For the boutique wines category, it is very important that they adapt quickly to digital tools and platforms to define their image and position the brand. Certainly - underlines the communication expert - to help all producers to sell during these difficult times, it is necessary to push the “Italy brand” even further with targeted actions by institutions such as the Italian Trade Commission or Vinitaly. The category of Italian wine, in general, is going well. Producers of lesser-known denominations in the USA, on the other hand, will be able to focus on the recognition of their region as a brand (for example, Tuscany, for producers of Montecucco, or Sicily, for other lesser-known territories). “For producers of prestigious Italian denominations such as Chianti Classico or Brunello di Montalcino, it is essential to promote their denomination as a brand that gives confidence to consumers’ choices. They don't ask for help or “navigate” between the various options”. They go to the shelf, take the bottles and pay. A famous retailer in New York told me that his customers enter the store already knowing what they want. This - continues Gino Colangelo - because the attitude of consumers has absolutely changed in recent times: consumers no longer shop but simply buy. On the other hand, the most recognized and positioned brands are doing very well. In the pre-Covid era, sommeliers were the real forerunners of the so-called boutique wines, but now their role has also changed and this has had a negative impact on newer and niche products. In the absence of events that allow tasting, and with the net reduction in consumption in restaurants and bars, traditional sales channels are no longer possible for this segment of wines. Covid - explains Colangelo - has certainly had a more negative impact on niche wines, which require direct and more careful sales, “vis-à-vis”. While sales have shifted towards off-premises and e-commerce, sales volumes have not changed dramatically. “In general, the performance of Italian wine in the United States is quite positive, despite the difficulties posed by Covid-19.
And then, as with every crisis, there are also some positive aspects, such as the relaxation of American laws that limit direct sales from producer to consumer. Attention, however, to communicate and promote the reference brands of Italian wine, today, is even more important, so the support of the exhibition and institutional world, from Vinitaly to the Italian Trade Agency, becomes vital. A huge problem for Italian wine, which has its first foreign market overseas, but perhaps the crisis could prove less acute than one might expect, as Gino Colangelo, at the head of Colangelo & Partners Public Relations, one of the reference agencies for the communication and marketing of wine in the United States, tells WineNews. While Italy is coming out of the emergency, trying to regain normality lost for months, in the United States the Covid-19 alert, initially underestimated, continues to bite: the numbers of contagions, after a short period of decline, have started galloping again, and many States have had to back off, postponing the reopening of bars and restaurants.
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