hawaii zip code

Regional wineries gather for second annual "license to steal"

Imagine the chief marketing officers of Ford, Daimler-Chrysler and GM getting together at a country retreat to discuss and share strategies on how to attract more buyers. Imagine them offering tips and tricks to their competitors, without a hint of hesitation or suspicion. Imagine they realize that because of an ultra-competitive consumer auto industry, they are rowing (or sinking) in the same boat.

Now imagine that the people in that room are not auto industry executives, but instead regional boutique winery and vineyard owners--farmers by trade who, because of a real fight-to-the-death struggle for consumer dollars, must band together to avoid being sunk one by one.

The latter example has taken place (officially) two years in a row in the resort town of Geneva, Ohio, where winery, vineyard and destination marketing managers from emerging wine-producing states in the Great Lakes region, as well as from North Carolina and Missouri, convened at License to Steal, the National Wine Marketing Conference.

The brainchild of a handful of state and winery association directors, the conference has blossomed from its early days of seven or eight decision-makers meeting in airport hotel rooms to a full-fledged, agenda- and seminar-driven convention that drew nearly 100 attendees this year.

"Our goal is that (attendees) leave ... exhilarated, enthused and energized," says Donniella Winchell, executive director of the Ohio Wine Producers Association and founding member of the License to Steal committee.

Add "Educated" To The Mix

The conference, with its multiple brainstorming sessions and brief, punchy presentations, serves not only as a catalyst for sharing best practices, but also as a sort of Marketing 101, outlining for the uninitiated the basic principles behind promoting a winery as a unique, year-round destination.

For years, smaller, regional wineries have focused on making wine and ends meet, rather than selling themselves as destinations, says Jenny Engle of the Pennsylvania Wine Association. "Nobody has a marketing plan."

Winery owners either thought they had enough money for the plan and it disappeared, or they didn't make time to hash one out, she says. The presentations at Licensed to Steal were designed to plant the seed for wineries looking to grow revenue streams.

Patty Held-Uthlaut of Stone Hill Winery in Hermann, Mo., attended the 2004 License to Steal Conference, where she learned that wine trails can be lucrative for all participants: They regularly bring in new visitors, and they help wineries through the so-called shoulder months--November through April--when tourism generally flags in the Midwest. If packaged correctly, they can build lasting brand awareness and customer loyalty.

Trouble is, wine trails are hard to manage, and the cost of starting a trail is not pocket change by small-winery standards. In addition, winery owners can be an intractable lot, and disagreements ranging from squabbles to all-out border wars are not uncommon.

The challenges notwithstanding, Held-Uthlaut and Stone Hill were convinced that the Hermann area was ripe for a wine trail. It's home to seven wineries in Missouri's most established wine-producing region, all within a 20-mile radius; dozens of bed and breakfasts, and within a reasonable proximity to a large metropolitan area (Hermann is approximately 90 minutes by car from St. Louis). In short, it's a good long-weekend destination spot.

In January 2005, Held-Uthlaut and the other Hermann-area wineries formed a tax-exempt association, opened a bank account and agreed to charge a 2% "tourism surcharge" on all retail sales. Each winery would send the proceeds of that surcharge to the association as seed money. In four months' time, the association had the capital it needed to begin marketing its trail. It hired a designer, printed brochures, devised an advertising campaign and began developing a Web site.

Hermann's first trail event, in July 2005, drew 400 people at $15 per person. Held-Uthlaut expected the holiday trail event, slated for Nov. 19-20, to draw 800 at the same price-point. What's more, the smallest winery on the trail, Bommarito Winery, has seen its sales increase by 50% since the trail began, according to Held-Uthlaut.

She also credits the trail for ending a dispute between two winery owners. Before the association formed, they could not stand to be in the same room. Now, they're actually sitting across from each other during meetings and holding civilized conversations, she says.

The trail's rapid success is nearly unqualified. Despite taking on the bulk of responsibility with no real sales increase to show for their efforts, Held-Uthlaut and Stone Hill have garnered media attention, and the Hermann area now has a new tourism director thanks, in part, to the wine trail.

Held-Uthlaut says unflappable leadership, willingness of bigger wineries to share information and an operating budget of between $45,000 and $65,000 per year will keep a trail organization strong and enable it to mature into a year-round destination.

Wine trails are "the future of the industry," says Winchell of the OWPA. They create a framework around which wineries can build multiple attractions--from food and wine pairings, to wine education activities and music and wine events. "The trails become experiential tourism themselves," she says.

Wine trails fit neatly into culinary tourism, one of the fast-growing niche tourism markets that has responded to (or grown out of) the deafening consumer demand for unique, "experience-based" getaways and vacations.

Consumers want to be heroes, says Erik Wolf, president and CEO of the Oregon-based International Culinary Tourism Association. They want to show off to their friends the great and different time they experienced.

Wolf, who presented the keynote speech on the first day of the conference, deftly connected the dots between cuisine, agriculture and destinations to form a picture of a getaway that meets the demands and desires of today's traveler.

Citing a study from Luntz Research Companies, Wolf said that 65% of vacationers staying in hotels said their stay would have been more enjoyable if the hotel staff could recommend a truly good place to eat.

"It's about prepared food and drink unique experiences," Wolf says.

Despite sparse empirical data on the growth of culinary tourism, anecdotal evidence is plentiful. Hawaii is touting its Kona region as a coffee-lover's destination. Slow Food USA (slowfoodusa.org) expounds on the lifestyle benefits of America's local and regional culinary roots. There's even a "dining in the dark" craze sweeping over foodies across the globe.

It's also hard to ignore established regional success. Wine-related tourism--a subdivision of culinary tourism--in Napa and Sonoma counties was estimated to generate $2 billion for the local economies in 2003. Similarly, Australia's wine tourism generated an estimated $1 billion for that nation's economy in 2001.

Wineries in regions that major wine publications either ignore or overlook can capitalize, however, by getting to know their local convention and visitors bureau members. More importantly, they should meet local restaurateurs and chefs and partner to create either wine dinners or wine and food education courses--two categories of experienced-based events that are widely successful, and relatively easy to produce.

Large-scale wine and food events are typically more arduous to conceive and create. The two-day Vintage Ohio festival in Kirtland, Ohio, the Pennsylvania Wine Festival in Hershey, Pa. and the Finger Lakes Wine Festival in Watkins Glen, N.Y. are other examples of culinary tourism destinations that emerging wine regions can analyze for possible implementation. These festival-type events may struggle financially for up to four years, but if a region is committed to culinary tourism, the events eventually pay dividends.

Direct-to-consumer shipping may also begin working for boutique wineries, thanks to recently enacted state laws that open up interstate commerce. Although the current legal landscape is more patchwork than well groomed, the legalization of shipping wine across state lines is gathering momentum.

"States don't want to spend millions of dollars to pay their own legal fees (to defend cases brought against them) and the legal fees of the plaintiff lawyers," says WineAmerica's Bill Nelson, who, in a follow-up seminar to last year's direct-shipping discussion, gave a thorough talk describing the ins and outs of direct shipping laws.

Because of the high cost, states are settling constitutional legal cases brought against them, and charging their legislatures to compromise with laws that comply both with consumer desire for choice and the Supreme Court's ruling that says states must treat every winery in the country the same.

Nelson distributed a binder that described in detail what wineries must do to ship to consumers in a given state. The binder, which cost attendees $75, included forms, laws and recommendations for wineries that wish to get in the nationwide distribution business for themselves. The most useful tip? Keep track of the county, ZIP code and state to which you're sending wine. The tax ramifications are many.

Dates and location for next year's event will be announced this month. The conference will likely re-address direct shipping because many states will have clarified their laws that affect shipping wine, Winchell says. The conference committee also hopes to double attendance by bringing in wineries from emerging and mature markets in Iowa, Kentucky, Texas, Virginia and Tennessee. A companion trade show is also in the works for the next License to Steal.

Attendees shouldn't get the wrong idea about where the conference is headed, though. Marketing--in particular, unique, results-driven plans--will remain the primary focus of the conference. "We want to push everyone intellectually to think outside the box," Winchell says. "We're going to keep focusing on marketing the experience (of wineries), on how to make money in selling these great opportunities we have."

(Joseph Frey is director of Web development at Great Lakes Publishing Co. Contact him through edit@winesandvines.com.)

RELATED ARTICLE: Book Promotes Wine For Health And Beauty

Stay Healthy With Wine--Natural Cures and Beauty Secrets from the Vineyards, by Marjorie St. Aubyn "The Wine Lady," touts wine as a versatile, natural food that can be used for a variety of beneficial purposes. St. Aubyn prescribes specific wines and wine concoctions for treatment of ailments from arthritis to the common cold. A wine and mayonnaise tanning lotion and brandy shampoo are other highlights. Published by Raven Press, the 292-page paperback retails for $24.95 at amazon.com.

COPYRIGHT 2006 Hiaring Company
COPYRIGHT 2006 Gale Group