How to Fill the Empty Seats at the Table: Data Literacy for Wine and Spirits

You know this just as well as I do.

Our industry is not exactly robust when it comes to the use of data. A recent statistic to reference comes from Silicon Valley Bank’s State of the US Wine Industry 2021, where only 16 percent of wineries who responded to the survey said they have a full-time person reviewing their consumer data. (See Figure 13 on page 25.)

One way to look at that statistic is to imagine all those empty seats at the table when it comes to analytics and business intelligence. Though it’s possible to see those empty seats as a lack or some indication of the “traditional” (read: backward) nature of the industry, we see it differently.

We see those empty seats as a tremendous opportunity, not only for the businesses who recognize the nascent value of the analyst role but also for the people who will take those seats.

Those people will be data literate, specifically in the dialect of wine and spirits.

How can we make that happen? How can we pull out the chairs of those seats at the table and occupy them with people who add value in this particular area?

This past Friday, we took a few steps in that direction. We’ve already announced Enolytics’ partnership with The Data Lodge and Valerie Logan, who created the concept of Information as a Second Language® (ISL). On Friday, Val and I sat down with a robust and diverse group of people from around the industry to introduce them to our plans for fostering the “dialect” of data literacy in wine and spirits.

The focus group included analysts, journalists, wholesalers and winemakers, each of whom has expressed a sincere interest in raising the bar when it comes to data in our community.

They, too, see the opportunity of those empty seats at the table.

They, too, recognize the challenges of filling them. This was the big ask of the focus group participants: to kick the tires of the three-part program that Val and I are creating to foster data literacy in wine and spirits.

A few of those challenges that I noted in particular:

• Buy-in is critical and it has, historically, proven to be an obstacle.

• There’s a recognized need for a shared language, across a diversity of backgrounds. What “data” means to someone in sales is different than what “data” means to someone who works in distribution, which are both different than what “data” means to someone who works in marketing.

• Education is key to that shared language.

• Businesses who ignore the value of data will be left behind.

That last takeaway – about being left behind – is the one that keeps us up at night. Not because we’re dwelling on the gloom-and-doom of the possibility but because there are specific actions and discrete steps we can take toward education and advocacy.

And filling those seats at the table.

How about you? Do you recognize the nascent value of those empty seats? Would you like to know about the three-phase program we’re developing with The Data Lodge? I’d be happy to share the slide deck and have a conversation about it.

Just let me know. We’re listening.

Thank you, as always, for reading –

Cathy