Company: Wines of Chile
Agency: RF|Binder Partners
Timeframe: 2005
South American wines have long enjoyed a certain amount of appreciation in the American market. But consumers have tended to view the wines of Chile mostly as a "good buy,"
strictly for home consumption.
The Wines of Chile, a marketing organization comprising some 90 Chilean wineries, wanted more than that. The group set out to raise the profile of Chile's premium wines
- the kind of wine you take to a good friend's home for a dinner party, buy in a high-end restaurant, or give to the boss for the holidays.
"One of the biggest challenges," says Meghan Dotter, managing director at RF|Binder Partners, "is Chile's pretty much categorized as a producer of great 'value' wines,
cheap and friendly wines. It's still the fifth largest country importer into the U.S., but during the 1990s, Chile imported better wine-making infrastructure and has made great
strides toward improving the products, with new varietals and vines."
Michael Green, wine & spirits consultant for Gourmet magazine, agrees. Ordinarily, if you want to raise the profile of a wine or the region where it is made, you
need to start by improving their quality.
Yet, "the interesting thing about Chile is the quality has always been there," Green says. "But the challenge the region has faced is that in the minds of many consumers, the
idea was that these were well-made wines at inexpensive prices. And while Chile has some of the best wines sold for under $10, where they can really soar is in the premium
category."
According to Green, Chile has wines that merit standing on a par with such world class regions as Bordeaux. To upgrade the image of any wine or wine region, he says, "You need
to increase people's association and awareness. It's important you get the authorities, the tipsters, (as in The Tipping Point), to truly drive public opinion. You need to
get to the sommelier community and the wine journalists community. Chile has done a swell job of cornering this side of the market."
RF|Binder designed the re-branding campaign for the organization to try to get the attention of the next generation of wine drinkers, to let them know that Chile isn't
just making wine to drink with pizza any more. The agency reached out to some of the best minds in the wine supply and marketing industries, talking to top sommeliers and wine
retailers to gauge their perceptions of the product.
Among the hurdles they had to jump was the difficulty of communicating what had changed in the market. First, however, they needed to tell the winery what consumers thought. "A
big part of this compared to other accounts I've worked on really is communicating about the Wines of Chile to the U.S. market," says Dotter. "But you have to learn about the
consumers and trade and communicate that back to the wineries. Try to provide as much research as possible so they understand the U.S. market."
Kevin Zraly, who wrote and teaches the Windows on the World Complete Wine Course, told the agency that one approach in influencing consumer opinion would be to emphasize
elements that are already familiar to consumers from other wine regions, but can also be found in Chilean wines.
For example, Chile is known for its Cabernet Sauvignon, a varietal that is found in many of the world's best known wine regions and is widely recognized by consumers. Once a
comfortable touch point has been established with consumers, restaurants and wine retailers can push the envelope a little and stress what is unique to Chilean wines; e.g.,
introducing them to the Carmenere grape.
To help them reach and influence consumers, RF|Binder turned to the media and brand managers. With a limited budget, they targeted top wine media, importers, sommeliers, retail
wine buyers and educators. The Wines of Chile also participated in two of the top wine shows in the country, including the prestigious Food & Wine Classic in Aspen, Colorado,
to try to attract the eyes of high-end consumers. A wine trade education program focused on the high end of the target price by promoting wines that sell for $10 or more per
bottle at trade shows, tastings and to the media.
The Wines of Chile and RF|Binder looked for the country's most important wine markets, as well as emerging markets with high consumption rates. A six-city wine tour visited
Chicago, Dallas, Miami, New York, San Francisco and Washington D.C. They showcased some of the country's best wines and created a tasting book, organized by wine growing region,
to distribute to the attendees at each of the tastings.
Top wine experts and retailers attended the shows in Chicago and Dallas. The Dallas show also attracted Kevin Garvin of Neiman Marcus, and a month-long promotion at
Neiman Marcus featured Chilean wines by the glass.
South Florida and New York were among the most important target markets for the Wines of Chile, and both these tasting tours scored well. In Miami, Judy King of the Country
Vintner, John Matte from the National Distributing Company and Chris Cataldi, Robert Barnes and Immanual Dellepiane of South Wine & Spirits (the largest
distributor in the county) were present.
New York's event was star-spangled. Wine Enthusiast's Michael Schachner attended, as did Edward McCarthy, co-author of Wine for Dummies, and James Rodewald, wine
editor of Gourmet magazine.
To help bolster the message, RF|Binder enlisted three wine experts to lend authority to the campaign: Zraly, Michael Green and Joshua Greene, editor and publisher of Wine
& Spirits (who conducted seminars at the tastings).
The campaign also worked with the media, tapping Michael Franz from the Washington Post and Schachner from Wine Enthusiast and answering all media questions
related to the growth of the industry, conditions in wine-growing regions and information on new boutique wineries.
Advertorial messages were placed in a Special Wine Collectors issue of Food & Wine magazine (October 2005) in an effort to reposition Chile in the minds of
its readers, create brand recognition for Chile as a wine-producing country and establish a starting platform for a sustained Chilean presence in relevant publications.
The agency's work has clearly paid off in terms of increased coverage in such high-profile and widely distributed consumer publications as Wine Enthusiast, USA Today, Food
& Wine, Drinks and The Washington Post.
"I'm seeing a lot more coverage of Chilean wines, acknowledging their quality and drawing parallels between Chile and other wine regions," says Green. "The challenge is to
translate that to consumers.
"If you ask a wine enthusiast about Chile, they won't have anything negative to say, but they will probably talk about the 'great value'." To change that, consumers needs to
have a context to frame their thinking about the wines.
"Even if you've never been to Australia, you have a feeling about the wines, food, people, etc.," notes Green. "People don't have any associations with Chile. But slow and
steady wins the race. The branding effort has to be consistent and ongoing to make a difference."
The results of a re-branding of this nature can be difficult to measure, says Dotter. It's hard to pin down whether sales have increased markedly as a direct result of the
campaign.
"That's one of biggest challenges of wine industry," says Dotter, because of the laws governing the sale of wine and spirits. "It's hard to get good information on sales. We
have worked with research companies, and done inventory of top restaurants in New York and south Florida to see how many of them carry Chilean wines by the glass and by the
bottle, as a percentage of overall wines, and we will compare those numbers six months from now."
Before the campaign, she says, the Wines of Chile captured about 1% of the average wine list. It may seem like a small number, but "that's an important way for consumers to get
excited," Dotter notes. "If sommeliers encourage them to try a wine by the glass," they develop familiarity and move forward, buying a bottle of the wine in a restaurant or a
bottle or a case in a local retail shop.
"We will do another study in December, and we're trying to track the price per case," she adds. "The higher the bottle price, the higher the rate of growth for the brand. For
Chile, because of the strong Chilean peso, 70 percent of the sales had been at the lowest price segment, but we are moving up from that. Wines are being priced a little higher to
reflect the higher quality."
"The branding issues are on many levels," notes Green. Next month, he is doing a large fundraiser in Pennsylvania for the American Cancer Society in partnership with the Wines
of Chile. "I am working with the Wines of Chile closely to define the images of the country and its people," he adds. "I'm a huge fan of the Wines of Chile. They are doing a
really cool job in the last year or so."
Contact:
Meghan Dotter, 202 349 3638, [email protected]; Michael Green, 212-787-1055, [email protected]