Hamburg Distributing closing doors after 75 years
CHAMPAIGN – The Hamburg Distributing warehouse in Champaign will close this summer after 75 years in business.
The closing, which affects 89 employees, comes as the result of two big wine-and-spirits distributors forming a joint venture and consolidating facilities.
Employees who work at the 45,000-square-foot Hamburg warehouse at 3104 Farber Drive can interview for jobs at a surviving Judge and Dolph warehouse in Peoria, company officials said.
Hamburg, which distributes beer, wine and spirits in downstate Illinois, has been in business in Champaign since the end of Prohibition. It was founded by Ben Hamburg, who had previously been a soft-drink bottler, said his son-in-law, Ron Levy, a former president of Hamburg Distributing.
Levy, who retired from the company a decade ago, said distributors have consolidated, just as breweries and distilleries have. He said he’s heard from several of his former employees since word of the Champaign closing got out.
“I feel sorry for a lot of them,” Levy said. “Every time there’s a merger, there are cuts.”
The Hamburg Distributing warehouse in Champaign will cease operations after its parent company merged with another company. Operations will be consolidated in Peoria, and employees can apply for jobs there. By Robin Scholz
The transaction that precipitated the closing is a bit complicated. Hamburg Distributing is a division of Union Beverage, which in turn is owned by Glazer’s, a multistate distributor based in Texas.
In late March, Glazer’s and the Chicago-based Wirtz Beverage Group – which operates Judge and Dolph Ltd. – agreed to form a joint venture, Judge and Dolph LLC, that will be the largest spirit, wine and malt beverage distributor in Illinois.
Under the arrangement, Union Beverage will cease operations June 30, with the new joint venture hoping to pick up many of Union’s supplier contracts.
“All the Union Beverage downstate operations will be shutting down, and Judge and Dolph LLC will operate out of existing Judge and Dolph (Ltd.) distribution centers,” said Louis Zweig, senior vice president for corporate strategy at Glazer’s.
The decision to close Union Beverage operations means the end of the line for Hamburg.
“We will be closing our operation in Champaign, and the market will be served out of the Peoria operation, which is Judge and Dolph,” he said.
Some Champaign employees could be hired in Peoria, Zweig said.
“All of our people are going to be going through an interview process,” he said. “It’s unclear how many will be offered jobs with the new company.”
Union Beverage, which employs about 750 in Illinois, distributes Brown-Forman spirits, such as Jack Daniel’s, Southern Comfort and Finlandia; and beverages from other companies, including Riunite, E.&J. Gallo Winery, W.J. Deutsch & Sons and Kendall-Jackson.
Judge and Dolph Ltd. carries Brown-Forman wines and beverages from Diageo, Remy Cointreau and other companies. Judge and Dolph has facilities in Elk Grove Village, Peoria, Rockford and Belleville.
Union Beverage also distributes malt beverages, but Judge and Dolph LLC isn’t picking up that business, Zweig said.
“We are in the process of determining our strategy for our current malt beverage brands and are working with our vendors on …. solutions,” Zweig said. “Among those vendors are Carlsberg, G.K. Skaggs, Green Mountain, High Falls, Merchant du Vin, Rogue and Sierra Nevada.”
Levy said Hamburg Distributing for many years was a wholesaler for Pabst and Stag beers. When he joined the business about 1960, the company served four or five counties, but within a few decades the number of counties had grown to about 30. Hamburg picked up new brands, expanded its wine business and joined with Union Beverage about 1992.
Personal connections were once a hallmark of the beverage distributing industry, with distributors knowing all their customers, said Levy, a former president of the Wine and Spirits Wholesalers of America.
But today, many of the contacts come through telemarketing because retailers have changed too.
“They’re all chains,” Levy said. “There aren’t any entrepreneurs, there aren’t any mom-and-pop stores. … It’s a different era.”