Wine

Marketing Wines to Millennials

In the Jul/Aug issue of Selector we ran an interesting feature on labelling wine bottles aimed at the millennial market. Millennials are people born after 1980 and who are so termed because they hit maturity at the turn of the millennium and beyond.

Not only is this generation cashed up, brand savvy and wine knowledgeable, they are about to overtake baby boomers (those aged 55+) as the biggest consumers and buyers of wine. Therefore, they are vital to the future of the wine industry. 

Marketing to this generation is a world away from traditional marketing.

 In the feature, we referenced a California State University study that found millennials prefer wine labels that are brightly coloured, less traditional and more graphically focused. Hence, you may have noticed a swag of wine labels that are more expressive, artistic and almost graffiti-like in nature. 

Of course, all that is fine for new and emerging wine brands on the market. But how can established producers whose labels speak of consistency, reliability and trustworthiness also appeal to the millennial market? 

 Hunter Valley wine producer Tyrrell’s Wines seems to have found an answer.

One of the Australia’s First Families of Wine, Tyrrell’s are true pioneers of the Australian Wine Industry with 160 years of experience across five generations of winemaking.

Their classic white label with a curved font and distinctive gold and black badging has become iconic as the wines they produce. This label allows them to convey a sense of trust and quality assurance to drinkers who recognise it i.e the traditional market of baby boomers.

With their recent ‘True Taste of the Hunter’ marketing campaign on their Hunter Valley range, they’ve tapped into the millennial market and what appeals to this hard to capture demographic.

What Tyrrell’s has done so cleverly is create an artistic, colourful brand story that is both eye-catching and informative.

With Instagram worthy info-graphic details of fruits in each bottle that deliver the characteristics of each wine: lemon, lime and rockmelon for Semillon; apricot, guava and grapefruit for Chardonnay; plum, raspberry and mulberry for Shiraz.

The bottles are laid out artistically on a black background with minimal but direct text and a firm but understated call to action. A snapshot of the flavours inside each bottle.

This fits the brief perfectly for capturing the attention of millennials – those who love splashes of colour and delineating lots of information in a short amount of time as is delivered via an infographic.

The label and badging remain the same both reassuring their traditional market and at the same time, creating an opportunity to imprint on a new generation of Tyrrell’s drinkers.

Fifth generation winemaker Chris Tyrrell explains the marketing campaign.

“As a 160-year-old wine company, we have built a loyal base of consumers over the years but in order to grow our brand long-term, we need to be relevant to new segments of the market, hence the development of a communications campaign that would drive awareness of our three key varieties; Semillon, Chardonnay and Shiraz, what we call our quintessential Hunter Valley range.

“We specifically chose to shoot the creative with a high-end fashion photographer, and to position the advertising in luxury magazines and online platforms to ensure we communicate with the female market and millennials and drive a more premium positioning of Tyrrell’s within the marketplace”.