Some, it turned out, were bartenders, who were focusing on social media while out of work. Mr. Boehm said the company sent gifts to influencers and received enthusiastic responses from many, some of whom wanted to promote the barware to their viewers.
That helped bring in sales and raise morale because by then, many of Cocktail Kingdom’s workers had to take a pay cut.
The company also began designing and selling T-shirts on its website to benefit the bars the company works with; the T-shirt sales raised $26,000 for the bar workers. Word about the T-shirts went out on the company’s email list, Mr. Boehm said, which has almost 70,000 names, and the bars’ social media sites, driving traffic to Cocktail Kingdom’s website.
He also noticed that a five-piece cocktail set, which sells for $99 to $159, became the company’s best seller. Sales for the set skyrocketed in April and May.
More plans are in the works. Mr. Boehm hopes to partner with local wine bars and liquor stores to present Zoom classes teaching people about spirits and cocktail-making, which would, of course, feature barware from Cocktail Kingdom.
“We’re thinking what we can do to create an experience at home,” he said.
Mr. Boehm owns five cocktail bars in the East Village and West Village, a Manhattan showroom, and the Miracle franchise of Christmas-themed pop-up cocktail bars around the world.
When the bars or festival will be running again is anyone’s guess, he said. But web sales continue to do well — just 16 percent down from the same time last year, but with 80 percent to the consumer market. All staff members are back up to 100 percent pay and no one has been laid off.
Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/12/business/cocktail-kingdom-barware-pandemic.html
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