Off to Europe I Go

Dear readers, friends and fellow wine drinkers,

I am off to Europe.

I am going to be managing our exports, based out Sweden, for most of the year. Whilst I am not sure that Europe and the rest of the world has emerged fully out of the recession, I do think the worst is over. One might also argue that pushing hard on exports now with the strong Rand might not be the best option. All of that aside, I am convinced that pounding the pavements and being on the ground at the coalface of the various markets is the way to go.

It has been a busy two years being in charge of marketing at the farm. I have learnt a huge amount, and we have enjoyed strong growth in terms of marketing activities and effectiveness. The plan is to take those learnings and work with our respective importers in connecting the dots on the export front.

Pre- 2008/2009 we were quite content to take the view that once the wine was in the container and on the ship, it was the importer’s job to sell the wine. That model is no longer viable. Our view is that going forward we have to be more involved in the markets.

Why Sweden? My better half is Swedish. And she has an apartment in Stockholm. Need I say more.

So, on the South African front Harry Haddon will be managing our marketing effort, with support from myself. As always you can contact me on my email simon at backsberg.co.za or on Skype, which no doubt will be my new best friend, through ‘simonback’. If you are a Twitterer, find me in Tweetland here. And if you happen to be in Europe or passing by Sweden, please give me a shout.

SB

This post was written by Simon Back on Thursday, January 27th, 2011 at 10:32 am.
After finishing up studying economics at UCT in 2007, Simon has joined his family wine farm, Backsberg. When he is not trying to figure out what marketing wine means, he is authoring his blog, Back Chat. .