The tourism industry is keenly interested in wineries that can offer a range of experiences and products - beyond wine - to visitors. This may range from a special winery tour; distinctive venue/dining options; unusual gifts; a tasting/ touring/ accommodation offer or other attraction.

Often this doesn't mean a heavy dollar commitment from you. It could see you linking up with a restaurant, accommodation provider or even a sporting facility to jointly market yourselves through the tourism network.

One of your significant partners should be your Regional Tourism Organisation. You need to work with and through them to increase overall visitation to your region so that everyone can benefit. Find out how wine tourism forms part of the marketing strategy and make sure that winery interests are recognised at committee level.

Who can you partner with? By focusing on the needs of the visitor in tandem with your own business objectives, select a range of businesses that you feel provide a natural fit with your own core values. In other words, that can complement your offering, not detract from it.

Create a Product Package
All too often winery operators think wine is the "product", which it is - to a point. Products and services are often separated in people's minds due to the tangibility of one and the intangibility of the other. In tourism terms, the word product can be applied to any tourism service or combination of services. It is anything that can be offered to the market for acquisition, use or consumption and includes physical objects, services, people, places, organisations and ideas.

Significant benefits can result from collaboration with venues that can complete the experience and extend the product offering - this is known as packaging. Packaging products together with other tourism providers can be an effective way to increase patronage, provide a unique experience and enter the tourism distribution channel. Consideration will need to be given to costing your package to allow for commissions to tour operators in some cases.

It may be as simple as inviting some local food producers to offer (chargeable) wine and food tastings at set times at your cellar door. The key is expanding your sales opportunities and appeal to visitors.

Identify your Partners
There is no limit to the range or type of partnership you can utilise. Here's how a single partnership arrangement might work with an accommodation provider. Let's say a local bed and breakfast operator has four properties and wants to value add their experience by offering a bottle of local wine for their guests on arrival. Naturally, you do them a deal and everybody's happy. But in the process you discover that their occupancy rates are low during the week. So you negotiate an arrangement whereby the bed and breakfast will accept bookings at its standby rates if they are referred by your winery. The B&B supplies promotional material in the form of a counter top flyer and a journal of enticing photographs depicting the different properties and their facilities. The B&B then offers an incentive to your staff to promote the offer to visitors by offering a free night's accommodation for every ten bookings made. The result? Win-win: more wine sales due to the higher occupancy rate, greater revenue for the B&B, a value-added service for cellar door visitors and very happy staff!

Wine Trails
Wine Trails are becoming increasingly popular and have broadened in recent times to include food and even accommodation. As a single winery, you get to be part of a much broader promotional strategy for a fraction of the cost as the trail is a product in its own right. It usually has a distinctive name, a brochure and a marketing campaign funded by the participants, and perhaps the regional tourism association as well.

However, it's also possible to do this less formally. You could work through a local tour operator to create a package that includes a visit to you, lunch at a local restaurant, a visit to a food producer, a winery tour and visits to local attractions.

Use your imagination, read the profiles for inspiration and use the Partnering Checklist to brainstorm new ideas.