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Preliminary study for the creation of a wine tourism quality label awarded by AREV. Meeting of the AREV board 13th and 14th of March – Hungary Interim report: Initial remarks .
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Preliminary study for the creation of a wine tourism quality label awarded by AREV. Meeting of the AREV board 13th and 14th of March – Hungary Interim report: Initial remarks
The OUTREMER team possesses considerable knowledge regarding the development and the promotion of tourist areas in various parts of the world. The ETI study carried out by AREV provides a thorough overview of the tourism capacities and infrastructures of our member regions. The goal of the present study is to assist AREV’s governing body in finding ways to reinforce and expand the assets currently at its disposal in terms of image and communication, in the face of competition from new producing countries. The goal is to give Europe’s wine producing regions a higher profile in order to win over and attract a worldwide clientele.
Questions: 1: How can we take advantage of a wine’s renown in order to promote an area or region? E.g.: - Bordeaux is a world-renowned wine, but the Aquitaine region is relatively unknown. - Tokay is now a widely known winemaking appellation , but how many people know where the territory of Borsod is located? 2: How can a popular tourist destination promote the fact that it produces high quality wines, that deserve to be known throughout the world? Austria is an extremely popular tourist destination, but have they heard of Austrian wines in China or the USA?
What arethe challenges? 1 – To ensure that the consumers and lovers of a wine become visitors to the area where it is produced. 2 – To ensure that the tourists who visit a European region become consumers and lovers of the wines that are produced there.
The objectives are clear: • Creating greater added value to European vineyards • Diversifying job creation • Boosting the image and the reputation of European winemaking regions, by promoting not only their products, but also their geographical, environmental, historical and cultural context. • Winning over new clients: Chinese, Americans, Russians, Indians, South Americans etc. who represent the greatest potential in terms of both visiting and purchasing power.
For the member regions of AREV, creating a quality label is the expression of a common goal and desire to raise their visibility. To better respond to the challenges posed by the competition. The methodology chosen by OUTREMER is to inform AREV in its choices by providing the answers to a number of questions. • How are our competitors doing? The world’s major wine producing regions have not waited for Europe in order to transform many of their vineyards into high-performing tourist destinations. • A rapid appraisal of the competition is prerequisite • Outremer will be responsible for undertaking this appraisal
On the international tourist market, whom do we wish to address? • The visitors and tourists directly • The private tourist agencies specialised in wine tourism • Public organisations: Tourist Information Centres, Regional Tourism Committees, State administration bodies. • The physical or internet based agencies specialised in wine tourism • Transport and coach companies • Business and event organisers specialised in wine tourism Based on the answers to these questions, the idea of a quality label may be more or less appropriate.
What is the geographical target that AREV wishes to prioritise? • The European clientele • The American clientele • The Chinese clientele • Or all possible clienteles Remarks: *The Europeans are considered to be connoisseurs, and generally travel by car, they can thus purchase wines directly on their wine tourism trips. *Foreign visitors travel by air and are less culturally familiar with the wines, the emotional aspect is therefore more important, and they are more likely to purchase wines from distributors in their countries of origin.
Throughout this study, we will be focussing our attention on two particular questions: • - How should we position the European wine making regions on the global tourism market? The answer lies in an approach based firmly on COMMUNICATION • - How can we create the conditions for sustainable and competitive European wine tourism? The answer lies in an approach based firmly on QUALITY The idea of a quality label awarded by AREV provides the answer to this double need.
French Wikipedia definition of “labellisation” • A quality label, or sign of identification, often known as a label (from the English term), is a mark that adds value to a product by guaranteeing the consumer that it respects certain criteria (quality, environmental, social…). In order to be visible, the label is indicated by distinctive signs (name, logo…).
Within the tourism industry the number of quality labels is skyrocketing, and this will undermine their value if they are purely sales tools. The labels give rise to several question: • Should the criteria be standardised without taking into account the particular characteristics of each territory, despite the fact that they are not necessarily relevant from one country to another? • Might their proliferation be self-defeating, on the principle that too much information can in fact smother the information?
In fact, the labels have two ultimate aims that are quite distinct in nature: • - The labels whose goal is to preserve or protect sites, traditions, heritage etc… • - The labels whose goal is to promote them. The labelling criteria will obviously be different depending on the goal. By presenting a number of examples, OUTREMER will assist the decision-makers at AREV in selecting which goal they wish to focus on.
Generally speaking, the value of quality labels depends on their capacity to communicate the values they promote to the public. In the case of wine tourism, there is a superimposition of quality labels that clearly mark everyone’s resolute drive to promote quality and to provide tourists with points of reference they can trust, effectively facilitating and encouraging wine tourism. These indicators are points of reference, generally indicating that the regions or professionals bearing the quality label are prepared to welcome tourists under optimum conditions.
TOURISM AND WINE SUCCESSFULLY LAUNCHING THE QUALITY LABEL OR AREV BRAND?
Before any technical, functional or legal steps are taken, any QUALITY LABELLING procedure must be based on the following principles: • Should a wine making region and its territories be considered as a product in the same way as its wines? • Can we talk about a wine tourism market in the winemaking regions? The answer is clearly: YES • Is the commercial marketing of these regions similar? The answer is clearly: NO • What criteria can we use to evaluate the success of a marketing strategy for a wine tourism region? There are several answers to this question
The approach taken by OUTREMER will be to offer several scenarios based on the answers provided by AREV to the following questions: What do we want to award the quality labels to? • - The attractiveness of the most famous European vineyards, through the promotion of the “grand cru” wines • The most typical and authentic European vineyards for tourism, in terms of their know-how, heritage, landscape… (vineyards beside the sea or in the mountains, for example ) • The less well-known European wine-making regions, where the goal will be to raise their profile
Should the quality label be awarded to the regions and their territory, or to the specific players: • Winemaking estates • Cooperatives • Communes • Specific sites….etc?
Who chooses? Quality labels are frequently awarded by administrations or by professional organisations, they are normative and institutional. There are few European quality labels in the area of wine tourism, the majority of them are national. As an association, AREV has greater freedom. But its credibility will be linked to the rigour with which is selects a jury to award the quality label and the conditions required to retain it. Outremer has no expertise in this area. But proposals can be made.
Choosing the goal of labelling quality and sustainable tourism, i.e. customer satisfaction, involves asking oneself about the role of the “wine tourism consumer”. This necessitates an analysis of the demand for wine tourism products and the ongoing development towards a demand for more individualised high quality products… “Wine tourists” are seeking discovery, encounters with others, escape, and a complete change of scene… They come for the stories they are told as much as for the wine… Developing the idea of a European wine tourism quality label will enable us identify the European winemaking destinations that meet these expectations
Focus on the foreign clients In order to effectively analyse the expectations of wine tourists and their perception of the European vineyards, OUTREMER is questioning the specialised Tours Operators for foreign visitors in European countries , as well as studying the specialised press. For the British clientele: Grape Escapes For the Belgian clientele: B- Tours, Rendezvous en France, Destination vignoble For the German clientele: Vin Tour For the Dutch clientele: Cazebonne For the American clientele: Decanter Tours For the Chinese clientele: CaissaTousistic For the Brazilian clientele: Biarritz Turismo Others will be contacted, and numerous websites will be studied
The spirit of the quality label The answers to these initial questions are essential, and enable us to orientate the choice of criteria, in order to promote and develop an effective tourism offer in the winemaking destinations • Developing and improving their wealth • Developing and improving their stakeholders • Legibility for the client • Legibility of the destinations • Encouraging synergetic actions • …
Project Manager: Evelyne LEQUIEN www.outremer-agence.com
