
Apply HN: Tiz.com - tboxer
The three tier system requires that all wholesale alcohol in this country be ordered from a liquor distributor. These distributors are primarily sales and logistics agents and aren&#x27;t technology driven.<p>We are looking to create enterprise software that allows liquor distributors to start accepting orders online via the web and mobile. This frees up sales reps to do high level sales activities and lets distributors save money by being able to service more accounts.<p>P.S. We are looking for a rails developer to hire if anyone is looking for some hourly work.
======
jeffmould
From a bar/restaurant manager perspective, I never understood why distributors
don't integrate technology. When I managed a large bar/restaurant, ordering
$1000s of dollars of liquor/beer each week, I would have to call each order in
to my rep's voicemail and leave a message. If he had any questions he would
call me back and ask for clarification. In almost every order though there was
at least one issue where the wrong liquor was sent, the wrong quantity was
sent, etc... Huge time suck for management having to always double check each
order as it came in and reorder with risk of running out.

With that said, it would be cool if you could integrate with liquor management
systems (i.e. BevSpot or BarMetrix) to somehow automate the entire process. So
when they ran their inventory it would automatically create events and reorder
the required products.

~~~
tboxer
Great thoughts and exactly the problem we are trying to solve.

We actually have our system setup to work with Bevinco, which comes in and
takes your inventory in the middle of the night and then generates an
inventory report. We have a quick order page that matches that so they can
just run down a list (opposed to driving through a catalog, which is our main
way).

Our plan is to eventually have inventory be apart of our system so we can have
machine learning on par levels, consumption, ordering.

------
aacook
I like the idea and a point-of-sale like system seems like it would make a
good product.

A couple years ago a new bar opened up across the street from me. At the same
time, a liquor store down the street was going out of business and put most of
the liquor on clearance. The new bar owner filled me in on the state of liquor
in Massachusetts. Apparently the system is super controlled by distributors.
Even if he wanted to go down to the liquor store and buy 100 bottles of liquor
on clearance, he couldn't. He can only buy through a licensed distributor.
Some of the liquor he stocked was actually more expensive through the
distributor than it was from retail liquor stores in the area. The industry
has special controls in place, like special caps on dealer-distributed liquor.
He joked about buying some of the clearance liquor and pouring it into the
bottles. It was pretty clear that I was paying higher prices because of the
distributor-controlled market.

Massachusetts seems to have some of the most strict alcohol laws around.
Unlike neighboring states like New Hampshire, we can't order wine from
wherever we want online. This means that many of the wines that I'd like to
drink aren't available to me since no one in the area distributes them. Some
people get around this by shipping wine to friends in nearby states or by
traveling to places and shipping cases back via UPS marked "tiles + olive
oil".

------
JayNeely
Are you aware of / how are you different than BevSpot
([https://www.bevspot.com/](https://www.bevspot.com/))?

They seem to be solving this problem from the restaurant management side,
which builds the demand-side of the marketplace, making it easier for them to
sell distributors on the supply side:
[https://www.bevspot.com/distributors/](https://www.bevspot.com/distributors/)

------
dccoolgai
Hey - from DC and my buddy used to work for the Beer Wholesalers Association
as a lobbyist and I have a couple other buddies who lobbied for Wine &
Spirits. I have a piece of advice that dovetails into a question. The advice
is to go meet with those folk at those associations if you haven't already.
The question is that I know from my buddies' experience at those places, there
is a lot of political resistance in those industries to "changing things" \-
how do you intend to navigate around that political/attitude problem?

~~~
tboxer
Thanks for the thoughts and we will check them out.

We aren't looking to change the way alcohol is distributed, just offer a tool
to take orders. There are a bunch of distributors that have already built
their own ecommerce ordering solutions and have found them to work well.

------
buss
Can you explain a bit more about how the current system works, and how your
software would make it better?

Are the distributors and wholesalers going to save more/make more money by
using your software? How?

~~~
tboxer
1) Accounts (bars, restaurants, wedding halls, grocery stores, etc.) are
either served by a sales rep or the orders have to be phoned in if you don't
have a sales rep. If you have a sales rep, you place your order by calling,
texting or emailing.

The problem is that all ordering and product info is then reactive to the rep.
You can't login and see prices or products available, you have to reach out to
your rep to answer questions.

The other side is that reps are busy and driving around all day, so they often
don't respond by order cut off time. Our system helps take away these manual
tasks and let hem do more selling.

2) Distributors spend $100k-$1mm each year paying employees to take orders for
house accounts. Our system allows them to cut down on this labor cost. It also
allows them to reach more accounts as each sales rep might only be able to
service so many accounts. If we can automate part of it, they can do more
selling to more accounts.

~~~
davemel37
Strange question - Is there a reason it is still done this way? Are there
entrenched distributors and commissioned sales reps that are incentivized to
keep things the same way?

Many wholesale & distributor businesses seem to operate this way, but the
reason is rarely due to lack of available technology solutions... Just a
thought worth thinking about.

~~~
tboxer
The sales reps could see it as a threat depending on how it works with them.
We always say that there is a place for good sales reps, we just don't want
them to be glorified order takers.

You do also have a lot of old school distributor owners that view sales reps
as hand to hand combat and are afraid of losing that touch point.

~~~
seivan
Sounded like it's straight out of The Office.

------
numlocked
I'm involved in placing POs for CPG products (I work for a retailer). Why
would the process be fundamentally different for liquor wholesales &
retailers? I get that it's currently an inefficient system, but if you could
snap your fingers and put the tech in place, what about it is differentiated
enough from existing purchase order systems to justify focusing specifically
on the liquor biz? Genuinely curious!

~~~
tboxer
Great question. The main problem isn't necessarily placing orders, its also
being able to manage your ordering process. If you are doing a new cocktail
menu and you need a lemoncello that is under 20 dollars to fit into your
cocktail, you would have to reach out to every rep and ask them for product
info and pricing. Our system lets you see everything available to you from all
distributors. You can then one click order across as many distributors as you
want.

------
manav
It's been some time since I've interfaced with distributors, but I thought one
of the largest companies, Southern Wine & Spirits, invested a lot into
infrastructure in their warehouses and online fulfillment. Is this something
thats just targeted to smaller distributors?

~~~
tboxer
We are targeting ourselves to anyone that doesn't have their own system. Small
and medium distributors lend themselves well to this because they usually have
small sales forces and are limited in the number of accounts they can service.

------
davemel37
Would this solution do much of the same thing you are looking to create
[https://www.handshake.com/](https://www.handshake.com/) ?

~~~
tboxer
The requirements of the alcohol industry are very specific and vary state to
state, so we think it requires specialized software to take that into account.

------
boxerdawg36
who is the value holder - the accounts or the distributors?

~~~
tboxer
It is a split, the bars, restaurants and stores get to speed up ordering
immensely and also don't have the interruptions of sales reps in and out.

The distributors get to streamline how orders are placed and have records of
them. They also get to save money by servicing house accounts that might rely
on telesales to take orders.

------
6thSigma
Do distributors currently have software that you can tie into to get up-to-
date stock and prices?

Are there any legal hurdles with scaling this across state lines?

~~~
tboxer
A majority of small to medium distributors use quickbooks, so we could tap
into that API. The larger ones have custom erp systems that could be tapped
into, but it gets tricky. At the lowest touch point, we could send orders to
sales reps to punch.

Yea, there are things to take into account with certain states related to
pricing, etc.

------
matheist
Hi there!

You're currently authenticating over http. Please switch to https, you're
putting your users at risk by sending their passwords in clear text.

~~~
tboxer
Will do - thanks.

------
gleb
How far along are you?

Why did you pick this idea to work on?

PS Nice TLD.

------
wehadfun
Are the distributors mom and pop shops or big corporations?

How does Walmart/Costco/Big grocery store chain place orders for liquor now?

~~~
tboxer
There is a pretty big range - but it ends up being a nice mix of large, medium
and small. Large distributors will typically be your macro beer and liquor
brands. Mom and pop distributors will typically be niche wine distributors.

A handful of chains have developed systems to create PO's, but a majority just
rely on sales reps to service the account.

------
boxerdawg36
how do you plan to monetize?

------
PM_NAKED_PIKS
Nice idea. But that's the problem, it's just an idea.

~~~
tboxer
So in order to get distributors onboard, we have been signing up bar and
restaurant groups to use our service to send sales reps orders.

Our goal is to go back to distributors and ask for integrations once we have
the orders to back it up.

~~~
Gargoyle
Have you talked directly to distributors (or even their salespeople) to ask
why they haven't done this? What are their concerns?

~~~
tboxer
Some distributors have built out systems to allow online ordering and it works
well for them and they view it as a competitive advantage. A few have also
tried over the years but found they couldn't get customers to actually use it.

It helps that we have seen a major shift from food distributors to online
platforms.

A concern of some distributors is losing the touch point with the sales rep.
They want a rep to be talking to the buyers at any chance they get or they
think people will pass up on their products.

