Monthly Archives: February 2007

New label for Two Oceans

 

Two Oceans has unveiled a cleaner, fresher and altogether more elegant packaging worldwide on the back of brand and packaging research.

Says brand representative Carlyn Lyons: “The globalised packaging initiative has standardised the pack look in all our markets.  This gave us the opportunity to make some small adjustments to the design to ensure it continued to project a light, contemporary coastal image, while emphasising the southern coast of Africa as the geographic point where two great oceans meet.”

The new look, complete with self-adhesive, scuff-resistant labels, features a longer, narrower label with cleaner, larger and more modern type, a swish under the trademark logo and a more clearly articulated diamond, framing the coastline where the Indian and Atlantic oceans converge. Textured varnish on the label has been used to echo the movement of the sea. Colour bands create the distinction between varietals, underscored by different colour capsuling.  The back label includes a map, locating the southern coastline of the Cape.

She adds that the new design also better accommodates the distinction between varietal and entry-level tiers.  “It makes it easier for trade when displaying product and also for winelovers when making their choice from the range.”

“In many countries, Two Oceans bottles are closed under screwcap to meet market demand.  However, in our two largest markets, Canada and South Africa, as well as in Ireland, we are still using cork closures in line with consumer preference.”

By DKC Communications.

Memorable quotations

“Designing with a conscience – in fact, living and working and playing with a conscience – and dumping products that have dubious origins or harm the environment is the way of now, as our future is already here and it ain’t looking so pretty inside. Here’s only one fact in the calamity that is being forecast by activists and scientists: we face having polar bears going extinct in our lifetimes. Do any of us want that?”

Louise Marsland, editor,  www.bizcommunity.com

Would your wine brand be missed?

In their book Mavericks at Work, William C. Taylor and Polly LaBarre include a very powerful question every brand owner must ask themselves. And given the current state of the global wine industry and it’s uncertain future, it’s a question every wine brand owner must answer today to better prepare for tomorrow.

That question is:

“If your company went out of business tomorrow, who would really miss your brand and why?”

The authors go on to further explain why people might miss your brand:

“Because it’s providing a product or service so unique it can’t be provided nearly as well by any other company. Because it’s created a workplace so dynamic that most employees would be hard-pressed to find a similar environment somewhere else. Because it has forged a uniquely emotional connection with customers that other companies can’t replicate”.

So, if your brand went out of business tomorrow, would any of us care? Does your brand provide such a unique product and customer experience that we would be saddened if it didn’t exist? Does your company treat it’s employees so astonishingly well that those workers would not be able to find another employer to treat them as well? Does your brand forge such unfailing emotional connections with your customers that they would fail to find another brand that could forge just as strong emotional bond?

How does your brand rate? Does your brand provide anything unique? Has your brand forged unbreakable emotional connections with it’s customers? Would anybody miss your brand if it went out of business tomorrow?

Mavericks at Work: Why the Most Original Minds in Business Win (William Morrow, October 2006).

By Mike Carter. Adapted from Would You Miss the Gap? by John Moore and posted on Brand Autopsy.

Pink Champagne

Interest in “all things pink” and a perception that rose wine is “young and extroverted” is propelling a growing market for nonvintage rose champagne, reports Sarah Nassauer in The Wall Street Journal (2/15/07). This trend, which “most producers believe … is a structure shift, not just a trend” — a new category, in fact — is being promoted most notably by Moet & Chandon, which made a decision that pink champagne made sense about six years ago. Part of their thinking was pure economics. It’s less expensive to produce a bottle of nonvintage rose champagne than nonvintage white champagne (nonvintage wines mix “grapes from different harvests”). The margins on the pink stuff are also better, with bottles of nonvintage rose priced “15 percent to 20 percent higher than a bottle of nonvintage white champagne.”

That’s not to say the move into rose champagne wasn’t risky for Moet & Chandon. Their decision meant “transferring valuable grapes to rose production years before any actual sales while the bottles aged.” They couldn’t just plant more grapes because of “a 1927 French law, aimed at maintaining quality, that fixed France’s Champagne region at about 84,000 acres, most of which is already planted.” But Moet figured if they got the marketing right, they should have a hit on their hands. The marketing began with “rose-petal covered Valentine’s Day ads in glossy magazines and special packaging in the late 1990s.” But the real focus has been the fashion industry. For three years running, Moet & Chandon has hosted the Moet Rose Lounge in New York’s Bryant Park during fashion week.

The events cost “hundreds of thousands of dollars” but when Paris Sheraton’s publicist calls and asks for a VIP pass, Moet assumes it’s getting the right kind of buzz. Next up are Moet Rose “picnic bags, complete with magnums of Rose Imperial. Only 10 will be available for sale in the U.S., priced at $1,500 apiece.” Other champagne houses balk at that kind of marketing, but Moet brand manager Franklin D. Isacson says it’s what’s required: “They’re so jaded,” he says of the fashion crowd, “We have to do something to stand out.” So far, so good: “For decades, rose’s share of the French champagne export market hovered around two percent to three percent. But since 2000, rose champagne’s share has climbed to more than seven percent, with exports soaring 37 percent in the first nine months of 2006,” versus a year ago.

By Tim Manners, editor www.reveries.com

Wine Blogging – South African Style

According to AlaWine there are 400 known wine blogs on the internet, so in theory wine enthusiasts should be spoilt for choice. Not exactly. The reality is that South African bloggers are starved for choice, and so far I’ve only managed to pinpoint nine home grown (South African) blogs (shown in alphabetical order):

  1. Cathy’s blog
  2. Cult South African Wine
  3. Pendock Unbottled
  4. Serious About Wine
  5. Stormhoek
  6. The Cru
  7. The Rootstock Blogspot
  8. Vilafonte
  9. Warwick

Prove me wrong! If you know of any other South African wine blogs please email me: mike@seriousaboutwine.co.za

The definitive list of 100 top wine blogs is available at www.AlaWine.com

By Mike Carter.

Wine Packaging Trends

The past five years has seen wine packaging undergo a revolution. As supermarkets become the main driving force in distribution, wine marketers have had to adapt and refine their packaging accordingly. For decades wine packaging design remained static and hardly changed. To remain relevant for consumers packaging needs to stay fresh and frequently has to be “re-freshed” or even totally rejuvenated.

So what’s the future for wine packaging?

To attract the consumer’s attention the wine industry needs to design products that are worth talking about. Products with that “wow” factor. Does your packaging connect with the consumer and get them talking about your products? Simplicity will be the buzzword as consumers overwhelmed by choices and starved for time want to feel like the decision process was made easy for them. Savvy marketers will focus on traditional production methods and styles in order to reach increasingly segmented markets.

Here are three major trends that will impact on the wine industry:

1. Lifestyle conscious consumers are looking for healthy alternatives. Four out of the top ten best selling soft drinks in America are low-calorie or low-caffeine. Beer manufacturers are trying to capitalise on the power of the purse by targeting women (who are the decision makers eighty percent of the time) with low-calorie products. Consumers regard the origin of their food as highly important, and they are prepared to pay a premium – if you give them a great experience.

2. Supermarkets are changing the industry’s dynamics by driving manufacturers to consider more environmentally friendly options in their packaging materials.        Wal-Mart unveiled their packaging scorecard last year with the aim of reducing packaging across its global supply chain five per cent by 2013. Retailers Asda and Tesco in collaboration with British Glass are encouraging wine importers to bulk import wine for bottling in lighter glass bottles manufactured in the United Kingdom.

3. Private label is a growing force and will become more so as retailers become better marketers. Private label wine sales account for nearly fifty percent of the UK market and sixty percent of German wine sales (www.winebusiness.com). And according to ACNielsen data, private label brands sell at an average price point of fifteen percent lower than the average brand price, further eroding wine industry paper thin margins. Private label industry expert John Stanley says that the time for selling product has gone; it’s now a brand issue. The question is whose brand will dominate, the suppliers’ or the retailers’? Private labels will continue to compete with brand leaders and if your brand is not a market leader then your market share is already under threat.

So maybe it’s time for wine industry players to consider what type of business they are really in – are you producing an agricultural commodity or are you a branded consumer goods company? And package accordingly.

By Mike Carter. This article was originally published on www.wine.co.za

Airport wine tasting & retail

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Duty free sales globally are worth $27 billion and growing. Of that, wine, beer, and spirits contribute $4.75 billion. And it’s also a crucial marketing platform for high-end brands. Here’s an innovative new concept recently posted on www.springwise.com.

Layovers at Washington Dulles, Seattle-Tacoma and Sacramento airports just got more sophisticated. Vino Volo, a play on the Italian words for “wine flight,” offers weary passengers an escape from the chaotic food courts and loud bars that are all too familiar at major airports.

At Vino Volo, customers can sample wines either by the glass or in tasting flights. Plates of cheese, cured meats, salmon rolls and other gourmet fare complement the flavours of the wine in a relaxed, upscale atmosphere. The experience doesn’t have to end when a flight begins boarding: wines are available for purchase by the bottle and can be shipped to a customer’s home (subject to state law).

Plans are in the works to expand to 10-12 additional airports this year, starting with JFK and Baltimore. The early success of Vino Volo goes to show that airline passengers are indeed willing to indulge on a little luxury as they await their flights – even if they may have pinched pennies on their airfare.
Website: www.vinovolo.com

Fortune Corkies

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In an overcrowded marketplace wineries are constantly looking for any conceivable advantage to keep themselves one step ahead of the competiton, and build brand loyalty. Here’s a innovative yet simple idea from Fantesca Estate, St. Helena, California – Fortune Corkies. Traditionaly wineries have often printed their names or brands on their corks, and this takes the process of brand building one step further by printing wine quotations on the corks. Consumers often examine the cork before drinking, so this is going to be a great conversation starter that will result in plenty of word of mouth marketing, but bound to create lots of copy-cats. Take a quick look at the web page www.fantesca.com/fortunecorkies or spend some time admiring their impressive web site www.fantesca.com

By Mike Carter. First posted on www.winecast.net