Ep. 858 Patricia Wilcox | Uncorked

Welcome to the Italian wine podcast. This episode is brought to you by Vinitally international wine and spirits exhibition, the fifty fourth edition of Vinitally will be held from the tenth to the thirteenth of April right here in verona to discover more about Vinitally and get your tickets. Visit vineitally dot com. This year, the Italian wine podcast will be live and in person in Pavilion six. Stand a seven. So come on down and say hello. Hello, everybody. My name is Polly Hammond, and you are listening to Uncore the Italian wine podcast series about all things marketing and communication. Join me each week for candid conversations with experts from within and beyond the wine world as we explore what it takes to build a profitable business in today's constantly shifting environment. As the co founder of New York's awe struck Siders, Patricia Wilcox knows a thing or two about the challenges of building and bootstrapping, a successful alcohol brand. With her latest article, She pulls the curtain aside on some of the less magical sides of organic social media. Today, we'll talk with her about that article and what she thinks wine brands can do better. Patricia, good morning. Thank you for joining us on a kind of gray European Monday morning. You are in the Netherlands right now. I understand. Yes. Good morning, Polly. Thank you so much for having me. I'm currently in the Netherlands because I work for wine master's TV and we're filming our next two series here. So I'm going to live from a houseboat in Lay Wharton. A houseboat. Wow. Super fun. Is that with a lot of people? Are you like trapped on a houseboat? I I'm imagining a frat party. No. It's very civilized. Yes. Yes. It's very it sounds very glamorous to be on set, but really it's more like wine harvest. I mean, we're pulling fifteen, sixteen hour days every day, and just trying to get it done. You know, I come from Los Angeles. And the number of times that I've looked at the wine industry and some of our issues around work for workforce and hours and x expectations, I think to myself, the only other industry I've ever seen that works this way is Hollywood, because we've got this idea of, oh, it's glamorous. And I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna drink with the stars, and I'm gonna be so special. And And, really, you're just, like, up at four AM, as you mentioned in your recent recent article rolling barrels and wetting down the floors. Yes. Absolutely. But, So that's a that's a really, good accidental segue into one of the reasons I've asked you to be on today. You recently published an article in the drop for pics that is a social media wine rant. It it brought up some issues around the behind the scenes working of social media for wineries. And, and I wanna dig into that a little bit more than you're allowed to do with like, an eight hundred word, you know, rant online. Yeah. Exactly. So the first thing I'll say is we'll we will put the link to that article in the description so that if anybody wants to go in and read it and kinda get caught up on why we're having this conversation today. We can. But let's start with you and your background really quickly because you started in alcohol, but not in wine. Is that correct? Yes. That's right. In two thousand thirteen, I founded a hard cider company Ostrek Ciders, in New York state, upstate New York about three hours outside of New York City. And I spent seven or eight years growing that, really having no clue what I was doing, just learning as I went along. My husband was my business partner, and he's been so helpful along the way, but neither of us had any idea. And then this opportunity to join the erasmus Munust master on wine tourism innovation presented itself. And I thought this would be a really great way to actually learn from professionals and experienced, you know, people in the industry and academic professors and things like that. So I joined Winter, and, now I've been able to, you know, really get a peek behind the scenes. Right. Because that program spans three countries. Is that correct? Three or four countries? And you have quite a lot of field work. Yes. That's correct. The program, starts in Spain, then the second semester is in France at University of Porto, and the third semester is at the University of Porto. And now the final semester, which is what I'm in, is a research slash internship semester. So it's a working research thesis development, but there's also two other internships in the program and multiple field visits. So we visit I visited at least seventy wineries during this program. Just, you know, and really getting to see the inner workings. It's not the same tour that they give everybody. Yeah. I I I think that I think that that's very true. And and and we're gonna come to this idea of, like, the the shine of it. But coming from a New York cidery, were there things that you expected coming into, especially in this case, the European wine world you know, had you had this vision of what it was going to be like? Because, you know, cider and to be fair beer making are so young and they're so vibrant and you can do so much at a rapid pace compared to wine. So how did those expectations and that background, kind of shine through in your experience so far? Or how does it just being a New Yorker? And, you know, being in Bordeaux? They're just like, people. Come on. Come on. We can do things differently. The first semester was a little bit like that. I had to get used to a different pace, which I love. I'm, you know, it's my dream to live in Europe because I love the the attention to lifestyle here, you know, quality of life is really important. So and and that shows through at the wineries as well, I think. But I will tell you this is my greatest business secret. And I'm gonna give it away already early on in this program, but the only expectation I had that didn't that I was shocked by is that almost no one is selling wine by the glass at their wineries. And that, like, staggers me. And if I could preach one piece of advice to every winery in the world, it's please sell your wine by the glass. Yeah. Alright. So you've written an article that is kinda like pulling, you know, the curtain aside on a lot of the things that wineries are doing for what we describe as Instagram to look, you know, look beautiful and perfect and polished. And you in the article discussed some of the challenges that you find with that for the benefit of everyone who hasn't seen the article and porter over it the way that I have, and I know you put hours into it, you know, what are some of those challenges that you're seeing social media is resulting in that drive toward, you know, the perfect Instagram picture? Is leading to in our wine spaces. Yeah. I mean, it's really just, I I feel like it's a confusion of vision a little bit. So We it's and I as as a fellow business owner, as someone who owns a cider business, in I understand we get so much advice that social media is so important and we have to take care of social media and we have to take care of our branding. And the reality of it is that most people don't realize how much time that takes for a business, especially a small business. It's hours and hours in a day that you just don't have. So huge big corporate wineries. Yes. Of course, they can do that, you know. They can build an entire barrel room that's just for show. They never put any liquid in that barrel because they want it to look super really great when you, come on your visit and they want you to take a lot of pictures of it. And they, They don't have to make wine in those barrels, but most of the small wineries in the world can't afford to do that. And I I don't wanna poke fun really at wineries because it's that age old adage. Everyone says it. How do you make a fortune in the wine industry? You start with a bigger fortune. Right? So, you know, nobody nobody's out here, you know, exploiting visitors to make billions type type of thing. But I think that in many wineries, some of the shift has been focused from getting brand exposure to creating authentic experiences for their wine tourism visitors and also even just making really great wine. So we have, in the agency. I I'm very open about the fact that organic social media is our least favorite job to do for clients. And a lot of the reason for that is a, the minute you hand it over to an agency, it becomes, you know, it's planned. It's not authentic. It's not contemporaneous. You just don't have the energy behind it that you do when you're doing it on-site. But the other thing is that, you know, years of working with numbers show us that organic social media provides very little direct attributable, revenue. To wine brands. So in terms of time and money, it always seems like a rather poor investment for us. I'm really happy to hear an expert say that. I've I've thought that, but it's nice to hear the words, from you as an industry expert. Yeah. No. I'm so not an expert on anything. I am a humble learner is what I am. And and, yeah, I I think though, like you say, we're really bombarded by messaging that is you need to do a, b, c, d, e, f, g. Right? And we, ourselves, can be very, you know, aspirational and in love with what we do. It's the equivalent of, you know, us making our home offices beautiful because it gives us happier, shinier, more Instagram worthy places to share. So what I wanna talk about with that in mind is, you know, we've got this space in marketing that's between authenticity and aspiration. So the notion that we're doing something that is authentic or and depending upon the brand, that we're doing something that is meeting the aspirational needs of our audience. So do you feel like that these wine brands are being driven more toward us perspirational marketing than authentic marketing? Is there such a thing as authentic marketing? I'm not certain there is. Yeah. That's a really, deep an interesting question. And to be honest, not something that I reflected a lot about because really the main goal of of the article was not so much to convince wineries to change as much as to convince people interacting with wineries to change. So from my perspective, the issue is how how we're visiting wineries because the wineries are just offering what we're asking for. So like you said, you know, yeah, maybe it's very aspirational because that's what we're that's what we're going there for. We're going there to show off our pretty sundresses. And we're going there to as I I mentioned in the article, we're we're going there to make our followers jealous. And that's the part that for me needs to change because with that, the wineries will change. It's a little bit like voting with your dollars. You know, if it if it weren't so successful for the wineries to make the barrel room so pretty and to hose down the floors, they wouldn't spend the time on that. Other than articles like yours, which I know is a consumer facing publication, but a lot of the discussion since the article was published has been in trade. How do we as wine brands collectively. And especially if we're looking at independent wine brands, how do we communicate to our audience? What is basically You think you wanna see shiny floors in perfect barrel rooms, but what you actually wanna see is blank. How do we begin to value that? That's so true. I mean, it's it really is a challenge for the industry. The biggest way is by having people actually experience it. So for me, you know, one of the best wine always the best wine tours that you go on are super spontaneous, and you're with the actual winemaker, and they're just, you know, a really unique persona, you know, we we went on a segway tour in Bordeaux that was phenomenal. We don't speak French. The the man, giving us the tour. He was the winemaker. He didn't speak English, but we made it work. And just really had like a top experience because it was in the moment and really genuine. And so how do you explain that online? Like, how do you as a as a wine brand start conveying to people that that's what they want because I didn't even want to go on a segway tour. It's my living shame that I went on a segway tour. But and you took lots of pictures and you put them all over your Instagram account. I did take lots of pictures, but I I think I I actually did have to share one, because it was just so much fun. But, yeah, I mean, There's also Do you think this is something that the Europeans are learning from the Americans? Because the Americans and and I say this is an American expat. The Americans are personal branders, like nobody else in the world. You know, are we, is the American, tourism and, basically, like, that online persona space, driving a lot of this movement toward glitz and glam? What do you mean by that? Well, okay. So if I look at Napa, Napa to me has always looked like the Disneyland of Wine. You know, like, it's it's just perfect and it's scripted and it's Instagramable and it has your sound bites. And just the whole thing is intentional. Which intent can have a great purpose in growing brands. That isn't traditionally how I've seen European wine brands operate, but I do see them becoming more and more like that. And is that because of the influence, you know, of our American tourism? Is it therefore just a cycle that we're just gonna go through and we're going through it a little bit later than than you know, coffee shops were in the nineties when they learned that they were good hot spots for for a glamorous life. Yeah. Oh, you know, it was just part of the pendulum swing? I think my I don't I I don't believe so. Because as you mentioned, like, coffee shops in the nineties, that coffee shops are still super glamorous today, you know, just adapting to trends in the time, but still, really, as you mentioned, aspirational place to be. So I think wineries will continue going toward that that aspirational, that intent of looking really glamorous. And to be honest, there's nothing wrong with that. I'm not trying to say that, you know, these wineries are bad. But that it's a different consumer should be aware that it's a different experience. So I love winery bus tours. I love getting to go to beautiful places. That's a huge part of why you wanna go to a winery because it's gorgeous to be in that space. But I am aware that when I go on that type of experience, it's to have fun with the people I'm with. It's to get to see beautiful things For my level of wine knowledge, I may not learn much. I may learn some things, but really it's not a learning experience. I'm not having cultural interactions. I'm not expecting to learn about local customs and traditions. You know, it's it's an experience that, you know, I went on a bus tour in Keonti Glasgow, and I could probably go on a bus tour in Champagne and have it be very similar. Or but the point is that consumers should know that they can also go to a small seller in Kianti Glassico and a small seller in Champagne, and those will be extremely different experiences. In touring all of these wineries for the program, for the master's degree, did you find some that really stood out and were absolutely, like, rocking it when it came to that real winery experience? Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, we have, you know, one of our professors in the program owns a winery in the Terrig on a deal. And, you know, it's it's amazing to visit his winery because you get to be there with this man who is so passionate about his land and And, you know, he's he's creating wine tourism experiences that are really driven toward authenticity. You know, and there's another winery in that same area that's doing these GPS guided wine bottle treasure hunts that is so fun. So fun and such a great way to really appreciate the landscape. It's like Pokemon, but for wine. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yeah. And I mean, that's that's the type of stuff that you know, if I could encourage wineries to reconsider their tourism programs, even bigger wineries, it would be that type of of different innovative you know, not just doing what everybody else is doing because it looks great, but really trying to think about what they have that's different and and what makes them apart from the rest. So last week, I interviewed a young woman by the name of Lindsey Dyke who runs a PR firm out of Portland. And she was talking about how really generationally, you know, that the and I love talking about younger than gym experts. How this is such a divide between I don't even know if this made it into the recording or not. There this is such a divide between younger audiences and older audiences. So older audience like me were, like, oh, I've worked. I wanna rock up. I want it to be perfect. I wanna be able to wear my good shoes and younger audiences. Or well, I mean, it's true. You go to a wondering, you know, you know, I've I've seen women get pissed off because they were having to get their nice shoes. Sprayed. And and then you have the I think you have the younger people who are like, no. I wanna imagine that this is part of a world that I could be in or I could contribute to. Mhmm. You know, the age divide is is is really true or even just consumer group, you know, different expectations among consumer groups is is really true. And it's something that I'm glad you brought up because I really wanna instill that there's nothing wrong with a bus tour. There's nothing wrong with a glitzy and glamorous winery. It's a wonderful place to be. I I think though that consumers need to be able to decide what they're going into. That's sort of the hard part is how do we convey ourselves online that shows, you know, what customers can expect because, yeah, I mean, if you wanna go somewhere where you can wear your nice shoes, that's fully great. Like, good. There's areas of a winery where you don't have to get dirty and you should enjoy those areas. And then for others who want you know, they want to meet that fifth generation, gnarled hands, winemaker, those experiences exist as well. Maybe that's the main point is that you don't see them, but they're there. Actually, that that I think is a really important point is that we have an inherent bias in adoption of technology and messaging because I I know that we've dealt with French wine brands that just to get them to understand how to use Zoom is a challenge. And and the but but that's important. Right? How are we supposed to get to some of those, like, deep and meaningful real experiences when they are not a part of our digital media spaces that we live in right now. They wouldn't know how to get that to the audience if their life depended on them. Is this where we do need a shift in, like, bloggerdom, right, where we do have the wine writers. And as specifically maybe the amateur wine writers who are who are talking to their peers who are the proxy for these stories. So we need to elevate the the stories that are not beautiful and perfect. Yes. Absolutely. Absolutely. If if I could have anyone take one thing away from what I wrote. That would really be the dream is that, you know, we do start focusing on promoting these guys. How endearing is it that they don't know how to use Zoom? I mean, I love that. That's that's so sweet. That's the winery I wanna go to, you know. I mean, I wanna go to every winery. So, maybe I'm not the right judge, but there's a market for that, for sure, if people can wanna go meet farmers. So you're here. You're you have you're in your last semester, or your last term. Is that right? Of the wine master's program. You do have a business in the states. Where do you see going next? Oh, that's the question. Yeah. I'm not sure yet. Our my personal goal is to relocate to Europe. So, we're not sure what that's going to look like yet. But, we'll see. Just So that's a really nice shout out for anyone who's looking to hire you, you know. She she needs the immigration pass to Europe. I'll get her in. Yeah. And and that goal would be to work in the wine tourism side? Yeah. I mean, we'll see how things pan out. It's My initial goal was to actually bring a version of our business over here. So, you know, I'm still I'm still a huge champion for Cider, especially, you know, all Ciders, but I wish I could preached to, European Cideries that they are undervaluing their product big time. It blows my mind that you can get cider made by a Michelin starred chef in France for ten euros a bottle that's absurd. So, yeah, I'm hoping I can hoping I can do something with with cider in Europe. High five. I'm forever preaching that we sell our wine for too little too. So I'm I'm right there with you. Like I said, I completely love the article, and I'm glad that someone wrote that because I know that when I sit behind the scenes and I talk to my my wine brands, It's shiny for us just like it is for the reader. You know, we want to be reminded of all the reasons that we went into wine, and we worked so hard. And a lot of that is it is a really beautiful in some sense, romantic space. And so I worry when I see my brands who are investing four times as much in their organic social media as Email marketing, which is decidedly unglamorous, but works so much better. So for that sense, when I read the article, I was just really glad to see somebody talking about Look. These are the costs. This is how it works because we do need to be more open around effort and expectations what we're gonna get back out of that. You know, if you wanna do it because it makes you happy and it looks beautiful, do it. But don't do it because you think that that's gonna be the thing that's gonna sell wine and make you money. The point here is be authentic to who you are to what you love, create a unique experience, invest your money in that. Don't invest anything in copying anybody else. If you're designing a tourism product, even if you're designing something for social media, really try to think differently. Try to think unique. No sameness. Yeah. Patricia, I hope you keep writing. And I I I really enjoyed, talking to you today, and I'm really grateful that you actually wrote this article and that you gave me some of your time. Thank you so much Patricia. I know you have a big week ahead of you. Thank you so much, Polly. It's been such a pleasure to, you know, get to hear. You've you've taken things beyond the article at this point. So I really appreciate that. That's super exciting. Given me stuff to think about. It's really good. And that's a wrap. Thank you for listening, and a very special thank you to Patty Wilcox for joining us today. The Italian wine podcast is among the leading wine podcast in the world, and the only one with daily episodes. Tune in each day and discover all our different shows. Be sure to join us next Sunday for another look at the world of wine marketing. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Italian wine podcast brought to you by Vignitally international wine and spirits exhibition, the biggest drinks trade fair in the world. 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