from Ackerman to Regional Brand Development
As Nella (2010) suggest, to enhance visitor’s post-visit winery experience, there are four effects including (1) build awareness (2) create strong emotional connections and long-term relationships with consumers (3) create loyalty and commitment (4) build a brand’s image, equity and impact on wine marketing mix. However, participants show differed ideas of whether they have experienced the above effects with a positive on-going purchasing behavior.
4.3.1 ‘Hygiene factor’ as the key to implementing WOM marketing
Mitchell (2006) suggests that wines must taste good, and it is a “hygiene factor” (e.g.
taste, price and packaging) – whose absence leads to dissatisfaction, but whose presence does not guarantee any motivation to purchase a particular brand. Other factors are also regarded as important as creating a style; however, it is less conductive to the decision to purchase. As Wilson (1991) suggests, word-of-mouth marketing is actually a process of “reputation building” effort. WOM would not be built without the appreciation of the product itself. Almost all participants have the positive response for recommending to their friends this wine and wine tour. “I love the taste of the wine, and the whole trip was very complete, professional, and different” (Kay). “Innovation” is the key to the positive perception. A distinctive design was raised as a chief part of their reason while recalling the tour. Joanna felt this trip educative, “I would love to recommend my friends to visit here”. “The taste is super good so I bought one back home as a souvenir for my friend” (Jingyu).
99
4.3.2 To see is to believe: brand loyalty roots from authenticity?
The search for authenticity of experiences is part of the post-modern condition and is widely discussed and debated in the tourism and services marketing literature (Schmitt and Simonson, Lewis and Bridger, 2000; Boyle, 2003; Hall, 2007).
Authenticity in winery experience is not just seeking genuine experience but wine production, and its symbolic meaning behind, people, philosophy and lifestyle. It reminds that MacCannel’s (1973) “backstage” theory and spontaneous act all designer to allow winery experience to seem more real and memorable. However, interviewees such as Fong and Hanbin have concerns for Ackerman in doubting the authenticity they have shown, even though they both would love to keep buying Ackerman wine or come back again. Fong said that “I would like to see how it was originally” while Hanbin knew it was “too developed to be authentic.” Here thus comes a confusion that does authentic experience guarantee a customer’s brand loyalty if we see it at a long-term scale?
There is no escaping fact that it is begrudging for traditional wineries to provide industrial services. When it comes to authenticity, it is derived from the property of connectedness of the individual to the perceived, everyday world of and environment, and the process that created it and the consequences of one’s engagement with it.
Authenticity does not directly assure a post-visit brand loyalty; however, for customers who pursue experiential activities, to see the out-of-fashioned wineries, experiencing the hardworking winemaking, meeting up the shabbily dressed winemakers will be the scenario of alleged authenticity that they would preferably like to consume.
4.3.3 Regional brand as destination image: the Loire is the brand
100
Post-visit purchase, throughout the discussions, is actually a combination, a test in a way, of how the wine and the wine tours were presented. It is in fact a development of a “personality” to wine brand. A brand with personage strengthens the emotional linkage towards “the place.” This linkage enables a winery a “sense of place” where the wine value chain happens. It further builds up the bonding between the certain sites toward the region. The creation of “regionality” (Hall and Mitchell, 2000) endows the tourists with the regional brand loyalty. Kay, Fong, Angeline, and Inés possess positive answers of post-visit brand loyalty. Among them, Inés expresses her fondness of the wine by saying “whenever I thought of the Loire Valley sparkling wines, I thought of Ackerman, because it’s really representative” (Inés). “I guess I will buy their wines if Taiwan has it” (Angeline). Most positive answers imply the success of the marketing skills through the tours: the eye-catching effects and decorations, combining educative and aesthetic purposes with uniqueness and memorable gimmicks. It implies that there is a further need to lift the game into a grander level by creating a regional brand for the case of Loire Valley wines. LJ delivered the comment as such,
… After the visit, I feel like knowing more about wines. I think I will start from Loire, and try to know more about wines from other regions. Reasons … I think it’s because it’s affordable, and it’s tasty. But I won’t limit myself to buy Loire wines only; I would like to try other types and to compare. (LJ)
The concern is lifted here, is the regional brand strong enough to compare with others noted brands that rang more bells for consumers? How the authorities cope with the issue? The interviews with three different organizations: InterLoire, Office du Tourisme de Saumurois and la Maison des Vins d’Angers, aroused the thinking of the
101
interrelation between the public sectors and the local firms in terms of the appellation of “Wines of the Loire (Vins de Loire)”.
4.3.3.1 Local organizational involvement in building regional brand
Mr. Huet from Marketing Sector of InterLoire elaborates the importance of developing the brand “Wines of the Loire.” It started since 2008, the setup of the
“Tourist Cave”49 for the purpose of integrating the smaller wineries. Also, the effort in holding wine events is one of the chief tasting they have been working on50. Benefits wise, Mr. Huet sees it as an attempt of raising “interesting media coverage”.
The promotion of the regional brand entails four reasons:
a strong offer because there are much more smaller wineries in this region
a complementary offer for changing the destination image of the castles of the UNESCO, supported by “the Loire by Bike”
an offer that corresponds the current demand for authentic experiential tours
a linkage of regional identity as “Here, Living is an Art”51
Besides, he mentioned the “biggest obstacle” of the tourism operation is also the main work that they are trying to tackle: “the supply”. In fact, “the attempt to move tourists from the castles to the wineries is in the meantime an attempt to raise the supply of the wineries”. Also, to make the supplies “attractive” enough to “seduce the tourists” is also important. For Elodie, the director of la Maison des Vins d’Angers, she sees “innovation” the first thing to overcome the obstacle of the diversified wineries in this region.
49 Les caves tourisques
50 Such as « Vignobles & Découvertes », « Vignes, Vins et Randos », « La Loire aux Trésors, à La Rencontre du Vignoble de Loire » etc
51 « Ici, vivre est un art »
102
Mr. Huet also gave meanings to the brand “Wines of the Loire” as a “seduction”.
It thus seduces the tourists who are “experts”, “curious”, and “discovery” to come have the quality wine experience that they offer. Different thinking from Catherine commented that “the mark of Wines of the Loire implies itself in the
‘link’ of the river, the land, and the environment.” And “oenotourisme should be after the wine products, and should be one of the dimensions to distribute the wine” (Catherine).
4.3.3.2 The role of industrial wineries (e.g., Ackerman) in Wines of the Loire
Ms. Rochelet points out that in fact the role of both industrial and independent wineries is equally important. For “Big House” (la Grande Maison) like Ackerman stands in an influential status because they are “organized”, “possessing sophisticated circuits of tourists” and “they have professional staff in this field that we rely heavily on” (Ms. Rochelet).
On the other hand, customers of the independent wineries are more for “buying instead of visiting.” “And visiting makes sure of buying.” (Ms. Rochelet) This confirms what the director of Ackerman said “the tour always helps to boost direct sales” (Mr. Goudeau).
4.3.3.3 The threatens and opportunities of other regional brands
The interviewees conveyed the inevitability during the discussions in view of threatens of other regional brands. For Elodie, Bordeaux is the image of luxury and Burgundy wines are more traditional with its culture of patrimony. Alsace is slightly more similar to Loire since it is famous for their white wines and their “wine routes”.
103
Mr. Huet considers it very “subjective” while “Wines of the Loire is obviously weaker than Bordeaux, Burgundy and Champagne in the ‘radiation of the wine (le rayonnement viti-vinicole)’ but the castles of UNESCO.”
It resonates to the scholar’s comments in magazine of Vins de Loire of “In Loire Valley, we make more humane wines” (Vins de Loire, 2011). It considers that Loire Valley wines arm themselves with great diversity with a wide range of productions. In contrast with Bordeaux, where they use large financial and industrial machinery working with wines to produce “eye-catching” wines (“tape-à-l’oeil”), Loire Valley stands for “niche winery”. Meanwhile, the winemakers of the Loire Valley are artisans who have their manner and personalities to make authentic wines. Also, this gives the wines more humane as a fundamental difference of the wine in Loire Valley52.
However, “Wines of the Loire is still more like an ‘emerging’ concept for brand building in French wine industry with its rich authenticity and diversity”, said Elodie.
And one of the chief things to do is to “move the radiation from the castles to the vineyards, and of course it’s a positive promotion” “The work on circulation and transportation between castles and wineries will be very important”, said Elodie.
The interviews with the public sectors are of significance for this research to understand the official involvement in terms of building the “distinctive regionality”
(Hall and Mitchell, 2000). This regional development and rural constructing relies on the Big House in not only implementing the major circulation of tourists but also prompting the development of the smaller wineries. As an “emergent” brand in French wine and tourism industries, Wines of the Loire is struggling to inevitably compete
52 Partially translated and transcribed from an interview of “En Val de Loire, on fait des vins plus humains” (Jean-Michel Monnier, 2011).
104
with other “radiant” brands in naming, supplying, and representing itself as a brand of authenticity, diversity and humanity.
Chapter Summery
This chapter follows the structure of literature review and analyzes the results within three subjects: before setting out, perceptions of on-site experience and, and reflections of post-visit consumer behavior. In order to provide a more holistic overview, this chapter collects 4 sides off opinions including: tourists’ experiential, managerial, governmental and artistic perspectives.Each sector provides several responses of 12 interviewees, 7 Chinese and 5 Taiwanese students, over the articulations of their winery experiences by post-visit reminisces and recalls. Also, managerial interviews with the cellar manager provided the supply-side aspects to this study as well as the cave exhibition in the aesthetical perspectives. Furthermore, four interviewees across four local organizations give the insights in terms of regional development and rural construction. It consists of the tourists’ elaborations which reckon the literatures reviewing the effectiveness of experiential and relationship marketing strategies, supported by the governmental involvement as part of the regional brand. The outcome of the incorporation of different opinions implements a single case study with a holistic overview.
105