{"id":2456,"date":"2015-05-19T06:00:49","date_gmt":"2015-05-19T11:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/?p=2456"},"modified":"2015-05-18T08:59:43","modified_gmt":"2015-05-18T13:59:43","slug":"sand-not-rock","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/?p=2456","title":{"rendered":"Sand, not rock……"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Lagunitas<\/a>In December of 2005, over breakfast in New York, the than CEO of Warsteiner made it perfectly clear that he expected the US operations to start making money.\u00a0 After 25 years in the US, Warsteiner had never made a profit, even when the exchange rate was favorable.\u00a0 The upside of the favorable exchange rate did, however, allow the operation to invest, grow, and become established across the country.<\/p>\n

Given this mandate, during the first full year at the helm, the operation turned a solid profit.\u00a0 From that point, and over the next several years, I was able to reduce the long term debt of Warsteiner\u2019s US operation.\u00a0 This was not done without the cost of some sales.\u00a0 Changing the strategic direction of field sales and marketing did put the operation in solid shape, and it stayed that way until Warsteiner\u2019s CEO\/owner retired, turning over the helm to his daughter.<\/p>\n

This month, Molson Coors announced that they had appointed their CFO acting CEO.\u00a0 Molson Coors had used not one, but two top headhunting firms to find the ideal candidate. Ultimately, they decided to go the internal route.\u00a0 Really?\u00a0 They could not find anyone?<\/p>\n

MC\u2019s recently released first quarter numbers continue the trend the company has had for a number of years.\u00a0 Net income was up +4.4%, yet net sales were down again -.9%.\u00a0 Revenues were up +1.6% against STRs down -2.7% and shipments -2.5%.\u00a0 The announcement of an internal CEO, with a CFO background, will change little.\u00a0 Going forward, expect the financial numbers and trends to remain the same.\u00a0 This is what the board must want!<\/p>\n

On the other hand, Lagunitas, using the same headhunting firm, during the same time period that MC had retained the firm, found<\/em> a new CEO.\u00a0 Lagunitas is one of, if not the, fastest growing crafts in the US.\u00a0 This year shipments are up 50% and depletions up +41%.\u00a0 The new CEO, Maria Stipp, is not from the beer industry although she began her career in chain sales at Miller Brewing years ago.\u00a0 She comes back into beer from a company that recycles consumer\u2019s old phones, MP3s, tablets, and more.\u00a0 She also helped build the video game Mortal Combat<\/em> at Activision into a billion dollar business.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the appointment of these two CEOs, more than any other measurement, indicates the differences between the craft segment and the established domestic segment.<\/p>\n

MC\u2019s board appears to be more than comfortable with the direction of the company and\u00a0expect MC to\u00a0continue to lose market share and volume while increasing revenues and profit.\u00a0 Lagunitas, on the other hand, looks to continue its dramatic growth by bringing in new leadership skills honed in industries that were successful in developing products for those consumers who support crafts.\u00a0 The comparison will be interesting to follow.<\/p>\n

Someday\u00a0over time, MC\u2019s sales declines will eventually bottom out and Lagunitas\u2019 sales will hit a wall.\u00a0 How these beer companies and others handle the change will be a defining moment of their history.\u00a0 Real leaders challenge the status quo which will cause controversy.\u00a0 Lagunitas knows this and it shows with their new CEO appointment.\u00a0 MC does not. This is sand, not rock.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In December of 2005, over breakfast in New York, the than CEO of Warsteiner made it perfectly clear that he expected the US operations to start making money.\u00a0 After 25 years in the US, Warsteiner had never made a profit, even when the exchange rate was favorable.\u00a0 The upside of the favorable exchange rate did, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_s2mail":"yes","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2xRTi-DC","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2456"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2456"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2456\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2600,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2456\/revisions\/2600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2456"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2456"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2456"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}