Wine Growers British Columbia Plans for Future Safe Travel

Formerly the BC Wine Institute, the organization changed their named in February to Wine Growers British Columbia, to better reflect the connection of the BC wine industry to the land, and demonstrate that wine is an high value agri-food product and economic growth generator.

Partnering with Destination BC via the Co-op Marketing Partnerships Program, the Co-op program plan is looking to the future, when it’s safe to travel. The goals of the program are to:

• Elevate wine and food tourism in BC
• Focus on moving consumers along the path to purchase
• Provide inspiration and compelling content to promote travel within a wine region and between wine regions during the same visit, or encourage a return visit
• Provide personalization and popular content on the new Wines of BC Explorer app which features every winery in BC
• Focus on advocacy to encourage repeat visits and word-of-mouth recommendations
  • Aggregate and distribute online ratings and reviews
  • Encourage pre- and post-trip wine purchases
• Build a list of influencers focusing on the wine trade
• Create cross collaboration with Destination BC, community destination marketing organizations, the golf sector, BC Farmer’s Market sector, and are exploring partnerships with other provincial sectors.

In previous years, funds from the Co-op Program have been used to promote the Chef Meets BC Grape consumer wine tasting events, conduct multi-faceted wine and food tourism campaigns, and create consumer-facing newsletters.