Alcoholic beverage sales are booming, and there’s never been a better time to optimize your convenience store’s wine segment to maximize its potential.
In today’s market, if you want to be seen as a destination for wine purchases, it’s important to have a variety of wines both in terms of type of wine and price point. If you’re only carrying Merlot and Chardonnay, it’s time to update your selection to cater to today’s sophisticated millennial shoppers. It’s also necessary to stay on top of current trends and update your selection regularly to highlight those trends.
At the time of this writing, for example, rosé is on-trend for summer 2021, so stocking this variety and drawing attention to it at your store this summer is likely to help entice customers. Also trending are cans of wine, and young adult customers especially are interested in natural and biodynamic wines, according to Datassential.
It’s also important to include wines in a range of price points. Consider adding some “good” or inexpensive wines in a $5-$7 per bottle range, some “better” or mid-tier wines for around $15 per bottle and “best” or more expensive wines at $25 or higher per bottle, so customers can find a wine that suits their occasion, whether it’s something to drink at home, to take to a friend’s house or for a special occasion. If you’re operating in a more urban or high-end market, you might consider adding a few more expensive wines around or above $50 to further position yourself as a wine destination.
Many c-store retailers say the secret to success is merchandising their wine section to make it easy for customers as well as sales associates to navigate. After all, if customers can’t find what they came for, they’re likely to leave empty handed. Consider arranging wines by color and type, as well as by price to make finding a wine fast and easy. Use signage to help customers find the shelf for the good wines, better wines and best wines (in terms of price point) to help shoppers move quickly to the area that fits their needs. If you have local wines, it can be helpful to call that out to customers using signage. If your store carries a sizeable selection of local wines, consider creating a special area that features the local wines together.
Lastly, educating employees on the wines can help them assist customers in making a selection that best fits their needs.