10 Strategies To Increase Your Brewery Sales & Profits

Breweries have an incredible gross profit margin of 74% to 92%. Despite the impressive profit margin potential, savvy brewery owners are constantly looking for creative ways to increase sales and profits.  

Besides, the number of breweries in North America is growing steadily, so it’s not surprising that brewery owners find it harder to increase their sales & profits each year.

Typically, increasing sales while monitoring and reducing expenses are the key strategies to better profit margins. This post highlights 10 strategies to increase your brewery sales while keeping your costs controlled.

For more information on breweries, make sure to read our guides below:
How to Start a Brewery in 9 Steps: Complete Guide
How To Build A Financial Model For a Brewery?
How Much Does It Cost To Start A Brewery? Examples
How to Write a Brewery Business Plan: Complete Guide

1. Focus on Building Brand Awareness

★ Strategy to increase your brewery sales

In an industry that is getting more congested, it is essential for brewery owners with a growth vision to focus on developing strong brands. Brand awareness includes the ability of people to recognize your brand logo. Think of brand awareness as the first stage of your marketing funnel as it casts a wide net across potential buyers.  

Therefore, brand awareness directly impacts your sales rates and overall organizational success. Besides, research shows that brand awareness can drive growth in market share. 

2. Establish a Strong Value Proposition

★ Strategy to increase your brewery sales

A value proposition strategy is the single most effective way for building loyal long-term customers.

With thousands of breweries competing for the same market, a big challenge is finding a large enough base of differentiation within your competitive market. To enjoy long-term success, you must be willing to deliver superior value to your drinkers. 

Therefore, research the market and engage the customers to find out what they are missing. The insights from customers are good enough to help you achieve a sufficiently large audience and increase sales. 

Your value proposition could be based on a specific taste, cleanness, unique ingredient, a unique formulation, or a captivating brand story. 

3. Increase Your Reach

★ Strategy to increase your brewery sales

You have established strong brand awareness and a compelling value proposition. However, if your audience can’t purchase favorite beer in favorite bars, that does not help much. The journey to profitability begins with securing a tap at the neighborhood bars and targeting the nationwide retailers. 

Ideally, you make progress towards increasing brewery revenues when you tackle availability issues. Remember that consistent product availability is an essence that makes businesses successful by providing a structure for attracting the target market. 

Focus on listing at the liquor stores and get those big retailers to help you reach a larger audience so your brands move up to the next level. Take advantage of e-commerce and online delivery platforms to reach a wider audience, especially those interested in craft beers. 

4. Train Your Distributors

★ Strategy to increase your brewery sales

No doubt you have a great beer, but have you taught your distributors how to sell and seek more listings at the outlets? 

A simple technique to increase your revenue is working with the distributor’s staff. Please provide them with branding materials to distribute at various outlets to help build a brand. Train the distributor sales staff on upselling and other basic sales skills they need to get your craft beer listed. 

Do not forget that product knowledge among the distributor staff is critical to increasing the overall sales. Remember, retailers will not buy if they do not understand how your products deliver more value than the competition offers. 

5. Price Your Products Appropriately 

★ Strategy to increase your brewery sales

Pricing is an important decision-making aspect after manufacturing your product. Because price is such an important driver of your profits, no wonder that pricing is the most effective strategy to increase your brewery sales and profits.

Setting beer prices can be tricky. Remember, if the prices are way above what the competition offers, you lose customers to the competition. If you underprice, you lose revenue. 

Ideally, you should apply reasonable margins using the tested pricing strategies across a broad range of industries. A competitive pricing strategy uses competitors’ prices as a benchmark, so you either set your price slightly below your competitors, above or at the same price. 

The value-based strategy is where you price your beer based on what customers are willing to pay. Therefore, you have to profile the customers to align your prices with customer sentiment and loyalty. 

Premium pricing is where you price your beer high to present the image that you offer premium products. The strategy focuses on the perceived value of a product rather than the actual value or production cost. 

An effective pricing strategy should help brewery owners maximize their revenue.

6. Increase Your Product Range

★ Strategy to increase your brewery sales

Multiple product lines can be a more successful approach for increasing sales numbers. Therefore, if you are focusing on just one line, consider expanding to different types of beers to attract a wider audience. 

Ideally, expanding the product line gives customers fresh opportunities to return and keep interacting with your brand. Apart from increasing revenues through more sales, introducing more products boosts market share and helps to lower the overall expenditure. 

What’s holding you back? Looking at the benefits of expanding your product range, it is clear that you should make it a strategy. 

7. Keep Your Overhead Costs Consistent

★ Strategy to reduce your expenses

Overhead costs include expenses that do not tie directly to the beer production. When it comes to controlling and minimizing overall costs, overhead consistency is critical! Focus on consistency from month to month so you can compare numbers over a certain period. 

Therefore, set the record straight by investing in accounting software. Using the accounting software will seal loopholes and ensure proper recording of expenses. Thus, you can follow the overhead costs, which also paves the way for reducing the related expenses. 

Another way to keep brewery expenses under control is by involving the employees. If your employees do not understand why cost-cutting is a priority, the exercise becomes a nightmare. To motivate the employees, offer incentives, so they take cost-cutting measures. 

8. Limit Waste

★ Strategy to reduce your expenses

Reusing and upcycling are the two core strategies for cutting brewery waste. For instance, if you package the beer in cans, collect the beer can rings and recycle them, rather than ordering new cans. 

9. Negotiate Bulk Discounts With Suppliers 

★ Strategy to reduce your expenses

As your brewery and production level upwards, you can build relationships with the suppliers, which is a great chance to negotiate. 

Discounted prices will keep the overall costs lower and generate better returns. 

10. Ensure Good Bookkeeping

★ Strategy to reduce your expenses

Access to financial data is essential for any business. Bookkeeping helps you understand the cash flow. Good visibility of your cash flow allows you to plan for the upcoming expenses and ensures you have sufficient inventory. 

Negative cash flow makes it difficult for the brewery business to thrive as you lack the necessary funds to pay salaries and keep the lights on. 

Good bookkeeping is key to cash flow management and helps monitor expenses.