50 Int. J. Leisure and Tourism Marketing, Vol. 4, No.

1, 2014

Wine consumption in new and expert consumers:

the case of Mexico

Raquel Castaño*, Josefina Martinez

and Ricardo Morales
EGADE Business School,
Tecnológico de Monterrey,
Campus Monterrey, Av. Fundadores y Rufino Tamayo,
66269 San Pedro Garza Garcia, NL, México
E-mail: rcastano@itesm.mx
E-mail: jmartinezperez@gmail.com
E-mail: ricardo_mu@hotmail.com
*Corresponding author

Abstract: Wine consumption in Mexico is low when compared with global

consumption. However, the buying growth rate in 2012 was one of the highest
in the world. In addition, expert forecasts position the country as a major new
centre of consumption in the medium term. Very few academic studies have
explored wine consumer behaviour in this country. This paper seeks to
contribute to the knowledge and understanding of Mexican behaviour regarding
the purchase and consumption of wine. It also explores the differences in
perceptions and motivations between two groups of Mexican consumers,
connoisseurs and aspirational/new wine consumers. Interviews were conducted
with consumers to find differences in the significance of wine between these
two groups. For the connoisseurs, drinking wine is associated with self-directed
pleasure, whereas for the aspirational/new wine consumers, drinking wine
means fulfilling aspirations. In members of both groups, we found important
wine consumption inhibitors.

Keywords: consumers; wine; Mexican market; perception.

Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Castaño, R., Martinez, J.

and Morales, R. (2014) ‘Wine consumption in new and expert consumers:
the case of Mexico’, Int. J. Leisure and Tourism Marketing, Vol. 4, No. 1,
pp.50–62.

Biographical notes: Raquel Castaño is a Professor of Marketing at EGADE

Business School, Tecnologico de Monterrey. She received her PhD and
Master’s degree in Management from Tulane University. She also obtained a
Master’s degree in Business Administration and another one in Marketing
from EGADE Business School. Her research focuses on the roles of emotion
and cognition in decision-making.

Josefina Martinez obtained her Bachelor’s degree in Public Accounting from

UJED and graduated with honours. She obtained her MBA from Universidad
Antonio de Nebrija Business School in Madrid, Spain, and is currently doing
her Master’s degree in Marketing in EGADE Business School. She has been
working in sales for seven years.

Copyright © 2014 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

 Wine consumption in new and expert consumers: the case of Mexico 51

Ricardo Morales obtained his Bachelor’s degree in Economics from

Tecnológico de Monterrey. He also obtained a Master’s degree in Marketing
from EGADE Business School. He has been working on regional development
issues in Mexico.

1 Introduction

Alcohol consumption transcends societies, present in many situations from religion

ceremonies to celebrations and gatherings. Individuals seek to satisfy multiple needs
by ingesting it, and the diversity of this aim has been represented in rites across the
world, illustrating that a few or none of them relates to each other. In 2012, alcoholic
consumption took the form of 251,000 millions of litres consumed, maintaining the
upward trend even in terms of consumption per capita. Among the total alcoholic
beverages consumed, beer is ranked number one; 77% of alcohol consumption is of this
beverage, followed by wine consumption, at about 10% of total consumption; this is
because the principal player in the alcoholic beverage market is Anheuser-Busch InBev
brewing. The market value of alcoholic beverages in 2009 reached $966,200 million,
which represented an annual average growth rate of 2.1% for the 2005–2009 period
(Euromonitor International, 2012).
Even though the worldwide beer consumption dominates that of other alcoholic
beverages, this is not necessarily the case in terms of the economic benefits generated
within this industry; in fact, beer represents only 50% of the 2009 profit as opposed to
27.4% from wine and 22.1% from spirit beverages. In Mexico, the global projections are
magnified because beer represents 93% of sales in the country, while other beverages,
like spirits, are relegated to 3%; meanwhile, wine in Mexico is more ephemeral, at about
0.088%. Other Latin-American countries demonstrate higher wine participation; in Chile,
wine sales represent 21% of the total alcoholic beverages, while in Argentina, the
proportion is 33% (Euromonitor International, 2013).
Mexico is the site of the first house wine in the American continent; however, the
consumption of this product has been minimal compared with that of Chile and
Argentina. Just like Mexico, they were also Spanish colonies. Table 1 shows the wine
consumption per capita for countries from the new and the old world.1 For instance, the
USA and Australia as old English colonies remain attached to spirit beverages over wine,
as they have a higher consumption per capita than Mexico (Euromonitor International,
2012).
In Mexico, the wine was born in Parras Valley in the northern state of Coahuila,
when Spanish conquerors came from the Zacatecas state looking for gold, without
success. However, the conquerors found the proper weather for grape farming.
By 1597, King Felipe II of Spain gave the authorisation to plant vineyards for wine and
brandy, thus marking the first production house of the American continent in Mexico
(Casa Madero, n.d.). In the early history of Mexico, wine played a paramount role in
religious services and for those of the upper classes of society − a situation that has been
reproduced in the present. Being relegated to the masses, beverages like pulque, mezcal
and aguamiel are substituted for beer in modern-day Mexico. The popularity of these
beverages resulted from the creation of a new identity for the country along the history of
Mexico, in its mainly half-cast citizens. A totally different situation in Argentina occurred
52 R. Castaño et al.

to draw large immigrants from Italy, a clearly wine consumer country, in the period of
1815–1970; this brought the introduction of Italian consumers (Devoto, 2006).

Table 1 Consumption of wine for 2012 (per capita in litres)

Country 2012
Argentina 21.1
Australia 20.5
Chile 10.1
France 26.9
Italy 26.8
Mexico 0.4
New Zealand 18.7
Spain 10.6
USA 7.7
Source: Euromonitor International (2012)

Today, the countries’ customs have been generalised through the great global society
(Pichler, 2011). In Mexico, the wine consumption growth rate has ascended, driven by a
greater layout and an international variety of products ever since the country’s
trade opening in the 1990s as well as a domestic production impulse this has motivated
a lot of consumers to try endemic products. The study by the Californian bank Rabobank,
which specialised in agricultural financing, pointed out that, while China and
South Korea are the most attractive short-term wine markets, Mexico, Brazil, Poland
and Nigeria are the four ‘hidden gems’ with the potential to become main growth markets
(Noticias: Internacional. Vinetur, 2012).
Despite the importance and popularity of the wine in Mexico, there are very few
academic papers that have been developed about the consumers’ behaviour regarding the
consumption of wine in this country. This research paper seeks to contribute to the
knowledge and understanding of Mexican behaviour regarding the purchase and
consumption of wine. It also explores the differences in perceptions and motivations
between two groups of Mexican consumers: connoisseurs and aspirational/new wine
consumers. This paper is organised as follows: Section 2 presents previous research on
the consumption of wine; Section 3 describes the methodology and design of the study;
Section 4 presents the empirical results; Section 5 concludes and presents practical
implications and Section 6 identifies limitations and options for future research.

2 Literature review

There is a history of research in the field of wine; this research has been conducted on
different topics and for different purposes. Medic Research about wine is one of the most
popular topics in academic research, from its disinfectant effects (to cure skin diseases)
(Fehér et al., 2007) to studies such as ‘The French Paradox’ (Ellison, 2011), which
associates with the health benefits of moderate consumption of wine by lowering rates of
heart disease. In the field of Behavioural Economics, many papers have been developed
 Wine consumption in new and expert consumers: the case of Mexico 53

related to hedonic price items and various intrinsic and extrinsic attributes that the
consumer assigns to the wines from the Old and New Worlds, concluding that there is
consumer marginal willingness to pay and estimate an implicit price for these attributes
(Orrego et al., 2012). Studies conducted in France show that extrinsic aspects are strongly
related to concupiscent consumption rather than quality and pleasure themselves,
suggesting that extrinsically motivated consumers buy luxury goods mainly, but not in
all, motivated by concupiscent behaviour. Even in studies with a marketing approach,
these behaviours are found in cultures such as English (Ritchie, 2007) and Chinese in
search of a ‘mianzi’ (Fang and Murphy, 2007) or driven by worry about how others
perceive them rather than for the pleasure of the act (Truong, 2010); the findings of these
papers agree that social interaction with wine varies significantly depending on the
occasion and the environment.
Conceptual and theoretical studies in Spain explain the technological revolution and
the internationalisation that the wine industry has experienced over the decades, which
has enabled the country to maintain high competitiveness, a situation that, without these
sustained changes, would have prevented it (Martínez and Medina-Albaladejo, 2010).
On the side of marketing strategies, research papers have been developed. Those with
conceptual and theoretical approaches suggest there conceptualisation of the categories of
wines to add one more: the ‘Third World’ or ‘Wines of the World’, owing to the outdated
current classification (‘Old World’ and ‘New World’) in regard to geographic locations,
production processes and marketing as well as consumer habits and the rapid adoption of
these habits by the middle class in new markets such as China and India (Banks and
Overton, 2009). Also, studies of consumer behaviour have been conducted in British
(Ritchie, 2007) and Chinese markets (Fang and Murphy, 2007), which has facilitated a
greater knowledge and understanding of the different behaviours, perceptions and
motivations of consumers in some regions of these countries.
In regard to market segmentation, studies have sought to group consumers
in numerous markets, assigning different groups based on behaviour (Spawton, 1991), to
demographics or psychographics (Barber et al., 2008), or more specifically by region,
such as German-speaking Switzerland (Brunner and Siegrist, 2011) or Texas in the USA
(Kolyeskikova and Duhan, 2008). There are also studies about the brand image of wine
regions in California whose findings suggest that the appellation of origin is the most
important information for predicting the quality of a wine that provides greater consumer
confidence (Johnson and Bruwer, 2007).
Seminal studies of perception and consumption of wine have also been conducted,
highlighting especially those that focus on the USA, which has seen a decrease in
consumption rates owing to the 2008 economic crisis severely affecting the premium
wines but opened a new business opportunity for economic wines (Ranneklev, 2009).
Such studies also examine Australia, where consumption has picked up in recent years,
thanks to innovation and a policy framework to promote the production and consumption
of wine (Aylward and Turpin, 2003). In the case of Latin America, literature exists
mostly focused on the southern cone countries like Argentina and Chile, which have
experienced a growing acceptance in international markets thanks to high-quality
products and lower prices compared with their European counterparts (Stein, 2010).
Similar to Mexico, China, owing to its size and its domestic market, is positioned
as a new player in the wine market (Thorpe, 2009). The acceptance of wine in Mexico,
as in the Chinese market, is in a very early stage and has a prominent future.
54 R. Castaño et al.

Mexico benefited from trade liberalisation in the 1980s and 1990s with the entry into the
General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs (GATTs) in 1986, followed by the tariff
reduction of final goods that accompanied the signing of the North American Free Trade
Agreement (NAFTA) in 1994, which allowed access to new products (Serra Puche,
2010). China experienced a similar occurrence with its membership in the World Trade
Organization (WTO) held in December 2001; thanks to this openness, demand in China
and Mexico has expanded, and preference for wine has included consumers outside the
Old World that were not reached before (Fang and Murphy, 2007).
Previous research findings suggest that wine has reached virtually every corner
of the earth, with good acceptance from the markets, from those already in the Old and
New Worlds to the relatively unrelated for which globalisation itself has enabled rapid
adoption. This research contributes to the extension of knowledge about this issue in a
country that had remained on the sidelines in the production, sale and consumption of this
product.

3 Methodology

Because of the lack of previous research regarding the motivators and inhibitors of the
consumption of wine in Mexico, a qualitative study using in-depth interviews was
conducted. A qualitative study will help to gain an understanding that often cannot be
obtained by other methodologies (Malhotra, 2010). The study was conducted among new
vs. experienced wine consumers in Mexico. The interviewees included questions
regarding knowledge and consumption of alcoholic beverages, wine purchase and wine
consumption habits (Oliver and Mano, 1993). The sampling process was non-
probabilistic through a convenience method; respondents were in proximity to the social
circles of the researchers to accelerate the process of sharing information in an intimate,
in-depth process (Frankel and Devers, 2000). All interviews were conducted by the two
researchers. Respondents were divided according to their knowledge and consumption of
wine using as segmentation basis as defined by D. McKinna and cited by Tony Spawton
(Spawton, 1991) in which the Australian wine consumers were grouped by
new/aspirational and connoisseurs drinkers. For the purposes of the study in Mexico,
respondents were categorised based on this pre-selection coupled with their degree of
involvement towards wine consumption, positioning the consumer with high involvement
in the segment of connoisseurs and low involvement consumers among the
new/aspirational wine consumers. Connoisseurs are the wine knowledgeable segment,
the primary purchasers of fine wines. These people consume wine on a regular (daily)
basis. They have a broad spectrum of tastes and like to experiment. These consumers see
wine education as a hobby, read wine journals avidly and are not price-sensitive
(Spawton, 1991). The new/aspirational wine consumers have between one and four years
drinking wine, with an approximate frequency of once per month (mainly at social
events). Members of this segment are concerned with the social aspects of wine drinking.
They are attracted to wine based on the behaviour of their parents or peer group
(Spawton, 1991).
Of the aforementioned interviews, 14 interviews were applied to the group of
aspirational/new wine drinkers and 11 interviews in the segment of connoisseurs. In total,
25 interviews were conducted over a period of 20 days between the months of August
 Wine consumption in new and expert consumers: the case of Mexico 55

and September 2013. An equitable sample was sought; however, we found a greater
response in the audience from men, with 11 women and 14 men. Respondents came from
the major urban areas of the country, and most were employed, with undergraduate
degrees, single, and mostly in a range of 25–35 years. The interviews were transcribed
for later analysis (see Table 2 for a description of the respondents’ profile). To aid in the
development of the interview guide, a preliminary interview was conducted with a wine
expert, the sales manager of a specialised wine store in northern Mexico.

Table 2 Profile of respondents

Current place
Name Age (years) Marital status Occupancy of residence Gender
Alfonso 25 Single Lawyer Monterrey M
Carlos R. 26 Married Student Monterrey M
Cristina 26 Single Event Coordinator Monterrey F
María 27 Single Management Director Monterrey F
Jesús 27 Single IT Engineer Monterrey M
Roberto 27 Single Business Owner Monterrey M
Cindy 27 Single Student Monterrey F
Estrella 27 Single Business Owner Querétaro F
Enrique 27 Single Engineer Monterrey M
Luis 30 Single Professional Chef México DF M
Carlos S. 30 Single Employee México DF M
Beatriz 30 Married Business Owner Monterrey F
Gloria 33 Single Accountant Monterrey F
Ignacio 34 Single Chef Durango M
Xicoténcatl 34 Married Engineer Monterrey M
Norma 34 Married Housewife Monterrey F
Francisco 35 Married Management Executive Monterrey M
Adriana 35 Married Accountant Monterrey F
Blanca 38 Married Housewife Monterrey F
Aurelio 39 Married Engineer Monterrey M
Claudia 39 Single Graphic Designer Monterrey F
José 40 Married Sales Manager Monterrey M
Eduardo 42 Married IT Engineer Monterrey M
Mónica 42 Single Engineer Guadalajara F
Jorge 65 Single Engineer Durango M

4 Findings

By studying the wine experience in both consumer groups, we found different rituals and
sequences of activities, in the purchase and consumption of wine.
56 R. Castaño et al.

4.1 The ritual of the purchase

The wine consumption experience precedes the purchase of the bottle per se; most
respondents express it as a positive experience, regardless of the establishment, to go and
buy the bottle and the selection process by itself. The time, store and buying process were
distinguishing characteristics between the two groups of consumers. On the one hand,
those aspirational/new drinkers found necessary to have someone who could assist them
in the buying process.
“… I do not consider myself an expert or connoisseur of wine … I go to these
stores because I know there are people or the same guy who is in charge, who
know of wines and can recommend some wine … for example, what I said,
if you go to a Soriana, a Sam’s, there is rarely, a person who will give you an
advice of some specific wine … there is almost no people who know wine… ”
(Enrique, 27 years)
“… When I go to Vinoteca or La Castellana, I like that there is always someone
there who can take care of you. Generally I look for a particular wine, it
depends, can be anything, right? But if anyone sees me looking for that wine
and gives me another recommendation it’s fantastic, right? Is like he´s going
to help you to see, I mean, and teaches you like to try another type of wine and
do not always take the same.” (Claudia, 39 years)
“… at Vinoteca’s, well that’s why I go there, it’s a plus to have someone
who can give you a recommendation … not like any supermarket.” (Alfonso,
25 years)
Meanwhile, the interviewed consumers in the connoisseurs segment perform the buying
ritual in more relaxed manner, as a result of a more quotidian consumption, in which
there is room for spontaneous purchases. This group does not need ambiance that
motivates the purchase, since the desire to consume is intrinsic in them. For the
connoisseurs, the purchase does not require a specific place and they prioritise the quality
of the product. In this group, the purchasing ritual still persists; however, it does not
involve the same ceremony as noticeably as in those of the other segment.
“… I, because of my work, have different suppliers, but I buy from
the supermarket, if I like I order online or with wine distributors …” (Ignacio,
34 years)
“The nearest liquor store is about 15 km from home, but my nearest
supermarket is about 1 km away, so taking advantage and making supermarket
shopping, my wife goes to grab fruit and vegetables and I go to the wines, you
know …” (Eduardo, 42 years)

4.2 The ritual of consumption

The central moment of the experience of drinking wine is the consumption of the bottle,
when both segments recognise the product they have purchased and try to enjoy it either
in company or alone. For the aspirational/new drinkers, the paraphernalia implies a
higher degree of ceremony: more complex meals, formal social gatherings, business
lunches, romantic dinners, etc., in which socialisation is a major etiquette event.
 Wine consumption in new and expert consumers: the case of Mexico 57

“… But it is always special moments. I have had the opportunity to be with my

dad and, for example, when he meets with people at work or do business,
people of a certain level of importance; he is very keen on ordering a bottle of
wine.” (Roberto, 27 years)
“… Celebrate a special date with my girlfriend … I went specifically to buy
wine when for example, what … a few months ago it was our anniversary and I
went specifically to buy the wine.” (Jesus, 27 years)
“With my family, well my parents do not live here but my sister, my cousins,
we can come together with my wife or friends but when we invite more
like in … an invitation to dinner, not so much to be improvised; we stop to
think, then cook, buy the wine …” (Carlos R., 26 years)

In the connoisseurs’ segment, the ritual of consumption is done in a more automatic

way owing to the very frequent consumption of this drink. They can consume it
accompanying less elaborate meals, drink it in relaxed meetings with friends, and even
consume wine alone − almost an unthinkable situation for the other segment.
“Yes, it may be [is wine a social product?], because many people use it
precisely to socialise, to get along with others and some groups do not drink
anything else, they take only wine to, during the gathering, be drinking, and it
can be social, but it also can be, to some degree, a drink that you can consume
even alone, without being socialising, for pleasure or for the pleasure of
consuming it.” (Jorge, 65 years)
“… we sat [Eduardo and his wife]in the table of the house, your house, and …
we get to talk about what we could not talk all week, so Saturday nights we
spend them to sit, I grab my glass of wine, some snacks and talking has been
said! Of all that we haven’t spoken during the week.” (Eduardo, 42 years)
“It has happened that I take a glass of wine to read or to study.”
(Cindy, 27 years)
In sum, there is an evident difference between the two segments identified and the
moment or situation in which they drink wine. For the new/aspirational drinkers, the wine
consumption has more ‘bluff’, or face value; it is even possible that they do not enjoy
drinking wine. On the other hand, for the connoisseurs, the wine experience is a self-
indulgent situation widely enjoyed.

4.3 The motivations

Among both groups of respondents, a search of recognition and self-realisation is
perceived. The new wine drinkers have aspirational and belonging motivations, whilst the
connoisseurs pursue hedonistic motivations: self-directed pleasure and enjoyment. In the
following subsection, the motivations of each group are analysed.
Meaning of wine consumption. Respondents evaluated the wine from intrinsic and
extrinsic perspectives. Intrinsic aspects are those physical attributes such as aroma, colour
and taste that cannot be changed without changing the physical product. The extrinsic
attributes are associated with the product, but not the physical part of it, such as the
brand, price and distribution (Dimra and Skuras, 2001).
Our findings replicate the results found by FangLiu and Jamie Murphy in China
regarding what they call ‘mianzi’ (Fang and Murphy, 2007) by identifying that the public
demonstration of being immersed in wine culture is an aspirational aim to show
58 R. Castaño et al.

snobbery, sophistication, intellectualism, or belonging. This behaviour is mostly noticed

in the segment of aspirational drinkers of our interviewees, who have a very basic
knowledge of wine − it can even be nothing. This segment focuses mainly on extrinsic
attributes and looks for the shopping experience by going to specialised stores and
purchasing wines with certain labels within price ranges that are generally not low, as
they associate low price with low quality.
“If you hold a glass of wine you fell like your posture has to be more delicate,
your expression is much smoother, because you are taking care to handle a
glass in the hand.” (Estrella, 27 years)
“… If you know about wine, you are like a more educated person, you have
another social level and has a lot to do because there are people who put
attention on how you hold the glass, how you look, how you ask for it,
and sometimes you: “no matter which one”, no! I mean, the people put
attention even in the level of education you have and how much you know.”
(Norma, 34 years)
“By tradition, I don’t think I will find a bricklayer drinking red wine … I don’t
know…For the presentation of the advertisements, the persons look very
wealthy, upper class …” (Adriana, 35 years)
In the connoisseurs’ segment, the concupiscent behaviour is practically null. They know a
great deal about wine − vintages, grapes, appellation of origin, etc. Therefore, their
selections are oriented to the intrinsic benefits that will give them self-directed pleasure
and enjoyment, rather than focusing on a high or low price (the latter is not a limiting
factor to buy a quality wine for them). The purchasing process is done not only in
specialised stores, but also in supermarkets.
“The wine because I like the variety, I like to discover when you’re drinking it
how it evolves over time, with the oxygenation. I like to discover how a grape,
being from different regions can vary the taste without losing its essence of
being of certain grape. I also like when, I mean, how the mixtures are made and
how that makes the taste to change.” (Beatriz, 30 years)
“I think that every, every moment that you uncork a bottle of wine memories
will always come, you know, and especially because we have been said and
have been … at least for me, I’ve been inculcated that there are flavours,
aromas, odours that are going to make you remind certain moments of your life
and it’s true! When I taste a bottle or a meal, they always bring back to me
memories from my childhood through important stages that I have lived, you
know, until today. I remember some family, places I’ve lived, places I’ve
travelled, some parts of Mexico City. Because sometimes we are very sensitive
to smells, to flavours, then I think that every bit or every sip that you give to a
drink or food is always going to bring back memories.” (Luis, 30 years)
“I like more a wine ‘reserva’, I like a deep red colour in the wine, obviously …
I don’t think there’s a bad wine, it’s just different and…the sensations of each
person as an individual.” (Ignacio, 34 years)
In summary, we found different motivations among those of the two groups: the new
drinkers seek to meet the needs of recognition and self-realisation, whereas the
connoisseurs enjoy wine to cover their needs in terms of self-directed pleasure.
 Wine consumption in new and expert consumers: the case of Mexico 59

4.4 Inhibitors
Throughout the study, marked differences were found among the way people experience
the consumption of wine and the motivations for each group; nevertheless, it was possible
to perceive that both segments share similar inhibitors.
Price. An important inhibitor was that the consumers in Mexico consider wine expensive.
Although in the market nowadays are more options that are cheaper, consumers are rather
adverse to try wines different from the types they have already selected as preferred.
“The table wine, I mean, well, as the name implies, I mean, you might
accompany the meal with a table wine, right? But the problem is that in
Mexico, well, it’s expensive to be regularly consuming, to talk about… for
example, talking about food, it’s somehow expensive.”
“My mom loves white wine, but I personally am more fan of red wine. I do not
dislike sparkling wine, there are some very good, we do not like to change…”
(Alfonso, 25 years)
Beer consumption habits. Beer is a category that is well positioned in the mind of
consumers, rooted in Mexican traditions and considered a refreshing drink in hot climate
regions.
“The beer is cheaper, here we’re more used to barbeques and it goes very good,
I mean, by tradition, the beer accompanies much more the barbeque or
something like that…” (Aurelio, 39 years)
“… Wine is for winter, normally here with the heat what you really want
is a cold beer, obviously you can drink cold wine and there may be variations
on how you prepare it, but I feel that it’s more like a European style” (Gloria,
33 years)
Size of the bottle. Some interviewees commented about feeling frustration for not being
able to consume wine more often, as the size of the bottle (750 ml) is too big for their
average consumption, because they fear that the wine loses the characteristics they were
interested in. It was also identified that the respondents tend not to acquire or ignore the
existence of certain appliances that prolong the proper state of a wine.
“For instance, my husband does not drink wine, I mean, when he really drinks
is when we get together with our wine friends, kind of for learning, knowing,
but it’s not something that he enjoys. Generally he does not drink alcohol, so
for me it’s very difficult, I mean, I’d like to drink wine, but I know that
if I open a bottle I’m going to drink an eights or little more and it will be there
and I’m not going to drink it in three days and for me that is very frustrating
because I know that wine will go degrading when oxygenating starts, then
I’ll lose a bottle of wine because I’m drinking it by myself, then the
presentations of wine, from my point of view, in the country are not coupled to
the consumption, I mean, we really are a country that do not consume too much
wine and, well, the bottle should be smaller…” (Beatriz, 30 years)
“Well I think that both drinks are popular and is more the situation how you
drink it, it’s more bearable to have a bottle of beer that you go and buy a carton
[24 beers]or a six and then you’re drinking it straight from the bottle, and for
example wine at a party in a house you should be somebody that really likes to
drink it to be bringing glasses, I mean to drink it how it really should be, well
you can take it in red cups that it’s ok, but not if it’s a casual party…it is more
common and easier to drink beer…” (Estrella, 27 years)
60 R. Castaño et al.

5 Discussion and practical implications

Wine consumption in Mexico is very low compared with global consumption. It was
found that, in this market, there are two very different groups of consumers: there are
knowledgeable people accustomed to this drink (a small segment of the market), and, on
the other hand, there are many potential consumers who express interest and curiosity in
wine. A distinction of these people is that they have tried and not frequently drink it, but
we noted the absence of a trigger that leads to a greater involvement in this culture; i.e.,
promotion to wine production via subsidies as happens in countries with a greater focus
on wine. Trends and fashions, like those related to tequila, could be examples of triggers.
In Mexico, despite the prevailing misinformation of the new wine consumer segment,
wine is seen as a vehicle to fulfil aspirations and achieve recognition and self-realisation,
including visiting specialised stores, following recommendations, speaking with
knowledgeable people, and performing a ritual for the consumption. However, on many
occasions, the consumer does not really know what he or she is buying, but believes that,
with it, a better social status is reached. This market has growth potential, as has been
demonstrated; however, there are barriers in different senses that the consumption of
wine faces. These barriers are inherent to the individual like misperceptions and
misinformation, related to society considering that wine is an elitist product, and finally
related to the market that does not offer products that meet the needs of the Mexican
consumer. The findings of our study show that, in Mexico, retailers do not offer a variety
of presentations appropriate to the consumers’ need. An example would be the Tetrapak
presentations, ‘Copa di Vino White Zinfandel’, and more options in half bottles at lower
prices.
The findings of this research paper could be useful for national and international wine
producers interested in the Mexican market as well as for distributors. Both specialised
stores and supermarkets have work to do to understand the motivators of consumers in
these major segments, from the proper manner to make the first approach to the adequate
marketing mix. It is important to recognise that the techniques deployed for each group
must be different. A better understanding of the perceptions, motivations and consumer
behaviour of each segment will help define the most suitable products that will fulfil to a
greater extent the market’s needs. The approach of wine as a social product has emerged
throughout this research.

6 Limitations and future studies

In Mexico, wine consumption is emerging in different segments, and despite showing a

high growth rate in consumption, there is still a long way to go before its use reaches a
significant volume. This was an exploratory analysis used to shed light over this new
phenomenon to assess the meaning and motives underlying its consumption among two
different types of segments: new vs. experienced wine consumers. Our respondents all
live in relatively populated northern urban area of Mexico, and we did not analyse
consumer behaviour in other regions of the country. Additionally, our investigation took
place in a city with a warmer climate when compared with the national average
temperature, and with a greater attachment to beer. Also, we would have liked
to interview the same number of new wine consumers and connoisseurs; however,
 Wine consumption in new and expert consumers: the case of Mexico 61

given the circumstances of the market, we were more likely to receive information from
those of the first group.
This paper attempts to establish the basis for further investigations that can address in
a particular modus each of the segments found here as well as new trends that may affect
the production, commercialisation and consumption of wine in Mexico.

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Note
1
The Old World refers to countries with a wide documented story of consumption and wine
elaboration amply associated with the Mediterranean zone countries, whereas The New World
countries represent the rest.