Hey Outliers ☀️
The drinks industry has always fascinated me.
The way some brands become bar and shelf staples whilst others pop up out of nowhere only to become distant memories a few years later. The packaging and design, combined with recipes and storytelling.
It’s a source of constant inspiration for anyone building a brand, that’s for sure.
And a brand that’s stood out for me recently is Whitebox Cocktails.
They’ve taken the ‘ready to drink’ cocktail market by storm and they’re doing something clever that their competitors don’t seem to have cottoned onto.
So, grab yourself a martini and let’s get into it…
Here’s what to expect today:
📰 Story: How Whitebox Cocktails achieved 400% sales growth
🧠 Insight:
💪🏼 DIY:
🔗 Good links: Making secondhand cool, brand storytelling and alternative growth models
📰 Story: How Whitebox Cocktails achieved 400% sales growth
Whitebox Cocktails makes ‘ready to drink’, single-serve classic cocktails to drink at home.
But they don’t do it like other brands.
They’ve brought the quality and expertise of top cocktail bars to the ready to serve format by creating the first ever bartender-operated cocktail production site.
In the first six months of trading they achieved 400% sales growth.
In 2022 grew their UK distribution from 60 to more than 700 independent outlets.
And there’s something very unique about their approach that I believe has driven a lot of their growth…
Besides the outstanding quality (try one if you haven’t and you’ll know what I mean) Whitebox has taken an interesting approach to branding that most of their competitors seem to have missed.
Each of their cans has its own unique name and design, making each one feel like a brand in its own right rather than ‘another cocktail by Whitebox’.
“Wherever you are, look in your nearest store. You’ll see formulaic brands doing cocktails by numbers. We are doing the opposite. Each cocktail is unique and excellent, and the passion we have for making excellent drinks comes through in every detail.” – Alex Lawrence, Co-Founder of Whitebox
This approach is interesting because it really takes the way people buy and talk about cocktails into account.
A lot of us have a favourite or a go-to, and many of the classics come with their own history and lifestyle, so why put them all under one umbrella?
“By keeping only the Whitebox stamp as a mandatory on the can, we have creative freedom to develop each idea to be the best it can be without limitation or compromise.” – Alex
And from their social media channels, people seem to love it. The comments reference the drinks themselves rather than Whitebox a lot and people love to rave about their favourites.
It’s a fantastic talking point, they stand out on the shelves and they let people express their personalities through the cans they choose in the same way they would in a bar.
Genius.
Check out Whitebox Cocktails >
🧠 Insight: Understand what your customers value
Whitebox Cocktails have understood the connections we build to the brands we choose and realised that it’s not just about flavours when we choose a drink, it’s about expressing our personalities too. Their creativity gives people the freedom to explore in a way that’s fun and engaging, not just another recipe that has no story or history behind it. The more you understand what your customers value in your offering, the more you can shape it into something that they just can’t say no to.
💪🏼 DIY: How to better understand your customers
Understanding what your customers put value on and how your product fits into their lives is critical if you’re going to grow. Whether you’re in the drinks industry or not, here are a few things you can do to better understand your customers:
👉 Whether you’ve got 10 or 10,000 customers, speaking to them on a regular basis to understand how they make their purchasing decisions will help you endlessly.
👉 Run a survey to people you think are your ideal customers. You can do this by setting up a simple Typeform and running some Facebook ads to it based on interests you know they have.
👉 Run a post-checkout survey to learn why they chose you in particular. What was important to them? What were they hoping to achieve? In what context are they using your product?
Need some help or more direction? Hit reply.
🔗 Good links
🔗 How Depop made secondhand shopping cool >
🔗 Every brand is a well told story >
🔗 Sustainable small business growth >
💌 Tell us what you’d like help with…
We started this newsletter for entrepreneurs just like you, and we want it to be as helpful as it possibly can. So tell us what you’d like help with and we’ll dig into it.
Or if there’s a brand you’d like to know more about, let us know and we’ll reach out to them.
Until next week…
Keep being an Outlier,
J + K