Tariffs, Schmariffs: Tools & Tactics for Grizzled BevAlc Veterans

With wine & spirits producers, importers, distributors, retailers, restaurateurs and consumers all writhing in unison to the tune of Trump’s Tariffs II: Electric Booglaoo, this is no mere recapitulation of the first go ‘round. What makes this sequel uniquely excruciating is timing, a convergence of unfavorable conditions stacking ever higher into a towering foe: declining consumption among younger consumers, the rise of enticing no & low alcohol and alternative beverage options, and a downright nasty economy all around. 

 

Still hungover from a global pandemic, it’s easy to feel as though we’ve awoken to an empty ibuprofen bottle, a car that won’t start, and 20 minutes left to run the 5k to work in freezing conditions. As the protagonists in this dark comedy, let’s not forget our superpower; beverage alcohol professionals are some of the most resilient, stubborn SOBs on the face of the planet.

 

Nothing New 

“When times are good, people drink; when times are bad; people drink.” We’ve heard it a thousand times before. For many of us, it’s the reason we’ve stayed in this industry over so many ups and downs across the decades. 

 

The good news is that tariffs are nothing new either; a quick review of this Wine Enthusiast article on the history of alcohol tariffs in the United States grants a sense of scale, perspective to the magnitude of today’s challenge. What is new is the array of tools and technology at our disposal to effectively deal with the tariffs this time around. 

 

Without belaboring this little pep talk, let’s turn now to potential strategies for getting back to work and doing what we love: gathering over a stiff drink.

 

“It Depends”; “The Plan is to Be Spontaneous” – and Other Frustrating Answers

Even if it were possible to offer a paint-by-numbers approach or one-size-fits-all solution to tariffs, any such suggestion would be inadvisable to take at face value. 

 

Every point of view in our industry – producer, importer, wholesaler, or restaurant/retailer – faces a different set of challenges and accompanying set of questions to consider in light of present tariffs and those looming on the horizon:

 

• As a producer, is your supply chain resilient in the face of tariffs on raw materials like aluminum, steel, glass and cork? Should you consider switching manufacturers, wholesalers, route to market altogether? Is a significant portion of your projected revenue vulnerable to retaliation from the countries you’re exporting to? Should you prioritize other markets to avoid becoming collateral damage in these trade wars?
• How do suppliers and importers distribute the burden of tariffs across the supply chain while remaining within reach of their customers’ wallets? What price point affords the distributor and retailer enough margin without driving customers away? How do we avoid passing prohibitive costs along to the end consumer?
• Everyone must grapple with timing. Should a cocktail bar selling on-premise stock up now on rare, high end spirits for fear of high tariffs in the near future? During the 2018 tariffs, many made the mistake of stocking up only to find their bloated inventory gathering dust due to shifting demand. As an importer, should you put that overseas shipment on hold until you’re confident there won’t be some devastating new tariff going into effect weeks from now when it finally lands ashore? 
• As a wholesaler, how are you going to accommodate bulk orders and all the clever little maneuvers required to mitigate the blow of tariffs along the supply chain while managing inventory within the confines of limited warehouse capacity? 
• Retailers, how can you plan shelf space for a future that may never come to pass, or come to pass only temporarily – validated or destroyed by Donald Trump’s mood of the day? 

 

Cheesy as it sounds, there are really only a handful of levers that anyone in our industry needs to weather tariffs in 2025: staying (or becoming) agile, gaining visibility, automating as much as possible, and executing upon a disciplined sales strategy.

 

But, First – A Bitter Pill

Here’s some good news disguised as an insult. 

 

Many drinks brands are so good at wasting money without any help from external pressures like tariffs, that with a little bit of work it’s actually possible to largely or completely offset the damage.

 

For some beverage businesses, tightening things up – reducing waste and streamlining inefficiencies – might actually be all it takes to hang in there and come out stronger on the other side. The difference in hard times like 2025 is that what was once a competitive advantage now looks a lot more like a life raft.

 

Stay Agile and Keep an Open Mind

Part of what makes these charming tariffs so uniquely difficult to deal with – even with above average visibility – is their unpredictability. BevAlc businesses need the ability to react quickly to unforeseen forces larger than ourselves and outside of our control. This is, of course, easier preached than practiced in an industry where everything is tied up in production (not to mention tradition), dependent on and beholden to mother nature’s pace.

 

One way to handle this, particularly for importers, is to diversify your portfolio. If all of your proverbial eggs are in the Bordeaux basket when Macron says something less than sycophantic about Trump, you’ll have options to fall back on.

 

Keeping an open mind is a prerequisite for outside-the-box survival maneuvers when disaster strikes. To be agile is to hold very little sacred, ready for an ingenious pivot or creative workaround. 

 

Brainstorming sessions aren’t just for elementary school kids; in all our office politics and posturing as adults, most of us have simply lost respect for the problem solving process; it’s too vulnerable. It takes time to build trust and enculturate our teams to bring their ideas to the table again – to reactivate those long dormant parts of our brains. 

 

Every brand has a True North and constants to which they must adhere; short of dissolving oneself in the name of responsiveness, brands must determine boundary lines for themselves and delineate where they are – or aren’t – willing to compromise.

 

For some, packaging is one such area primed for reinvention. If switching vendors proves too difficult, consider switching mediums or materials altogether. Pair that initiative with current high demand for sustainable packaging, and you’ve got a winner. For some compelling examples, look no further than Target’s recent paper wine bottle rollout or participation in reusable glass bottle ecosystems like Revino. For a masterclass in supply chain resilience, see Keurig Dr Pepper’s strategy of partnering with independent bottlers regionally.

 

Gain Visibility

None of the decisions we make in business matter without visibility. Even if you objectively had the world’s greatest wine, it wouldn’t translate to dollars without a strategy that’s grounded firmly in a clear line of sight into activities vs. results and return on your investments. 

 

It’s hard to grapple with any of the questions raised by tariffs without understanding your own pricing. It’s impossible to know where to direct one’s sales efforts without understanding one’s buyers. You’re unlikely to drive more than a few feet blindfolded without causing a crash.

 

Taking greater control over your own pricing and trade promotions is one of the best ways to ensure your winery, distillery, or brewery remains resilient and responsive in the face of tariffs, come what may. If you don’t already have it, gaining the ability to answer basic questions like “which of my programs is responsible for the most lift?” is enough to make informed decisions about where to spend that money in the future. 

 

Would you spend that money again for a BTG or cocktail menu placement? Can you reallocate your budget to only the promotions that drive the most sales? This is where investing in pricing/trade promotion management/deal management/billback management tools like Tradeparency has the potential to completely course correct a struggling business by helping identify previously overlooked inefficiencies and wasted spend. 

 

Another area where many suppliers lack visibility and effective collaboration is with their distributor partners. While many suppliers are getting their distributor’s depletion data and account universe generated for them in reports, or worse – in an outdated PDF periodically emailed to them – few are yet taking advantage of real-time, two-way communication. Seeing what the distributor sees through tactical collaboration solutions like BevPath allows suppliers to target key accounts and know where to direct their sales team’s efforts in the market.

 

Automate As Much As Possible (Wherever It Makes Sense)

It’s easy to understand why more people in beverage alcohol aren’t leveraging automation; so many of these tools just haven’t been around for that long – at least not to the extent that they’re available today. 

 

Automating things as much as possible keeps your business lean, scrappy, and efficient. Working smarter enables even small businesses to compete against much larger competitors with far more resources – resources that are likely fat, happy, and complacent by comparison.

 

If you’re not already, catching billback errors using solutions like AI Invoice Manager might be enough savings alone to significantly reduce the blow inflicted by tariffs. Automating your depletions reporting by integrating those into your CRM is another great way to save your team hundreds of hours of tedium uploading CSVs and PDFs manually every month or week until the day they die (likely of terminal boredom).

 

The Discipline to Execute a Highly Targeted Sales Strategy 

In times of tariff and free trade alike, our sales teams’ time is perhaps the most easily wasted – and therefore precious – resource at our disposal. When tariffs strike, the businesses most likely to endure are those who spend the majority of their time and budgets targeting only the accounts and channels responsible for the most sales. This means excluding or saying “no” to the majority of accounts and advertising opportunities out there, where it’s easy to waste time bulking up vanity metrics like “accounts sold” despite high churn and little long term fruit.

 

Measuring sales volume against sales activity side-by-side using sales execution management (CRM) tools like GreatVines ensures that your team’s time is thoroughly accounted for and that future decisions are data-driven, founded on actionable insights instead of pure speculation or a spray-and-pray approach. Save the “vibes” for your copywriters; effective sales strategies come from your sales leaders’ ability to analyze and interpret data.

First Principles are First for a Reason

It’s a boring answer to the problem of tariffs, longevity, evil, or anything else to say “just handle the basics really well.” Most enduring and effective solutions in life are not exciting. Being healthy and looking good is a function of small, consistent wins over a long period of time. Hardly anyone suffers from crippling debt because they don’t understand the principles of personal finance; emotional spending and behavioral issues often persist despite having all the knowledge one needs to succeed.

 

It’s a good thing that readers hoping for some magic bullet or clickbait Tariffs Hate This One Simple Trick! listicle will have long departed by now; this would have bored them anyways. The earth is for the disciplined to inherit, and even the best among us need to be reminded of the basics every now and again. Here’s to long term vision trumping quick fixes; lay that bottle of 2025 down in the cellar. Someday we’ll open it together and enjoy.