my experience with running an NA bottle shop

people reach out to me all the time because they're interested in opening their own non-alcoholic bottle shop or bar, and they want to know what it's like and if it's worth it. my answer will usually depend on my mood, how the past month of sales has been, and if my AuDHD brain can manage processing an actual conversation. today, on the last day of 2023 and a little over one full year of being in a physical space, i'm feeling reflective so I will share my experience of what this is actually like. 

I want to put a disclaimer *here* that this is my personal experience with running a shop in the non-alcoholic "scene", and while other shop owners may relate (or not relate at all) ultimately this my lived experience as a queer, woman of color, who is neurodivergent and autistic. I mention all of that for the simple fact that the way my brain works, my severe depression, and the lack of representation of sober BIPOC people all highly influence my experience with the shop and how i move, not only in the NA scene, but in the world. with all that being said:

There seems to be a romanticized idea of what being a small business owner is like based on what we see in movies, shows, and social media. If they're to be believed, we just come in to open to shop, help a handful of eclectic customers, take a bunch of selfies, and then spend the rest of the day daydreaming while the money just rolls on in - this is not the case. my biggest piece of advice would be: don't get into this for the money. you're not going to see a profit for a long while. I'll be transparent here and say that luckily our shop has about broken even every(ish) month, but if there's anything left over for "profit" it just gets rolled right back into the shop.

Also when i say we've "broken even" that also means I'm not paying myself - which I know is breaking possibly rule Number 1 of owning a business but the reality is that I haven't paid myself an actual paycheck in months. and this is the reality for many of your favorite shop owners - we are Struggling to get by. there honestly is not a lot of profit margin in selling NA products from a bottle shop. For some numbers: NA beers and the RTDs at max are like a $2 profit, though they're more like $1.25. Wines and Spirits have a bit more of a profit margin, but even that is dependent on the brands themselves and how much they want to be priced at. 

it's definitely not enough to take home a big paycheck. also, because I have staff, I would rather make sure they are being paid a livable wage, and are being paid on time as they are a huge piece as to why our shop is successful. I literally could not do this on my own, and I'll talk about that in a bit. 

Another piece of advice I would give is: break out of the socially expected idea of what "success" is. people think success is becoming a millionaire, being in the headlines every week, everyone knows your name - that's fake success (in my humble opinion). real success is being able to show up for your community, opening your doors to those in need as often as you can, creating an accessible, comforting space, making sure people are seen. we live in a capitalist society so I'm not going to sit here and say that the money doesn't matter - I have cried countless nights because I wasn't sure how we were going to make it to the next month. But I keep going because my community is what matters to me, being able to show up and say "i got you" matters to me. it's why I got into this in the first place. 

Ah since I mentioned it, something else people don't talk about when it comes to being a small business owner - you're going to cry A Lot. for lots of reasons. sometimes it's that product came in broken, sometimes customers aren't coming in, sometimes you have to decide which bill gets paid or if you can go another month with just the bare minimum, sometimes your social media content just isn't hitting the numbers you want, sometimes it's just a bad day and you think you're doing everything completely wrong. In my case, as someone with all of the disclaimers listed above, some of the crying comes from how you're being perceived by others, or more often, being overlooked in the scene. Some (a lot) of the crying comes from being so overworked, so burnt out, so depressed, so disassociated, so exhausted from masking all day that you don't even know how to put one foot in front of the other. there are endless emails, endless phone calls, endless content to be made, endless restocking, endless requests from brands - an endless list of To-Do items. My day usually starts at 7AM and ends at about 2AM.

It usually gets done, but not until we've taken a moment to breath and remember that we are humans and not robots and we can't do it all all of the time. So many of us are doing this single handedly and while this may seem like I'm complaining, I'm honestly just trying to emphasize how this is all too much work for just one person to do. Because trying to run an entire business alone And also trying to take care of yourself, hang out with friends, have a romantic life, working on keeping your sobriety stable - it's not for everyone.

You will not have your own life for a long while, you'll lose friends, you'll gain new friends, and you'll really need to count on your community to show up for you and help take care of you when you've completely forgotten yourself. Over the last year I have put myself in the Urgent Care more times than I want to admit because I was giving the shop 120% of myself And trying to have social life And self care and I completely, completely burnt myself out. There are days so low that I don't even want to do this anymore. So, yeah just get used to crying. 

This is where I wanted to talk about how being neurodivergent and autistic truly impact my day to day at the business, and how sometimes I'm so overwhelmed by how much I have to do that I just end up staring at the computer screen for a while, frozen. How often the depression is so bad I can't even get out of bed.  How I love talking to people but masking all day and being hyper aware of the facial expressions I'm making, the tone of my voice, how burnt out I am, how I'm standing, how I'm being perceived, am I making enough eye contact, am I picking up on their social cues - etc. - is very tiring and it's mostly all internal and on a loop so I can't really just Talk about it to people. But I'll save this for another post. Just know that if you're a fellow bottle shop owner and you experience the same thing - I see you and I love you.

I want to end this on a positive note because the above sounds scary and well, there IS a reason I'm still doing this despite all of that, yeah? When I really sit with the feelings, even the scary ones, the root of it is that I love what I'm doing. I love when people come into the shop for the first time and are overwhelmed by how many options they actually have. I love when people feel safe enough to share their own stories with us. I love trying to find the perfect drink  for someone when they've struggled to find one in the past. I love when people come to the events and are in community with each other and feel seen. I love when people come back excited to try more new things. I love working with people who want to host sober events are trying something new. I love connecting with brand owners who are also sober and genuinely love what they're doing. I love doing this. and it's exhausting, and it's scary sometimes, but I can't think of anything else I would rather be doing. 

I also cannot say enough about how supportive my fellow NA bottle shop and bar owners are - they're amazing. This support system we've built with each other has gotten me through so many tough days. My advice for anyone looking to get into this is to start building your network asap. As stated very bluntly above - you cannot do this alone, you need people who understand what you're going through, people who can give advice through experience, share behind the scenes info, talk about their wins and challenges, all of that. Everyone I have met in this space has been so welcoming, and excited to talk to one another. Finding other shop owners who also face the challenges of the disclaimer above has been so affirming and validating and beautiful, even when we're all barely hanging on, we're hanging on together. 

And how amazing is it that we have so many options for non-alcoholic beverages now? I will say that a big perk to developing so many close relationships with the brands is getting a sneak peek, a first taste, providing feedback, and really getting to help shape the NA industry on a level you normally wouldn't be able to. If you get really invested, you even connect with brands and people from across the globe and you get to introduce their products to a whole new audience that otherwise wouldn't have access to it. It's really very cool how much of an influence you get to make.

So should you open your own non-alcoholic bottle shop? I don't know. Sure, why not?