International luxury alcohol supplier saves money and time with consolidated printing

With 200+ years in operation and dozens of well-known luxury brands, this international alcoholic beverage supplier spent an exorbitant amount of time and money creating POS (point-of-sale) marketing materials for their wine, champagne, and cognac brands.

The problem: Their U.S. distributor partners were not printing items in the expected quantities or at the expected frequency demanded by the team.

In a typical “3-tier” model — followed by most major players in the beverage-alcohol space — the:

Suppliers (Tier 1) manufacture or source alcoholic beverages and sell them to wholesale distributors. Suppliers are responsible for creating imagery and content to tell their brand’s story.

Distributors (Tier 2) purchase alcoholic beverages from suppliers and sell them to various retailers. They own the relationship with the retailers (accounts). Think liquor stores, supermarkets, restaurants, bars, etc., that ensure those stories (and products) are well-received by customers.

Retailers (Tier 3) are where consumers purchase alcoholic beverages — any establishments licensed to sell alcohol to the public for consumption.

But there was a missing link between the distributors and the suppliers.

This supplier came to BrandMuscle to execute a revised approach: printing on behalf of their distributors.

Consolidated printing.

Rather than having individual sales reps at each distribution site place their print orders as stand-alone, one-off pieces, BrandMuscle consolidated and shipped them in bulk on behalf of the client’s distributors… at a discounted rate.

BrandMuscle used this POS consolidation model for long-run printing and helped this customer:

• Save $1.7 million in the first two quarters
• Increase material adoption and speed-to-market

As the program expanded to 14 brands — ranging from wine to whisky — over a half million marketing materials were printed: posters, shelf talkers, case cards, and bottle neckers.

The flexible program means brands have assets in the market for everything from announcing new partnerships to telling how customers can discover the perfect bubbly gift.