Marketing Strategy in Chapel Hill Winery

Marketing is an important tool in any organization since it’s the best way to ensure products are introduced to stakeholders. Therefore, for the success of any product in the market, firms should ensure proper induction through marketing strategy. A lot of activities are involved when dealing with marketing concepts such as research on the market and advertising (Baker 2016). Chapel Hill being a wine company based in Australia essentially requires a lot of attention to the marketing department to ensure continuous profits through high sales levels. Regardless of how quality and appealing products a company makes, without any marketing strategy they cannot be well accepted in the market.

Company History

Chapel Hill Winery was given the name after the Australian iconic Ironstone Chapel which was constructed by Methodist settlers at McLaren Vale and later opened on 5th December 1865. For a century, the site served as a school, place of worship as well as families and friends gathering location. After a hundred years as a place where people worshiped, Chapel Hill was closed in 5th December 1965 with a commemorative ceremony. In the 1970’s, the ironstone Chapel caught the eye of professor Thomas Nelson who purchased it together with the surrounding land and planted vines on it.

The professor worked hard in order to make the winery site into a success by converting the old church with its surrounding environment into offices and wine tasting room which set the base for the current Chapel Hill Winery. The renovation made it a stain glass window which later became the logo of the company. For Chapel Hill Winery to grow into a global production, winemaker Pam Dunsford played the leading part as he was most reputable in South Australia for his work. With Pam’s ability, Chapel Hill Winery received multiple awards and acclaims in the 1990’s and some of the wines that were made then are still being drunk today.

Since the first owner Thomas Nelson, the winery has had many owners in the course of time. The Swiss Schmidheiny is a family obsessed with wine and hoped to own a global Australian winery which was a dream come true in December 2000 when they purchased Chapel Hill. Chapel Hill Winery celebrated its 40th consecutive success at the wine industry in 2014 with more expected to come due to its strong roots from the founders as it unveils the next chapter.

Evolution of Marketing Concept

The concept is based on a philosophy that an organization like Chapel Hill Shiraz should anticipate or analyze the needs of their customers then come up with means of fulfilling them in a better manner than their competitors at a profit. According to the concept, marketing has more to it than a mare physical process. A lot of companies have been able to follow this marketing strategy nowadays although it has not always been the case (Rafiq 2000).

Elements of a Marketing Process

Marketing requires some several elements to successfully hold a product in the market.

Segmentation

The process involves Chapel Hill Company dividing its potential customers into groups according to characteristics. The strategy is crucial considering the current international ventures which need concrete focus on the particular group. Arranging customers into various segments helps business plan promotions according to their knowledge of each segment (Wedel 2012). With segmentation, campaign for a product is guaranteed for success. A market can be segmented geographically according to where customers are located in the world, it can also be demographic which represents age, gender, and occupation. Segmenting can also be done on the basis of psychographic where individuals are divided according to personality and social class while behavioral segmenting is done on the grounds of usage, liking and purchase patterns.

Targeting and Positioning

The Chapel Company should identify segments in its target locations which are financially profitable for the business. After targeting, it should take necessary measures of positioning its resources in the parts that are more profitable and attractive in the targeted categories. The positioning should entail assessing the competitive advantage of targeted segments and choosing the best alternative (Grönroos 2004).

Promotional Tactics

There are various ways for a company to promote its products starting from advertising and personal selling, sales promotion and direct marketing, and also the use of the internet. These tactics help to create awareness of products in the market (Thackeray et.al 2008).

Monitoring and Evaluation

When products are introduced in the market, the company should ensure that there is follow up on how it is doing throughout the life cycle. It’s also important to evaluate the product according to the market report through inducing more promotional tactics.

Marketing Plan

Every organization involved in sales like Chapel Hill Winery should adopt a marketing plan by writing down a blueprint which will help show the promotion efforts to be used later. It also describes the kind of businesses to be conducted to achieve marketing goals (Cohen 2005).

Situation Analysis

Marketing strategy can sometimes be difficult for the Company mostly those agents in the field. Chapel Hill Company has to have an eye on external factors that could be costly for business.

Political Factor

The government of certain countries may impose taxes, trade tariffs or fiscal policies that could make business transactions difficult. Chapel Hill Wines being an international entity is mostly affected by such due to the import and export duties applied in different countries. Since a business cannot keep track of all countries political affairs, at some point such changes in tariffs are costly (Friske 2015).

Economic factor

Changes in a countries economy affect the purchasing power of buyers hence demand and supply variation. Such instances are as a result of interest rates, and inflation which a company should look out for through marketing to avoid financial constraints.

Social factors

Cultural trends, population, and demographics should guide marketers to help the company in making supply decisions based on profitability.

Technological

Technology is one of the trends threatening businesses around the globe. Due to its dynamic nature, marketers must conduct research and ensure that the company is responsive to the latest trend like online stores (Friske 2015).

Environmental

Geographical location, climatic and global changes can easily affect the demand and supply trends of a business. Marketing personnel should ensure that they are aware of these changes and can balance their supply routes accordingly.

Competitor Analysis

Due to the major demand in the wine business, Chapel Hill wine has had to be innovative in order to stay ahead of the competition in its geographical market. With competitors like Jacob Creek Shiraz, it is important for the company to differentiate its ways of meeting customers’ demands not to be overtaken in the Australian wine market. The marketing department of the firm, as well as design and innovation, should all do their parts to ensure the competitive advantage of products (Sohel 2014).

Consumer Analysis

The process can be conducted by identifying Chapel Hill Wines consumers who are known and those not reached yet. After knowing existing and potential customers, the company should take measures to note down their needs. Customers’ requirements and specification on products can totally differ hence each should be treated individually. Then, at last, the organization can work out on how to bridge the gap between demand and supply (Sen et.al 1998). Getting customers to purchase wine especially potential ones requires a study in their behavior for example what influences their buying habit. Some customers could be influenced by friends and families, quality, quantity, features and also financial situation. Therefore, the organization should have products ready to meet these influences as well as marketing teams to help push the purchase decision.

SWOT Analysis

Strength

weaknesses

Opportunities

Threats

Due to the strong foundation the business was build on, marketing is made easier as the product speaks for itself.

The company only focuses on wine without diversifying.

The company has goals to be the leading wine business globally which is possible given its records.

The company faces threats from competitors who have decided to diversify and offer customers other products other than wine.

Chapel Hill Winery has a high capacity of production in the manner that they can produce 80,000 cases of wine in a year which is quite impressive.

The company has not invested much on marketing strategies due to its ancient popularity.

The wine company has employed digital marketing to create awareness to all customers beyond geographical boundaries about its products.

Other wine companies around the globe have already occupied their local market making it hard for Chapel Hill to succeed globally.

Chapel Hill gives customers wine tasting chances which help attract more customers and ensure their satisfaction.

Poor capitalization on equipment with security concern of grapes and water shortages.

The company’s market position is strong and can easily venture into other diversification.

Table 1.1 SWOT analysis

Target Market

After a long run for Chapel Hill Winery as a family business, it has recently come to realize that the company can achieve its big dream of global leadership in the wine industry. Therefore, the firm has its target market focused on the international soil although most of its current consumers are still in Australia. Not much marketing strategy has been put in place hence making the global market quite broad for their resources to satisfy although a lot of progress has been recorded from the few of online advertisement the company has made (Lee 2006).

Market Positioning

In order to get a broad reach of the global market, segmentation was done sporadically rather than positioning. The company opted this in order to take advantage of different brokers spread across the globe (Okazaki et.al 2013). Any effort of market positioning with the few resources in marketing could have been wasted. It was then wise to use wine brokers located worldwide in supplying their products from Australia. The strategy helped save on marketing and distribution cost which when invested in production can increase the quality of a product. 

Brand Strategy

Due to its current global ventures, Chapel Hill winery is looking forward to improving its wine collection in order to satisfy the diverse needs of its current target market. Adding another product line under Chapel Hill will also help greatly in penetrating the foreign market as the company desires.

Marketing Mix

The Chapel Hill Winery ought to have a variety of factors that its management controls in order to boost sales and acquire more business.

Product strategy

For a product to help marketing strategy, it has to have its three levels which include core, actual and augmented. From the winery corporation, products need to have imaginable qualities like how good they taste and smell. Then the actual product which is tangible has to be presented to customers who later receive augmented products which come in terms of warranty and after-sales services or promotions to boost customers’ experience (Yoo 2000).

Products are classified in three groups by the company in order to make it easy for customers to purchase. Wine is classified according to its durability from the time of production. The product is highly durable that’s why even the wine made during the beginning of Chapel Hill winery is still being taken. It is also important that Chapel Hill Company explains to its customers through its products catalog the number and types of items they provide. The strategy helps during the purchasing decision of customers so that they can request for the best.

Pricing strategy

Chapel Hill Winery has been known to use Contribution margin-based pricing which helps to ensure continuous profits per every bottle of wine. Individuals have a perception that old wine is supposed to be costly hence the company makes a fortune from their ancient wine collection. The wine business also needs small sales to break even hence the pricing strategy works best in the foreign market.

Placement

Chapel Hill Winery has endeavored to ensure minimal distribution and marketing cost in such a manner that it used the internet as a channel for advertising its products to customers. Therefore, the product goes directly from the producer to end user without intermediaries (Yoo 2000). The company has also relied on brokers in the international market since the chain is long for them to bridge directly. Instead of dealing with international customers directly, a broker poses as the intermediary.

The company has now gained bigger distribution coverage by becoming a global entity. By venturing into the international wine market, its scope of distribution has increased and so does the customer base. Their coverage strategy is mass in the case where there is neither selective nor exclusive target location but the companies wine is sold globally to all wine outlets.

Promotion

For a product to survive in the market, a team has to make the necessary marketing moves for awareness. Chapel Hill though not much invested in the marketing department has used its tools to promote their products. Their wine collection has greatly been advertised to help penetrate the global market which is their biggest dream. By having them on papers helps spread the word quickly. The company has some members who sell wine products directly to customers mostly through the internet then delivered at home making business fast and easy (Yoo 2000). In some cases like when a new wine in being introduced, some sales promotions like low prices and gift hampers are given out to boost sales and awareness. Through technology, the business has been able to conduct direct marketing where there is no intermediary between the producer and final customer.

Marketing Metrics

Chapel Hill Winery has adopted the return on investment metrics to help determine the effectiveness of marketing strategies used to boost its sales. The returns received after sales have to be big enough to cover advertising and sales promotion, direct marketing and personal selling and many other marketing strategies that the company uses to ensure its product survive in the market (Ambler 2003).

Responsibilities of a Professional Marketer

According to the society and culture, marketers have the responsibility to customers of ensuring their product requirements are fulfilled by the production company. Marketers are also required to communicate all relevant information to the public about any product produced by the company to promote informed purchasing decisions (Craig Smith 2011). Environmentally and globally, marketers have the responsibility to learn about companies target population geographically to ensure a continuous supply of demands without any barriers that could have been overseen.

Communication and Problem-Solving In Marketing

Marketing entails a lot of communication and in most cases, they happen to customers during product promotion. The customer always comes first making it a requirement for every marketer out there to know ways of solving conflicts and communicating with customers (Avelino 2014). Through proper communication and conflict resolution, potential customers are able to trust the company’s’ ability hence pledging their loyalty.

Conclusion

Marketing should be taken more seriously in the corporate world since, without the creation of product awareness, they have no chance of survival in the market. Marketers out there should take more pride in what they do since it’s their efforts that ensure companies sales and profitability. Too much credit is taken by innovation and design team forgetting that without marketing, whatever product is made cannot be well appreciated by the target population. Therefore, all corporations around the world should put more importance in marketing their products to maximize on profits.

Recommendation

The Chapel Hill Winery has little endeavored into marketing its products which is not quite advisable. When drawing its next periods marketing plan, the company should ensure more focus on promoting its product since that will aid boost the global agenda.

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