This Is Not Your Hobby

This Is Not Your Hobby is the no-fluff podcast for independent beverage brands that want to scale smarter, not just hustle harder.Hosted by Julie Rhodes - beverage business consultant, educator, journalist, and brand co-founder - this podcast dives into the real-world sales, marketing, and distribution strategies that small craft beverage companies actually need.Each episode tackles common business bottlenecks with practical solutions, straight talk, and the occasional guest expert. Stop winging it and start building something sustainable.Because your business? It’s not your hobby.

This Is Not Your Hobby is a business podcast hosted by Julie Rhodes, with 26 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Julie Rhodes hosts This Is Not Your Hobby, a business show with 26 episodes published.

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  Episode #26

  Episode 26: Stop Boosting Your Posts - the platform loves it, your budget doesn't

  Sep 22, 202634 min

  Meta and Google ads still work, and for a small beverage brand they're still some of the cheapest ways to get in front of the right people. But the platforms changed the rules this year. AI "enhancements" are on by default, the opt-out switches are buried, the boost button is a cash grab with a friendly font, and if you're not watching, the robots will rewrite your ads and spend your money doing it. Julie walks through what changed, what to turn off, when boosting is actually okay, where the AI helps, and the four numbers that tell you whether or not any of it is working. Best For: Small craft beverage brand owners and operators (beer, cider, wine, spirits, NA, hemp) who are spending money on Meta or Google ads, or about to. What you'll learn in this episode: What changed on Meta and Google in the last six to nine months, and why both platforms are pushing you toward handing them the keys The real story of Meta's AI rewriting a taproom's ads to promote food trucks and live music that don't exist, and why it's happened to Julie's own brands too The 3 kinds of damage AI ad enhancements do (fake copy, fake images, overspend) and where the off switches actually live in Meta and Google Google keyword match types explained, and why broad match is a budget leak when you're starting out Why boosting a post is for emergencies only, and what a real campaign gives you that a boost never will Why beginners should run everything manually first, and which AI features are worth handing back to the machine later The 4 numbers to check every week Why your state guild membership is an investment, not an expense Mentioned in this episode: Meta Ads Manager: Advantage+ creative enhancements (ad set and ad level), Advertising Settings dashboard, campaign and account spending limits Google Ads: keyword match types, negative keywords, automatically created assets, final URL expansion, AI Max for Search Episode 19: Use AI Like a Grown-Up Episode 24: Your Distributor Wishes You Knew This with Melissa Johnston of Tryon Distributing Virginia Brewers Conference, Richmond Wyoming Brewers Summit Great American Beer Festival, Levitt Pavilion, Denver, first weekend of October Proof, the NYHMS dashboard hub GuestWork waitlist RouteWork waitlist More Links: Submit your bottleneck Join The Bottleneck newsletter All episodes

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  Episode #25

  Episode 25 — Turn Your Data Into A Decision — Dashboards Don't Run Your Business, You Do (Introducing Proof)

  Sep 8, 202623 min

  Docs, sheets, exports, and dashboards scattered across the cloud, all of it looking great and none of it telling you what to do. This episode, Julie gets personal about the data overwhelm that pushed her to build Proof: a new analytics-plus-action tool that pulls your whole beverage business into one live dashboard, tells you the story your numbers are actually telling, and hands you the moves that matter. It's technology and human insight together, minus the tech-bro and minus the chatbot. Best For: Small and emerging craft beverage brands buried in data with no time to make sense of it. What you'll learn in this episode: Why consolidating your data is only half the job — and what's actually missing The three traps every brand falls into: scattered tools, gut-call decisions, and useless robot summaries How Proof consolidates, guides, and clarifies your numbers into a Monday-morning plan Why this isn't another AI dashboard, a tech bro who's never worked the industry, or generic chatbot advice How it works start to finish: discovery call, view-only access, dashboard build, and the read The three ways in — The Read, The Debrief, and The Huddle — and how channel-based pricing works Mentioned in this episode: Proof — See It All, Pricing in the Open Book a Discovery Call Submit a Bottleneck The Bottleneck Newsletter Barrel 2 Business Collective All Episodes

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  Episode #24

  Episode 24 - Your Distributor Wishes You Knew This with Melissa Johnston of Tryon Distributing

  Aug 25, 202656 min

  Most brands pour everything into consumer marketing and then go quiet to the people who actually decide their fate at wholesale — the buyers, the reps, the accounts. This week Julie sits down with Melissa Johnston, VP of Strategic Development at Tryon Distributing and a 20-year veteran across all three tiers, to hear what the buyer's seat actually wants to see. If you sell into distribution, or you're trying to, this is the B2B marketing wake-up call you didn't know you needed, plus how to do it all without tripping a single compliance rule. Best For: Small and emerging craft beverage brands selling — or trying to sell — into wholesale and distribution. What you'll learn in this episode: Why marketing to buyers and reps is the gap almost every small brand is ignoring What a distributor's brand-picker looks for before they ever taste your product How to make your distributor reps actually want to sell your brand What separates a sell sheet or buyer email that gets read from one that gets trashed The TTB compliance line for using social media and digital ads to support wholesale sales — what you can and can't say How to market a brand-new category (like hemp beverage) to a distributor who's never carried one The one or two wholesale-marketing moves to start this week, even with no time and no budget Mentioned in this episode: Melissa Johnston, VP of Strategic Development, Tryon Distributing ( @tryon_distributing ) Kick Fizz, distributed statewide in NC by Tryon Distributing Proof — Julie's New Offer Submit a Bottleneck The Bottleneck Newsletter All Episodes

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  Episode #23

  Episode 23: Choose A Modern Sales Rep Model– The 2013 Playbook is Dead

  Aug 11, 202622 min

  There is something out there for every brand at every budget and every stage, so let's walk through some modern models to help you get to work. Five of them, to be exact! In this episode, Julie breaks down sales representative strategies and how to choose the best one for your brand. Best For: Small, emerging craft beverage owners and decision makers assembling sales teams on a budget. What you'll learn in this episode: Julie's five sales representation models, and what kinds of brands they work best for How to choose a sales rep model. Hint: The choice should reflect your current business climate, not the one you're striving for. Questions to ask before you make hiring moves Mentioned in this episode: Got a bottleneck? Submit It Join The Bottleneck Newsletter Hemp Beverage Alliance Action Center - Send a message instantly and directly to your local representatives. More info about what's happening in hemp beverages at the federal level US Hemp Roundtable Petition

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  Episode #21

  Episode 21: Get Found in an AI World with Scott Kolbe of Market Your Craft

  Jul 14, 202647 min

  Everybody keeps yelling "AI is coming" and most small beverage brands still have no clue whether they even show up when a drinker asks ChatGPT where to grab a local beer, cider, or canned cocktail. In this episode, Scott Kolbe of Market Your Craft breaks down answer engine optimization — basically the AI cousin of SEO — and the cheap, low-tech moves any small brand can make to actually get found. No big budget, no dev team, no computer science degree required. Just a few smart tweaks to the website you already have. Best For: Small craft beverage brand owners who keep hearing "AI" and want to know what to actually do about it instead of nodding along nervously. What you'll learn in this episode: Why AI search hands people a short, credibility-ranked answer instead of ten pages of blue links — and what that shift means for whether your brand gets named at all The authority signals AI actually reads: reviews, press mentions, and social proof (and how to stack them in your favor) How to write event descriptions and FAQ pairs on your top landing pages so AI can find and quote you The one file (LLMs.txt) you can drop into your website's root directory to point AI models at your best pages Why an out-of-date retail locator might be quietly costing you sales in AI results How to get customers reviewing you on Google, Untappd, and Reddit — the platforms AI leans on Which AI model to start with, why Scott leans toward Claude for data protection, and why the $20/month tier is plenty for most brands The "treat it like a new intern" mindset that keeps you out of trouble — including what financial info to keep far away from it Mentioned in this episode: Scott Kolbe, Market Your Craft RadCraft Claude ChatGPT Gemini StoryBrand AI From the Not Your Hobby world: Got a bottleneck? Submit It Join The Bottleneck Newsletter Barrel 2 Business Collective All Past Episodes More Free Tools and Everything Else

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