Tasting Panel ITA Canada – By invitation only SELLA&MOSCA – Giovanni Pinna – General Director / Davide Champion – Regional Sales Director EMEA&APAC BERSANO – Francesco Davico – Export Manager VELENOSI – Angela Velenosi – Owner GERARDO CESARI – Mario Menozzi – Sales Manager  MASI – Sandro Boscaini – President / Giacomo Boscaini – Export Manager  NONINO – Giannola Nonino – President / Elisabetta Nonino – CEO / Antonella Nonino –  Director BADIA A COLTIBUONO – Roberto Stucchi Prinetti – Owner ZONIN1821 – Domenico Zonin – President / Giacomo Manzoni – Agronomist SAN FELICE  – Fabrizio Nencioni – Sales manager / Alexander MacRae-Brown – Sales manager BANFI – Enrico Viglierchio – General Director DOMINI CASTELLARE DI CASTELLINA  – Alessandro Cellai – General Director RUFFINO – Sandro Sartor – President / Beppe D’Andrea – Director ROCCA DELLE MACIE – Sergio Zingarelli – President / Thomas Francioni – Marketing and Communication Manager

Tasting Panel ITA Canada – By invitation only SELLA&MOSCA – Giovanni Pinna – General Director / Davide Champion – Regional Sales Director EMEA&APAC BERSANO – Francesco Davico – Export Manager VELENOSI – Angela Velenosi – Owner GERARDO CESARI – Mario Menozzi – Sales Manager  MASI – Sandro Boscaini – President / Giacomo Boscaini – Export Manager  NONINO – Giannola Nonino – President / Elisabetta Nonino – CEO / Antonella Nonino –  Director BADIA A COLTIBUONO – Roberto Stucchi Prinetti – Owner ZONIN1821 – Domenico Zonin – President / Giacomo Manzoni – Agronomist SAN FELICE  – Fabrizio Nencioni – Sales manager / Alexander MacRae-Brown – Sales manager BANFI – Enrico Viglierchio – General Director DOMINI CASTELLARE DI CASTELLINA  – Alessandro Cellai – General Director RUFFINO – Sandro Sartor – President / Beppe D’Andrea – Director ROCCA DELLE MACIE – Sergio Zingarelli – President / Thomas Francioni – Marketing and Communication Manager

Amazon has just released a robot that knows when to stay out of the bedroom. The government of Nicaragua has passed a law requiring businesses to accept bitcoin as legal tender.

LVMH has acquired expensive land in a digital universe. Why?

To build a shopping mall for the rapidly growing virtual fashion market. Hologram sommeliers and critics are braced to help the wine lover in store. Is your winery prepared for the future?

The technology in our pockets has fragmented audiences forever. Tribes and influencers matter, but what counts more than ever is brand. Against a backdrop of fierce competition, changing consumer trends, and rapidly evolving platforms, brand and brand values still drive sales.

Keeping those values at the forefront of the conversation will not be easy.

Paul Caputo will present an overview of the imminent technology landscape and potential trends in order to provoke thought and discussion around maximising wine marketing opportunities. Despite a focus on how wineries might leverage these ideas, they are equally relevant to trade and press audiences.

Over the last 18 months, online sales at Vivino have skyrocketed across the globe as app users became buyers for the first time and continued to use the marketplace beyond the initial pandemic “stockpile” to search for and purchase their favorite wines. Vivino founder Heini Zachariassen will discuss the consumer behaviors in online wine consumption that are proving to outlast the pandemic, with a focus on how they are engaging with the Italian wine category. He will also discuss how Vivino is growing under new leadership to improve the user experience and continue to democratize the world of wine with the Vivino rating.

Over the last 18 months, online sales at Vivino have skyrocketed across the globe as app users became buyers for the first time and continued to use the marketplace beyond the initial pandemic “stockpile” to search for and purchase their favorite wines. Vivino founder Heini Zachariassen will discuss the consumer behaviors in online wine consumption that are proving to outlast the pandemic, with a focus on how they are engaging with the Italian wine category. He will also discuss how Vivino is growing under new leadership to improve the user experience and continue to democratize the world of wine with the Vivino rating.

Wine apps have made some changes since they first hit the scene. For wineries is critical to optimize opportunities that wine apps can offer. Helping consumers get the right wine for them, collect valuable consumer data, and shorten the sales cycle are just a few examples of the benefits provided by wine apps.

Which wine apps are still relevant? Which ones will impact your bottom line? And how can wineries use them to stay ahead of the trends and increase sales? Amy Gross, CEO of VineSleuth, is back to share an overview of the wine app landscape and give a deep dive into key apps to watch. She will suggest practical strategies for working with wine apps (both directly and indirectly), analyzing the data they share, and growing your business and digital footprint.

There are many ways of examining a specific market. Yet, one cannot have a comprehensive understanding of the wine market without knowing the cultural context. This presentation is going to be a cultural tour that explores the similarities and differences between the palates of Chinese and Chinese American wine professionals.

In this session geared toward Italian wine producers, Francesco Pensabene, The Trade Commissioner / Direttore ICE – Sezione Sviluppo Scambi Ambasciata d’Italia a Mosca, Coordinatore ICE per Federazione Russa, Armenia e Bielorussia will present salient, up-to-date facts, figures, and statistics in order to help Italian producers unravel mysteries of the Russian wine market and answer the questions that they might have been pondering.

Italian viticulture is a world-wide excellence and a very important part of the agricultural risk portfolio of the market. One of the most important problems facing the wine-growing world today is climate. Climate change has amplified the frequency and catastrophic scale of extreme natural events in recent years. This condition implies not only dissatisfaction on the part of the winegrowers with the standardized insurance instruments but also the non-sustainability of these instruments by the insurance companies, which also see a concentration of risk in the areas most prone to the above-mentioned calamitous events. Therefore, there is an increasing need for advanced forms of risk management in agriculture that take account of specific needs. In this context, since 2019 Cattolica Assicurazioni, in addition to the standard insurance offer, has developed the insurance product “Uve di Pregio” dedicated to high-quality wine production, to meet the specific insurance needs of producers, their vineyards and the particular production characteristics of the individual DOC. As a new frontier, the “Agrifood Sandbox Project” was launched to evaluate the use of blockchain in parametric policies to cover risks from natural disasters in the agricultural supply chain. An innovative and experimental project that brings together the main Italian players in the field of innovation and risk management in agriculture. The aim is to support the evolution of the agricultural risk management system, its digitalization, administrative simplification and sustainability.

Too often China is spoken about as one market or the ‘Chinese wine consumer’ described as a monolithic entity. However, the Chinese market is highly segmented and fragmented, with not only geographical delineations demarcating consumer behaviour, but also age-groups, social identifiers and economic status. This talk will analyse various consumer profiles in China and link their traits to wine consumption, both in terms of taste preferences and buying habits. For the wineries looking to build brands in the Chinese market, this will be an invaluable exploration of the diversity of the Chinese markets and will allow for a much more targeted approach to not only identify possible importers and distributors but also to gain insight into the possible end point consumer.

There has been a concerted push within the top players of the Indian wine industry to highlight and expand the premium end of their portfolio (17 – 45 euros/ bottle). This also ties in with an effort to raise the profile of Indian wine both domestically and internationally. This session will provide a look into this trend and its results.

With the pandemic, Korea’s wine market has actually gotten bigger than ever. The country saw over a 27-percent increase in wine imports last year, compared to the statistics from the year before. In this session, Summer Lee and Hong Dongmyung talk about what new wine trend is seen in the country and what had contributed the most to make the wine market expand further. Learn more about what Koreans are drinking right now and how that’s going to shape up the wine scene in the coming years.

The country of 1000 islands and big diversity. Even though relatively small, the Croatian market is becoming more interesting in the last years to the foreign wineries. As a tourist country, Croatia is selling mostly local wines, but as the wine culture is growing there are opportunities for imported wines as well. Get to know Croatia, its wines, and which are the best ways to enter this market. How to find the best distributor for your needs, which wines to offer and what has changed due to the pandemic – find out in this 30 minutes session

The country of 1000 islands and big diversity. Even though relatively small, the Croatian market is becoming more interesting in the last years to the foreign wineries. As a tourist country, Croatia is selling mostly local wines, but as the wine culture is growing there are opportunities for imported wines as well. Get to know Croatia, its wines, and which are the best ways to enter this market. How to find the best distributor for your needs, which wines to offer and what has changed due to the pandemic – find out in this 30 minutes session

Without a magic crystal ball this session will explore and discuss how key factors such as changes within the wine industry itself, technological breakthroughs, socio-economic, political & cultural shifts as as well as the ongoing interplay of globalization vs. localization, might just tweak, expand or completely re-invent the concepts of wine education for the future.

We like to imagine science free from discrimination, impartial, neutral. In fact, like any other human activity, it never operates in a political vacuum: even science has its prejudices. The eugenics born in the nineteenth century, which postulates the existence of “superior races” and “inferior races” and which even inspires the policy of euthanasia of the “less fit” promoted by Nazism, is an eloquent example of this. Similarly, the hostility towards American vines is not the result of scientific findings based on objective evidence, but of deductions from a time when the wine of these vines was a witness of poverty and hunger.

The session will explore the common origin of American species and European vine, which is currently very divisive in the scientific community. Reflecting on the elements supporting the main positions in this regard, Prof. Scienza will show how, from a scientific point of view, the ostracism towards the vines created by the crossbreeding of American and European varieties is not only not justified, but also prevents the resolution of important problems linked to wine production.

Wine apps have made some changes since they first hit the scene. For wineries is critical to optimize opportunities that wine apps can offer. Helping consumers get the right wine for them, collect valuable consumer data, and shorten the sales cycle are just a few examples of the benefits provided by wine apps.

Which wine apps are still relevant? Which ones will impact your bottom line? And how can wineries use them to stay ahead of the trends and increase sales? Amy Gross, CEO of VineSleuth, is back to share an overview of the wine app landscape and give a deep dive into key apps to watch. She will suggest practical strategies for working with wine apps (both directly and indirectly), analyzing the data they share, and growing your business and digital footprint.

Dive into U.S. 3-tier system to import, distribute, and sell wines in the U.S. while understanding some major markets (MA, NY etc.) fluctuations by value and volume. Discuss the main reasons as to why these markets have performed well or not, such as travel restrictions, education, events, specifically from a distributor and retailer perspective. In particular, Gianluca and Ciro will discuss and share their experience in how wine education has changed and what benefits and challenges were experienced from retailer and distribution standpoint. Lastly, some key grape varieties and appellations on the rise in the market will be shared.

With changing wine market situation, Korean consumer makes new trends and spend much more than before. It’s not only because of Covid-19, also economy situation is very positive in South Korea.

· How changed alcoholic drinks culture

· Why Korean people consume mostly wines at home

· Disappearing Sommelier, so who or what is alternative.

– It’s period of changing and figuring out what kind of Italian wines can be adopted. Dongmyung Hong, the owner of Vinovino co. will talk about strategies and how to approach South Korean market.

Wine apps have made some changes since they first hit the scene. For wineries is critical to optimize opportunities that wine apps can offer. Helping consumers get the right wine for them, collect valuable consumer data, and shorten the sales cycle are just a few examples of the benefits provided by wine apps.

Which wine apps are still relevant? Which ones will impact your bottom line? And how can wineries use them to stay ahead of the trends and increase sales? Amy Gross, CEO of VineSleuth, is back to share an overview of the wine app landscape and give a deep dive into key apps to watch. She will suggest practical strategies for working with wine apps (both directly and indirectly), analyzing the data they share, and growing your business and digital footprint.

The western world’s mainstream media outlets and wine and food industry still have a difficult time understanding that visibility does not, on its own, create an environment of diversity and inclusion (and often is simply tokenism) and the white mainstream still lack understanding of the difference between cultural appreciation and cultural appropriation. Only when the mainstream accepts and gives space to people of colour to create their own paths outside of the “traditional” and ensures that BIPOCs are in decision making roles with respect to the stories to be told, how they are told and who is telling them will diversity and inclusion be what it should be – which is a truer representation of society – rather than just a superficial marketing message solely for optics.

The restaurant industry, which accounts for 10 percent of the U.S. workforce, saw the most significant sales and job losses during the Covid 19 pandemic. Close to 9 million restaurant employees were furloughed or laid off, and the industry lost more than $250 billion in sales during the first year of the pandemic. Clearly, there is much work ahead for the industry. As the world continues to recover, restaurant operators will need information and council, to thrive. Why are we all coming together today? We all care about wine, hospitality, sustainability, and finding solutions to the problems that restaurants will continue to face in the years to come as we rebuild. A successful wine program is essential to generate a profitable revenue stream for any restaurant or wine bar. It has never been more important for restauranteurs to find unique and cost effective ways to thrive while simultaneously creating beautiful, inviting experiences for guests. As bars and restaurants continue to rebound following the pandemic, preserving craftsmanship and artistry is critical like never before. ew and exciting opportunities exist for alternative packaging like canned and keg wine and beyond in order to achieve those goals.

Archer Roose Founder & CEO Marian Leitner and VP Wine Portfolio Alicia Towns Franken will speak about the benefits of alternative packaging (cans and kegs) and how these formats can be leveraged to drive profitability of bar program.The restaurant industry, which accounts for 10 percent of the U.S. workforce, saw the most significant sales and job losses during the Covid 19 pandemic. Close to 9 million restaurant employees were furloughed or laid off, and the industry lost more than $250 billion in sales during the first year of the pandemic. Clearly, there is much work ahead for the industry. As the world continues to recover, restaurant operators will need information and council, to thrive. Why are we all coming together today? We all care about wine, hospitality, sustainability, and finding solutions to the problems that restaurants will continue to face in the years to come as we rebuild. A successful wine program is essential to generate a profitable revenue stream for any restaurant or wine bar. It has never been more important for restauranteurs to find unique and cost effective ways to thrive while simultaneously creating beautiful, inviting experiences for guests. As bars and restaurants continue to rebound following the pandemic, preserving craftsmanship and artistry is critical like never before.  ew and exciting opportunities exist for alternative packaging like canned and keg wine and beyond in order to achieve those goals.
Archer Roose Founder & CEO Marian Leitner and VP Wine Portfolio Alicia Towns Franken will speak about the benefits of alternative packaging (cans and kegs) and how these formats can be leveraged to drive profitability of bar program.

The Hispanic consumer in the US (defined as people with origins in Latin America or Spain) is a significant segment of the US market both in terms of size and economic importance. Wine consumption among US Hispanic consumers has grown considerably during the last few years and represents a large, untapped opportunity. Hispanics have close cultural, linguistic, and culinary ties with many winegrowing countries and share similar values. However, the industry faces several challenges to accelerate this growth. Hispanic wine educators have the potential of acting as a bridge to reach these consumers with culturally relevant initiatives, training, and resources.

The Ukrainian wine market Revolution: the extraordinary story of a market that grew 5 times in the last 5 years.

During the presentation the audience will be introduced to some impressive trends and tendencies in the Ukrainian wine market, as well as insights and market specifics from the experts.

No one will leave the presentation without the answer to why Ukraine is the Treasure Island of Europe.

Wine and politics are an inseparable pairing. This session examines wine politics from two very different perspectives: inside and outside. First there are the political issues within the wine trade, including within appellation organizations and regional promotional groups, which are magnified by the lack of growth in the global wine market. As globalization’s momentum has shifted, wine has become an unexpected victim in the political trade wars of the past decade from the US to the EU to China, Australia, and beyond. Economist Mike Veseth will examine the what, how, and why of wine’s prominence in international politics and speculate about what the future may hold.

The latest social media app, Clubhouse was launched last year in April of 2020.

Working on an invite-only policy, Clubhouse can be summed up as a platform that brings together the feel of a podcast with genuine audience participation.

The exclusive feel of the invite and the ability to say your piece is a powerful social media tool.

In the online playing field Clubhouse opens a lot of doors for wine professionals.

Wineries, sommeliers, small businesses, importers, and wine writers can harness the potential this app provides to get closer to their customers, network across the world, learn new online skills, and create virtual experiences.

During COVID wine was over-used, sometimes vilified, and other times used as a crutch. So as we head through a time of transition, how can wine professionals hone their own skills to manage their health through mindfulness, moderation and awareness? Join Rebecca Hopkins and Cathy Huyghe of A Balanced Glass to discover ways to make the re-entry back to business a little easier with practical tools to help manage health and wellbeing.

“Sustainability” in the wine industry oscillates between being the most important topic for the future of the industry and a useless buzzword. Key making sustainable wine into something tangible and easy to understand for consumers, buyers, journalists and the industry itself is to cover the whole supply chain in the work, find an industry wide agreement on the most important practices, and including science backed metrics. Erica Landin-Lofving, previously a sustainability focused wine writer out of Sweden and consultant to Systembolaget on sustainability certifications, sits on the steering committee of the newly presented global non-profit Sustainable Wine Roundtable. The SWR has as a goal to create a global agreement that can reduce confusion on sustainability in wine. With several large buyers already signatories of the organization, including Waitrose, Whole Foods, Lidl and the Scandinavian monopolies, it will be an important organization for anyone dealing with international sales. Mrs. Landin-Lofving is also Chief Sustainability Officer of the publicly traded US wine group Vintage Wine Estates (Nasdaq: VWE). The strong interest of the financial markets in ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) places different requirements on the company’s structuring and reporting sustainability practices – relevant for any producer dealing with financial institutions in the form of investors, banks or insurance agencies.

This session will explore 5 critical insights into China which will put this complex market into an updated perspective and provide critical tools to succeed. The following points will be discussed: 1) how to move beyond “ganbei”; 2)“weiwen”, the key; 3) the central role of “ganxi”; 4) why you should never underestimate “mianzi”; 5) why success needs “xinyong”. A paradigm shifting session ahead.

Covid has had a significant impact on the U.S. market, particularly in terms of the expansion of wine e-commerce apps, sites and tools.

Sales to consumers can now take place, on-premise (HoReCa), off-premise (retail) and “e-premise.”

Producers need to understand the structures of the various tools and platforms supporting e-commerce as it is now being conducted in the U.S. And further, you’ll learn about ways to use these new tools to get past the roadblocks and complications that commonly occur going through a traditional agency-brand importer model.

One of the fundamental factors in understanding the E-comm wine universe in the U.S. is “who owns the relationship data?” In the case of third-party facilitators such as Drizly, they do. In the case of services such as CityHive and similar retailer direct-to-consumer solutions, it’s the retail store. We’ll discuss why this matters and how the difference can be leveraged to drive sales of your brand.

We’ll also parse out distinctions that differentiate the component tools and strategies of E-commerce. These include DtC (direct to consumer from domestic winery), intra-state retailer to consumer delivered by either common carrier or the store itself, and retailer to consumer interstate by common carrier.

The case histories of AGIVI – Association of young Italian Wine Entrepreneurs: from the lockdown of Covid-19 to the design of new initiatives that look to the markets of the future in a sustainable way.

Even before the pandemic, trends in alcohol sales were pushing towards deregulating the three-tier system. While the three tier-system offers many benefits to society, including economic, commercial, and safety measures, a healthy distribution system should never impede any winery from entering the US Market. A Multi-Channel marketing system keeps the distribution system in check preventing barriers to competition. Dave Parker, CEO of Benchmark Wine Group and President of the National Association of Wine Retailers, will discuss all the opportunities for multi-channel selling to allow any wine brand to legally enter the US market and the channels of which exist to do so.

While different marketing campaigns have different goals, most share one thing in common, no matter the medium. The campaign runs, people did or didn’t see it, and that’s a wrap. Native advertising in the form of content marketing is different. Although a campaign may have a defined ‘window,’ most publishers who offer this type of marketing campaign allow the content to live on their website or podcast feed indefinitely. This allows well crafted campaigns to continue to reach new audiences for months, even years. We’ll explore this phenomenon through two mini case studies: Fontanafredda’s Barolo-centric campaign with VinePair in 2016 that still draws in thousands of new viewers every month, and E&J Gallo’s sponsorship of VinePair’s Wine 101 podcast

The role of a wine writer is to communicate and comment on current and trending topics within the industry. Engaging with producers is fundamental to that task. Michaela Morris has been writing about wine for fifteen years. She will examine the various ways in which journalists and producers interact – from group media trips, solo visits and quick tasting room encounters to zoom, website and email correspondence. Her discussion will focus on how to maximize the time you have when journalists are in front of you as well as how best to communicate with them from afar. She will also share tips for keeping media happy during wine tours. While this session is geared to producers, consortiums and wine trip organizers, it is equally suitable for aspiring wine writers as it will give some insight into what the profession entails.

The presentation of “How fast are consumer trends in Romania changing” throws a light on position of Romania on the international market based on import and export market forces. It will cover more in detail the relationship of Romania and Italy in the context of wine. The audience will have a better understanding of the Romanian market and market trends. The session will also reveal the result of a market study on wine consumer habits in Romania. The presentation will include examples of brand segmentation and market positioning of an upcoming winery (Girboiu Winery) and already classic and well established example of Recas Winery. The public will leave the venue with key takeaways from the session.

We are entering a golden age of wine online that will forever change the way wineries think about customers, marketing, and channels. The landscape of wine discovery is changing forever and is not about algorithms, artificial intelligence, or machine learning, but about human beings.

Wine producing regions worldwide are facing many consequences due to climate change. At the same time winemaking processes themselves lead to the production of CO2 and therefore have an impact on the environment whether it be in the use of glass for bottling, carbon emissions from fermenting processes, the type and quantity of pesticides used in agriculture, monoculture, water used for irrigation purposes, the use of fossil fuels for the various stages of production or in transportation and agricultural machinery. Many steps can be taken to minimize environmental impact. This might consist in “cover crops , drip irrigation (or no irrigation at all) to preserve soil and water, a reduction in bottle weight or opting for environmentally friendly materials. Climate change can be embraced as an opportunity by those companies that aim to improve their management of resources. This might entail for example improved energy efficiency, a drive for innovation, or a search for environmentally friendly products and services and last but not least a greater control of a company“s production line. Such measures can promote competitively and reveal new opportunities for growth. Should they instead be postponed they could prove costly and risky for the company concerned.

The wine industry is suffering. There is a perceived “barrier to entry” that for years went unchecked. But now we are losing a younger generation of wine drinkers who cannot afford the wines of their parents generation and who are intolerant of any notion of elitism/snobbery, to the Ready to Drink category. This is a generation that values authenticity, health, sustainability, Diversity, Equality and Inclusion. In other words a generation that will go around the gatekeeper as we saw with Shawn Carter, aka Jayz when faced with a choice, called out the racist comment, took his fans and built his own brand, i.e. “ I don’t need you, you need me”.

Is alternative packaging the answer. “Drinkers ages 21 to 34 represent only 15% of bottled wine buyers but 26% of canned wine buyers and 29% of canned sparkling wine buyers,” By leveraging new formats that can: help reduce the “barrier to entry”, is better for the environment and will fit into their active lifestyle, alternative packaging can provide new revenue streams for the industry. At Archer Roose, we set out to democratize high quality wine by bringing a better, consciously-made glass of wine to consumers, in a format to fit their lifestyles and freeing it from “special occasions so it can be enjoyed at an accessible price point-everyday.

Over the past 18 months, more and more wineries have realized how fundamental Direct to Consumer sales are: Italy is one of the leading wine producers in the world but, at the same time, it is still not very competitive in sales to private clients. Matteo Ranghetti, founder of Divinea, will present Wine Suite, the software that exploits the potential of using data to increase sales conversion and improve customer shopping experiences.

Hungary is the country with long history of wine production and strong wine culture. Wine consumption per capita is high and 22% of country’s adult population can be classified as frequent wine drinkers, that consume wine at least once per week. Since 2019 Italy has the largest share ofHungary’s imported wines both in volume and value. These facts make Hungary an interesting export market for wines from Italy and the session will give the overview of Hungarian wine market in aim to explore the opportunities. After brief introduction about Hungarian wine market and wine production size and export, the presentation will show the dynamic of imported wines in Hungary in the past ten years, focusing on wines imported from Italy, in particular. The presentation will touch import of bulk, sparkling and still bottled wines. Moreover, session will give overview of retail market structure and wine prices in Hungary. Also, it will give insights about consumption behaviour and socio-demographic profile of wine drinkers, their habits preferences in terms of type of wine and sweetness level.

Japan is Asia’s second largest wine market and the sixth largest importer of wine worldwide. For wineries wanting to export it represents a sophisticated market that is politically stable and one where long-term relationships are valued. It is a mature market with well-trained, knowledgeable and dedicated staff in the on and off-trade. Japan also boasts one of the most cultivated restaurant and bar scenes anywhere in the world. Japan’s top restaurants are destinations for gourmets from around the globe but especially from other Asian countries (in pre-pandemic times). As such they influence taste around the region. While Japanese wine consumers have traditionally been ‘Francophile’ the market is very broadminded and open to new or less well-known regions. Many of the more successful regions are supported by regional bodies / agencies who undertake local promotional activities. Key trends include sparkling wine, ‘low-intervention wines’, promotion of wine sets, changes in wine packaging. Experienced importers, many with decades of experience; dedicated wine writers, rather than ‘social media influencers’; and an army of trained sommeliers are among those who influence the market. All these positives need to be tempered by the knowledge that the aging population and deflation continue to constrain the market.

With a changing consumer demographic and preferences, distributor consolidation, and brand explosion, we can all agree the wine business is more competitive today than ever before. The key to success in this day and age is brand pull, recall, strength, notoriety, recognition → brand awareness. A brand refresh strategy requires less risk than a total rebranding, and it can still get you the results you need to remain competitive. By making subtle changes to your positioning, messaging, and how you communicate, you can:

Protect the integrity of your brand
Expand your reach to new customers
Ensure your company image keeps up with the changing marketplace.
Michelle Erland, Senior Account Executive and Juliana Colangelo, Vice President of Colangelo & Partners, will talk about strategies and tools to refresh and differentiate your brand story to stand-out in the U.S. market for both press and trade audiences. Using case studies and data, they will share some of the most current and successful tactics for communicating your brand story to reach your target audience.

The COVID-19 crisis has deeply changed travellers’ behaviours. Despite their interest towards gastronomic and wine experiences is still growing, they are requesting even more innovative, engaging, active and sustainable experiences.

Roberta Garibaldi will present the new needs and expectations as well as emerging trends. A particular attention will be placed on (1) wine tourism, by presenting the new proposals that travellers are seeking along with traditional tastings and visits, and (2) sustainability in gastronomic and wine experiences, by explaining the sustainability issues that may drive travellers’ decisions and showing how to crate sustainable experiences. The presentation also includes a wide range of national and international best practices, as to concretely explain how suppliers can adapt their current offering.

This session will explain how to adapt to the Norwegian market, where price is (almost) everything. The Monopoly system requires product visibility to succeed, and a fixed price. The session will present a different focus on the Horeca business and the Monopoly, elements that follow each other, explaining why producers do not like the Monopoly. Tenders are actually not a lottery, and have no flexibility, but they are (almost) the only way to succeed. The session will explain how to do it.

Australia is only just emerging from the Covid bubble with international borders expected to re-open December 2021. Due to extended lock downs the Australian beverage industry has undergone a massive transformation for both on and off premise sales. Local producers have lost important export markets and have been looking inward for sales which has impacted imports. It’s not all doom and gloom though as consumers have increased wine consumption and are looking for new tastes and flavours. Italy is an exciting prospect for both consumers and trade. With a significant Italian expat demographic, major plantings of Italian varieties, an educated market and the Australian love of food and the Mediterranean lifestyle, Italian wines are well poised to gain more traction as the economy opens and rebuilds

In a quest for effective wine communications, two market professionals – Vlada Lesnichenko and Anton Moiseenko – will explore the intricasies and ways of promoting wine, wineries and wine regions in the Russian market.

Together they will take a look at Russian influencer community, effectiveness of wine influencers as communicators and discuss the best cases and practices in the wine communications in Russia. If you are a representative of a winery or a wine region, this seminar will leave you with practical understanding of route to effective Russian market communications.

Verbal communication about wine, broadly treated like the default, has its limits, potentially hindering our ability to reach new customers and capture their imaginations, particularly as the market for wine expands into new regions and cultural contexts. Non-verbal communication about wine, while not yet mainstream, is being employed by different players within the wine industry to intriguing effect. The session will feature two major examples of non-verbal sensory content related to wine, exploring lessons learned and impacts on the relevant wines/brands.

As travel was not possible during the months of Lockdown, many involved in the world of wine found new ways to connect.
The aim of this session is to look at the different ways people in wine have connected through virtual wine tastings during Lockdown and identify some of the benefits for various sectors: wine journalists and writers, wine educators, wine students, wine sellers, wine consumers.
The ability to connect with producers, customers, educators, students at a time when travel has not been permitted has been vital for many businesses and it seems that the connections made through utilizing new media (Zoom, Microsoft Teams, etc) will be here to stay, even after life returns to ‘normal’.
This presentation seeks to explore the benefits for the various sectors as well as some of the difficulties and downsides.
To achieve this, Marc Millon surveyed about 50 people across the industry and will be analyzing the results.
His hope is that the session will lead to a lively discussion as people attending relate their own experiences.
It will be very interesting to hear your thoughts from the point of view of a wine producer.

Despite the pandemic consequences, data extrapolated from industry research confirm the interest of wine consumers in the Russian market, where Italian wine grew by 45.4%, from 39.9 to 58 million euros. However, Russian consumers are looking for more attractive offers and rewarding value for money, but also paying more for the wines that interest them. The main features of the Russian market in 2021 according to Wine Intelligence remain the strong position of Italian wine and growth:

in volume and value of consumption;
of the off-trade channel driven by the drop in currency and the increase in taxes;
in the number of wine lovers between Moscow and St. Petersburg;
of Millennials in the shares of wine purchased with increasing involvement.
Focus Market sessions powered by ICE devoted two sessions to the Russian importers: 8 speakers importing Italian wine come together to present not only their companies to the audience, but to give some inside information on what wines they are really looking for on the Italian market.

From the columns by Luigi Veronelli to the photos, videos and podcasts on the main social platforms: the figure of the “wine communicator” has seen over the years a profound evolution in characteristics, language, modes and means of expression to tell the vast and complex world of wine to the public of wine lovers. Up to the explosion, during the months of lockdown, of the phenomenon of “wine influencers”. If the backgrounds are often very different and the skills on the world of wine are more or less profound, wine influencers undoubtedly have in common enormous communicative skills and the ability to intercept the curiosity of young wine lovers, eager to learn a little more about wine and wine pairings in a simple and fast way. But who are the “wine influencers” today? And how do they impact consumers and the market? In response, the session will retrace the evolution of wine influencers from the 1980s to the present day, analyze the use of new media and communication tools, and trace the profile of new wine lovers and their relationship with wine influencers, to understand what is their actual impact on the market.

Despite the pandemic consequences, data extrapolated from industry research confirm the interest of wine consumers in the Russian market, where Italian wine grew by 45.4%, from 39.9 to 58 million euros. However, Russian consumers are looking for more attractive offers and rewarding value for money, but also paying more for the wines that interest them. The main features of the Russian market in 2021 according to Wine Intelligence remain the strong position of Italian wine and growth:

in volume and value of consumption;
of the off-trade channel driven by the drop in currency and the increase in taxes;
in the number of wine lovers between Moscow and St. Petersburg;
of Millennials in the shares of wine purchased with increasing involvement.
Focus Market sessions powered by ICE devoted two sessions to the Russian importers: 8 speakers importing Italian wine come together to present not only their companies to the audience, but to give some inside information on what wines they are really looking for on the Italian market.

Reports indicate that there is no end in sight to the record pace of import cargo, the congestion at global ports and terminals, the shortage of warehouse space and labor, and the continued schedule disruptions through the year and into 2022. The pandemic combined with these challenges has created the biggest shipping challenge in the last 20 years. With these challenges on the supply chain, Alexi will identify how brands can ensure their products reach the US market and offer insight into how brands can change their business models and take control of their logistics.

The study on the gender gap in the world of wine, conducted by the University of Siena in collaboration with Le Donne del Vino and UIV, has highlighted the growing role of women in Italian wineries who have become protagonists of the commercial, communication, marketing, cellar hospitality, and agritourism-catering sectors. There remains a problem related to the lack of nursery schools (absent in 100% of the sample) which could be directly related to the high percentage of female employees working part-time. Donatella Cinelli Colombini will present the proposals of Donne del Vino to accelerate equal opportunities. These proposals concern the maintenance of the current advantages for female-run farms and a bonus – in terms of tax breaks or scores – for farms where there is equal pay and career progression between genres. Wine blogger and influencer Laura Donadoni proposes the introduction of courses against gender violence by presenting the American example. Valentina Ellero (UIV) will talk about sustainability and how effective gender equality can only be achieved through the punctual monitoring of ethical and social indicators.

This session will present the economical and geopolitical situation in Belarus, taking into account how COVID and political issues influenced the Country. The current place of Italian wines on the Belarussian market will be analyzed thanks to figures compared to major players, highlighting growth opportunities and the main tendencies and features in the HoReCa and Retail channel.

Strong and recognizable female figure – one of the very few in the Polish World of Wine, Izabela created something very special – a YouTube wine show called “Ale wino” in which, together with the co-host, Tomasz Czudowski, they introduce the world of wine to the viewers by tasting, sharing the story behind the wines and winemakers, inviting special guests from various fields related to wine.

Izabela worked for the wine magazine, “Winicjatywa” and two food magazines – “SMAK” and KUKBUK. She is also a passionate wine educator who teaches in the Polish department of the WSET (Wine and Spirits Education Trust). Izabela is a creator of two dinner clubs. She organises wine pairing dinners and cooperates with the best chefs and restaurants in Poland. Two clubs together gather more than 600 members!

She also organises tastings, masterclasses and wine courses opened for the public in different cities of Poland.

The digital landscape for products is growing and interactive experiences are increasing in demand from customers. This talk will highlight success across the wine industry with groundbreaking interactive experiences. We will cover the evolution of experiential branding and the demand from consumers ranging from apps to web-based experiences that bring the label to life in the hands of the user.

How can you get started in building experiences that drive your brand’s voice? Hear from the leaders in the industry about how to start a web campaign and how to effectively grab the attention of customers.

In today’s digital-first age, many wineries still fail to harness their most valuable asset: their information. Unlike other industries where the quality of digital product information, brand photography, and story-telling creates success, wineries have a difficult path to market.

In this session, Madeline Puckette introduces Wine Folly’s latest project: Region Guides. These dynamic, education-focused guides walk consumers through a region in order to discover wineries and wines. Region Guides remove wineries’ barriers to the market by allowing them to present their brand and wines directly to consumers.

With increasing competition both online and offline in the wine retail space, it is important for retailers to differentiate and to find new ways to connect with their customers. This session will explore how content creation relates to developing brands, enhanced customer interactions and ultimately increased sales. The amount of consumer touchpoints has never been greater which is both an advantage and a disadvantage. The session will look at the advantages of creating content, the different types of content that can be produced and the platforms that can be deployed. Tactics and best practices will be analyzed.

There has never been a more difficult time to sell wine in the U.S. At the same time the wine industry is dealing with a pandemic, historic drought, wildfires, and channel shifting to name a few, it is also dealing with an onslaught of attacks from the anti-alcohol movement while discovering a rotation of the older wine consumers into retirement, against the backdrop of a very different younger consumer. The result of the tumult is an industry that is likely to see a drop in volume sold for the first time since 1994. The industry context for selling wine is changing, at the same time the average consumer is changing. Hitting the consumer mark today is like throwing a dart at a target placed on a carousel

Latvia is very young as an independent country and as a wine market.

Distance from the former republic of the Soviet Union in 1991 when the city of Riga – the capital of Latvia with a population of about 1 million people was a city with a dozen restaurants and bars, to today’s hundreds of wine sales and consumption points and the Latvian sommelier Raymond Tomsons who won the title of the Best Sommelier in Europe in 2017 and took the 3rd place at the World’s Best Sommelier in 2019.

Italian Wine Ambassador Andrejs Batkilins living in Latvia and Valdis Lucis – owner of Latvian wine importing company will make introduction and the spotlight on the wine market in Latvia.

Who are local major players in this business sector, how to work small/medium size importers and retailers of Italian wines?

Distribution channels and the difficulties that Latvian importers have working with Italian wine sector. Short overview of Latvian customer’s habits and behaviour.

Join Mike as he reviews best practices for digital customer experience (site design, navigation and more) as they relate to winery websites. During the session, he’ll present 8 concrete suggestions for improving your informational website for consumers, with plenty of real-life examples.