What are the specifics of buying beer in bulk for my small business?

I’m starting a business with my friend, which consists of delivering beer, specifically microbrew. We’ve done a lot of research for competitors, distributors, the current demand, prices, and everything else you can imagine. We’re in the process of getting an alcohol distributor license from our province, and we’re doing great so far, considering our lack of experience.

However, it is now time to talk to distributors who will sell us beer in bulk, so we can re-sell it. We came across one business that has a wide variety of beers, and the in store prices are very low, however, neither me nor my partner are that good at negotiating.

So, when it comes to buying beer in bulk, what’s a good price range and how much percent of our profits should we give to our distributor? We’re trying to start off with a MINIMAL investment, and we’d like to start off with around 700–1000 bottles, but spread out over a variety of brands, weighted of course. When/if we run out, we’d invest more and let the business grow, but in the case that it fails, we don’t want to have to chug 1000 bottles of beer, although that would be very cliche.