After Proximo exit, Reyes deal, RNDC loses Delicato in almost half its markets

Editor’s note: This is a developing story and will be updated periodically with new information. If you have tips about what’s going on at RNDC, please get in touch by emailing me ([email protected]) or texting me on Signal (dinfontay.11). Anonymity available.—Dave.

The hits just keep coming for Republic National Distributing Co. Following the nearly national exist of Proximo Spirits and the seven-market sell-off to rival Reyes Beverage Group earlier this month, Fingers has learned the embattled mega-wholesaler alerted employees earlier today that it would soon be bidding farewell to Delicato Family Wines in nearly half of the markets it repped the country’s fifth-largest winemaker.

In a midday memo to staff on January 26th, Chief Supplier Development Officer Shawn Higgins announced the loss, writing:

Fingers has obtained a copy of the memo from a current RNDC employee and reprinted it in full below. I’ve granted the employee anonymity to share information from within the company without fear of retaliation.

Neither RNDC nor Delicato immediately responded to a request for comment. A press release published on Delicato’s website today does not address the reasons for its exit from RNDC, but indicates its realignment will be split among Johnson Brothers, Breakthru Beverage Group, Columbia Distributing, and Empire Merchants.

Per Higgins’ memo, on March 1st, the wine group will shift its volume “to a new distributor” in the Pacific Northwest, Illinois, and nine other states. On April 1st, it will follow suit in RNDC’s home market of Texas. RNDC will retain Delicato’s business (for now) in the 15 remaining markets in which it served the supplier.

The move is just the latest in a relentless drumbeat of discouraging developments that RNDC has faced in the past 18 months, from the collapse of its California business, to the sudden passing of its widely liked interim chief executive, to the real-time breakup of its 39-state empire at the hands of a rising foe in RBG. The slog has been good for gallows humor among the middle-tier firm’s rank-and-file workers, if not morale per se. After relaying Higgins’ memo to me, my source followed up with a brief assessment, texting, “More good news from the good news factory.”

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