Wine & ecommerce: good pairing?

In these times we are living, the collateral damage on the economy is big and global.

One of these collateral damages from COVID-19, has been global confinement with its impact on brick and mortar stores, and most of all the restaurant industry.

This change has precipitated the move of these businesses on to digital platforms, when before they could be reluctant to it. This move prompted us to ask ourselves, is it a good pairing?

How has the wine industry adapted to ecommerce?

In terms of wineries, most of their income comes from the on trade (hotels/restaurants/bars), which is the worst impacted industry. This is the reason why many wineries have decided to try their hands on ecommerce, by opening this channel or creating interesting packs to bring the consumer to their sites.

For Protos, it was important not only to increase our sales, but to help the restauration industry that is the bone marrow of our commercialization. This is why we created a pack that had a 25% discount on wine for the consumer with free shipping, but also help this industry giving it 10% of all its sales. It was an astounding success with our sales increasing by 3 times versus last year online sales’.

Another channel that has seen a huge surge in sales, has been the wine online marketplaces, such as Bodeboca, Vinoselección or Vinissimus that have seen their sales double, specially during the first month of confinement.

Why now?

The confinement prompted traditional consumers, to try their hands at ecommerce for the first time. Specially when seeing all the offers given by wineries and marketplaces, increasing +55% internet sales during the first 3 weeks of confinement, and wineries online sales an +80%.

Even with the increase in sales during these times, they still represent a small percentage of wines sales. However, there are some that think that buying wine online has come to stay, what do you think? is wine and internet a good pairing?