"Would you like fries with that?" Moments

[Old Glory Distilling Co.]

Has anyone made simple changes to their retail tasting rooms/gift shops that have positively impacted revenue? Things that made you wish you would've done them long ago? 

Maybe it was starting to offer gift cards or case discounts or a wider variety of products?

Or maybe you literally started asking the "Would you like fries with that?" question in regards to another product or piece of merchandise.

Even though this will undoubtedly vary by market, I'd love to hear everyone's ideas and success stories.

-Matt

 

[bluestar]

Probably good idea, but you do have to use caution if done in the context of a room that sells cocktails, depending on state laws. In our state, laws prohibit doing things that encourage increase of consumption of drinks by economic incentives. For years, we didn't have Happy Hours for that reason. But specifically, if you did something like say offer: "order 3 cocktails, and you get a $5 discount on a purchased bottle", that might be prohibited, because it encourages increased consumption in a sitting at the bar.

[Old Glory Distilling Co.]

Completely agree. I should've phrased my original post to be geared more towards the gift shop ... not tasting bar. For us, we're glad to be able to serve our spirits in cocktails, but we're not set up to be a hangout cocktail bar. 

[Lassiter Distilling Co]

We found a local mixer company to partner with and sell their products. The make great products with a similar philosophy to ours, and they've improved sales of our clear rum by 50%, since it's one stop shopping for a lot of folks. I resisted mixers for a long time, but we just had to find the right partner who makes a quality product line for it to make sense. Also, 

Also, Groupon helped us increase retail sales significantly. I'd recommend at least considering a deal with them if you haven't already.