Issue link: http://winesandvines.uberflip.com/i/172581
SALES & MARKETING Sales and Customer Service What tasting room staff should know before asking for the sale By Craig Root people have a good time, they tell five friends; if they have a bad time, they tell 10 friends. Now, with social media, they tell 500 friends. W henever I coach tasting room personnel I bring up how to ask for the sale. I tell them that at some point during their interaction with customers, it is important to ask for the sale with a sentence as simple as: "Would you like to buy some wine today?" However, if you are working in a tasting room, you need to set the stage by interacting with customers so that this question comes off as constructive rather than pushy. I don't mean to imply that you should ask for the sale with every single customer. There are reasons it may not happen. If you haven't achieved a very good rapport with the guest, for example, or your retail shop is some distance away from the tasting counter, asking for the sale may feel inappropriate. However, throughout the year there are numerous times in most tasting rooms when asking for the sale will greatly increase profits. Helpful sales The best way to think of helpful sales is to remember what you do the day after you have seen a great first-run movie. Chances 58 WI NE S & VI NE S O CTOBE R 2013 are that you tell all your friends about it. You are trying to enhance your friends' lives. Helpful sales enhance the visitor experience and tasting room profits. Always remember that your winery produces some of the premier wines in your area. Therefore, you are actually enhancing peoples' lives by encouraging them to consume your winery products and join the wine club. Please keep in mind that not all of these techniques listed below are possible all the time. Sometimes you are so busy, it's all you can do to keep your head above water. However, there are numerous other times during the course of a year when these techniques can be very effective. 1. The importance of the tasting room: TV ad Imagine that you successfully ran advertising on a TV station for your product. When you went to pay the bill, they refused the money and instead handed you a big check. Tasting rooms are not just profit centers; they are also highly effective public relations vehicles. Remember: You are not just selling wine; you are also selling memories. If 2. Staff is the most important component of success, second only to wine quality Good staff can overcome bad architecture; great architecture can't overcome a bad staff. Many impressive wineries offer very poor service with staff that "pour and ignore." They don't act interested in the customer, and they expect all the energy to come from the customer's side of the counter. This drags the experience down and diminishes the effect of the great architecture. It also shows disrespect for all the hard work that goes into making a bottle of wine. We in the tasting room are the last in a chain of events before the wine is presented to the customer. To "pour and ignore" is like being the last person in a relay race and deliberately dropping the baton. It is the worst possible public relations we could provide next to outright rudeness. 3. Lasting positive impression Just because you didn't make a sale doesn't mean that you dropped the ball. Highlights • he author, a former tasting room T manager and veteran consultant to wineries, lays out his rules for customer service. • taff must remember that a helpful S sales approach enhances both visitor experience and tasting room profits. • he author's 12 points about sales and T customer service cover critical points that make wineries stand out from their "pour and ignore" peers.