Université MONTESQUIEU – BORDEAUX IV Institut d’Administration des Entreprises Diplôme d'Université « Management des Affaires dans les Pays Anglophones » Promotion 2007-2008 THE STUDY OF A FAMOUS AUSTRALIAN WINE COMPANY Banrock Station is an Australian wine company situated within three hours drive from Adelaide, in South Australia. Its slogan "Good earth, Fine wines" perfectly embodies the two main motivations of the company: the protection of ecological balance and the pleasure of quality wines consumption. This is aimed at convincing more and more consumers to look for both pleasure in tasting wines and a civil act in their consumption behaviour. However, now different important stakes remain for the company. ✔ How to meet the demands of a new market? In fact, Banrock Station has to meet the demands of a new market. In fact, the company can focus on the ethical aspects of its production through its corporate responsibility. For example, it can emphasize on the protection of the environment since the company represents a guarantee of seriousness when it comes to ecological issues. The company can develop the idea that its activity aims at preserving the environment in terms of nature, sustainable agriculture, biodiversity of the wetlands; conserving water and energy, reducing waste of CO2 emissions, preserving the ozone layer and promoting organic recycling. This can be a good means to enhance the image of the company in the opinion of new consumers and future customers. As far as consumption is concerned, the company should heighten people's awareness of the risks posed to individuals and society by excessive or inappropriate alcohol consumption, encouraging to drink in moderation to avoid disasters due to drink driving or excessive alcohol intake. This would enable the company to benefit from a powerful image showing that it is aware of the problems linked with alcohol consumption and that it wants to protect the general public. Another idea would be to promote ethical topic by enhancing the high quality of its products through continuous improvement and constant innovation. We can suggest all these ideas to the Banrock Station company in order to help it to conquer a new market. Ethics and consumption are two important elements that can make the strengths of the company while entering a new market. ✔ How to find necessary communication tools? The company also has to find some appropriate communication tools to get the message across. We can recommend it to make television advertisement presenting the fact that Banrock Station belongs to powerful groups Hardy Wines and Constellation Brands in order to testify of the seriousness of the brand. Since these brands are very famous in Australia and all over the world, people can easily have confidence in the company. TV ads are very useful because they have immediately a huge impact on people. Since, nowadays, almost every households are supposed to have a TV at home, TV ads seem to be a good way to get in touch with a larger target. However, to be more convincing so as to encourage people to buy the products, the TV ad must be based on the three elements of the advertising skills: ➢ the cognitive aspect, which consists in developing the fame of the products among the target through credibility and realism ➢ the affective aspect, which acts upon the target's attitude and gives a preference for the products ➢ the conative aspect, which leads to the conviction and to the purchase Credibility and realism could be represented by pictures showing wetlands and vineyards and a slogan dealing with the company's wish to protect environment and awareness of ecological issues. Since today about 3 out of 4 Australians are ready to privilege products that are linked with an important cause on the condition of being clearly informed, such a TV ad would affect the people's attitude by creating a preference for the products.We think that an ad would strongly persuade people when watching TV and be a positive medium to increase the market shares of the company. Another important medium is the press. In fact, we can suggest to publish some advertising inserts in different newspapers in order to extend the target of prospective consumers. Obviously, these ads should be written following the above elements of the advertising skills. Moreover, Banrock Station could create some pictures with a vineyard landscape in the background to stick up on billboards in the streets or on buses to broadcast information about its activities (production, ecotourism, ... etc) so that it could encourage a lot of local customers to come and visit its wetlands site. However, the by-products method already used by the company is a good way to develop its fame and communicate on its activity. The aim is to establish customer loyalty and attract new ones by word of mouth. This another excellent way of communicating which is no costly for the company. To conclude on the communication tools, we can say that it is unavoidable to create the fame of Banrock Station products. It is important to accentuate on ecological issues and ecotourism while advertising since more and more Australians feel concerned by this particular issue. ✔ How to use the brand name "Australia" as a market position reinforcement? The brand name "Australia" has to be used by a specific way to reinforce its position on both a domestic and an international market. On the one hand, customers of the domestic market may be used to consuming local wines. So, we can suppose that they know their characteristics, such as the quality, the price, and can develop a certain confidence in the local production. But, in this case, the difficulty consists above all in how differentiating the Banrock Station products from other local wines. We think that emphasizing on environmental friendly production is a relevant asset for the company. Consumers know how the wines are produced, where the grapes are grown, and this can lead to a strong confidence relationship between customers and producers. In the present context of environment- oriented behaviour among Australian wine consumers, people must take into account the efforts made by the company to protect environment. For instance, we can suggest to the company to indicate on the bottle labels some information dealing with the region (wetlands near Adelaide) where the wine comes from and briefly describing the different stages of its production. This is a solution to increase the sales of Banrock Station products by enhancing the authenticity of the products. On the other hand, when it comes to international market, the difficulty is to make foreign customers realize the quality of Australian wines. In fact, French wines and above all those from Bordeaux vineyards are very famous all over the world. They are known for their quality and taste. In this context, competition in the wine market is high and it seems difficult for Banrock Station to face it. The brand name « Australia » has to find forceful arguments to conquer the international market. For instance, since Australian wines are not as famous as French ones, it has to be proved that they have a good quality in order to attract new customers. We can advise the company to explain that Banrock Station is an Australian brand that belongs to the Constellation Brands group which is the largest wine company in the world and a leading producer and exporter of wine from Australia. To summarize our views, we can say that Banrock Station has to adopt different strategies when it comes to the specific markets it focuses on. We suggest that it must focus on the aspect of an environment-friendly production while acting on the local market because of the current trend of Australian consumers to privilege products linked with an important cause. When acting on the international market, it seems relevant to insist on the fame of the Constellation Brands group as a wine exporter from Australia to give more confidence in the Australian brand in the eyes of foreign consumers. After having considered a possible strategy for Banrock Station to develop its marketing shares and profitability, we can study the French case more closely. Actually, there are many ideas that can be taken into account before forecasting to penetrate the Australian market when it comes to wine. Of course, one of the great advantages of the French wine will be its reputation and the notoriety it benefits from. Nevertheless, this must not be a reason why French wine companies can think their arrival will necessarily be a franc success. There are some measures that have to be taken to optimize such an operation. The conquest of the Australian market will certainly pass through the realization of different points: ➢ Developing a brand name related to each vineyard, depending on each French region ➢ Possibly creating a label ➢ Making French wine more understandable ➢ Presenting cheap French wines better ➢ Communicating on the secular know-how of the French wine-producing sector ✔ A name for each wine It is to realize that the French wine has a lot of resources and any consumer can feel lost faced with the panel of different wines the current market provides, even for a French customer that should basically be more used and aware of the offer than any other non-French consumer. But, as a drawback, the French wine market still remains a bit vague because of the profusion and the multiplicity of vintage wines which the French regions propose. Developing a brand under the name of which we could group together wines of the same vine would be a means for the average consumer to identify wines having the same vegetable base and a common manufacturing process.