Photo Essay

Topic: Wine marketing (André Blanck, Vin

d’Alsace)

Advances in marketing theory and practice

Submitted By: Keyur Doshi

Under guidance of Prof. Norah Campbell
Introduction: Located at the town of Kientzheim in the Alsace region, estate and winery,
whose fame is well known The André Blanck family from Kientzheim is indeed well known to
the public for the excellence of its Alsace wines, which come from noble grape varieties,
selected from the best, planted with passion in the fertile soil of the sunny hills at the entrance
of the Kaysersberg Valley.
For wines, the branding is not more focused on types of wine, but from the region they come
and its age. This is termed as Place Branding. Like in this vineyard, that I visited last week, has
several varieties of wines, but famously it is known by its region, i.e., Alsace. Similarly, for
other wine like famous Bordeaux. It has the country-of-origin effect.
Here in the above image, we can see the board mentioning the vineyard name and Alsace.
They have used a window display on the right side, where a woman is looking at the wine
bottles kept as exhibition. This is to attracts the passer-by people to at least have a check of
it.

This is one of the entrance gates to vineyard directly connected to road. Here, I found two
noticeable strategies:
1. Since ages, wooden barrels are mainly used to store liquids, like alcohol, for a long
duration. Wooden Barrels are placed on the left side to make people notice about
some sort of alcohol industry.
2. Wine is made using grapes. Grapes plant has a growth habit of trailing or scandent
(that is, climbing) stems, lianas or runners. The walls of the building are decorated
beautifully in such a pattern as if grape vines have grown all over it.
These two things combined clearly showcases of it being a vineyard.
The exhibition here shows the traditions and history of the vineyard. It dates back to 13 th
century, when first wine production started in this region. It showed the old equipment and
technology used in wine making and the photos of key people involved in the region. This was
appealing to wine lovers.
A lecture from the grandmaster: Then we were invited to the lecture hall where the
grandmaster of the Alsace wine brotherhood was to explain us about the vineyard and its
history. Here we got a glimpse of the traditional attire of a wine master. He explained about
the significance of wine in day to day life and how to taste a wine. It’s like a ritual they follow,
associating wine with our senses. First you see through it and predict the quality and age of
wine. Then you shake it and smell the wine, to better know about the aroma it has. Then they
sing their traditional song and suck it in with air, making some sounds, and after a short gargle,
drink it. Here they tried to emotionally connect with people by making them teach some of
their traditions.
Wine tasting: They gave us 6 varieties of wine and helped us understand differences between
each of them. They also served us some sandwiches and desserts along with wine. This way
they initially offered us their taste and showed us their culture.
The Storage Walt: This is the place where they preserve wines for aging. It had wines stored
according to the year of manufacture, ranging from the 15 th century to 2018. Here, they
explained about the aging concept of wine and how it changes taste. Wines have a concept
as “The older the better”.
The Premier collection: Here they showed us the oldest wines they had preserved from the
18th century. This is served only on special occasions or on demand. These are very costly and
few are kept for studying behaviour of wine with age. There is no definite behaviour of wine
with age, and cannot predict how it would taste after so long.
The Labels: Most important part of a wine bottle is the label on it. Here they showed us many
labels of past bottles and how they have marketed from time to time. The image here shows
various landscapes of the Alsace region, with a major focus on the year of manufacture of
wine. This helps the buyer know about the age and region of wine origin.