No Longer Business as Usual

I work with wineries throughout North America and have been amazed at the growth in the industry over the past decade or so. The growth is in all states and provinces and in some areas the number of wineries has quadrupled in fifteen years.

This means that there is a lot more competition for consumer interest and customer dollars. As well as making products that can stand up to the quality that customers expect, you also need to create an atmosphere that will make customers want to come back and want to continue to buy from you.

In order to keep up with the rapidly changing world of customer service and sales, it’s important to also keep an open mind and be ready for the next new thing. It wasn’t too long ago that there was no such thing as Social Media, and now a good social media campaign can increase the number of people who know about and will try your products.

There are a few things that we have to understand and practice if we want to be successful in the long term.

• Know what you want to achieve: Have clear goals and make sure that everyone in the company is aware of the goals and how meeting these goals affects each individual job.
• Be open to suggestions: Sometimes doing things a certain way because that’s the way they have always been done is not the best option. There may be a better way because the business has changed. More competition can mean that you need to promote your business in different ways, for example.
• What else can you do to be successful? There may be things that you haven’t thought of. Look at your competition and see what they are doing or ask your employees if they have any ideas.

There are lots of things to consider that may or may not work. Though you are not going to know until you have at least given every idea a fair hearing and thought it through. It may be with just a little tweaking it changes your business and possible the world.

A tip of the glass from me to you