Trade marketing is a common term you hear in the alcohol and beverage distribution industry. Big companies dedicate entire teams to each sales channel, whether that’s convenience stores, liquor stores, on-premise accounts, grocery, or mass retail. It’s a boots-on-the-ground function, built to generate sales velocity and get products moving off shelves.
The same is true for emerging hemp beverage brands new to the game. Distributors get your product on the shelf. After that, it’s the brand’s job to sell it.
When the THC beverage Cann launched in California around 2020, Tara Falk was on the ground leading brand ambassadors across the state and building the framework for field teams in other adult-use markets. She went on to found Aim & Fire, a national experiential brand activation agency, where she led the California launches of Jones Soda’s hemp brand Mary Jones and Snoop’s hemp line. She sat down with us to share what she’s learned about trade marketing in the hemp beverage space.
Managing field teams spread across the country, coordinating activations and assets that are constantly in motion, and adapting to different market realities in every state are serious operational challenges. Yet most major retailers demand in-store marketing support from their brands.
What to Look for in a Trade Marketing Partner
Falk makes the case for hiring a cannabis-focused agency rather than a generalist staffing agency. Educating consumers about the complexities of the plant and its wellness benefits is a marketing challenge and priority for brands looking to move the industry forward. It takes genuine understanding to effectively translate that information to consumers.
A full-service partner manages an end-to-end program, from sourcing brand assets and building kits to setting up reporting systems and moving materials across markets.
She notes that THC beverage brands entering the mainstream market for the first time often arrive without the tools a traditional staffing agency would expect: no printed assets, no deployment kits, no tracking systems. A true program management partner has that covered before the field team ever walks through a retailer’s door.
Falk’s experience with mainstream brands and large-scale events, such as festivals, national campaigns, and high-visibility consumer activations, brings a level of process discipline and accountability that carries over to every retail interaction. She says the same rigor she applies to a major brand activation gets applied to an in-store demo.
Falk also pointed to the accountability advantage of working with a smaller operation, where high volume at larger agencies can let quality slip, and responsibility gets diffused across too many layers of management. The other alternative, building an in-house trade marketing team, comes with its own hidden costs. A small internal team rarely has the resources to make a meaningful impact, and as the contractor count grows, so does the administrative burden. Managing schedules and processing payments across multiple markets can easily become a full-time job in itself.
Hemp beverage brands navigating a fragmented, state-by-state retail landscape may benefit from a partner that is both flexible and well-versed in an industry that is still finding its footing.
Executing a Go-to-Market Retail Strategy
One of the most common mistakes new brands make is underestimating the budget and effort required to get a product noticed at retail. In a crowded market, where shelf space is packed with sleep gummies, shots, and functional beverages all making similar claims, standing out requires creative planning.
The starting point, she says, is always retail velocity. First orders mean nothing without reorders, and that means making sure your first retail accounts have the support to move through their initial inventory before momentum stalls.
Live tastings and samplings are the most direct tools for doing that, but Falk points to consumer-generated content as another often-overlooked opportunity to build brand awareness that compounds.
Getting out into the community to drive retail traffic through events and sponsorships tends to carry higher production costs and larger personnel requirements. New brands often want to plant their flag with a big community activation, but the retail foundation needs to be in place first.
Before any of that, she says brands need to decide how they want to show up. A retail demo is more than a can and a cup. Signage, branded materials, and something for a customer to take away all contribute to how a brand is perceived. A well-designed table setup can stop someone who would otherwise walk right past.
Sampling regulations also vary significantly by state and can shift quickly as new rules take effect. Knowing what is and isn’t permitted in each market is part of the job, because the assumption that anything goes can create serious compliance exposure.
A Distributor’s Role
Getting on a distributor’s menu is a milestone, but it’s not a marketing strategy. A distributor is carrying many brands at once, some of which may be direct competitors, and they will naturally put their energy behind what’s easiest to sell. They are not brand-specific salespeople, and expecting them to push a skeptical retailer to take a chance on a new product isn’t guaranteed.
That’s why brand-side support is essential to any GTM strategy. Whether it’s a dedicated sales contact, a marketing rep, or a third-party field team, there needs to be someone whose sole focus is making sure the brand gets the attention it deserves at the account level. That means showing up consistently, making sure merchandising is in place, and helping retailers understand what the product is, where it is on the shelf, and what it costs.
Some distributors offer in-field trade marketing services, but the expectation either way is that brands come prepared to support their own accounts. Dropping off product and waiting for reorders isn’t a plan.
Store Audits and Reporting
Falk’s team uses detailed reporting forms tailored to each client. A Google Form that feeds a spreadsheet gives you a snapshot of market activity. A CRM that lets the ambassador tag the sales manager in the field to flag an account running low, sold out during the demo, or needs a reorder tomorrow, turns field activity into a live communication channel between the brand’s trade and sales teams.
Store visits also include photos of the full shelf, so brands can see how they’re positioned against competitors, spot merchandising gaps, and identify real estate worth pursuing.
Units sold are only one measure of a demo’s success. Traffic, regional consumer behavior, product formulation, brand positioning, and the quality of the story the ambassador has been given all play a role. She’s noticed real regional differences too: Midwest shoppers tend to want to reach their own conclusions, while East Coast consumers are often more receptive to a direct sales pitch. Knowing that changes how a good ambassador works a room.
Finding the Right Mix
When it comes to the minimum investment needed to make a dent in consumer awareness, Falk says a mix of retail demos and community events is stronger than either alone. Community events feed content to digital channels, and brands that can hit both at once tend to see the strongest launches. For those starting lean, the basics are a fine place to begin, but the ceiling is higher when all sides are working together.
Events don’t have to be pure spend, either. A lot of hemp beverage brands default to free sampling, but Falk points out that on-site sales are available at more events than people realize, and consumers who want to try something are often just as willing to buy as they are to take a free sip.
Prioritizing events with on-site sales helps offset the cost of showing up.
Beyond demos and events, Falk sees a lot of room for creativity. She pointed to a recent campaign from Florida-based Black Market as an example of what’s possible when a brand thinks differently. They collaborated with an artist who had worked as a stylist on Sex and the City, who painted one-of-a-kind pieces directly onto their spirit bottles. The bottles were displayed and sold as art, each one a one-of-a-kind piece. For a brand that is art-forward, edgy, and urban, it was a perfect fit.
A similar approach worked well for Mary Jones a few years back, when the brand invited consumers to submit a photo to be featured on their beverages sold in dispensaries, with their name on it. Falk, who led the brand’s California launch, still has the bottle she submitted sitting on her desk. She sees the brand every day. That’s worth more than what they spent on the packaging.
Where a brand shows up should align with how it’s positioned, because the consumer profile for a recovery and fitness brand looks very different from that of a brand built around social consumption or relaxation.
