Canceled: Annual SVB Direct to Consumer Survey

You probably recognize the photo up top of Times Square. I took it this afternoon from a webcam. You might never again see it this empty - or so that's my hope.

The Decision to Cancel

Everywhere in the US today, we are making unfortunate but necessary decisions. We're no different and have had to make the difficult call to suspend the Annual SVB/WBM Direct to Consumer Survey effective immediately.

We had to face the reality that we weren't going to have anywhere near enough responses to conduct meaningful analysis and produce statistically significant results. While we could have bombarded you all with social media and email to remind people the survey is closing, it just doesn't strike us as the right thing to do when all of our combined attention is presently focused on crisis management as well as personal health and safety.

We’d like to thank those who have already completed the survey. When business normalizes, we will revisit the decision and may reopen the survey if there is sufficient time left in the year. In that case, we will try to use your responses in that analysis so those efforts won't be wasted.

More than likely, the next survey will be the Annual State of the Industry Survey which will come out in October.

Hang in there wine industry and be positive. I can tell you with a high degree of certainty that this crisis will pass and like all past recessions, we will benefit from pent up demand at the backside when we get through this trough.