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June 20 2006

Wine Marketing: Let Them Eat Cake!

Business2.0, a new economy business magazine, ran an article last month that was veryintriguing.

Theoutline of the article is on the cognitive effect of mortality in our consumer decision-making.

Thishas interesting implications for wine marketing (and wine consumers) becausewine is, 95% of the time, a purchase that is made at the point of sale and thusopen to swaying the consumer at the time of purchase.

Thisis also the reason, presumably, why advertising in the wine industry is soscant—wineries are, for the most part, small businesses and unless you have a tremendous amount of scale behind your campaign it’s likelywasted money.

Basically,the gist of the research by Stanford Asst. Marketing Professor Baba Shiv, foundin this article is:

Shiv, now a marketing professor at Stanford University’sGraduate School of Business, has been using cake and fruit salad to explore differentways of getting consumers to yield to temptation. For marketers, theimplications of his research are both significant and counterintuitive. Inanother experiment, Shiv determined that, regardless of their answers, peoplechoose cake more often after being asked the following hypothetical question:"If strong evidence emerges from scientific studies suggesting that cakes… have some major health benefits, what would happen to your consumption ofthese items?"

Obviously, when presented with the option of eating cakeor fruit salad (sans strawberries which were deemed too appealing) most peopletook the cake because the supposed link to better health.

Shiv admits that this practice in marketing might actuallybe illegal, and, at best, could lead to very bad press.

But if you’re asking consumers to, say, sample a new candybar, it might help to have a TV playing nearby with distracting content."We’re telling marketers that if you’re catering to a compulsive need,here’s the way to go," he says. "If it’s a more rational appeal, trythe opposite."

The interesting situation, related to wine, is wine marketers try both approaches--the "bomb them with information," and the "cute, furry animal" approach--the compulsive need and the rational approach.

The lesson learned for wine marketers? It would seem that, in terms of marketing towoman, many of whom are health conscious and also a narrow leader in wine purchasing,the answer would be to tout the health benefits of wine—this could very easilybe done as a differentiator for wineries that have multiple labels at differentprice points—leave the “Adventure” brand to find its own audience and then,potentially, use this tactic for the higher priced sku that doesn’t have asmuch sell-thru velocity at, say, a grocery store.

Shiv has a couple of other pieces of research related to consumer behavior. The translation into wine terms, based on wine’s high degree of purchase involvement, is pretty easy. Check it out:

http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/research/mktg_shiv_mortality.shtml

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June 19 2006

The American Vine-Dresser’s Guide Pg. 18 -19

In this continuation of The American Vine-Dressers Guide by John James Dufour, he continues his narrative in Chapters 1 & 2 on his initial travels throughout the United States in the late 1700s/early 1800s searching for appropriate land for the cultivation of the Good Grape.

I resolvedtherefore on a visit to see if any remains of the Jesuits vines werestill in being, and what sort ofgrapes they were; supposing very naturally,that if they had succeeded as well as tradition reported, some of them might possiblybe found in some of the gardens there. But I found only the spotwhere that vineyard had beenplanted, in a wellselected place, on the side of a hill to the north east of thetown, under a cliff. No goodgrapes, however were found either there, or in any of the gardens of thecountry. A thick forest was covering that spot, with luxuriant undergrowth, and of asparagus in the place where the Jesuitshad planted a bed of that vegetable.

This lastcircumstance made me think that the vineyard had not been sosuccessful as represented to me; but had been subject to thesame sickness which afflict now all importedgrapes, of which I shall speak more at large hereafter; the existence of whichI have seen on the vines now growing in the gardens of St. Louis & Kaskaskia,where I have been lately. The grapes are such a good fruit that the inhabitantswould have kept some in their gardens, in spite of all the governmental restrictions, as has been done in Brazil;and even, if there would have been grape vines of a hardy nature, as many sorts are inEurope, some vestiges of them would have remained, and climbed up some of the foresttrees and become wild, as the asparagus haddone. Traditions among illiterate men are not to be depended upon.

In myjourneying down the Ohio, I found at Marietta a Frenchman, who wasmaking several barrels of wine every year, out of grapes that were growing wild, and abundantly, on the heads of the Islands of the Ohioriver, known by the name of Sand grapes,because they grow best on the gravels; a few plants of which are nowgrowing in one. of our vineyards, given bythe Harmonites under the name of red juice of the Islands, I drank some of the wine, when about 4 months old, and found it like the wine produced inthe vicinity of Paris, in France, if notbetter. All the French then livingon the borders of the Ohio, were fully of the opinion, that those vineswere of French origin; that they had beenplanted first at Fort Duquesne, now Pittsburgh, and when the English took thatfort, the French rooted them out, andthrew the vines into the river, which carried and lodged them at the heads ofthe Islands, where they havemultiplied and produce (an) abundance of grapes,because they are most regularly pruned by the floating iceof the river which acts on them, as the pruning knife of a vine-dresser. The tradition was handed down with so many peculiar circumstances,and the grapes, which are thebest, that I know among the wild,resembling partly the species known in

France by the name of de la Madelaine, that I believedit, until I found the same kind of grapes, up the Kentucky, and Mississippirivers, where it was impossible they could have been brought, from theOhio by floating on the water; and, by the inspection of their blossom I foundthem to possess the genericcharacters of the indigenous American wild grapes; of which I shall speak more hereafter.

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June 19 2006

Enomatic: Changing the Wine Game

A local wine shop called Grapevine Cottage puts out a weekly newsletter that is conversational and newsy--part blog, part legacy wine marketing. In general, it’s a pretty good read and it supposedly goes out to about 3000 people--its reach is pretty good.

Two weeks ago the owner of the shop was detailing a vacation to Winter Park, FLA and the wine scene that is growing rapidly. He went on to rave about a wine sampling device called the Enomatic--the wine tasting machines that are slowly but surely penetrating either coast and the Southeast.

I find this interesting for a couple of reasons--most notably because I am a huge advocate of taking the wine tasting room model to retail acceptance. It’s a no-brainer to me. And, while some state laws make it difficult--like Indiana for example--any sampling can occur only if you have a full liquor license (read: expensive to obtain--$100 - 200K +), a restaurant (in which case consumers can’t actually touch the wine while shopping), or as a winery (where you can only sell your own wine).

But, aside from individual state vagaries, the Enomatic is just plain cool. Imagine going into a wine shop and sampling EVERY wine before you buy--ensuring that you never get a bottle that is a letdown--because you tasted it. Or, imagine, sampling to your hearts content with a group of friends, scoring wines and seeing what your group winner is for the evening.

The article says this:

TheWine Room may represent the next big concept in wine bars. Back in 1983, I read a book that influencedmy career perhaps more than any other. In retrospect, Megatrends, by John Naisbitt, was filled with what Imight now term "blinding flashes of the obvious." One of his mantras was what he called"High Tech - High Touch," theconcept that people wanted the convenience of technology, but still wanted apersonal touch along with it. Rightagain… witness our store… order it on line, but everyone knows your namewhen you pick it up. The Wine Roomtakes that idea to the next level.

Thenthey inserted a completely computerized wine tasting system with over 150 wineavailable by the 1 ounce or 4 ounce pour… in your Riedel Vinum Bordeaux stem,of course. The selection spans thegamut from $.90 cents to $15 an

ounceand from Caymus Special Select Cabernet and 2001 d’Yquem to Chilean SauvignonBlanc and Bogle Petite Sirah.

Utilizing an Italianwine dispensing system called the Enomatic, (see the system at http://www.sheffimports.com- they’re not cheap) they have both wall mounted and free stand circular winepouring stations throughout the store that keep the wine at proper servingtemperature, and blanket it with inert gas to prevent oxidation. They are activated by "smartcards" that you purchase and are programmed at the front counter. Hand them your credit card, tell them howmuch you want to spend and they give you a smart card that can be used at eachtasting station.

I’m in love with this idea. It’s not being done in the Midwest, to my knowledge, outside of Chicago, but this is such a simple and easy wine to make wine not only enjoyable to shop for by consumers, but also a way for marketers to cut through the clutter of the wine wall.

Check out: http://www.sheffimports.com/sheffimportshome.htm

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June 19 2006

Wine Sediments

I have a post over on the Wine Sediments portion of the WellFed Network. I’ve consistently been in the Monday slot, which is either good, or it’s bad, depending on how you look at it.

Monday’s are a tough slot. You don’t want to be too over the top, yet inoffensive isn’t the route either.

Either my writing is too general and not inflammatory enough to stoke the weekly fires, or I’m the wine blog equivalent of Matt Lauer from the "Today Show"--just likable enough to be inoffensive.

And, in that vein, I play the role of observer and layperson ala Lauer in a segment on gadgets--in this case, wine gadgets including the very cool Pek Wine Steward--a personal, one bottle preservation system that can increase the lifetime of a bottle of wine up to two weeks.

You can read the post over here.

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June 16 2006

Maryland Wine Dispatch

I picked up the obligatory travelers newspaper this morning--USA Today. It’s the soundbite newspaper perfect for the guys and gals on the road that make headline based small talk for the better part of everyday.

And, while traipsing through the airport I got sucked into a Maryland schwag shop. I’m such a sucker for local wine. Even if its bad, it’s still feels somewhat philanthropic to support a small, regional winery. So, buy I do.

The wine rack in this Maryland shop was, for the most part, filled with fruit wines like Raspberry/Strawberry mixes. As I noted in a previous email on the "The Long Tail" of wine marketing, this is pretty much stock-in-trade for wineries that aren’t in states that begin with CA, WA or, perhaps, OR.

I picked up a 2004 Syrah from Boordy Vineyards for $16.95. Information is scant about the wine on the Internet leading me to believe that this is probably not distributed out of the state. I think Boordy does a pretty handsome business as a winery and doing wedding receptions. There’s another winery in Northern Michigan called Blackstar Farms that this web site and winery reminds me of.

The Boordy web site indicates that the family that runs the place, and Rob Deford, in particular, went to school at UC Davis for Enology.

Actually, you can tell this is made by somebody that is professionally trained at a place like UC Davis because it’s a darn good wine--one of the better wines I’ve tasted from vinifera grapes East of the Mississippi. They say it’s crafted in a Rhone-style, which is probably right. It’s low in alcohol--just 12%. If I had it sooner, I might have used it for the Wine Blogging Wednesday that just took place and was centered around reds under 12.5% alcohol--which, I am to believe, is pretty tough to scare up in this "New World" day and age.

The Boordy is much less of an in-your-face Syrah, like a Bogle, for example, and medium-bodied with a heady bouquet of strawberries, spice and some earthiness. It goes down easy with medium length. I made it through my first glass without giving it much thought. Nobody likes a quitter, so I poured another glass. Overall, I’m not sure it’s a $16.95 wine, but you could do significantly worse in your local wine shop. I came away impressed.

While sitting in the airport scanning the USA Today, I also ran across a couple of three things that I thought were interesting.

There was a blurb about the Park Hyatt in Chicago introducing "sensory branding" whereby the hotel will have a signature scent--the Hyatt will smell like green peppercorns, with overtones of red habanero peppers. Anybody that has ever walked by a Cinnabon knows what this is all about. I can barely smell cinnamon now without my stomach grumbling for a 1300 calorie cinnamon sugar bomb.

But, the real thought that I had here was that sensory branding really means that a brand is made up of touch, taste, smell, sight and sound. Wine is probably one of the very few consumable products that encompasses all five. Wine X magazine created wine bars with Jelly Belly jelly beans , wouldn’t it be fun and interesting if a winery did a scratch and sniff sticker or multiple single scent stickers on the outside of their bottle encompassing the flavor profile--raspberry, earth, violets, etc ... what a great opportunity to differentiate on the shelf.

Also in the Life section was a blurb on Jerry Shriver’ daily under $15 wine pick. Today’s pick was the Kendall-Jackson Zinfandel which he dubbed, "A hamburger wine if ever there was one." To make five recommendations a week would seem like a pretty tough job, but when you consider how many nationally distributed wine SKU’s there are now, it’s actually not that tough--especially given that most mass produced wines are pretty clean and consistent. It doesn’t have to be great, it just has to be non-offensive. Like a house guest, kind of. Interestingly, to bloggers at least, he doesn’t have a whole lot of comments--which, to me, means by sphere if influence, a lot of bloggers are doing better traffic than USA Today.

The final thing that caught my eye was a review on the book "Heat" whereby the author, Bill Buford, left his writing gig at The New Yorker and did an apprenticeship with Mario Batali at his Babbo restaurant. First, I think Batali is the only Food Network chef that has been able to transcend the medium to a mass platform and still keep his credibility intact. Secondarily, it mentions that Batali is a wine drinking machine that can down 12 bottles over the course of an evening with a companion.

I mean, seriously, twelve bottles!!! Anybody that can drink more than 4 bottles with somebody else deserves a special mention and notice. Can you say "Under the Table?" Can you say "Headache of Titanic Proportions?" This may also explain Batali’s girth because those 3000 calories alone exceed the daily allowance for a man and I know Mario is eating in there, as well.

Have a wine soaked weekend!

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