Vender vino

It was Tuesday. Vinexpo had started on Sunday and ended on Thursday and I had no reservation in a hotel in Bordeaux. There are 700 kilometers from Madrid to Bordeaux.

I decided to go by car if I got a room in a hotel at good price. I got into booking.com, but I couldn’t find anything in Bordeaux below 200 euros per night.

Then I looked in San Sebastian and Irun which are cities halfway from Madrid to Bordeaux. I found a hotel, The Ibys at 60 euros per night. I booked it and decided that if I didn’t get a room at good price in Bordeaux I would use the same hotel in this same city on the way back.

But what was the exact address of the fair in Bordeaux? I got into vinexpo.com , but … would I know how get to the show? I grabbed the iPhone mapping application that accurately showed the number of miles and how to get to the fair.

I went home and made my suitcase and started my 700 kilometer journey. To keep me entertained I had transferred to my Iphone all the conferences that I had attended the previous week in “La red innova”. After having listened to all of them on this journey I think I could recite them by heart. They were pretty interesting!

After having slept in Irun I went to the fair arriving at 2PM, without having to ask anyone directions (and without getting lost). At 4 PM I decided to look again at booking.com, I found a tiny hotel in the center at 85 euros per night. I grinned because I knew I was staying this night in Bordeaux.

I arrived at the hotel. To get there, was not an easy task, but with the help of my Iphone I had the impression I could go any place in the world. They gave me the key and the code to enter to the hotel wifi. I read my email , and went to the Vinexpo website again to prepare some of the visits to certain stands that I wanted to schedule. I also visited several websites of potential clients in order to have a clearer idea of what was their positioning, image, products, awards, who was behind them, their facilities, and their history.

How simple it is to prepare an appointment if you have good information about the people you are going to meet!

As I left the hotel in the evening I asked for good places for dinner in Bordeaux. The answer I had was something like… “you go right, and then you take left and after right…. No Sir! Tell me the name of the street and I will find it on my Iphone. ¿Is it an 8 minute walk? Ok. I felt as comfortable as if I was at home.

On the next day I returned to Vinexpo with no hesitation. I paid a fee to have wifi on my laptop which allowed me to show to my contacts several demos and emails that I thought could be helpful on the visit.

Is everything I am talking about here “High tech”? I wouldn’t say so. What have I done? Just the same things I would have done 20 years ago. But now, thanks to the new technologies I can do many more things, and particularly in this case I would not have made the trip without them.

Will I sell or not because of this trip? I still don’t know, but I do know is that I have done all I could do to get results. Helped and complemented by the new technologies. And for sure I would not have sold anything if I had not gone.

Now I am talking directly to the wineries.

Do you think you’re taking advantage of new technologies to sell? Allow me to answer for you. I’m sure you don’t. How do wineries sell wine? For the most part in front of the buyer physically the first time. You could take advantage of the Internet a lot more than you do, to find interesting prospects, or allow these prospects to find you. You could take advantage of much of the new technology to keep in touch with the people you’ve come to know in the real world

Do you want to sell more? Get with it!

This post in Spanish: Cómo las nuevas tecnologías me permitieron ir a Vinexpo en Burdeos. 

It´s amazing the difference between social media on the English speaking wine sector, if compared with Spanish speaking wine sector.

There is a huge distance. Bu there is something that is unquestionable. What is happening there will happen here too.

Someone said a few days ago in Twittter that the wine industry does not believe in Social Media. My answer to this tweet was that it is not important if wineries do not believe. What is important is that many consumers do. These two factors altogether mean  there is a huge potential for entepreneur wineries that are brave enough (Are they only brave or have they also the knowledge?), to make the leap.

But… Do we want facts?

A few days ago, Fenavin, one of the most important Spanish wine fairs took place in Ciudad Real. A good friend of mine,  Jesús Benito, was responsible of making a conference during the fair about 2.0 which was called  Fenavin 2.0. In the beginning, the room was crowded, but as soon as they gave some prizes for important players on the wine industry, most of the people left. Only 20 or 25 people stayed for the “true conference”. Very few wineries.

By the way. Y have to say that the speakers and their conferences were at premium level. Congratulations to Jesus Benito for organizing it so well. Everything was fine.

This same week the London Wine Fair took place. On this fair there was also a conference about electronic commerce. The ticket for getting in was 150 pounds per person, with a maximum of 200 people. They had closed he ticket allocations on the internet several days before the event. Y guess there was a full assistance.

I do not know what conclusions my readers do take about this. I have no doubt about the importance of what Social Media has in order get visibility and sales. This is coming also to Spain very soon, and many wineries are not going to be well prepared for this.

In the English speaking world there is a great excitement. And in Spain, at the same time it looks as we were in the middle of the desert. Let us give time to my prediction. But not too much. It is coming soon.

This post in Spanish: Comunicación digital del vino en España y en el mundo anglosajón

The organizers of the show contacted me to see if I could get Spanish wineries willing to be exhibited at the 2ème édition du salon virtuel du vin WineFair.com in Paris.

The idea seemed interesting to me because the world that I proclaimed turns around internet.

With this proposal I approached several wineries, some said they would have to think about it, some others said a straight no, only Estrella Orti from Gosalbez-Orti winery (Madrid), was willing not only to participate as speaker but as a conference lecturer, presenting her winery and the whole project around wine production.

Estrella gave an excellent presentation in French, explained the basis of her winery, the philosophy evolving wine (they produce high quality organic wines which are distributed in 13 countries) and above all, they are strongly committed to wine tourism.

To hear the conference click here (in french)

Bodega Qubél Conference Ir a descargar

And the questions are: How did it go with Bodega Gosálbez Orti at the virtual fair? How can you measure the effectiveness of their active presence at the fair? Well, main evaluation comes by the number of hot contacts obtained at the fair , the degree of general interest shown by the visitors , the number of appointments generated , the future encounters with actual clients , the number of direct and indirect sales generated, by general observation and what one has seen along the event, and finally for the direct feeling of what is being done in the wine sector .

In no case Gosálbez Orti is going to provide data , on this or any other fair event. The knowledge of how well it worked in a specific fair is an asset to the winery that gets involved.

You should keep in mind that we are talking about a virtual wine trade show, something totally new in the wine market. But Gosalbez-Orti winery is different for many reasons others than shown in their blog winetoursmadrid.com and Facebook bodega qubel , but for being the only Spanish winery who attended this event and have a much more entrepreneurial sense than the rest of thousands of wineries in Spain . Getting into this kind of adventures gives them a much better and clearer differentiation.

Among wine producers the world game in 2011 tends for quality and many more attributes, like the very important fact of standing out from competition.

I also participated as a speaker at the fair show and my participation had an added difficulty that gave me more challenge to my statements. This was about my difficulty of speaking French and not being able to communicate as fluent as Estrella did in her speech. For this reason we agreed that my questioning would have to be made in French and I would respond in English. Besides this minor problem, the whole virtual wine fair was a nice experience and I hope to hang soon a post after fixing some trouble I had with the edited audio.

I invite my readers to visit, taste and drink the wines from  Bodega Gosálbez Orti, among other qualities, you will find a different winery “, I think it is “unique.”

This post in spanish: Con Bodega Gosálbez Orti en La 2ème édition du salon virtuel du vin WineFair.com, en París

The Perez-Pardo family comes from the Caroig Massif, a rugged, very mountainous area with deep ravines, broad valleys and a very long tradition of wine making.

It is located in the southwest of the province of Valencia, in the River Clariano district, which comes under the the “Valencia” Designation of Origin.

The Bodega was founded in 1999. Its motivation was that of building up a winery entirely based on our own vineyards, so as to produce wines by our extensive work , beginning with our wines and ending with the satisfaction of the customers who taste our wines.

At present Bodegas Enguera possesses 160 hectares of its own vineyards, distributed between two specific areas. The first lies in the municipallity of Enguera ; there we have some 100 hectares located in various properties, the most important of which are the Antolin, Bañona, Benali, Toñuna and Venta Corrales.

Peter, the third generation of his family in Enguera Winery presents to us Cotopardo Crianza 2007, Cañada Negra 2008, and Benali 2007.

Peter also talks about the potential for wine tourism in the cellar and in the surrounding area.

Related posts:
First International Organic Wine Fair in Spain. After the event.
First International Organic Wine Fair in Spain

Post in Spanish: Bodegas Enguera en la Primera Feria Internacional del Vino Ecológico

Text from: Enguera Winery Website

The Winery Dominio de Punctum was born five years ago as a project and has now been in the market for one year.

They expect to grow rapidly; bearing in mind their 500,000 bottles produced every year.

The Winery is located in Las Pedroñeras (Cuenca) and has 110 hectares of vineyards. Their philosophy is to produce organic wines through sustainable viticulture in order to offer quality products elaborated according to traditional production methods.

They produce distinctive red and white wines from Tempranillo, Graciano, Syrah, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Petit Verdot Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc and Viognier grapes at 800 meters above sea level, on a sandy and limestone-rich soil.

Their main characteristics are the following:

- Permanent search of quality.
- Organic production in order to elaborate wines containing the essence of the region.
- Continuous efforts to innovate (i.e. application of biodynamic methods).
- Evaluation of natural resources (i.e. reuse of waste water).
- Commitment to sustainable agriculture and production with a very attractive good-value-for-money culture.

Jesús Fernández, Business Manager and Owner of the Winery, presenting his business at the Fair. Graciano Syrah (Dominio de Punctum) presenting his product.

Related posts:
First International Organic Wine Fair in Spain
First International Organic Wine Fair in Spain. After the event.

Post in Spanish: Dominio de Punctum en la Primera Feria Internacional del Vino Ecológico