99 - From Pandemic Inception to Global Palates: The Fly Wines Story with Fly Wines' Stephanie Franklin

Welcome to Listening with Leaders. I'm Doug Noll, lawyer turned peacemaker. I teach executive leaders how to listen to emotions rather than words so that they can become the leaders everyone wants to follow. And I teach those same leaders how to be authentically present, available, and connected to their families despite being insanely busy. I have learned that we are 98% emotional and only 2% rational. Learning how to listen to emotions is, in my experience, the foundational skill of life. Stick around to the end of the show, and I'll reveal how you can be on our next guest in 15 to 20 minutes. So let's get started.

Stephanie Franklin, welcome to Listening with Leaders. You are the founder and CEO of Flywines, which can be found at flywinesclub.com. Welcome to the show.

Thank you guys for having me. I'm definitely excited to be here.

Why don't you just—

let's do this. Let's start with the backstory. Tell us about you, and then you can tell us about Fly Wines. And Fly Wines is such an interesting concept, but let's start because I think you're even more interesting. So let's start with your story.

You know, I will say I think I'm not as interesting, but when I do tell the story, people do find that it's pretty interesting. Starting out, I grew up in Miami. I got my undergrad in Georgia, in Atlanta, Georgia, at Georgia State University. I then moved on and got— received my master's in London at Roehampton University. Then I had to leave, which I did not want to, and cried on the whole plane ride back to the US. And I ended up in New York. I was done with Atlanta. And then from New York, I actually transitioned into the Bay Area because I wanted to get more involved in the tech industry. Before, it was just more of like the, just the ad tech, martech side, and I wanted to get more deeper into that industry. So that's how I transitioned over. So, um, I think that's a big interesting standpoint about me that people find.

What was your master's degree study in?

International Management Marketing.

Oh, interesting. And that turned out to be kind of handy, huh?

Yes.

Tell us about your concept around Fly Wines.

Fly Wines itself, the concept developed during the middle of the pandemic. I was working from home just as everyone else was in the middle of 2020. And before I had another idea that I wanted to kind of spin off because I have personally realized that I've been always full of ideas and I had tried my hands at entrepreneurship before. And whether it lasted a year or two, I found myself back in the job market. This time, it felt quite different. I was having just drinks with a friend on the porch in San Francisco, Hayes Valley. And she said, oh, I have this wine tasting kit. And I told her, I think we could do something. And she was really hesitant. I actually have no idea what the drive for me to keep going and trying to find out about the industry was. But it was something in me, a fire in me that I could not— I couldn't, like, I couldn't push that fire away. So I kept digging. And once that happened, the whole Fly Wines concept transitioned. And that's how we came about. And so now we're an importer/exporter as well as California wine distributor. And we work with independent wineries around the world to bring them increased visibility within the US market, which is one of the world's largest wine markets.

And California probably being the largest wine market in the United States.

And even within California itself, you'll find within our tasting kits, is what you have our logo behind me now, is that there's still things outside of Sonoma and Napa. There's Livermore, there's Gilroy.

Oh yeah, there's a whole Central Coast in Santa Barbara.

Correct.

Temecula. And even here, even here where I'm in Central California, there's some really amazing red wines that are grown here.

Correct. So we work with wineries worldwide as well as locally too. And our first one in our current box that we have, our curated box, is with Fortino Wineries, and that's in Gilroy.

So, uh, I interviewed you in Authority Magazine, and a story that you revealed that I'd like you to tell my audience here on the show is about your adventures in Turkey.

Yes. My adventures in Turkey came about to where, um, in the last year I said, you know what, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna source these wines. So I mapped it out, and for 2 months of my life I went to about 5 different countries, 6 different countries, uh, Turkey being one of them. And I came about to where there are wines everywhere where people don't really know about them. So I found myself in Turkey in the Antalya region, which is right, right, right or less between Greece, right? And within that, I thought I had made a wrong decision. I was like, I don't know about this. And luckily, I ended up finding a contact who told me about a winery in the mountains. So I don't know if anyone of you in this audience is familiar with Turkey and driving around those curves going up to mountains.

One lane roads and those curves.

One lane for 3 cars. Yeah. So I personally said a prayer and just like, okay, we're going to make it up.. And I got up to the most beautiful winery I have ever seen. And there are two brothers that are in charge of the winery. One is the chef and the other's a geologist. And I taste some of the most fascinating wines and heard some of the grapes that I had never heard of because they focus on resurrecting grapes that are 200, 300 BC.

Wow.

Yeah. If you have them tell it, they taught the Italians how to make wine, but that's neither here or there.

So you developed a relationship. Are you importing their wines now?

Yes, we are in the process of importing those Turkish wines in, so we're excited to bring them to our customers here within the US.

So how, how does your, how does your business model work? You're an importer, exporter, and distributor. Are you B2C or B2B? Um, how's it work?

We developed a business model that allows us to work twofolds. So we are B2B, meaning any consumers that are listening today can go to our website and purchase some of Fly Wine's items. Our main focus though is the B2B market.

They—

we focus and work with 4 and 5-star restaurants that needs wines that are not of the norm. So with the wineries, the relationships that we do establish with them they work exclusively with us to bring them into the US. So we work with a very niche audience. So anything that you even purchase on our site that's internationally can only be purchased through the Fly Wines brand. So the B2B side is where we actually go directly to the restaurants and wine shops that are 4 or 5 stars, and they buy wines from us as well too.

And, and I guess what differentiates you from everybody else is that you're bringing in some really different stuff like this Turkish winery that nobody's ever seen before, and the wines are good.

We have a Georgian wine coming in as well too soon that I'm excited about. And I was telling one of my, uh, sourcers, I was like, you know, I heard about Morocco, they have wines. He's like, I never thought— I'm like, well, I think we're gonna go to Morocco and see if we can find some wines there. There's so many wine regions.. But within the US, I find that the most focus is always on the Italian and the French wines. There's now getting to be a little bit of demand, not even a little bit, but for South African wines and some New Zealand wines and maybe some South American wines here or there. But you miss all of the niche ones in between, particularly if you're talking about Georgian wines and Turkish wines. And then, like I said, the Moroccan wines and Bolivian wines. Bolivia is huge for wines.

Wow. And they, and they make good wines.

Exactly. And we make sure that we bring quality in. So it's not— our niche is not just we're bringing you wines from these countries that you're not going to like. We use— we have our in-house sommelier that actually says, okay, for the palates of the US, these wines will work best. And we focus on that to make sure that the wines are very inviting to the US market. We don't want it to be so obscure to where it's like the palate's just going to differ.

Right, right. So how do you— how do your restaurateurs like, like your offerings?

They actually really like them. Surprisingly enough, they really like them. They're excited about what we're bringing in. And we still have the sprinkling of a few of the ones, regions that are known, like we have an Italian wine, wine that's coming in. But again, we make sure that if we're in those regions, that that wine that we're bringing in has such a different palate than what's known in that region. People love it.

So how much of the wine do you get to taste?

All of it. I have to taste all of it. I definitely don't always continue to swallow all of it, but I definitely have to taste all of it. But when it's coming in, especially a lot of the wines that we've sourced, that's almost like 6 months, a year ago, it's like, okay, let's re-taste this again and see what it's like on the palate. And then we focus heavily, and this is something where Fly Wines is going to, we focus a lot on the food wine pairing. We give a lot of suggestions on the wines and what they can be eaten with because we think that's a really big part, especially if you're tasting a grape that you haven't heard of, right? Like they call it Furson. I never heard of this grape, but we find that, hey, this Furson grape works pretty well with very nice lamb. Or something that's light on the palate, it's like, oh, this is great. So therefore, you— we take you on an experience, and that's what we do.

A world tour. How fun.

So I don't even—

I'm going to ask you this question, but I already know the answer. What gets you excited every morning to get up and get going?

Thank you, George. It really is just making, um, meeting and building relationships, particularly with the wineries. So what I've learned is that it's not always just about the grapes as well. You're talking about these wineries have probably been in business for generations. A lot of times in order for them to break into the US market, they have to go with one of the bigger conglomerates, which requires them a huge amount of money up front. And then not only that, they feel as if though their wines may not be given the proper attention and the love that they put in them. So that's one way that we've heard. And then the other avenue is that sometimes they have such a high demand, they can't meet that demand, and it brings the quality of their wines down, and they don't like that. So what makes them hesitant to come into the market? So for me, having these wineries have a company like us, Fly Wines, to come in and say, hey, we're not going to have you go up, scale up too fast, we're going to do it gradually, and we're going to make sure that you get the attention that you need without a huge up upfront burden as well from you. So this allows us to have that exclusivity, but my relationship with these wineries, and they feel very safe because they say, okay, well, you're not asking for a chunk of money. And I feel as though we can build that rapport and relationships. And that's one of the things that is really important to me as I have a sales background, customer success background, is building relationships So people can trust that whatever I say I'm going to do, and if that can't happen, I will always let you know beforehand.

I would imagine— I'm a lawyer, you know, as you know, I'm a— I don't practice law anymore, but I would imagine there's some complexity involved in importing wines from other countries, especially small wineries that are way off the beaten path.

Yes, very much so. A lot of complexity in it. And I'm grateful for the people that I work with. I have met along the way. I will tell you my key with that, and even, even coming into the wine industry without knowing anything about prior, is to be very vulnerable. I'm very upfront with people from the beginning. I say, hey, we're very new to this. Can you apologize in advance? We're going to take it step by step. Help me understand what I need to do. So once you do that and you take down the barrier to people actually want to help you more, because you're not coming from a place of arrogance, you're coming from a place of humility. And I'm a very genuine person naturally, a natural core characteristic of me. And with that, people were willing to help me or just take me through the ropes. And the complexity is actually broken down when you're able to be vulnerable with people. And then the people that do have the knowledge are there to help guide you along the way. So I'm very grateful for that. That's the ladies at ABC, from TTB to the FDA. If you haven't noticed, that wine is considered food.

That's right. So I have to have an FDA registration number and you got to get it cleared.

Exactly.

It doesn't have any weird stuff in it.

Oh, customs. Yes.

What is it? Yeah, your, your business is so unique, Stephanie. What is it that you think that's unique about you that you bring to this that makes it so successful?

I think my natural way of building relationships, um, and that's what's helped me in my career altogether. I do genuinely care about people, and I want to make sure that I'm giving people the best of what I have. I would tell customers when I'm in tech, I'm like, I'm not gonna sell you any crap because I don't want you to be upset with me later. So if I'd rather tell you, tell me now, it's not gonna work, and we pivot to go somewhere else. So I think for me, the main difference has been the skillset of building and taking down those walls and having people building trust fairly quickly because I'm like, I'm very genuine about what I'm doing. People feel that authenticity, and within that, they're more willing to break down the different barriers. And that's what helps me out a lot. And it actually— I'm— but again, the core characteristic that I have within myself is I'm very big on just treating people the way I want to be treated. I don't— it, it sounds very simple, but a lot of people find it quite hard to do that at times. But for me, it takes— it takes more for me to lie than to have— be honest and just say, hey, I don't think this is gonna work. I don't— not if you told me more or less pivot somewhere else. But then also not taking things personal. That's one of the main things for me as well too. I learned years ago after doing a lot of um, reading and— are you still there?

I'm here.

Okay, you're good. Okay, I went reading and understanding and realizing that most people take everything to heart when there's so much more going on in this universe besides me, Stephanie, sitting here and chatting with you at the moment. So once I take myself out of the equation and I'm taking it so personally to heart, I don't take anything that I'm doing in relationships, whether is building a relationship or sell to heart. I take it— I'm going to do my best. If it doesn't work out, great. Maybe later on. But if it does, it's good as well. So I think that's a fairly unique quality about me that a lot of people don't have because everything is, oh, well, they did something to me. No, they didn't. They probably have a lot of other stuff going on. I used to tell my mom before she passed away, I'm like, it's not about you. Maybe they have something else going on.

So, so this show is called Listening with Leaders, and as you know from my background, I'm all about listening. Um, tell me about the importance of listening in your line of work.

Very important. I said my background is in sales, customer success management. You have to learn to read between the lines. You have to not only hear their words, but also if you can try to see their actions, if your actions can, whether they're visible in the body language. I think that there are a lot of different layers of people just beyond the words themselves. And listening to those words is definitely step one. But if someone says one thing, but then I'm noticing their actions dictate another, the actions are going to override the words, because then I'm going to take a step back and say, are we sure it's just about that? Is— could X, Y, and Z also play a factor in it? Um, so that allows me to kind of take things down and take a step back to figure out what's beyond the words that you're actually saying. There, there's actually something a little deeper.

So you're paying close attention to not just the words but to the entire communication.

100%.

Um, how'd you learn that?

I'm naturally, um, like, some genuine— so I'm empathetic by nature. So one of my, uh, people that I actually look up to is like Richard Branson, and I think he's always come off as this kind of empathetic, genuine, authentic person. And I align with that energy as well too, because I'm like, oh, that's how I always try to be. So it's one of those things to where you have to have a really good understanding within yourself. And again, first off, not taking things personally. Then once you have that standpoint, you can be very genuine and authentic and empathetic with people.

Hmm. Wise words. Not many leaders know how to do that, unfortunately. So I think you're really blessed that you've got a good start on it. So where do you see Fly Wines going in the next 10 years?

I actually see us growing quite a bit. We'll likely end up having various different distributors that we work with in the US, uh, to bring in and increase our efforts to independent wineries. So we hope to have that expansion there within the next couple of years. We also hope to even increase our inventory on online offerings to consumers. So within our website, we do have our wine tasting kits per se, but then we want to start offering our wine subscription program, which allows people to taste different wines, full bottles of wines from home as well too. And then also increasing our relationships, of course, to those 4 or 5-star restaurants within the US, the wine shops as well too.

Are you, are you in with your restaurants and wine shops? Are they mostly here on the West Coast or are they all over the country?

For now, they're here on the West Coast, but we want to expand all over the country within the coming years.

That's a big ambitious project, isn't it?

Yes, because everything in wine costs, um, it's definitely an ambitious process, but again, it's not, um, it's not insurmountable. Like, it definitely can be done, and that's where we're here to do. And that's what I've learned about, tell you the truth, about the wine industry in general, is nothing is insurmountable. It's just kind of taking it in little chunks here and there. And then from there, you break down the layers of what is the next step. For me, I think that's another quality that I have to where even I find sometimes my friends are very challenged with, to where they're, um, risk-averse. So they get overwhelmed, they want to see the end. And for me, I'm okay with just taking— I'm gonna focus on this next step And then get that done. And from there, what other step do I need to take? So breaking it down is more digestible for me, especially coming into an industry that I don't know. And of course I'm interested in that industry. It's gonna help me learn as well too. But once you do that, it doesn't become overwhelming for me. I must admit, if I had seen everything that had to go into it from the— like this big, I'm like, hold on, hold on. I don't know. Let me think about this.. But because I, I just allowed myself to take a step back and to take those itty-bitty— first off, the application. What do I need to do? What do I need to present? Okay, who do I need to talk to now? TTB. Who is TTB? Tobacco Trade Bureau. Why does Tobacco Trade Bureau have anything to do with wine?

Good for you. It sounds like you found a good formula for learning and growing.

Uh, it works for me, and that's what I'm very understanding, that my particular avenue doesn't work for everyone, but for me, I found a formula that helps me to grow into an avenue, that an industry that I wanted to grow within. Um, and it does help, like I said, with me having an entrepreneur mindset from years ago, it was one of those things to where I was up to the challenge, and I knew that if things fell, like, I was okay, because I do have the standpoint to where, you know, life happens, and I want to make sure that I'm doing all that I can while I'm here. And I will share something to you that's extremely personal, but I think it may be helpful to the audience. My mom passed away at 67 out the blue. And that was right at the end of 2020. And it was just so baffling to me to see her whole life just change in a year out the blue. And I was like, I don't understand. And my mom thought she was going to live into her 80s like her parents. So for me, it did shine another light on the fact of, You just never know. So you have to live it while you're here. So that was number one incident. But another thing I want to share is that my friend who actually had me taste that wine tasting kit, she passed away out the blue at 42, 43, a couple of years ago, a little over a year ago. I was like, you just never know. So for me, it allowed to take off the layers and say, You know what? My time here is limited. I'm not gonna get out of here any different than anyone else. Yeah, we have— there's birth and there's death, and that's just it. So what I do with the in-between, I just want to make sure I do all that I can while I'm here. And for me, the risk factors were low, and I said, well, why not? And it's turned into a huge success.

Yeah, I can tell that. I can just feel the energy coming off you. It's really phenomenal. One more question, I'll let you go, Stephanie. What's one thing about yourself that we would never know unless you revealed it to us?

I do sing. I do.

Sing?

Yes, I sing.

I thought I heard your voice singing.

Guess what? Yes, I do sing. I don't sing as much as I used to, but I love a good jam session with friends. I have friends that play instruments.

I play jazz and blues violin.

Oh, that is hilarious. Yes, perfect.

This is my 5-string electric.

Yes, I am definitely a singer. I sing typically— my voice aligns more with good jazz song, a good Ella, Sarah Vaughan.

Good for you, jazz singer too. Yes. Oh, see, we have a lot in common.

I know.

Well, thank you so much for your time today, Stephanie. I mean, just wonderful talking with you.

Thank you so much, and thank you for having me.

Doug Noll here. Thank you so much for listening to Listening with Leaders. If you are a successful executive leader who would like to be on this program, please visit podcast.dougnull.com/podcast. If you got something out of this interview, you, would you please share this episode on social media? Just do a quick screenshot with your phone and text it to a friend or post it on the socials. If you know someone that would be a great guest, tag them on the social media to let them know about the show and include the hashtag #ListeningWithLeaders. I love seeing your posts and guest suggestions. We are regularly putting out new episodes and content. To make sure you don't miss any episodes, go ahead and subscribe. Your thumbs up ratings and reviews go a long way to help promote the show and mean a lot to me and my team.

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