Yes Way Rosé

0:00Nikki Huganir:Welcome to the Emerging Brands podcast. Sharing the stories behind brands you'll want to shop next. I'm your host, Kelly Bennett. I am a New York City-based brand strategist for CPG Food and Beverage Brands. In each episode, I'll take you behind the scenes of founders that are building better-for-you products and bringing them to market. it. Also, I talk to brand builders, retailers, industry experts, and tastemakers who help bring those cool products to your shopping cart. You will hear stories of real-life founders, their launch strategies, and practical advice you could use to grow your own brand or simply discover what's next on shelf.

0:42Nikki Huganir:And the best part is you could shop all the brands featured on the show. This podcast is brought to you by Glimpse. Glimpse is an AI powered deduction management tool that disputes and recovers invalid deductions, winning brands, thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours back to founders so that they can focus on what really matters most. If you're a brand selling and retail, go to tryglimpse.com backslash trial for 30 days free and let them know I sent you. Now let's dive into the new episode. Hi everyone. Welcome back to a new episode of Emerging Brands Podcast with Kelly Bennett. Today I'm speaking to the co-founders of Yes Way Rosé, which started off as a lifestyle brand.

1:35Nikki Huganir:They cultivated a highly engaged community through humor and their shared love of rosé. And they built that community before launching their wine brand, Yes Way Rosé. Now today, they are the number four overall rosé in the United States. And that is such an impressive statistic, thinking about how they started and where they are now. I'm so excited to dive into the details today. So Erica Small and Nikki Houganier are here. They are the co-founders. And Nikki and Erica, I'm so glad to have you on the show.

2:15Erica Small:We're so happy and excited to be here. Thank you for having us.

2:19Nikki Huganir:Of course. Erica, I'm going to kick it off to you. how did this brand idea first come to be? Like what was that light bulb moment or that aha moment of, wait, we should start a rosé business. What was happening?

2:37Erica Small:Well, Nikki and I are best friends. We've known each other since middle school and we reconnected while we were both living in New York. Actually ran into each other on the street. I was working in fashion and for magazines. And Mickey is a graphic designer. We ended up working at the same place. And we were hanging out all the time, loved, you know, never had a go-to drink. And when we'd go out to dinner or go out to bars, never knew what to order. And then discovered rosé and absolutely fell in love with it. And we're like, this is our drink. And it inspired so many jokes, so much humor in our lives.

3:20Erica Small:And we started back in 2013 first as a social media account and lifestyle brand before we made the wine. And we focused on building a community of people who loved rosé the way that we did, but in a way that felt fun, relatable and less traditional than what existed at the time. we didn't come from wine um so we approached it much differently than you know the way the wine world was um you know the way that they spoke to consumers right and um we didn't have the resources to launch with wine like I said we worked in media and lived in New York so we literally started with a hundred dollars each to make some totes which we called totes and And he designed it that featured the logo that is now on our wine.

4:15Erica Small:And we built from there the lifestyle brand and the community. And that eventually led us to launch the wine in 2018. And so from the beginning with the wine, the goal was to make a classic French rosé that was genuinely delicious, but felt approachable and aligned with how people actually live and drink today. And so now we have the still wine, cans, sparkling, and our new non-alcoholic rosé, which just launched and all are sold nationally. Okay.

4:54Nikki Huganir:I'm obsessed that it started with a social media account and a tote bag. Like this is my style of building brand. Okay, so Nikki, you are a designer. Was that part of the concept as far as creating brand awareness? Or what was the thought process even starting the lifestyle brand? Was that maybe in the future we'll have a rosé brand? Or was it let's just do this for fun?

5:24Erica Small:I think it was both. I think Erica always had this bigger idea for us. this vision and she was like I can see this being this big thing for me I was like at the time I was like this is just really fun um we have this social media account and we're like we need some merch so I designed the logo um kind of we were so in love with rosé but all the french rosés the delicious french rosés we were drinking we didn't connect to the branding all the labels were old-fashioned. They had chateaus on them and gold lettering, and we couldn't pronounce them. And we're like, this rosé to us was so fresh and so fun, and we didn't see that visually.

6:13Erica Small:So the logo was designed kind of as the antithesis of what we were seeing to be like, oh no, rosé is like cool, it's fun, French rosé can be this modern thing. And that, I guess, really resonated with a lot of people. And so our kind of bold tote bags and sweatshirts, you know, people would stop us on the street and be like, where did you get that bag? And we were like doing deals in the elevator of our office building for this stuff. So something resonated.

6:48Nikki Huganir:I love it. Okay. And that was in 2013 where lifestyle blogs and social media accounts were really becoming a thing. I was very much a lifestyle blogger in that time. And it was a different era than how you build brands now, for sure. It was very much about engaging and building community. And it was a lot easier, I think, back in the day to cut through the noise because it was so new and fresh of a brand even building. So what was that transition like as far as turning the social media account tote bags into an actual wine brand, which is a huge leap? Erica, it sounds like you had that vision, but what did that look like in practice?

7:38Nikki Huganir:Like what were some of those early steps you all were taking to do that? It sounded like you took your time as well, which is cool, but I would love to hear what did that look like in practice?

7:50Erica Small:Well, we had hit several milestones. When we started, we were selling everything out of our apartments. And then Drew Barrymore wore our sweatshirt on Instagram and toasted to us. And then we graduated from selling everything out of our apartments to working with someone else to ship the merchandise for us. And so we had been growing and we had our other jobs still. And we kind of, Nikki and I made this decision around, you know, between 2015 and 2016, that we really wanted to go all in. And we wanted to figure out how to make Yessir Rosé the wine. And we met, I mean, we had been learning as much as we could about the wine, We wrote a book about rosé.

8:43Erica Small:And so we were not sommeliers, our experts in rosé. And we set out to find the best way that we could make the wine. And we met with everyone we could and realized that we really wanted to focus on what we do best, which is brand and product. And we found a partner to help us with importing and who had great relationships with winemakers in France so that we could bring this product to life. And we'd also really focused on growing our community. So the way that the product ended up really getting kicked into high gear is we had sent a product, a fashion kind of partnership deck to Target. and it got in the hands of the adult beverage buyer.

9:35Erica Small:And he said that if this wine was made, he would sell it. And that sort of kicked things into high gear for us because we had already had this big community of people who trusted us because we'd been doing it for so long. And so that's really how things came to be, which was our very intentional way of making the wine. And also some magic sprinkled in that things happen for us at the same time so it could all come to life.

10:05Nikki Huganir:Well, what a great in of, you know, the head of adult beverage at Target being like, oh, if this was a wine brand, I would buy it. Like, that's a great sign. And also having a viral moment. Those are the things that so many brands wish for, but you really can't plan for or strategize. So Nikki, what was it like designing this next evolution of the brand because the way that you go about building say community merch totes to then actually making a physical cpg product where it needs to communicate um on to on retail shelves make it really easy for someone who wasn't maybe following the social media accounts or knew the backstory.

10:57Nikki Huganir:What did that shift look like?

11:01Erica Small:You know, it wasn't that much of a shift because I feel like, you know, the, it was kind of like the same aesthetic. Again, it was like the same logo that I designed for, um, the tote bag and the sweatshirts ended up on the wine bottle. I have like always envisioned what would our wine looked like in my head, even if I didn't in the beginning, like really understand that it could be real. I still had a vision of what that would look like. And it's exactly what it looks like today. And I think I did have the experience. I worked for a lot of brands. I worked for magazines and did a lot of like physical print media.

11:41Erica Small:So I was familiar with like printing processes and, you know, ink finishes and stuff like that. So it wasn't like a huge stretch for me to think about a physical product in that way. And again, I think at the time, even though it was 2018, there still weren't as many wine brands as you might see now that had kind of a more modern branding. So it really stood out on the shelves, that big, bold logo, really black and white, simple. It was really unique. And I guess it did resonate with people who beyond our following, because it was a kind of an immediate success. And now the number four French Rosé in the country.

12:30Nikki Huganir:Incredible. Did you launch in Target in retail? We did.

12:36Erica Small:It wasn't exclusive, but they were our first and biggest retailer for sure.

12:42Nikki Huganir:What a way to kick things off. I mean, that's incredible. What has the evolution look like? Because now you're doing cans. You have multiple SKUs. You have a non-alk, which is really interesting. And again, just the consumer behavior and wants and needs from 2018 to 2026. Lots have shifted and changed. And to your point, Nikki, even the branding has evolved, right? So that's not just the one thing that makes a brand stand out anymore. Erica, what did that look like on the strategy side of evolving, growing, but staying true to who you are and true to the community and the roots that you've built, but also be able to roll out skews and meet consumer new demands and just really stay on top.

13:42Nikki Huganir:And I mean, the number four, you said number four rosé in the country. Okay. That's amazing. That's incredible. Erica, what did that look like as far as evolving the brand?

13:56Erica Small:Well, we've decided to focus on rosé. That's what we're known for. So, you know, we do rosé, we want to do it well. So that after the still wine, that was sparkling. We did a sparkling French rosé. And then after that was the cans. We really wanted everything to stay very approachable and fun while still making this delicious, quality, fresh French rosé. and then now with the non-alcoholic rosé. So everything's very intentional and what we could bring to it and not just add, you know, with the non-alcoholic rosé, there's already, you know, several sparkling skews and we decided how can we come into this space in a way that's really true to us and that we can, you know, really own a piece of this in a fresh way.

14:59Erica Small:And that was with still rosé, it's still French, non-alcoholic rosé. And so it's a little bit more difficult than making sparkling because without the alcohol, the bubbles do a lot of work with the taste. And so we really spent our time to get it right. And we think we really are delivering that experience of having a glass of French rosé just without the alcohol. But to do those things takes longer than just, you know, turning out products. But that was something. Some of it is Nikki and I are the consumer and some of it is, you know, we're thinking what do we want to do next? Cans is something where, you know, we're super, we were super excited about and we always have ideas of other ways, other packaging, things we could do to, you know, keep yes rosé fresh.

15:54Nikki Huganir:Nikki, for you, when you were thinking about the packaging for the non-alk, I noticed from, because I was sent both SKUs, thank you, they look pretty similar. I mean, there's a very clear distinction, right? It says like non-alk or dealkalized, but they look similar. Like if you had them both on a table from afar, you really, it didn't feel like a quote unquote, quote, oh, this is something different, right, than the alcohol. Was that on purpose? Did you want to really make it feel almost like the same behavior if it had alcohol or not?

16:33Erica Small:Yeah, I think that that's, you know, that's how we see this product, you know, in our family. It's not necessarily about, you know, never drinking alcohol. We're really focused on the way people are drinking now, which is today I might want a glass of non-alcoholic wine and tomorrow I might want a drink or I might have one glass of this first and one glass of that next. You know, it's really meant to be the same. We're trying to deliver the same experience, like Erica said. So, yeah, I think we see them as kind of like little twins, you know. Yes. so that was intentional in that way to not like try and make it into a different thing or something

17:26Nikki Huganir:it's it's not they could still be on the same table and it's a similar experience just one tweak yeah also something too that stood out about your wines to me that I didn't realize was how low in sugar they are yeah I was reading that I'm like wait what this is amazing this is a really good find. Um, how, is that something that you all promote or is that like a, a nice to have when someone then experiences the brand? Um, because I know it wasn't like super forward facing, but I thought that was a really cool, unique aspect of the product too. Yeah.

18:08Erica Small:We always, we like to talk about how there's no added sugar, um, and talk about how our wine is dry, which kind of means that it's not sweet. It has kind of that classic dry taste. That's just kind of inherent in that style of French rosé that most of the sugar is kind of evaporated in the winemaking process, essentially.

18:33Nikki Huganir:That's great to know, especially heading into summer. I'm looking for a lower sugar. I love a dry wine. So I genuinely got super excited getting your wines. Yes, Erica, now that you all have been in the trenches and have grown piece by piece, brick by brick, I mean, from 2013, which is, again, really impressive, 2018 for the wine, what piece of advice would you share with a founder who's in the really, really early days of having a product idea, they may be sitting on something that they just keep coming back to like, wow, this could be a really cool product, but not quite sure what next steps to take.

19:23Nikki Huganir:What piece of advice would you share with them?

19:28Erica Small:I think based on our own experience, the product really matters and you can have a great brand and a lot of buzz but if people don't come back to it it doesn't last and for us that's why we are the number four french rosé is because the label you know the packaging is amazing nikki crushed it but the wine is really good that's why people come back to it and so you have to have this balance between moving quickly and taking the time to get it right and rushing something just to get it out there can cause more problems later. While we started building our brand and Rosé was blowing up, there were others that rushed to market before us and got a Rosé on the shelves.

20:15Erica Small:And it felt like the end of the world at the time, especially, you know, I really was devastated by it, but a lot of those brands and SKUs no longer exist. And so it really paid off for us to take our time.

20:30Nikki Huganir:That's a really good point, Erica, because I think so many emerging brand founders, they're hitting on a trend or they see that this next wave of consumer demand is happening, but then other people are taking note of that too, right? Like there's trends just like fashion in food and wine. So something that you're touching upon, I think is really helpful for them to remember. So you're saying that, yes, all of the things that made it stand out, community, branding, et cetera, great retail partners, and paying attention of the actual product to get those repeat purchases, even when demand, or sorry, competition became louder.

21:17Nikki Huganir:I think that's a really good piece of advice thank you you're welcome it didn't feel that way at the time no I'm sure it felt really shitty at the time when you're like wait hold on we're doing this really well why is everyone coming in our area but I'm really glad that you touched upon that because it's something important to keep in mind that there's going to be competition and competition is showing that there's growth in your category, which you can leverage, but it's just like how you work with that and how do you stay competitive? Um, Nikki, from your point of view, what piece of advice would you share with someone in the really early days?

22:04Erica Small:Um, I think like being clear on how you're different. I think for us that was, you know, both visually on kind of the voice that we established on our social media account back in the day that that still carries through which is you know kind of how we speak to each other how we were different than again that kind of like old-fashioned wine traditional wine world So I think just staying really true to kind of those ideals that you have and how you can stand out. And that'll take you far.

22:47Nikki Huganir:Owning your point of view, right? And having a clear point of view. I think now more than ever, again, like back in the day, 2013, just being a brand on social made you stand out. Right. Now everyone's on social. So having that clear point of view and community building and engagement, and like you said, a distinct look, personality, conversations that you have with your community, I totally co-side on that. It's so vital. I know I have to let you both go. Go back to building your Rosé empire, which I'm obsessed with. But last question, where are some good places for listeners to find Yesway Rosé?

23:33Erica Small:Well, we're in several stores nationwide and we're in Target, we're in Publix, we're in Albertsons, and we're also in regional retailers like HEB in Texas and Binnie's in Chicago. On our website, you can shop the wine and you can also use our store locator to find it near you.

23:59Nikki Huganir:Amazing. Well, thank you again, Nikki and Erica, for taking the time to pulling back the curtain and sharing about your brand, your story, the strategy and advice. I really appreciate it. This was awesome. Thank you so much. You're so welcome. Thank you everyone for listening and I'll see you on the next episode. This episode was brought to you by Glimpse. As we know, building a brand is not as sexy and glamorous as it looks on social media at times. A lot of those unsexy problems come into play when brands start to scale in retail distribution. Founders are always incredibly excited to see their products on shelves at major retail chains, but they don't realize all the hard work that starts to begin.