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Recent marketing debates in the wine industry highlight two distinct viewpoints on how new wine consumers are created — through lifestyle choices or via lifecycle maturity. Qualitative research with a quota sample of American wine drinkers suggests that lifestyle choice is the more reliable source for new wine consumers. Based on the research results, several wine lifestyle options are identified and described. In addition, suggestions for further quantitative research models are recommended, as well as marketing strategics to capitalise on the wine lifestyle selections.

Wine marketers realise that to increase the overall size of the wine consuming population they must make wine more approachable and easier to understand. As it now stands, many consumers lack confidence in their ability to select a wine for either their own consumption or to share with others. Therefore, understanding the role played by consumer self‐confidence is especially relevant to marketers of wine, and the need to accurately measure the construct is important to scholarly research. Recently, the development of a scale to measure consumer self‐confidence has appeared in the consumer behaviour literature (Bearden, Hardesty and Rose, 2001). This study first adapts this consumer self‐confidence scale for use in wine‐related research. Next, the impact of six distinct dimensions of consumer self‐confidence on three different wine purchase situations is demonstrated. Results show the scale has the potential to inform both researchers and marketers about consumers' self‐confidence related to wine purchases.

This article investigates whether a negative country of origin bias facing imported wine can be offset when it is distributed in marketing channels alongside already accepted complimentary products. Specifically we consider the case of Mexican wine being introduced to consumers in a Mexican restaurant versus a more general themed contemporary restaurant. An experimental design was employed to investigate consumers' perceptions and future purchase intentions after tasting Mexican wine in a proposed restaurant with one of the two themes. Findings suggest that the best method for introducing Mexican wine to US consumers may be through Mexican restaurants although adoption of the wine for consumption at home may be slow.

The purpose of the study is to examine the attitudes of millennial wine consumers and determine if positive affect in tasting room situations leads to higher levels of brand equity for the winery.

A survey was developed to evaluate winery tasting room experiences based on standardized brand measurement scales. In total 80 millennials visited tasting rooms and then completed the survey to evaluate their experience.

The results of this research empirically support the anecdotal evidence that, through positive emotions associated with the tasting room experiences, wineries can cultivate relationships with millennial customers that may lead to long‐term, profitable relationships through continued patronage and brand loyalty.

Practical application of this study suggests that carefully orchestrating a tasting room experience to create a positive experience for the millennial customer appears to be a critical component of post‐purchase attitudes and building brand equity. In addition, customer commitment, product quality, service quality, and fair pricing are also significant predictors of brand equity.

Three recent cases within the oil and gas industry point to the trend to prosecute companies in the USA for alleged human rights and environmental degradation abroad. The Alien Tort Claims Act has been used with varying degrees of success to bring claims against multinational companies. The examples of Texaco in Ecuador, Chevron in Nigeria, and Unocal in Burma are presented as case studies of the use of the Alien Tort Claims Act. Implications for global ethics are discussed and recommendations for managerial actions to lessen the potential harm brought about by legal charges under the Act are proposed.

The purpose of this study is to investigate variety-seeking behavior among US wine consumers to determine if there are differences in their personal characteristics, values and relationship with wine.

The research design uses a quantitative research study using data from an online survey of 401 US wine consumers. The Schwartz Value Inventory and the VARSEEK scale are used as measurement instruments. Data are analyzed using descriptive statistics, cluster analysis, ANOVA and discriminate analysis.

The results illustrate strong differences between high variety-seeking consumers compared to moderate variety-seeking and variety avoiders. High variety seekers are younger, hold values favoring stimulation and tolerance of risk, pay more for wine, purchase wine in more locations, prefer more varietals and consider themselves more wine knowledgeable and involved than the other two segments.

The results provide implications for wine marketers targeting high variety-seeking consumers, including offering wine brands with a wider array of varietals, wines from different countries, various price tiers and include creative packaging and sustainable messages in their presentation.

This paper presents research addressing an important construct for wine marketers attempting to introduce new products and build brand loyalty.

The purpose of this paper is to present a model for promoting professional sales in winery visitor centers, as well as the results of an exploratory study to test the model.

A survey methodology was used to evaluate the sales behavior of winery personnel in three popular wine tourist regions of California, USA. In total, 284 mystery shopper evaluations were completed and analyzed. In addition, a professional sales model for winery visitor centers was developed based on secondary sources drawn from the literature.

Results indicate that some of the winery visitor centers have adopted professional sales techniques and trained their staff to perform these tasks, but there is still ample opportunity to improve. Sales presentations could become more interactive in many cases, and relationship and trust building actions could be emphasized more.

The study was limited to three wine regions in California, and only provides descriptive statistics of service and sales in the tasting room. Further testing of the model in new locations with expanded statistics would be useful.

The study highlight effective professional selling tactics used in winery visitor centers which could be adopted by managers. It also identifies areas for improvement.

This paper introduces a new model on professional sales in winery visitor centers. This is the first of its type to be applied to the wine industry for direct to consumer sales.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on one product category, organic wine, to provide a possible explanation for consumers' purchase behaviors regarding organic wine. Specifically, the authors consider the role of environmental protection and hedonistic values and their impact on organic wine purchases.

Hypotheses are proposed to examine relationships between environmental and hedonic values in organic wine purchasing. Online survey data were collected from 321 wine drinkers in the USA. Partial least‐squared analysis was used to test hypothesized paths between latent variables.

In total, ten of the 13 proposed linkages were supported by the data. Values reflecting the need for environmental protection and for living a hedonistic life were found to lead to belief systems that influence the purchase of organic wines.

The results demonstrate that hedonistic and environmental protection values and beliefs can partially explain the propensity to purchase organic wines. The study is limited in that only two values were investigated.

The results indicate several marketing implications for professionals around communication, promotion, and point‐of‐sale information for organic wine.

This is the first study to integrate environmental and hedonistic values to explain the purchase of organic wines.

The purpose of this paper is to compare and contrast wine sales in neighboring franchise law and non‐franchise law states in order to determine impact on wine price, consumer choice, consumer satisfaction, and stakeholder perception.

The study used qualitative interviews with 14 wineries, distributors, and retailers, statistical analysis of Nielsen Scantrack data, and an online survey of 401 wine consumers in Georgia and Florida, USA.

Results show statistical proof that Florida offers more wine selection and lower wine prices on matching brands than Georgia. Qualitative interviews indicate wineries, distributors, and retailers perceive differences in wine choice, price, and overall operating costs in these two states. However, there was no statistical difference between a sample of 401 consumers from Georgia and Florida when asked about their satisfaction level with wine choice and pricing within their state.

For practical purposes, the research was limited to only two US states. It would be useful to duplicate this study in other states.

Practical implications include the need for new wineries desiring to enter franchise law states to carefully research regulations and distributors before making a commitment, as well as the social issue of less wine choice and higher prices for consumers in Georgia versus Florida.

This is the first empirical study in the USA to focus on the impact of wine franchise laws on consumer choice and wine price. It yields useful information that contributes to the body of knowledge for wine and policy research.

Hungarian wine culture has been developing steadily over the past decades. The number of wineries offering quality wine is growing as consumer interest in quality consumption increases. The purpose of this paper is to study the segmentation of the Hungarian wine consumers based on their purchase habits and preferences to identify how this shift towards quality consumption is represented in these segments.

An online survey was conducted in Hungary. Nearly 28,000 consumers filled in the questionnaire. The TwoStep Cluster analysis could handle the large database and variables measured on different measurement scales.

The growing interest towards quality wine in the market is reflected in the study’s segmentation results. The large sample size made it possible to identify a special Hungarian wine consumer group, which has different buying habits than traditional wine consumer segments. Four segments were evolved: ordinary wine consumers, unsophisticated wine consumers, wealthy wine-experts and open-minded consumers. The last two segments seem to be the most valuable groups for high-quality wine producers.

The sample size allowed a relatively novel segmentation, whereby the preferences and purchasing habits of smaller, high-quality wine consumer groups became measurable.