Challenge

Wente Vineyards is the country’s longest, continuously operated family-owned winery, founded in 1883. For decades, the winery had built a reputation for for cheap, uninteresting wines mostly sold in grocery stores. The company had made major investments in winemaking and vineyard operations, and needed help communicating their commitment and demonstrating the quality of their wines. Through a selection process, they chose Balzac to help them with these activities.

Solution

We developed a comprehensive PR and marketing program for Wente Vineyards, which included general media engagement, event promotion, and specific projects. One example of our work was in the creation and promotion of National Chardonnay Day activities. Wente is arguably the leading name in the world of Chardonnay with roughly 70-80% of all Chardonnay planted in California tracing their heritage to the Wente Clone. We developed a program to further establish the Wentes as the “First Family of Chardonnay” with a series of activities. This included a social media campaign, sample sending to key gatekeepers, and on-site event execution.

Outcome

The National Chardonnay Day activities resulted in more than 40 articles, 5 million media impressions, and 9 million social impressions. In addition, we were instrumental in getting Carolyn Wente nominated as the 2017 Person of the Year for Wine Enthusiast’s Wine Star Awards.