So they're there.
Bobby Fleshman:Everyone in Appleton and Neenah, they're all here.
Bobby Fleshman:But then I wanted to bring some rock stars from across the state.
Bobby Fleshman:And we even went to Chicago this year.
Bobby Fleshman:We got Dovetail.
Bobby Fleshman:And if people are in the beer world, they know what that name is.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:It's the top lager brewery in the United States is going to be there this year.
Bobby Fleshman:And we got, Seriously, they have the number.
Allison McCoy:Oh no, my eye roll wasn't that they are not good.
Allison McCoy:I was, my eye roll was just like, Oh my God, I remember.
Allison McCoy:We went, actually, we went and had a meeting with Dovetail.
Allison McCoy:And so we go to their brewing facility and
Bobby Fleshman:This is when a courting started two years ago.
Bobby Fleshman:David.
Bobby Fleshman:Dan.
Allison McCoy:Dan.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:And you and he just, they, they were looking at the barrel room that they have.
Allison McCoy:And there are these things.
Allison McCoy:What are the wood things?
Allison McCoy:The chalks.
Allison McCoy:The chalks.
Bobby Fleshman:I'm looking at.
Allison McCoy:Oh my God.
Allison McCoy:Side story.
Allison McCoy:I'm just going to take over.
Allison McCoy:So Bobby's like, look at those chocks.
Allison McCoy:And he reaches over and he's like, Oh my God.
Allison McCoy:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:And they're like both looking at this type of wood thing.
Allison McCoy:It looks like a weird wood wedge.
Bobby Fleshman:And it's got very specific angles.
Allison McCoy:How did you get that angle?
Allison McCoy:And then they are talking in the weirdest code about these barrels.
Allison McCoy:And I just kind of started to back away because there was some.
Bobby Fleshman:I asked if I could steal one so I could copy it.
Bobby Fleshman:It was proprietary.
Bobby Fleshman:You wouldn't believe.
Bobby Fleshman:A double miter would be this, this interesting, but it was
Allison McCoy:Anyway.
Gary Arndt:You're, you're right.
Gary Arndt:I would not believe that.
Bobby Fleshman:But now we use it.
Bobby Fleshman:We balance barrels four high.
Allison McCoy:The amount of love and care that goes into a McFleshman's beer goes into a Dovetail beer.
Allison McCoy:Oh my gosh.
Bobby Fleshman:So all this to say, we have some really sexy breweries coming and it's getting better every year.
Bobby Fleshman:And we got the reason we did it.
Bobby Fleshman:to bring in the best lagers and the best brewers and to get our name out there, but also because we think Appleton's Oktoberfest needs a compliment if that's going to be what it is with a bunch of cover.
Allison McCoy:And we make it fun.
Allison McCoy:I mean, we have we, we put our beers on a cart last year and we had a bell and we would like to
Bobby Fleshman:Bring out your dead bell.
Allison McCoy:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:Pretty much had this like beer parade every time we like presented a beer and then we had a Stein holding contest.
Allison McCoy:It was lots of fun costume contest.
Allison McCoy:If it was in your best dirndl or lederhosen.
Bobby Fleshman:The energy is pretty good in a world where craft beers kind of down and beer fests are kind of down.
Bobby Fleshman:I think our energy is pretty good on this event.
Bobby Fleshman:It's actually increasing
Gary Arndt:And you literally will reserve the entire street.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:It's we could outgrow it at some point, hopefully.
Bobby Fleshman:And if we do that comes with its own challenges, but it would be awesome to hold it in a park with a lot of green.
Bobby Fleshman:Trees and stuff.
Bobby Fleshman:We have some ideas.
Bobby Fleshman:Jones Park down the street and then, river view is another spot that could hold it.
Bobby Fleshman:Anyway, these are some nice places that are close to us we could expand into, make it more of a, I don't know, feel, feel more German in some ways, because you'll have the trees and the the grass and the benches
Gary Arndt:and the, the, the breweries that come here, do you charge them or is it just an invitation?
Gary Arndt:They're free to,
Bobby Fleshman:We pay them!
Gary Arndt:Well, so we, we, yeah, we pay.
Gary Arndt:Oh, you pay them.
Gary Arndt:We pay.
Allison McCoy:So the ticket buys you a stein and infinite beer, but your ticket costs, or what we do with the ticket money is we then pay each brewer however many kegs of beer that they bring.
Allison McCoy:We then pay them for that.
Allison McCoy:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:And so that's how your beer, that's normally where your beer fist ticket goes.
Allison McCoy:And so that's why it's pretty much a break even deal.
Bobby Fleshman:Once in a while you see a beer fest where you either have to pay or you get nothing.
Bobby Fleshman:There's, there's not much reason to do those sorts of festivals.
Allison McCoy:And I guess really, we, we, we normally don't make anything because we're out all the planning and coordination and all that.
Allison McCoy:Oh yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:This is a branding event.
Bobby Fleshman:And I think eventually we should, we will, and we're talking about collaborating with bigger sponsors so we get more.
Bobby Fleshman:Exposure and money to Jack.
Bobby Fleshman:And then ultimately that'll benefit charities.
Gary Arndt:Let's talk about another thing that you guys do that.
Gary Arndt:A lot of pubs do live music.
Gary Arndt:There are different ways, different approaches, like your neighbor, like literally next doors, it's called the Appleton Beer Factory.
Gary Arndt:They're very, they're, they're like a venue for live music.
Gary Arndt:You guys are more, I would say they're more.
Gary Arndt:venue than beer, which is not to say that they're, you know, on a, that's just meant to be a slam on their beer or anything, but they're a larger facility.
Gary Arndt:They can handle, you know, bigger venues, bigger crowds, things like that.
Allison McCoy:Also inside.
Allison McCoy:So they're not subject to Wisconsin weather
Bobby Fleshman:And Mark who does their planning is he lives, eats, sleeps, sleeps, breathes music.
Gary Arndt:So where does music fit in?
Gary Arndt:With what you guys are doing and how do you, how do you plan that?
Gary Arndt:Where do you find people?
Gary Arndt:How does that,
Bobby Fleshman:That has changed so many times through the years.
Bobby Fleshman:We started with the idea that we would have music inside and we did do that for a long time and we still do on occasion.
Allison McCoy:And for a while we had a woman worked with us, Jess Grimm, who was really great in connecting us with all sorts of music and she,
Bobby Fleshman:She helped us get on our feet after COVID.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:And so she worked with getting basically like weekly music shows.
Bobby Fleshman:And her husband is Ian who works with mild music.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:So they were very well connected and they taught us a lot.
Allison McCoy:But there's only so much, what we found was that, if you had these large shows, if you just have beer, a lot of folks will come for the music, but they might not necessarily like beer.
Allison McCoy:They wouldn't necessarily be our patrons anyway, which is fine.
Allison McCoy:But then they worse,
Bobby Fleshman:We've had people show up with beer and drink it and watch the show for free like this.
Allison McCoy:So it's, it's taken us a while to navigate what fits best while, you know, our brand is beer, not music, as you say, where Appleton Beer Factory has really embraced kind of, they, they call themselves also apples and music factory kind of tangentially.
Allison McCoy:And so I think that we have, we've started to figure out that rather than having weekly music shows, we're going to have like a few shows in the summer months kind of leading up to Mile of Music that's kind of specialized in either
Bobby Fleshman:Like three weeks
Allison McCoy:Every three weeks or so.
Allison McCoy:Not necessarily really big shows, but ones that we try and advertise for when we do have them Although we do have two ticketed shows for the first time.
Bobby Fleshman:We're putting our toe in the water there.
Bobby Fleshman:That's where you can fund bigger acts when you start doing ticketed.
Allison McCoy:Yeah, because it's, it's, and that's been a real challenge.
Allison McCoy:And I'm normally one sitting at the table saying, I absolutely do not want any ticketed shows at this place because you can't call yourself a public house.
Allison McCoy:And if you restricted an entry fee essentially,
Bobby Fleshman:And that ties into construction.
Bobby Fleshman:Cause we're building this upstairs hop deck and so on and we can start to isolate locations for people to be if they're ticketed and doesn't interfere with the everyday.
Allison McCoy:But because we've got a really great relationship with a music sponsor so we've sponsored with Air Wisconsin to sponsor our summer music series we're actually able to have both ticketed shows and free shows.
Allison McCoy:So some of our music will be, I don't even know the days.
Allison McCoy:I should have the days in front of me.
Allison McCoy:We should carry those.
Allison McCoy:Look at our website.
Allison McCoy:Which is probably not there because I'm behind on posting things there too.
Bobby Fleshman:The things, the hats you have to wear.
Allison McCoy:Anyway.
Allison McCoy:But we have, two ticketed shows this year that are going to be slightly bigger.
Gary Arndt:This show is about branding.
Gary Arndt:So I want to ask you something that you just brought up, your partnership with Air Wisconsin, because this seems to have opened a bunch of doors for you.
Gary Arndt:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:Explain how that came about and what you're doing with them.
Allison McCoy:That was all Bobby.
Bobby Fleshman:Well, so Rob is the CEO.
Bobby Fleshman:Of the company of Air Wisconsin and Rob, his favorite beer is tall mass.
Bobby Fleshman:So we're kindred spirits there.
Bobby Fleshman:And this is our English IPA
Allison McCoy:And these are just conversations that you just started talking to him in the pub one day.
Bobby Fleshman:Well, he was walking out the door one day and he spun around.
Bobby Fleshman:He says, I have an idea.
Bobby Fleshman:And he sat down and he said, did he ask to do it?
Bobby Fleshman:A beer together.
Bobby Fleshman:I think, yeah, because they're rebranding their, their company.
Bobby Fleshman:They, they had a new us, they were a new collaborator and they were repainting their planes and they wanted to do a big roll out their, their flagship planes called El Guapo.
Bobby Fleshman:And he wanted to do a beer to celebrate that.
Bobby Fleshman:And it just happened to sync up with Cinco de Mayo's like that.
Bobby Fleshman:Is obvious we're doing a Mexican lager, so we made it and they promoted it and they've got a big marketing hand and they're, they're based in Milwaukee as much as they are in Appleton.
Bobby Fleshman:They're kind of all over the place and they operate what they do is they operate these small planes from the big airports to the smaller airports all over the Midwest.
Bobby Fleshman:You know, fast forward a year and they come here every couple of weeks, months, I don't know how often, but they do a lot of events in the room that we're recording outside.
Bobby Fleshman:They have, 3000 people, I think, in their network, and that's gotten our name out in different areas.
Bobby Fleshman:That beer itself, whether or not it's related to Air Wisconsin, is now being poured where the Brewers play baseball in Milwaukee and looks like we're getting into their box in Lambeau.
Bobby Fleshman:So we're starting to get through a crack in that dam at Lambeau and that gets us on a 1919.
Allison McCoy:So let's talk about the plane a little bit.
Allison McCoy:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:So this is, airplane N471ZW is the call letters of this airplane.
Allison McCoy:It's known as El Guapo.
Allison McCoy:And apparently there's something about this plane that when people in Air Wisconsin get to fly the plane and, or work on the plane, there's just an absolute love affair with that particular plane.
Allison McCoy:They absolutely love this plane and it was built in Mexico.
Allison McCoy:And so they're like this, so it's nicknamed El Guapo.
Allison McCoy:and we have had so many pilots come in and they're like, I flew El Guapo.
Allison McCoy:Do you have it on tap?
Allison McCoy:They're so excited.
Bobby Fleshman:I'm only here for an hour.
Bobby Fleshman:I'm here to get a case of this.
Bobby Fleshman:So we have an employee discount for all those people.
Allison McCoy:Anyway, so it's, it's quite, I, I really love how much they love this plane.
Allison McCoy:Oh
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:And one of these days I want to get on the damn thing.
Allison McCoy:Cause I'm like, this will be fun.
Allison McCoy:Like,
Bobby Fleshman:Oh, that's the other thing.
Bobby Fleshman:I'm working to get it on to American Airlines now, our beer.
Bobby Fleshman:So this opening up.
Bobby Fleshman:These through by way of this channel, there's a whole lot of stuff here behind the scenes.
Bobby Fleshman:Let's just say that they've done a lot for us and what we're doing for them.
Bobby Fleshman:I'm hoping we're doing them justice by putting their name behind our stage and, and, and sharing that branding of all of our music that we do here in the way we roll it out.
Bobby Fleshman:I think that Rob has bought into our brand for sure.
Gary Arndt:This seems to have been some that just kind of occurred organically
Bobby Fleshman:Organically.
Bobby Fleshman:We didn't seek this one,
Gary Arndt:But it seems to have worked really well.
Gary Arndt:El Guapo.
Gary Arndt:I don't know the numbers, but it seems to sell pretty well here.
Gary Arndt:I think so.
Gary Arndt:Summertime for sure.
Gary Arndt:yeah.
Allison McCoy:And we also have a dark version.
Allison McCoy:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:It's gotten you into places that would otherwise I would think would be rather difficult for a small brewery to get into.
Gary Arndt:You know, for a beer in Wisconsin to get into American Family Field or Lambeau Field is pretty hard.
Gary Arndt:Big feather in your cap.
Gary Arndt:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:Are there any other potentials, opportunities for doing co branded or co marketing things with other larger companies?
Bobby Fleshman:Wow
Allison McCoy:I don't know a larger company listening, why don't you give us a call on the page?
Allison McCoy:I don't
Bobby Fleshman:We could spitball a bunch of ideas and we already have.
Allison McCoy:I think the funny thing is that if you think about the things that we would couple with, an airline and a yarn store.
Bobby Fleshman:And that's, that's key.
Bobby Fleshman:I think we need to get out of our box and that's key.
Allison McCoy:Well, and not to mention the connection with Lawrence university.
Allison McCoy:I mean, there's been a lot of kind of double dipping there too, which is really nice.
Bobby Fleshman:We're doing a lot more these days with the city itself of Appleton and, and they want to do
Allison McCoy:The Chamber of Commerce
Bobby Fleshman:And the Chamber of Commerce.
Bobby Fleshman:We just did their 150th anniversary.
Bobby Fleshman:We repackaged our flagships, our Pirates Cove, light lager, our Hellas lager and then our Amber lager those are now rebranded to include Chamber of Commerce.
Allison McCoy:We also work with we've partnered with Cheese Fest.
Bobby Fleshman:Cheese Fest.
Bobby Fleshman:We make, we make the beer for that.
Bobby Fleshman:Cheese Fest, which is in like a week or two.
Bobby Fleshman:I feel like it's tomorrow.
Bobby Fleshman:I still don't know when it was.
Bobby Fleshman:It's happening all the time.
Bobby Fleshman:And then Paper Fest, we're now a sponsor of that out in Kona.
Allison McCoy:But yeah, I'm really excited about the Cheese Fest beer.
Allison McCoy:A little shoot, yeah.
Allison McCoy:It's got a fun logo on it.
Gary Arndt:So you said if you could go back and slap Allison from several years ago, what are the marketing lessons that you've kind of learned going from basically something close to zero to where you are today?
Gary Arndt:If you could go back, what would you, other than just, you know, this is an important thing you can't ignore.
Allison McCoy:That was such a great question.
Gary Arndt:That's why I'm here.
Allison McCoy:Yep.
Allison McCoy:what would I have done differently?
Bobby Fleshman:Make no assumptions about what people know.
Allison McCoy:Oh my god, make no assumptions.
Allison McCoy:I would spend a lot more time on our website.
Allison McCoy:Making it user friendly.
Allison McCoy:Our first couple websites were just awful but making it easy to get the information people need as well as just have a strategy.
Allison McCoy:I mean, it seems, and this is what's happening right now, is that we are rather short staffed in the, in our marketing department, which is me at the moment and I put Alex there.
Allison McCoy:That's true.
Allison McCoy:Yeah.
Allison McCoy:And I think there's not really a strategy right now because we're, we're still like, just, okay, just Put something out, put the market out.
Allison McCoy:You know, I, I think that it actually does take care and time, the same amount of care and time it goes into, well, the miter angles on the blocks that hold up the barrels, and there's the, the recipes and how do we know which beers we're going to put out on our menu.
Allison McCoy:There's actually quite a bit of thought that goes into that based on season, based on demand.
Allison McCoy:I think the same amount of thought and care should go into a marketing strategy.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah, exactly.
Allison McCoy:As opposed to just shoot from the hip and just go with it.
Bobby Fleshman:I'm glad you pointed that out though.
Bobby Fleshman:The brewing schedule has shifted over these last several years.
Bobby Fleshman:Getting a handle on that.
Bobby Fleshman:You've got to brew six months ahead.
Bobby Fleshman:You got to be ahead of this, all of this stuff.
Bobby Fleshman:There's so many reasons we didn't think that way before.
Bobby Fleshman:We're way better at that now.
Bobby Fleshman:And that sets us up well for her marketing and production to knock it out of the park.
Gary Arndt:All right.
Gary Arndt:Well, that wraps up another episode of Respecting the Beer.
Gary Arndt:Make sure to subscribe to the show and check out the Facebook group and Patreon page to receive updates about future episodes.
