As the pioneer of Vitis Vinifera in the Eastern US, Dr. Konstantin Frank is one of the key leaders of the Fingers Lakes region in New York. Meaghan Frank, a fourth-generation vintner, has been leading the charge to evolve its hospitality program to create brand ambassadors for the winery and the region. Its 1886 Wine Experience has won Best Wine Tour by USA Today in the last two years. Meaghan breaks down their hospitality program and its impact on their business.

Detailed Show Notes:

Finger Lakes region, NY - 150 wineries (of 400 in NY), NW NY State - 5 hrs from NYC

• Skinny, deep lakes that moderate weather
• Glaciers left diverse soils
• Tourism-driven, seasonal visitors (spring to fall) for lakes, hiking, close to Niagara Falls, Corning Museum of Glass

Dr. Konstantin Frank - PhD in Viticulture from Odesa, Ukraine; a grape scientist; fled to NY during WWII

• 35 years of cold climate grape growing experience when moved to NY
• 1st to plant vinifera in Eastern US
• Planted experiment station in the 1950s - 68 varieties, including Furmit, Pedro Ximenez, and Touriga Nacional) to research what would work best

Dr. K Frank Winery

• 17 vinifera varieties → 40 wines
• 60% wholesale, 40% DTC
• 40 states, 9 export markets (5%, incl Japan, Aruba (lots of NY visitors), UK)
• DTC 60% e-commerce (driven by wine club), 40% hospitality

Hospitality program

• The goal is to create brand ambassadors and loyalty, get the word out about the Finger Lakes
• Inspired by Australian hospitality programs - private, educational
• ~40k visitors/year (#1 PA - 1 hour away, NJ, OH, NY core markets) - all seated, paid
• Pre-pandemic - ~80k visitors/year for free bar tastings
• Moved to an experience-driven program with wine educators, take advantage of lake view

Three experiences:

• Eugenia’s Garden - modeled after great grandmother’s garden, most casual, can do a la carte glasses/bottles/flights; enables people to enjoy the day; targets a younger demographic
• Signature Seated ($15pp) - most popular, educational, 1 hr, 6 wines, 5 different themes that are part of the winery’s story (e.g., traditional sparkling, Riesling pioneer, groundbreaking grapes, red wines)
• The 1886 Wine Experience ($75pp) - only May-Oct, 2-2.5 hrs, led by wine educator, a tour of the vineyard, sparkling and still wine cellars, seated tasting of 4 wines with bites, followed by additional tastings; won best wine tour by USA Today last 2 years; lots of 1st-time visitors book 1886 due to unique nature
• Lessons learned - used to do 6 wine flight w/ bites, which was too many; did themed months (e.g., sparkling) - did not work with mostly tourists
• Differentiators - spend lots of time, has a separate private space for 1886

Wine club evolution

• Used to have people pay upfront for the year - bigger barrier to signing up, always feel like “playing catchup” to ensure value delivered, concentrated work during shipment periods
• Moved to more subscription model - quarterly, 3 wines w/ default package, fully customizable, no upfront fee, 20% discount on wines, and get free tastings (no limit)
• 8% club conversion - the only way to get free tastings now, used to waive w/ 4 bottle purchase
• Locals small portion of the club - pickup option only 10%, PA #1
• Avg tenure 1.5 years, seeing it extend with the new club model

Popular wines

• Hospitality - Rkatsiteli #1, traditional method sparkling
• Wholesale - #1 & #2 - dry & semi-dry Riesling
• Riesling 60% of production, traditional method growing

Increasing issues around climate change - 2023 had the largest spring frost in history, increasing water issues

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

With ~2M monthly sessions on their newly unified commerce and media website, Wine Enthusiast continues to be a beacon for the wine industry. Jacki Strum, President of Wine Enthusiast Media, details their new wine review platform and global wine travel directory, democratizing access to wine and wine experiences globally. These initiatives help bring more people into the world of wine, including the younger generations, a critical part of building a vibrant wine industry.

Detailed Show Notes:

Covid altered the business model, led to re-structured organization and unified media and commerce divisions on wineenthusiast.com

2022 - WE paused reviews for emerging wine regions to recalibrate systems

Existing tasting process

• 1 of 2 publications that review every wine blind (high cost), taste in flights w/in region and price brackets
• Need to store, archive, organize wines, set up tastings (in paper bags with numbers), and hire reviewers
• 50% of reviews are done at HQ (imported wines), and West Coast wines are done locally
• The manual process of filling out a pdf and putting that into the box with wines, manually inputted into J Guide (legacy system, 20 years old), then stored and organized for tasting

New tasting platform (Sept 2024) - anyone can submit a wine for review and all will be reviewed

• New digital platform - bar code scanners, printed tabs, can track shipments and deliveries, a more fluid database
• Reduces large volume of questions from people submitting wine (can track digitally)
• It has the same # of reviewers, but a more flexible infrastructure can allow for more wines to be tasted
• $65/SKU processing fee - all reviewers charge in some way (e.g., require subscription, membership, or advertisement)
• 6-month processing time (same as before) - hope to reduce this over time, based on the schedule of reviewers
• Printed reviews selected by the tasting dept, all scores published online for free

Tasting platform benefits for new and small wineries

• Opens up reviews to all regions across the globe
• The US market is still heavily score-driven for distribution (some major retailers, e.g., Costco, Kroger, Albertsons, require scores from major publications)
• Helps with tasting room and local distribution sales

Media trends

• Print is still doing well (e.g., books outsold movie tickets last year), and magazine subscriptions are increasing (free tote bags help)
• Advertising up slightly
• Digital media is growing, with a targeted advertising focus
• Events - biggest growth area - launched Sip of South America, Sip of Italy, and biggest event is Wine Star Awards (25th Anniversary in SF this year)
• TikTok now allows alcohol advertising, getting Gen Z engaged with wine knowledge

New travel division for WE

• Tasting room directory, partnered w/ Tock - 1st agnostic travel global wine travel guide
• Leverages Tock’s wineries as launching list (~1,200 wineries, CA focused), building out globally with WE relationships (~100 wineries reached out in 1st month to be included)
• The 2nd most trafficked page on the site

WE revenue mix

• Covid - led to explosive commerce growth
• Today - back to 2019 levels, ~80% commerce / ~20% media

Getting Gen Z engaged with wine

• Print enables content absorption without ad bombardment (e.g., book reading bars in NYC)
• Need to change content for each channel to target audience (e.g., Google as people’s “secret diary,” article on how to hold a wine glass became a top 5 article)
• Influencers, infographics, video - bring in new consumers (e.g., wine & potato chip parking article led to major influencer doing every pairing on TikTok)

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

During a career sabbatical from wine PR at a yoga teacher retreat, Morgan Perry tried combining wine education and yoga with great success. Her classmates practically forced her to found Vino Vinyasa, which has blossomed into six cities. With a focus on creating great experiences rather than selling wine, Morgan has created a platform where people learn about wine and end up seeking out the wines featured in classes.

Detailed Show Notes:

Morgan’s background - wine PR, been in wine for ~15 years, became a yoga teacher in 2017

Wine & Yoga synergies

• Both are about mindfulness - yoga and the wine tasting process
• Not for hard-core wellness or yoga people

Vino Vinyasa

• For the yoga teacher exam, the teacher encouraged something different, tried yoga & wine, and got a fantastic reception
• 6 cities - NYC (2017), Austin (2018), Nashville, Chicago, LA, Houston

Vino Vinyasa programming

• 45 min Vinyasa yoga (all levels), followed by wine tasting of 2 wines
• Taste wine after yoga - people are relaxed and have “yoga brain” in a quiet, focused environment → people may be better tasters
• Embed wine facts during yoga
• A comparative tasting of 2 wines, usually themed (e.g., Rose, Sauvignon Blanc)
• All instructors have a wine background (min WSET 1)
• 2-3 classes/month, 20-25 people/class for intimacy (capped at 30)
• ~30 classes/themes developed to date
• Very intentional class structure, certain poses not suitable for teaching

Business model

• The core business is to get people to do more classes and events, not be overly salesy with wine
• Do private events (90% are bachelorette parties)
• Sell swag (t-shirts), co-branded bottles
• Look to be good value (avg class price $30) vs. regular yoga classes (avg ~$20-25, range from $10-35 for drop in class)

Students often seek out wines after classes

Wine selection for classes

• Venue dependant, venues carry liquor licenses
• City Winery (NYC) - chooses the wines based on their selection
• Other venues - can get wines donated for classes
• Private events - Customers can select wines/themes
• Have worked with PR clients for wines
• Some wineries sponsored virtual classes during Covid

Marketing

• PR background has helped and got early press (e.g., digital Good Morning America), mostly wine market
• Email newsletter
• IG is the best channel, does some boosting, and is focused on growth during Covid (~11k followers)
• Digital marketing has focused on both wellness and wine people
• ~15-20% of people have attended multiple classes

Private events

• Bachelorette parties, birthdays, corporate events (e.g., Binny’s in Chicago)
• The focus area for growth
• Same format as classes

Wellness & wine market

• Other wine + yoga classes are not educational; some are tied to multi-level marketing wine programs that have long sales pitches
• Sees more yoga at wineries
• They have been approached by a couple of spas for partnerships, but the economics were not favorable yet (i.e., yoga teachers often are not paid well, ~$30/class)

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