Ep. 1154 Canada Navigating The Monopolies | wine2wine Business Forum 2021

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A wine to wine business forum twenty twenty one media partner is proud to present a series of sessions highlighting the key themes and ideas from the two day event held on October the eighteenth and nineteenth twenty twenty one. This hybrid edition of the business forum was jam packed with the most informed speakers discussing some of the hottest topics in the wine industry today. For more information, please visit wine to wine dot net and tune in every Thursday at two pm Central European time for more episodes recorded during this latest edition of wine to wine business forum. This is the last session. It's going to be about the monopolies and Mariana will be introducing and moderating this session with Wellperdham. Okay. Let's do this. Hello, everybody? I am Mariana Velinosi from Velinosi winery. I've been asked to moderate this session because my winery works with the Canadian monopoly, since two twenty five years now. So we, get in touch with this market through the Italian trade agency twenty five five years ago. And now it's one of our most important export market. We are here to speak about the Canadian monopoly and to understand why this market is so important in the wine sector. We have with us, professional, so many and now on a an entrepreneur of the wine industry will prude out or will, speak and let us understand the monopoly in Canada and why it is so important. Before to leave the word to you, I would like just to give a few figures of the market. The import of wine represents two point five billion dollars in Canadian market. And Italy is the first imported country in terms of volume. So we are speaking about one of the most important wine market for Italy. Moreover Canada is a stable market. So in the last ten years, it has grown by two point one percent. So we're speaking about a stable market with a stable growth with educated customers, in the wine industry. However, it is not so easy to enter this market to approach this market because there are really high entry barriers to enter the Canadian market. So a new producer has to, has to make a really big investments to find a solid partner there. And, there are really high marketing costs. So now I believe that the word to will will explain as the the Canadian monopoly. Thank you, Mariana. One of the things I've asked Mariana to do, during this session as moderator, is to help understand. Something I'm working on is not speaking so fast. Apparently, I can ramble on. So I'll do my absolute best not to do that and to accurately communicate something that is eluded, many wineries, especially in Italy, for some time, to give some, a bit of a synopsis of what we're going to talk about today. Our key learnings like Y Canada, and I think Mariana made a very good point couple good points. We are a growth market. We are a, relatively wealthy market. We buy a lot of Italian wine. But it's really important to understand the markets themselves, and you'll hear me say markets many times. Reason being, It is a collection of individual markets within one country. So to look at Canada is one entity is a challenge to begin with. We're going to focus on the main ones, and we're going to kind of work behind what's actually going on in those areas to give you some tools. How do you establish your presence when you're there? It's one thing to, you know, go and sell some wine, but you need to repetitively keep working within that market. And I think Villinosa has done a really tremendous job, you said twenty five years working in this market. When I was a buyer, I was buying your wines, and, gratefully so, I do think the market is an incredibly underappreciated and underrepresented area I'd like to see more of. We know, unfortunately. But for that reason, we actually have tremendous value coming from there. And then effective sales strategies. We'll touch on all of that as we go through, this presentation. A little bit about myself and my company, Freedom Strategic Marketing. I started this in twenty fourteen. I left a very solid career in the hospitality industry. I'd worked in the monopolies themselves with, hotels and casinos. I was a sommelier for many, many years. I was a buyer, but I was inspired in twenty thirteen to start expanding away from the restaurants And having been on the other side, the purchasing side, I saw a number of glaring flaws in how people were conducting business at trade shows, how they were marketing their wines and getting it to be accurately communicated to, the people that were important, the buyers in the media. So I started this company. We began working with, Oregon and Washington State, wines of South Africa, we've done some work, here in Italy, with, well, wine to wine and, definitely, I mean, in Italian via wine Ambassador as well. I've enjoyed that program. We also work with a number of consortios, here in the Canadian market in its entirety. We are Canada wide. We work majority in Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia, and Alberta. And myself, I've given you the little background there, but, I've been in wine my whole professional career. I'm forty now. I started when I was eighteen. And it's still quite quite an entertaining. I'm still engaged by this industry, especially now. There's a little QR code there. If you wanna hop to the website, gives you some more information. But Canada, what does it look like? So we're one of the top ten importers of alcohol in the world. It's a significant, significant because we're a place that doesn't produce enough to satisfy its own population. We have a population of approximately thirty six million people spread over six thousand kilometers. It is a massive land area with a small population. Seventy percent, of the wine being consumed in Canada is imported That's a huge number. And the top five countries, which Canada imports wine in twenty eighteen. This is the most recent stat I could find. France, Italy, United States, Australia, and Spain. Again, most of everything there is all from these countries. And we're seeing approximately two point nine percent growth in volume. So, again, we're we're moving in a upward direction here. We're gonna focus on the provinces or the markets. Ontario, Quebec, Alberta, and British Columbia. Each of them have their own governing bodies, regulations, import criteria, and agents on record system. It sounds a bit daunting, and I'm sure it was when when you started twenty five years ago. At that time, it was quite quite quite a bad bad location to work within. It is not any less complicated, but there are methods that do work. Starting with looking at them as individual markets is a for a is the first way to beat it. So let's begin with Central and Eastern Canada, specifically Ontario and Quebec. So we are, Ontario that's where I'm based is the most populous province Our largest city is there, and the which is also the economic hub, which is Toronto, and our capital city. We account for thirty seven percent of Canada's global imports. The liquor control board of Ontario, the LCBO, which is the provincial monopoly, as over a thousand retail shops and post annual revenues of six point three nine billion. And wine sales account for two point one billion. And this is a number that continues to increase. When you think about the population of Ontario, which is approximately eleven million people. It's a it's a staggering number. Working within Ontario, you have a few different options here. You can work within the LCBO's ret retail store system. Something to clarify, the LCBO is a two tier system. So you aren't working with, you aren't working with representatives that are selling individually. Everything is bought and sold by the LCBO. You do have agencies which represent and facilitate that process, but it's always going to go through this one area. And this is the same throughout Canada. Each province has its own, system that you'll need to go through in its one singular purchaser. But you don't necessarily need to work within the retail stores. There are a lot of wineries, and it's very important to understand where you wanna be if you are that winery. Retail is kind of the golden goose. You wanna move your way up to that. But with a thousand stores and this is staggering amount of sales. For a smaller winery, this could be untenable. For a larger winery, you're competing with established brands that have been there. So there are some challenges, but to understand where you wish to be is is important. We have other outlets, though, in Ontario. We have a private ordering program that would work with your agency to bring in smaller quantities. And when I say smaller quantities, it could be anything from five cases to a thousand cases that is relatively ace those are smaller numbers. Depends on how many sales they can they can access. And these wines would go directly to on-site, on on premise locations, hotels, restaurants, private clients. Right? And that really depends on the stretch of your your agency and how much time you've invested there. You do need to have a licensed agent to represent you in each market as well. Requires a licensed agent. It's only one per market. If your agency has business in all the provinces, you can negotiate with them in order to represent it to you. My recommendation is choose one that works for you in one market. And we'll get into talking about agencies and how to kind of search for those. It is a country within a country. Predominantly, it is French is its main language. It's the second most populous. The major cities of Montreal and Quebec City are located there. Montréal also has a massive port. This is where all the wine comes in when you are importing for the most part, and they import more wine than any other province, almost by a factor of three. It's quite remarkable. It is built within the quebecois culture to enjoy wine. It always has. As you can imagine, French is quite strong in this province, though we have seen an uptick in Italian wine, Heinz's presentation yesterday morning for for, VIVino has outlined the growth scale that they've seen throughout the, the provinces, and Quebec is definitely on an uptick for Italian specifically. Wind sales at SAP account for two point three nine billion in twenty nineteen, again, massive numbers. And the FAQ, the society, the is the organization is the, the government's body, which brings in all of your want. It's very similar here. They controls, purchase, distribution, and sale of alcohol. Now this one of the the more common comments I get walking around people find out that I'm from Canada. They always oh, the monopolies. They roll their eyes, and I I totally understand where you're coming from. But it it's there are other opportunities for you to work within them to understand these aspects first, to know that those organizations are doing all of the work for you. You don't need to worry about, arranging your own shipping. You don't have to worry about, distribution to stores. This is all taken care of within the pricing, and that is a costly endeavor. We will talk about Alberta, which is the privatized province, where you have multiple purchasers. And if you think about the points of contact that that generates, that becomes a costly venture as well. So there is a benefit working within the monoclonalistic system in that you have one purchaser, one distributor, one shipper. That's that can be economic. It can be very economic for you. An agent can obtain a provincial liquor board listing through the retail channel or, again, decide to sell it through consignment to bar and restaurants. And again, that's that's where I would recommend a lot of wineries begin. As opposed to trying to get on the shelf right away, which is, is normally something you build up to, work on your strategy of working within the restaurants that you think would work the best. Western Canada. So a review of the provinces of Alberta and British Columbia. We have a phenomenal view here of the Bow Valley in, in Alberta, which borders British Columbia as the Rocky Mountains. Alberta, the fourth most populous in Canada, characterized by the Rockies, major cities, Calgary, Edmonton, and Alberta is the only fully privatized province in Canada. But when we say fully privatized, that's fully privatized retail. Everything still does go through a government. Purchasing system. Though you have far more opportunities to work with grocery with scores, with, restaurants, and so on and so forth, mind you, the population is quite a bit smaller. So the AGLC controls the importation again, and we have six hundred and twenty nine million in sales. So this is we refer to Alberta as the wild west of Canada. It's the Texas of Canada. Right? We have oil and cowboys, and they're like, they love Italian wines. They love big wines. We're not all cowboys that's good vendors. Definitely not. Yeah. Fair enough. Exactly. Alright. Cool. Well, they definitely share the same sort of aggression, don't they? Alright. The nice thing about Alberta is they don't limit or control the variety of products. So the LCBO, the FAQ will place limits on what you can order, or more importantly, place limits on the amount you can bring in based on this size that it can be stored. Alberta, you don't have that. If you wish to bring in containers of wine, by all means, go ahead and do it. It will be your responsibility, of course, to make sure that it's sold. But, that's something we definitely want to be to outline here. It's a really good place to start, in Canada if you want to kind of put your toe in the water. Asians are responsible for ordering, consolidating shipping and marketing. This is, again, another difference. That the agent needs to be quite competent to be able to bring these products through this system and and arrange it themselves, and the AGLC pays the liquor suppliers for their products after it's sold to licensees. Another aspect about Canada, you are working with government systems. One thing about them is you will always get paid, and that's not normally the same thing you could say about other, other areas. Ninety days, typical terms that money will be in your account. That's something to really, as a as an exporter, you don't necessarily need to worry too much about. And BC, third most populous, characterized Pacific Ocean, mountains, and the major city of Vancouver. There is a massive support of domestic production. Hopefully, many of you have heard of Canadian wine and the wines of the Okinawa and Valley, about seventy percent of those wines are sold to Vancouver itself. There's massive support for local But there's some things that they can't do and one of that one of those things is Italian wine. They represent seventeen percent of the total wine imports, and, it is controlled by the BC liquor distribution branch. They're responsible for wholesale, one point two seven billion, but they do have a public private system. So why not mix it up a little bit? They started privatizing retail. Now with the monopolies, especially in the east, it is all monopolistic retail stores. With the very, very recent exception of restaurants being able to do off sales. In Vancouver, they decided to employ some private stores that will be able to control and retail their own products. Those through the BC liquor distribution branch. So you do have a couple different options here. You do need an agent, and everything has to be registered through the liquor distribution branch. There aren't really any ways to get around this. That's one thing I get asked a lot. It's like, well, what if I just bring it into Alberta where it's free and clear and I start shipping it all over the country? And that's probably not the best way to go about things. For private consumers, you are actually allowed to do something like that. But if you're going to do any substantial volume based business in a retail or hospitality environment, you have to work within your province. Are you enjoying this podcast? There is so much more high quality wine content available for mama jumbo shrimp. Check out our new wine study maps or books on Italian wine. Including Italian wine unplugged, and much, much more. Just visit our website, mama jumbo shrimp dot com. Now back to the show. Alright. Let's talk about agency representation here. So what does an agent do? And I know yesterday at his, presentation, he said something that was very important. He cares about the wine that is being produced, the winery, and the end user. Right? But there's a couple spots in there that There definitely is some in between, movements that are required. And one of that is the agency. Now they aren't bringing in the wines themselves. They're facilitating the wines through the system. It is remarkably important. That you work with an agent, but that you not only work with an agent, you work with a competent agent. You talk to them. You spend time to understand what their philosophies are. You that you can accurately explain what it is that you want out of the relationship. They are the exclusive, agent for you in that place. You aren't bound by that, agency agreement, in any necessarily legal way unless you have transactions going on. So if it's not working, not mutually agreeable, you can move on to another agency if if needs be. But again, it's costly to do something like that. So it'd be very important to go through and find that right agents. And I'll get to how we can kind of go about that shortly. This agency should be facilitating the the ordering process through the mundane government system. I would not recommend wineries take this upon themselves. Unless they have an export director that is very familiar, work with your agent to do that. They're supposed to do that. They're supposed to help market. They're out there to sell those wines to the, to the restaurants, to the hotels, to the private clients. They should have that database, and they should be able to prove those numbers to you to make sure that it all works. As far as finding an agent, these are a couple points that that we promote within our organization We also set these up for wineries as well, especially through consortiums trade shows. These are excellent opportunities to be able to find an agent which works for you. And I would ask this of of every winery and consortium to set this up. This is part of the whole trade process. To get new products represented is a an important part of any of these transactions. So look at which markets do you wanna be with? There's four right there. We do have other markets. We have Manitoba. We have Saskatchewan, the East Coast provinces. These are all very valid provinces, but it really probably behooves you to start with one of the four major ones. You have more population. You have more access to market, and it costs you relatively the same to be able to do the same actions in all provinces. So you may as well start with the big ones. Choose which channel retail or consignment are the two major ones that I would look at. I would look at your product, volume, your marketing strategy, if you have one, if you're a producer that can only supply twenty six packs of wine in the sixty dollar price point range, that would probably be far more suited to consignment in restaurants. As opposed to the ten thousand case volume player that is established with its marketing plan to support these government organizations very, very different. So understanding that, you can have both. Often we have product line extensions that have both aspects that's something that we aspire to do as you're moving forward, baby steps into this. So understanding which wines you want to send out, is it the lowest hanging fruit? Is it your Prestige Qvay? Is it something in the middle? Very much up to you. Participate in the trade events. So, I mean, we're all here. We like to participate in trade events. The purpose is to conduct trade. We do host them in Canada. This is probably the best way for you to meet multiple agents, to meet multiple buyers in one single setting. When we put on our trade shows, we highlight those wineries, which have attended, and are looking for representation, then we send that list to the agents that are out there to come and meet those individuals. Two different columns there. I've been on far too many junkets where they've sent the purchaser, the Sumeli on, on a trip to, say, South Africa. Though that so many might love the wines, they don't have the access to get those wines from there to where they need to be. It is highly important that they have an agent go along as well. So connect with your cons consortio, each a, find a supply list of agencies. Though that's as good as the piece of paper it's written on until you talk to these people and you understand what it is that that they can they can present, you know, after two years. Coming here, I've found it incredibly satisfying to be able to connect with people that I've had screen time with over the and some of the, the small things were were being solved in moments. So that face to face touch point, incredibly important. And I would ask questions about that agency's business. You could love that individual. You can love that group. Better remember, they're also salespeople. Right? So they're selling you on what's going on to understand they should be open about where their target, what their target audience is, where they sell the most within each province. Take a look at their other like brands to ensure that yours fits within that portfolio. So there's a little leg work that you need to do. And then marketing your wine. So visiting the markets again, you've done the trade show. You've found an agent. They have started to bring in your wine. Now what? You have now started the investment process of being within Canada, and it could be lucrative. It could be a twenty five year, relationship that continues to grow. It could be part of your portfolio of of export and distribution. Work with your consortium. Again, your local trade organization, they will have resources to be able to help out. The agency should be supporting you as well as ask them for what they are going to be doing to sell your wines. Attend trade shows, b to b sessions, scores and reviews. When we start getting into, the retail model, if you're aiming at retail, they definitely take the scores and reviews, very seriously. And we're starting I'm sure there's going to be a a session next year on scores and reviews. It'd be pretty interesting to do one on how effective they are and, you know, where where they they sit within the diaspora, but that is definitely a tool the boards use, whether you like them or not. Then competitive pricing, looking at excel or pricing for your wineries and ensuring that it is in line with what is being retailed in those environments, ensure that the, yes, we tax we have high taxes in Canada. But it's not something that just applies to your watery. It applies to every beverage alcohol product out there. So we're used to higher prices in Canada. It is the rigor. But understand if you're Barbara is eight euros and people who are selling them for six fifty, you have to understand that there must be an additional value add that you're going to bring. So looking at competitive pricing strategies, I'm not saying discount at all. I'm saying taking a look to make sure that you are priced for export appropriately because selling to the United States is slightly different than Canada. Canada is the collection of different markets. If you take anything away, that's one way I would look at it. If you are talking to the SAP and you're talking to the LCBO, I would recommend not talking about each other to each other, the kind of territorial. If you say, oh, they love it in Ontario, you probably won't get that sale. And the SAP and vice versa. You said they love it in New York. They'll probably take it for whatever reason. What kind of understated in Canada. You have your four key markets. The important of your agency support understand what you're offering and support your wines when you're here. Obviously, you've chosen to be there. Obviously, that agent has decided to help you. And, obviously, at this point, the, the wines themselves are selling, and people want to try those wines. So to go and visit, go visit those key accounts, we have tremendously good under rated restaurants throughout the entire country. Toronto is a melting pot of cultures and societies where you can eat any style of food that you want at the top, top levels. You find that in Edmonton, you find it in Calgary, Vancouver, Montreal, the main markets. These are great places to visit. That will definitely respond to your wines once you're set there. We have some helpful links and resources. So that whole presentation, if you want, you can scan that guy right there. That's we've uploaded it to our website. I know it'll also be available for the next two months, through the one to one business forum. But, there's something here. You can just scan that. At there's more useful links there, things that you can use in order to decipher. Again, I would dedicate some resources toward understanding this that are in the export area. It can get quite mundane and boring, but it's all pretty much right there in some additional links. So you don't need to write all that down right now. Just scan it. And that's it for me. So Do we have any questions? That was an amazing presentation, on how to work with monopolies. But now I have a question for you. So you already talked about how to approach this market for a new producer. And this is really difficult. We already saw that. But I have a question about the new trends because now in the Canadian market, we speak a lot about online sales, e commerce, and also about organic wines. So I would like to know your opinion about what's going on on the market and which are the main trends right now. Yeah. Excellent segue. So we've all been thrust into online shopping. The boards themselves have invested tremendously to facilitate those online sales channels. They aren't quite there yet for some of the specialty products. For example, the LCBO has recently announced that they're going to turn every other release, and they release new products every two weeks in the form of a glossy magazine sending it to the store. But every two weeks or every other release will now be online. So you'll be forced to go online, which is a fascinating move for them to do. Right? So they're not only grasping the concept of online sales. They're pushing towards it. They see the benefit. There are some some constructive areas. The system can be still mundane. No one has figured out really how to mark it on a grocery store website. Very well, Amazon hasn't been able to do it quite yet. It it's still kind of confusing that physicality is still there. And you bring up a tremendous point that should be added to this not only scores and ratings, but, yes, vegan, organic, biodynamic. You know, I don't wanna start getting into the natural stuff, but they are starting to move into that direction. They're seeing sales, spikes, One thing to keep in mind with the boards, they are not predictive. They study data that has shown itself already and make decisions based off of that data. So looking as opposed to, yes, this is popular. It's being supported by x y z industry. It doesn't really need much on a purchasing perspective unless the sales are there. They are building themselves to be retailers. They're built on turnover. These are huge points to bring up if you wish to be able to give them the tools to be able to market, investing as well in your own promotion of your products, whatever that may be, incredibly important. Let people know this is organic. It's bio. We are following similar global trends. Thank you. You're welcome. And, since that we you have, a marketing company, a marketing company in Toronto, which is the role of communication for a wine producer in Canada. So it is important to communicate to the final customer, for example, and we charge the channels that a producer can use now we are speaking for new producers, so or also good producers like Villainosi, which, are in the market, and they want to communicate to the final customers. Absolutely. I think that applies to to both new and to establish. It might even be more important for a for some established ones that are trying to figure out how do I get that touch point. There's been a number of seminars here that definitely, touch on those things, the physicality, the, the visual, the, the, the marketing, Our company tends to focus on digital, strategize ads. We targeted ads to individuals that have you've given your data to the, the ether. And we've we mind that, and we target individuals with specific products. Or specific regions. That's one way to talk. There is a bit of an education component, but it's not so much education for John Q Public. It's more so can you get it in front of their eyes? They need to understand that This there's tremendous wines from the market. There's tremendous wines from Villanosa. How do you tell that? The boards will not do that marketing for you. It can be an expensive ordeal, to a certain degree. That's why I try to promote a collective movement of individual wineries to work together to promote a region. It's more cost effective. And, frankly, if people can just gravitate and say, I understand the market. Alright. I understand whites from this area are great. I understand that Verdicchio. Is the greatest white wine that Italy has. Like, those those right there will you inevitably will come up yourself. I think it's important to talk about the generalities in some ways. Then you have mature areas, mature, regions such as Brunello Dimatocino, Barolo, which have this brand integrity that can still do better, that can still grow and keep can maintain that market space. You have the super growth areas of Kianti classico that has really done a great job of rebranding itself, but they're talking about their general message, not necessarily about the individual wineries. So that's what where I would I would dedicate resources. So we would say that, the consortium role of communication is more important of the single producer in the Canadian market. Unless you're a very, very large, deep pocketed producer, that would be the way to go about it. That would be amazing if you if you could do it, but you definitely need to be in the the antinori level in order to do something like that. Any other questions? So we have one at the back? When it comes to oh, hi. Well, great presentations, Renee, your friend. Yeah. So I paid her to do this. You know, supporting Canadians. Anyway, so, how have you as a marketing agency been able to give advice to producers from Italy in terms of understanding label changes and best ways to make their moves in the marketplace with what is exactly written on their bottle. I know it costs a lot to change a label, but this is important that I'd like to hear what your thoughts are on it. We have a resource for that on our website. Which outlines the Canadian standards for for bottles, for, you know, we now need certain font sizes, so on and so forth. Your agency, if they don't understand this, they probably aren't the agency that is going to get your products going. This is kind of a one zero one thing for those agents. So that would be something I would ask them right away. How do we make these labels compliant? Sometimes it has to do with ensuring that the alcohol is correct. They implemented a global lot system now, which, applies to almost all food products but ensuring and there's not many things that you actually need to have on on a label as to be bilingual, so and so forth. These are things that can occur, but your agent is definitely the one to facilitate that. Does that answer? The question? I think I think as a as a previous importer, I also think it's really important for producers to understand things that just should be on labels that are also not required for them to be on labels and things that might help them sell better in the marketplace as that is first touch point, especially if they want to be in the LCBO versus a restaurant where they have a person that is a point of sale contact. So, for example, are you referring to, like, having, you know, biosurts and things like that, like ensuring that there's certification agencies or, like, little gold stickers, like, they have in Australia that have all the little little prizes on there? Yeah. Like, it it could be any of that kind of stuff, but also looking at, what the grapes are that make it up. Oh. What what the winemaking is, If it was a single vineyard, is it organic? Is it biodynamic? Is it vegan? Whether you have that certification or not? I'm pretty sure you can write it on a label. At least in some way, shape, or form. Yep. That would be a marketing decision by the winery. There are some wineries. Most a lot of wineries They'll just need to get it to compliance. That's something, again, your agent can help you with, but that would be an investment that you're you're the winery itself would wish to make. And that's a marketing program that you'd want them to be able to to invest in. You have to be kind of careful with myself being in the marketing side of things. It can get pretty crazy right away. I think understanding what your story is. Like, why are you the barbaric SD? Why are you the Verdequeo? Why are you the best one? Why Why should I be buying that? Having that translated to the label? And part of the beauty also, as opposed to having somewhat homogenized labels, is the expression of these things, the whys. Right? But that is very much a winery decision, and there are definitely best practices that we've explored over the last few days that outline what you can do to get involved more than that as an agent to ensure that it's compliant, you start opening yourself up to becoming a marketer. And I'm a very firm believer that if you are in the agency distribution side of things, you should really be excellent at that. I wouldn't rely on my agent to design my label by any means. I take their their advice. If I wanted wine label design, I would go to a marketer or a branding agency, and branding agency is different thing different than a marketing agency, then ensure that they do that. And I would look locally as well if you're Italian, You have tremendous agencies here that work with a number, multinational, organizations with many, many countries. And I rely on their expertise and see what fits within you while trying to keep it within a budget. Also, the role of the agent to suggest the producer how to, Absolutely. Yeah. Suggest to have any agent. Well, you work with a tremendous one in Toronto with profile. They understand their market incredibly well, but you understand your wines incredibly well. You understand your wine are incredibly well. To move into export is no small feat. I would look at making sure that you are selling to your own domestic market first, learn from there, and then starting to look at additional export markets while we want you in Canada, is it the most appropriate place? I mean, we've given some data saying it's a very appropriate place, but understanding that you might be dedicating thirty percent of your production to be traveling around the world, that's a significant financial impact as well. That agent definitely needs to help you along the way. But it's still going to be your decision. It's still your brand. It's your wine. And, they're there to help, but the buck stops at you. 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