For most wineries, marketing still follows a familiar path: email campaigns, wine clubs, tasting room experiences, and social media. These channels continue to drive direct-to-consumer sales, but they are also becoming increasingly saturated. Reaching new customers often requires more content, more spend, and more competition for the same audience. At the same time, another force is shaping consumer behavior at scale—film and television. A single streaming series can influence travel, dining, fashion, and brand awareness almost overnight. Within those moments, wine is already present. It appears in dinner scenes, celebrations, restaurants, and quiet evenings at home, serving as a natural extension of lifestyle and hospitality. Historically, however, the bottles used on screen have rarely represented real wineries. That is beginning to change. Wine product placement is emerging as a viable and strategic marketing channel for wineries looking to expand beyond traditional touchpoin

Looking for innovative ways to keep your wine club members engaged? Awtomic Moments lets you visualize and gamify retention—helping wineries build long-term loyalty, increase average order value, and create personalized rewards program When it comes to wine club retention, wineries often focus on the basics: great wine, exclusive perks, and occasional discounts. But what if you could gamify retention, making every shipment feel like a milestone and every year of membership feel like an achievement? That’s exactly what Awtomic Moments is designed to do. 🍷✨ What Makes Awtomic Moments So Unique? Awtomic Moments is an industry-first tool that visualizes a customer’s membership journey, making it easy to see: ✅ What rewards they’ve earned ✅ What’s coming next ✅ Why it’s worth staying in the club By gamifying retention, wineries can create excitement, anticipation, and long-term loyalty—turning passive subscribers into engaged advocates who s

When the Super Bowl and Olympics approach, we celebrate the performance we see on the field. What we don’t see is the year-round conditioning, repetition, and skill-building that made that performance possible. Winning teams don’t train only when the lights are brightest. They train all year long. The same principle applies to winery DTC teams. Downtime Is Where Advantage Is Built Periods of slower visitation or economic uncertainty can feel like a signal to pause. But research shows that the opposite approach separates leaders from laggards. A landmark study published by Harvard Business Review analyzed more than 4,700 companies across multiple recessions. The findings were striking: “Only 9% of companies emerged from recession stronger than before.” Even more telling: “Companies that balanced cost discipline with continued investment in people and capabilities recovered faster and gained market share.” Training Is a Growth Strategy,

Coffee with Rob: Macro Trends & How  Top-Performing Wineries Are Responding This session is all about stepping back and looking at the bigger picture. Rob will dig into the macro trends impacting the wine industry, drawing from the 2026 SVB State of the U.S. Wine Industry Report along with additional slides from his presentation deck that help put the data into context. Rather than focusing on day-to-day tactics, the conversation will center on what’s happening at a market level and what the data shows about how top-performing wineries are navigating today’s environment. We’ll start with Rob’s take on the data, followed by a moderated Q&A with questions submitted in advance by the eCELLAR community. DATE: Tuesday, February 24th, 2026 , 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM WHO: Rob McMillan, EVP & Principal Brand Strategist, Wine Silicon Valley Bank, a Division of First Citizens Bank LOCATION: Virtual Event RSVP ABOUT THE SPEAKER Rob McMillan, EVP & Pr

The SVB Wine Division hosted this virtual event to launch our 25th annual State of the US Wine Industry report. Our panel of wine industry experts discussed the report's key findings and explained how top quartile wineries are winning in the current market.

National Direct Sales Report Webinar this Friday Date: January 16, 2026 Time: 11am PST Register: https://wineindustryadvisor.com/event/vinoshipper-2026-national-direct-sales-report/ Vinoshipper releases its 2026 National Direct Sales Report this Friday with a webinar and full report. The data is clear: growth is no longer happening by chance. Wineries that invested in clubs saw better outcomes. Events drove engagement and loyalty. And producers who know their metrics are making smarter decisions because of it. Join Friday's webinar for the key takeaways, then dig into the full report released the same day. Register now

This year’s event will be held as a virtual meeting on Thursday, January 22, 2026 from 9:00 AM to 11:30 AM. Join us for a recap of Sonoma County Winegrowers’ and Sonoma County Fundación de la Voz de los Viñedos’ activities in 2025, along with a preview of exciting plans for the year ahead. Turrentine Brokerage will also present during the meeting, and we will recognize outstanding contributions with the Nick Frey Community Contribution Award. Click here to register.

Please join us on Thursday, January 15 for a live, virtual event to review findings and analysis from our 2026 State of the U.S. Wine Industry Report. Our panel of wine industry experts will present findings from the latest SVB State of the U.S. Wine Industry survey and discuss market sentiment, ongoing business challenges and share success stories. In this year’s session, we will: Examine the biggest impacts on U.S. wineries’ financial health. Analyze the ongoing shifts in consumer behavior. Investigate the relationship between wine supply and emerging threats. Explore the sales strategies currently used by leading brands. Our panel of wine industry innovators hosting this discussion include: Rob McMillan – EVP & Founder, Silicon Valley Bank Wine Division Janie Brooks Heuck – Managing Director, Brooks Wine Kristin Marchesi – Managing Director, Metis Mergers & Acquisitions Matt Owings – COO & CFO, Rombauer Vineyards Virtual Event Details

Join our 2-hour virtual harassment prevention training for supervisors, AB 1825/SB 1343 compliant. Is it really sexual harassment? Is it a hostile working environment? Do your managers know how to respond to rumors or complaints? Do your supervisors realize they are being held to a higher legal standard? This AB 1825/SB 1343-compliance training educates supervisors and managers on their role in harassment prevention. Attendees must attend the entire two hours of training in order to obtain a certificate of completion. This training will be held on Zoom. A link to join will be emailed to attendees before the session. In preparation for the training, please take note of these important points: This training ideally should be accessed on a computer with audio and video conferencing capabilities. One attendee per web-cam enabled device (computer, tablet, smart phone). This training is interactive and you are encouraged to participate (to your comfort level). When everyone participates, the

Join our 1-hour virtual harassment prevention training for non-supervisors, AB 1825/SB 1343 compliant. This 1-hour AB 1825/SB 1343-compliance training provides non-supervisory employees with important information on harassment prevention. Attendees must attend the entire 60 minutes of training in order to obtain a certificate of completion. This training will be held on Zoom. A link to join will be emailed to attendees before the session. In preparation for the training, please take note of these important points: This training ideally should be accessed on a computer with audio and video conferencing capabilities. One attendee per web-cam enabled device (computer, tablet, smart phone). This training is interactive and you are encouraged to participate (to your comfort level). When everyone participates, the experience is richer for all in attendance Register here. Dec 3 from 8:30am to 9:30am PST