Two bartenders serving a customer a beer

23 Ways to Keep Customers Coming Back to Your Winery, Brewery, Or Distillery

23 Ways to Keep Customers Coming Back to Your Winery, Brewery, Or Distillery

A recommendation for a great bottle of chablis, a unique sour beer, or a smooth and grassy rye is one of the most satisfying things we can share with each other. Being told you have great taste can feel as good as that booze actually tastes.

So how do we remind your current customers to share how delicious your products are with their friends and family? Ideally, by getting them to come back over and over again through club memberships, events, and so much more.

We hope you’ll try a few of the ideas below to convert one-time customers to raving fans, not just on a Friday night but pulling from their at-home stash to serve their friends at a Tuesday night dinner party too.

  1.  

    1. For the love of all things holy, please share when you are open, post your hours on your website, in all of your social media bios, and on your Google Business Profile. We hate discovering something and having a great time and then when we try to go back we can’t figure out when they are open because every place we look has a different answer. This is a small task that makes a huge difference in whether someone will try you a second time. Consistency is key.
    2. And speaking of social media, pick at least one and post to it regularly. It’s better to post to one channel regularly than to have four or five that you post to only every once in a while. We love discovering new spots on Instagram or TikTok and usually follow them on social media as a reminder for us to check them out soon.
    3. A few basic digital marketing items you should think about: each webpage on your site should have at least 250 words, folks should be able to subscribe to your email list from your website and a link in your social media, and of course you should send regular email updates with event invitations, new products, and other business updates. You should be inviting folks to subscribe to your emails in person too.
    4. We know it’s a ton of work to build and manage, but you have a huge opportunity to sell your products online as well. Think about folks who used to love your stuff and then moved away but still want to enjoy it. Or local folks who want to send it to friends in another state.
    5. This may seem like an obvious one, but serve small samples so folks can make sure they’re going to love it before they order 8 oz. of something. A way to offer folks options is of course flights, but even a tiny free sample before they order a glass is a lovely courtesy. We also get that this is tough to offer when you’re slammed, but you’d rather have customers loving what they’re drinking, rather than feeling just meh about it, right?
    6. On that note, we love offering discounts on what customers drink in your shop if they make a purchase of something to take home. Making that mini tasting free if they purchase a bottle gets us every time and gives us something to take home and share with friends, expanding your reach.
    7. We love when sommeliers, cicerones, and stewards make recommendations and offer special pours that might excite a customer to purchase that reserve or seasonal bottle they didn’t think about. For some reason being upsold doesn’t feel as cringe when it’s a bougie bottle of booze. We would have never discovered extended tirage sparkling wine if it weren’t for a somm offering a taste many years ago. Now we’re obsessed and even special order when each new release comes available.
    8. Invite your customers to celebrate their birthdays, anniversaries, and other milestones with you. We often gather a group of friends together at a brewery for birthday shenanigans but that could also mean just purchasing a special bottle of something to enjoy at home.
    9. Do you offer some sort of club membership? You need a variety of price points and volume options. While some of us throw monthly dinner parties and want to share with our friends, others just want to open a bottle occasionally. How are you enticing folks to join? Is it listed on your menu? Does your staff mention it when folks are oohing and ahhing about how yummy their drink is? Do you remind folks via email around key holidays and events?
    10. Can you build on that club idea and offer something just for members? Your members likely have more in common than just loving your stuff. Building a community around your business will make them feel even more connected to you, likely purchasing more and more frequently, and sharing your business with others. This doesn’t have to be anything super time-intensive like a Discord server or a Facebook group, but a quarterly members night with discounts and special pours could help your customers make new friends with folks with similar taste.
    11. If not a formal membership, everyone loves feeling like they get a bonus so something like a simple punch card or loyalty program to excite folks to come back and check out your wine, beer, bourbon, or gin multiple times. The reward doesn’t have to be big or costly either. Think about a wall of names, or a glass of something special, or even a piece of merch.
    12. Along those lines, what merch do you have? Beyond your actual products, consider things that won’t be consumed next weekend. Are there tiny stickers you can giveaway for water bottles and laptops? Comfy t-shirts, hoodies, branded wine stoppers, bottle openers, and tasting glasses?
    13. Be careful not to serve anything that’s past its prime. That glass may be the first time someone has tasted your products and you don’t want that to be their lasting impression. Your bartenders should be tasting that bottle of wine you opened yesterday, that keg you tapped a couple days ago, or that pre-mixed rum punch you made earlier in the night.
    14. Do you offer anything for folks who don’t imbibe? It’s easy to discount that just because they aren’t going to drink alcohol that they aren’t your main customer, however, many folks drink to socialize which could include non-drinkers of any variety. Children, pregnant people, sober folks, or just anyone not drinking today for whatever reason (hangover, medicine, tomorrow’s workout, etc.). Or some folks may just not love IPAs, tequila, or dry wine. The odds of someone in any social group who falls into one of those categories is high and we’d hate for that person to feel uncomfortable and have to drink just water, or worse for the group to decide to go elsewhere so everyone can enjoy their experience. While we think it’s a great idea, you don’t have to offer a non-alcoholic version of your current products. Simply serving a wide range of products can solve that problem for some. Plus, canned mocktails are trendy and affordable to stock as well as other juices and sodas.
    15. Tours are a perfect way for folks to get to see behind the scenes, but also take photos beyond just a glass in your taproom. They are more likely to post on social media and tag your business when they participate in your process in this way. Lots of folks offer them for free, but you can charge a few dollars as well, allowing you to diversify your offering and encourage discovery of your whole product line.
    16. We love the idea of educating your customers. Are there tasting classes or blending workshops where they can make their own version of your products? These can be time-intensive but these experiences are more memorable than a simple tasting, deepening your connection with them. We’re here for the long-term relationships, not one-night stands.
    17. Speaking of deepening engagement, if your business doesn’t offer food, you could partner with a local restaurant to host a pairing event. This can be a white-tablecloth fine-dining type thing or even a back patio casual thing. So many even ideas, but personally, we will attend any alcohol pairing event. Cheese, Girl Scout cookies, chocolate, tacos. We’ve even seen Halloween candy pairing events. You could even tie into current events like which wines pair with each Taylor Swift album, or what cocktails you imagine each Ted Lasso character would drink.
    18. We’ve also loved attending events that pair alcohol with crafts, art, or fitness. Particularly with art and crafts, those things can be so much fun when we relax and let ourselves be creative without shame, and a glass of bubbly can do just that. And just in case it wasn’t obvious, wait until after the yoga event to break out the beermosas.
    19. Participate in local festivals so folks who have visited you before remember to come back. This can mean festivals specific to your industry like the wine and flower festival that happens in our hometown or community markets throughout the summer or holiday season.
    20. Develop a special release that supports your favorite cause or charity. Your customers may be more motivated to support your business if they see their values reflected in the way you do business, including the products you offer and how you spend your profits.
    21. Encourage folks to track what they drink with you in CellarTracker, Untappd, or Distiller so they remember what they loved about your giggle water and remember to come back.
    22. Invite folks to review your business on social media, Google, and other sites like Yelp, Trip Advisor, etc. Reviews are great because other people are saying good things about you and that will always be more trusted than anything you say about yourself.
    23. Also, consider what other directories you want to be listed in. Is there a local ale trail, a state winery directory, or a liquor association it makes sense for you to be part of?

We hope this list gives you some inspiration and reminds you that marketing your booze business can be so freaking fun!

Don’t forget to track what is working and what isn’t so you can make data-driven decisions about your customer retention marketing efforts. And of course, let us know what you tried and loved from this list so we can help more businesses like yours.

DIY not your thing, or you just don’t have time on top of everything else? We’d love to help grow your winery, brewery, distillery, cidery, meadery, or liquor store. Writing blog posts about your latest wine releases or emails about a hard-to-find bourbon, a literal dream of a workday for us.

If you’re looking for other simple and quick ways to achieve these goals, you might also find some goodies in our store. Email templates you can copy and paste, step-by-step guides for marketing tools, and even inspiration lists for content ideas. It’s all in there.

Comments are closed.