24 August 2010
Hawke’s Bay has a hearty appetite for international wine promotion
A Hawke’s Bay wine industry summit has agreed to maintain cohesiveness within the region and work together to promote the regional brand ‘Hawke’s Bay wine’.
Over 40 of the region’s wine industry decision makers met last Thursday (19 August) at a Wine Summit at Vidal Estate to determine the future direction and marketing strategy for Hawke’s Bay Winegrowers Inc.
The Summit also identified that any regional marketing of Hawke’s Bay as an international wine region had to be self-funded to be able to do what the industry wanted and needed to do.
It also agreed the region needed to focus on quality and ensure the decision makers in Hawke’s Bay were committed to the development of the ‘Hawke’s Bay’ brand.
"These are all strong statements and the fact that they were welcomed and supported by the local industry says to me that the region is ready to invest further in the Hawke’s Bay Regional Wine Brand,” says Rod McDonald, chair of Hawke’s Bay Winegrowers Inc.
Chaired by respected winemaker and industry leader, Dr Alan Limmer, the summit included presentations from Rod McDonald, Lyn Bevin, HBWG executive officer and John Buck, owner of Te Mata Estate.
Steven Green of Carrick Wines in Central Otago was the guest speaker and spoke with extensive knowledge of Central Otago’s regional marketing efforts, the structure developed to provide regional marketing, commitment and focus required for those efforts, and the challenges facing then and now.
Mr Green urged Hawke’s Bay’s representatives to take the Central Otago experiences and adapt them for Hawke’s Bay. Hawke’s Bay has a far greater number of producers of different sizes and an extensive wine industry history compared to Central Otago, he told the Summit.
John Buck stressed that the region was the brand, as the fine wine world is based on geography. He pointed out in these challenging economic times with supply and demand imbalances dictating market activity, no winery or grower could afford to neglect the importance of the ‘Hawke’s Bay’ brand for the region’s wine industry.
An open session throughout the afternoon addressed funding issues, gaining buy-in from all producers, developing national and international regional programmes, achievements of the regional organisation and potential steps forward.
With 60 wineries categorised as small within the region, nine as medium and only two large, the biggest benefits identified were going to come from aggregation of capital in regional promotion.
Lyn Bevin said she was delighted with the result. “We wanted to determine that we were doing the job our members wanted us to do and to keep directing our efforts in this way.
“More international promotion of the region is top of the list but not at the neglect of the local market. It’s my job now to take away the positive outcomes of the meeting and develop a marketing and promotional programme for the next five years that is achievable with the resources we have.”
Xan Harding, director and deputy chair of HBWG, asked the Board to make minor alterations to the organisation’s mission statement to reflect the summit meeting outcomes, namely to bring more focus to building the Hawke’s Bay wine brand by collective regional effort.
For further information contact:
Lyn Bevin
Executive Officer
Hawke’s Bay Winegrowers Inc.
