How to Sell Beer: Tips From Chains to Corner Bars

Cheers, March, 2000 by Priscilla Estes

Help! We're surrounded by quality beer.

It's everywhere today, from national chains to regional restaurants to the local bar. Import sales soar higher than the Concorde, regional microbrews flood local markets and new beer brands abound. With such a wealth of choices, how do you manage the modern beer business with an eye toward encouraging today's discerning drinker to come back for more?

Seasoned managers, from chains to single sites, have shared their insights with Cheers on the best ways to manage and succeed in the brew world.

Tried and True Tactics

If you want to stay in the beer business, clean your lines, draw your drafts right, get your list organized, carry a variety of product categories and serve it in a washed glass, please.

TIP ONE: Clean Your Lines

"A clean line is monstrously important," says Chris Black, co-owner of Denver's 69-tap. Falling Rock Tap Room. Every two weeks, Black brings in his 14 distributors to clean the lines, a three-hour process. If they don't do it right, he'll call the brewery owner at home on a Sunday afternoon. "They learn real quick," Black laughs. To play it even safer, every two years Black cuts the lines off the wall and installs new ones.

TIP TWO: Draw it Right

"On-premise operators need to understand how draft beer works," says Terence Connaughton, field director of national accounts on premise for Guinness. And the Guinness draft technicians will gladly demonstrate, free of charge, through their draft maintenance program (see sidebar).

"Bars ruin kegs all the time," adds Jim Anderson, a Philadelphia-area beer promoter and bar and restaurant veteran of 25 years. "There are no instructions on a keg, and I see foamy beer, flat beer and people pouring three pints to get one. It doesn't have to be that way." Most larger breweries run draft beer academies off and on-premise, and Anderson himself runs one for free (for information and a draft beer booklet, e-mail anderjim@voicener.com).

TIP THREE: Organize

"Everything was hard to find when I came here three years ago," says Annette May, manager of Chicago's Map Room. Formerly a nurse in Australia, May set about alphabetizing their 150 bottled beers. "I'm a bit anal," she confesses. Chris Black must feel the same about his 69 lines. He painstakingly numbered them, top and bottom, to avoid mix ups.

TIP FOUR: Offer Variety

"Category management helps beer sell," says Guinness's Connaughton. In other words, retailers must offer a coherent variety of styles. As you might expect, individual operators offer the most variety, but there's an amazing selection of beer in chain restaurants today.

John Augustine, division president of The Office Beer Bar and Grill, expanded the number of draft lines from 6 to 15 and increased bottle selection to 35. He rotates their bottles and taps frequently, with an emphasis on imports. And it's paid off. "Since we started our beer program five years ago, we've increased our alcohol revenue from 32% to 42%, and half the 42% is from beer," says Augustine, who operates seven locations in New Jersey. A customer favorite is their "retro list": cans of Piels, Schlitz, Old Milwaukee and Schaeffer.

Brent Campbell, beverage manager for Claim Jumper, put 20 taps in their new locations and offers 70 different bottled beers. Campbell says, "We split the bottles down the middle between craft beer and imports, including some of the Belgians." Most drafts are regional microbrews at this western chain with 26 locations.

Even Red Lobster, the mega-chain with 618 U.S. restaurants, has a unique beer rotation program. Ken Thewes, marketing director, is running 12-week promotions in 2000 for Guinness, Corona Lite, Tequiza and Grolsch. "We want to project a more contemporary, fun image, and bar atmosphere is one way to do it," says Thewes, adding that their newer restaurants have up to eight taps with a larger bottle selection that favors domestic brands.

Individual beer bars thrive on hard-to-find brews. "We have lots of things other bars don't have," says May of the Map Room, including cask conditioned ales and rare Belgian brews. Their 26 drafts are a 50/50 mix of microbrews and imports. Robert Gagnon, owner of 24-tap The Gate Bar in Brooklyn, says "We consciously focus on the styles that don't come out consistently, like winter warmers and barley wines. We also rotate the Belgians and other high-priced imports." Chris Black at Falling Rock says, "My place is all about encouraging people to be more experimental. "His pricing helps. " I charge the same for a Bud as a Heineken. The more a beer costs me, the lower my profit margin. They don't do me any good in the cellar," he says, adding that he does use a sliding scale margin for some of his 55 varieties of expensive Belgian ales.

TIP FIVE: Consider the Glass

"A clean glass is important," says Connaughton, "and for a Guinness, it should be an Imperial pint. It's the emotional connection." But Brent Campbell of Claim Jumper eschews special glasses. "They usually have a logo and we don't do logoed products in our stores--it gets too noisy and sends too many messages. We just use plain [clean] schooners."