“I tell them all the same thing I was saying thirty years ago, which is, ‘Look, you’ve got to develop real customers, people who are really committed to us and people who we’re committed to, and help them build their business with the Brooklyn brands.’ That philosophy was developed thirty years ago and is still at the core of what we’re doing now.” —Steve Hindy
When you speak with Steve Hindy, founder of Brooklyn Brewery, his passion and commitment to his business and the world around him are clear. Steve is a great storyteller, which isn’t surprising given that he was a writer long before he started Brooklyn Brewery. He began his career as a war correspondent for the Associated Press, and after spending more than five years covering wars and assassinations throughout the Middle East, he finally returned to New York after one too many close calls. Fond memories of sampling extraordinary home brews returned with him, and he and his business partner Tom Potter went on to develop one of the first craft beer companies in the Northeast by founding Brooklyn Brewery in 1988.
From Steve’s perspective, Brooklyn was and remains a natural fit for his brand. Traditionally home to many immigrants and artists, the city had a long history of hosting mom-and-pop bars with home-brewed beer long before Brooklyn Brewery came along and reoriented the playing field. In fact, at the turn of the last century, Brooklyn itself was home to forty-five breweries, including eleven on one twelve-block stretch of the Williamsburg neighborhood. This amounted to a significant share of the nation’s production. But Prohibition took its toll and, over time, the dynamics of the neighborhoods changed. By the mid-1970s beer production had all but ceased in Brooklyn.
So, it’s not surprising that Steve pursued a modest vision of trying to sell his beer door to door in the early days. As he hit the streets, it did not take long for him to recognize that most consumers neither cared about nor understood craft beer. Steve knew that it wasn’t the consumer’s fault. The beer that he and Potter had developed, Brooklyn Lager, represented a completely new approach to brewing. Without knowing or planning it, Steve was a “disruptive innovator” in the brewing sector.
While the Budweisers of the world were off selling to the masses, Steve believed that there was an overlooked market segment interested in a more sophisticated product. So while the bigger players were looking in the other direction, he quietly but assuredly began making inroads into the market. As a result of his new product and approach, Brooklyn Brewery decided to build its own distribution network. Initially Steve focused on introducing and delivering the Brooklyn Brewery brand, but later he added other craft beers such as Sierra Nevada, Dog Street, and Harpoon, as well as beer from international brewing hotspots such as Belgium, Germany, and the United Kingdom to his distribution network.
Ironically, at first it was harder to sell the brew locally than it was to sell it in Asia and Europe. This indicated just how revolutionary Steve’s beer was in Brooklyn.
“From the very beginning . . . we had people coming to us from Sweden, from Japan, from Brazil, from France, saying, ‘Wow, we tried this beer in New York. We don’t have anything like this in our country. We want to import the beer to Japan or wherever.’ I don’t know if I said this, but what I was thinking was, are you kidding me? I can’t sell this shit in Brooklyn. Are you crazy?”
At the time, the Brewery was so cash-strapped that they agreed to work with amateur distributors, such as a Japanese oil executive and a Swedish SAS pilot. It sounds pretty crazy, but this strategy slowly paid off, and Brooklyn Brewery made inroads into international markets—almost unintentionally. Today, the Carlsberg Group is their distributor in Northern Europe while Kirin is starting to brew Brooklyn Lager in Japan. Brooklyn Brewery is currently the largest independent exporter of craft beer in the US and it continues to expand its reach across the globe.
Although Steve had created a distribution company, in 2003 he realized that in order to grow the brewing side of the business, they needed to sell the distribution business. Brooklyn Brewery had been around for about fifteen years at that point and had established a significant, if nonthreatening, market foothold. At the time of the sale in 2003, they sold about forty-eight thousand barrels annually of the beer they brewed. Today, through a distributor, Brooklyn Brewery sells more than three hundred thousand barrels of it annually, half of which is exported. This phenomenal growth has challenged the organization to evolve from a small group of passionate beer aficionados to an international organization staffed by people who must learn about and then embrace the Brooklyn Brewery culture. To do this, Steve focuses on three key elements to maintain Brooklyn Brewery’s success: training, corporate culture, and community.
Training: Part One
With Steve at the helm, Brooklyn Brewery delivered its first case of “unusually dark,” hoppy ale to Brooklyn’s neighborhood bars in 1988. (It was unusual because at the time, the vast majority of Americans drank mass-produced beers like Budweiser, which are paler in color.) These days you can walk into a bar in just about any city in the United States and try a variety of local brews, but that wasn’t the case in the late ’80s. Back then, Steve and Tom were the renegades who had not only developed a different kind of beer, but also a completely new way to market it. Although they believed their beer deserved the same respect given to a bottle of pinot noir, they also knew that the only way to get people to take that idea seriously was to educate them about beer. This insight, that people had to be educated about beer in the same way they had been educated about wine, was and is the first element in the training process and a foundation of the Brooklyn Brewery brand.
Step one in educating their new employees was teaching them the history of beer and its many styles, from Irish stout to Bavarian hefeweizen. Before Brooklyn Brewery, consumers had limited scope and style expectations for beer; the term “craft beer” was not a part of the common lexicon. With this understanding in mind, the ultimate goal was established: to cultivate long-term clients, not just “one and done.” The idea was that when business owners saw a Brooklyn Brewery sales person coming, they would know they weren’t going to be asked to take on the same old beer in a “new” package. Instead, the salesperson would help an owner increase his business by getting his customers excited about trying innovative, flavorful beers.
“We really went to school on how the wine guys sell wine. We told our sales people, ‘We want you to be essentially consultants for your customers and you help them build a beer list that makes sense in their restaurant or their bar that fits with their menu,’” recalls Steve.
Training: Part Two
You might think selling beer is not very complex. After all, it’s everywhere, from college keggers to summer barbecues. This may be true, yet a significant, dedicated effort is still required to ensure that the torch of the company’s vision is carried with every case. Currently, Brooklyn Brewery employs about 115 full-time and 60 part-time people. New hires all go through the same training, called “Beer School,” where each salesperson becomes a “brand ambassador” and attends a three-day training program on the history of beer in general and Brooklyn Brewery in particular.
Going to this school sounds like a lot more fun than working physics equations or studying the periodic table. Students at Beer School sample beer at a dinner cooked by the company’s brewmaster, Garrett Oliver, or the company’s personal chef, and learn how to pair beer with a variety of food, just like a sommelier. The student employees also read copies of Steve’s book, The Craft Beer Revolution: How a Band of Microbrewers is Transforming the World’s Favorite Drink, and Oliver’s book, The Brewmaster’s Table: Discovering the Pleasures of Real Beer with Real Food, before rounding out the syllabus with The Oxford Companion to Beer, an encyclopedia of beer for laypeople, which Oliver edited.
Steve’s commitment to creating a meaningful service experience for his business-to-business customers has been driven by his investment in training his sales force. Remember, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, few people knew what “craft beer” was and very few people had ever tasted dark and hoppy beer. Therefore, it was essential that Brooklyn Brewery employees educate each new customer. Steve recognized that just as Americans had become excited about trying new wines and incorporating them into their lifestyles, many would be just as intrigued about making beer an important element of the dining experience.
Steve believed people would buy the new style of beer if they understood it, so he took a chance and printed beer lists to accompany menus in local restaurants around Brooklyn. His hunch was validated when Florence Fabricant of the New York Times wrote a large article in 1993 titled, “Candlelight. Fine Food. Waiter, the Beer List!” At that point, Steve knew that educating customers about a whole new beverage category was a recipe for success. While it may seem obvious in retrospect, Steve was a revolutionary. He captured an idea about leadership and customer service that has served Brooklyn Brewery well for over thirty years.
At the end of the day, Steve says one of his greatest pleasures is “changing the world in a small way by selling good beer and turning people onto good beer.” While that might sound like a simple idea, it would never have worked without him first realizing the importance of educating his workforce and the greater community about beer.
A Community Brews in Brooklyn
It’s impossible to overstate how important a sense of community is to Brooklyn Brewery—both inside and outside the organization. The process of building a tight-knit, loyal group of employees starts at the table at Beer School, where employees share meals and build relationships in the same way communities have for generations, through food, drink, and conversation. The tradition of welcoming people and developing a nurturing environment doesn’t stop there, either; it permeates all aspects of the company. To illustrate this point, Steve recounts a great story to me. One time the brewers were developing a new type of beer, and he took a keg home. What to do with it?
“I thought, ‘I’ll invite the marketing department to my house.’ Twenty people came, and I did a barbecue. I slow-cooked our pork butt and they had a great time. . . . Then, of course the brewers said, ‘Well, shit. The marketing department gets to come to your cookout and we don’t?’ I said, ‘Well the marketing guys didn’t kill the keg, so maybe I should have you guys over.’ The brewers came and that was like twenty-five more people. They killed the keg in the first half hour. Now I’m on the hook. Now I’ve got to bring the logistics and the admin and the warehouse people. . . . Then I know our out of state sales people are going to be knocking on the door.”
The truth is that Steve loves all this. For him, these get-togethers maintain a personal connection that he believes is vital to the organization’s success. “You know, you’ve got to make an extra effort if you’re going to maintain that sense of intimacy and connection with people,” he says. He puts into action his belief that great leaders must stay connected to the core business practices that drove success in the early days. In Brooklyn Brewery’s case, that means staying true to its mission and caring for fellow employees. Steve accepts and embraces the idea that he needs to be personally accountable to his employees, no matter how large the organization becomes, whether he’s selling beer to a local bar or a restaurant halfway across the world.
Building Community on the Outside
Community engagement is another aspect of the Brooklyn Brewery heritage that has continued to evolve and expanded exponentially over the years. An early example of such engagement was the company’s creation of a local music festival called the Brooklyn Lager Band Search in 1989. Designed to highlight unsigned bands in the area, the festival gave away awards to rock, world beat, and jazz groups that played in local venues. In 2017, the company hosted a party in Brooklyn called Brooklyn Brewery Beer Mansion and more than one thousand people attended. It featured live music, art, local food, and, of course, beer. The Brewery has hosted similar events in Chicago, Philadelphia, London, and Paris. Though the events are sponsored by Brooklyn Brewery, they are definitely not beer events. As far as Steve is concerned, it’s all about building community by infusing energy into local businesses; selling more beer in the process is just gravy.
Steve recalls another early example of building community bonds that aligned with the culture of the Brewery. He and some colleagues decided that an old-school blues bar in New York City called Tramps would be a perfect venue for a special beer event. So Steve and one of his salesmen approached the owner, Terry Dunn, and told him they wanted to take over Tramps for one night to bring in Michael Jackson, the world’s foremost beer expert (not the singer). Dunn thought they were crazy and was certain it would never work.
After a lot of back and forth, he finally agreed to their request and listed it along with the regular acts as “Michael Jackson Live at Tramps.” In the fine print, the flyer explained that this Michael Jackson was the beer expert, not the King of Pop. Regardless, on the night of the event, there was a packed house. Dunn was flabbergasted when he realized Tramps was filled with people who had purposefully come to hear the beer expert. (He was also delighted to get a cut of the proceeds.) It was a turning point for Steve because he realized the brand could be a beacon in the community, not just a beer label.
Steve admits there have been challenges in maintaining culture through significant transitions in the company’s evolution, especially when he sold the distribution part of the company in 2003. At that inflection point, the Brewery’s hand-picked staff was no longer dealing directly with bar and restaurant owners, who now had to place orders with a larger distributor. The new distributor didn’t really know anything about Brooklyn, the history of Brooklyn Brewery, or even craft beer. Steve recognized this change in relationships would require a whole new focus on the basics.
As Steve describes it, “I always told our sales managers who were working with the distributors, ‘Look, find out and identify the salespeople at the distributorship who understand what we are, who understand better beer, understand craft beer. I’d rather you worked with five out of fifty people. I’d rather start with them than try to convert all fifty of them from day one.’ It was similar to the philosophy I had early on, when I’d rather have ten really good customers than one hundred people who just buy the beer once. You kind of fish where the fish are, which is pretty basic to selling.”
Social media is playing an increasing role in keeping the Brewery relevant to a new generation of beer drinkers. Thanks to Milton Glaser, the legendary graphic artist, the Brooklyn Brewery’s logo is already iconic. (Back in 1988, Glaser agreed to waive his normal fee in exchange for equity in the company and has since designed many of its labels, keeping his office well-supplied in fresh beer.)
Other events such as the Brooklyn Lager Band Search and the Art of Fine Beer Contest—originally created by Steve as a way to offer prizes for the best painting, drawing, or poem on a Brooklyn Brewery bar coaster—also continue to spread the word about the Brewery as artists vie for the chance of being featured on a Brooklyn Brewery bar coaster. These days there are fifteen people in the marketing department, and Steve is convinced that social media has magnified all of the company’s early grassroots efforts so that the impact of what they’re doing now is far greater than it was.
Speaking of impact, Steve reiterates that giving back to the community is the key to the company’s marketing strategy—and is undoubtedly responsible for its financial success.
Each year, the Brewery donates free beer to hundreds of nonprofits and special events in New York that celebrate what Steve calls “the native or creative culture.” The result is enormous goodwill—and invaluable positive publicity. “I can’t go anywhere without people saying, ‘By the way, I don’t know if you know this, but you guys have been donating beer to my dance company’s fundraiser for like twenty years.’ If you went out and tried to buy this kind of recognition, the New York media would be happy to take millions and millions of dollars from you, but you might not get shit out of it. The way we’ve done it, I think has been very effective and like I said, it’s been completely magnified by social media. And, it’s authentic.”
Spreading Brooklyn’s Culture Across the Globe
So how does Brooklyn Brewery take its unique spin across the world while at the same time remaining true to its values? Steve says it’s simple: hire the right people. They can bring the same passion and excitement about the brand to London or Paris or Stockholm. For him, it’s all about transplanting the company’s commitment to local community to other places by going back to basics, spotlighting local craft beers, and celebrating the local culture in whatever city they’re in. Of course, they’ll feature Brooklyn Brewery brews, but more importantly, the partnerships focus on showcasing the best local craft beers as well.
Steve has also benefitted from the rise of the Brooklyn borough’s brand—which, of course, he had a hand in building. “I don’t have to tell you; it’s quite amazing that Brooklyn [the borough] has evolved as this maker and creator of culture. In so many places you go now in the world, people say this is our ‘Brooklyn neighborhood.’ In order to infuse this same energy into the Brooklyn Brewery brand, we focused on restaurants and bars that really are committed to us, not just a ‘Beer of the Month club’ kind of mentality.” Steve’s consistent, laser-like focus on community and culture are typical of his leadership style.
Steve believes part of what makes Brooklyn Brewery unique is its dedication to its employees, and he still takes great pleasure in recognizing when employees go the extra mile. He told me he had just sent a “herogram” to the team responsible for a successful event the night before. Yet, unlike some other notable entrepreneurs, Steve wouldn’t describe Brooklyn Brewery as a cult—at least not formally. Instead, he revels in the fine quality of employees who continually strengthen the business.
And fine they are. Steve says there is no shortage of high-quality people who are interested in being a part of the iconic Brooklyn company. “There are so many educated people who come down the financial world sinkhole or even the legal world or the corporate world who just can’t wait to get away from that and want to work for a small independent company. I don’t feel a need to screen people. The kind of people we want apply to us in great numbers, and it’s really a matter of choosing among ten fantastic applicants for every job here.”
He makes it sounds so easy, almost like an accident, which is par for the course. If nothing else, Steve is a cool guy. Yet it’s obvious that Brooklyn Brewery has made a purposeful effort to make sure everybody in the organization is drinking from the same Kool-Aid—or, perhaps, keg.
In fact, this sensibility directly relates to Steve’s perception of millennials, who are both employed by the Brewery and the principal consumers of the product. What makes the Brewery different from many other organizations doing the same thing is that the company’s commitment to community-giving and sustainability, for example, happened organically when Steve first got started. It was never something adopted in a boardroom out of a perceived sense that it would make a good PR campaign. In fact, Steve claims that these efforts benefit Brooklyn Brewery on several levels. Most important, he feels strongly about the Donations Program and its ability to help community efforts and also speak to employees and consumers—and, according to Steve, drive potential new employees to the organization. Along with a chorus of others, Steve recognizes that authenticity and meaning is a critical component in attracting great millennial employees and keeping them.
Customer Service for All
In the end, I’m struck by how innovative Brooklyn Brewery’s customer service model is. Steve didn’t instill traditional customer service tools or practices at Brooklyn Brewery. Instead, he identified a need in the market and addressed it while remaining true to his training, community, and culture. This leadership approach, one that couldn’t be further away from the traditional “command and control” formula, has fostered extraordinary growth and loyalty from his employees and customers. And considerable profits.
As we close our conversation and I’m pondering this realization, Steve excitedly tells me about his plans for the evening. They completely exemplify his unique approach.
“We did this series at the Brewery called “War Correspondents at the Brooklyn Brewery,” where I interview war reporters. Tonight we have Victor Blue from the New York Times and The New Yorker. That event will attract journalists, students, and foreign policy nuts. It raises money for an organization called RISC, Reporters Instructed in Saving Colleagues. It trains freelance war reporters in first aid and gets them medical kits. It was started by Sebastian Junger and my daughter. That’s also a way that I kind of keep in touch with my roots as a foreign correspondent and I think it’s also an effective way to market the Brewery as a thought leader in something that really matters to me.”
Brooklyn Brewery’s Recipe for Success
Brooklyn Brewery with Steve at the helm proves that a well-oiled, highly stylized corporate construct for leadership is not a prerequisite for success. In fact, to the contrary, Steve excels because of his consistent passion for the product, the community of people that make up his organization, and his love of Brooklyn. It’s an honest and genuine approach that has led to extraordinary growth without sacrificing the early core cultural values that made the Brewery successful in the first place.
For Steve, success is a pretty straightforward recipe:
1. Training—Give your employees a sense of purpose that goes beyond the basics. It’s easy for a leader to provide the “blocking and tackling” required to sell a product. The bigger challenge, and one that Brooklyn Brewery has faced exceptionally well, is to develop and nurture passion for a product. This takes time, a sense of purpose, and consistent messaging from the day of hire and through every event that’s sponsored by the company. It’s an especially thoughtful approach.
2. Culture—Like training, the culture cannot be faked. In fact, culture and training are woven together in many ways to ensure that the brand message is consistent. Accountable leadership embraces the torch of culture and considers it in every action, ensuring a consistent message and hands-on approach.
3. Community—Genuine leadership cannot stop at the warehouse door. Leaders must create the time and brain space to engage with the broader community, both to express the brand’s appreciation to it and to reinforce the legitimacy of the company’s culture. In the case of Brooklyn Brewery, each effort not only results in benefits to the brand but also reinforces employees’ pride.
Steve sums it up: “You know, when I started in ’88, imports were 2 percent of the US market and I thought that was the segment, the niche that we were competing against. What’s happened in the last thirty years is imports have grown to be 15 percent of the US market and now craft beer, if you count the craft breweries that have been bought by the big guys, it’s actually about 16 percent of the US market. We really have revolutionized and changed the American beer market.”