Winery websites

Shiraz Man · Post by **Shiraz Man** » Mon Jul 31, 2006 10:18 pm

I fail to understand how some wineries fail to keep their websites up to date.

For example, I went to the Wynns websites to read the tasting notes on the Wynns Shiraz 2005 as I had seen it in a wine store. To my amasement, they did not have the 2005 tasting notes, only up to 2004.

I can understand this being the case with a small boutique winery, but there is no excuse for a large one such as Wynns, part of the largest premium wine company in the world - Fosters.

I work in the automotive industry with a vehicle importer, and it is unacceptable in the industry to launch a vehicle without posting the specifications and pricing on the website at the same time as the launch. I cannot understand how the same would not be the case with some of the larger wineries, who have the resources to do so.

MerlotWine · Post by **MerlotWine** » Tue Aug 01, 2006 3:40 am

Hi! I totally agree with you. I also hate it when wine reviews are not updated. Big wineries that offer this kind of service to the clients should be careful about this and update the information. Customer service they call it.

TORB · Post by **TORB** » Tue Aug 01, 2006 6:08 am

A couple of my pet hates.

I was looking at a site a couple of days ago and their wines were two vintage out of date. :roll:

The other thing I hate is the number of wineries that do not respond to emails.

GraemeG · Post by **GraemeG** » Tue Aug 01, 2006 9:43 am

Are you in agriculture or FMCG, guys? Make up your mind. Actually, that's probably an irrelevant question. If you're going to put tasting notes on your website, then keep it up to date. Otherwise, just have a general blurb, contacts, photos, a few general essays, and nothing that goes out of date...
cheers,
Graeme

kirragc · Post by **kirragc** » Tue Aug 01, 2006 4:21 pm

I does seem apocryphal that in this massively competetive market people are being lazy with their marketing.

roughred · Post by **roughred** » Tue Aug 01, 2006 6:38 pm

I do agree with the above, but recognise that websites can be hard work.

Small to medium wineries without dedicated IT people, or wads of cash for IT consultants often have to make do with clunky content management systems, often with uninspiring results. Also clearly a lot of people think that you design the website and then the hard work is done...you can sit back and wait for the orders. Quite the opposite, the hard work has just started, and most websites will take a few precious hours out of each week.

Still no excuses for tasting notes to be months and months out of date, and definately no excuses for not returning emails - be it a winery or any other trader, if email is a point of contact they must be anwered immediately. My two cents.

LL

winetastic · Post by **winetastic** » Wed Aug 02, 2006 9:38 am

I am going to disagree that creating and maintaining a decent website is a difficult or expensive task. There are a lot of IT sharks out there and many less computer literate people are still feeling a bit dazed, and have empty wallets, from the internet bubble/burst. However that does not mean that every web development company is going to screw a client over on price.

The ideal situation for a smaller winery is to have a site built and maintained by a web development professional, you wouldnt do your own high quality print brochures and such, so leave it to someone with the right core competency.

For those who have some technical knowledge, have a pro set up a site that uses a CMS, and then keep your tasting notes/news up to date yourself. A good quality CMS is no more difficult to use than a wine forum, however getting it to look good in the first place takes experience.

Disclaimer: I am a software engineer with a fair amount of web development experience

Gavin Trott · Post by **Gavin Trott** » Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:03 am

winetastic wrote:A good quality CMS is no more difficult to use than a wine forum,

What are you trying to say ??

:lol:

Red Bigot · Post by **Red Bigot** » Tue Aug 08, 2006 5:58 pm

Went in to DM today to get a replacement for a Morris 2002 Shiraz (bought last week) that was cork-tainted (the only cork-sealed wine in a bracket of 6 reds on tasting!), they had one bottle of the 2002 left and a stack of the 2004. Now the 2001 is still around in a few places, despite a big discount sell off that saw it down to $10pb and I thought the 2002 was only fairly recently released to retail, so seeing the 2004 was a surprise.

I had a look at the Morris web site to see if there was any info, they have been selling the 2002 for at least 6 months at CD I think. The tasting notes for the shiraz are still for the 2001 vintage and the order form doesn't list vintages for most of the wines except a vintage port. :-(

Looks like the at least one of the big companies doesn't see the need to keep the web-site updated, at least for one of their non-mainstream brands