In this exclusive interview, Metro Distributors’ ever-traveling Regional Account Manager, Ryan Landie, offers an update on the exciting developments awaiting the company’s clients in 2024.
(Note: This story appears in the December 2023 issue of SE Magazine)
Metro Distributors, which began 50 years ago as a porn distributor, has undergone many renovations over the years, but nothing quite like their current undertaking. The entirely new Brazzers and Men.com toy lines promise something partners have never before seen, while updated products and packaging from best-selling lines like Hung and the Cloud 9 beverage ensure quality and increased foot traffic in stores.
STOREROTICA had the chance to speak with Regional Account Manager Ryan Landie, whose focus is primarily on Metro’s clients west of the Mississippi. Landie, April Young, Nicole Giolitti and Metro’s leadership have some exciting news for vendors and retailers that Landie details here.
STOREROTICA: What can you tell me about the mission of Metro Distributors?
LANDIE: Our mission is to distribute the highest quality packaged products in the industry with the biggest ROI. We specialize in our own branding and packaging that provides a consumer experience. Our packaging never gets thrown away; they’re actually keepsakes. We also always offer some sort of a consumable in the product packaging as a way for our consumer and retailer to reconnect after the purchase. We call it a “bounce back.”
Take, for instance, our Hung brand, a complete system for guys. Within Hung, we have a stroker, a pill, a shot, a wipe and a de-sensitizer. For our top-selling UFO Hung stroker, we’re including two of our Snap and Slide lubricant packages and two of our Hung wipes.
The Snap and Slides are these new single-use lubricant delivery plastic cards, which are cleaner and easier to use than foil packs. Snap one in half and lubricant comes out in a straight stream wherever you aim it. We include these with the Hung UFO stroker, so that if you’re using the stroker in one hand, you can use the snap in the other.
STOREROTICA: For manufacturers, what are the benefits of working with Metro, especially as an exclusive distributor?
LANDIE: April, the team and I are not really salespeople at all, we’re more like business consultants. With each one of our accounts we bring on is another partnership. We prefer to work with our partners in-person to discuss growing our businesses together, so that each business we work with is going to be just as successful as the other thousands of relationships that we have.
STOREROTICA: What are some challenges that you see facing retailers today, and how do you think that Metro can help?
“April, the team and I are not really salespeople at all, we’re more like business consultants. With each one of our accounts we bring on is another partnership.”
– Ryan Landie
LANDIE: What I’m finding out on my travels is that, as the economy is taking somewhat of a downturn, foot traffic decreases. I’m hearing that a lot of retailers are off by a greater percent than they’ve ever been in years. With our new launch, we partnered with MindGeek, the parent company for Pornhub, Brazzers and Men.com, the three largest adult entertainment sites on the planet. We launched a toy collection for the Brazzers and for the Men.com, and what’s different with this is that many of their top content stars are now contractually obligated to use our toys in their content moving forward, which provides unprecedented marketing power. This has never before happened in the industry. To see the top stars now using these toys, we believe it’s going to drive consumers to retail locations, looking for these brands specifically. This new launch is going to benefit from a marketing campaign on a scale this industry has never seen, because each one of these sites has users and fans in the millions.
It’s a huge moment in Metro’s history, and I’m not going to tell you who said it, but one of the biggest people in our industry, at the ANME show, stood right next to me and said, “This is what manufacturers dream of. How did you guys pull this off?”
We took all of our data from all our years of being in business to build a complete set of the best of the best for the launch. And the packaging is some of the most appealing out there, in a bright yellow, it absolutely just pops. We launched 40 SKUs, with 20 on each side, and this is just the start of many to come. I’ll tease that they will be more interactive as we move forward. We are just virtually started.
These two lines are shipping next week, so we’re super excited to see what’s about to happen. Nobody has them in the store yet, not even a sample. It’s the first time that I’ve ever been able to actually successfully introduce a brand for which I didn’t even have to bring the boxes out for them to buy into the new partnership, just off the brand recognition name alone of Brazzers and Men.com. We feel confident that the same thing will happen with consumers: when you introduce a Brazzers planogram and Men.com planogram into your store, people are going to resonate to brands that they know.
“It’s a huge moment in Metro’s history, and I’m not going to tell you who said it, but one of the biggest people in our industry, at the ANME show, stood right next to me and said, ‘This is what manufacturers dream of. How did you guys pull this off?’”
– Ryan Landie
STOREROTICA: Tell me about the Cloud 9 Aphrodisiac Beverage. What makes it unique in the performance enhancement world, and how does it compare to the other enhancement brands exclusive to Metro?
LANDIE: Cloud 9 has been the number-one-selling aphrodisiac beverage in the world for the last seven years. It also has over a 98% reorder rate with us right now. Our average store incremental growth is at almost 2% of top line revenue. This is because when you bring Cloud 9 into your store, you’re not just introducing a new SKU, but instead a whole new category bringing with it incremental sales to grow your topline without cannibalizing any existing products. And on top of that, the attraction of having a Cloud 9 cooler in your establishment, which is free when you buy into our program, actually brings more value because it becomes a conversation piece. It’s a consumable annuity for our partners.
It also helps to bring up the UPTs, the units per transaction, on items you already have. Everybody that buys a shot, a pill, so we train all the sales team to ask them, “Would you like to wash that down with an ice cold can of Cloud 9?”
All of those things that you’re washing down work downstairs, but Cloud 9 works upstairs. It’s a sensory enhancer; it does nothing to gain an erection at all, but what it does is it’s formulated to give you a euphoric body high to make you want to engage. Any gender can drink it.
I’m personally a great fan of it. It’s a fully unique flavor with hints of green apple and pomegranate. It’s all natural, and what I like about it compared to energy drinks is you get zero sugar crash. It has about as much caffeine as a small cup of coffee, but that caffeine is natural guarana. And it mixes great with alcohol, so you can stimulate your spirit in both senses, your cocktail and yourself. We’re really excited to be the distributor of it, and we just had a new re-branding, so it’s very exciting times for Cloud 9 also.
STOREROTICA: So, if I’m a brick and mortar retailer, how do I begin working with you?
LANDIE: You just have to reach out to April, the team or me, and we’ll take care of you. It’s that easy to become a Metro partner.
For more information, call (888) 464-4800 for the West Coast, (888) 464-4856 for the East Coast, email sales@metrob2b.com or metrob2b.com.
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