{"id":2619,"date":"2015-06-09T06:00:38","date_gmt":"2015-06-09T11:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/?p=2619"},"modified":"2015-06-09T12:05:25","modified_gmt":"2015-06-09T17:05:25","slug":"a-long-and-winding-road","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/?p=2619","title":{"rendered":"A long and winding road…"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"New<\/a>By the mid-1990s, the\u00a0success\u00a0of New Belgium was permeating the beer industry.\u00a0 At the time the beer was sold only in Colorado, but sales in Arizona were forthcoming.\u00a0 New Belgium’s\u00a0distribution model was to appoint wine and spirit houses on a statewide basis.\u00a0 To manage their sales, they outsourced that function using a broker in Denver.<\/p>\n

In 1995, As New Belgium grew; they hired JB Shireman to help oversee their sales.\u00a0 The next year they brought in a marketing pro in Greg Owsley.\u00a0 At the time neither JB nor Greg had any beer industry experience, but they did have a passion for the craft segment and New Belgium.<\/p>\n

By the end of the 1990s, New Belgium decided to enter Texas, and in keeping with their business model, they appointed Glazer’s the distributor for the state of Texas.\u00a0 Having joined Glazer’s at the start of 1999, I was tasked with the job of rolling out New Belgium later that spring.<\/p>\n

At the first of the year a large group of managers and directors from Glazer’s visited New Belgium and both JB and Greg introduced the brewery to the team.\u00a0 It was during the months prior to the rollout that the brewery started to change its go-to market model by developing its own sales team.<\/p>\n

New Belgium hired two sales people with the now famous titles of Beer Ranger.\u00a0 One of these was Brian Kruger from Austin.\u00a0 The New Belgium team of JB, Greg and BK now managed this introduction which resulted in\u00a0first year\u00a0sales just over 500,000 cases.<\/p>\n

As New Belgium expanded its territory westward in the coming years, BK was soon promoted to Ft. Collins and worked with JB as more and more states were opened.\u00a0 All the while Greg worked to develop the now famous Tour de Fat bicycle events across the country.\u00a0 New Belgium’s dramatic growth is well documented.<\/p>\n

Both JB and Greg left New Belgium in the mid-2000s. JB became a bar owner and later went to work at First\u00a0Beverage Group\u00a0assisting crafts in the financial area.\u00a0 As we know he is a well-known speaker at beer meetings and conventions. Greg continued in the world of marketing, overseeing his own agency, The Storied Brand.\u00a0 Both JB and Greg continue to be very successful in their ongoing ventures.<\/p>\n

Last month it was announced that the third member of this team, BK was leaving New Belgium to head up the sales for Enjoy Beer, the holding company that will eventually include five successful crafts starting with Abita Brewing Co.<\/p>\n

New Belgium has continued moving east and growing; now building a second brewery on the east coast.\u00a0 Under Kim Jordan’s leadership, New Belgium has become one of the industry\u2019s leading crafts, but one can see the successful fingerprints of JB, Greg and BK.<\/p>\n

The history of the beer industry has many stories similar to New Belgium’s and the people that led various companies to success.\u00a0 For those people and others like JB, Greg and BK, it is a long and winding road…<\/p>\n

Beer Fodder: http:\/\/pdx.eater.com\/2015\/6\/8\/<\/span>8743991\/pdx-beer-week-2015-best-events<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By the mid-1990s, the\u00a0success\u00a0of New Belgium was permeating the beer industry.\u00a0 At the time the beer was sold only in Colorado, but sales in Arizona were forthcoming.\u00a0 New Belgium’s\u00a0distribution model was to appoint wine and spirit houses on a statewide basis.\u00a0 To manage their sales, they outsourced that function using a broker in Denver. In […]<\/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-Gf","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2619"}],"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=2619"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2619\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2650,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2619\/revisions\/2650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2619"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2619"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerbusinessunplugged.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2619"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}