Cheryl Murphy Durzy is the Co-founder and CEO of LibDib, an online wholesale distributor. She has over 20 years of experience in the alcohol industry — she was the Vice President of Sales and Marketing/Proprietor at her family-owned business, Clos LaChance Wines. Her time there gave her the opportunity to develop skills and branch out on her own entrepreneurial dreams.

Cheryl graduated from the University of San Diego with a Bachelor’s in Marketing, and she holds certifications from The Court of Master Sommeliers and the Wine and Spirit Education Trust.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

• Cheryl Murphy Durzy describes creating a digital tool to develop relationships and increase your alcohol distribution
• How a customizable platform allows for the flexibility to meet consumer demands 
• What can a new brand do to scale and increase revenue?
• Cheryl discusses the importance of a distribution model for successfully marketing brands 
• Why connecting the buyers with suppliers is key
• Cheryl talks about evolving and improving the three-tier system
• Cheryl shares a tequila recipe perfect for the fall atmosphere

In this episode with Cheryl Murphy Durzy

Where can you go to distribute your wine and spirit brand? Is there a simple way to deliver the brands your customers want?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy grew up in the alcohol industry and recognized the need for an innovative way to distribute and market brands without the frustration of jumping through hoops. Through her digital tool, LibDib, brands have instant access to distribution in all markets.

In this episode of Legends Behind the Craft, Drew Thomas Hendricks and Cheryl Murphy Durzy, Co-founder and CEO of LibDib, sit down to discuss how to customize the wine and spirit distribution model. Cheryl talks about how she is helping scale brands by simplifying the buying process, why a distribution and marketing model is crucial for success, and improving supplier and buyer relationships.

Resources Mentioned in this episode

• Barrels Ahead
• Drew Thomas Hendricks on LinkedIn  
• Cheryl Murphy Durzy on LinkedIn  
• LibDib 
• Rich Brashears on LinkedIn 
• Reid Hoffman on LinkedIn 
• MICO Tequila 
• Jack Duan on Legends Behind the Craft
• Josh Jacobs on Legends Behind the Craft 

Sponsor for this episode…

This episode is brought to you by Barrels Ahead.

Barrels Ahead is a wine and craft marketing agency that propels organic growth by using a powerful combination of content development, Search Engine Optimization, and paid search.

At Barrels Ahead, we know that your business is unique. That’s why we work with you to create a one-of-a-kind marketing strategy that highlights your authenticity, tells your story, and makes your business stand out from your competitors.

Our team at Barrels Ahead helps you leverage your knowledge so you can enjoy the results and revenue your business deserves.

So, what are you waiting for? Unlock your results today!

To learn more, visit barrelsahead.com or email us at hello@barrelsahead.com to schedule a strategy call.

Episode Transcript

Intro  0:03  

Welcome to the Legends Behind the Craft podcast where we feature top leaders in the wine and craft beverage industry, with your host Drew Thomas Hendricks. Now let’s get started with the show

Drew Thomas Hendricks  0:19  

Drew Thomas Hendricks here on the host of the Legends Behind the Craft podcast, where I talk with leaders in the wine and craft beverage industry. You know recording these episodes, it’s really become the highlight of my week. And last week I talked with Jack Duan from Gliding Eagle, Jack and his team, they’re bringing direct to consumer wine shipments to an international landscape. And on the show, Jack went beyond explaining the obvious benefits to wineries open up their sails to international audience, and shared his overarching vision for Gliding Eagle, one that aims to make the world a better place through shared experiences. Today, I’m talking with Cheryl Murphy Durzy, whose mission is to empower craft distilleries and family on wineries to be successful on their own terms. Today’s episode, sponsored by Barrels Ahead. At barrels ahead, we work with you to implement a one of a kind marketing strategy. One that highlights your authenticity, tells your story and connects you with your ideal customers. In short, we help wineries and craft beverage producers unlock their story to unleash their revenue. Go to barrelsahead.com. today to learn more, I am super excited to talk today with Cheryl Murphy Durzy. She’s the Founder and CEO of LibDib. Now, Cheryl’s roots in the wine craft industry, they run deep. She spent 20 years her family’s winery, helping them among many other things. Navigate the three tier distribution system this experience led her to found LibDib with a glove allowing three tier compliant distribution for all makers, whether it be one bottle or a truckload, available in all markets. Welcome to the show, Cheryl.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  1:51  

Hi. So glad to be here. Nice to see you in person. And I’m a fan. So very excited to be on the show today.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  1:59  

Well, thank you so much for being on. So show. Tell. Tell the listeners about you like so you’re in 20 years running up and running a winery?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  2:08  

Yeah, so my family owns a midsize winery. It’s called Clos LaChance it’s in the Central Coast. And we Yeah, I started working there, gosh, three years out of college. And actually, I like to tell people I started working there when I was 16. Because that’s really the first time I’ve ever sold wine out of the garage. You know what I mean? Sangria in a sink. So I have been in the wine industry for a really long time. My most of my job was managing this three tier distribution piece of the business. I start when I first started the first 10 years of managing all the wholesalers, it was actually pretty easy. I was able to get the meetings that I needed, I was able to get into the market, I was able to have direct relationships with the sales reps, I was able to get distribution. So I was selling all my cases, and then kind of consolidation hit. And then I started to not be able to sell all of my cases, I was really challenged in terms of getting distribution, I would lose distributors kind of left and right. And it was it was just getting harder and harder to do my job

Drew Thomas Hendricks  3:22  

when you were so when we first started it was what was the impetus? Was it a consolidation? How did how did the landscape change that made it so difficult?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  3:30  

Yeah, I mean, you started to see consolidation at a number of levels. And within the three tier systems first, you know, at the wholesaler level, you started to see the big wholesalers expanding into more states, they were buying some of the mid size wholesalers, that was kind of my bread and butter was working with those midsize family owned wholesalers. I wasn’t the biggest fish in the pond, but I wasn’t teeny tiny. So they would they would pay attention to me. Then, you know, and when that started happening, then the little wholesalers were having a hard time keeping up, they weren’t necessarily able to pay their bills, they didn’t have the market share. Their sales reps weren’t hanging around that long. So you know, I went from 40 markets down to 14 within five years. And so it was just it was you know, I’ve probably worked with 200 distributors overnight, you know, as when I was a supplier and just it that that consolidation also was kind of driven, you know, the wholesale or consolidation was really kind of drip driven by the supplier consolidation as well, you started to see the big, big suppliers buying more and more brands to increase their book to have more sway with a distributor. So it’s kind of like this very interesting cycle. That as a midsize winery, it was just hard to get the attention of the wholesalers to do what I needed to do to get my cases sold.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  4:53  

Yeah, I saw a lot of that back when I was a wine bird retail store, where we’d have our favorite connections. With the small small distributors or the small reps or brokers then suddenly it just gets consolidated, consolidated. And suddenly, it was very hard to find some of these smaller ones that we loved when they got folded into this big book of business.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  5:12  

Yeah, it was really interesting because I also, I loved working with smaller wholesalers too, because you can have that direct relationship. But it’s just such a very low margin, I mean, the margins for distribution having been in it now for five years, they’re tight, you know, so it’s expensive to ship cases, it’s expensive, you know, they’re, it’s, it’s big, it’s glass, it’s liquid, it’s, you know, it’s not, it’s not an easy business to get things for me to be. And I, it was tough on the small wholesalers, because, you know, once you, once you get into that cycle of not being able to pay your bills, or if like one of your sales reps, leaves that has all of these great accounts, you kind of lose that connection to the accountants to so you, you almost have to start over as a brand. When you when you would lose a wholesaler, it was just this vicious cycle of not being able to stay in the market, and enough to continue doing business for the long term.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  6:08  

Yes, that is challenging how so how LibDib five years ago became, I mean, the frustrations you felt? Yeah, you found LibDib?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  6:17  

Yeah, ultimately, I came up with a business plan, probably over a couple bottles of wine, I was super frustrated with the best plans, or the best plans come out, right. And I was really frustrated with, you know, I was putting my case number, we were growing as a brand, right, we were growing his winery, we had all these you know, we had these vineyards that were coming online, so we had to find places for the wine. And, you know, every year there was it just seemed like, Okay, we can’t be in this market or okay, this distributors kicking us out the book or whatever. And I was just losing places of where I could, you know, sell. And so I kind of said, hey, you know, there’s got to be a different way of doing this, how could you know, brands really own their own distribution? How could a? How can I how can I own my own relationships. And, and you can do it in California if you’re a California winery. But this whole, it’s harder for accountants to work with 100 different wineries versus one distributor. So you know, when it comes to billing and things like that, so having that, you know, that maths book does make sense. And so I just said, how can we use technology to be a distributor, allow distribution for everybody, and then be a marketplace where, you know, restaurants, bars, and retailers can go online shop, discover, learn about new products connect directly with the makers who I believe are really the best salespeople and and want to answer those questions without kind of the sales rep in between and do business and do business legally and compliantly. That was another piece of it is not trying to disrupt or tear apart the three tier system, I’m, you know, only trying to kind of help it evolve, like how can you use technology to make those connections, but everything is still a compliant transaction?

Drew Thomas Hendricks  8:07  

How did you do that?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  8:09  

Well, we built the marketplace. Well, okay, so Okay. All right. Business Plan came out, you know, it was early 2016 kind of started thinking, how can I make this a business? Started talking, I live in Silicon Valley. So I said, okay, like, let me go start talking to some VC friends of mine. And, you know, how do you how do you do this, I’ve never started a company before. And they said, the first thing they said prior to even thinking about raising capital was you need to find your technologist this is this is going to be a completely custom application. You can’t just build it on top of Salesforce, you can’t, you can’t just you’re going to need to customize this and find someone who can do this for you. And so I you know, I had actually worked with Rich Brashears. He is our lives of CIO, CTO, COO like just magician, basically. And he I we had worked together on a project he had done a few years prior to, and and so I called them. So Rich, what do I do? How do I do this? Knowing that he had had kind of had a lot of Silicon Valley startup experience, and he was a coder. And he had built a team. And he done this before. And we had we had lunch and he says, Yeah, you know, I’m in. He’s a big data guy. He’s one of these days, you got to get into a conversation with him about data. But he says, I, you know, I’m running a data company now. And when you know, as you get started, call me because I want the data and I’ll tell you how to monetize it. Okay, that’s great. He’s like, in the meantime, let me think about who you’re going to, you know, who could build this for you? And the next day, he called me and he says, You know what, I want to I want to build this for you. I want to build a team, and I want to build this platform from the ground up.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  9:57  

Sounds like the data spoke to him. The date

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  9:59  

Well, I think he rocked it, I think he went and did a little bit of research and said distribution interesting. Like, all these products kind of have to go through distribution. So you’re gonna have an aggregated source of where the data come from comes from. And, yeah, so he, he, he said, let me build this for you, I want to do this. And that’s kind of how it started. And so we, at that point, I had my technologist, we started raising money, and we, you know, built a mim MVP, and got it out to the market, I think nine months after, after he started. That’s quick already, considering we built it completely from the ground up,

Drew Thomas Hendricks  10:40  

that is truly embracing the MVP model, which everybody needs to I mean, the worst thing you can do is keep it in, keep it in development for too long in

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  10:47  

total, I think it’s Reid Hoffman from LinkedIn, who said, you know, if you if you’re, if your platform is perfect, then you’ve released it too late, or something of the sort? Because, and this is this a funny story from day one of when we released it, you know, we, we did, I had 100 suppliers on board when we first released it. So that was, you know, I spent, I spent those nine months calling wineries making connections and like selling people on hey, we’re gonna do this. And, you know, then we had a team who was building it. But there was a number of things that we didn’t take into consideration. One of them was importers, importers, how do you how do you support an importer? Like we just didn’t even think of that. So but day one, we built it, we put we uploaded the code, and we were able to support importer. So exactly what you just said is like you learned so much from your initial users. And, you know, we still to this day, we have people who say, Hey, you don’t have this appellation on here. Oh, great. Okay, let us know. And then we put it on the drop down, and we uploaded, we’re good. So that’s the greatest thing about software is you can, you know, you can change it and make it better. So, yeah, it was it was certainly a mad rush for those first nine months of getting, getting it to market. We started in two states, because also in the meantime, we had to get distribution licenses, which is also not easy to do. You know, and congrats

Drew Thomas Hendricks  12:11  

on Connecticut, by the way. Yeah,

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  12:15  

every time we get any license, we, we do we toast each other and take a shot, because it’s like, it’s been a process to get it from to get to get that license. Um, so yeah, we started in California, in New York, we learned so many things along the way. I mean, California is actually fairly simple and consideration to New York, which you have to price posts, and you have to, yeah, you know, everything is completely locked for, for 30 days, you can’t change pricing, even if it’s available to everybody, like there’s a lot of just, you know, there’s COD’s different, like, all of these different things, as a distributor are different by every state, which is why we had to completely customize the platform, you can’t, it couldn’t be a you know, build it on top of another thing, because every state is like a completely different country. Like with the rules and regulations, you know, some things are at rest, some things are not it can go directly to the warehouse, it can go directly to the sit for 48 hours of the warehouse, it can go directly to the account, like it’s, it’s certainly a different it’s, it’s definitely a very complex piece of software.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  13:23  

Yeah, I can only imagine just navigating just shipping between the states is often difficult.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  13:31  

And the business model, I mean, in terms of the business model, like you know, traditional distribution is, you know, they buy pallets, it sits in their warehouse, their sales reps, sell them, and then they bill and they invoice and they do all the pay the taxes and do all the things that they’re supposed to do as a wholesaler, we do all the things that we’re supposed to do as a wholesaler, however, the fulfillment model is is different. And that when we get, we like to call it the promise of an order, like which is retailer goes in and says, I have this demand, I want to buy this case of wine, and we go and buy it. And then they ship it to the compliant location. And then we invoice upon arrival, which is those are all the compliant ways of doing things. So it’s

Drew Thomas Hendricks  14:14  

sort of a one to one so let’s for the for the new matters for people that are not familiar with LibDib. Let’s flash forward to today. So I do have some questions about your growth, but I won’t give give the, you know, the two minute two minute overview to someone that is just they’re a small family owned winery, their maker they’ve just started their you know their bourbon distillery whiskey distillery. While it did

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  14:36  

well, you will get instant access to distribution and all of our markets. It’s interesting because you say Oh, tell me a brand new maker, 30 bourbon, whatever, because it’s actually the people that have been in the industry for a while that get it more than the folks that are brand new because the folks that are brand new do not understand how The challenge is to get to market and to get a distributor. And it’s funny because we have a lot, we get a lot of startup people who are like, Yeah, I want to work with Libya, and they start working with LibDib. And they sell a few cases here and there, and they’re not really putting the effort into building their brand. So then they leave and go to a big distributor. And then they’re back within a year, because you have to do this the same things that you have to do at a big distributor, you have to do at LibDib to you have to have some kind of a go to market plan, whether it’s e-commerce, whether it’s brand ambassadors feet on the street, however, you’re going to do it, you still need to do it on LibDib just as if you were doing it if you are with another large wholesaler like RDC. So um, it’s important for makers to know that that you don’t just sell a bunch of pallets to a wholesaler unexpected expectable the brand, it just does not work that way. So what I would say to brand new baby distillery starting up is like, Hey, we’re going to give you access to distribution, we are a great place for every, you know, new distillery new winery to start, because we also will provide you with a bit of an education over the last four years, we’ve developed a ton of content, whether it’s blogs, we have an excellent help center, we have videos, we have webinars with, with experts, all these kinds of things that we’ve done to help you launch your brand. Plus, you’ll get your distribution. And once you do that, and start building, you know, start with your first account, then your fifth account, then you’re 10th get like you start growing your brand on your own, then you can start thinking about how can I how can I scale from there and get to a chain or get you know, start shipping trucks. But everybody has to start at case one. And it’s very difficult to get a distributor to take you if you’ve never sold the case.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  16:47  

That makes Yeah, that makes sense. So sort of the nurturing the nurturing kind of incubating aspect of that. But the distributor, the actual producers in charge of opening up the accounts in in the States versus being reliant on a distributor that has very little incentive to sell their one case,

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  17:06  

correct. Yeah, I mean, I am a very firm believer that the best salesperson, the best brand ambassador for your brand is the maker themselves. I mean, there’s nothing better than a winemaker going to a city hosting a dinner or visiting accounts like you’re going to get business that way. When you have it diluted more and more through sales reps that have a ton of other priorities. It’s not necessarily going to be as effective. You know, what

Drew Thomas Hendricks  17:29  

a 12 ounce bottles in their bag that they Yeah, up on the counter that day?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  17:33  

And don’t get me wrong sales reps work. Really? Oh, yeah. I mean, they they work really hard. They have a lot of things thrown around, they have a lot of priorities every week, they’re getting new brands. I mean, it is it’s a hard job. But I wanted to create a, you know that that marketplace where the wineries can do it themselves, the distilleries can do it themselves. And we encourage that we encourage those direct relationships, we make introductions all the time, we have a ton tons of retailers that are like, hey, every time you get a new Irish whiskey on, I want to know about it. Anytime you get a new bourbon on, I want to know about it. And we get them on every single week, I mean, I have 30 to 50 new products that go live on you know, every week. So in all of our markets. So it’s, it’s constantly growing, we’re getting all kinds of new stuff every day, because this is something that’s really, really needed. And it’s we have, we have buyers out there coming online searching looking for different things. But you know, use it, it’s great, you can post something and hope something, someone will buy it. But that’s not how you build a brand. If you want to build a brand, as a new supplier, you still have to be to invest in it and figure out what your path to market is.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  18:47  

And if you can control your you control your own destiny, which is great, everyone should be able to, you also have that network. So it’s not like you’re just going out alone, you do have that kind of little referral system from LibDib to help you kind of navigate.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  19:02  

And you’ll get you know, we have an ability for where buyers can connect with if they see your stuff online. And it says hey, you can ask the maker a question you can, you know, you can connect to do business. So we do buyers, you know, that reach out and say, hey, I want to know more about this product. So that’s, that to me, when you think about customer acquisition costs. That right there is is huge value for folks. And I also one of the things you know, you know, I was kind of going through the the how we started up, you know, we had our first couple of years. And then when I decided when we were starting to scale and really grow, we had to start looking at our next source of capital. We decided to you go with a strategic partner, which was rndc. Oh, and one of the reasons we did that is because I fully believe I love the idea of being an incubator, because I want people to say there’s some people that come on board and they just want to sell a few cases. And they, you know, they or they just want to stay with LibDib they, they, they have already been with distribution, and they want to do it their own way. But there’s other people that I think are looking for that opportunity to go national to go big, but just need to get their foot in the door. And you know, with this kind of combination of LibDib, and rndc, providing these options for everybody in all of those markets, it’s truly a reality, we can provide that data back to our partner and they say, this is something we need to put in these four markets. And it’s a pretty cool model, because now everybody not only can just get into the market, but they have a chance to, hey, I can get national distribution, if I build my brand.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  20:38  

That’s that’s a very powerful thing to have there that that ability to scale. Yes. And go right up. Not write a chain, but to be able to go national, and how have those avenues already there for you?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  20:50  

Yeah, and I mean, just getting your foot in the door with these folks is not easy. I mean, I don’t know of any other industry that has more, more products. How many of you walk into a wine Stop and Shop and you see, you know, 15,000 1500 bottles? That’s that’s like a drop in the bucket of how many bottles are out there? I mean, yeah,

Drew Thomas Hendricks  21:11  

I went when I was a wine buyer, we had 4300 skews over the course of the year. And it’s mind boggling, keeping up keeping the spreadsheets. I mean, this is back in mid 90s.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  21:23  

out there working in the market. So yeah, I remember I mean, it’s crazy. Yeah, you would keep track of it on a spreadsheet. They didn’t have those cool apps or anything yet.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  21:31  

It was all in spreadsheets and figured out the own nomenclature of it. It was,

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  21:35  

yeah, it’s it’s certainly come a long way. But it’s still one of the most crowded marketplaces I think out there. Nobody needs your product. Like there’s a million red blends, right? There’s no There’s, whether it’s, you know, domestic or international or whatnot, it’s, there’s just that there’s a lot out there. So it’s important to be able to get to market in order to have that shot, and then be able to prove yourself and then go to, you know, and be able to go to the bigger wholesaler, which are, you know, in our cases are in DC and just hand them that data and say, hey, here you go, you should take these people. And here’s why.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  22:13  

You have some other purchase partnerships. We were talking in the pre show about how you work with Josh Jacobs, who was on our show a few years ago.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  22:20  

Yeah, yeah. Josh is great. I’m speaking I Yeah. Speakeasy, he actually just saw him last week. So it was for the first time in, you know, a year and a half because of COVID. But he wins the style award. I know he’s so great. He’s awesome. He you know, I think when we first met and started doing business together in like January of 2020, and then like world shuts down two months later, and then all and then his business explodes. Because what grew you know, what was everyone in our industry knows that e-commerce just went crazier and COVID. But people started buying stuff buying bottles online, which is great. And I don’t think that’s ever going to change. Now. I think people like that experience. But he what I’m very I love his model. And here’s why is it it almost reverse engineers, what, what what it is to get to the consumer. Because as a distillery, you know, for an winery in the past, you’d have to go, you know, from, you know, here’s the distillery, I have to go get a distributor in the market, and that cost money and then I have to launch the distributor and that cost money, then I have to go out and get my placements at the retailers and that cost money. And then I have to go do tastings to get to the consumer. So you’ve got this whole line of this whole chain of work that you have to do before you can actually get liquid to lives. Whereas with Josh’s model, you know, you can sell direct to the consumer fulfilled through the retailer, which is bought by the distributor who buys it from the distillery and it’s all compliant. And there you go, and you can you can reverse engineer it. And then when you’re wanting to scale and go to big distribution, or even go to a chain in any one market, or any account, you can take that consumer data and say, Hey, specs in Texas, I have 500 consumers in Texas that are already buying from me, how can I get into your market? So or get into you know, how can I get my brand into your stores? And that, to me is super powerful because you know, it’s using real real it’s allowing smaller producers to use real time information about who’s drinking what and where in order to scale their businesses. And you know, Josh has got that figured out which is super cool.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  24:44  

That was I mean, that’s that was what a solved a very, very big problem. It was I was very, very impressed with it.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  24:53  

Yeah, you bring up

Drew Thomas Hendricks  24:56  

bring up the topic of reverse engineering and I always like to ask this for especially in technology, business, you’re five years in, what would you have done differently? If you started today?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  25:09  

That is a good question. Um, God, you should have given me some time to think about, I don’t even know, I think I would have. You know, here, here’s what I’ve seen. That’s been one of our biggest challenges is we are almost, we almost have, we have too many. Okay, so here’s what I would have done. In the very beginning, we were, we were super focused on the supply part of it, right? So because it’s, you have a chicken and egg thing when you have a marketplace, right? You have to have supply in order to create demand and make sales. And so I think so in the beginning, you kind of have to focus on supply if you go back and read and I read a ton on like platforms, like how did Airbnb get their, their first 100 apartments on, you know, how to how did eBay get their first products on, like, all of those types of things that you have to get your first on before you then can go to buyers? I think we spent a little bit too much time on the first suppliers, and not enough time on making the buyer experience awesome. And, you know, like it was a real, it’s really hard to to wade through the the different people that come to us, because we get a lot of people that sign up every day, a lot of people and we have a lot of squeaky wheels that ask for a lot from us. But don’t ever and you know, it’s free for everyone to be on our platform like you do not have to pay right now to be unlimited to get distribution. So, you know, but it cost me money to have my people answer a bunch of questions, you know, we did as much as we can to make it automated and easy for people to sign up. But you know, ultimately, we have a lot of squeaky wheels who are asking a lot of questions come back multiple times take up a lot of time, but don’t do anything on the platform. They don’t sell anything. They’re not out there building their brands, they’re not doing the things that then eventually make me money where I can continue to do business. So my long answer to a short question, what would I do differently, I would have a better way of kind of weeding through all of the noise to focus on the right suppliers to make to hook them up with the right buyers. I think that’s the key to what this marketplace is.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  27:20  

So you saw a strategy plan?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  27:22  

We do we have strategy, you know, we we don’t sell it right now I’m giving it away. So we have all kinds of strategies for our makers to do it, but makes me think, Hmm, maybe I should be selling it. But you know, we have all kinds of tips and tricks and how to sell and what to do. You know, and the makers that get it, they, you know, they get it and they they’re like, Okay, I’m going to first go to consumer. So I’m going to call Josh, or I’m going to call barcard. Or I’m going to call one of these types of companies. And that’s going to be my strategy. Or we have someone else who says hey, I’m going to go call a national chain broker and start making chain presentations. We hooked them up with a company called Edge beverage. Or I’m going to hire five, you know, one of my biggest distilleries is Distillery 291 in Colorado, they have brand ambassadors in every market. So they have feet on the street. And they all work for them. And they go out. And they’re usually people that used to work at a distributor or they were a bartender or something like that, they go out and they sell that great whiskey in that state. So there’s multiple ways to get to market. And the ones that get it pick one or multiple, or all of them and do them all. But they at least have some kind of a plan. And the ones that don’t get it are just like oh yeah, I’ll just put on LibDib. And then they’re like, Well, I didn’t get any sales this week. I’m like, that’s not how it works. Like, you still have to do some work. So

Drew Thomas Hendricks  28:44  

because then the people that are in your lifted network could theoretically buy the one by the product without any promotion. Yeah,

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  28:51  

they could, right. But I have you know, I have 10,000 products, you know what I mean? And we have algorithms that whatever selling well in this area shows what’s in that area? Well guess what sells well is people that are out there doing things in the market. So anyway, but I mean, ultimately anyone can find that product and purchase it. And it happens happens all day long every day. But is it likely that if you’re a brand new whiskey distillery and you haven’t started and you put it on LibDib and you just leave it there is are you going to get a sale? You might get one of our quirky little you know, cool bottle shops buying a case or two but if you’re not out there talking to people, probably not.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  29:30  

So get it get out there be active. What other advice do you have to a new a new maker trying to get their product to market?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  29:37  

Um, I like I said, Pick your path and and invest in it. And focus like a lot of people also are like, Oh, you’re only in seven markets. I’m like, Hey guys, we’re in the top five like, you know, you could folk for half these people. They could sell all their inventory in one county in New York or California, like, pick one or two markets and spend the time in the resource versus on developing them. You know, I was actually I can be a victim of this, I think that someone or some people at our company will say, Cheryl, you’re kind of always like squirrel, like, next big thing. And I have to really bring myself down and say, Okay, this year, we’re focusing on these five things, you know, don’t, you know, try not to veer from that. And, and I would say that to all of our makers to is like, pick your path, figure it out, invest in it and spend the time to make it a profitable, you know, successful part of your business.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  30:31  

I to fall subject to the shiny object syndrome, or there’s, there’s always just so much well, this is the last time I’m going to do it. I’m going to I gotta just check this one thing out. And it’s totally

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  30:42  

your your marketing person, right. Like that’s your so me too. Like I’m sales I’m, but I’m really marketing. That’s been my. And I think that’s kind of what everyone that I talked to that’s in marketing kind of has that because you’re like, Oh, what’s this next cool thing? What’s the next cool thing? You know, I was doing, you know, Facebook and Instagram ads. But what’s this TikTok? And then you start going down that rabbit hole wrong? And then clubhouse? Yeah, I mean, it’s like, there’s always kind of a new thing. And I do think marketers have a little bit more of a challenge that they have to know what the new thing is. So they talk to pay attention to stuff.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  31:15  

Yeah, it’s our duty, our duty to experience it. But yeah, I always tell all of our clients that that’s what they should be doing it,

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  31:22  

and then put resources into it. And yeah, it’s really hard. And that that is probably my biggest challenge, as you know, as CEO of this company is like staying on track. It’s, I’m constantly like, and I’m supposed to be thinking like two, three years down the line. But sometimes I’m like, I can’t wait for two years, we got to do this now. You know,

Drew Thomas Hendricks  31:41  

that’s a good segue. So whereas LibDib going in the next three to five?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  31:46  

Well, and hopefully more markets, um, you know, it’s my goal that we will be in, you know, most states, and we’d recently launched into Texas through a little bit of a different business model, it’s actually with our partner rndc. It’s a program called LibDib. At rndc. We’re we’re not actually a licensed entity in Texas, well, rndc is the licensed entity, we’re utilizing rds, these warehouses were utilizing their trucks, they are the distributor of record, but we’re using our technology to take the orders and to, you know, make sure that the product is getting to where it needs to go. But it’s still that kind of just in time model. I’m, I think that that’s the way to scale, I really do. Because it’s hard to get licenses, and be profitable when you’re your own licensed entity, because there’s lots of fees and things like that. And I have this great partner that has a mate, there’s no one who knows how to deliver alcohol better than a distributor, you know, we use a lot of common carrier, FedEx is okay, they’re great. But a distributor really knows how to do it without breakage without losing stuff without, you know, like they are just good at it. And that’s why I have access to all of these great trucks and this last mile delivery. And these warehouses that when something comes in and goes out, like within the next by the next day, it’s so I want to really tap into that and bring that to every maker, so that they have access to it. And that bring that to every retailer and restaurant as well. So they have access to all the cool stuff that’s out there. And all the new Quick innovations that are happening.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  33:21  

Where do I see the Where do you see the three tier system going in? The next is it’s just going to kind of stay the same consolidation? Where do you see that evolving?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  33:29  

I think that so, you know, the three tier system has, you know, and as a former supplier, I’m like, Oh, am I really saying this, but it really does have value in it in the last five years. Again, it is not easy to deliver a case of alcohol across the country. It’s just not it takes a lot of time. It’s heavy, it’s expensive. That’s number one. Number two is, you know, even buyers don’t like to have to pay 1000 invoices. You know, if there was no three tier system, and you know that everything wasn’t consolidated under these distributors, they’d be paying 1000 invoices to 1000 suppliers and guess who would be most of the suppliers, it’d be constellation and Biagio they would win every time. So it’s not going anywhere. In terms of like evolution. Yeah, I think technology is going to play a part in it. I see. And this is why it’s actually very, it’s been really great working with W Swa, which also has a corporate supplier. I was like I used to be super scared of them. But they like they have a whole new program just for craft suppliers on how they can get to market whether it’s through lifted or whether it’s through any of our other members and how to teach them how to approach a distributor how to teach them how to use someone like Speakeasy or thirsty or one of those to go to market first and then present that data. It’s there was nothing like that before. Like you would just call a wholesaler and they’d be like, yes, no, maybe so right. And now it’s you know, now there’s actually some guidelines and some assistance from this source. but it’s it’s this program called access. And it’s, it’s really cool. And I was I’ve been a part of it that, you know, being on the board and I’m just, I see the the industry changing to kind of help these smaller folks get to market and, and and be a part of the three tier system so that everybody can have access to their products.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  35:20  

That’s a that’s a that’s a, that’s a good answer on that. And there’s so much infrastructure that’s built upon it, you got Josh, over at Speakeasy LibDib, and you guys figured out to navigate it, that this is the wrong word, but I don’t say gaming it, but your whole infrastructure is figuring out how to, like maximize this system, that if it was changed in any way, it’s gonna have this ripple effect across the across the industry?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  35:45  

Yeah. I mean, if it’s changed in any way, I mean, first of all, like, every state is already different. Like, if it’s changed, like, what’s going to happen at the state level, right? Like, it’s, it’s really, it’s a it’s super complex. Um, and, like I said, there’s, it’s what distributors do is not easy, and it’s hard, it’s hard. It’s hard to get stuff to where it needs to be efficiently. It just is. I mean, we’re seeing it on right now with the supply chain with all of our suppliers, having problems getting bottles and labels and corks, and we’re going to see, I mean, I think that we saw it last year with getting you know, when when FedEx and UPS were just, you know, bogged down because of e-commerce, it’s going to be the same thing at the holidays this year. It just

Drew Thomas Hendricks  36:29  

it’s like that’s that’s top of news right now. And this is probably gonna come out right about the start of the holidays. I think this will be out mid November.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  36:37  

I think I heard on the news this morning, or one of the news podcasts I listened to right before I listen to yours is that toys, getting toys for kids for Christmas this year is going to be really hard. And actually even the Biden administration’s like getting involved with all of these ships that are stuck out

Drew Thomas Hendricks  36:55  

there requiring 24 hour operation in Los Angeles port, which I’m not I’m surprised they are already doing that. Yeah, something that they an easy way to fix it. But

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  37:05  

you would think and but it’s just it’s a it’s a problem. And for you know, I do think the the alcohol industry is is unique in that they have this they kind of have this thing all set up and ready to go to get stuff to the right. You know, is it perfect? No. But is it is it doing what it’s supposed to be doing? Yeah, I mean, I think it is.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  37:28  

Yeah, no, it’s got to be quicker and faster is gonna be the way. Mm hmm. I’m gonna step way back because I went to the school. He went to University of San Diego college, and I went to the high school right across the street. Oh, you went to uni. I went to uni. The school that no longer exists. Oh, it doesn’t know it’s they moved it over to Sorrento Valley. It’s ah, Carmel Valley. No,

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  37:52  

Aro I’m going there tomorrow. It’s my 25th reunion that makes me seem really old. But it’s my 25th college reunion. So I’m going and staying in mission beach tomorrow. All of my girlfriends and we’ll be up at USD on on Saturday for the football game.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  38:07  

Oh, that’s gonna be awesome. Yeah. Yeah, that that campus has changed tremendously. Yeah, 25 years.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  38:14  

I was there five years ago and I’m like, Wait, that’s not an all boys dorm anymore. And this is not I mean, when I was there it was like here were the boys here were the girls and then like the walk of shame in the morning and all that kind of like that anymore. It’s like all intertwine.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  38:27  

Yeah, what I did a couple graduate classes over there. I went to Gonzaga. Oh, cool. Sure. Our basketball teams play together. But yeah, you always one. It was kind of fun. Yeah. We went to a basketball game about two years ago. And I think it was at one point it was like 90 to 30 Oh, yeah. Now, we’re chatting up by 60. And they’re like, but we have football.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  38:53  

Now you live in San Diego,

Drew Thomas Hendricks  38:54  

right. Do I live up in Carlsbad? Well, actually VISTA just east of Carlsbad. Yeah.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  38:58  

Yeah. So have you so Josh lives and Josh Jacobs lives in San Diego to Have you guys met.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  39:02  

He does. We haven’t met COVID at all. I think he’s done in the city. Yeah, I grew up in San Diego grew up in Point Loma. No, no live in North County here.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  39:12  

That’s great. I was actually born in San Diego when my in La Jolla. My dad worked at eight HP. And then we moved when I was three. And we moved to Idaho, Boise, Idaho, and then we moved to the Bay Area when I was about 10.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  39:28  

Oh, yeah. Boise, Boise. Boise is is a nice city.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  39:32  

Oh my gosh, it’s beautiful. We had the opportunity to go back there about five years ago as a family just to go to Boise. We went to McCall. We went to Sun Valley. It’s all kind of this like beautiful, you know, three hour drive. Lots of people move in there. I know like three people who moved out of California and went to Idaho.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  39:48  

Three neighbors, three independent neighbors on our street. All moved to curling. Oh my gosh. Everyone’s moving to

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  39:54  

curdling. Yeah, everyone, the people that I know I’ll move to Nampa Nampa which is like it’s It’s like an hour outside of Boise. Yes, I know. And it kind of confused me because it’s like Napa with an Nampa

Drew Thomas Hendricks  40:07  

he said Napa so much it almost seems like you’re mispronouncing it.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  40:09  

AMPA nearby. Yeah, but it looks B. I mean, like you see them on social media, you know, they’re having a great time. So, yeah, you know, COVID in the great existence of California, right?

Drew Thomas Hendricks  40:21  

It has been that way. So while we’re here in California, what have you been drinking lately?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  40:26  

Um, okay, so I’m going to tell you about a drink that I made last night. That was really really good, and I saw it sadly, on TikTok. The only reason I’m on TikTok is because my daughter is 14. I need to monitor what she’s doing. I’m not a creator. But there are some really cool people to follow that are making great drinks. I follow this like tequila expert, who’s also based in San Diego, he’s, I’ve like found some really good tequilas. I’m into tequila right now.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  40:52  

So that’s why I was at Cal affino. Last night. Oh,

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  40:55  

that’s one of our that’s what where’s that?

Drew Thomas Hendricks  40:59  

It was right up the hill for me. Yeah, it’s

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  41:01  

a great place. That’s one of our

Drew Thomas Hendricks  41:03  

extra and Yeah, whoa, that was unbelievable.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  41:05  

Oh, that’s cool. Um, so it was a fall cocktail because it was cold yesterday was like the first cold night. So everybody had like a fire was like putting their pumpkins out and like thinking about thinking about fall. And it was an ounce and a half of tequila, an ounce and a half of Cointreau. And ours, I’m sorry, half an ounce of that. And then a fresh orange, a cinnamon stick and cinnamon. And a thing of a little thing of rosemary. So it was like a fall east. Margarita, and it kind of would put in a shaker. Shake it up. And it was great. Love to try that. That sounds and I made it and it was with a rep. Oh, so it was like a little bit more kind of rich. It was really good.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  41:53  

That sounds fantastic. What’s your what? You’ve got? You represent a ton of brands of tequila. But what do you like drinking tequila?

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  41:59  

Ah, well, my favorite. My favorite brand for tequila right now is called Mikko Am I co and it’s, I like the reposado. I order it and I you know, it’s funny because he’s the, they’re the founder is awesome. He’s like, let me send you some like No, no, I like to support my makers. I like to support my customers. So I order it from taskers. And I get, you know, three to six bottles at a time. And it’s amazing how fast I drink it. It’s almost like shameful. But I am the mother of two teenagers. I’m trying to run a company. I like a little tequila at the end of the day. But they’re, they’re they’re reposado I can put in a glass with some ice and just puts I have a lime tree. And I just take one or two limes and that’s it. And so lime juice and the reposado doesn’t need anything else. And it’s so good.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  42:43  

That sounds fantastic. Yeah, last night we were at a was a friend’s birthday and Kela fino has a kind of co working space right next to their, their their story but where they bought their business. And they um, the the guy there made a a tequila Sazerac. Oh, and two of the guys in our group spent a bunch of time in New Orleans either in college or for work. And they swore that that sounds AraC would that extra na Whoa. And he did it with extra Nico the Luxardo a little bit of chartreuse. There may have been a couple other things and yeah, but it was It was eye opening.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  43:23  

Yeah, that’s it. I love kind of see you know, I used to before I got in to this business. I was a wine drinker. So I really did not drink that many cocktails except for like a vodka soda here and there Right? When I go out to a bar I’m so really really opened my eyes about bourbon number one I really have started to like bourbon, and tequila. I didn’t know that tequila you know, you always thought of tequila as like let’s take a shot.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  43:51  

Especially down in USD probably spent nights in Tijuana with

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  43:55  

Wow. And the pennant like it was fun. Yeah, that’s I went to the pennant like every day, and I actually used to drink. It was tequila shots, Jaeger shots, and whiskey sour. Like so disgusting when I think about it. So. But you started when you start to get a sipping like a really good sipping tequila and bourbon. And it’s like, gosh, you don’t even need to mix this with anything. It’s just good straight. i It really opened my eyes to spirits in general, because I was I was just a big wine drinker. And now like, I drink more spirits, I think than wine. And just because as I’ve gotten older, wine is just hot. You don’t I don’t sleep as well. So during the week, it’s hard for me to drink wine. Otherwise, you know, I’m up half the night.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  44:42  

Yeah, I do experience that from time to time I’m gravitating as I go, go go grow older towards bourbon.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  44:50  

And I’m starting to like RTDs to like I’m telling you there’s some cool innovations with with cocktails. And again, like you said, you’re talking about drinking that earlier moment. Hey, Nico has a tequila and Seltzer that’s really, really good. And I swear to God, I think just three or four of my suppliers this week just came out with a new cocktail. And again, those are just those are getting bigger and bigger and those are really hard to distribute because they’re heavy and they may have they have less alcohol by volume, but it’s judged as a spirit so they tax it as a spirit it’s expensive to ship it’s their shipping sharding water basically, you know, I mean they’re they’re like five or 7% alcohol by volume most of them except I have one of one called other supplier called SIP shine. And there it’s like it’s like 20% alcohol by volume. It’s like crazy crazy I

Drew Thomas Hendricks  45:45  

would be good yeah cuz the drinks missing like 16 It’s that yeah, I want to craft cocktail. You want it to be a little boost

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  45:52  

you want it to be a have a little bit of kick to it. So SIP shine definitely has that has that in there and you pour it over ice. It’s really good, but it’s got it. It’s a good it’ll get you which is a good thing.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  46:06  

So you’re off to your you’re off to your reunion weekend.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  46:10  

Yes, I leave tomorrow morning bright and early. So we’re staying Mission Beach. I’ll be at the pennant. probably

Drew Thomas Hendricks  46:16  

tell you now the weather’s gonna be fantastic. I’ve heard it’s full fall down here. Yeah. offshores are blowing it’s fantastic.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  46:25  

Full fall like a full 82 degrees in San Diego. Right? That’s,

Drew Thomas Hendricks  46:28  

well, if I was surfing at that Oceanside harbor this morning, it was 45 when I put on the wetsuit, oh my god, I think it’s about 70 now, but now

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  46:35  

Yeah, it’ll be I’m super excited. I’m definitely looking forward to seeing seeing some of my friends and getting getting getting into San Diego. I miss San Diego. It’s such a great city.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  46:45  

Yes. Well, Cheryl, where can new makers? Where can people find more about you and LibDib

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  46:52  

just LibDib.com, it’s really easy. It’s um, we we’ve basically automated getting distribution, which I think is also kind of a cool, a cool part of our platform. You don’t necessarily need to talk to anyone, you know a lot to understand exactly what to do. So you go in, you sign up, you add your brands, you add your products, you price it out by market, you submit it, make sure you have the right compliance, and then you can be live. There’s all kinds of different training materials on there. There’s a go live document for each market that says what, what do you have to do? Well, in this market, I need a shippers permit in this market. I need a type 28 Like it tells you what you need to do to get compliant and to get live. And then what you should do once you are alive. How do you sell How do you build your brand? Who do you talk to do you go to Josh do you go to get brand ambassadors, you got all these things you need to do? So I feel like we have really got it a good process for for makers to get started and to start being successful.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  47:51  

That’s fantastic. Well, thank you so much for joining us today.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  47:55  

Thank you. Thanks.

Drew Thomas Hendricks  47:56  

It’s good to reminisce about San Diego.

Cheryl Murphy Durzy  47:58  

I know. I’m excited. I like don’t get on I get on the plane in 12 hours. So

Drew Thomas Hendricks  48:05  

thank you so much. Thank you.

Outro  48:14  

Thanks for listening to the Legends Behind the Craft podcast. We’ll see you again next time and be sure to click Subscribe to get future episodes.