Hugging the Bar Is Back, Baby.
A new Hugging the Bar focused on building and broadcasting bar, brewery, distillery, and brand stories.
Guess Who’s Back, Back Again, This Lady’s Back, Tell a Friend
Greetings, subscribers! I hope at least, I don’t know, 33.3 percent of you are happy to see a Hugging the Bar email land in your inbox after…[checks notes]…17 years? Not really, but it does feel like it, doesn’t it? Time sure doesn’t fly when you’re living in a totalitarian Nazi hellscape.
While it’s a wild era to do anything, I, like you, need to work to make money and also to spend fewer hours screaming into the void. (The neighbors have complained!) And we all have to find whatever ways we can to find joy these days, right? To that end, what I’ve realized in recent months is that I miss Hugging the Bar, but that I don’t quite miss adding a metric ton of writing to my already teetering-on-the-edge-of-burnout writing workload each week. What I do want to add is more conversation and more collaboration. In the past year, I’ve dabbled in media consulting and found it’s a whole new way to apply my experience in the beverage and hospitality world. While it requires some intentional navigation around conflicts of interest, I find that worthwhile to interact in a more hands-on way with how bars, breweries, distilleries, and brands shape and then broadcast their stories. And so, here are the three big announcements behind this revisit to your inboxes.
Meet Hugging the Bar Consulting.
Alongside a decade of journalism, I have 15 years of experience in branding, marketing, and e-commerce copywriting and content creation. I have helped new brands build their websites and blogs from the ground up, and helped well established brands overhaul and refresh theirs, too. I have written many a brand bible, consulted on many a brand voice, and do love to create spreadsheets mapping out social media strategies. When I combine that with the deep dives I’ve done into trends and how businesses in the beverage alcohol and hospitality industries, it turns out I’ve learned a thing or two that might help your bar, their distillery, her brewery, etc.
The consulting I’m launching lives here. There are three channels:
Media consulting for PR firms: After a period of consulting on a retainer for a major firm with beverage alcohol, hospitality, and travel clients, and appearing on podcasts and panels for others, I’ve decided to make it official. It’s easy for a writer to gripe about bad press releases but ultimately it behooves media members to foster relationships with publicists. I’d rather work together and help you when a pitch isn’t landing, or help you make sure your next one does. This looks like one-on-one or team information sessions and/or ask-me-anything’s; press release reviews, feedback, and edits; one-off meetings, monthly meetings, and anything in between; plus a handy crash-course PDF guide to get started / in the meantime / instead.
Media consulting for brands and businesses: These are tough times for these industries. I’ve seen plenty of folks taking on their own PR to save money. But they’re often not getting anywhere because, well, no one expects a distiller, brewer, or bartender to also be a PR whiz. My services here also include one-off or regular sessions where we can go through anything you need help with, from general basics for starting to hyper-specific questions. Let’s shape your story, make you stand out, and then plan who we’re going to get that story to so you make some headlines and some waves. Let’s get you on the media’s radar. And let’s make it easy, for chrissakes, shall we? I can write anything you need from those pitches to any and all web copy to social copy, blogs, and newsletters. I can train you for media interviews. Oh, and there’s also a handy crash-course PDF guide for you.
Consulting for freelance writers: These are also tough times for media. I have personally stumbled my way to where I am now, tripping over just about every mistake you can make along the way. I don’t think you should have to do that to “earn” your status. If you’re just getting started, switching beats, need a brush-up, have questions—maybe you’re a bartender with a few extra hours a week, need extra cash, and have a knack for writing so want to give this freelance thing a go—we can do one-off meetings, regular sessions, or you can just grab your handy crash-course PDF guide.
The Hugging the Bar Podcast Gets a Revamp.
My favorite part of writing is interviewing smart, fascinating, talented, creative people at bars, breweries, distilleries, and all sorts of tangential brands and businesses. That’s why I’ve kept a mental pin in the whole podcasting thing for a couple of years now—I wanted to reapproach it with a dialed-in focus. I’ve found that with this consulting launch: The Hugging the Bar podcast will now support my mission with consulting and work hand-in-hand with it by diving into various pockets of brand storytelling, marketing, PR, education, events—essentially, if it has anything to do with making your business stand out, balancing your unique ethos with current trends, disrupting the industry, broadcasting your story, and generally surviving and thriving nowadays, it’s par for the course on this podcast. I plan on catching up with some of the brilliant minds brewing beer, selling beer, distilling spirits, mixing up cocktails, running bars, consulting any and all of these businesses, paving new paths in non-alcoholic and/or functional beverages, advocating for inclusion and representation in this arena, writing about it, etc.
I plan to release this roughly once a month (if not, more) and will do so in conjunction with this newsletter—I encourage you to follow and subscribe to the podcast where you get your other ‘casts, but new episodes will also always be linked here.
I’m dropping two episodes to start to hit the ground running (and also because both of the interview subjects are doing super exciting things and took time out of their busy schedules to chat with me and I’m well behind on sending our conversations out into the world!). First up, I spoke with Anton Kinloch, founder and operator of wave-making cocktail bar Lone Wolf in Kingston, New York. We got into his inspiring educational program for fellow industry members and newcomers as well as his take on draft cocktails. Next, I get into the magic of Bier Omakase with its creators, Shana Solarte and Jenny Pfäfflin. Already seasoned beer industry veterans and experts, the duo has launched a tasting event series and corresponding Substack that approaches beer in a whole new way. Both of these discussions are fun and jam-packed with great takeaways, so don’t miss out.
The Hugging the Bar Newsletter Returns.
Well, duh. Here we are, right? But here are the key details: This will also be about a monthly thing, again, timed with podcast episodes dropping. It will be shorter and hopefully sweeter—less longform reporting and essay-ing, more fast and fun observations from all things drinks for the month, from notable cocktails to can’t-miss articles, and some updates on my work, plus perhaps some event listings, cool new spot openings, etc. I think we’re going to have a good time, y’all.
That said, please of course feel free to unsubscribe if this is not what you signed up for! My subscriber count has actually grown during this dormant period (you guys prefer silence, maybe? Idk but I do get it…), but if the promise (threat?) of a monthly return gets a “nah” from you, well, life is too short to waste your time so go, be free, touch grass, etc.
And if you’re new here, well, please feel free to subscribe! We’ll talk drinks and branding and industry trends, and subscribers to this newsletter will always be first up for perks like discounts on my consulting and other exciting things to come.
Recent-ish Writing
ICYMI, here are a few of my favorite stories I’ve written since we last caught up here.
I looked at why beer, FMB, and RTD brands are increasingly naming and branding themselves around specific identities like “girl,” “mom,” and “dad” for Bon Appétit.
I dove into the gorgeous and complex world of South African fynbos and how these endemic botanicals shape a rich gin scene for the country, for Wine Enthusiast.
I dug into the waning homebrewing scene, reporting on closing homebrew shops as well as potential signs of new interest in the hobby in some places, for The Washington Post.
For subscribers, I explored the wonderful world of aquavit and how creative American distillers are interpreting it, for Craft Spirits Magazine.
I highlighted why the New Orleans beer scene is so special and unique for Craft Beer.
I profiled one of the best bars in the world (fact, not opinion), John & Peter’s in New Hope, for PUNCH.
For subscribers, I broke down what breweries need to have on their websites for Brewing Industry Guide. This is a very important topic and germane to the consulting I am launching here, as it is something I know and care tons about!
For subscribers, I looked at how nano-distilleries can thrive in tight spaces for Craft Spirits & Distilling.
I wrote an exhaustive guide to just about every IPA substyle you can think of for Inside Hook.
I spoke to 10 different brewers about what they might do differently when they opened 5, 10, 15 years ago if they’d had a crystal-ball view of the present, also for Inside Hook.
I blindly tried macro lagers alongside craft analogs of retro American lagers for Men’s Journal.
That’s all for now, friends! If you have questions, want to chat about media consulting or content creation or truly anything else, you know where to find me.
Welcome back!