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July 28, 2025
FOND DU LAC – Lacey Sadoff – president and fourth-generation co-owner of Badger Liquor – said statewide, “anyone with a liquor license” can expect to benefit from the alcoholic beverage distributor’s network, which Badger Liquor built throughout 90 years of operation.
“We have the largest – and, we think, the best – portfolio of wines and spirits,” she said. “So, we are able to offer a product line and services to our customers that no one else [in Wisconsin] can.”
Sadoff said Badger Liquor, which has been family owned since 1935, is currently headed by her and her father, Gary – CEO and third-generation co-owner.
“We are the only two family members left in the business,” she said.
In 2006, Sadoff said Gary’s brother – “who was his business partner for many years – passed away.”
Shortly thereafter, in 2008, Sadoff said she stepped away from her career – which she built separately from her family’s business – and came to work with her father.
“Before then, I had a number of different jobs,” she said. “I was working in the nonprofit arts sector in Milwaukee. I was doing some graphic design and writing. I also worked in fashion retail and did event planning.”
Prior to her official welcome home, Sadoff said she and her dad agreed that she needed to gain industry experience elsewhere before stepping into a leadership position at Badger Liquor.
“I had done nothing in the liquor or wine industry,” she said. “I didn’t want to be the ‘owner’s daughter,’ and he wanted me to have my own two feet to stand on, so I moved down to Chicago for a short time and worked for Bacardi – the rum company – in their marketing department.”
After her stint at Bacardi, Sadoff said she moved back up to Wisconsin to work at Badger Liquor – “and the rest is history.”
Though any relationship – professional, platonic or otherwise – is not “always totally easy” to manage, over her last 17 years at Badger Liquor, Sadoff said she and her dad have developed not only “an awesome [business] partnership” but a “friendship” as well.
“It’s been amazing,” she said. “I feel extremely lucky and grateful to be in a position to have built the relationships I have with my dad.”
Acquired growth
Starting “in Fond du Lac as a very small operation,” Sadoff said Badger Liquor has grown to an organization large enough to serve the wine and liquor needs of its “many thousands” of customers across Wisconsin.
The expansion of Badger Liquor’s distribution network, she said, was a result of its family-owners’ growth strategy.
“When my grandfather, [the] second generation, got involved, he started acquiring other distributors across the state… then my dad and uncle did quite a bit of that, too,” she said. “Through the ’90s… they were acquiring other wholesalers in the state to [build] our network.”
Then, roughly two decades ago, Sadoff said Badger Liquor formed a partnership with a distributor in the Madison market – Frank’s Liquor.
“[We did that] to finish out the back corner of the state – to make [our distribution network] statewide,” she said.
And, Sadoff said, due to Wisconsin laws and regulations, if businesses are looking to source certain brands of alcohol, they have to go through Badger Liquor.
“[State] regulations are such that for the vast majority of our brands, we are the only distributor that sells them in the regions we sell them in,” she said. “The way the industry is designed gives people benefits if they have a great portfolio – which we do.”
According to its website (badgerliquor.com), Badger Liquor is committed “to sourcing exceptional products from renowned producers.”
So, with a selection showcasing “the best of the beverage world,” Sadoff said the company has “the right product offerings to fill [customers’] needs at the right price point,” while simultaneously offering “whatever additional services we can to help their businesses be successful.”
“[What] has been absolutely integral to the success of our business [is our] understanding [of] who our customers are,” she said. “Understanding what their account [is] like – their bars, restaurants, grocery stores – [and] what identities they’re trying to create.”
Relationships are key
Though Sadoff said she’s unsure of the 100%-accurate origin story of her family’s company, she said the one she’s historically been told started in the Prohibition era.
“The family story goes, my great-grandfather was selling whiskey out of the trunk of his car during Prohibition,” she said, “and when Prohibition was repealed, whiskey makers were looking for legal ways and avenues to sell their product. That’s where Badger Liquor was born.”
From then, through the company’s next nine decades in operation, Sadoff said her family has worked to build the “good relationships” that have, and continue to, fuel Badger Liquor’s success.
“It’s good relationships with our employees, our customers [and] our suppliers,” she said. “It’s fostering a good solid network… [of] all the people [in all the] categories that we operate with.”
Ensuring the company is always focused on growth and innovation, Sadoff said, has been another contributing factor to its longevity.
“There’s been a lot of changes in the industry, [but] we always do what’s best for the business [in the moment] – not [following a] predetermined [plan] for what we thought it would be,” she said. “[We’re] involved, we listen, we stay up [to date] with what’s going on and we surround ourselves with the best people in the business.”
Implementing those business practices, Sadoff said, by no means paved a simple path to success for her family’s company.
However, she said they have helped Badger Liquor maintain its standing in the state’s alcohol distribution industry.
“I don’t want to say it’s made it easy, but it’s made it a heck of a lot easier than it would be otherwise,” she said. “The most important piece [to] our longevity is building relationships with our customers and suppliers.”
Additionally, Sadoff said those relationships are not only maintained in a professional setting but in a philanthropic one as well, through the work of The Sadoff Family Foundation – a 501(c)(3) nonprofit per Badger Liquor’s website.
“It’s the charitable giving arm of Badger Liquor,” she said. “We support a lot of different causes, most of which are in Fond du Lac – [in sectors like] education and the arts – [in the form of] directives or donations and grants that we provide through [the foundation].”
These initiatives, Sadoff said, are especially important for a company like Badger Liquor with its deep, historic roots in the greater Fond du Lac area.
“It’s been really wonderful to give back to the communities we live and operate in on a regular and annual basis,” she said.
For more on Badger Liquor’s product portfolio and services, or The Sadoff Family Foundation, visit the company’s aforementioned website or find it on social media.
