Afternoon Brief, March 29th

Omar Khan Has Pleaded Guilty to Identity Theft: Omar Khan, the bon vivant who allegedly swindled fine-wine insiders out of at least $9.5 million, pleaded guilty to identity theft on Thursday, less than one month after the FBI arrested him at John F. Kennedy International Airport...

Afternoon Brief, March 22nd

Some Early Results from the SvB DtC Survey: Today, we are about 50 responses short of what we need to produce the Annual Direct to Consumer Report, so please participate. To help us reach the finish line, we are leaving the survey open over the weekend and closing it on 3/24...

Afternoon Brief, March 8th

Women Are ‘The Emerging Market’ for Fine Wine – But Merchants Must Invest to See Growth: Fine wine merchants and private client teams may be missing a trick by failing to invest in high-net-worth women as fine wine collectors, according to some of the leading voices in the industry – with the first merchant to crack this emerging market set to have “a massive advantage”...

The wine marketplace continues its post-pandemic shifts.  By Laurie Wachter The August 24 Wine Industry Sales Symposium consisted of four sessions covering the value of DTC and sales data in boosting sales, planning for the holidays, corporate gifting and luxury marketing strategy. Here’s a quick look back. Using Data Analytics to Optimize DTC Pricing and Inventory Depletion Costs have risen exponentially since the onset of the pandemic, making it even more critical to use data analytics to guide wine pricing to maximize profits.  “Wineries have an amazing amount of data from their POS systems and wine clubs that can be used to build a depletion curve, price elasticity estimates and predictive models,” says Bob Terzotis of Mather Economics.  Jim Moroney reached out to Mather after opening Sixmilebridge Vineyards (Paso Robles, Calif.) during the pandemic. “We were running out of Cabernet Sauvignon partway into our first vintage. I needed to raise t

Welcome to our fifth installment of LibDib's multi-part series on the topic of E-Premise. This time we highlight Thirstie, a technology company that connects alcohol brands with consumers through DTC-like e-commerce, consumer adoption and data intelligence solutions. Companies like Thirstie, are part of the e-premise evolution in the three-tier system. We are thrilled to introduce you to Thirstie’s innovative solutions that are transforming the beverage alcohol industry.  What’s your company’s origin story? A: Thirstie has been a pioneer in beverage alcohol e-commerce 2014. Having started in the space as an e-commerce marketplace, we soon recognized a huge opportunity with suppliers and brands. It was evident that marketplace solutions were focused on consumers and retailers. At that time, brands and their e-commerce needs weren’t fully being addressed. In 2017 we pivoted our business model and launched the first enterprise e-commerce solution