On Wednesday, Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits announced that it reached an agreement with Anheuser-Busch InBev (ABI) to acquire its New York City distribution operation. With its expanded reach, Southern Glazer’s — the largest wine and spirits distributor in the U.S. — plans to launch a new division: the Southern Glazer’s Beverage Company of New York, which will cover Manhattan, Queens, Staten Island, and the Bronx. The transaction is expected to officially close later this year.
The move comes just a few months after ABI terminated its partnership with Republic National Distributing Co. (RNDC) in California (before the distributor pulled out of the state entirely) and transitioned all spirits brand rights to Southern Glazer’s in the state. Now ABI is furthering its relationship with the company, handing off its wholesale distribution network in NYC with the goal of strengthening its presence in the Big Apple.
In partnering with ABI — the manufacturer behind Michelob Ultra, Busch Light, Budweiser, Bud Light, and fast-growing RTD brand Cutwater Spirits — Southern Glazer’s is significantly increasing its presence in the beer and RTD categories.
“We could not be more excited to expand our business with Anheuser-Busch, the leading brewer and malt beverage supplier in the industry and an emerging leader in spirits and energy drinks, by acquiring their owned New York City distribution operation,” Southern Glazer’s president and CEO Wayne Chaplin said in a press release. “We look forward to welcoming all current employees at this location to the Southern Glazer’s team and working together to grow these iconic brands.”
The new Southern Glazer’s total beverage division will be led by Devyn Dugger, 20-year veteran of the Anheuser-Busch independent beer wholesaler network, in the role of senior vice president of the New York Beverage Division. Upon closure of the transaction, Southern Glazer’s plans to retain all of Anheuser-Busch’s Bronx-based employees, and continue to use the existing Bronx facility to distribute ABI products.
“We are confident this move will strengthen our business and we are excited to work together with Southern Glazer’s to continue to provide world-class service to our retail customers and consumers across New York City,” Simon Wuestenberg, chief sales officer of Anheuser-Busch added in the statement.
VP Pro Take
Well, that didn’t take long. A couple weeks prior to the official start of the shitshow at Republic National Distributing Co.’s (RNDC) California operations — news broken by yours truly here at VinePair, by the by — I filed a column about how consumer-led shifts to “total beverage,” single-serve packaging, and convenience store shopping had triggered another significant supplier shuffle in the Golden State. Namely, Anheuser-Busch InBev’s sorta-strange decision to move its Cali Cutwater and NÜTRL volumes from RNDC and its own independent red network, respectively, to Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits (SGWS.) “There are several surprising aspects of this middle-tier two-step,” I wrote at Hop Take on May 23. Chief among them: SGWS is not a beer distributor, and “lacks the penetration and know-how of a beer distributor” to service the higher-velocity, lower-margin, heavily chain channels where those brands need to win.
But the Tango to RNDC’s Cashed-Out has been making moves in that direction, acquiring New England’s Horizon Beverage Company, a 600-employee wholesaler of Molson Coors, Constellation Brands, and BBC, in late 2024. In May, I argued you could read its presumably pricey arrangement to secure Cutwater and NÜTRL in California as an indication that SGWS was taking seriously the imperative of pushing further into beer (and flavored malt beverages, and RTDs, etc.) With today’s announcement, you have to read it that way. New York is the fourth-largest beer-drinking state in the country by volume, and by acquiring ABI’s Big Apple WOD, SGWS obtains a turnkey-ish beachhead for the next battle in the total beverage war. (That’s “-ish” because integration is never as easy as it seems; just ask RNDC!) On the other end of the deal, ABI gets one of those cartoonishly oversized burlap sacks of cash with a “$$$” emblazoned on the side: terms weren’t disclosed, but after the deal closes later this year, the American brewing industry’s Brazilian overlords corporate stakeholders will be obligated to disclose them to investors. Expect a heartstopping number. Beyond money, ABI also gets to advance what’s become a pretty obvious corporate priority of divesting from its WOD network (see sales this decade in Colorado, Massachusetts, and Ohio), and gets “one throat to choke” in a high-stakes market. You can see why that looked good on paper.
Will it bear out in practice? Maybe — but it’s no gimme. Remember, SGWS has yet to pull off its pivot, and ABI is still on the comeback tour. There are more angles here, more dots to connect. But I’ll save those for my column on Friday. See you then. —Dave Infante, VinePair columnist and contributing editor
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