Wines without a face

Neil Pendock chats to brand guru Jeremy Sampson.

In the foreword to a local wine guide, Cape Town retailer Vaughan Johnson bemoans the lack of local brands. What¡¯s your opinion?
Johnson points out that SA produces 6000 wines annually, up 10000% from 1960, while SA wine sales dropped 15% over a five-year period. Compare this with research house ACNielsen¡¯s report that, in the UK, US giant E&J Gallo was the fastest- growing wine producer, with sales up 20.6%. These statistics tell many stories, one being that SA wine sales are regressing.

One reason is the fixation on producing new labels ¡ª there were over 800 in 2006 alone. It seems little effort is made to invest in marketing and building brands. Most wine producers are farmers and this is a cottage industry. A major reason SA is not a premier division player in the world of wine is this lack of critical mass. There is a desperate need for consolidation.

SA is still content to export containers of wine to prop up Australia¡¯s ailing industry or to supply the UK¡¯s retailers so they can create their own brands. And remember commodities are priced at the bottom of the range. This is illustrated by Wosa¡¯s trumpeting just before Christmas that ¡°bulk exports of unbranded wine rose 63%¡±. That¡¯s not something they should be proud of as this is the lowest of the low, the typical SA mining attitude of old.

Do wine brands exist? Aren¡¯t they for toothpaste and toilet rolls?
They do in the rest of the world! In wine branding there will be a series of layers: the country; the region; the estate etc, and you can add further layers such as cultivars, vintage, winemaker etc. All play a role in the overall reputation of the brand. Major brands are often owned by major drinks companies. For instance, Jacob¡¯s Creek, the largest Australian wine brand by sales, is owned by French giant Pernod Ricard, which owns Jameson, Mumm, Chivas Regal, Beefeater, Malibu and paid € 5.6-billion (about R73-billion) last year to acquire Absolut Vodka. They are in the business of alcoholic drinks, all under the umbrella of ¡°luxury in a bottle¡±.

Key elements of any brand are trust, confidence, consistency, quality, availability etc. Currently, Australian brands make up six of the top 10 UK brands (SA has one in the form of Kumala, an overseas invention) and a reason for their success, as stated by the authoritative magazine Marketing, is that ¡°they have combined strong branding and heavy marketing spend¡±.