Search results

Purpose: This paper adopts a practice-oriented approach to address gaps in existing knowledge of the significance of cultural producers’ and intermediaries’ practices of taste for the construction and organization of markets. Using the example of the cultural field of “natural” wine, I propose how taste operates as a logic of practice, generating market actions in relation to the aesthetic regime of provenance.

Methodology/approach: The paper sets out the conceptual relationship between aesthetic regimes and practices of taste. The discussion draws from interpretive research on natural wine producers and cultural intermediaries involving 40 interviews with natural wine makers, retailers, sommeliers, and writers based in New York, Western Australia, the Champagne region, and the Cape Winelands.

Findings: Three dimensions of how taste is translated into action are examined: as a device of division, which establishes a fuzzy logic of resemblance; as a device of operation, which provides an intuitive platform for shaping the means of production; and as a device of coordination, which enables an embedded experience of trust.

Originality/value: The paper’s discussion of dispositions, affect, intuition, and pattern identification provide new insights into the translation of taste into action, and the macro-organization of markets. I argue for attention to how cultural producers and cultural intermediaries are mobilized through their habitual sense of taste, shifting the focus away from consumers to those whose market actions are largely self- and peer-referential. This is important for understanding processes of market development and value construction.

Previous research suggests that constructions of legitimacy play a central role in the development of markets, yet little attention has been given to how that legitimacy is constructed through the material practices of market actors. This paper aims to address this gap via an examination of cultural intermediaries in the fine wine market of Shanghai.

An interpretive thematic analysis was carried out on data from 13 semi-structured interviews with fine wine intermediaries based primarily in Shanghai (5 wine writers/educators; 5 sommeliers/retailers; 3 brand representatives).

The dimensions of the legitimation of wine were examined, identifying three key themes: the legitimacy of intermediaries as experts; the legitimacy of a particular mode of wine consumption; the legitimacy of the intermediaries as exemplars for not-yet-legitimate consumers. These findings suggest that cultural intermediaries’ personal, consuming preferences and practices are significant to the formation of a new market, and that they must negotiate potential tensions between interactions with legitimate, not-yet-legitimate and illegitimate consumers.

Limitations with regard to generalizability are discussed with regard to potential future research.

The focus on cultural intermediaries and dimensions of legitimation can be used to examine the case of other emerging markets to anticipate the pathways to institutionalizing new forms of taste and consumption practices.

The paper offers an empirical insight into the market dynamics of distinction in the Shanghai wine market and conceptual insight into the importance of cultural intermediaries as exemplar consumers.

The case of Wines Manufacturer from an Emerging Economy (WMEE) aims to provide a starting point for reflections and discussions about the influence of home country formal institutions on the internationalization process of an industry in an emerging market context.

The plot revolves around the Wines Manufacturer from an Emerging Economy project, which was created to promote the Brazilian wine industry in the international market. A qualitative-descriptive approach was applied to the study, and data collection was conducted through primary and secondary sources.

The context involves the difficulty of positioning Brazilian wines in both the domestic and international markets, especially fine wines. The relationship networks built during internationalization processes (in most cases promoted by formal institutions such as WMEE) help to shape strategies for Brazilian wineries.

Doing business in international markets has made Brazilian wine known worldwide and internationalized wineries can attain new levels of learning, which can be transposed into their domestic operations. If, on the one hand, institutions are important for promoting the industry and its internationalization process, on the other hand, it is equally true that the fragmented institutional structure and their overlapped roles generate many conflicts.

Tourism and hospitality scholars have examined tourists' food experiences in the tourism context. However, little research has been focused on the experience of tasting slow food/wine and the market that consumes slow food/wine. This study aims to (1) understand the factors contributing to tourists' slow food experiences and (2) identify the market segmentation of tourists who experiences slow food and wine at a winery. Four hundred fifty-three online survey questionnaires were collected from Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) platform. The critical research variable is slow food experience, which contains 16 items explained by four dimensions: (1) food, (2) place, (3) behavior, and (4) knowledge. Subsequently, a cluster analysis based on slow food experience measurement was adopted to discover the tourist market. The study identifies three markets: (1) hardcore slow food gastronomes, (2) common slow foodies, and (3) casual visitors. In the conclusion section, this study offers theoretical contributions to the slow food literature and managerial implications for tourism marketers to establish new marketing strategies.

With growing interest in the penalties associated with straddling market categories, it is important to develop a stock of evidence about the relative importance of consideration and valuation penalties in different empirical settings. In this chapter, we isolate the possible adverse implications for currently kosher Israeli wine producers that were established as non-kosher producers. Our analysis suggests that crossing the kosher categorical boundary exposes these producers to experience-based penalties that are reflected in lower product quality ratings. However, we find no evidence of additional penalties associated either with consideration (i.e., market access) or with the possession of a convoluted organizational identity.

Diversified trading networks have recently drawn a great deal of attention. In the process, the importance of diversity has perhaps been overemphasized. Using the trade in port wine from Portugal to Britain as an example, this essay attempts to show how a market once dominated by general, diversified traders was taken over by dedicated specialists whose success might almost be measured by the degree to which they rejected diversification to form a dedicated “commodity chain.” The essay suggests that this strategy was better able to handle matters of quality and the specialized knowledge that port wine required. The essay also highlights the question of power in such a chain. Endemic commodity-chain struggles are clearest in the vertical brand war that broke out in the nineteenth century, which, by concentrating power, marked the final stage in the transformation of the trade from network to vertical integration.

Wine tourism literature still falls behind other streams of research in its ability to assess phenomena associated with the implementation of digital practices to address strategic challenges. Moreover, studies on social media in tourism and hospitality prioritize the relationship between tourists’ behavioural aspects and technology. Relationships, experiences and timely responses on the digital environment are particularly important, taken the ‘new normal’ which COVID-19 necessitates. Within this framework, the present case study explores the role of social media (Facebook in specific) in the effort of Cretan wineries to respond to new encounters, as well as the importance, if any, of collaborative practices for developing online strategies of individual businesses. Findings help us identify (a) the role of the winescape studies in exploring the digital environment and (b) the main communication priorities of wineries as expressed through social media during the pandemic crisis.

This paper tests the potential for the food and wine tourism model developed by Hall and Sharples to be used as a tool for identifying specific food and wine segments in a destination. Using Cairns, Australia, as a case study a survey of tourists identified three food and wine segments and confirmed the ability of the model to be used to classify the destination's position as a food and wine destination based on the categories developed by Hall and Sharples. Results of the survey indicate that while almost all participants experienced the destination's food and wine products, only one group of respondents (45%) self-identified as food and wine tourists. A second group participated in food and wine experiences but did not select specific destinations on the basis of the destination's food and wine sector. A third group expressed no interest in food and wine as a tourist experience but did consume unique food and wine as part of the overall tourist experience. The research found that the food and wine tourism model developed by Hall and Sharples was a useful tool for both identifying the stage of development of the food and wine industry and planning strategies to develop the sector. The paper concludes by outlining a number of implications for marketing food and wine tourism.