This Is Not Your Hobby

In this discussion, Michelle Forster, Director of Sales at Black Tooth Brewing with a rich background in field sales, shares valuable insights for beverage brands. She emphasizes the need for both soft and hard sales skills and highlights the importance of active listening. Michelle advocates for respectful curiosity in managing distributor relationships and simplifying pricing for better communication. The conversation also touches on effective tools for streamlining distributor interactions and practical advice on avoiding burnout.

Transform your website from a digital brochure into a 24/7 salesperson that actively drives sales. Discover essential strategies like emotional targeting and clarity that connect with customers. Learn why showcasing lifestyle visuals beats production images and why mobile optimization is a must. Find out how to implement SEO for visibility and keep your site's design simple yet effective. With practical checklists and insights, maximize your brand’s online presence to avoid leaving money on the table.

Sales down? That’s not your wholesaler’s problem. Julie tackles this episode’s bottlenecks with two specific scenarios in mind: an owner-driven sales approach scrappy— but not in a good way— and, having a sales representative but not a sales plan. Both lack strategy, and you can’t sell anything without strategy.Tune in for a dose of Julie’s tough love and sound advice on training your sales team, a non negotiable. Instead of sitting around and commiserating about the beverage alcohol category down, let’s get to work on sales training! What you’ll learn in this episode:Julie's 20 hour a week rule of thumbThe value of engagement with accounts that fosters relationships and promotes reordering Tactics for identifying and building relationships with key accountsA checklist of quick wins for your sales department Best For: Owners and operators of beer, cider, seltzer, kombucha, spirits, THC, and non-alc brands who want to drive revenue... so, every one of them.Submit your bottlenecks here.

Beverage marketers increasingly need to do more with less. Not to mention every department in the company relies on the materials they create. In this first interview episode of This Is Not Your Hobby, Reuben’s Brews Marketing Director Hunter Oetinger schools Julie’s listeners with digestible, easy to implement marketing strategies for small teams to make bigger impacts. What you’ll learn in this episode:Tools and SOPs for automation and streamlined communication within your marketing team, with your external vendors, and across the entire companySuggestions for gauging and maximizing marketing ROIAdvice for ballin’ digital marketing on a budget Reminders about the power of outsourcing Best for:Owners and operators of beer, cider, seltzer, kombucha, spirits, THC, and non-alc brands who want to optimize the capacity of their small team without burnout.Submit your bottlenecks here.

If you’ve been ghosting your email list (or haven’t even started one), it’s time for a wake-up call.Welcome back to This Is Not Your Hobby, the podcast for beverage business owners who are done guessing and ready to grow. In this second episode, host Julie Rhodes gets into another massively underutilized— but wildly effective— sales tool: email marketing.Julie breaks down how to use her 3 R’s of Great Email Marketing—Relevance, Rhythm, and Relationship—to build an email strategy that actually sells… without annoying your audience or spamming their inboxes.Whether you’re starting from scratch or trying to level up your current newsletter game, this episode delivers a smart, actionable framework to help you grow your list, create better content, and build brand trust through email.💡 Spoiler alert: Email still has the highest ROI of any marketing channel. Yes, really.Let’s stop winging it. Let’s get to work.What you’ll learn in this episode:Why email marketing isn’t dead—it’s just been misusedThe 3 R’s of Great Email Marketing: Relevance, Rhythm, and RelationshipHow to start building and maintaining your recipient list (no shady tactics)Ways to use email as a sales tool, not just a megaphoneBest for:Owners and operators of beer, cider, seltzer, kombucha, spirits, THC, and non-alc brands who want to grow a loyal audience and drive real sales through email—without sounding like a robot.Submit your bottlenecks here.

If you're a small beverage brand stuck in a love-hate cycle with social media, you’re not alone, and you’re in the right place.Welcome to the first episode of This Is Not Your Hobby, the podcast for beverage business owners who are done guessing and ready to grow. In this kickoff episode, host Julie Rhodes tackles one of the most common marketing bottlenecks: building a social media content strategy that actually works.She breaks down why the algorithm isn’t your enemy (even if it feels that way), and how her 3C Rule—Clarity, Consistency, and Connection—can help you create engaging, ongoing content without the burnout.Let’s stop winging it. Let’s get to work.What you’ll learn in this episode:Why social media feels overwhelming—and how to make it manageableThe 3C Rule for creating a content strategy that drives resultsHow to build connection without chasing trendsWhy social media is a business tool, not a personal diaryBest for: owners and operators of beer, cider, seltzer, kombucha, spirits, THC, and non-alc brands who want to stop spinning their wheels on social media and start getting traction.Submit your bottlenecks here.