XChateau Wine Podcast

With insurance costs skyrocketing, having a good understanding of the types and amount of coverage needed for wineries and vineyards is becoming essential. As a broker for Country Financial, as well as the host of the Wine Crush Podcast, Heidi Moore describes what is necessary vs. optional for winery insurance and the changes happening in the industry. 

Detailed Show Notes: 

Insurance trends - very volatile now, Covid supply chain issues, wildfires / other natural disasters

Rates are soaring

FL/CA - natural disasters happening more, impacting insurance

If >5 mi from a fire station, insurance premiums can be double

Winery insurance is a niche market, so it is better to have expertise

• Leakage & contamination are a big issue - often wineries do not have enough coverage
• General liability and liquor liability are base levels of coverage
• Rest is optional - a winery should look at what will break the business if it happens
• Premiums based on gross sales, inventory, and assets (e.g., buildings, barrels)
• Range of costs - small wineries ($1,500-2,000/year), larger wineries ($50-60k/year)

CA - many companies have stopped writing business

Sometimes, there is state coverage for catastrophe-only coverage

Insurers often value inventory based on “final destination” (e.g., DTC vs. wholesale)

A wine library with increasing value should be looked at annually to see if coverage needs to be adjusted

Vineyard insurance is different from winery

• Farm policy for an agricultural commodity (e.g., for runaway tractors)
• Crop insurance, which is federally subsidized, covers annual crop value and covers against smoke taint, fire, etc…; often can insure at different value levels of the crop
• Can buy specific coverage for vines and equipment in vineyards
• Climate change mostly impacts crop insurance vs farm policy

Base level of insurance needed for winery w/ vineyard

• Winery policy - covers tasting room, production, buildings, the commercial business
• Farm policy - covers vineyard, buildings, farming operation, home autos
• Depending on assets - umbrella policy to cover assets (e.g., drunk driving accidents are expensive)

When to stop buying insurance?  Need a good agent who is your advocate

Value of a broker vs. direct from the insurer - can provide different options of insurance, the downside is they do not know policies as deeply

Wine Crush Podcast

• Share stories of winemakers, encourage people who do not drink wine regularly to try it
• Mostly OR wineries, expanding to WA, ID

Key trends for wine insurance - circling in on natural disasters and how they affect policies

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

With 27 years of research on the US wine consumer, the non-profit  Wine Market Council is a critical industry resource. Liz Thach MW, the new President, dives into their most recent research on which wine consumers are buying, why, and how they buy. Members can get even deeper insight and access to the industry’s most robust database on US wine consumers. 

Detailed Show Notes: 

Wine Market Council (“WMC”) - non-profit, formed in 1996

• Mission - provide cutting-edge research on the US wine consumer purchasing habits, trends, and attitudes
• Members use WMC data for marketing and brand strategies

US wine sales

• From 1934 - today - there have been several declines in consumption
• The last decline - 1990s - showed similar factors, increased anti-alcohol groups, large excise taxes; catalysts to growth (French Paradox, introduction of new products - e.g., White Zinfandel, wine spritzers, Merlot getting popular)
• Growth for 20+ years from the late 1990s, peaking during Covid
• 2022 - decline in volume sales, 2023 - decline in volume (-9%) and $ sales

WMC does a benchmark segmentation study of wine consumers every 2 years

• Has done 19 over 27 years, the largest database of wine consumer trends
• Boomers - drinking less (61% cutting alcohol, faster than expected)
• Millennials - finally coming to wine, took until they were in their 30s (have children, bought homes, settled down, more financially stable); spend more on wine (often $20+)
• Gen Z (oldest is 26) - had high wine adoption initially, but in the last 3 years, it has declined (“cool to be sober”); 9% of Gen Z drinks wine, though only 33% are of legal drinking age; concerned about transparency of products (saw food scares, recalls), climate, and social equity

Wine drinkers are 60% married, 71% own homes, 53% live in suburbs

Ethnicity diversification making progress

• By 2050, the majority of the US will be non-white
• Today’s wine drinkers are 66% White (vs. 77-78% in the past), 15% Hispanic, 11% Black, and 5% Asian
• Significant progress with Blacks and Asians, but less with Hispanics, which are the fastest growing population in the US
• Ceja an example of a successful Hispanic owned winery, links wine and Hispanic cuisine and been successful
• Other ways to enhance diversity - ads that look like “us,” diversity in the workforce, pop up events where the consumer is (e.g., a Mexican wine importer did pop-ups at Hispanic events with taco trucks)

Premiumization is still happening, people drinking less, but better

• $20+/bottle drinkers are now ~7-15% of the total US population
• Younger people (21-30) purchasing more high-end wine
• Boomers dropping buying more expensive wines

Where people buy wine

• Supermarkets
• Wine shops
• Online now 12% vs. 5% pre-Covid
• 29% buy on their phone

93% of wine consumers on social media

• #1 Facebook (Boomers)
• YouTube - 61% use
• Instagram - 55%
• TikTok - 40% (wineries can’t advertise, but influencers can post)
• X/Twitter - went from #2 to #6
• Wine apps - 17%

2024 trends

• Anti-alcohol movement 
• Talking about the benefits of wine (illegal for alcohol brands to discuss health) - WMC launched a social campaign called “Wine is…” (e.g., wine cocktails, family dinners…)
• Transparency/ingredient labeling (e.g., 50% of Americans believe wine has added sugar)
• Low / no alcohol movement - 40% of wine drinkers drinking less (of those, 40% drink non-alc spirits/cocktails, 35% NA beer, 34% NA wine)
• RTDs / single serving sizes

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Having gotten bitten by the wine bug young and with deep wine retail experience, Devon Magee, founder of Offshore Wines, decided to start a small wine importer. Inspired by Kermit Lynch, Offshore focuses on small, artisanal brands making high quality, yet affordable wines. Devon shares how he bootstrapped the company and is finding his way as an importer. 

Detailed Show Notes: 

Background - mostly wine retail, did harvests in France (Vieux Telegraph, Chandon de Brialles in Burgundy - 2012-2014)

• Inspired by Kermit Lynch, he was interested in writing

Offshore Wines Portfolio

• Christian Knott of Chandon de Brialles started a new project, Domaine Dandelion, and asked him to import them
• 2017 - 1st shipment - 4 cases of Domaine Dandelion, 20 cases of Champagne Charles Dufour
• 15-20 producers now
• Goal: find high-quality wines made in an artisanal way from lesser appellations that are “affordable”
• “Affordable” = $30-100 in US retail

Starting an import business

• He did it on his own, with no lawyers
• ~2 months to get a license, ~$1-2k in fees
• Need a licensed warehouse to receive wines (uses CA Wine Transport)
• Self-financed 1st shipment

Cash flow is challenging

• 2-3 months for wines to land in warehouse (from France)
• Restaurants/retailers get 30 days terms
• Payment to wineries varies - most ~60-day terms from shipment, while others want payment upon shipment or 50/50 terms (upfront and on delivery)

Lifestyle is fun, traveling and visiting rural areas

Choosing winery partners - a lot is timing, being at the right place, getting to know communities, and very relationship-based; most wineries are referrals from existing relationships

Offshore differentiation - speaks the winemaker’s language (French, Spanish), worked production, and is building deep personal relationships

• Wineries are exclusive to CA, and only market Offshore works, though they sell to a small distributor in CO
• Focus on small producers precludes needing to be in all 50 states
• Optimal portfolio size ~25 wineries to be able to respond and represent wineries well
• Gets wine out for people to taste them, prefers personal connections over social media
• Shares other aspects of what people are doing (e.g., got and gave away bags of coffee from a producer experimenting w/ carbonic coffee bean ferments, giving away sweatshirts from Domaine Hausherr with an artistic word game on the back)

Devon is the only salesperson now, and he would ideally like 1-2 salespeople

• Other salespeople have opened doors for him to help him

Building small brands

• Many people struggle with name pronunciation
• He tries to share wines, stories, and pictures of brands
• He doesn’t agree with the need for scores and tasting notes; he uses email to share stories, wants to publish a newsletter eventually
• The new style of wine writing can help small brands - e.g., Alice Feiring, Ray Isle’s new book

Advice for others - be able to sell the wines

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As part of the importer series, Yi Xin Ong, Managing Partner of KOT Selections in Singapore, provides an international perspective. From Singapore’s 2-3,000 active importers for the small island to the impact of international media, Yi Xin describes how KOT navigates the importing, distributing, and retailing of its portfolio of winegrowers.  

Detailed Show Notes: 

Background

• Founded KOT in 2011 - they couldn’t get the wines they were buying in Singapore, three partners
• Work w/ 57 winegrowers, mainly in Europe, 6 in the US

Singapore wine market (~6M population, ~20% Muslim - don’t drink)

• No 3-tier system, no gov’t monopoly
• It is a pretty open market, like the UK
• Many players are vertically integrated - import, distribute, retail - with lots of captive distributors and retailers
• Very low barriers to entry - founded KOT in 2 months for S$200 to get licensing and paperwork
• Horizontally spread - ~2-3,000 active importers (in 2011, ~700 importers, mainly focused on Australia/NZ with either big brands or high-scoring wines)
• Two casinos / integrated resorts provided the spark for other wines (e.g., Marina Bay Sands opened in 2011)
• Generally, 1-1.5 generations behind the UK and US wine markets

Took inspiration from other importers - Kermit Lynch (CA), Louis / Dressner (NY), Yapp Brothers (UK Rhone Specialists) - importing wines others were not

• Yapp - focused on winegrowers
• Dressner - spent a lot of wine visiting growers, good storytelling
• Kermit Lynch - newsletters (1970s) were key to storytelling for the wine growers
• Storytelling is critical to standing out in a crowded market

Sourcing strategy - most wineries they bought from personally (90%) were not represented in Singapore

• Informal rule - 5 visits to winegrowers between the three partners before they import
• Broad portfolios - easier to serve clients and fulfill their needs
• Focused portfolios - clearer story and differentiation
• Optimal portfolio size - ~50-70 to give each winegrower ~1 week/year of focus

KOT differentiation

• Market knowledge
• Links to trade, client base
• Trust of the people (have only signed one contract, mainly handshake deals, exclusive relationships) -> been burnt occasionally with generational change

Build brands in Singapore - a very organic approach

• Get the right people to taste them - professionals, and influencers / Key Opinion Leaders (“KOL”)
• Host tastings every year, even for highly allocated wines (e.g., Pierre Gonon)
• KOLs can drive demand

Int’l media have a strong influence - English is the primary language

• More important than local media
• Only the top few have an impact - The Wine Advocate (Robert Parker), Jancis Robinson (less emphasis on scores, more on editorial content)
• Robert Parker had a big impact on the local market; a Singaporean bought the company
• 100-point scores can drive sales spikes

Consumer data/reviews can start trends, increasingly important

• Vivino, Wine-Searcher, CellarTracker, Instagram

75% wholesale, 25% direct-to-consumer sales (mainly e-commerce)

• Private clients saw KOT through the pandemic
• Trade is vital for tourist demand

Singaporean wine trends

• New regions increasing, Japanese and Chinese wines
• Value increasing - ~$20-30 retail, ~$5-10 FOB
• The low/no alcohol trend is not a thing yet
• Rose has never been a trend

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

With a portfolio of luxury wineries, including Domaine de la Romanee-Conti and Biondi Santi, Wilson Daniels has developed deep expertise in marketing luxury wines. With allocations, deep tracking of where wines go, and a heavy event schedule, Shannon Coursey, EVP of Sales & Marketing, describes how taking great care of the wines is critical. 

Detailed Show Notes: 

Wilson Daniels (“WD”) overview

• Founded in 1978, they started as a domestic wine brokerage,
• In 1979, they were asked to represent Domaine de la Romanee-Conti (DRC) and became an importer
• Represents 37 families with ~50 producers, ~⅓ France, ~⅓ Italy, ~⅓ New World
• Owns distribution in 5 states
• ~35 sales managers, sells ~600k cases/year

Importer role

• Curate portfolio
• Distributor management - make sure strategy is executed
• Create messaging with the wineries
• Pricing - for WD, keep consistent around the country
• Education
• Channel mix - on/off premise, national accounts, chains
• Work with press
• Keeping wineries top of mind in trade - does a lot of events

Sourcing

• Sources wineries with estate vineyards, some with the ability to scale (~⅓ of the portfolio), look for regions where they will not take away from existing producers
• At optimal book size now, additions could be grower Champagne or 1-2 new Burgundy producers
• Grew portfolio a lot in recent years - ~20/37 families added in last 8 years, ~10 in last 3 years (including Gaja, Faiveley)

Distributor management

• With RNDC and Breakthru in ~50% of states
• Create groups within the portfolio to help distributors
• Manage pricing, inventory, programming (sometimes)
• Does not allow wine closeouts, prefers to buy back
• Fast Start program - incentives for new placements, not volume
• Wholesale Manager Bonus - for distribution managers, often trip-based
• Other support methods - ask to be on focus, market work, getting the producer in market

Marketing wines

• Crafting messaging is critical, and some producers already know what they want (e.g., Gaja wants to be known as 4 different wineries)
• Does a lot of grassroots marketing - events around the country at top restaurants, visibility of on-premise placements
• A lot of trips to wineries
• Iconic brands - taking care of the wine from start to finish, the allocation process is essential (~⅔ of brands are allocated)
• Lesser known brands - more about visibility, messaging is critical, can target a broader base (e.g., use more social media)
• Luxury - 3 key segments - sommeliers, collectors, critics
• For larger brands, does some consumer marketing: e.g., Bisol Prosecco - did 15 city tours, wrapped an Alfa Romeo car in Bisol green, did press, consumer, and trade events; went from 7k cases (2015) to 120k cases (2024)

Process for building brands in the US

• Create messaging
• Education - WD wholesale team, WD national team, distributors
• PR launch kit and sales kit
• Identify channel mix, including target account list
• Events (very different for each producer - e.g., vintage tastings for Biondi Santi, Faiveley; Gaja - white launch, Tuscan properties, Sicilian tasting)

Re-establishing brands that had poor marketing (e.g., Biondi Santi, Dal Forno)

• Need to work through inventory in the gray market
• Don’t lower prices to match the gray market
• Make a splash on new vintage releases
• Dal Forno - launches in the US 6 months before the rest of the world, helps reduce gray market activity

Private client group / direct-to-consumer

• ~300 people by invitation only
• Experience-driven
• Members support the entire WD portfolio

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In part 2 of our series with Nick Ramkowsky, Owner of Vine Connections, Nick describes how he builds brands in the US market, striving to turn “annual” brands into “perennial” ones. Partnering with distributors both directly and working independently with consistency helps create a virtuous cycle of long-term relationships. Nick also covers his interest in sake and how it overlaps with sales strategies for wine.  

Detailed Show Notes: 

Two types of brands

• Perennials - brands where accounts grow in value each vintage; very few become this
• Annuals - need to sell the same case to a new account each year; everything starts here

The goal is to build brands into perennials

Getting to perennials includes having value in the bottle, packaging (VC has three designers on staff), relationships (finding the right spots/customers for brands and supporting the accounts (staff trainings, consumer events)), identifying champions on the distributor sales team, and press

Creating brand value as an importer - consumers believe in the importer’s book through consistent producers and quality across the portfolio

Consistency helps develop brands

Marketing strategies to build distributor demand

• Press (primarily critics)
• Effective distributor work withs (distributors need confidence importer will support them)
• Creating credibility in the marketplace (trade events, work withs, samples, incentive/launch programs)
• Can’t outspend more prominent importers for incentives, need to create unique ones - e.g., one supplier affiliated w/ custom made shirts, created incentive around the shirts

Setting suggested retail price (“SRP”)

• Through tasting, looking at the competitive set, and where the winery wants to be
• $1 in home country becomes ~$3 at retail in US

Sales strategies

• VC has ten salespeople across the US
• Do work withs with distributors, but also on their own to not overwhelm distributor reps
• Partner with reps, sending recaps for follow-up

Sake - started in 2002

• He went to Japan to work in a brewery to study the process
• Had to make more accessible - standardized back label, 1st to put English names on front labels
• They use the same distribution network as wine
• Place importance on education; VP of Sake Monica Samuels is a great educator
• Now, 20% of the Japanese imported sake market
• Recommends drinking sake from a wine glass, at cellar temp, or warmed to order for hot sake
• Kome website is more focused on the style of sake (e.g., fruity/floral vs. round/rustic) vs. grade now
• 46 prefectures brew sake - lots of expression of place
• Gluten and sulfite-free

Wine importing trends - people drinking less, but better (Gen Z - less alcohol, and non-alc drinks, believes they will look at wine more as they age; value premium products that are authentic, smaller, good stewards of land)

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

After falling in love with wine through a year abroad in Burgundy in high school, Nick Ramkowsky, Owner of Vine Connections, has built a premium national importer of South American wines and sake. Nick discusses the types of wine importers in the US, how he thinks about building a brand portfolio, and the keys to success as an importer in part 1 of this 2-part series.

Detailed Show Notes: 

Vine Connections

• A national import and marketing company based in CA and has a retail license
• Focus on regions with winemaking history but not globally recognized
• Started as a broker and distributor (when Nick was 25)
• Worked with Billington Imports and met Laura Catena, went to Argentina, and fell in love with wines
• Established 1st premium portfolio of Argentine wines (1999-2000) - least expensive wine was $24 retail
• 2002 - imported sake
• 2013 - 1st premium Chilean wine portfolio
• Has wholesalers in all 50 states, including RNDC (#2 in the US), Breakthru (#3), and other smaller ones
• 30 people today, from 2 originally
• Split company in 2 - Kome Collective (Japanese), GeoVino (wines)

Types of wine importers

• All importers are also distributors in their state
• Sales Geography - can be state, regional, or national; Vine Connections is national for control over brands all the way through, exclusive for all 50 states, contracts w/ producers outline the responsibilities of importer and producer
• Portfolio Focus - world or specialized; Vine Connections is specialized in S America and sake

Role of importer

• Bring wines in, warehouse, sell to distributors, & work with sales teams to sell to various channels (on-premise, off-premise, chains)
• Work with press, do consumer events, lots of training and education

Sourcing wines

• Looks at people first, then property, and consistency in product and pricing
• New wines don’t cannibalize the current portfolio
• Complementary driven by a sense of place and identity, even if the same region, varietal, price point
• Looking at expanding to more regions to take advantage of the distribution network
• Originally specialized to have more of an identity as an importer
• Optimal book size - has ~120 SKUs in portfolio vs. ~900 at some importers and ~10,000 for RNDC as a distributor; optimal size varies by business model (e.g., focused on chains vs. independent stores/restaurants)
• More in not better - high cost to inventory and more challenging to prioritize

Pricing wines

• In general, SRP is fixed, but each state is different (based on freight & tax differences, distributor margins (larger tend to work on lower margins), and retailer margins (some take less margin)

Selling wines

• Used to self-distribute in CA, now uses wholesalers (couldn’t service all the accounts, wanted to focus on national sales)
• Distributor salespeople don’t have time to focus on everything
• Importer needs to generate interest in brands

Key elements for success

• Find good partners - share the same philosophy (quality, value, consistency), support each other
• Vine Connections doesn’t add new wineries often (only one new Chilean winery); only one winery left in 20+ years
• $1M revenue/employee benchmark for success

Vine Connections differentiation - good communications, both in transfer and transparency (e.g., sales by state), consider Vine Connections an extension of the winery

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

To give their customers the ability to trade up and a broader selection than what’s inside their 1,900+ grocery stores, Albertsons Companies have launched Vine & Cellar. Curtis Mann, MW, Group VP of Alcohol, discusses the greater selection, wine description and storytelling, and flexibility Albertsons has with Vine & Cellar to complement their in-store offerings. 

Detailed Show Notes: 

Curtis’ background

• Worked at IRI / Circana (database of retail scan data)
• Worked in retail wine stores and restaurants
• Was head of beverages at Raley’s (grocery) before Albertsons

Albertsons Companies

• 1,900 stores that sell wine
• A lot of value wine, some specialty stores (e.g., Pavilions, Hagens) sell fine wine
• West Coast - more domestic (~40% import, 60% domestic), East Coast - more imports

Vine & Cellar (“V&C”) online wine store

• Wine only now, no beer & spirits yet
• CA only now will expand to others (e.g., WA, IL)
• Extension on top of the grocery store website
• Has a larger selection of wines (2,300 items vs. average 800-1,000 at typical stores, up to 1,500 at some stores) - e.g., Super 2nd Bordeaux, allocated CA Pinot Noir
• Wines are only available to ship via UPS (vs. in-store pickup or delivery)
• Can use the same checkout process for groceries and V&C

Benefits for consumers of V&C

• Curated wine selections that are representative of their regions
• Buy groceries and V&C wines and checkout together
• More flexibility - can do wine dinners, in-store tastings, wine clubs

Goals of V&C

• Let customers continue to explore and trade up on wines and not trade out of Albertsons
• Don’t cannibalize in-store, but more add-on, incremental purchases
• Capture a portion of the wine DTC market

Online vs. in-store buying

• More imported wines online
• Broader selections vs more volume of the same wines in-store
• Avg bottle price is $10 higher on V&C than highest in-store
• ~½ V&C customers buying iconic wines (e.g., Silver Oak), ~½ exploring (e.g., Burgundies in the $50-100 range)
• V&C customer is both existing Albertsons and some new customers
• You can put a lot more details/descriptors of wines online
• Online buys in 6 or 12 packs to economize on shipping

Marketing V&C

• QR codes inside stores
• Vinecellar.com
• Some ads on the website, V&C wines come up during a search for wines if they are not offered in-store
• Events / PR
• Napa Safeway has V&C featured wines in-store
• Some paid search, Wine-Searcher

Loyalty programs - now Albertsons customers get promo codes for V&C

Wine trends - less high-end wines, people focused on value / high QPR

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

2023 wrap-up for the wine business

Topics we covered in 2023

• Sustainability (8-part series that had Drew Bledsoe to CEO of Silver Oak David Duncan and across the world from the US to Spain to Bordeaux)
• State of the Wine Collector (LA, Dallas)
• Leveraging non-gov’t organizations (VDP, Grand Pagos) to promote wine

Revenge travel

• Post-Covid move back to in-person / offices -> delivery of wine -> reduced visitors to wine country and people buying wine to stock and drink at home
• Americans Took Record-Setting Vacations In Summer Of ‘Revenge Travel’ - 32.8% of households went on vacation (a record since data kept in 2015)

Online retailer issues - Underground Cellar (April 2023), SommSelect (July 2022), Winc (Nov 2022, 1 year after going public) all went bankrupt, others struggling back to 2019 or even lower levels

• More missing bottles w/ Sherry Lehman (~Mar - Aug 2023), Chelsea wine storage

Inflation / economic slowdown globally and impact on wine market

• Bleak outlook for 2024 as fine wine buyers narrow their focus - Liv-Ex indexes down double digits year to date; “flight to quality” - Bordeaux benefiting, Burgundy, Champagne down
• Inflation is used as the “reason” many wineries increase wine prices
• BBC article on wine pricing increasing - glass, labor, fruit - all getting more expensive and wineries increasing price; and burgundy/napa/champagne got very expensive, consumers starting to pull back
• Many napa wines taking prices up to $300+ (Memento Mori - $225 -> $300)
• Chinese consumption is as low as 1996 levels, - the peak of 19.6M HL in 2017 to 8.8M HL in 2022 (#8 globally) vs. US in the top slot at 34M HL

Global health/wellness; Millenial/Gen Z slowing down alcohol consumption

• WHO says no alcohol is good for you (released a statement Jan 2023)
• Gen Z drink 20% less than Mill, who drink less than prior generations - college-age abstainers went from 20% -> 28% in the last 20 years (to 2020)
• Better non-alc and low-alc alternatives (kombucha, pot, mushrooms, better no/lo options for alcohol)

Is wine part of the good life? 

• Wine, particularly fine wine, is used differently than beer & spirits; it is also better from a health perspective
• The Wine Access interview re-emphasized - the experiences with wine
• The Italian lifestyle / holy trinity of the good life - cheese, wine, & bread

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As the podcast space matures, it becomes a more meaningful channel to market wines to consumers and create new experiences.  3rd time guest Amanda McCrossin, Host of the Wine Access Unfiltered Podcast, and AJ Resnick, CMO of Wine Access, explain their rationale and experiences in launching and building the podcast and associated wine club.  From celebrities crying on the show to creating a 360 experience with their wine club and podcast audio and video, the Unfiltered Podcast continues to build traction, make wine more accessible, and build Wine Access into a loved wine brand. 

Detailed Show Notes: 

Wine Access background

• Launched in the late ’90s, it hosted wine retail websites and described wines
• 2004 - offered wines on their platform
• Curate wines (team includes an MS), tell the story behind every wine, excellent customer service, and technology (powers wine clubs like Michelin Guide, Sunset, Decanter, and Williams Sonoma)
• Goal - to be a loved wine brand

Wine Access Unfiltered podcast

• Launched in 2020
• A wine podcast w/ conversations around wine w/ wine, but not about wine
• Released every other week, 45 min - 1 hour show length
• They have done podcast ad buys and have seen success
• Format - Season 1 - talk about wine stories, mostly with celebrities
• Season 2 - off more value add, more thematic (e.g., wine regions), added a wine club to drink the wines w/ the show (full 360 experience)
• Has IG (>10,000 followers) and YouTube (>300 subscribers) channels

Listener base

• They assumed it would be the same as Wine Access customers
• They found it to skew younger and less wine-savvy, but very curious
• Another way to connect with members

Traction

• >100,000 cumulative downloads
• Past episode performance increases with new listeners
• Holds people’s attention for an extended period of time
• Most podcasts fizzle out after five episodes

Getting celebrities on the show

• “Do you want to drink wine with us?” worked during the pandemic
• They did a lot of cold calling, worked with a few producers
• More prominent celebrities didn’t always have the best performance
• Bert Kreischer’s episode was very successful; he cried on the show and then mentioned it and FaceTimed Amanda while on 2 Bears, 1 Cave podcast

Wine Club

• Four wines for four episodes, sent every other month, curated by Amanda
• 10% off all Wine Access purchases
• Includes shipping, can add wines w/ free shipping to shipment
• Some wines exclusive to the wine club
• Q3 2023 - Unfiltered Wine Club had more new members than any other club that Wine Access runs

ROI

• The wine club helps cover the cost
• The goal is more brand awareness
• Retention through connecting w/ members in a different way
• Content creation (audio, video) that can be reused

Podcasting

• Spotify is bringing new energy to the space with a better listening experience (went from 15% -> 30% of Unfiltered listeners)
• YouTube has a podcast section
• Repurpose clips for social media is a best practice

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.