Coursey Graves had been operating Commerce7 for several years, but its potential was largely untapped. Once they paired a modern digital marketing approach with a high-converting website, and began using Commerce7 more intentionally as the backbone for reservations, segmentation, and customer data, they were able to move quickly, test what was working, and turn insight into real growth. We recapped all of it — every tactic, every tool, every lesson learned — in a full blog post. Read it here: https://hubs.li/Q04fB7SK0

If you're thinking of selling your winery, rather than closing, this article is for you. These are the top things to consider when positioning your winery for sale in today's market.  If you’re in the wine industry, you already know that this is a hard market. There are an increasing number of wineries for sale, and you likely know several others that would sell if they had the opportunity. So what do you need to do if you’re seriously considering selling your winery in the near future and want to maximize the value of that sale? Here are three areas to focus on: maximizing your cash flow, assessing your salable assets, and being honest with your expectations. Read on my Substack page. Maximize Your Cash Flow The best way to show that your winery is worth the price is to have cash flow. The highest value in a winery is, in fact, cash coming in. At the same time, most wineries consider selling because they don’t have enough of it. That tension is real, and

Wine club churn has always been a challenge, but the stakes are even higher as the direct-to-consumer (DtC) wine shipping channel has entered a period of sustained contraction. With 2025 seeing the largest year-over-year declines in both DtC wine shipment volume and value — according to the 2026 Direct-to-Consumer Wine Shipping Report — the channel is smaller, more concentrated, and increasingly reliant on a pool of higher-end customers. Stabilizing revenue in this environment means wineries must be more focused than ever on retaining customers in your winery’s wine club. In practice, churn rarely begins with a cancellation request. It typically starts with subtle changes in behavior that are easy to overlook in standard reports. This webinar will discuss: What those signals are — where and how to look for them How early churn forecasting differs from traditional churn reporting Which member behaviors tend to signal increased churn risk before cancella

Five years ago, running a winery on Shopify meant duct-taping a lot of things together. Great for e-commerce. Okay for DTC. Difficult for wine clubs. Not really designed for tasting rooms. That's changed. The combination of Shopify's platform investments and a handful of wine-specific apps has created something genuinely new: a single operational stack that connects your tasting room, your wine club, your online store, and your loyalty program under one customer record. That convergence has real operational consequences — and it's why an increasing number of wineries are consolidating everything onto Shopify. Here's what's actually different. Your Card on File, Finally Done Right One very frustrating limitation of running a winery business on Shopify used to be simple: Shopify didn't let you vault a customer's payment card and charge it later for anything other than a subscription — not from your POS or your back office or sales team for one-tim

Best Wine Club Management Software for Wineries (2026 Quick Guide) Your wine club is likely your most predictable DTC revenue stream. Members buy on schedule. They purchase more outside of shipments. They refer friends. According to Silicon Valley Bank’s State of the U.S. Wine Industry Report, direct-to-consumer revenue, particularly wine clubs, remains one of the most controllable and margin-protective channels for wineries. Yet many wineries are still running their wine club: Manually Across disconnected systems On software not built for winery operations That friction quietly costs money every week. What Wine Club Software Should Actually Do in 2026 At minimum, your system should: 1. Increase retention Flexible club levels and shipment schedules Clear, automated member benefits Customization options that members value 2. Reduce revenue leakage Automated expired card updater Clean billing workflows Fewer manual errors 3. Speed up tasting room enrollment POS-connected s

We call it a Tasting Room, when it’s really a Sales Room. Why is that? After the repeal of Prohibition in 1933, wineries re-opened in an environment where the government was highly suspicious of any and all alcohol sales. On-premise consumption was restricted and considered the purview of saloons, which were vilified during the years of Prohibition. So, to comply with laws and distinguish themselves as places of refined moderation, wineries leaned into “tasting,” not drinking. The Tasting Room became the winery’s sales room. Over the decades, tasting rooms have become places of hospitality, education, and increasingly, dinner (or lunch). Along the way, the primary role of the tasting room—to form a connection with the consumer for the purpose of selling wine—got lost. Now, I recognize that I’m being hyperbolic here. In the contracting market we’re living in, too many wineries are focusing only on the hospitality aspect. They need to lean

 Wine Club Retention    Predict Churn Risk and Act Earlier Churn rarely starts with a cancellation. It starts with drift.   What drift looks like • Stops opening emails • Engages less with releases • Buys less between shipments • Feels less connected while still “active”   That is why retention is not one save campaign. It is a system. The fastest way to improve retention is to catch risk earlier, then focus your time on the members who are drifting.   3 signals that spot drift early   Recency Recent opens, clicks, site activity, add-on purchases  Do: simple check-in or personal invite Consistency A normally engaged member suddenly goes quiet  Do: ask what they want more of, adjust cadence Value High lifetime value behaviors, add-ons, referrals, events  Do: human outreach, recognition, insider access   Match outreach to the moment   VIPs who are drifting: personal outreach that feels hum

The wine club isn’t dying. It’s being rewritten. Wine clubs in 2026 still matter, but the way wineries build and grow them has fundamentally changed. What has changed is the lifestyle of the people in them. In 2026, the strongest force shaping wine club behavior is the Millennial generation — not because they are the only wine buyers, but because the way they live, spend, and subscribe has become the default expectation for everyone else. They are running households, hosting friends, raising families, managing busy schedules, and making more intentional purchasing decisions than any generation before them. That reality is quietly transforming what a wine club needs to be. Why lifestyle now matters more than allocations Wine clubs used to compete on bottles: how many, how rare, how discounted. That’s not how people experience wine anymore. Most members don’t think in terms of allocations or case sizes. They think in terms of how wine fits into their lives &

What we’re seeing Holiday and event weekends are where wineries make their money — and also where tasting rooms get the most stressed. Lines back up, staff get flustered, and POS screens fill with clutter right when teams need simplicity. How vinSUITE TabletPOS helps TabletPOS is built for exactly those moments: fast, flexible, and easy to use anywhere you pour. These three small setup tweaks have a big impact on busy weekends: 1. Dollar-Based Tips That Match Wine Service Swap restaurant-style percentages for simple dollar buttons that feel natural in a tasting room. The problem Restaurant-style 20% tip prompts can feel out of place on high-value wine tickets. Guests hesitate, do math, or skip tipping entirely. The tweak Use Custom Tip Amounts in TabletPOS to swap percentages for simple dollar buttons like $5, $10, and $15. Why it’s a win Feels natural for winery hospitality vs. restaurant-style math. Speeds up checkout with fewer edits and awkward pauses. Suppo