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The Losh Cause - South Africa's wine marketing misses a beat?
A fortnight ago, Wines of South Africa held its biennial tasting event for the country's wine producers in London. At the show, the trade body unveiled its latest marketing tool: ‘DNA SA – a Brand Blueprint for South African Wine’. Will this approach help the nation steal greater share from its competitors? Chris Losh looks for holes.
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24 days ago
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RE: The Losh Cause - South Africa's wine marketing misses a beat?
OUCH!
Maybe they are trying to take too many steps too quickly
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24 days ago
by F
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RE: The Losh Cause - South Africa's wine marketing misses a beat?
In response to your article on DNA SA, written by Chris Losh, Wines of South
Africa would like to clarify some points and respond to others.
It would appear that the DNA SA marketing guidelines, targeted at producers,
may have been erroneously conflated with marketing messages directed at
consumers. The DNA SA is intended as a brand blueprint for South African
wine, which the industry can draw from when creating brand-specific messages
that are consistent with the overarching positioning, ‘variety is in our
nature’. DNA SA has been shaped by the experiences that make the Cape
winelands and South African wines stand apart from other countries.
It is not designed as a single marketing strategy but as a reference tool
for producers and brand owners, to ensure that when they are marketing their
wines, and selecting from the many great stories that brands can associate
themselves with in the Cape, there remains a common language and shared
ideals, across the industry. What DNA SA does is break down some of the key
marketing concepts already associated with South African wines and clarify
them, creating four distinct threads (i.e. the cornerstones) that brand
owners can utilise and integrate with their own marketing strategies.
You may ask why, if we have the well-established ‘variety is in our nature’
campaign, do we need a DNA document? For two reasons. Firstly, there are
continually new players entering the market and the document provides a
framework within which they can conceive and articulate brand messages.
Secondly, it allows established players to re-examine and refresh their
messages as dictated by individual brand life cycles or the creation of
brand extensions.
To claim that South Africa has failed to come up with a coherent and
'stickable' marketing message is surprising. Certainly there is a
multi-layered message but the ‘variety is in our nature’ positioning, is
widely recognised by the UK and global wine trade and has been embraced
across retail and the on-trade, with a positive effect on the category. When
the campaign first launched some consumer research was undertaken. It was
established that 62 percent of respondents found the campaign appealing or
very appealing, and 61 percent thought it portrayed an image of South
African wines as high-quality. 54 percent felt that they would be interested
in finding out more about South African wines as a result of the campaign.
South Africa has shown good growth in exports and in the UK, where the
campaign has been most widely used, the country is the fastest-growing
category, seeing growth across all price-points and selling more wine over
£10 than Chile or the US. It would be fair to attribute this success, at the
very least in part, to image building. The suggestion that the campaign
'failed miserably' is without basis. In what sense, exactly? Surely the
country’s present performance and its ability to grow sales in the face of a
protracted recession would suggest otherwise.
Chris notes that the country has made 'laudable efforts' in the fields of
sustainable farming and biodiversity and they are, indeed, a part of the
marketing campaign. And one that has interested trade, press and consumers
when clearly executed. The Great South African Wine Trail is a good example
of how this message can be used to engage consumers and bring the Cape
winelands to life. That Chile and California have invited the Biodiversity &
Wine Initiative to visit their countries, and learn from it, is proof that
some people do know, and care, about the Cape Floral Kingdom.
Creating a campaign, as Chris suggests, around Jo'burg restaurants, tribal
dances and wildlife may well fulfil the 'sexy' brief and sound great on
paper. But it doesn't connect with the place where South African wine is
made. The thousands of wine drinkers who visit the Cape, and subsequently
remain loyal to its wines, would be baffled by the associations. Marketing
is about identifying genuine stories and this is, fundamentally, what DNA SA
is designed to do.
So, to the wines. Chris states that the 'few big brands' are unremarkable.
But they are successful. Given the relative youth of South Africa's brands
it is exceptional to see so many that are widely recognised. There are two
South African brands in the top 10 UK retailed wine brands, First Cape and
Kumala. In Germany Nederburg and Golden Kaan, in Canada Two Oceans, in
Sweden Drosty Hof and Foot of Africa are all brand leaders. The bold
statement that South Africa is recognised as 'producing premium-quality,
interesting and distinct wines' is not a naive one, nor is it false. South
Africa is gaining impressive recognition for the quality of its wines.
For many consumers a country that shouts about its history, its culture and
its sustainability is appealing, aspirational and desirable. The Cape
experience is 'sexy' and the associations with tourism, which form a core
part of the marketing strategy, clearly confirm this but South Africa's
story must relate to the real, authentic South African winelands experience.
Su Birch, CEO, Wines of South Africa and Jo Mason, UK market manager, Wines
of South Africa
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23 days ago
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Jo Mason
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RE: The Losh Cause - South Africa's wine marketing misses a beat?
Hi Chris
I remember our conversation two weeks ago about this issue and think that perhaps there is maybe a sense of throwing the baby out with the bath water, or to paraphrase Seth Godin: What should our response be when a man complains of the temperature of the nuts served in First Class? (and he wasn’t talking about the passengers)
Many SA wine marketers have called for a coherent SA Wine Marketing strategy for a number of years and WOSA have, in my opinion, responded well to the challenges of bringing our young - in world wine marketing terms, diverse, and complicated wine industry story to bear. The DNA SA represents a significant step forward for our industry and is not perfect I am sure, and there will no doubt be refinements that are needed over time, but from these building blocks can come the consumer messages that you allude to, in whichever format the brand owners wish to commit to, which was the objective of the exercise was as far as I know.
This morning for example, I was driving two UK visitors around our farm here in Stellenbosch, explaining to them that the many soil types and subsequent differning varietals on our farm are part of what makes our wine offering special. We have the ability to bring a number of wine styles to market. This is a competitive advantage as we don't have huge riverine basins that have the same soil and climatic conditions for hundreds of hectares, delivering a universal one "type" of wine. But, this can also be, as we know, a competitive disadvantage in that our costs per hectare for production vary because of this diversity when compared to the above scenario, not to mention the extra effort required to sell many varietals and not one. However, we are faced with the simple fact that in South Africa our wine story is complicated and whilst not always easy to discern for many people who haven't been here, it is part of who we are, and is in my opinion what makes us special.
The challenge for brand owners is to use elements of the DNA SA story and weave them into our own market facing promotion, but please don't expect us to all sell "Sunshine in a glass", or some other generic and mindless message. This doesn’t fool consumers either. There are no shortcuts to this game and if our route is longer and steadier, then so be it. I have yet to see a route followed by any generic body that is a universal success, so maybe a building block approach is the way to go.
Regards
Ross Sleet
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23 days ago
by Ross Sleet
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RE: The Losh Cause - South Africa's wine marketing misses a beat?
As company of wine people we have always believed that Variety is in our Nature is both a truism for South Africa and very effective communication platform for our branded wines on a number of levels. If one truly understands South Africa then there are a myriad of simple, exciting visual and emotional cues as well as the more sensible and sustainable messages that can be used but that all fit under the WOSA umbrella positioning. While we would have felt that the original execution was one dimensional and only covered a particular aspect of the broader message, we as a company are fully supportive of the new developments under the Variety is in our Nature positioning and see tremendous opportunities in its execution.
With three of our core brands we have already aligned behind the DNA principles using elements of the four cornerstones to distinctly and successfully position one brand from another; Welmoed with its handcrafted since 1690 talks to heritage and history and consistency of quality over time while Kumkani is positioned to capitalise on the modern SA lifestyle of discerning Afro chic environment and then the unpretentiousness and distinctiveness of Arniston Bay which is embedded in the laid-back place and lifestyle of a typical Cape coastal fishing village.
With regards to the statement about South Africa’s “big brands are unremarkable at best”, to cement what WOSA has said, we are in 42 countries where we consistently push the South African diversity messages based on the DNA SA cornerstones and to date we have yet to receive any negative feedback. Our core brands have grown by over 20% in 2009 and Arniston Bay, has experienced a surge in sales despite the tough economic climate (42% growth, according to Nielsens figures), and our brands have also enjoyed positive feedback, keen interest and interaction from consumers on social networking sites such as Facebook.
South Africa has also proven that it can produce premium quality wines, judging by the number of awards won at prestigious international competitions, and can produce a diverse variety of wines to suit everyone’s pocket and palate and that is the uniqueness of South Africa and its potential differentiation from other countries.
Chris O'Shea - Executive Director of Sales and Marketing at the company of wine people
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22 days ago
by
the company of wine people
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RE: The Losh Cause - South Africa's wine marketing misses a beat?
With all the people of South Africa's wine companies talking about how well they are doing, they don't mention the US market at all. In fact, as some one who was involved in the largest chain of liquor stores in NJ, I can tell you SA wines don't sell any where as well as South American wines or New Zealand wines. They have not spent any money , so to speak, in the US to promote their wines. What a waste of time, what with the US market ripe for them. But, I assume ,they want the UK etc first. They better realize that this market is really different from all the rest when they do get around to embark to sell here. In this economy, quality and PRICE are what is driving the market today. Even the large retailers are running FULL PAGE ads in the NY Times
pushing wines under $8-9 for the 750ml.
Norman Weiner USA
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3 weeks ago
by Norman weiner
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RE: The Losh Cause - South Africa's wine marketing misses a beat?
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20 days ago
by
barbara789
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