Tag Archives: naked wines

The King is Dead! All Hail Caesar!

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Majestic Wine has acquired Naked Wines today for around £70 million. On the surface it is a straightforward but interesting business deal giving each a new injection of energy. Underlying this, however, is an interesting story of conquests and empires that are a lot less regal than they are imperial.

Source: Wikipedia

Julius Caesar
Source: Wikipedia

[read more here on Harpers]

The key is that Rowan Gormley, the entrepreneur behind Naked Wines, but also Virgin Wines and before that Virgin Money, has been appointed CEO of the acquiring business. What ‘assets’ were the real target in this exchange?

A lot more will be revealed in the days ahead of the strategy for the separate businesses and whether, and how, they might be combined, but as this unfolds, I think it would be instructive to look up the life story of one Julius Caesar.

“Caesar is considered by many to be one of the greatest military commanders in history.”

Rome too was once ruled by kings, but the military exploits of generals in the field became the route to power and these ‘imperators’ took over the Empire. No more ‘majestic’ rule, it was time for the new ‘imperial’ one. All subsequent leaders not only became known as Emperors, they even adopted the ‘title’ Caesar.

Maybe the newly combined business should change branding, not to Majestically Naked, but to Imperial Wines instead?

Just a thought

Hail Gormley!

 

Naked Wines’ Latest Marketing Campaign a bit See-Through?

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I just received the latest email marketing campaign from Naked Wines (the UK office – now that they have a presence in the US and Australia this probably needs to be stated), and I’m a little disappointed.

I’ve always thought highly of their marketing savvy. The move to rate wines not by stars or points, but simply by whether you would buy the wine again, was genius.

No matter what you thought of the actual wine range, they managed to connect with the audience they were targeting, and speak to them in a positive way, involve them in the business, and create a strong user community. It fitted the honest, or ‘naked’, approach they claimed to favour.

What rankled in the latest email – “Become a wine genius in about 52 seconds” – was that they sent a quiz (I’m a sucker for a wine related quiz, and I had 5 minutes with a cup of tea, and they promised it would take only 52 seconds, so …) to see if I was a “Wine Genius” but instead of a quiz, I got a lecture.

It really surprised me.

There are 6 questions, most of which are slap-in-the-face obvious marketing statements, such as:

Tricky one this one

Tricky one this one

“Well, let me see … now, I think I remember studying that at school, just a minute …”

However, two things really surprised me. It wasn’t just the questions, but the approach taken to the answers.

The first question was:

Define your terms, please

Define your terms, please

Now, I would argue this point. I know what they are getting at, but since they do not define “costs to make” but one could certainly argue that the true cost of hand-picked grapes, made in small quantities, aged for years in cellars and carefully prepared and presented to the customer could cost more than £10 if the winemaker wanted to survive, invest in the winery (and pay off debts), stand out from the crowd, and also pay others fairly too.

The next question was a false choice between traditionally packaged wines and screwcap bottles:

No corks allowed, sorry

No corks allowed, sorry

 

Ignoring the biased “delicious vs average” aspect, there may be plenty good reasons for preferring the traditional packaging (for example, I might like to keep the wine for some years then use my Coravin), but apparently I MUST conform to their packaging mantra, or else!

And this was the second, and major point. Apparently, I’M WRONG.

We hear a lot about making wine more accessible, less frightening and stressful for consumers. I believed Naked Wines agreed. However, it seems that if I suggest that I might like a cork, or that it actually might be possible to believe that wine costs over £10 to make, it is not a valid opinion, and I am simply wrong. Like this:

Naked Wines Answer

Naked Wines customers are deeper than that! (oh, and that “small fortune” can’t be that much since they’ve told me that it still has to come under £10 all in!)

The good news, is that despite disagreeing with all their statements questions, and being consistently wrong, I am apparently still a Genius and worthy of my £20 discount (you might be a genius too – try the “What’s your Wine IQ?” quiz)

I’m left with the impression of a marketing misstep from the team at Naked Wines

Give them Access, They Will Talk

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Last week, the London International Wine Fair (#LIWF) saw the arrival of a new breed of exhibitor. This one was called “The Access Zone”.

The Access Zone was a combination of Press Office, Lecture Theatre, Consultancy Office, Networking Zone, Business Centre, Free Wi-Fi Spot and Sales Platform.

Instead of a stand being directed by a single company or brand, or acting as a neutral information or service point, The Access Zone was a place where ideas were exchanged, wines tasted and business contacts made. In many ways it was an exhibition within an exhibition. You can read some of the results here (thanks to @gabriellaopaz)

The organisers of the LIWF invited Ryan & Gabriella Opaz of Catavino.net, and my partners in The European Wine Bloggers Conference (EWBC), to help put together a site dedicated to Social Media in the wine business as part of the main event. This ‘hub’ was then home to all sorts of individuals and companies that wanted to explore the possibilities of social media for promoting wine, including this site as one of the main sponsors.

The users determined the content

What made this stand different was that all sorts of people in the trade were invited to give talks relating to social media tools and strategies. There were interactive talks on using facebook for wineries, wine fault seminars, promoting films, wine blending, personal branding (my own contribution), the launch of the EWBC 2010 in Austria, and more. The USERS determined the content, then stayed there to help others. It was about bringing our online social networks to life, and as such it was important to have the right people at the centre who could motivate and attract an interesting group of friends.

What did we discover? Well, in a show affected by the economic downturn and volcanic ash related travel woes, it was good to have a positive message to discuss. This was especially true online, but also in the trade press. The wine business is very interested in the potential of social media, but still uncertain as to how to achieve this. Having people there, not just us ‘consultants’, but practitioners, brands with experience and brands who invest in social marketing, they were able to get a better overall picture.

The stand was always busy, with a variety of bigger and smaller exhibitors coming to attend talks or meet someone on the stand, including generic wine bodies, wine journalists and winemakers. The stand also hosted Naked Wines‘ spectacular selection process where their ‘angels’ selected a wine (video) to import which then sold out in less than 24 hours! (more videos here)

The Access Zone is not necessarily a model for every future exhibition. In reality, embracing social media is something ALL exhibitors should do, but while adoption is still very low and exhibitors and visitors are interested in learning more in a non-commercial atmosphere, the Access Zone model is probably one that more exhibitions around the world should emulate. I suspect that many other wine events will now look to have such a space, and will invite key players from around the globe to fill it.

Did you come along? What did you think? Worth repeating? Was there other content you would have liked to see?

Well done James!

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Save money, invest in the future – if you have spare cash

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It is possibly no coincidence that in the same week that the world’s top wine ‘experts’ head to Bordeaux to evaluate the latest “vintage of the century” from 2009, that Naked Wines has chosen to update the concept for more modern times.

The annual Bordeaux en primeur scramble sees wine writers, retailers and other influencers run from winery to winery on a glorified “Chateau Crawl” tasting each of the top wines to rate them WELL BEFORE they are released.

“Let the customer decide how good a wine is, how much it is worth, and IF they are prepared to pay in advance for an allocation”

Do the Chateau offer this for fun? For education? For marketing? No, it is all about points, prices and sales. The global demand is such that the judgement of the visitors, plus the ego and history of the winery, helps to set prices for bottles that will only leave the winery years later then probably rarely be drunk and many spend decades being sold by one investor to another.

It is a shame. In principle the idea is a good one: Let the customer decide how good a wine is, how much it is worth, and if they are prepared to pay in advance for an allocation of that wine, to lock-in some discount on the final retail price.

Interestingly, regular consumers CAN start to do some of this, and not be restricted to Bordeaux either. Naked Wines has created a “buy early, pay less” system that means that the earlier that consumers are willing to commit to buying a wine, the greater the discount they get on that wine. They have even already selected a small number of wineries, some of them well know names (such as Teusner Wines) to launch with, and they do not cost £200+ a bottle.

It ticks a lot of boxes for me on The Wine Conversation: it focuses on unusual wines with unique stories, it engages consumers with the wine process (which inevitably includes distribution) and it still gives them a unique price advantage (i.e. discount).

I do worry about how many wine consumers are really willing to part with their cash in advance, when the wine could take months to arrive and they have to buy a case, but it is a great start.

I also wonder whether the discount being offered is really attributable simply to removing risk and some of the costs of sale (it amounts to a 40%+ discount in some cases), but if the consumer is satisfied that the final retail price is real, and that they really are getting a discount and offering help to wineries, then maybe the model will become established.

We might be seeing something very new in wine buying here, it could be fun to be part of it.

Disclosure: I am a Naked Wines customer and I have already “invested” in one of these wines

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