I enjoy looking at vacation photos, especially now that
COVID is no longer a problem. I’m presently taking a much-needed vacation where
I’m spending time admiring the stunning Waimanalo sunsets on the island of
Oahu. While I don't post many pictures on social media when I travel to Hawaii, or on cruise vacations I do enjoy learning about the history of an area and
sharing it.
As I sit here with my
curious green friend, gazing at Rabbit Island in the distance, my thoughts turn
to the US Wine Business and its future. Some might find this a strange topic to
ponder while relaxing in Hawaii and I would unfortunately have to agree. But this is what I enjoy.
Many people believe that the wine industry is cyclical, and
while true particularly in grape growing, there are also distinct periods in the industry that
are characterized by unique events that don’t repeat themselves and shape the
industry. Those eras typically last from seven to 10-years.
The answer to the blog title is the point of the Annual SVB Direct to Consumer Videocast, which is taking place this coming Wednesday, June 15th.
You can sign up to receive the SVB DtC Report, receive a link to the live presentation, and a post-conference link to the videocast replay ----> [HERE.]
Last week I had a call from a friend in the wine business asking for a meeting to discuss the Annual SVB State of the Wine Industry Report. I had no real idea what he was going to say.
When we met, he told me he appreciated what I presented in the report but didn't like the stories he'd read in the news. He thought some were overly critical and missed the positive things happening in the wine business. He asked me if I should be more positive during interviews to cast a better light on the business.
From his perspective, the industry is doing really well. That's because he sees the industry from the vantage point of a business that is hitting the cover off the ball. And to his view, a very large part of the premium wine business reported 2021 was one of, if not their best year ever!
We all became unusually preoccupied in the U.S.starting somewhere around March 15th, 2020. I don't know about you, but the picture above was how I felt at that point in time. Since then, all of our thinking and behavior has evolved in a myriad of ways, and some of that evolution is permanent.
I'm hopeful we are nearing the end of this queird social, economic, and health experiment. After getting sucked out of our realities by the COVID tornado, I think we are finally on the glide path that will land us in Oz. I know it won't be Kansas anymore when we lift from our comatose fog. It will be something different and probably in Technicolor. But whatever it is, it's going to be better than the last two years!
Anyway, with all the distractions since 2020, I've been remiss in posting this blog. In my defense, I thought this post probably didn't matter given the other issues we were all facing. But the smoke is clearing, the vaccines and boosters are helping, Omicron is waning, so just maybe I'll be able to shake someone's hand again without running for alcohol sanitizer.
To the point of the blog though, top-level the answer to the title question is "more than you expected."
I opened the 2021 SVB State of the Industry Report with this line: "2020 will go down as the year in which we answered the heretofore rhetorical question, what else can go wrong?
We are all glad 2020 is over. We are all grateful vaccinations are signaling an end to what we've endured this past year, and almost uniformly across America, there is renewed optimism that 2021 will be better as we move into spring.
I'm not alone when I say that I've never been through anything like this and didn't see it coming. I had no way of imagining such a circumstance: a world-wide pandemic that closes down the US and World economies? While I've seen shelter-in-place orders for regional issues, it's beyond comprehension that this would ever take place in as many countries as we're seeing now, or in the entirety of the State of California and the growing list of other states and regions that have similar orders.
After the string of directives this past week from state, federal and local governments that pounded down our prior realities, I spent time surveying the wine industry landscape and talked to as many people as possible to gain a sense of where we stand.
The 2019 SVB State of the Industry Report helped change the narrative in the wine business this year. While the industry remained focused on premiumization, I had to report in January that the positive elements that created the industry's astounding success over the past 25 years were hitting a wall. We predicted that M&A would slow this year and thus far, that appears to be a good call, notwithstanding the massive sale of about thirty of Constellation's wine brands to Gallo for $1.7BN.
There is plenty of activity still. Probably once a week both buyers and sellers ask me, "what are average winery multiples?" What they are really asking is "how much is my winery worth?" But there is more to the question. They also want some color on the business environment.
As a banker, I love those questions because it means there might be a financing opportunity (...yes I do have a day job making loans, as boring as that might sound.).
The short answer to the headline question for today is there are still plenty of buyers but overall they are being a little more selective, and your winery and vineyard are probably not worth more than they were last year.
Without going into details on a long topic, we are presently oversupplied with grapes and bulk wine from most regions, and the upside to higher sales is for today - more limited than in the past when the rising tide of higher boomer incomes along with the belief in the health benefits of moderate wine consumption lifted all boats. Today millennial consumers are spirits and beer consumers and are trying to cut their alcohol consumption for health reasons.
There are activities that with certainty will return the growth rate in demand that we've been used to, but that is another VERY long topic for another day. Buyers believe in the strength of the product and know there is upside given time, expertise, and focus.
As it stands, shrewd buyers and sellers are still finding agreement on price and repurposing valuable assets for tomorrow. Investors with a long view recognize the opportunity this current market change is creating. But with any sale, there has to be an offer, and an answer to the question, "How much is my winery or vineyard worth today?"
Every year SVB and Wine Business Monthly collaborate on a survey that maps out the changes in direct to consumer wine sales - providing benchmarks to respondents that are invaluable in day to day business, and equally important as we chart new paths and channels to sell wine. The 2019 survey closes this week. Join the hundreds and hundreds of wineries who have already taken the survey this year [Take the Survey]
Take the above chart for instance which was a product of last year's survey. In it, we can see that for the first time, there are more tasting rooms being built than wineries. Why? Because wineries all believe they need a tasting room to sell direct. But is that true? The answer is that not all tasting rooms are necessary, but client experience is necessary even if there isn't a tasting room
Procter & Gamble has long been respected for it's integrated product development, integration of acquisitions, and brand marketing. Consider the number of iconic brands they hold like Ivory soap, Pampers diapers, Duracell batteries, Gillette razors, Tampax feminine care products, Crest toothpaste, Tide detergent, and the list goes well beyond that. P&G has more billion dollar brands than any company in the world ... but they don't sell wine. If P&G sold wine people would be running to their mailboxes for free samples and the TTB would not be happy about that.
How do you know you are performing at the top of club performance, or even above the average? What percent of revenue, relative to total revenue do your neighbor wineries produce from just the tasting room or just the club? If I asked you how many wineries pay for data capture within their comp structure in the tasting room, what would be your guess? What percent of revenue comes in through web sales in your region?
What's the reserve tasting fee in your region? How about the average tenure of a club member sorted out by average bottle price? Would it help to know the average gain in club members in your AVA last year?
It's easy to tell people what they want to hear. It's harder to tell them what they don't want to hear. In 2007 I saw the above chart that tracked US home prices versus median family income. With other indicators in the market, I was convinced there was a real estate bubble already in the process of bursting and I started talking about it in speeches. The result of my prescience? I stopped getting speaking invitations and in one speech had the organizer ask if I could be a little more cheery. People don't want to consider the downside risk in business when things are going well. If I told you today what you wanted to hear, I would say that wine consumption is growing in both volume and dollars and consumers are continuing to trade up above $9.00. I would tell you that grape prices are at an all-time high and trending higher right along with land prices. That's true and might get me more important speaking engagements, but I'd rather you know about an underlying trend I'm seeing that's more than a little concerning. If I'm right, it's going to change the way you are thinking about business right now.
This is the third of a three part series: Part 1, Part 2
If millennials are narcissistic, lazy, and entitled as described in our last post, you will need to quickly come up with some new marketing tactics. So instead of giving them a toaster for joining the wine club (a boomer era tactic), maybe you could give away a free mirror with every new account? Oh I know! What about giving away a tiara for the self-absorbed, and some Red Bull for the lazy ones?
Let's talk about Millennials! How exciting is that conversation? Demographers and researchers are laser focused. It's a feeding frenzy at times because that's the growth opportunity of future retail. Boomers are old news, nothing to write home about and not hardly anywhere near as interesting as Millennials.
Oh ... there is GenX of course but why talk about them? They are a small cohort.... except they are the second largest consumer of fine wine in the U.S. today and the largest growth opportunity for most wineries, but that doesn't matter. Let's talk about Millennials!
We know that the average winery today has nearly 60% of their sales made direct largely through wine clubs and tasting rooms. How do we know that? Through an annual survey conducted by SVB.
If you have a club or a tasting room, how do you know you are performing at the top of the club performance, or even above the average? If I asked you how many wineries pay for data capture within their comp structure in the tasting room, what would be your guess?
Today 168 wineries have responded to the SVB Annual Tasting Room Survey and here is the result thus far for that question:
What about the average dollar comp awarded to tasting room staff in your region. Is that of interest? How about the average tenure of a club member sorted out by average price point so you can compare your winery against a winery with a similar price point? Would it help to know the average gain in club members in your AVA last year, or what about the average number of lost members?
Each of those questions are examples of benchmarks that will be available to you for free but here's the catch:The benchmarks are only available to those who take the 10-15 minutes to complete the survey. Isn't that an investment well worth making?
When the survey is closed on March 18th, we will spend over 200 person hours completing the analysis and will then return charts, graphs, and an excel spreadsheet cleaned of any identifying information. You will be able to dig even deeper into the data if you want.
In May we will host a live videocast to go over some of the results as we did last year.
In the July issue of Wine Business Monthly, the magazine will publish some of the information and conclusions in their annual Direct To Consumer edition.
None of the above is possible without the 10-15 minutes invested in the survey itself. Please consider taking the time to answer the survey questions. Your participation will improve both your own direct program, and help the US wine industry improve.
If you feel this content is worthwhile, please promote the link in your favorite social media platform, or even better - please forward the link to your winery colleagues and ask them to participate.
If you would like your AVA to participate, we will also send them free Regional Benchmarks for their own use if we have a statistically significant sample size and an address to send the information.
I remember walking to school shortly after the Cuban Missile Crisis. We were practicing ‘duck-and-cover’ drills in our classrooms, and we trained
on what to do when we saw the blinding white flash. The propaganda video clip at the top is a great example of the beliefs of the day.
Wine and Cuban Hero Che
Walking to school in the early 60's, I’d plan
where I would hide along the route just in case. One of the neighbors had a bomb shelter but
after that, it was refrigerators in garages and fireplaces as the preferred hideouts. It was a discomforting
time for the Country. President Kennedy embarrassed in the Bay of Pigs Invasion was staring down Khrushchev, the Premiere
of the former USSR in a game of nuclear chicken with continental annihilation
hanging in the balance.
With that as context, it’s surreal to find myself sitting in
a bar in Havana Cuba writing this piece and participating in an official U.S.
Trade Mission promoting California Wine. We're not promoting world peace or selling tractors. We're promoting a luxury product to a socialist country.
The first part of the year has turned into a fire hose of new industry information in the wine business. Right after we released the State of the Industry Report, we all ran to Unified to hear more discussion about industry trends. I missed Fred Franzia's lively lunch presentation Tuesday but was there all week and once again moderated the Thursday General Session. I then came home and got on a plane to Miami where I will leave with the Wine Institute and the Napa Vintners for a Trade Mission to Cuba at 4:00 am Sunday morning.
Thursday, January 21, 2016 9:30 a.m.–10:30 a.m. PT
I expect this will be one of the most interesting reports we've ever authored. I would like to invite you to join us live for a discussion of the report and wine business with our expert panel: Rob McMillan, EVP & founder of Silicon Valley Bank’s Wine Division, Paul Mabray, Chief Strategy Officer of VinTank, Amy Hoopes, Chief Marketing Officer/EVP Global Sales at Wente Family Estates and Jeff Bitter with Allied Grape Growers.
We will review the findings of the 2016 State of the Wine Industry Report, which is based on SVB’s in-depth survey of wine industry experts and insiders, third-party research and Rob’s unique perspective as a long-time member within the wine industry.
This presentation will include insights on:
Changes in the market share of imported bulk and bottled wine
Predictions of 2016 sales growth in the fine wine segment
Winery financial performance
Expected changed in U.S. per capita and total consumption
Consumer demand changes
Harvest yields and bulk inventories
Prediced changes in the opportunities of domestic wine producing regions
Bottle price changes
Please [register] for the videocast and receive a link to the replay and the complete 2016 Wine Industry Report after the live event.
It can be a little hard getting revved back up when the year starts. Truth be told, few of us are excited to jump back in full speed. We'd rather slip back to revel in the warmth of the holiday's then start executing on the new plan.
I have a little difficulty finding normal when the year starts because November and December find me researching and writing the Banks Annual State of the Industry Report. Add in Christmas, the New Year, business holiday parties, routine daily business issues and my birthday - which falls on December 24th, but it's OK if you forgot. You can get me a gift next time. Anyway.... I can't wait to start the new year and find normal again!
The Annual Wine Conditions Survey is open and delivering interesting early information on supply, price, and many other interesting questions. The survey closes next week but after the first week, almost 300 of your fellow wineries have invested 12 minutes. Why take the survey when we are all busy? Because participants are the only ones who will get complete results.
What's really going on in the wine business this moment? Can wineries raise prices? What's the supply situation in the Central Valley? Is there good land available for planting anywhere? Where is there too much supply? With the crush in the tanks now, winery owners are starting to think about 2016 and making plans.
I started researching for the Annual State of the Wine Industry Report in August and have a good idea what it's going to look like already, but I always like getting another layer of information of the current situation. So for the past decade now, I've led a survey of the current conditions in which more than 600 wineries and the major AVA's from across the country participate every year.
Ten years since we started this, I'm told by winery owners that new surveys now show up in email boxes every week. Thankfully I'm consistently told, "We look for your survey and make sure to participate." Why are we so lucky to get this kind of participation? I think there are a few reasons but bottom line, we keep the information anonymous, we aren't selling the information, and we give back more than we take.
The survey takes about 10 minutes and in exchange, we send
without cost the complete survey results, dozens of relevant graphs, and our early analysis on
wine industry conditions. [Last year's survey results].
Note the results this year will be released in early December only to those who
participate in the survey. Ready to take the survey? Click on the link below.
