“One of the biggest challenges we have as retailers is educating the consumer,” says Barry Broudy, co-owner of Broudy’s Liquors in Florida. “Our suppliers do a great job informing our employees, but the challenge can be translating that back to the customers.” So, the beverage alcohol retailer is on a mission to ensure that all of his customers gain some type of product knowledge, whether it’s through in-store events, product education classes, or simple interactions with staff members. Engaged customers, Broudy has found, spend more time shopping his stores, come back more frequently, and help spread the word about the retailer’s offerings.

Broudy’s Liquors is a northeastern Florida institution, with five stores located between Jacksonville and St. Augustine. Combined annual revenue is $25-$30 million. With two locations in St. Augustine, and one each in St. Johns, Jacksonville Beach, and Fleming Island, the chain employs 50 workers. Spirits are the biggest driver for Broudy’s, accounting for 60% of sales, followed by wine at 25%, beer at 10%, and miscellaneous items at 5%.

The chain has served customers of its coastal communities for more than 70 years and recently welcomed fourth-generation family members into the fold. The first Broudy’s package store was opened in the early 1950s by Barry’s grandparents on North Ponce de Leon Boulevard in downtown St. Augustine. “It was essentially a counter-only operation attached to the family grocery store,” he explains. Barry’s father Martin “Baby” Broudy joined the business, and during the ’60s, space from the grocery was carved out, enabling customers to walk into the liquor store to shop. By 1970, the store was moved to a freestanding site but remained on “the same piece of dirt” as the original location, he says.

In the ’70s, Barry joined the family’s licensed business, and soon after, Broudy’s Liquors expanded into the Jacksonville market, driven by the store’s reputation for low prices that had spread as far as the city one hour north of St. Augustine. In subsequent years, a fourth store on Fleming Island was added. Around 2000, Baby Broudy began stepping back from the business and Barry stepped in and took over. A few years later, a fifth store in St. John’s was added. 

For his commitment to building upon his family’s legacy and educating customers on their drinks’ journeys, Barry Broudy has been named a 2024 Market Watch Leader.

Renovation Wave

While the store count has remained at five, for the last two decades Broudy’s Liquors has been transformed into a chain of modern stores, averaging 5,000 square feet in size, with a growing emphasis on whisk(e)y and special events. In recent years—in addition to the involvement of his children Natalie and Porter into the business—Barry Broudy has led a big push into renovations, and in some cases, relocations of the stores. The Jacksonville Beach store, for example, was recently expanded and renovated, complete with an events space. Last year, the historic St. Augustine store was remodeled while the St. Johns store in the Julington Creek area was moved about 1,000 feet to a spacious 12,000-square-foot site. And in late spring of this year, that store’s crown jewel, a 2,000-square-foot education center and tasting room, was unveiled. “I’m trying to make each store unique and representative of its neighborhood,” Broudy says of the wave of renovations. And more are planned. At press time, Broudy—who is co-owner of the chain with his sister Joan—was in negotiations with the city of St. Augustine to build a downtown parking garage on a 6-acre tract owned by the family, a site where the original store will be eventually moved. 

The St. Johns Julington Creek store—which Broudy describes as “the first store I’ve built from the ground up”—will certainly serve as a model going forward, with about half of its footprint devoted to selling space. The retailer describes the store’s design as a cross between a Florida citrus plant and a spirits rickhouse, with features that include wide aisles, high ceilings, exposed steel beams, and painted concrete block walls. The learning center contains a private lounge, about 70 lockers for leasing, and walls lined with whisk(e)y barrels. “It turned out better than I could have expected,” Broudy says of the store. “It’s large enough that customers can shop and comfortably mingle with staff and other customers.” Indeed, the spacious feel of the store helps to encourage shoppers to spend more time, and ultimately, more money. Average transactions at the site are at least 20% higher than at the other stores, he notes. 

For his part, Broudy has served in virtually every capacity at the family-owned business over the course of the last 40 years. “I’ve done everything from sweeping the floor to being a cashier to being a store manager,” he says. Among the ways the business has changed is the increasing reliance on technology. “I remember back in the ’80s, my father wouldn’t take credit cards,” he recalls. “He thought we would go broke.” But in other ways, the business hasn’t changed much, Broudy says. “I’m still friends with people I’ve been doing business with for the last 30-40 years.”

Tapping The Bourbon Boom

Broudy’s stocks about 2,200 spirits SKUs, priced from Gilbey’s vodka at $8 a 750-ml. to $4,800 for The Macallan 30-year-old Sherry Oak Cask Highland single malt. “Bourbon is our top category, but Tequila isn’t far behind,” Broudy notes. Bourbon lovers flock to the stores for new releases, he says, but most recently they’re exploring products from beyond Kentucky. “I’m seeing Bourbons from Georgia that are making a name for themselves,” the retailer notes. Broudy’s single barrel Bourbon offerings, priced between $50-$130 and numbering some two dozen a year, are also popular, he says, pointing to a recent Elijah Craig 8-year-old ($90) as an example.

While Tequila is a strong category for the chain, “the response to new releases isn’t as crazy as it is for Bourbon,” Broudy says. Rather, “consumers are buying really good Tequilas at less than $100 a bottle and drinking them,” instead of collecting or directing them to the secondary market. Thanks to the falling price of agave, “we’re able to offer some really strong promotions on Tequilas, about $40-$50 a bottle,” Broudy notes. Additive-free Tequilas, such as Mijenta Blanco ($40 a 750-ml.), also perform well. Top-selling spirits at the chain include Crown Royal ($22), Jack Daniel’s ($22), Tito’s ($20), and Casamigos Blanco ($43).

Broudy’s offers about 1,600 wine SKUs, priced from $6 for a 750-ml. of Yellow Tail to $650 for the 2011 Colgin IX Estate Proprietary red. New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs rule at the Florida chain, led by Kim Crawford ($13). Sparklers, particularly Cavas, also perform well. “We sell more than 20 cases a week of Spanish Cavas,” Broudy says. Freixenet Brut ($10) is another top-selling wine at the chain, as is Woodbridge ($10 a 1.5 liter).

Some 2,800 beer SKUs are stocked at Broudy’s, priced from $11 for a 6-pack of 12-ounce bottles of Landshark Lager to $17 for Dogfish Head 90-Minute IPA. Top-selling labels include Coors Light ($10) and Modelo Especial ($12). In general, sales of craft beers are declining, Broudy notes. “Hard seltzers, FMBs, and RTDs are now competing for that space,” he says, with “co-branded” products, such as Absolut with Ocean Spray ($15 an 8-pack of 12-ounce cans), gaining ground. “Consumers know what they’re getting with those products,” he explains.

Building Knowledge

With the recent store renovations and expansions, Broudy’s goal is to ramp up on educational events for his customers. While the stores already hold frequent supplier-hosted product samplings—recent examples include Yellowstone Bourbon, Aviation gin, and E11even vodka—the new education centers and events spaces will allow team members to engage on a more one-to-one level with customers. Shortly after the unveiling of the Julington Creek learning center in St. Johns, Broudy’s hosted a complimentary Dewar’s Scotch tasting and bartenders competition, as well as a rosé tasting. The retailer expects to hire a manager for the space, with fee-based classes to be offered. “The room was specifically designed with education in mind,” says Broudy, pointing to plans for product education classes, cocktail classes, and Bourbon stewardship certification, “and at the same time, having a lot of fun.”

The retailer works in other ways to build knowledge among his customers. Broudy is proud of the initiative he took during the pandemic, for example, to encourage out-of-work mixologists to partner with drinks suppliers on cocktail-making demonstrations at area liquor stores. “It’s turned standard sampling events into experiences,” he explains. “It’s been a giant leap forward in educating consumers.” Broudy is also a co-founder of the annual St. Augustine Spanish Food & Wine Festival, founded in 2013, and the chain serves as a sponsor of the event. Earlier this year, the festival raised more than $100,000 for Flagler College’s hospitality program.

Broudy’s ties to the community run deep, and the current ownership doesn’t see that changing. “We’re going to continue,” says Broudy. “My children were born and raised here, just like I was, and just like their grandfather. I see them becoming more of an intricate part of the community, much as I have been over the years.” 

That doesn’t mean Broudy himself is going anywhere. “I’m that person who feels as though he’s never worked a day in his life because I really love what I do,” he says. “There’s always something new to learn, and that knowledge fuels the fire.”