Marketing Green with Wine

Wine plays a major role in the new marketing of regional “green” food products.  Regardless if you drink or not, wine is an interesting case study for how people select products based on place.  People buy wine by year and cultivar but, the role of the wine region is a major factor in marketability.  Wine marketing is in the business of targeting more consumers who are socially-minded with an interest in agriculture and the environment.  Wine paves the way toward bundling information of origin with the food product in the consumer marketplace because the wine label, the marketability of the vineyard landscape, and the differentiation of wine quality across regions

One of the best ways to deliver information about a place is describing important public services such as conservation of natural resources and mitigation of greenhouse gases.  In the case of wine, winegrowers cultivate winegrapes to create a carbon sink and plant vineyards within various ecosystems.  Spatial data can account for these two major indicators.    To the target consumer, these indicators provide valuable information to differentiate and add value to a product.  I wrote about an approach to describe the vineyard landscape in a past post.

In the article, I described the Russian River Valley American Viticultural Area (AVA) in Sonoma County, California.  Winegrapes are the dominate commodity in the Russian River Valley AVA and home to diversified agriculture and land-use as well as valuable ecosystem diversity.  Past efforts to conserve natural resources create an opportunity to capitalize on the unique nature of region.  In a world of fierce competition in the global wine industry, unique characteristics of the region are valuable assets for marketing.  Many wine marketers rely on anecdotal evidence to communicate the unique nature of a wine.  But, the delivery of relevant content based on two major indicators of greenhouse gas mitigation and conservation of ecosystem diversity may prove valuable to the consumer.

The potential for a wine region to generate a negative exchange of greenhouse gases or net storage is tied to vineyard management practices.  Management practices, cultivars, and soil types differ across the acreage but, unlike other carbon-emitting industries, the woody vines and cultivated soils of the winegrape industry are a carbon sink.  Information delivered about the carbon footprint of management practices are one type of relevant information for the target consumer.  Practices such as conservation tillage, use of cover crops and conversion of woody waste to biochar all reduce or mitigate greenhouse gases.   In the race to develop the future “green” product, wine has great potential if marketers leverage technology to deliver relevant content to the target consumer.

Outside the vineyard lies a diversity of ecosystems important to diversified agriculture and species richness.  The ecology of a region often includes a combination of natural habitat or land for agricultural production.  Policy decisions at the local level, including a combination of land conservation incentives, environmental regulations and innate winegrower stewardship, are all responsible for the condition of ecosystems.  Efforts yield valuable benefits at the local level but, may not be appreciated by the global marketplace.  In order to bolster the wine products of the region, marketers will leverage technology to communicate the facts about a region to the target consumer.

Finally, information shared by producers allows for growth and promotion of consumer confidence.  Further work may help ameliorate the carbon footprint associated with vineyard management practices and the condition of ecosystem diversity.  Furthermore, data collection and distribution technology paves the way for the development of major indicators including the role the agricultural lands play in the mitigation of greenhouse gases and conservation of ecosystem diversity.  In conclusion, wine marketing will play an important role to change the role of regional foods in the new “green” marketplace.