If you’re in the beer business, you most likely were looking forward to another February with five Fridays—as was the rare case this year. After all, most Februarys come, by their 28-day nature, with no more than four of any day. Leap years, however, shuffle the deck.

For the record, the last time one sashayed by en route to March was 1980, 28 years ago. The fourth Friday that February was the day the USA hockey team upset the Soviet Union in the Miracle on Ice. Perhaps February’s reward to America was that fifth Friday...and a little extra beer on ice.

Yes, Fridays are important if you sell beer. A month of them would be ideal. Five are fine. More than fine. Friday is when the weekend begins. Friday is when the week ends. Friday is a good time for an ice-cold beer, whichever side of the glass you’re on.

It’s all pretty intuitive, one supposes. But one also has to ask what kind of beer people, when you ask them how they’re doing in the dead of late winter, will respond that they’re doing great because February this year had five Fridays.

Those would be highly dedicated beer people. Those would be the people of Peerless Beverage in Union, N.J., USA. Those would be people who enjoyed the leap year goodness of February 2008 because it had those five Fridays that goosed draught sales, people who strived to take advantage of the little gift the Gregorian calendar bestowed on them, people who seem dedicated to living up to the name of their company.

It’s Peerless, not beerless. Not that they’re unwilling to look around a little. In their substantial corner of North Jersey, Peerless Beverage thrives because an open mind is always kept ajar. Peerless Beverage plans to continue to thrive because not beerless doesn’t mean not willing to consider the rest of what the beverage world has to offer.

“We’ve got good suppliers,” Jim Lau, vice president of marketing, says of the beer brands that comprise the heart of the Peerless portfolio, explaining that ’08 is, wouldn’t you know it, off and leaping to a reasonably lofty start. “We’ve got Coors Light on a roll right now,” helped immensely by Golden’s Cold Refreshment initiatives and innovations—cold-activated bottle, wide mouth can, consistent message all around—and supported as well in the specialty arena by some brands that are tough to top in their segments.

“Corona,” Lau says, “is a strong brand for us and Crown is a good supplier. Boston Beer with Samuel Adams and Diageo with Guinness are both very strong suppliers, too, and are great at marketing their product. They’re all very helpful.”

Good help can’t hurt, y’know? Nobody can go it alone, and Peerless is thrilled to work with brewers and importers who understand there is no “I” in team, but potentially plenty of money in beer if everybody puts their heads together.

The Peerless approach is to meet with every supplier with whom it works at the beginning of each year, develop annual business plans, map things out and work with them monthly to execute those strategies.

Pretty basic, but pretty necessary. If it doesn’t sound all that exciting, it has been known to yield results.

“One of the things we did coming out of last year,” with Coors, notes general manager Marc Kramer, “was look at Blue Moon.” It’s “on fire” in the seven counties covered by Peerless and it’s continued to throw off sparks given some serious setting of benchmarks with Coors along with the alignment the wholesaler has established on the brand with those who do the Mooning in Golden—“right on through the system,” says Kramer. “You go into it, drill deep, look at the brand and benchmark challenges in the organization.” He adds a similar focus lit a fire for Modelo Especial from Crown.

Amid Peerless’ upscale selections, the GM says, it comes down to “strong distribution throughout the channels, good visibility, consistent pricing,” meaning that given an alignment of programming in the market, “when you go into an Irish pub, you’ll find Blue Moon there, and in a steakhouse, you’ll find Blue Moon there...that’s how you build brands in the marketplace.”

Smaller suppliers, too, put their heads together with Peerless to give their brands the best chance. Everybody from nearby Brooklyn Brewing and Blue Point to faraway Magic Hat and Sierra Nevada has a chance to succeed in North Jersey because Peerless is anxious to focus on them, understanding 20 percent of the craft clientele consumes 80 percent of the craft beer, creating the need for a de facto craft tier of accounts in a region—one river removed from New York City—where specialty beers, particularly imports, but also those generally considered micros, thrive to the tune of an overall 35 percent share in the market.

“It’s not all ours,” muses president Scott Beim, “but we have high hopes.”

The same can be said for another side of the Peerless coin, the one that doesn’t have a minimum age attached to it.
In 2007, Peerless created a standalone, pre-sell, non-alcohol beverage company called Crescent Marz, built partly on the ashes of a former Snapple distributor and selling throughout the Garden State. Its stock in trade is, Beim says, “a portfolio of high-end natural and organic beverages...broad and non-redundant,” one that would seem at home if the Unionites held a family reunion for all its drinks, which would be appropriate in that Beim’s grandfather Jake was indeed in the soda business before Repeal and before beer.

That’s history. The modern tale is told by products like Reed’s and Virgil’s, GuS and Steaz, Calypso and Herbal Mist, Sweet Leaf and Mad Croc, to name but a few.

“I’d liken it somewhat to the beer business,” Beim says, referring to the Peerless crafts. “High-quality, different product benefits, nutrition, low sugar, low carbonation. They’re quality products with a good price that we can make a margin on.” But family resemblance aside, it’s a different business from beer, technically (separate company, separate regulations by which to abide) and in practicality.

Past efforts amounted, literally, to trying to sell grapefruit juice on-premise. This non-alcohol effort, Beim says, is more specific, playing more to strengths and realities. “The customer base is different between alcohol and non-alcohol,” Beim explains. “We don’t sell beer at 7-Elevens or grocery stores or gas stations, but that’s where the majority of these energy drinks are consumed by young adults.”

Peerless delivers beer to liquor stores, but bringing energy drinks in with the brew wouldn’t help with that demographic because “someone under 21 can’t go into a liquor store in New Jersey.”

Some skill sets that apply to distributing beer apply to the array of soft drinks and New Age beverages Crescent Marz is happily hauling. Some of it diverges like a spur on the Jersey Turnpike. The non-alcohol line, Beim says, is “more seasonal,” not one that readily blossoms in winter.

The good news is it’s about to get warmer in the Northeast...and for what it’s worth, May and August will have five Fridays this year.

From Beverage World April 15, 2008