By James Wells
Calabria Family Wines has released a new product called Kings of Prohibition with unique packaging targeted specifically at millennial wine consumers.
“Kings of Prohibition a new brand and reflects our aim to be a little bit different,” said Calabria sales and marketing manager, Andrew Calabria.
“To achieve this we started looking at some unique packaging formats and we paid for some market research on what precisely the millennial is buying and what is important to them.
“As a company we are in a transition at the moment, with my brothers and my sister and our staff in general. We are quite young and we want to keep the evolution going by offering something different and outside of the square, and also have some fun while doing it.
“The research showed us that millennials are happy to spend higher dollar value per bottle, so it is not about the cheapest wine they can find. So we decided to take some very good wine that we are already producing and put it into a less traditional format of bottle that is not your typical Bordeaux or Burgundy bottle.
“We took inspiration for the labeling, packaging and the story from what is happening in the spirits and craft beer industries that 10 years ago couldn’t have been more boring. We are hoping to develop something like the early days of Australian wine when the French would come over and look at our labels and say ‘wow’.”
The first launch for the Kings of Prohibition will be into the United States and with a strong distribution channel planned in Australia from the start of June.
Calabria added: “This a Barossa Cabernet Shiraz blend, positioned at the $15 price point delivering all Estate fruit and some pretty funky packaging. We think it is very accessible and we are still offering value for money which is important. We are not necessarily calling out that this is a big Australian wine. We talk about the Prohibition era which sets the foundations for so many wine and spirit companies and families in the early days, so we are playing on the story of how that evolved the wine and spirits industry across the world.”
He added: “Who is the millennial and what are they buying? We are still figuring that out. You have to try new things and you have to fail to go forward and I think we have grown up to learn that and we are not scared of that and we are there to work with each other. I’m a winemaker, so we rely on the retailers to give us some guidance too, so that is a big part of making it a success, but I think you need to just give things a go.”
Calabria Family Wines have also released a 750ml format of Bevi Spritz, which was released in a 200ml format last year.
“As part of our new product development program which consists of me, my dad, my brother and my sister, we wanted to play with the idea of a Prosecco Spritz. We were the first Australian producer to make a Prosecco Spritz – and others have entered the market now. Our new 750ml format is a big brother of 200ml format and is now available for independent retailers,” Calabria said.