Meet Ricardo Kelly, founder and leader of Kelly Family Distributors (KF Distributors), a dynamic force in premium beverage distribution. Drawing from his distinguished background as a U.S. Army veteran and Fortune 500 executive, Ricardo transformed his passion for the beverage industry into a thriving business specializing in premium beer, wine, and spirits. With a particular focus on elevating Black-owned beverage brands, KF Distributors has spent nearly three years building strong partnerships and delivering excellence to its customers, suppliers, and community.
Under Ricardo’s leadership, the company combines premium product selection with unmatched service, creating lasting relationships that drive mutual success. As KF Distributors continues to grow and innovate, its commitment to quality, professionalism, and exceptional service remains unwavering.
What inspired you to start Kelly Family Distributors?
So actually, it goes back to Pre-Covid. I had always wanted to enter into the alcohol space as a brand owner specifically, and I partnered with brand click, vodka. And this was in 2020 and decided to move forward with it. Move forward with it 2021, and I started Kelly family distributors. So we specifically for this brand that I work with. So we can have distribution in the State of Georgia and beyond, if we chose to to do so. And yeah, that’s that’s how Kelly family started October October of 2020.
How have you approached scaling your business from one beverage to multiple brands?
The scaling piece is always challenging, and it’s always a revenue piece that’s involved. Whenever someone says scale, I automatically think of revenue money, because that’s what it takes to scale. And so I looked at the platform that we were on. And you know we had all these different people that again, I didn’t start this to be a distributor for other brands.
That was not my goal, nor did I have the desire to do it. I wasn’t really aware of it. And so these brands started finding out about us as a Black owned distributor ship, and I’m a veteran as well in the State of Georgia, and they started reaching out, asking, “Hey, can you guys sit down and talk with us about distribution?
How important is acquisition in scaling your distribution business?
Well, absolutely important, because now we have more to offer in terms of products. There’s so many different palates out there from, wine to tequila, to vodka. So we wanted to have a representation of everything that was a mainstream alcoholic drink that was out there. And so that’s what we sought to do, to have a representation that’s, mainstream.
What does Black History Month mean for your business perspective?
I think, for me and many people who are in this space that look like me, it’s black history day for us every day. 365 days a year is black history day, but I think for me in terms of black history month, I think of a reminder.
I told someone I liken it to going to church on Sunday. You’ve gone the whole year you fought the good fight, and now we need this reminder to come together. Let’s come together. Let’s let’s look at what our dollar can impact to the economy. And let’s and let’s focus on that. And and so that’s what that means to me, right coming together, reminding us where we came from, and the fact that we do need to do this together.
How do you approach hiring within the Black community?
I think that it’s important for us to speak to us right? You can’t really speak to something that you’re not familiar with, that you haven’t specifically lived through right? And so it’s important for me to seek those people out in the community because it’s about awareness, right? People don’t know what they don’t know. And so we look for those people to go out and spread the word about those specific black owned brands.
They are black owned brands that are out there that are just as good, comparable to anything that you can buy on the market. And so it’s very important for us to go out there and find the people who look like us that can tell our story.
How significant are relationships in distributing Black-owned brands?
For us, it’s about relationships, specifically relationships. And I’ll say it again relationships. Because without those relationships we wouldn’t have been able to get to the point that we are right. Those people who gave us a chance. We’re an unknown distributor, sometimes carrying unknown brands. That doesn’t have any representation, and brands that wouldn’t have been able to be picked up by some of the bigger distributors out there. And so the relationship with us is that we go out and we partner with each and every location that we work with.
It’s important for them to see that not only are we you, a customer of ours, but we’re partnering with you to make sure that the product that you purchase from us is represented well, and that we come out and we help support you to sell it, because again, it doesn’t do us any good to get to you buying it. It sits on your shelf, so I want to work with you and partner with you to come out. We’ll do tasting events to introduce it to. Your local customers who come there on a regular basis, who purchase their libations.
We do those events. So now, hey, there’s a black owned brand that you can buy on aisle 8. It’s important for us to collab in partnership with those those locations.
Why is owning your distribution system crucial for entrepreneurs?
I think the key point is, and I know many of us have heard this. If you can’t get a seat at the table, you have to create your own table. And I think that in essence is what we’ve done here, and many other people who look like me, who have started distribution companies. I think it’s a big step, and we manage the businesses within our business. And it’s needed because these brands, many of these brands that I carry would not have been able to be on shelves without Kelly family distributors. So I think it’s important that we collaborate and we pull with those those brands.
Can you explain how the distribution system works for new brands?
The distribution piece, in the State of Georgia. In many States it’s a 3 tiered system. So alcohol brands can’t reach the shelves without a distributor, because we’re licensed to sell to retailers, and they can’t do that without the distribution unit, which is, you know what we do.
And I think again, it’s important that you know these brands, that, and and for me it’s a business, right? So if you come to me and you say, Hey, Mr. Kelly, I need distribution, and you go out there and you sell a million units. And now you know, the goal is to get to the bigger scale. Right?
So if you get to a point and you come to me and say, Hey, Ricardo! And this has happened. We’re going into Chicago. We’re going into Florida, you know. Do you have distribution there? Can you help us there? Well, not at this time. And so I understand that the goal is to get on a bigger platform. So if I can help a brand start here in Georgia and sell a million units to go to the next big distributor and go global, I’m all for it.
How do you help new brands navigate the competitive market?
I mean, and I think that’s what keeps us moving forward in this. This is a tough climate. Right? Let’s just keep it 100. This is a very tough climate, I think, for a lot of businesses. It’s a tough climate, and when you walk into a restaurant and you walk into a bar, and it’s fully stacked already. Right? It’s fully stacked with 10 tequilas, 8 Bourbons, whatever whiskeys. Now we have to come in and tell the story behind where this product came from, right along with our relationship.
Which kind of goes back to your last question when you said, Why is that needed distribution. Because we have the relationships right? The trust from our company will allow us to go to a consumer and say, Hey, we have a new product. Are you willing to try it? If you’re willing to try it? Would you take a chance on it and put it on your shelf? We’ll come out, we’ll support it. We’ll promote it, and we’ll make sure that it sells. So we’re doing multiple things. When we bring a brand on. We’re doing the marketing for them. We’re doing the placement, deliveries. We’re doing the full gamut.
What are your top brands and how do you select them?
Our tequila is one of our top sellers – it’s tequila season. Rea libre is our top selling tequila brand. We have the reposado and the Blanco 100% blue Weber agave made out of Jalisco. Two young ladies here, a couple in Georgia. They’re great to work with, and they get out and hustle. They’re running on the left, I’m running on the right, and we’re meeting in the middle making those sales. Our second top selling brand is Sokari. Sokari Rolesha Brown was my first brand that I picked up. She’s a broker for many different brands with some of the bigger distributors in Georgia.
A broker meaning that a brand outside the State of Georgia needs a broker to be brought into the State on their broker’s license, then I can pick them up and distribute them in the State.
She knew so many brands, and I picked her up. She was the first one, and she started posting “Hey guys, I’m with the new distributor, Kelly family distributors, and guess what y’all he’s black” and the fireworks went up. My phone was blowing up off the hook, and many people were calling to be distributed by us. Our third seller is click Vodka, made in Latvia with pure wheat grain and natural spring water – that’s our top selling straight vodka.
We have sangar rum made in Liberia from pure sugar cane juice. We have Ronald Isley’s Golden – he has a brandy and a vodka. We have Cedric Entertainer’s wine portfolio – he has a Napa Valley blend, which is a high-end blend, and two Californias, a red and a Sauvignon Blanc, and all those brands are in total wine and more.
We have birthday sex by Jeremiah, R&B singer. He’s got a hard chardonnay going into Costco this month. We’re growing and have a lot of key brands opening doors for us, and we’re going to keep checking along.
How do you build trust with celebrity partners like Cedric the Entertainer and Ron Isley?
When I first sat down with Cedric, I was a little nervous, but he was just so open. I think people want transparency right? People want to know. It wasn’t more about what I could specifically do for his wine brand. It was more of who’s Ricardo, you know? Who’s Kelly family, who is a part of Kelly family, what are some of your hobbies? What do you like to do? And we got to know each other on that level, and then the businesses became secondary, and I built the trust because I did what I said I was going to do.
I didn’t oversell it. I was so excited to have Cedric entertainer on our, as a part of Kelly family, and he says it all the time. Kelly family distributors. And it’s such a big thing for us and but I showed him prove. Everything that I said that I could do. I did. I work hard any request that they have for us, we do it. And so the trust became kind of part of an innate part of it, because we looked at each other. We had a straight conversation again, straight. No chaser. He told me what he wanted. I told him I could do that.
This is what some of my limitations are, and we work together, and that’s just it. People want transparency, and they want honesty.
How does curiosity drive your business decisions?
Well, I mean, you’re always curious, right? You always want to question things right? I’m always hmm. Did I make the right decision on that brand? Did we do the tasting at the right time, know? Did we promote this properly? Curiosity, I think, is needed, because without that you become complacent, right? And you don’t have that. What’s the next thing I want to? I wonder how we can do this the next time. So from my perspective.
That’s how curiosity is constantly, you know. Hey? What’s the next drink that’s going to be out there, I’m constantly looking at the trends. Okay, what are people drinking more in outside of 2 85, you know. Are they drinking red wine? More? They’re drinking white wine. More same with my overall geography. Who sold the most this year? Was the Tequila brand? Or was it this? What were some of those key things that that Tequila Brand had that made them so successful. So I look at those things, too. Hey, how can we implement that as well? So I’m constantly curious about this environment.
How has your military experience shaped your business approach?
There was a time where and still to this day, I said that men, most men. It should have been mandatory that men go to military for at least 2 years, because there’s just so many things that you learn from a honor perspective, from a respect perspective, and for me it was a leadership situation. I went in. I was pretty. Gung. Ho! I’m the only child.
I went into the army when I was 17, signed up before I even graduated high school. I graduated on Friday, and I left on a Monday, and the rest is history, but I learned it wasn’t easy, but I learned so much, in terms of just utter respect for your fellow person, and lending a helping hand when necessary, and not turning your back on someone in need of help.
So all of those things, and just learning how to lead and talk to people whom again may need some guidance. And giving that support system to, those younger guys and some of the people that I’ve mentored in the past on just how it is to be a man, and what being a man means, and what some of your responsibilities as a man is, and how to execute that. So I think for me it was very important, because that got me on my start.
How do you apply military structure to your daily operations?
I think, for us. And my team is, it’s about organization. The chain of command. We know we can’t have multiple quarterbacks on the field right? And so we have to know what our role is and how to execute that role. And then we come back and we talk about it. Okay, what did you do this week? Oh, I did this.
Okay, good. What’s your plan for next week, and the same. And so that structure and I think the structure part of that is also a big piece that you get from the military. That structure is what you’re going to need in any organization to run it.
