Business to Consumer Best All-Round Business or Brand with Annual Sales of £75 million+ Sponsored by
Laithwaites Wine A
The Sunday Times Wine Club March 2011 Catalogue
gainst stiff competition from supermarkets and other wine retailers, Direct Wines, the
organisation that operates Laithwaites, has one aim—being the best there is, anywhere. This means fully harnessing the business’s potential, expanding it overseas, strengthening its online appeal and improving all marketing communications.
To compete effectively, Direct Wines knows it has to bring its wines to life through an engaging multichannel proposition. In October 2010, it revamped the catalogue and changed it from mailings containing flyers to a single 60-page catalogue that moved away from generic pictures of wines to more detailed information on wine regions and producers. Each catalogue is also accompanied by an email to customers, before and after the mailing.
What the judges said “Impressive turnaround in a difficult and competitive market” Shane Redding
“The catalogue has been reinvented! In fact the whole business has been given a 21st Century make-over which is now paying admirable dividends.” Matthew Tod
Also online, the Laithwaites website now includes customer reviews and ratings and a blog written by founder Tony Laithwaite. Direct Wines is also active on Facebook
and Twitter, further engaging its audience by inviting fans to share their experiences. Offline, Laithwaites opened its first London store in 2010, allowing customers to talk to wine experts, browse the selection and sample the wines at regular customer evenings and tastings. In total, Direct Wines holds approximately 65 customer events and 200 wine tastings each year, which attract some 30,000 customers. Laithwaites also takes care of its suppliers and in 2010 introduced its first supplier conference, attended by 150 wine producers.
When new chief executive Simon McMurtie boldly announced in 2008 that Laithwaites would deliver profits of £10 million by 2010, there’s no denying that eyebrows were raised. But thanks to a shakeup at the business that saw Laithwaites go from strength to strength, his doubters were quickly silenced. The company not only “mastered, optimised and delivered” its every selling channel, it also exceeded its profit expectations for last year.
Pictured (l-r): David Lockwood, Dylan Jenkins (Transactis), Emma Devlin, Dermot Murnaghan
ecmod DIRECT COMMERCE YEAR BOOK 2011 35
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