+ Executive summary

Goal

The introduction of the red wine AOC Beaujolais Villages from the Domaine Château Baron de la Voile (France) in Finland.

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Market Analysis

General presentation: Finland is a small market with an increasing wines consumption over years. It is supposed to grow of 7,2% between 2011 and 2016.The main issue is the heavy taxes that are applied on alcohol (45% of the price for wine).

Needs: Most consumed wines in Finland are red wines. Finns like to have a clear image of what the wine tastes like and enjoy organic wines and recyclable bottles.

Trends: The global trends about wine consumption in Finland are

• Organic wines
• Bottles with screwcaps
• Popularity of the package “bag-in-box”
• Increasing sparkling wine consumption
• Finns prefer wines coming from : Chile, Spain, France and Italy (80% of wine sales)
• 2 peak seasons : ski season in early Spring and Summer.

Consumer behavior: Finns are less and less interesting in “binge drinking”. As a consequence, Finns are consuming less and less spirits and more wines, beers and ciders. 14% of alcohol sales concern the restaurants and bars sector. Finns like “exotic” drinks such as wines from France. They mainly appreciate soft and fruity red wines.

Consumer interviews: We ran a survey to know more about the buyer behavior in Finland. We interviewed 20 people in front of an Alko store. Main findings → people buy wines around 10€ at Alko + they don’t have a big wine knowledge + they like informative labels.

Competition: In Finland, French Wines are facing competition from both traditional countries producing wines and relatively newly emerging producers (Chile, Argentina, Australie, South Africa, California…). Competition is tough but there are not a lot of Beaujolais Villages kind of wines in Finland.

Collaborators: The major wine player in Finland are Alko Oy (monopoly state company on alcohol retail), Altia Oy (importer and state company), Pernod Ricard Finland Oy (importer),  the national airline FINNAIR + ferry lines between Finland, Sweden and Estonia (mainly TALLINK SILJA and VIKING LINE).

Macroeconomic forces: PESTEL analysis.

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Company Analysis

Presentation: The Domaine Château Baron de la Voile is a vineyard situated in the Beaujolais area, in the East part of France. It exists since 1902. It is one of the best reputed vineyard of the Beaujolais area in France.The biggest production of the vineyard is Beaujolais Villages (vines over more than 9 hectares). 60% of the production of the different wines is sold internationally in more than 23 countries.

Tangible Assets: The Domaine Château Baron de la Voile has 4 main tangible assets which are lands and real estate possessions, grapes, wine-making machines and employees.

Intangible Assets: The Domaine Château Baron de la Voile has 4 main intangible assets which are grapes and lands know-how, winemaking know-how and production processes, international importers portfolio and international reputation.

International and marketing capabilities: The vineyard is working with an extensive and reliable international network of importers (more than 75) that work in 23 different countries. We made a focus on how things are done in Denmark, which is considered as a Scandinavian country : wines mainly imported for restaurants and specialized wine merchants, labels translated in English, use of local media.

Key success factors and key weaknesses: We elaborated a SWOT matrix.

• Main strength : international experience of the company and in Scandinavia (Denmark).
• Main opportunity : trends in consumer and buying behaviors are favorable.
• Main threat : Finns don’t have an extensive wine culture + heavy alcohol taxes.
• Main weakness : the Domaine Château Baron de la Voile is still traditional and not very reactive in term of price.

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Segmenting, Targeting, Positioning

Segmenting: We did a behavioral segmentation of the Finnish wine market and spotted 3 segments which are wine for pleasure, wine for partying and wine for dining.

Targeting: We have chosen to target the “wine for pleasure” segment. Why? Its measurability and substantiality are quite high, it has good wine knowledge and often consume wine through the distribution channel we have chosen (bars, restaurants and hotels).

Positioning: The AOC Beaujolais Villages obtains a good ratio quality/price on our perceptual map compared to competitors. We believe that this wine also convey a good and strong brand image about fine dining and wine traditions.

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Marketing Strategy

Support from a wine consultant: Dorian Mathieu is a French wine consultant who helped some French vineyards getting into Romania, Brazil, South Korea… He gave us precious tips on currents trends, contacts, prices and import-export processes.

Branding & positioning: We elaborated a perceptual map for the positioning of our product. About the branding of the AOC Beaujolais Village wine it has a good transactional function (label in English and the AOC quality and origin guaranty), a strong relational and identity function (typical French symbolic product) and a nice aspirational function (enjoying good and natural organic wine).

Product attributes: Some slight changes are made to the product for its introduction on the Finnish market. These changes are : a new label in English with the mention “organic wine”, notable type of grape (gamay) and how to taste it (red fruity wine, good with meats or can be enjoyed for itself).

Place: There are two possible distribution channels for wine in Finland which are Alko stores and bars, restaurants and hotels. We have chose the latter because we don’t have a mass market production, the already good reputation of the AOC Beaujolais Villages in foreign restaurants, and we have a price of around 40€ the bottle (too extensive to be well sold in Alko). Finally we would like to work with the Finnish wine importer Vindirekt (extensive experience with French wine and bars, restaurants and hotels).

Promotion: We have planned B2B and B2C promotion activities. Our B2B promotions are about attending Finnish wine fairs, purchasing importers list for Finland and use wine consulting agencies advice. Our B2C promotions are about using local specialized media (wine magazines, blogs…), attending wine fairs open to the public, organizing events in restaurants and having a strong online strategy.

Price: Thanks to the help of our wine consultant we have evaluated the retail price in Finland of one bottle of AOC Beaujolais Villages at 41,55€. This price seems to be competitive when we compared prices of equal quality wines in Finnish restaurants.

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Action Plan and Objectives

Please open the Excel file to discover our Action plan, Costs, Objectives & Forecasts.

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