Martinis are everywhere right now — except at home.
At the bar, they’re ice-cold and glamorous. At home, they’re a mess of half-empty olive jars and wasted brine.
Halli Segal and Shelby Sims built Quincy to fix that. One jar with brine and garnish, making dirty martinis easy at home. Now their mixer is shaking up 100+ stores nationwide and bringing the bar’s most glamorous cocktail home.
What we cover:
- Turning a niche obsession into a nationwide brand
- Making their first sale with just product in hand
- Driving demand by showing up at events, not buying ads
Refresh a stale category. Mixer options hadn’t changed in decades. Bottled brines were too salty, too weak, or full of extra ingredients. Quincy’s founders saw a chance to refresh the category.
Validate before you build your product. A survey of 500+ consumers confirmed what they suspected: martinis are a top order at bars, but rarely made at home. That gap became their opportunity.
Start with old fashioned door-to-door sales. Halli and Shelby walked into a Brooklyn butcher shop with product in hand and left with their first order (soon followed by a celebratory drink next door). Today, Quincy is in 100+ stores nationwide.
Show up where your customers are: Martinis are social, and so is Quincy. Instead of spending on ads, they sample at art nights, vintage shops, butcher BBQs. Social events help build both discovery and community around a single jar of brine.
A martini-tiny effort opens the market
Brine by the numbers
14L Number of dirty martinis you can make per Quincy jar
1,200 jars: Size of Quincy’s first production run
100+ stores: Current retail footprint across the U.S.
5 ingredients: Simple, premium recipe
Try this if you’re shaking up a stale category
Look for what’s missing. Quincy saw people ordering martinis out but not making them at home. That gap gave them the idea.
Validate with data. Surveys and blind taste tests confirmed demand and taste before scaling.
Make the first sale simple. Their first account came from walking into a neighborhood shop with product in hand.
Teach as you go. Clear messaging and in-person demos helped consumers understand exactly how to use the product.
The full Quincy playbook: How to shake up a stale category
