Sam Smith and Rob McGregor turned their bar into a gin brand, selling bundles on Near To Marketplace while building their story on Instagram. They launched a subscription club during lockdown and used low-budget iPhone videos to show real moments, blending hospitality with retail.
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This brand that sells on near to and also does a great job on Instagram was previously two bar owners, Sam Smith and Rob McGregor. Jane, tell me more about them and tell me what they're doing really well.
I mean, these guys have made a complete success story out of what was a very challenging 18 months from starting as craft beer and gin spirits barkeepers. They created their own gin brand, which is great fun and created some nice income for them when they couldn't actually open their bar.
So what we're seeing here is their page on the Near To Marketplace, which is the marketplace for independent retailers across the uk. So, Jen, show me some product and then let's go and jump across and look at their Instagram feed.
Yeah. Just scrolling down the notew site, you can see all their lovely gin bundles and flavours and miniatures. Just to give you a nice idea of sort of. I think whilst you can drink them yourself and buy them only for yourself, they do make lovely gifts. And I think that's one of the nice things about gifting alcoholic beverages sometimes is that you can share them with the person you give them to, which is always a bonus.
I like your thinking. And let's jump across and look at them on Instagram and see the transition between what I call selling products and then storytelling your product.
Yeah, well, their Instagram and their near to products are completely different. Whilst on near 2, you can see the gin, see the story of the gin and really understand why they've created a pink gin that's actually colorless on their Instagram. You can you very much see what they are as a bar and very traditional sort of bar messaging as a way, their opening hours, what's been happening to them. I mean, you can see very. Unfortunately they had a break in recently and they used that to a great extent on their social media. They actually had a themed night based on their break in, produced a new beer and cocktail based on their break in, and I think they probably made their money back on the Glazers actually from the incident.
That's incredible. And so they're both running a bar, but also selling gin on the side, but telling the story or selling it as a different business. I beg your pardon. But they're blending the two things really seamlessly together in a really rather lovely way. Beautifully stylish. Look at that cocktail. Isn't that delicious?
Yeah. I mean, you can feel the enjoyment that they get from making the cocktails. You can see what the gin is used for in the bar and you really get a sense that actually If I couldn't, if I can't pop down there and really enjoy that espresso martini, I can use this gin to create my own one at home.
This is making me desperately, desperately require drinks. I think we have to say please drink responsibly as we go through this.
Yes.
But again, just a lovely example of how a brand is using social media to make you want to go there. You understand when you visit the. Keep what you're going to get and really making a lovely job of it. What are they showing me in their stories, Jane? So stories popping up on my feed more regularly, they don't need to be a great. They don't just be like they're really. I'd say they're not leveraging stories, but what have they got to show us?
I think on their stories they're just really showing what they were doing for a while and I think they still may be doing is they have a little flamingo gin club where you can join and every month you get a selection of the gins, some mixes and some little snacks as well. And I think this is one of their lockdown projects, so you could get gin delivered to your door before they had the large bottles. So they're using that sort of content for their stories. But I think also judging by what we've seen on their Instagram, they're too busy having fun to record stories. I think they're too busy producing lovely gin and beautiful cocktails in store to really leverage their social stories.
Too much looks great fun. It's really bringing it to life, isn't it?
Yeah. I mean, that image of the gin in the garden, that makes me want.
Summer now and something, that something. And this is the key thing is this is shot on an iPhone. It's not high production. Any brand can do this. You're watching this within the maybe platform. So if you have any questions, please do use the little button to the bottom right hand side and our social media teams will help you. And Jane, as always, thank you so much and look forward to seeing you again very soon.
