Ep. 1596 Silvia Ghirelli | wine2wine Business Forum 2023 Series

Since two thousand and seventeen, the Italian wine podcast has exploded. Recently hitting six million listens support us by buying a copy of Italian wine unplugged two point o or making a small donation. In return, we'll give you the chance to nominate a guest and even win lunch with Steve Kim and Professor Atilio Shenza. Find out more at Italian One podcast dot com. Welcome to the Italian wine podcast. I'm Cynthia Chaaplin, and this is voices. Every Wednesday, I will be sharing conversations with international wine industry professionals discussing issues in diversity, equity, and inclusion through their personal experiences, working in the field of wine. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe and rate our show wherever you get your pods. Hello, and welcome to voices. Today, I am happy to welcome back Sylvia Gerali to voices. Sylvia was chosen once again by winearound, a sponsor of wine to wine business forum, to talk about the importance of wine tourism as a driving four for wine sales. So welcome back to voices Sylvia. We spoke last year at wine to wine. It's great to have you back on the show. Oh, thank you, Cynthia. I'm really glad to be here again. Perfect. Well, you are a hugely experienced consultant in wine. You've worked for lots of, very well known wineries in Italy. So I'm wondering, in your opinion, how big a role does wine tourism play in wine sales since the pandemic? Wow. Wine tours have a new approach now, which is expressive in a new awareness of wine and its contents. And the new interest, is in the intangible value, such as the culture behind the sustainability, the ethics of the winery. And I think that now, the visit will there for become an educational and communication moment of the company vision, which are one of the reason behind the decision to buy a bottle and consumer loyalty. I think that through how the experience, the tourists become ambassadors of the winery visited. They share with friends and family the picture and the videos, and what they saw and taste it, and also, making them taste their product that they purchase. So I think that now, thanks to the new technology, which become familiar doing the pandemic, The factor of the visit could continue at home by joint loyalty problems. For example, such as wine club, and, and also through the e commerce, people can buy bottles more easily. So hospitality tours become really important in in this way. Okay. Well, I think I think you're onto something there. I think all of that is is definitely growing. Do you think Italian wineries are doing enough to attract foreign visitors. You know, what what could Italian wineries be doing better? What do you think the most important components of a successful wine tourism project could be? I think that now wine tourism is increasingly demanding. They look for places with beauty, I think, and beautiful landscape, culture, and tradition, will come in local community as well as, quality food and wine offering They search for new food, new recipes, new experiences. They like to explore. They love to connect, different sectors shopping, sport and food and wine comes up. Option. So I think the future is based on the uniqueness, the emotionality of the experience you offer. That will should be in harmony with environment in which you are. And and I think that creativity and a continuous innovation would be the mantra for one of these to grow. Well, I think that's definitely a very important point that you touched on tours are increasingly demanding and they they want more for their money, as you say, they don't want to just visit the winery, taste three wines and go away. They want to have food. They want to connect with the vineyard and the landscape and other things they can do in the area. So very, very important components of successful wine tourism is including all these bits and pieces. Do you think Italian wineries are beginning to understand the work that they have to do to create attractive wine tourism projects? I think they start to think about, but they need to have a more professional approach to have maybe some training on this, on a on a hospitality, on tourism in general because sometimes the producer of mine, they really know how to to do to produce good wine, but it's not the same to do a great job in hospitality. So Well, I think that's that's all true. Just because you're a great winemaker doesn't mean that you are great at welcoming guests and making them, happy and excited. So that's a good point. There's there's also you touched on it briefly that that topic of sustainability and connecting to the land and knowing what's in our wine, sustainability has become a really hot topic for wine consumers all over the world. How do you think the concept of sustainability fits into wine tourism now? What do visitors want to see? How can wineries meet the challenge of showing that they are sustainable. Well, sustainability is an essential value, in its full social meaning. I think the companies, that educate the consumer and make them part of an improvement process will win. Sustainability to reduce environmental, social, and economic impact require awareness and sensitivity. And be sustainable means taking care of yourself, loved ones, but also of your community. And sustainability can be a powerful driver of choice. It's why people consumer decision from primary goods, tutorial. It's essential, therefore, to communicate what is being done for an environmental point of view and for the local community so people can really choose you. In in in day charge. Well, that's that's right. I think making sure that the message comes out, from each winery, how they are incorporating sustainability will help attract more tourists to whom that concept is really important. So what innovations have you seen in wine tourism in Italy in the past few years? You know, what are what are wineries and trip organizers doing to reach a bigger, broader audience of people outside of Italy? I think that, a real, recent innovation is the awareness that the journey, the the travel doesn't not end with the journey. So the never ending tourism is a trend that's starting to grow and company and destination that want to intercept it will have to invest in digitalization. I think That is important to understand that there is a before and then after that become element of the experience. And the new technology will increasingly offer access to important resources to decide and organize the trip, but also during the visit, during your trip, a company can offer information about, for example, the philosophy of production, the data about the wine, or they take an egg adopted to impact less on the environment, then after the visit, technologies and and digitalization allow to share experiences and increase royalties to company, to the company that you visit and maintain and improve the relationship over time. I think that with the help of digital technology, the winery will establish a relationship with tourists that is really an opportunity for collect data, for an exchange, not a damn to improve the selling process. That's that's so interesting. I I like the concept that the experience doesn't end with the visit. It it's actually sort of starting with the visit, and it's up to the winery to make sure that the VIN experience continues after the tourists have gone back home again. So that's that's a very interesting point. I haven't heard it put quite that way before. Are you enjoying this podcast? Don't forget to visit our YouTube channel, mama jumbo shrimp. For fascinating videos covering Stevie Kim and her travels across Italy and beyond. Meeting winemakers, eating local foods, and taking in the scenery. Now back to the show. I'm wondering you know, what we're talking about technology and and digitalization, things like that, do you see any differences between older wine tourists and younger gen z or millennial wine tourists? You know, what sort of things set them apart. What kind of experiences are they looking for that wine tourism didn't provide in the past? I think this is a really important question as it is more and more necessary for the manager, for wine manager to create different proposal by Target based on the trends. With reference to wine tours, my younger people prefer to participate in one events, festivals, and Boomer, for example, follow automatic itineraries, while seniors are more attracted to classic visit to the winery. Young tourists seems to love more than the the idea to lend different sector art while being wine They search for a communication, focus on a real corporate sustainability. They, want to be involved in the good processes of the company, and, in the action for social environmental improvement. So different stage and the offer will win for sure. That's true. I think having understanding the the consumer base and and the differences all between all of these various, groups of consumers I think if a winery can understand that there are, you know, several types of consumers out there, they can start making experiences to attract more people. So that's that's a very interesting point. What new consumers want versus what old consumers want. And I know you've got such a strong background in public relations as well. And you've worked with lots of famous wineries such as Petra and Ornelayan, Moseto. What do you think PR contributes to the success of wine tourism? How should wineries harness a more powerful PR presence to drive their sales forward. I think the attitude to develop relationship and then understand people is extremely important to develop class success for wine tourist offer. It's necessary to have a new interpretation of PR, in a modern way, by the winery. That's that is fundamental to improve visions, and strategies and to build a destination or a or the tourist product in an innovative way, combining, creativity and passion. I think the wineries should increasingly present itself as an ambassador of a territory of a society whose attractiveness depends on its ability to generate value for the tourists, but also for the resident and for the whole community connected to. So my suggestion is always to build relationship among the stakeholder of the territory in order to create a wine destination through a collateral a collaborative network with the tourist supply change in the logic of creating an attractive cultural district more than a a a simple destination. And therefore, a better and more effective enjoyment of the wine experiences. And do you think Italian wineries are are understanding that need to be ambassador for their whole territory, not just for their wine. I think they start to do something in this direction with the, consorts you, with the consortium, but for selling products, not really pick about a territory or, in terms of tourism flow. So I think there is there are opportunity to grow in in in that sense. And is that something that you look into doing and helping wineries connect with other parts of their territory? Yeah. That's really something that, starting from, I mean, I I always help one is to structure themself before with the people, training the people, but then to really build relationship with the territory and with all the, tourist supply chain because that's really important. With the other wineries that want to do hospitality, with hotels, resorts, with restaurants, with, tourism, offices, and transportation. That's the only way to really have, collaborative environment. And if you are able to to do this, you you you can have really an attractive cultural district in a in a way that is not anymore a problem of, a competition but you are able to, collaborate in the same direction. And I always think that if you work well, but by yourself, you know, in a territory and you are not able to build a destination. And, so I think that in general public relation in this sense, are really important. Yeah. I agree with you. I completely agree with you. And especially for this sort of new era of of wine tourists who want to make their visit to a territory sort of multi experiential, not just about wine. They want to be involved in other things. So collaborating instead of feeling that you might lose your tourists to some other person's business in your territory. Collaborating is going to be the way forward. I completely agree. I wanna ask you, you know, sort of along these same lines. We're looking at the future of wine tourism or talking about what Italian wineries need to do to improve and to attract more visitors. How has AI and social media and online information affected wine tourism in recent years? You know, what do you think is coming in the future with this? Do you have a dream of sort of a perfect wine tourism experience? And is it going to include AI and social media and all of these other elements that people are so involved with at the moment? Well, I think that the future is really to integrate the direct experience with digitalization and ending to, well, established storytelling, the innovative communication for example, through gamification or emotional podcast or, for example, Eastagram would also acquire elements because food and wine influencer really continue to be assert source of inspiration of for the choice of destination. And they think that the act of sharing appears a trend also in a rural rural hospitality. So I think that the I think also that the world, living a pandemic has acquired cooperation as a new value, leaving the birth of new re new human relationship with new tourist segments, which want to experience a human relationship and connect with people who live the context. So, yeah, it's important to, include new technology, but it's also important to integrate them. With reality. I I think that's gonna be harder than we imagine, but, it's already here. So I think we're all going to be learning to work with it and make it a positive impact on everything that we do in the wine sector. So interesting to hear your thoughts on all of these things. And I wanna thank you so much for coming on today and chatting with me about, wine tourism, how it's changed even just in the past year since we talked last year, and I wanna thank wine around. And a wine arounds being a a great sponsor for wine to wine business forum, which will be held here in Verona on the thirteenth and fourteenth of November. So tickets are still available for that, and I'm hoping that you'll be coming Sylvia. I'm looking forward to seeing our our guests and all of our speakers there, and I'm very grateful that we had time to have this chat today. So thank you very much. It was a pleasure for me. Thanks to you, to one to one and to I went around for that opportunity and see you soon. Thank you for listening and remember to tune in next Wednesday when I'll be chatting with another fascinating guest. Italian wine podcast is among the leading wine podcast in the world and the only one with a daily show tune in every day and discover all our different shows. You can find us at Italian wine podcast dot com, SoundCloud, Spotify, Himalaya, or wherever you get your pods.