The only thing that matters is the comfort and durability of the shoe
In which I admit to driving the world's least fashionable car. And explain how wine "works". Another installment of the Wine Marketing Masterclass.
In the last instalment the Wine Marketing Masterclass we heard about wine’s greatest shibboleth; the phrase “the only thing that matters is the liquid in the bottle”.
It’s complete guff. And I now intend to prove it, using the world’s best… or worst… shoe. It depends on how you look at shoes. And wine.
This is the latest installment in a COMPLETE MBA course in wine marketing. For just $10 a month. (A full wine MBA costs up to €30,000) you’ll discover sell more wine, more profitably, to more people. And to catch you up we’ve already covered a LOT, with multiple sessions across Market Orientation, Market Research, Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning. We’re now tackling PRODUCT - the first of the 4P’s.
In a minute we’ll have the paywall. For the juicy stuff, be sure to…
I want you to imagine we’re selling shoes.
And I want you to imagine that all the important people in the world of shoes insist that “the only thing that matters is the comfort and durability of the shoe. Let’s face it,” they say, “they’re shoes. Their job is to comfortably take you from place to place. And what’s the point of doing that in anything other than comfort, and with the durability that offers great value for money?”
As it happens, during my childhood, the British brand Clarks launched a shoe that did just that:
The polyveldt was the single most hideous shoe known to man. And I include in that the $875 Balenciaga Croc. Polyveldts were beloved only by geography teachers. But remember, we’re in a world where the only thing that matters with shoes is comfort and durability. Everything else is “marketing”. And we all know “marketing” is bad.
Now imagine if every shoe journalist and Instagram “foot-fluencer” insists that we “shouldn’t be misled by the looks of the shoe. All we should ask is ARE THEY COMFORTABLE?” To this end shoes are judged in specialist magazines by the “comfort-price-ratio” of the shoe. And there are even special shoe awards, where shoe experts judge the shoes. Although they ONLY make their judgements based on the comfort of the shoes. Which means that for the judging process the shoes are wrapped in special black bags while the judges try them on so they’re not influenced by the look of the shoes. (This year they gave a gold medal to the Freeman, Hardy, and Willis desert boot for excellent low cost comfort and an extra-wide toe. Picture below.)
Would it be any wonder if the rest of the world thought shoe lovers were knobs?
This is not how shoes work. It’s not how wine works either
Over the past few weeks I’ve been reviewing interviews for a consulting client. The interviews asked young, affluent, professional Swedes about their wine drinking preferences. We’ve interviewed doctors, actors, architects, software engineers, and UX designers. And every one of them said they like to buy wine in an attractive bottle.
Every. Single. One.
Yes, they want the wine they buy to taste nice. But in general they find that wine usually tastes nice. And they want to explore different sorts of wines. So long as it comes in an attractive looking bottle. They also admit wine is a bit complicated. And often worry they don’t know a lot about it. But they still like to buy wine. So long as it comes in an attractive looking bottle.
No, the liquid in the bottle is NOT the only thing that matters. And to insist it does is like condemning the world to wearing Polyveldt shoes.
Introducing the Polyveldt “Leonidas”
No analogy is perfect. But I’ll be honest, the Polyveldt shoe/wine nerd analogy is better than most.
Back in the 1970’s and 80’s it’s true that some people really loved Polyveldt shoes. (Geography teachers, like I said). And they drove Austin Allegros with square steering wheels (as did I for a while). And they wore knitted tank tops under a corduroy sports coat with leather elbow patches. And people thought they were slightly ridiculous, marginal figures. (So in no way whatsoever like wine nerds. *Looks to camera like Tim/Jim from The Office*).
So yes, there are people - some people - for whom the only thing that matters is the liquid in the bottle. And that’s fine. It’s okay to judge wine that way. But they have an outsized and disproportionate influence on the world of wine. And to most people who buy wine, they’re oddities. For most people, how a bottle looks… matters.
Imagine putting 1980’s geography teachers in charge of the global shoe industry. And you think you’d like a pair of £120 Steve Madden tan ballerina shoes because you saw someone on TV wearing them…
…only to be told by a geography teacher that you need more “education”. And that “ackcherly” you really need to try one of the “classics from Greece”: the Polyveldt “Leonidas”. A hidden and underrated gem…
…a shoe described by The New York Times in 1975 as “Not for Earthlings”.
Attractive labels might be a proxy. But what if they’re not?
At this point some of you - quite rightly - might be saying something like this: I get that people choose wine by the label. (In fact in questionnaires upwards of 80% of people admit to choosing by the label). But maybe that’s because they’re so confused by wine, they use attractive label as a way to “navigate the category”?
And that’s a fair question. But it’s also fair to turn it round. Maybe people just like buying wine with attractive labels. A quick analysis of two wine brands suggests that may well be the case.
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