Welcome in. It's Monday, July thirteenth. We start at the top of Brown-Forman, where The Wall Street Journal reports a change in the corner office. Brown-Forman Chief Executive Lawson Whiting plans to step down, according to an exclusive report in The Wall Street Journal, an account Market Screener also carries. The company frames the move as part of an effort to push past a slowdown in alcohol sales. Whiting has led the Jack Daniel's maker through a stretch of softening demand across the category. This is a transition at the top of one of America's largest spirits suppliers, a portfolio that runs from Jack Daniel's and Woodford Reserve to Herradura and el Jimador tequila, with the United States accounting for a little over forty percent of net sales, per Market Screener. No successor timeline has been reported. For a supplier of this scale, a change in leadership reads straight through to strategy, at a moment when the category is already under pressure. Continuing. We have a development on the unwinding of Republic National Distributing Company. Following our earlier report on RNDC shedding sites and route-to-market rights, Brewbound and BevNET now report the wind-down of its national operations is nearly complete, and the disruption is rippling through the three-tier system. Suppliers tell both outlets that some distributors, emboldened by the transitions, are delaying payments, and that RNDC has cut staff. Industry reaction leans wary. Some in the trade read the sequential market exits as exposing a structural vulnerability, where brands that anchored on-premise strategies to a single distributor now face cascading risk if that relationship breaks. The near-term question for suppliers is who gets paid, and who carries their brands next. Separately, Circana's latest weekly off-premise scan data offers a read on the Fourth of July. The market research firm reports that total volumes stayed roughly flat over the holiday, even with hot temperatures across most of the country. Beer supplied the standouts at the brand level. Modelo, Michelob and Busch led the gainers, according to Brewbound's account of the scans. The flat topline is the signal here. A holiday weekend that usually lifts the category delivered little aggregate movement this year, leaving brand-level share shifts, rather than a rising tide, as the story for suppliers watching off-premise demand. Also today, a legislative push around hemp beverages. A coalition of stakeholders is backing a forthcoming bill, the Goodness of Hemp Act, that would set a federal framework for the category and open a regulatory pathway for hemp products, according to Brewbound and BevNET. Backers say it could pre-empt restrictions slated to take effect in November. Industry reaction is not uniform. Support leans toward the idea of federal clarity, but some operators oppose the bill's proposed potency cap, and a recurring concern is that a blanket inhalable ban could strain a supply chain that depends on that demand. For a fractured category facing a November deadline, the framework fight is really a fight over the details. On the next item in the agenda. France's prolonged summer heat and drought are shrinking grape development across major wine regions, according to The Drinks Business. Champagne growers expect yields to fall around ten percent this year, with harvests beginning weeks earlier than normal as the vines respond to the heat stress. That makes this a supply-side factor for the category, tightening the base-wine picture at a time when producers are already navigating soft demand. Now, a few more headlines moving the trade today. Staying with Champagne, Shanken News Daily reports the segment is showing signs of a U.S. rebound, even as the broader wine category stays pressured by moderation and economic trends. IWSR projects super-premium Tequila volumes to slip about five percent by twenty thirty, even as it expects the high end of the category to keep growing. Asahi has taken full ownership of Dutch brewer Gulpener through its Grolsch subsidiary, per Just Drinks, adding another Dutch name to the group's stable. South Korea is lining up changes to its alcohol warning labels, according to Just Drinks, a regulatory shift for suppliers selling into that market. Bump Williams data credits spirits-based RTDs, led by Cutwater and Surfside, as the largest contributors to second-quarter bev-alc growth, with el Jimador New Mix and Suntory minus one ninety-six among the ones to watch. And finally, Viva Wine Group has received a cash takeover offer from Riesling Ventures, a vehicle backed by its three largest shareholders, a bid that could take the group private, according to Just Drinks.