Southern Wine & Spirits, the nation's largest liquor distributor, has agreed to purchase Bloomington-based Quality Wine and Spirits in one of the biggest deals in Minnesota's liquor wholesaling business in many years.
Quality, a family-owned mainstay in spirits distribution for decades, signed a letter of intent with Southern on Friday, said Jack Goldenberg, Quality's chief executive officer. He declined to disclose the price.
The nation's liquor wholesaling business has been consolidating over the past decade or so as global liquor producers have themselves gotten bigger. Meanwhile, some retailers have gained more market clout, too, with the growth of liquor chains.
Miami-based Southern, a private company with around $9 billion in annual sales, has been the chief consolidator of the wholesale business. And the Quality deal should give it a considerably bigger presence in Minnesota.
"Quality is a big player in the [state's] industry," said Frank Ball, executive director of the Minnesota Licensed Beverage Association, which represents alcohol beverage retailers. "This is huge," he said refering to the Southern deal.
Goldenberg said Quality is the state's third-largest wine and spirits distributor after market-leader Johnson Brothers of St. Paul and Chicago-based Wirtz Beverage.
A joint venture of Southern and J.J. Taylor Distributing is fourth, he said. Southern entered Minnesota through that partnership in 2010.
Goldenberg said it's easier these days for big spirits companies to do business with big wholesalers like Southern. "It has become very clear that the single-state wholesaler [like Quality] is of less interest to his suppliers than companies that operate in multiple states."
