Entrepreneurship, Industrial Policy and Clusters: The Growth of the North Carolina Wine Industry

Abstract

This paper examines the late 20th Century emergence of wineries in North Carolina, using the concepts of clusters and industrial policy to explain the dynamics of entrepreneurship in an embryonic industry. Specific attention is paid to how changing resource conditions (available agricultural land and financial capital) interact with an entrepreneurial climate that has fostered individual interest in winemaking to precipitate institutional changes that consolidate cluster formation. Using a model of small business growth in which firms gain credibility through identification with a cluster we trace the success of key wineries in this geographic region.

Citation

Saylor Breckenridge, R. and Taplin, I.M. (2005), "Entrepreneurship, Industrial Policy and Clusters: The Growth of the North Carolina Wine Industry", Keister, L.A. (Ed.) Entrepreneurship (Research in the Sociology of Work, Vol. 15), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 209-230. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0277-2833(05)15008-0