Stone Brewing has hired former wine, spirits and cannabis executive Erin Smith as its next vice president of marketing.
Smith’s arrival comes several weeks after the Escondido, California-headquartered craft brewery announced a reorganization of its sales and marketing teams. Under the new structure, Smith and a yet-to-be-hired vice president of sales will report to CEO Maria Stipp. The reorganization made the company’s chief commercialization officer role obsolete and Dan Lamb, who had held that title, departed the company earlier this month.
Smith joins Stone after nearly two years at PAX Labs, Inc., a cannabis vaporization technology company, where her most recent title was senior director of marketing. In that role, Smith led “the marketing team though a consumer-insight and data-informed identity and content refresh,” according to a bio provided by a Stone spokesperson. PAX Labs spun off from prior sibling company JUUL Labs, maker of the JUUL brand of e-cigarettes, in 2017.
While at PAX Labs, Smith also established the company’s consumer insights team and shaped the brand into “a lifestyle content leader in the cannabis space,” according to Stone.
Prior to her time at PAX Labs, Smith spent 15 years in beverage alcohol, primarily focused on wine and spirits. She has held marketing, brand management and sales roles at Constellation Brands, E. & J. Gallo Winery and the Gallo Sales Company, Gallo’s northern California distributor.
“Erin is thrilled to return to beverage alcohol at Stone, as a long-term fan of craft beer (she’s married to a homebrewer) and brands that have long-standing consumer love,” a spokesperson said.
During a February episode of Brewbound Frontlines, Stipp discussed the company’s findings from recent consumer research, which will no doubt inform Smith’s work. Consumers told the company they associated the Stone brand with quality and IPAs.
“What I think we’re known for is very explicit and what we’d like to be known for in the future is a bit broader than that,” Stipp said. “The good news is that we’re known for quality, but how do we widen that approach and start attracting a broader set of consumers?”
Smith is the first woman to lead Stone’s marketing efforts, and is one of Stipp’s first major hires, indicating a changing of the guard at the 25-year-old craft brewery. Stipp, who joined the company in September 2020, said many consumers, primarily women, found the brand’s muscle-bound gargoyle logo “off-putting.”
“If you have a strong brand, people will remember at least two things about it. … No doubt, people recognize the gargoyle as Stone, and they also recognize masculinity in the brand,” she said. “That’s totally fine and fair, but I think the trick here is how do we put the welcome mat out to women or to people that might find it to be a bit too aggressive or off-putting?”
Smith joins Stone as the company has begun to rework its portfolio, building around Buenaveza Salt & Lime Lager. The company has also launched Features and Benefits, a 95-calorie, 4% ABV IPA; added Neverending Haze IPA to its year-round lineup; and released limited-edition Dayfall Belgian White.
Stone’s off-premise sales have seen modest single-digit growth since the COVID-19 pandemic began and shifted consumer spending away from on-premise establishments. In the 52 weeks ending January 24, the company’s dollar sales increased 7%, to $82.5 million, according to market research firm IRI. Stone is the 23rd largest beer category vendor in IRI-tracked multi-outlet food, mass merchandise and convenience stores, and the nation’s ninth largest craft brewery by volume according to the Brewers Association (BA). In 2019, the most recent year that production volume is available from the BA, Stone produced 395,000 barrels of beer, a decline of 1% compared to 2018.
The company operates production breweries in Escondido, California, and Richmond, Virginia, plus nine retail locations. Stone Distributing is the largest independent craft beer wholesaler in the country, according to the company’s website. It sells 43 craft, import and hard kombucha brands in Southern California.