Ana Kornegay – Building Sammy Hagar and Guy Fieri's Tequila Brand

On this episode, we’re joined by Ana Kornegay, the VP of Marketing at Santo Spirits, the premium tequila brand co-founded by Guy Fieri and Sammy Hagar.

Before leading the charge at Santo, Ana spent over 15 years at Brown-Forman overseeing iconic spirits like Gentleman Jack and Jack Daniel’s Single Barrel. She's also the founder of Hummingbird Branding & Marketing, and holds a Master’s in Medical Cannabis Science & Therapeutics.

We cover a ton of actionable insights and tactics.

Episode Highlights:
🌵 How Santo turned a “what if?” into the world’s first “Mezquila”
📦 The 3 biggest packaging mistakes she sees new brands make
🚀 What to expect if you want to jump from “Big CPG” to an “upstart brand”, and where should new grads start
🧩 “Build vs buy” (hiring internally our outsource?)
⚖️ Siloing agencies vs spreading across multiple in-house brands
🤘 Building a celebrity brand without losing authenticity
🧠 When and why to refresh packaging (and when to leave it alone)
🔮 The rise of NA and functional beverages

⏱️ Table of Contents
00:00 – Intro & Ana’s Career in Spirits
03:00 – Santo’s Origin Story & Mezquila Launch
07:00 – Startup vs. Corporate Marketing Life
12:00 – Celebrity-Backed Brands: Behind the Curtain
18:00 – Trends in Low/No Proof & Functional Beverages
24:00 – Packaging Frameworks for Spirit Brands
30:00 – When a Packaging Refresh is the Right Move
35:00 – Campaigns That Flopped & What She Learned
39:00 – AI in Marketing: Love it or Hate it?

Links:
Santo Spirits – https://www.santospirits.com
Follow Ana on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/ana-kornegay

Follow Adam on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg

Check out https://www.kitprint.co/ for CPG production design support.

Transcript

Adam Steinberg (00:00)
All right, welcome to Shelf Help. Today we're speaking with Anna Kornegay, who's joining us from Raleigh, North Carolina. Anna's currently the VP of marketing at Santo Spirits, the premium tequila brand co-founded by none other than the infamous celebrity chef Guy Fieri and rock legend Sammy Hagar, which also runs her own creative agency, Hummingbird Branding and Marketing, which you may get into here as well. And before taking the reins at Santo,

Anna was a marketing and brand leader at Brown Forman for about 15 years, which is one of the world's most formidable wine and spirits operators where she managed the Jack Daniels family of brands. So if you're looking for tips and tricks from a true expert in the spirit space, this is definitely gonna be a good one. with that, let's get into it. maybe Anna just kind of first off for the listeners that aren't as familiar with the Santo Spirits, if you want to just give them just kind of a quick lay of the land in terms of kind of the origin story.

maybe the why behind the brand, some of the core products that you offer, and maybe where some of the listeners can get their hands on them.

Ana Kornegay (01:01)
Sure. Well, thanks for having me. It's great to be here and appreciate the kind words. Santo Spirits has been around since 2017. If you don't know, Sammy Hagar was the lead singer of Van Halen. He's also a solo artist and he's been with several other bands, but that's what he's most known for. Sammy was one of the original, they call him the godfather of celebrity tequila. He's actually kind of one of the godfathers of tequila, stateside anyway. He's been going down to Cabo San Lucas

since I believe the mid to late 80s when there were four hotels and not much else there. And he built his own venue called the Cabo Wabo Cantina. And he decided he was gonna create his own tequila to serve at the cantina because he really didn't enjoy a lot of the stuff that he was having. Most of what he was drinking was mixto tequila, which means that there are a lot of sugars and flavors and things added. It only has to be a certain percentage.

Blue Weber Agave. Sammy built this brand. was one of the first 100 % Blue Agave tequilas to come to the US around the same time that Patron was blowing up the category. And he sold his tequila to Campari, I believe in the late 90s for $100 million. So he's been making tequila at this point for close to three decades. He really knows what he's doing. He's down in Mexico a ton. He's actually an honorary ambassador for Cabo.

So he knows what he's doing. He's really out at the distillery, really involved in the creative direction for the brand. Well, he decided back in 2016, 2017 that he really missed the business. And one, to my understanding...

One night he was out with some friends in Cabo and they were like, what would it taste like if we combined tequila and mezcal? That would be really interesting. And so they did. And our flagship product, mezquila, was born. And it was really innovative. It was actually something that had to be, we had to convince the distillery to do it. We had to convince the CRT, which is the regulatory body of tequila down in Mexico.

to allow us to bottle and import and sell this product. It's the first and only of its kind. There are other agave blend products out there, but it was really exciting. And...

Bartenders love it. It's got a ton of application in cocktails. It's also great on its own. Well, Guy came on board in, I believe, 2019 and decided alongside Sammy that they should launch a Blanco and a Ruppasato. So we've had those since 2020, 2021. And we launched our Enyejo in 2023.

and we have a 110 proof Blanco tequila as well, is we like to call it tequila turned all the way up. 110 proof is the maximum proof that you're allowed to bottle tequila and it gets great reviews. We actually scored number one in the

tequila matchmaker blind competition among tequila panelists and bartenders because it's got a great flavor profile and it's hot without being too hot in terms of proof and burn.

One of the great things that we offer beyond being additive free, which is kind of a big deal because only about 30 % of tequilas on the market are certified additive free and it's been a really hot topic. It's really controversial right now because the there are a lot of folks who don't want that certification to exist. ⁓

Adam Steinberg (04:23)
Hmm.

sure.

Ana Kornegay (04:32)
But we like to say that life is better when it's lived out loud and our tequila embodies that. I like to think of Santo as kind of a glam rock tequila. We got a little bit of edge and a little bit of polish. Just like Sammy and Guy, they like what you see is what you get with them. They like to express themselves. They have a lot to say and there's a lot of energy behind everything that they do. And so I think the same is true of the brand and the same is true of the people who love the brand.

Adam Steinberg (05:00)
Yeah, that's great. feel like that's what you can tell when it comes across the brand, when it's a brand that's tied to celebrities or influencers, whether they're actually really involved in the brand and it's really their passion versus just kind of tying their name to it. And you can tell with this brand that this is like their real passion for sure.

Ana Kornegay (05:16)
But I'm glad that that's coming through. It's definitely become a really crowded space.

Adam Steinberg (05:21)
Yeah, it has for sure. In terms of, I it sounds like it's definitely a great lineup where in terms of the retail distribution footprint these days, where can people find the products?

Ana Kornegay (05:32)
Well, we are distributed in all 50 states and we also have an e-commerce presence both on our website and through Reserve Bar and Sip Tequila and some other properties like that. But you can find us in a lot of the national and regional chains.

particularly in the big states like California and Florida and some of the others. So if it is not available in your local independent liquor store, grocery store, then please do ask for it and definitely check us out at www.santospirits.com.

Adam Steinberg (06:02)
Well, yeah, the first question I had for you was...

you  spent a lot of time at Brown Forman working on the Jack Daniels brand, which is some of the biggest and well-known brands in the spirit space. And now you're at, more of an upstart brand to at least to a certain extent. For the marketers out there that have recently made a move or are considering making a move from a big multinational CPG conglomerate, whether it's in the spirit space or maybe just generally in the CPG space to a more upstart brand, what should they expect?

expect?

Ana Kornegay (06:32)
That's a great question and I was lucky. I left Brown Forman in 2018 and I did consulting work and coaching for about four years before I started at Santo and some of those consulting gigs were longer term as kind of a fractional CMO or a fractional marketing director and almost all of them were either pure startups or very early stage and

Gosh, I think one thing you need to be prepared for is that if you're coming from a big company that's been around for a while, you've got a ton of resources. Things move more slowly, which is a con, and you've got more chefs in the kitchen, but you also have...

a full HR, a full finance department, all the IT infrastructure you need. You're much more present and established in your distributors for beverage alcohol. And that's probably true of some non-alcohol and food products as well. The great thing about working with a startup or early stage company is that you can be really nimble and you can be really creative and you can be a lot more disruptive. You can...

at least bend the rules more if not break the rules a little bit depending on whether we're talking about creative rules or operational rules or legal rules which is important in a regulated industry. I think you got to wear all the hats. There's no such thing as silos. There's no such thing as that's not my job. It's your job. I've had to learn so much more about I mean the marketing space the marketing industry is moving quickly. It's really dynamic between

digital and social and AI and all the other things going on. I've had to learn how Google Ads work and how Meta Ads work and how e-commerce platforms work in a three-party system or three-tier system.

That's great for someone who loves to learn like me, but it can also kind of weigh you down and you need to make sure that you've got the bandwidth and the time and the interest to take on that kind of learning at a certain stage in your career. But it can be a lot of fun and it can be incredibly rewarding because you're usually building something from the ground up and you have a real personal impact on it.

Adam Steinberg (08:39)
Yeah,

would you recommend for maybe someone that's a new graduate or coming out of college sooner or maybe within their first few years, being a marketer in the spirits or CPG space in general? If you had to make recommendation, I think there's probably pros and cons to both, but to start their career in one of the bigger players and really get a sense of how established SOPs and practices work or?

start in the more upstart place where you can get exposed to a lot of different things, but you may not be learning maybe some of the core practices or established practices that you might learn at some of the more bigger established players.

Ana Kornegay (09:16)
Like many answers, this is an it depends answer. I think it depends on the personality and the interests of the person. think if you're really entrepreneurial and you're interested in it also depends on whether you're more interested in learning about marketing or you're more interested in learning about the beverage alcohol business. If you're super interested in beverage alcohol, I think it would be it's great to start with a more established company or more established brand because you are going to be you're going to have more mentorship.

You're going to have more of those resources available to you. You'll probably have bigger budgets to actually go and do things with and learn from. And you'll have, you'll know what the guardrails are. You're going to learn some of that regulatory, those regulatory limitations that you might not learn in a startup. I think if you're super, if you, if you're really independent and really entrepreneurial and you want to get out there and really make a mark,

Adam Steinberg (10:00)
Yeah.

Ana Kornegay (10:10)
then working for a startup can be great. gets a lot of times with startups, what I've noticed is there's a lot of ambiguity and there's a lot of pivoting and there's not necessarily always a stable budget. And that can be really frustrating if you're just starting out and you're trying to learn because you've got so much ambiguity and so many changes and so much disruption all the time. It can be hard to

kind of filter through that and figure out how to go do what you're being asked to do.

Adam Steinberg (10:42)
Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. mean, I think like anything is, you can make an argument for both, but it seems like you're probably starting in a bigger organization. If you just started straight out in the startup world where you're kind of playing by the seat of your pants, to certain extent, I think there's, I feel like there is probably some, you know, core learnings that you would learn from a mentorship standpoint that you may never, may never pick up if you start in that startup world and kind of stay there for a while.

Ana Kornegay (11:08)
Well, and the other thing I'd say is if you think you want to be in startups, when you move from job to job or role to role, I think there's some street cred to having been with a startup and made a mark on the business and a startup and having that scrappy kind of different culture and different approach. However, having at least some experience with a bigger supplier or a bigger brand gives you an anchor.

You've had, and it's also great, I'm a big fan of test and learn. Try it out, see what you like and what you don't like. So I would highly recommend doing both or at least interviewing with both.

Adam Steinberg (11:46)
Yeah, for sure, that totally makes sense. Well, yeah, shifting gears a bit, you talked about Sammy Hagar, Guy Fieri connection to Santo a bit. In terms of building a celebrity backed brand specifically, in what ways has that aspect felt like a bit like a cheat code or like you're starting on second base to a certain extent?

Ana Kornegay (12:07)
Well, I think it's both. The cheat code has been that we have a built-in following. So Sammy's fan base is incredibly loyal and super avid about everything that Sammy does. So Sammy puts something out there and we immediately have social media followers and we immediately have e-commerce sales and the same is true of Guy.

challenge for us is that

is just perception. So because there are so many celebrity brands out there and to your point, most of them are just endorsement deals or licensing deals. They're not really, the celebrities aren't creating the brand. They're not involved in day-to-day operations and creative decisions. They're doing limited appearances or content.

creation for the brand. They're just getting paid out if the brand does well on the backs of somebody else who's going down to distilleries or out and around to distilleries, who's doing the sales meetings with distributors, who's out there day to day making the sales calls and learning what's working and what's not. know, Sammy and Guy are really involved and

Guy, I just came back from bottle signing in New Orleans with Guy this weekend. He's doing on average two a month. He was the keynote speaker at the United States Bartenders Guild's first annual meeting last year in Denver. I it's also great to be working with celebrities who are operators themselves. So they understand how bars and restaurants work and

how important it is to make sure that you're talking to the stakeholders on the staff as well as the guest. And, you know, one barrier that we've had to overcome or that I thought we were gonna have to overcome is that bartenders wouldn't be that stoked about a celebrity-owned tequila. However,

when the proof is in the pudding and the bottles and the products really good, that's an easy barrier to get over to some degree. Also being additive free has helped a lot, but what's really helped is that people remember Cabo Wabo and they know what Sammy's legacy in the tequila space is. And they also know what Guy did for the hospitality industry during the pandemic by raising, you know, 25, $26 million in grants for folks. So that's been a really great

Adam Steinberg (14:12)
you

Right.

Ana Kornegay (14:24)
connection point for Guy and Sammy and our sales team and the hospitality industry.

Adam Steinberg (14:30)
for someone that's a marketer that's been in the space, not at a celebrity backed or brand that's partnered with celebrities. if they were thinking about or had an opportunity to join a brand like Santo that's partnered with two celebrities that are pretty big and maybe are fairly involved in the brand, would be a few things that they should keep in mind or consider?

Ana Kornegay (14:54)
I think the pro is that there's a lot of fun and novelty and energy associated with a celebrity brand that might not exist with a brand that doesn't have celebrity backing or a significant pop culture infusion of some kind.

I think a con might be that there's an extra level of complexity in terms of how you're navigating partnerships and event proposals and things like that. There are a lot of folks who come to us and I've worked with celebrities on Jack Daniels too and a lot of friends of mine are working on celebrity backed or owned brands and I think this is true across the board that people come to you and think that they're

The value proposition is really different. So when you're a celebrity, especially when you're a big celebrity, everything you're doing, every moment counts. Time is money. And when you're creating different product lines and have different businesses and are doing paid appearances and have contracts for concerts or shows on television, then that's a high hurdle.

So when folks are coming to us and they want to maybe carry a few bottles to

do a podcast interview or an appearance with one of these folks, then it's like the value prop is the balance is off a little bit. And there you have to be very delicate in how you approach that with partners that you want to partner with. Because they're not interested in being educated about the celebrity business model versus the product business model, right? I mean, they're both brands, but there's a big difference between a celebrity brand and a and not a product, but like just the celebrity themselves. And the way the

Adam Steinberg (16:25)
Right.

Right.

Ana Kornegay (16:39)
that we do business as just a product in a bottle or a box or whatever. it's a delicate dance that we have to do to make sure that it's a win-win for everybody, but that we're only bringing the most valuable opportunities to the celebrity partners.

Adam Steinberg (16:54)
Yeah, that makes total sense. Are there any other celebrity backed brands inside or outside of the spirit space that come to mind that from your perspective are really doing things right?

Ana Kornegay (17:08)
Well, that's a great question.

I mean...

The one that comes to mind for me off the top of my head is Blake Lively's brands.

Adam Steinberg (17:17)
What jump what jumps out about those ones?

Ana Kornegay (17:20)
Well, I think a lot of it is around if you connect with the celebrity or not, but I also think that the way being, and she was an early, relatively early entry into the non-alcoholic space, and the name is fun, and.

The product formulations are good and it's kind of understated. It's not all about the celebrity. It's really product first, celebrity second. There's a good lifestyle alignment. I think that's the most important thing with any celebrity brand is there has to be a legitimate...

alignment between the product offering and the celebrities personality and lifestyle. So if this person is selling a non-alcoholic product but is out partying online all the time, then that's a disconnect for me. Now she does have a new line that does have some alcohol in it and that's great. It's like kind of an extension. It's an offering for everybody, but I believe it's still low alcohol. So it's still pretty aligned.

Adam Steinberg (18:01)
Right.

you

Yeah.

You mentioned non-alcoholic space, I'm curious how, what's your take

Ana Kornegay (18:25)
It is definitely impacting the alcohol space. I think it's all, know, challenges are always good in an industry. makes us innovate. It makes us get creative. It makes us get resourceful. Sometimes it creates, generates really great partnerships. I think what I love about the NA and Low-Proof space is that it has been a really nice breath of fresh air.

for the drinks space in general. The product sizes, the packaging, the formulations, the education around what some of these functional beverages do. know, there's stuff with THC, there's stuff with mushrooms, there's stuff with adaptogens and nootropics. I think it's invigorating. And it also, it's been really nice. I love the...

Adam Steinberg (18:49)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Ana Kornegay (19:15)
We don't want too many options because then we have a predator's dilemma, right? But it's been really fun to go out during the day or even in the evening for work events or for social events and have an NA or a low proof option that tastes great. I think where the space has some room to grow is finding

Adam Steinberg (19:19)
Sure, right.

Yeah.

Ana Kornegay (19:37)
options that are a little bit more differentiated in flavor profile. I feel like a lot of these brands have two, three, four offerings and every brand has kind of the same four flavor profiles. So tell me more about what's different about your brand's four products over this brand's four products because if it's just packaging that's not enough. I also think there's some room to make lower sugar and less sweet.

Adam Steinberg (19:48)
Yeah, I agree with that for sure.

Ana Kornegay (20:03)
options for folks. think there's this little bit of pinking in the space where it's like, well, women are going to drink these and so women like sweet things and women like pink things and, you know, we like all kinds of things.

Adam Steinberg (20:15)
Right,

totally.

Shifting gears a little bit in terms of talking about marketing resources, looking in your background and speaking with you in the past, there seemed like there were stints at Brown Foreman where you had pretty large internal teams, you 15, 20 plus people, which I assume was maybe a bit less of a reliance on agencies. And then it looks like there were...

other stints in which you had a much leaner team of less five or less, but you were leveraging seven, 10 plus agencies. I'm kind of curious when you just think about resourcing, what frameworks do you use and variables or factors come into play as you're building out your plan with a regards to

internal versus external resources and are there certain functions like influencer management or creative agencies or packaging design that you always tend to bring in-house versus ones that you always tend to contract out or is it really all situational? That's kind of a multi-part question but.

Ana Kornegay (21:06)
That's okay. I think it's a difference between, there are two considerations. One is generalist versus specialist. I'm always for PR, for social media, for packaging. I'm always gonna want specialists. I want people who know the function and the practice.

better than anybody I could have on the team in-house. Now there is an extra layer of complexity with beverage alcohol and that there are certain regulatory things that I need those out those partners to understand. You know my generalist I'm going to want to be able to wear many hats and be really focused on our brand and our business all the time. The other consideration is the length of engagement. So do I need

How much design work am I doing on a weekly, monthly, quarterly, annual basis? Can I base that on previous experience with this particular company or brand or is it a guess I'm making and like...

from a relationship building and quality of work and cost effectiveness perspective, does it make more sense to bring in somebody as a contractor or bring in somebody full time with benefits or does it make more sense to engage with somebody I might only need to talk to once or twice a week?

Adam Steinberg (22:30)
Yeah,

on a similar track for market leaders that are new. Excuse me, market leaders that are new to managing multiple brands within a portfolio. Like I think you did it at Jack Daniels at certain points. Like how would you recommend they think about resourcing with regards to agency engagement specifically as an example? Like would you recommend they silo each brand within an individual agency? So each, you know, each agency that

they're working with is focus on one each only one specific brand or like helping sure each one really just stays laser focused on that specific brand or do you find it sometime works better to engage one agency for multiple brands to streamline and maybe optimize workflows comms budgets that kind of stuff?

Ana Kornegay (23:11)
So I think whether you're working with multiple agencies or different agencies on each brand or one agency across a portfolio, it's really important that that agency is invested in and passionate about understanding the core essence of that brand and that they are willing to spend the time and energy getting really comfortable with the brand guidelines and the brand architecture and all that good stuff.

In my experience at Jack Daniels, I found that it was really helpful to have different agencies work on each brand because it's really easy to cannibalize yourself when you've got a portfolio with seven, eight, nine plus brands and an innovation pipeline because especially in, I'm thinking a PR off the top of my head. Like there are only so many times a month where you can go out and talk to

you know, put out a wire or make an announcement or pitch the same universe of beverage and food and lifestyle writers and influencers. So it's important to have some laser focus on things like that because it's really easy to look, overlook a, you know, a hundred thousand case brand when you've got a five million case brand that you're competing with for attention.

Adam Steinberg (24:19)
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

Ana Kornegay (24:31)
So.

Adam Steinberg (24:31)
Right.

you've got a pretty extensive background leading some of these biggest Spirit brands in the world. So if I came to you, told you I was launching a new brand and I was planning on launching a new brand in the Spirit space, this is my first foray into the space and I'm about to kick off packaging design specifically. What are three to five frameworks or tips that you'd give me or things to watch out for that might trip me up as I'm starting to approach this part of the project?

Ana Kornegay (24:58)
This is my favorite question, I think. Number one, you want to be differentiated, but in a good way. Too often there's like a code in beverage alcohol in particular where it's like, oh, if you're a rye whiskey, you're going to be green. Or if you're a tequila, you're going to be in the green and teal and gold white space. I think if you're sitting on a shelf, whether it's on a bar or in a store,

you want to pop. So differentiating is one, standing out is two. They're the same thing, but I want you to be visible. Differentiating and being visible are a little two different things, especially when you're in a dark bar, you know, staring at 200 bottles. But it has to make sense, you know, if you're throwing hot pink and purple on the label for a product that's a legacy brand that's

Adam Steinberg (25:32)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Ana Kornegay (25:51)
you know, age for 10 years and is targeting a certain demographic that that doesn't make sense for them, then that's not the right call. So differentiate, be visible. And the third thing I would say is think ahead. Do you know how like, and a lot of people don't want to think about this because there's such a focus on urgency and speed and, you know, now is better than perfect, good is better than perfect.

But you really want to, and I always get this term wrong, and you can correct me, is it a hierarchy or a system? Like there's an approach to creating packaging for multiple products in a portfolio so that they connect in a very clear way to the consumer, but they're also different enough that you know that you're getting a higher proof point or a different flavor.

Adam Steinberg (26:37)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Ana Kornegay (26:43)
So I think those are the three most important things to be thinking about.

Adam Steinberg (26:45)
Those all

make a lot of sense. Are there any that, in my experience working in some of the stuff, specifically things that jump out in the cannabis space where, as an example, are you designing the packaging? Let's just say there's like an employee on the back of house. They need to go back in and restock and...

it makes it harder if they can't look if like, you know, a jars or a bottles are sitting in their case pack of, know, like 10 bottles as an example. And, you know, is it designed where they can look straight down within that box to pull out and see which flavor this is or which skew this is versus they have to actually pull the whole thing out of the box and look at the side of the panel, like just as an example, like anything that comes to mind that's not so much.

it's maybe like customer consumer facing, it's more like on the operational, like back of house side of things that people may not think about that. I think in a lot of ways when you're, if you can make a, you know, on-premise or off-premise customer make their lives easier from this point of view, like anything that's like, you know, not so mainstream that you might overlook, that might actually be important to consider on that front, if that makes sense.

Ana Kornegay (27:44)
No, it makes a lot of sense. You know, I think you want to always think about function over fashion. So you've got to think about the entire life cycle of a product before it gets to the purchaser's hand and even afterwards. You need to make sure that the beautiful label that you've designed is going to stick on the bottle through

Bottling putting in a box being shipped in a hot truck whether it's overseas or over a border or just across you know the street You need to make sure that the boxes are easy to read and that it's easy to open and that you know as the product is being pulled in and out of the box you're not pulling and ripping and Scraping, you know, I have one

shipping partner who's been using bubble wrap with the adhesive on the back to wrap our bottles to ship and then when we we pull it off the paper label comes off. You also I've experienced this with Santo and our repackaging in 2023 as well as with some other brands at Brown Foreman.

The package needs to be easy to handle, especially for bartenders and home bartenders. A lot of times when you have these wide packages with shoulders, they get turned to the side on the shelf at home or in a bar or restaurant or in a store, and you can't even see what the brand is. So if you think that that's gonna happen, you need to make sure your branding's on the side of the bottle too. And it needs to be easy to open and pour from. I think that gets overlooked a lot.

Adam Steinberg (29:18)
Yeah, good point.

Ana Kornegay (29:20)
especially with designers who aren't familiar with the on-premise space and who might have never been a bartender and isn't thinking about high volume pours and things like that. Even when we're doing sampling events at big festivals, it's important that we have some accuracy and we're not making a big mess because that's wasteful. ⁓ There was one other thought I had about that.

Adam Steinberg (29:37)
Yeah.

Ana Kornegay (29:42)
that the closure is of high quality because if you've got a cork or a stopper that is glued onto a cap and you're opening and closing many times or if there's heat involved if it's a glue of some kind.

like that can be, it's just, it's a real turnoff for people, especially when they're buying a 40 plus dollar bottle of anything. So just think through the entire bottom to top, inside out, especially of the bottle or the jar, and think about all of the elements, the natural elements it might be exposed to, whether that's weather or human contact.

Adam Steinberg (30:06)
Yeah.

You said you position like thinking about the entire life cycle of the package. I think that's a really good way to look at it. I think these are the type of things that I think of, you know, especially someone who's building a brand that's the first time in the space, a lot of stuff they wouldn't really think about, which they might have to go back and redo later. So I think this is really helpful.

Ana Kornegay (30:36)
I would also say that it's important to think in a multi-sensory way. You do want it to look pretty, but you want it to feel good and you want it to...

Adam Steinberg (30:45)
Like the texture of the bottle or something like those lines, right? Yeah. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

Ana Kornegay (30:48)
Yep, totally.

Adam Steinberg (30:51)
And another different but similar scenario, let's say I was a brand leader at one of the big legacy spirits brands similar to your alma mater, Jack Daniels as an example. And I told you, I came to you said, we're considering a packaging refresh. What questions would you maybe ask me that help me confirm if this even is the right strategy in general? then assuming it is the right strategy how would you maybe balance the need for a fresh look with also the importance of keeping some of the most important familiar

legacy brand elements that for existing customers that they will always recognize? and you don't want to disappear so they won't know to find it, guess. That makes

Ana Kornegay (31:25)
And are we speaking specifically to legacy brands or to any brand?

Adam Steinberg (31:29)
Whichever one you feel like is a better answer to give. I'll let you pick.

Ana Kornegay (31:32)
Well, I think

it's true of all brands, but there's obviously, as you mentioned, a difference between people having a strong brand recognition with, I think it was 98 or 99 % at Jack Daniel's as opposed to like single and low double digits on new and upcoming brands. My three questions would be why, how much, and then what? So why are you doing this? Are you doing this because there's a new CMO and they want...

to put their mark on something? Are we doing it because we're getting feedback from which part of the three tier system? Is it distributors? Is it buyers or is it consumers? And if so, what is it? Is it functional challenges or is it creative challenges that we're addressing? Are we trying to save money?

And if so, how much? Which element of the package needs to change in order to do that? So some really practical, have you done any research or is this all anecdotal? You don't have to do research. I sometimes you just know there's an art and a science to brand building. So that's the why. The how much, as I mentioned is, is it about?

savings, is it about charging more, is it about competing in a different way, and if so how much is it going to cost us and it's not just about how much it costs us to produce the package. It's about are there disruptions in the supply chain that we have to consider, are there disruptions in our you know internal supply chain with the three-tier system, how much inventory do we have on hand that we have to sell through before we have new package coming into the market.

And then last but not least the then what like how many brand touch points are out there between your website and your social media platforms and all of your physical collateral and your merchandising your t-shirts, you know, I mean What things are you gonna have to go completely redo and refresh? So that there is consistency in your branding everywhere people might see it

Adam Steinberg (33:22)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

When you think about some of the most cited, what people would say like game changing, packaging refreshes, like, you know, RX bar and they change and, you know, they went from a few million in sales, like a few hundred million in sales or.

I Celsius, they made a few changes and once they got the right one is when they really started to explode. Or I think people talk about Oatly as another example. Like just those examples compared to ones that maybe fell flat. Like why do you think generally some of these packaging refreshes really do work and can be a catalyst to big growth or?

taking the big next step of the brand versus ones that didn't really work. Maybe it alienated the customers, the sales dropped, or maybe they were just flat and it was a complete waste of time or resources. Like why do you think some worked and some didn't?

Ana Kornegay (34:11)
Well, I think you touched on one reason which is people have a hard time finding it or they don't get it. Like it just feels wrong to them. And I think there's an important element to package changes that you want to stay fresh and modern and relevant and dynamic, but you don't want to do it just for the sake of doing it. Like you want to be

Adam Steinberg (34:18)
Mm-hmm.

Ana Kornegay (34:35)
mindful of you. Number one, you always want to keep your consumers mindset and needs at the forefront. So are you trying to bring in a new consumer? Are you willing to alienate or leave behind a core consumer that's been following your brand for a while? How loyal are consumers really about anything anymore? So

And then the other thing I would say is you really have to be thoughtful about the value proposition. Is the change that you're making, it, as a consumer, if I buy that product now with the new package or the refresh at the same price, do I feel like I'm getting more for my money or less for my money? Are you gonna be charging me more? And if so, does it feel like that upgrade is worth it or not?

Adam Steinberg (35:19)
Yeah. Yeah. Those are all seem very relevant. Um, on, on a similar track in terms of, you know, things that work versus things that didn't, you know, it's clear you've got a lot of wins, wins under your belt over the past, you know, few years. However, I you could probably agree some of the best learning experiences come from times when things didn't go expected, whether it was a, you know, campaign or launch or something. Yeah. Anything from, yeah, whether it's, you know, a campaign or launch strategy or something else that comes top of mind that you worked on that didn't really work or.

Necessarily like go as planned and then kind of like looking back. there anything you would have done differently with that? man, this now seems obvious to me or maybe wasn't so obvious then but

Ana Kornegay (35:58)
Hmm. No, everything's been a win, of course. No, I'm kidding. you know what? I will say that...

When we launched our 110 proof Blanco back in August of 2022, there wasn't a clear reason why. And we did not put enough energy behind it.

So sometimes you need to take a risk and you need to think big and you need to be willing to invest behind it. I think the biggest mistake I see brands make, whether it's an existing brand with a new launch or whether it's a startup is grossly underestimating the amount of money you need to be willing to lose before you start making money. And this might be a captain obvious answer, but you know, what I've seen work best

There's a practice in the beverage alcohol space and it's probably true in most industries where you want to invest a certain percentage per case or per bottle per product towards marketing efforts and awareness driving and commercial efforts. And for an emerging brand or brand new brand that needs to be at least 60, 70 % of the margin or the profit. With established brands it can be a lot less but you still need to be spending it because you make up for it in volume, right?

Adam Steinberg (36:58)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Ana Kornegay (37:19)
But I think if you really want to hit, you've got to lose money before you start making money. Because it's such a saturated space that you've really got to spend enough money to stand out and do it in a way that's exciting. Not just in the standard marketing plan, do these things, check the box kind of way.

Adam Steinberg (37:24)
Sure.

Yeah.

Speaking of exciting things, are there any trends that, whether you're looking back, like, oh man, I wish I would have jumped in that trend or taken advantage of, or things that you're seeing now from whether it's mostly just referring to product categories or anything even maybe broader than a product category. Yeah, anything either that's looking back, oh man, I wish I would have jumped on that, taken advantage of that category, or jumped on the brand in that space, or things you're seeing now that you're feeling like has a lot of promise.

Ana Kornegay (38:03)
I mean, I'm really excited about the non-alcoholic space. actually have a master's in science in medical cannabis science and therapeutics. And it's a fascinating area. And what's happening with psilocybin treatment is even more fascinating and expansive.

Adam Steinberg (38:14)
Mm-hmm.

Ana Kornegay (38:23)
You know, it's still the Wild West. know, medical cannabis and recreational cannabis have been around for, gosh, almost 20 years now. If you go back and look at California and...

Adam Steinberg (38:33)
Yeah,

1996 was in like Prop 215 passed, yeah.

Ana Kornegay (38:36)
It's

been fascinating to watch the life cycle in different states and how the market has peaked and started to fall or plateau. And I think as a tangent, in my mind, the biggest challenge is the federal laws are still so antiquated that businesses can't really put the kind of...

marketing and operational and strategic firepower behind the brand and the customer experience in dispensaries in order to keep people coming back in a way that's not just price based. You know the model is which dispensary is featuring the product I like this month on sale or you know this is my go-to spot and what are they selling today the cheapest that I can buy and it's really creating a commodity instead of

Adam Steinberg (39:06)
Yep, totally.

Ana Kornegay (39:22)
a brand experience or a product experience which is disappointing because you know we should really honor plant medicine not to get too woo woo on you but I think we're only just scratching the surface on what functional beverages and functional functional food and beverage products can do and so I'd love to dig a little bit more deeply into that space.

Adam Steinberg (39:29)
Yep, yep, I'm on the same page in all this for sure.

Yeah, for sure. I'm on the same page with you. All right, well, last question for you.

how are you and your team currently leveraging AI and what are you feeling like, we're starting to look into this. Maybe the other things you can use it for that you're not using it yet, or you're excited about the potential.

Ana Kornegay (39:58)
So I'm really forward thinking on some things and old school on other things. And this is something I'm really old school about. I think that AI can be really helpful for thought starters. I think AI can be great for give me 20 social media content ideas for social media. And we're not doing this to my knowledge. All of our work is being done with a third party, but.

Adam Steinberg (40:27)
Mm-hmm.

Ana Kornegay (40:28)
It's a great way to prompt yourself to get some thought starters, to get some ideas. I just, it gives me the ick that people are using it to write long form stuff. Like I do not want to get an email from you that's generated from AI and I can usually tell and it's an immediate no for me. Like to me, it feels like a cop out and too much of a shortcut, especially when it comes to anything that needs to have a human connection or real creative energy behind it.

And I mean the term AI slop exists for a reason. What's being produced is based on a limited amount of data. It's a lot of data, but it's still limited and it still feels kind of regurgitated and out of touch to me. So I get pretty fired up about it. I'm not a fan, but I realize that none of us want to get left behind. And so we got to find ways to incorporate it into what we're doing, whether it's in our professional or personal lives.

Adam Steinberg (41:17)
Sure. ⁓

Yeah, I think all those things are very valid for sure. Well yeah, Anna, this has been really great. This has been awesome. think, Claire, you have a lot of expertise in the spirit space and I think in the CPG space in general.

Where can people follow along, whether it's LinkedIn or Twitter or anything beyond those?

Ana Kornegay (41:42)
LinkedIn would be best, Anna Cornege, and I try to stay as active as I can on Instagram, and that's at Anna Cornege with one N in Anna. So please join me, follow me, comment, like, do all the things.

Adam Steinberg (41:52)
Awesome.

love it. All right. Awesome. Well, thanks, Ana. I really appreciate the time. This has been awesome. I think this has been a really great episode. And yeah, again, appreciate the time.

Ana Kornegay (42:03)
I'm glad you're doing this. Can't wait to hear future episodes. Thanks a