Winemakers On Fire, Issue #120

Greetings from Cape Town, South Africa!

In this week's edition, we're tackling the competitive advantage most wineries overlook—the one asset your competitors can't replicate, no matter how much they spend. It's not what you think.

Here’s why…

Why Trust Is the Ultimate Competitive Advantage

Your competitors can copy everything except the one thing that matters most.

Research shows that 91% of consumers are likely or very likely to buy from a company they trust. Lose that trust, and 71% won't come back. The math is brutal, the message clear: trust isn't a soft skill anymore—it's the hardest currency in business.

Seth Godin put it perfectly: "Playing safe is very risky." In an era where every winery can access the same technology, hire the same consultants, and copy the same marketing playbooks, trust has become the one asset your competitors can't replicate. While everyone else chases the illusion of safety through conformity, the real risk lies in being forgettable.

Here's what the wine industry hasn't fully grasped yet: trust doesn't follow quality—it creates it in the consumer's mind. And in 2025, that perception gap between what you make and what people believe you make determines whether you survive or thrive.

Trust Outperforms Price in the Minds That Matter Most

The data reveals something counterintuitive about modern wine consumers. Studies indicate that approximately 70% of Gen Z are more likely to spend more with businesses they trust, with research showing up to 90% willing to pay at least a 10% premium for trusted brands. These aren't anomalies—they're the early signals of a fundamental shift in how value gets calculated.

Think about that for a moment. These younger consumers don't see wine purchases as transactions. They see them as endorsements of their values, reflections of their identity, and investments in relationships with producers who earn their confidence. When a 28-year-old chooses your Chenin Blanc over a cheaper alternative, they're not buying fermented grapes—they're buying into your story, your authenticity, and your demonstrated commitment to what you claim to stand for.

The traditional wine hierarchy—where price signalled quality and experts relied on regional pedigree—is collapsing under the weight of a trust economy. Novice buyers still use price as a proxy for quality, but the emerging consumer class that will define the next three decades operates differently. They'll research your farming practices, scrutinise your labour policies, and Google whether you actually meant what you said about regenerative viticulture. Then they'll make their purchasing decision based on whether your actions match your words.

This represents a complete inversion of how the wine business has operated for centuries. We've moved from "trust me because I'm expensive" to "I'll pay more because I trust you." And if you're not seeing this shift yet, you're not paying attention.

The Architecture of Modern Wine Trust Lives in Three Dimensions

Building trust in today's wine landscape requires understanding its three-dimensional nature. First, there's the vertical dimension—the connection between vineyard and glass. Blockchain-enabled traceability isn't just Silicon Valley hype; research shows it genuinely influences buying decisions by making the invisible visible. When consumers can trace their Pinotage back to the specific vineyard block, harvest date, and winemaking decisions, you're not just selling transparency—you're selling certainty. And certainty, in an uncertain world, commands a premium.

The horizontal dimension encompasses peer-to-peer trust. Online reviews and social proof have become the modern sommelier, with industry surveys showing that 88% of customers would recommend trusted companies to others. This word-of-mouth amplification turns satisfied customers into brand evangelists who carry more credibility than any advertising campaign you could afford. Here in the Western Cape, I've watched small family estates build international reputations not through marketing budgets but through authentic relationships that customers felt compelled to share. That's not marketing magic—that's trust doing what trust does best.

The temporal dimension—consistency over time—might be the most challenging to maintain and the most valuable when achieved. Delivering on promises repeatedly creates the reliability that transforms first-time buyers into loyal advocates. This consistency shows up everywhere: the wine quality year after year, the accuracy of your tasting notes, the alignment between your sustainability claims and actual practices, and even how you handle the inevitable vintage variations and challenges. It's unglamorous work, but it's the work that matters.

What Apple and Patagonia Understand That Most Wineries Don't

Look outside our industry for a moment. Apple doesn't compete primarily on specifications—they've built an ecosystem of trust where customers assume each new product will deliver on unstated promises about design, usability, and integration. They've earned the right to charge premium prices not through superior technology (though that helps) but through decades of meeting expectations so consistently that "it just works" became their unspoken guarantee.

Patagonia took an even bolder approach. They actively discourage overconsumption, repair products for free, and publish the environmental cost of everything they make. This radical transparency doesn't hurt sales—it drives them. Their "Don't Buy This Jacket" campaign became legendary not despite its anti-commercial message but because of it. The trust they built through authentic commitment to their values created customers willing to pay significantly more and wait longer for products.

Both companies understand what many wineries miss: trust isn't built through marketing messages but through the alignment of words and actions over time. When Patagonia says they care about the environment, their supply chain proves it. When Apple promises seamless integration, your devices demonstrate it. The message and the experience form a continuous loop that reinforces trust with every interaction.

South African wineries pioneering certified sustainable farming aren't just reducing their environmental impact—they're building trust capital that justifies premium pricing and creates customer loyalty that survives economic downturns. The estates that have embraced biodynamic practices, published their carbon footprints, and openly discussed their journey (including the mistakes) have discovered something valuable: vulnerability, when paired with genuine commitment, builds stronger connections than perfection ever could. And isn't that refreshing?

Trust Isn't Built in Blind Tastings—It's Forged in Relationships

The wine industry's traditional obsession with blind tastings reveals a fundamental misunderstanding about how people actually choose wine. Strip away the label, the story, the relationship with the producer, and yes, experts can often identify quality. But that's not how 99% of wine gets bought.

Real purchasing decisions happen in the context of relationships, stories, and accumulated trust. When a sommelier recommends your wine, they're transferring their trust equity to your brand. When a customer visits your tasting room and meets the winemaker who discusses harvest decisions and vintage challenges with unvarnished honesty, they're building a relationship that transcends the liquid in the glass. This is where wine stops being a commodity and becomes personal.

This is where the four pillars of wine's future intersect most powerfully. Quality grapes and thoughtful winemaking create the foundation—you can't build lasting trust on inconsistent or flawed products. But that quality only becomes valuable when wrapped in authentic experiences that feel genuine rather than manufactured. Your story gives context and meaning to that quality, transforming technical excellence into emotional connection. And the collaborative relationships you build—with growers, retailers, restaurants, and customers—amplify that trust across networks.

The estates thriving in South Africa's competitive landscape aren't necessarily making the highest-scoring wines. They're the ones whose tasting room staff know regular customers by name, whose winemakers respond personally to Instagram comments, and whose consistency allows retailers to recommend them with confidence. They've recognised that in a world of infinite choice, relationships built on trust are the only reliable filter. Everything else is just noise competing for attention.

The Trust Deficit Costs More Than You Think

Here's the sobering reality: research indicates that 37% of consumers switched brands in the past year due to lost trust. Not because of price. Not because they found something better. Because trust eroded. Industry forecasts predict brand loyalty will drop by up to 25%, and that decline hits wineries particularly hard because wine purchases involve higher risk and more personal expression than most consumer goods.

When trust breaks through inconsistent quality, misleading marketing, or the gap between claimed and actual values, the cost extends far beyond a single lost customer. That person tells an average of fifteen others about their disappointment. Online reviews amplify that dissatisfaction. The opportunity cost of broken trust includes not just the immediate sale but every future purchase they would have made, every recommendation they would have given, and every defence of your brand they might have mounted when others criticised it.

The mathematics of trust works in reverse, too. According to consumer research, 81% of consumers need to trust a brand before considering a purchase, and separate surveys show that business executives overwhelmingly agree that trust improves the bottom line. These aren't soft metrics—they're hard evidence that trust drives measurable financial outcomes. The business case isn't just compelling—it's irrefutable.

The Future Belongs to the Trustworthy, Not the Perfect

The path forward requires rejecting the industry's traditional obsession with projected perfection. Modern consumers, particularly the value-driven buyers who prioritise sustainability and ethics alongside quality, respond more authentically to honest narratives that acknowledge complexity than to polished marketing that pretends challenges don't exist.

This means discussing vintage variation openly rather than positioning every release as the best. It means explaining farming decisions and their trade-offs rather than claiming unqualified sustainability. It means building customer relationships that outlast any single transaction and viewing every interaction as an investment in long-term trust rather than short-term sales. It means being human in an industry that too often mistakes formality for sophistication.

The competitive advantage of trust emerges from this consistency between claim and reality, promise and delivery, image and substance. In a marketplace where competitors can copy your varietals, match your pricing, and mimic your marketing, they cannot replicate the trust you've built through years of authentic engagement and delivered promises.

Trust isn't the soft alternative to business hardball—it's the ultimate competitive weapon in an age of infinite choice and diminishing differentiation. The question isn't whether you can afford to invest in building trust. It's whether you can afford not to.

Because when research consistently shows that the vast majority of consumers will choose you if they trust you, and most will abandon you if that trust breaks, playing it safe by following the crowd isn't just risky—it's potentially fatal. The future of wine belongs to those brave enough to be consistently, authentically trustworthy.

And everything else? Well, that's just everyone else making the same wine, telling the same stories, chasing the same scores, and wondering why nobody's listening anymore.

Mike Carter is a Wine Futurist based in Cape Town, South Africa, who believes the path to future success isn't found in perfect predictions but in perfect positioning. Want to dive deeper? Download his complimentary book Master Positioning by emailing [email protected] with 'Master Positioning' in the subject line, or connect on LinkedIn for more contrarian thinking about wine's future.