As COVID-19 continues to challenge the business of your winery, consider these three different strategies to up-level your business and return to profitability:
1. Maximizing loyalty and community for your winery through technology.
• What is the best strategy to execute successful virtual tastings?
• Why does my virtual tasting and/or tour feel “forced”?
• How can I best sell wine online?
Customers are craving authentic face-to-face time with your winemaker and team. The most successful wineries give their followers at least a week’s notice for the virtual tasting, story time, or tour.
2. Maintaining and building your long-term on-premise presence and to get creative with your Tasting Room (Direct to Consumer) sales.
• How can I keep a good relationship with a restaurant that closed?
• How do I work with my distributor to maintain my relationships on-premise?
• Are there any ways to sell wines other than curbside pickup?
While wine sales continue to surge off-premise, the pendulum will eventually swing back so don’t lose touch with your on-premise accounts. Furthermore, social distancing will more than likely continue as businesses eventually open (including restaurants and your tasting room) so get creative to maximize sales.
3. Creativity and flexibility in wine manufacturing to keep your employees safe. Explore opportunities with automation.
• Do you have enough or too much finished wine on hand, in tank, in barrel?
• How have you had to adjust your winery operations and bottling schedule to ensure the safety of your team?
• What type of automation upgrade did you put off that could be helping now?
Production plans and winery operations in the cellar and in the bottling, hall change rapidly and will even more over the next twelve months.
Please contact me if you’d like to discuss any of the above strategies and come up with solutions to boost your winery’s profits.