For this episode I venture back through the years to relive the lessons I have learned slinging cider in the Bay Area and trying to build a cider brand from scratch in a market I knew nothing about. It’s been a rough journey but all the cider you sell along the way and the relationships you build makes all the pain worth it. Most days… Let’s go!

MUSICAL INTERLUDE!

Hello!!Welcome to Courage and Other C Words! Episode 5! I can’t believe it!  I’m your host Jenn Root Martell. It’s awesome to have you with us. This episode might be one of the hardest ones I’ll have to put together because at the core it is why I started this podcast in the first place - to get things off my chest, to share my story, however painful it is. And to talk about how difficult it is to be a woman in this world. When we first founded South City Ciderworks, I had zero intention of doing sales and being one of the public faces of the company. It was not what I wanted to do and something I felt comfortable at all doing. And yet, as we struggled with sales strategy and needing to cover as much territory as possible in those early days, sales was something that kept coming up, and I had to suck it up and get out and do. Cause there was no one else to do it. And this is where I had to dig really deep for the courage to face this challenge. For the courage to conquer my fears and for the courage to keep going and keep selling. Day after day. So for this episode that’s the c word I want to focus on. The one that keeps me going every day and has gotten me this far.

So real talk time - building a brand new market for a product that is not beer and wine, in a place where there are a lot of great options for beer and wine, is fucking hard. And we had no concept of how difficult that task would be when we started out. We had done all the research (I have been doing episodes on this) saying that the market was ripe for more cider, there were niches we knew we could fill, that the country was going through a massive cider surge, and that if we had a really high quality cider in an accessible package for a competitive price, orders would be flying in. It would be exactly what the market needed. 

And yes, in retrospect that was completely delusional. You’re right. You have every right to be laughing at us right now. We sometimes find ourselves doing the exactsame thing. Because we really thought that sales wasn’t going to be an issue. That everyone had had Angry Orchard for a few years now, and that they would want to change it up with something more local. Man were we wrong. 

Getting out in the market in general is a time-consuming task. But, it’s made more difficult by the fact that I was pedaling something no one had heard of. To find places to pitch our cider, we started with the basics, that’s what you do right? You get to the basics. And the first thing you do when you need any information these days - we went to the internet. It’s a little easier than driving around looking at the signs on bars and trying to gauge them that way. Though I definitely have done that plenty of times. 

Our main focus in this internet search was bars and restaurants that focused on good-old American fare, “pub grub” as we call it in the industry, had plenty of taps, and looked like they could use some cider. Which usually means there’s only one option, or no options. Bars with a good draft list were of course top priority, along with local markets that supported local. I know none of this is probably surprising if you’ve ever done sales for anything. Try to get that low hanging fruit first and build your way up to the harder places where the fit might not be as obvious, the sell might be a little harder. But at least you have that nice core of places that have taken your cider to then build off of. We made those lists, we made so many lists, I love making lists... researched opening times and draft menus. It was a whole thi

The next step is reaching out to those places. Sometimes it was an email. In the beginning I even wrote numbers down and just started cold calling to see if there was any interest in setting up a tasting or in bringing on another cider in general to their bar. This last technique landed me only one account in San Francisco and is all together not a very good use of time. 

At least in my experience. Or at least it wasn’t for us. Most people who work in the industry only want to pick up the phone if there is an order on the other end, and I totally don’t blame them for that. It’s also quite hard to time it right as far as when the buyer is around, when the time is right. Which is hard because you’re not there. Usually it ends up with a message being taken or left on a voicemail and it never gets to its mark. Otherwise you’ll probably just get a brutal rebuff from the person on the phone. It’s not a great feeling.  

So in the end, it all comes down to knocking on doors. Usually it takes one visit to figure out the name of the person you actually want to talk to. The one who is actually making decisions. Then another visit when that person is around to make sure you get the cider in their hands and they hear your pitch and meet you. Leaving samples for them is a nice gesture but you can burn through a lot of samples that way since they rarely make it to the person they are meant for. A lot like those voicemail messages. I would say dropping samples leads to definitely more people drinking and enjoying our cider but it’s not terribly efficient if they’re not the ones making the final decisions. So now you’re on two visits. If the buyer is not instantly enthralled by your pitch and needs, like most, needs time to look at your products, look at the list, look at what they’re doing with their cider selections already, do some tasting, then it turns into a long game. And don’t get me wrong, I’ve had a bunch of people order on-site, cider un-tasted. And it is the most remarkable feeling. Of trusting what I say is true and taking a chance on a little brand they’ve never heard of to add a cider to their list. But more often than not it’s the opposite. It’s relationship building time, and it’s giving that buyer a better understanding that this is the cider that they want to go with. 

And for that to happen requires a ton of time, patience, probably more samples, and finding your inner tenacious sales person you might not even know existed. That’s defintely what happened to me. That after enough visits, they start to get to know you and your ciders and try them out on the menu. Hopefully their customers likewise agree that the cider is worth trying and they become regular consumers of it at the bar. And then it’s just account maintenance at that point because hopefully that means that that account will start ordering more frequently, and then all you need to do is keep them updated on what new products you have coming out or what’s generally going on with the business, or just to say hi and make sure they’re doing OK. 

And the greatest thing that happens is that once you’ve started to meet the team behind the bar, you slowly build a list of favorite places and favorite people. You develop actual friendships, and for me, those places and those people became my refuge, my sanctuary, they still are… over the years where I knew I could find a friendly face after a long slogging day of doors in my face or stocking shelves all by myself. I feel like this also holds true with receivers actually at grocery stores too who have an unbelievable job and can really be in the worst mood most of the time when you see them in the morning. With all the delivering I’ve done, those people will sometimes be the only human contact I’ll have during the day and many of them are perfectly lovely. I know one builds and amazing houses for their chihuahuas and some are running some side hustles to keep their options open that sound really awesome. You can never guess where the next friendly face in this industry. 

However, more often than not, you do everything right, make the pitch, try to build that relationship, and it’s either the wrong time for the buyer or the wrong fit for the bar in their eyes. And at some point, a point that honestly becomes shorter and shorter the longer you are in the industry, you have to just cut your losses and move on. It’s at this point that I do wish people would try to not worry about my feelings and would just straight up tell me that they don’t want the cider and that they’re not going to buy it. Stop coming around. That unfiltered response is not mean, it’s just realistic and would save so much time and money on my end. I do sometimes wish I could just tell them that but I know that’s not a great sales practice. And I know I have gotten that response sometimes but at the end of the day it’s a call that usually you have to make after you realize that you’re just not getting anywhere. This can be a hard pill to swallow, especially if you like the place and you see a lot of potential. But sometimes it’s not worth the trouble. And who knows? Buyers can sometimes rotate through so if you give it some time, you could come back to a blank slate and it will be a whole new story. Again, it can be a long game. But sometimes persistence in a strategic way can pay off. 

So that’s like the happy sales experience in a nutshell. But I feel like it’s so easy for me to talk about sales strategy now that I’ve been out in the market for five years slinging cider. It was not always that easy and I really really struggled to get to the mental place that I’m in right now. Where I can just walk away and I don’t get terribly invested if somethings going sideways. For me it was just all about getting out of that comfort zone. Though I’d consider myself an extrovert, I definitely do, and have spent time on Capitol Hill peddling discretionary funding requests, and in college I managed large-scale events with lots of people. Before COVID I loved house parties and hosting them and being out there with people. But there is something about having a product that you made and presenting it for the judgement of strangers. It’s a whole new ballgame. At least on the Hill you know who you’re pitching to. They have a voting record and legislative priorities. When it’s one on one at a bar, it’s a blend of saying the right thing, sharing the right cider, having the person on the other side be in the right mood, and then being even remotely interested. That’s usually a critical part of that whole conversation. It’s so many variables that you can’t control. And for so many in sales, and I’ve seen this, they have that gift of the gab and it’s amazing to see them in action. Alex definitely has this gift. Where they thrive on the not knowing and being able to take control of a situation where they in effect have no control. I take my hat off to those people for sure. I will definitely be having them on this podcast to pick their brains about how they do it. After five and a half years I am definitely still not one of them.

Cause even with my lists, all my lists, and my little cans of cider, and a product sheet I was really proud of. Even being the owner myself and for more times than not, having had some hand in making the cider I was selling, I struggled. I struggled to say the right thing, to be aggressive enough but not too aggressive, to be compromising while not giving anything away. Not giving a lot away. We are actually SUPER regulated in this industry as far as what we can give away to accounts like coasters and swag like t0shirts.  There are some parameters there to work within, but a lot of those bigger companies blur those lines all the time and it makes it difficult for little guys like us to compete without all those nifty big marketing dollars. So it wasn’t until about a year or so into my cider sales career that the concept of Courage as a personal mantra came about. 

And this is sort of a super side-story but I think it’s pretty funny. It came out of good, old-fashioned capitalism. Because while I’m just perfectly honest on this episode, I have come to terms with the fact that I am the exact customer that Facebook and all the other social apps are targeting when they run all those ads on your feed. Those algorithms do a damn good job of finding things you might actually like to buy, or most recently, that your husband was talking about over dinner… which is super creepy. So more often than not, I do totally hover my finger over those ads as something usually catches my eye. Long enough of a delay for them to just keep coming. So while I was still trying to find my rhythm and my pitch, I found I was getting discouraged a lot, or would simply freeze. And I guess I was talking about it a lot or searching on the internet about it, I don’t know. But all of sudden, these ads started popping up on the socials for a jewelry business called MyIntent Project. Their tagline is - What’s your word. You can select a word or short phrase, they’ll etch it into this cute little circle and you can wear it as a reminder, or motivation, or statement. Spending all that time in the car by myself gave me plenty of time to ponder what my word would be. But I was on a mission to figure out what my word would be so that, of course, I could buy the requisite bracelet and participate in the consumer economy. 

But when you think about it, this is actually a really difficult exercise. To find one word. I didn’t follow a particular faith, I don’t identify with any particular social or hobby group. I had to dig really deep and think - what word would I want to see everyday? What would help boost me up and keep me going? I don’t remember quite when the ah ha moment happened, but I’m sure I was on 280 driving somewhere. But Courage came to me as my word. A word I felt represented what I had been striving for, what I have to come up with everytime I walk into a bar that I have never been to, to pitch a cider. It’s a word that I feel I have at least partially achieved so far at that point. And yeah, there is always room for growth but it is also the cause of many victories. I don’t necessarily wear that bracelet everyday anymore, but I still have it with me and it did become an engrained mantra that kept me going. 

Armed with my little badge of Courage I had a daily reminder that I could do this, that I didn’t need anyone else, and that as long as I kept selling and kept a good attitude about it, that things would only get better. It took a ton of soul searching and a lot of time in the car with just myself but all of that was really helpful as I’ve moved on to now building out a small sales team and am working with others to get our cider out on shelves. And sharing what my experiences have been so that they can be better sales people. Being confident in what you’re selling is only half the battle, but having the Courage to get out there and actually sell it. And that is a whole different story. 

So with that, and because you now know how much I love lists, I’d like to share some lessons learned in case you wonderful listener ever get tasked with this job or would want to jump into the sales world. Or just to really share my story of some of these experiences that have helped shape me as a salesperson. I think the lessons you learn doing sales can be pretty much attributed to any industry, it’s just the conversation is different.

OK, for one - I learned this one really quickly - the product does not speak for itself. Even if you think it does. I know that’s a saying. If the person who manages the bar has never heard of you, you’re already starting out on ground zero. And for us, for me, that was everyone. Still, after five years in the market I regularly meet people who have never heard of us and are trying our ciders for the first time. It’s a hard pill to swallow but they’re going to be coming at you from a place of doubt because these buyers get so many samples come across their desks every day and honestly, it’s not all good. No matter what I say as an owner and cidermaker, tasting really is believing with these people. Which is hard when a lot of bar owners or people on that side of the bar are recovering alcoholics and aren’t drinking anymore. It then falls to their group of regulars to decide your fate. I remember one place on the peninsula where I dropped some cans and a huge group of people were there next to me at the bar. The bartender started pouring out samples of the cider into little shotglasses for everyone to taste and I was stoked because I would be there while they’re trying it to explain the cider. I should have known exactly what was coming that day because before I know it this big loud guy who I know for a fact had been slamming jager shots kicked back the cider and then started railing to everyone about how the cider was too sweet and that it was like drinking sugar syrup, and that the bartender might as well stick with the Angry Orchard which was better. And I think it was the only cider that they had in the cooler. I think it is still the only cider they have in the cooler. And the bartender did nothing to intervene. She probably actually thought this was hilarious. That was totally the worst situation because you’re trying to make a great impression on these people and you just have these goofballs who seal your fate. Needless to say I let that one go. Which sucks because it’s a great bar and I know our cider would have done so well there if given the chance. Though that’s my general feeling about most places we try to sell our products… It’s not always the buyer’s idea but I usually think that the cider is going to go really well there. So that was a horrible situation.

Second - Despite what you might think, it is a small, small industry world, especially when it comes to product reps. And I really don’t feel like this is just alcohol. So keeping your likeability and integrity high is paramount, and that also means not being an asshole and bad talking competitors. I know it can sometimes be a really easy topic to put others down in an effort to build up your brand. But that word gets around and you start getting a rep for it. And that’s not a great thing. I even know a lot of bartenders who have stopped taking certain beers or ciders because they don’t appreciate the bad-mouthing of the reps. I actually believe there is enough content to do a stand alone episode on shitty sales reps and how it makes no sense to me to belittle and talk bad about other ciders in a market that is so small and in a community that is so tight. I probably will put that together sometime now that I think of it… But anyway, it’s so frustrating to hear when you’re working your ass off and trying to sell to some of these places, and there's all the shit that’s being said about your brand from those who have no place saying it and that is not true. As small businesses we can’t afford to be fighting each other out in the market. It’s embarrassing and looks bad and if all you can say in your sales pitch is how much better your product is from everyone else, you might want to find a different career. Because if you’re selling on the premise that your cider can’t stand by itself, you don’t have much to sell. So that’s been really hard. 

Next, they say in sales that the customer is always right, even if he’s an asshole. Well, right or wrong, if he’s an asshole, just walk away. It takes a lot of energy and a bit of a hit to your self-confidence for sure, but you do not need to deal with toxic people and you’re better off without them. There is always another bar and another restaurant that might be your next sanctuary and it’s not worth trying to make some people happy who refuse to be. In my five and a half years of sales I haven’t come across that many amazing assholes. But I did have one guy super early on when I was on my initial list of places - he took my cider, which was not cold by the way, I was still figuring out about being prepared for tastings and things, whether to bring cold product or not cold product. He threw it over ice and downed it. Only to then turn to me and say “ hey, it tasted like water and good luck selling this cider anywhere.” So yeah, this was probably one of my fifth or sixth stops doing sales ever. So what do you do? I froze. I thanked him for trying and it took everything I had to not run screaming out of there. It doesn’t take much to be nice and some people just can’t do it. At tastings I’ve also had someone to my face say that our hopped cider tasted like mouse piss. This was a few years later so it did actually cross my mind to ask him how he knew what that tasted like first of all and then also not smack him in the face. There are people behind these products y’all! It doesn’t take much to treat people like people. So just don’t bother with them if they’re going to be assholes. You’ve just got to walk away no matter how much it hurts.  

Another lesson I learned early on is the most obvious places for your product might not always be the best ones. That you shouldn’t turn down an opportunity to pitch your cider anywhere. A small sushi bar in San Bruno and it used to be an amazing customer because he’d do sake bombs with our Original Blend cider. Which I would never have thought of but it works really well actually! Also, just because the whole draft list is consumed by big brands and distributor happy, some of my favorite customers are holes in the wall spots with a macro list who just happened to take a chance on a small craft cider and crush kegs every month. At least they were before COVID... All of this was before COVID...

On the flip side, a really lovely British pub in the Bay Area, name unsaid, is also the only place that has ever made me cry after a sales call. I was convinced our cider would be great because culturally it has strong connections with Great Britain and I was excited to bring it in and share it with them, leave some samples. The bartender who had just arrived from across the pond and was delightful, very excited and worked really hard to get the buyer away from whatever he was doing to talk to me. And before I know it, that guy shows up around the corner of the bar literally waving his hands at me like I was a pack of pigeons on crumbs at a park yelling we don’t want any and that we’re not interested. I hadn’t even said anything. I have never in my life been treated like a slimy salesperson pedaling the next snake oil. I left a can for the lovely bartender and walked right out the door. And it just hit me. Something about that experience. I got in the car and proceeded to ball my eyes out. And it wasn’t even something he said it was just the whole experience of him treating me like less of a person. And being female I feel also played into that a little bit. I don’t think he would have done that if I was a guy sitting there with a can of cider. Needless to say I have never been back in there and have recommended every time it has come up for others to also not go in there. It’s the least I can do to get rid of some of the bad juju. But that man was waving his arms at me that day still seems like it was yesterday. 

And though I could probably go on in this vein for hours, I promise I won’t. My last piece of advice that encouraged me during some of those hard days was - just keep moving. Places are taking our cider and they’re selling a ton of it. Again, not this year, but before the pandemic we were doing really well and selling a lot. Even with that, there were days when I was doing sales in South Bay, and the territory is so big and there are so many other things I needed to do as an owner, that I would just sit in a parking lot in my car and freeze. It would just be so overwhelming that it would just wash over me and I just didn’t feel like I could keep going. But, then I would look at my bracelet, come back, focus, focus on what I’m doing, and tell myself that if I didn’t do it, no one else would, there was no one else. And I just had to keep going. You have to do that even when the group of old men at the end of the bar won’t stop asking you stupid sexist questions or you have to run the gauntlet of judgey people as you deliver your cider because you’re a female delivery driver and that’s such a nuance for them for some reason. Even when things are just not moving on the shelf or you haven’t been able to stop by a place for a while, find out too late they’ve been out of cider forever but also couldn’t be bothered to call you and won’t be bringing yours back on. Just keep hanging in there and celebrate the small victories. The new tap handle or the additional SKU at the market. It’s not all bad. I’ve even found that at tastings if someone walks by and says “I don’t like cider”, well actually, that’s a opportunity to try our cider. Because they have probably only had a couple of ciders if they feel that way. And this is a great moment to open their eyes to this great category. You have seize those moments and don’t let them walk away, help them propel you forward. And just keep moving forward no matter how hard in the moment that may seem.  

So there you go! My first and definitely not my last screed about the sales beat and having to find my own courage in this industry. At the end of the day, as long as you believe in your product, don’t act like an asshole or sink to the level of other assholes, and keep your Courage and your chin up, you will make the greatest friends and have a great time. Every NO is room for growth and learning and every interaction is a chance to build you and others up. Though the wins definitely out number the losses, some of those negative experiences are as fresh for me today as the day they happened. And that will just be the cause but you add them to the list of opportunities for growth and good karma and just keep swimming. And like me, just smile at everyone and ask how they’re doing and be the one that they remember as being nice and then they’ll also remember that your product was great and the company was great and it was worth investing in us.

And that’s a wrap! Are you still on the sales beat even during these trying times? Have some great stories from your time doing sales? Is there anything you’ve struggling with for your sales pitch? If any of this rings true with you, email me at info@othercwords.com. I’d love to hear about it and totally commiserate!

For the next episode we will be back in the new year to continue with this conversation of sales by bringing on a good friend in the industry - Cathy Gambel of Blindwood Cider Company out of San Leandro in the East Bay. She also has been working over the past few years to build out a new cider brand in the Bay and I want to pick her brain to see how her experience has shaped her and then also what keeps her going. 

In the meantime, please subscribe, rate, and review to help out this podcast! 5 stars goes a long long way and I so appreciate your support. For more information about me and this podcast visit us online at othercwords.com. Talk to you soon! Thanks for listening!