Professional drinks buyers are worth their weight in gold and we should start 2024 by recognising the role they play, says The Buyer’s Richard Siddle.
Firing up the office computer, or opening up the laptop after the festive break is not fun for anyone. It might only be less than two weeks, or a matter of days before you packed up for the Christmas holidays, but somehow it always feels much longer. The mental challenge of stepping from one year to the next is real.
The new year blues can take a while to wrestle with…
To make matters worst all those issues, problems, and things you did not want to do before Christmas are all still there lurking under Post-it notes and unreturned emails…and then there is the tax return to deal with.
But however big your inbox is spare a thought for all the drinks, wine and spirits buyers amongst us. In fact, let’s do more than spare them a thought, let’s collectively raise a glass of new year Appletiser to all the drinks buyers out there that effectively make this great industry of ours work.
The intrepid souls who scour the earth looking for the right beers, wines and spirits to put on our retail shelves and restaurant and bar drinks lists. OK, on the one hand that does not sound too bad a job to come back to, no matter how many Die Hard movies you have watched over Christmas. But the pressure – and responsibility – on drinks buyers intensifies every year. There may not be more drinks aisles or wine lists to fill, but how those wines, beers and spirits are sourced, analysed, tasted, tested, negotiated and bought becomes ever more complex. Particularly with so many higher supply chain and dry good costs to factor into equations.
That’s before you even throw in the challenge of what sort of bottle or packaging you put the chosen drink into, or calculate the most cost effective and sustainable way of getting it to your chosen market. All the while making enough margin to keep the company’s bosses, accountants and shareholders happy.
More complex
The shadow of Brexit continues to hang over the drinks industry and all the added red tape, administrative costs and supply chain issues that buyers now have to deal with
Writing out the ‘requirements’ criteria for any new drinks buyers’ position gets longer every year thanks to often ill thought through government legislation that just makes the job even more complicated and challenging than before.
Last year’s much publicised change in the UK alcohol duty system was just the latest in a series of administrative headaches that buyers now have to deal with. Particularly as it comes on the back of the form-filling bureaucratic quagmire otherwise known as Brexit.
In fact, having advanced maths should be the latest requirement on a buyer’s CV if all the proposed changes to the duty regime come into force as planned in February 2025 that will require them to re-calculate the duty for every 0.5% between 11.5% abv and 14.5% abv.
Now many of these new hurdles and challenges are also the burden of wine and drinks producers around the world, but they have the advantage of being able to sell their products in whichever market they want.
The UK drinks buyer only has their own domestic playground to operate in and is having to become even more creative and imaginative in how they do their job.
Particularly as the powers that be at our major supermarkets, pub operators, drinks wholesalers and distributors are only adding more fuel to the fire demanding ever more profits regardless of what added costs, and administrative burdens their drinks buyers are having to deal with.
Whatever is thrown in their way drinks buyers are expected to find a way and Indiana Jones-style save the day
Because they know their intrepid buyers will always find a way. That is what they do. Regardless of the obstacles, snakes, and ladders thrown in their way, they will somehow, Indiana Jones-style, make their way through seemingly impossible situations to fight another day.
Be they working for a major retailer, restaurant group, drinks importer, wine merchant, or individual sommelier sourcing wine for their wine list.
Feared to revered
It’s why our industry’s buyers are so well respected and revered. There was a time in the recent past when they were feared too – and perhaps some still are, but they are, thankfully, a dying breed.
In my time reporting on the retail, drinks and hospitality industries “the buyer” has gone from the all powerful, all demanding, all conquering individual to an all together far more collegiate, understanding and responsible drinks professional – and those sectors are all far better for it.
The big bullying buyers are now disappearing out of the drinks, retail and hospitality sectors
Yes, there are still a few bad apples out there, but arguably that is more the blame of the organisation and business they work for. Companies that sill think the knuckle duster approach is the best way to get the most out of their suppliers and producers.
It is remarkable, in fact, how quickly the bullying buyer – particularly of the supermarket variety – has mostly disappeared from the scene. We can all think of those ego-driven, big, brash buyers of the past, who would scream, shout and demand the impossible from their suppliers.
Individuals who roamed around generic tastings and trade fairs like school bullies looking for their next victim. Most have either now left the industry all together, or been rehabilitated into higher paid, below the radar corporate roles, or re-invented themselves as an all pleasing, conciliatory consultant.
For that we can thank, in part, the huge focus businesses – most noticeably the major supermarkets – now have to place on sustainability which goes far beyond their carbon footprint, but how they treat, deal and work with their suppliers for a common, positive goal. It is a lot harder now for a supermarket buyer to even justify flying to ProWein, never mind getting their importer to fly, at a moment’s notice, to the other side of the world for a dressing down.
The professional buyer
The rise of the professional drinks buyer is good news for the sector as a whole
The rise of the professional drinks buyer in place of the of all powerful, ‘just fuck’n do it’ drinks buyer of the past is one of the most significant developments the drinks, hospitality and retail industries have seen in recent years. A change that arguably has been fast tracked by Covid. Companies and individuals alike have re-assessed just what it is they want out of business and how effective things can be when all sides of the supply chain are working in true partnership rather than conflict.
Increased dry goods, packaging, supply chain and energy costs have hit both buyers and sellers hard and sales negotiations that were once sacrosanct have had to be ripped up time and time again to deal with the fast changing global economic picture.
Which, in turn, has demanded a new approach from buyers and an even bigger necessity for them to be looking at the bigger picture, the longer term rather than chasing quick fixes and deals that might be out of date before they are completed.
We have also seen the rise of the super supplier. Or the ‘preferred supplier’ as they are more commonly known. Businesses that now act as an extended arm of a major supermarket, managing even more of their category, buying, sourcing, packaging and branding needs.
Suppliers that increasingly have more cards in their deck as they are the ones with the black book of producer contacts around the world, that they can juggle and switch around to ensure the major retailers always have the quality and volume of wine they are looking for at all the key commercial price points.
It is perhaps why we are seeing so many buyers take the unusual step of moving away from the high profile, but also highly pressured BWS buying jobs at the major supermarkets and look to take up senior roles at these super suppliers and importers. Taking their professional buying skills with them.
Total respect
The Buyer was set up to analyse, explore and champion the role and significance of the drinks buyer and how they do business and build relationships with their producers and suppliers
When we first started The Buyer, we knew what we wanted to do and what the concept of this website should be. An opportunity to provide a new platform that went beyond news headlines to look at how the industry really works. To get under the bonnet and look at how buyers and drinks producers work together and what we could do to help them work better together.
But what we could not do is think of a name for the website that summed all of that up. Until we stripped everything back to analyse what is the most important function in how the whole drinks industry operates – the buyer. Be it producers buying grapes from growers, or importers buying wine from wineries, to retailers buying brands from suppliers. It all comes down to the buying and how effective and now professional your drinks buyers are.
Which is why we should all take a moment to welcome in the new year and recognise the importance, the significance and the professionalism of the buyers that help make the rest of the drinks, retail and hospitality sectors get on with making and selling the products they want to buy.
