Have you heard the saying: "If you don't know which way you're going, any road will take you there"?
Business planning helps you choose the road that best fits your aims and resources. Failing to plan really is planning to fail...
Running an effective wine tourism operation can boost your brand and profits and secure new sources of cash flow - the key to survival for any business.
The key items to consider are:
- Capacity - number of cases you have to sell
- Current sales avenues - wholesale, export, on- premise, direct, cellar door
- Formal requirements - licenses, etc
- Brand positioning - what makes you different?
- Marketing plan - who are you targeting, how and why?
- Action plan - key opportunities, dates and responsibilities
- Administrative resources - development of resources to support your objectives
- Financial resources - mastering the money game
Sharpen your Plan
Once the decision has been made to enter into a cellar door business, all romantic notions need to be set aside while the real business takes place: a business plan, budgets, potential markets, licenses and resources.
Before you even consider what facilities you are going to offer, take a good hard look at what is already available in your region, and visit other wine regions as well to find out what operators are doing. Make a list of how many cellar doors there are and what services they offer. Can you identify any gaps? How would you rate the service? What about the facilities?
You need to be able to create a point of difference - a reason for people to visit you - so you need to either improve upon the current offerings or create a totally new experience.
Whilst having objectives is necessary, it's also important to allow room to simply evolve as you implement strategies and measure the outcomes.
In this Section:
- Find out about licensing and legislative issues in your State
- Learn how to define your brand
- Understand the fundamentals of business planning
- Create a business and marketing plan
- Consider the merits of plans for environmental and risk management
- Develop a set of comprehensive resources to develop and support your staff
- Work out how your cellar door is going to provide you with cash flow, and a return on investment.
