Breakthru Beverage Group’s Strategy for Spring Break Madness

As a leading North American beverage wholesaler, Breakthru Beverage Group (BBG) experiences many busy seasons throughout the year. And while most would assume the end of the year is the busiest time for the distributor, the spring break time frame rivals the holiday season.

The southern states, in particular, experience a tidal wave of increased sales during March.

“You’ll have an estimated 1,000,000 snowbirds still in the marketplace and in different pockets during the five or six weeks of spring break itself,” says Jeff Ortmeier, BBG’s EVP for Florida. “An estimated 30-to-32,000,000 visitors come through. We also have half of Major League Baseball teams playing in Florida, as well.”

With this influx of customers visiting Florida during spring break, BBG has spent years strategizing in order to meet the demands of their customers during this hectic time.

Spring Break Preparation

With how busy Breakthru Beverage Group can get during spring break, Ortmeier says BBG starts preparing as early as the third quarter of the previous year.

“We’ve got to be locked in there with our customers early on, so collecting data and analytics on consumer insights is extremely important to making sure that our teams are bringing commercial solutions to our customers,” he says. “As the influx of people come into Florida, our retail and bars/restaurants partners are not necessarily able to make quick changes, so we have to plan way in advance for this.”

Building on the capacity and skill sets of BBG’s sales representatives is very important, as well, since the competition is fierce in Florida. “Our teams need to be able to bring solutions to the customer because they rely on us to help grow their business,” Ortmeier notes.

Breakthru Beverage Group Expands Florida Operations

To continue meeting the needs of its customers, BBG recently added a new facility in Tampa.

“We’re very excited about the investment,” Ortmeier says. “It’s important not only to the Breakthru system, but also to our suppliers, since Florida is typically at the top of their markets.”

Fostering an environment where the associates feel like family and have opportunities to grow and succeed is important to BBG, which is why the new Tampa facility includes upgraded spaces designed to enhance comfort, foster connection and support overall associate satisfaction.

“BBG made sure that there was a significant investment in building capacity for the future of the company,” explains Ortmeier. “Our goal is to increase customer expectations and make sure we are the distributor of choice, so we doubled the size of the facility to 1,00,000 square feet.”

BBG also installed some state-of-the-art equipment, adding nine palletizers and a high-speed dispenser, allowing the distributor to continue to grow without negatively impacting customer service.

The distributor has also noticed a big decline in customer returns, which have dropped by 50%. Service windows have increased by 2.5 hours, as well, with 1 p.m. ET being the earliest sales cut-off time ─ even for same-day deliveries going as far as Pensacola.

“From an overall culture standpoint in Florida, this is a fantastic opportunity to continue to build on BBG’s legacy,” Ortmeier says.

The post Breakthru Beverage Group’s Strategy for Spring Break Madness appeared first on Beverage Information Group.