Account Login




[ Login ]

Talkin' Tech

Talkin’ Tech is a monthly column in the Beverage Media that discussed issues related to ecommerce for wine stores.

Winery Ecommerce Points to Trends for Retailer Websites

While ecommerce has become a prominent feature of retail wines sales for some years, the scale of retailer sales is probably much smaller than the impact of online sales for wineries, especially in California.  According to Whole World Wines 92% of wineries have a website, with 70% of those using a secure shopping cart to [...]

Design Choices that can Set Your Wine Store Apart

Recently a store owner told me “all other wine store websites look the same; we want our design to stand out as being different”.  To be honest this statement made me a little nervous.  Unless the store has a very clear idea of what “different” means, or has experience with a designer that knows how [...]

An Ounce of Compliance is worth a Pound of Data Breach Cleanup

For most wine stores their efforts to secure information against possible theft have been driven by banks and the card issuing companies.  The Payment Card Industry (PCI) launched its campaign to define security standards in 2006, and has been largely successful in promoting these standards to retailers and their vendors.  Now a new source of [...]

Searching for the Intended Result

By now most of us have had the experience of entering a search term into Google only to make a typo that Google has helpfully corrected, stating “Did you mean…?” Depending on the merits of your misspell you may find Google is confident you made a mistake and is showing you the corrected results. Other [...]

Why Reinvent the Wheel? Sticking with an Industry Specific Solution for your Retailer Website

In recent discussions with a prominent retailer who was selecting an ecommerce solution for his store I was surprised to discover that the benefits of an industry specific solution for both his POS system and website were being overlooked.  Part of the reason for this was the involvement of a project manager from outside the [...]

Have you talked to your Wholesaler about Interstate Shipping?

Have you talked to your Wholesaler about Interstate Shipping? We have a unique view of the wine industry at Beverage Media in that we work with retailers, wholesalers, importers and wineries to support their businesses. Of these industry players the mostly maligned tends to be the wholesaler who is hidden from public view and appears [...]

Wine Information: from Scarcity to Abundance

If you’ve spent time searching for labels and wine information you will recognize that access to this information is variable. Wineries and importers assume that you will come to their website where they may provide trade-oriented content resources.  In many cases the information is missing, or more frustrating has been built into a flash presentation [...]

Is It Legal to Sell Wine You Don’t Own?

The concept of “just-in-time” inventory has become a hot button issue in the wine trade recently.  Businesses that sell wines they don’t physically own have been attracting attention from state regulators, and other areas of the trade.  The California Alcoholic Beverage Control (CA-ABC) issued an advisory earlier this year that has had an impact on [...]

Raising the Bar on Retailer Ecommerce

Over the past five years there has been a significant shift in the way we use the Internet. We have heightened expectations and want to interact with websites in different ways. The biggest trend that has impacted behavior is the growth of social media. The Pew Internet Project reports that 35% of adults [...]

Are There Still Opportunities Online for Wine Stores?

Has the Economy Impacted Online Sales?
After years of supporting wine stores online, I take it for granted that most any retailer can benefit from a presence online. So it was with some puzzlement that I revisited this question for a presentation at the Empire Wine Merchants’ Retail Seminar.
To be sure, the past 4 Quarters has [...]

more »