Ep. 2543 Inside Wine.com with Tim Marson MW: Italian Wine Category | Masterclass US Wine Market

We learned fairly early on that the reason why people weren't buying wine from us is because we didn't have what they were looking for. So we can adopt it more than the Amazon approach. It's like build it, they will come. We offer everything, let them pick and choose, help them find it, and build from there. And since we're buying from this huge network of distributors around the country, we can buy small quantities regularly to kinda keep a a balanced inventory and allow customers across the country to access this. We operate in 42 states across the country, and so the customers in some of the kind of less well trodden parts of the country that are interested in in Italian wines and wines that are kind of off the beaten path. And we really enable them to find those wines, And that's that's been a probably excitement of building this assortment because, obviously, it's driven by our passion for wine. Being able to present wines that people don't normally see on their local store shelves and being able to ship them in a day or two is is incredible. Hello. Welcome to MasterClass US Wine Market with me, your host, Juliana Colangelo. This show has been designed to demystify The US market for Italian wineries through interviews with experts in sales and distribution, social media, communications, and so much more. We will quiz each of our esteemed guests in every episode to solidify the lessons that we've learned from the episode. So sharpen your pencils, get out your notebooks, and join us this week to learn more about The US market. Welcome to MasterClass US Wine Market on the Italian Wine Podcast. Today, we're joined by Tim Marsan, master of wine and a category director at wine.com, the largest online only wine retailer in The United States. Tim oversees category strategy, assortment, and consumer insights for one of the most influential digital wine platforms in the country. He has a deep background in global wine markets. And under his stewardship, wine.com has become a critical discovery channel for Italian wine from household names to the long tail of regional gems that rarely make it onto traditional retail shelves. I'm thrilled to have Tim here with us today to unpack what's happening right now in The US wine market in the Italian wine category, what's performing on wine.com, and and some of the biggest opportunities that lie ahead of us. Tim, thank you so much for joining us. So so great to have you here. Thanks for having me, Juliana. Great to be here. Absolutely. Before we dive in, just to our listeners on this episode, our three key takeaways for this interview with Tim. Number one, why wine.com is leaning into or out of specific Italian wine categories right now. Number two, how wine.com evaluates producers for US readiness and price architecture? And finally, number three, which formats and price tiers of Italian wine are currently outperforming the total wine category and why? So, Tim, you know, let's dive in and just get right into it. I think most people, of our listeners are probably familiar with you and your rolloutwine.com. But is there anything else you wanted to add just about your background or your role at wine.com? Sure. I've been, with the company for nine and a half years. Started out running the California wine portfolio, and then moved into imports primarily with French wines, and then added Italy a few years ago. I was tucked away from California, added spirits. So I've done a little bit of everything here, so it's been quite a fun ride. Amazing. Fantastic. So you've had quite a broad experience and been quite impactful as well in wine.com, which is great. Thank you. To start, you know, wine.com does have one of the broadest Italian wine assortments that there is in The US market digitally or in brick and mortar. Can you talk a little bit about what makes the wine.com selection of Italian wine unique? Sure. So we currently offer over two and a half thousand different Italian wines, out of our largest fulfillment center. And over the past year, we've sold over 7,000 different distinct Italian wine Wow. Specific SKUs countrywide. During this time, well, over a third of our customers have purchased Italian wines from us. It's a huge assortment, the same kind of policy we've conducted with most of our categories, but Italy is certainly one of one of the big ones. It certainly represents the length and breadth of Italy. So alongside familiar categories, appellations, brands, etcetera, you can find interesting and esoteric wines also beaten path too. As a three tier ecommerce business, we work with importers and distributors of all shapes and sizes to achieve this huge huge selection. Right. Can you talk a little bit about what allows wine.com to offer perhaps such a broad breadth within the Italian wine category? Was it led by consumer demand or something that's more led by the the sourcing team and yourself? Yeah. It's a combination, really. I mean, we learned fairly early on that the reason why people weren't buying wine from us is because we didn't have what they were looking for. So we can adopt it more than the Amazon approach. It's like build it, they will come. We offer everything, let them pick and choose, help them find it, and, build from there. And since, we're buying from this huge network of distributors around the country, we can buy small quantities regularly to go keep a a balanced inventory and allow customers across the country to to access this. So we operate in 42 states across the country, and so the customers in some of the kind of less well trodden bottles of the country that are interested in Italian wines and wines that are kind of off the beaten path, and we really enable them to to find those wines. And that's that's been a popular excitement of of building this assortment because, obviously, it's driven by our passion for wine. So, being able to present wines that people don't normally see on their local store shelves and being able to ship them in a day or two is is incredible. Absolutely. And I think that comparison to the the Amazon model of if you build it, they will come and kind of being that number one search site for for wine makes a lot of sense and gives a, I think, a good clear picture of the the segment that wine.com operates in as well. Right. And like unlike Amazon, we need to kind of be able to make them be able to find the wines they're looking for and make it accessible. So having the kind of right navigations tools on the sites, filtering mechanics, and also useful information, content on the wines, that enables us to sell effectively through this long tail of products, which other retailers might struggle with. Right. Exactly. You can use digital marketing tools to either put those wines in front of new consumers or, of course, get them in front of the consumers that are looking for them as well, I'd imagine. Yeah. So you've mentioned, Tim, that, you know, a third of wine.com customers have bought Italian wine, and you're seeing growth in the Italian wine segment in general on wine.com. What are some of the trends you're seeing in the category right now? Yeah. I mean, Italy is performing better than many other major categories for our business right now. Unlike The US market as a whole, Italy, for us, is well behind France in share of total sales both volume and value. That's largely due to our strong history of selling Bordeaux, more recently, Burgundy, and, of course, champagne, which is very giftable and online friendly. And so France kind of over indexes with us compared to the overall market, but Italy is still a very very strong category for us. Worth mentioning that imported wines, nearly two thirds of our business, which again is very different from the broader US market where I think domestic wines are, like, 65, 70% overall. So we're very import heavy. And the the important thing there is that, again, if you offer it all, then customers obviously vote with their wallets.