MHW Ltd. joined Distilled Spirits Council of the U.S. as a director member, the association announced today.
“MHW is a dynamic importer and service provider for spirits brands and has helped thousands of brands enter and excel in new markets. MHW’s unique market position broadens DISCUS’ reach, combines new perspectives with our existing expertise, and positions DISCUS to continue to support a growing distilled spirits sector in a changing market landscape,” said Chris Swonger, ceo of both DISCUS and Responsibility.org.
MHW is the first non-distiller to become a director member. MHW provides services that include operations, logistics, fulfillment, compliance, distribution, accounting, sales, marketing, and new brand development across wine, spirits, beer and cider.
It’s an example of Swonger’s drive to expand DISCUS to include not only top distillers but also those company that provide services to the spirits industry.
We sat down with Swonger to understand how he plans to lead the association. He began by discussing leaving the industry about a decade ago to take a job with Smiths Group, a diversified global technology company with interests in homeland security, defense, aerospace, energy & environment, and medical devices, among others, where he was senior vp for global government relations. He described Smiths as an “intellectually stimulating group of businesses.”
But the opportunity to return to the spirits industry – he worked in government relations for Jim Beam and Allied Domecq for a number of years before joining Smiths– but DISCUS and Responsibility.org presented a unique opportunity.
Grew Up With DISCUS
“I grew up with DISCUS, following the leadership of Peter Cressy, who was unique, with such gravitas,” he said. “We’re moving fast on multiple fronts.”
“The industry itself, in terms of the people, issues and personalities hadn’t changed that much while I was away,” he said. That helped him settle in his role he said.
We wondered what his role was in bringing both DISCUS and Responsibility.org under one CEO. “That decision was made preceding me,” he said.
Hiring Dr. Ben Nordstrom as executive director of Responsibility.org gives stakeholders some sense of comfort, he said. “The opportunity to bring Responsibility.org closer to DISCUS gives an opportunity to synchronize both organizations. The Responsibility agenda can be complementary to DISCUS’s commercial agenda,” he said. Responsibility is a separate organization with its own board.
“They do magical, magic work, sometimes working with stakeholders who wouldn’t naturally work with DISCUS. At the same time, we want to raise the awareness of their programs within the trade,” Swonger said.
Nordstrom’s job is focused on three things, Swonger added: Eliminating underage drinking; drunk and impaired driving and responsible consumption. That won’t change.”
We noted Swonger had made a number of personnel changes, including hiring a new general counsel to succeed Lynne Omlie as senior vp and general counsel. Omlie had been with DISCUS as long as I have been reporting on the distilled spirits industry, I said.
“Swonger acknowledged that when he joined Hiram Walker and Allied Domecq, Omlie was DISCUS’s top lawyer and corporate secretary. “She is awesome,” he said. “My first impression with DISCUS was Lynne, who was the best of DISCUS.”
But all organizations need to evolve and to modernize, he said. “The good news is that Lynne, Frank (Coleman) and Mark Gorman will remain with us as senior advisors.” While he said this, Coleman was busy working just a couple of doors down the hall, so the senior advisor title is not one that implies the person will be sitting at home, waiting for a call asking his or her advice.
At the same time, it seems to us to give DISCUS the opportunity to transition three critical areas to leadership that will, presumptively, be in place for the next 15 to 20 years while making use of Omlie, Coleman and Gorman’s expertise, contacts and initiatives on a daily basis.
It sort of reminds me of a friend who left a white shoe law firm after hooking up with a 65 year old attorney in the Berkshires. The deal they struck was that for a few years the older lawyer’s name would be first on the letterhead, followed by the younger lawyer. Then the names would switch with the younger lawyer’s name first, and then eventually the older attorney would be “of counsel,” handling the cases he wanted, when he wanted.
Colleges do somewhat the same thing when professors retire, awarding them emeritus status. The professor can teach as much as he wants, do whatever research he wants, but without the need to do either or to attend administrative meetings.
“All three of them will continue to have vital roles to play in support of DISCUS. But as we are resetting, DISCUS needs to prepare for the future. We’re lucky to have Lynne, Frank and Mark supporting their successors. All three have incredible roles to play. No one can ever question their commitment to the industry.
The announcement, he said, was “a notice to the trade that DISCUS positioning itself to serve the needs of our member companies in the future while maintaining the continuity that we have to have with the great performance of the past.”
“Where do you see DISCUS today, and when do you want to take it in the next three to five years, we asked.
No change of mission, which is to drive consumer convenience, he said. “We want to be sure our consumers can get distilled spirits when they want, how they want and where they want.”
Growing membership is important, he said, noting that DISCUS has just hired two people to build membership. “There’s a large component of the supplier tier that isn’t engaged with DISCUS,” he said. “I want to make DISCUS a more inviting organization for others in the industry to engage. Part of this is resetting the relationship with our control state customers, our wholesale and retail partners.”
That’s not to say anything was off with industry partners in the past, but DISCUS will be “very very focused working with our stakeholders across the industry to drive our agenda of consumer convenience,” he said.
Partner Member Program
As part of this effort, DISCUS has just launched a partner member program, which is designed for those in the distilled spirits supply chain and related businesses.
In the last 10 years, spirits performance in control states has been great, a testament to DISCUS and its control state partners, he said. Working with NABCA, craft distillers, is key he said, because the industry will be facing a lot of unknowns over the next 10 years, including the implications of cannabis.
We observed that with craft distillers in every state, it changes DISCUS’s posture vis-à-vis Congress. A decade of so ago, distillers were essentially in only three states, Kentucky, Tennessee and Illinois. Now DISCUS will be able to do a flyin bringing distillers from every state to discuss issues with their senators and representatives.
DISCUS is creating a grass roots platform for consumers, bartenders, craft distillers and employees of our members, he said. This is a continuation of DISCUS’s normalization platform, he said.
Anti-Alcohol Advocates
Turning to the issue of science and health, we noted anti-alcohol advocates have become much more aggressive in recent months. Swonger agreed, saying DISCUS is well-positioned to continue with the positive trends of the last two decades.
Swonger said some of the activist community “wants to take liberties with science and health as it relates to moderate consumption of alcohol. DISCUS always wants to be guided by sound science and doesn’t want to get tripped up by the activist community promoting what could be called ‘junk science’.” But, he said, “we’re willing to work with the activist community as well.”
“No one can question this industry’s commitment to do the right thing. Underage drinking has been on the decline by 32% since 1991. We want to continue that trend as well as the trend of people drinking better, not more. That’s a trend we want to continue, Swonger said.
Spirits has been making great progress, taking market share away from others in the sector is a good thing, he said. He wants to work closely with the Beer Institute, Wine Institute, as well as the Brewers Association, which does a lot of great work for craft brewers. “We work closely with the American Craft Spirits Association.”
Cannabis
On the issue of cannabis, he called that the great unknown as to how it might impact distilled spirits consumption “but there’s probably enough unanswered questions as to what that means for the industry.”
DISCUS has called for cannabis to be properly regulated, taxed and for testing just as police can run BAC tests on people suspected of driving drunk.
Swonger said he has all the people he needs to move forward. He noted that Courtney Armour left DISCUS, where she was state government relations manager, to go to law school. And after a few years in private practice at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, she is returning to DISCUS as general counsel.
On the lobbying front, DISCUS just hired a new federal government relations team member. Christine Locassio is transitioning from international trade to lead public policy – state, federal, international and economics. “DISCUS will continue to be very, very aggressive,” Swonger said.
Tariffs
Swonger said tariffs have become very concering because the U.S. exports so many distilled spirits to Europe. “The impact of retaliatory tariffs has been very, very concerning,” he said.
DISCUS has been working hard to insure distilled spirits aren’t included in the latest tariff dispute “because that’s more related to aerospace products,” he said. The industry has a lot riding on tariff talks, he said.
Editor’s Note: An earlier version of this story had a significant error in the last paragraph, saying “DISCUS has been working hard to insure distilled spirits are included…” Obviously that’s wrong.