Student loan debt is a national crisis totaling roughly $1.2 trillion. That’s a number big enough to give anyone pause, but it can be particularly alarming for current students. So when given the opportunity to raise awareness—and funds—to address the deficit, students at Sonoma State University’s Wine Business Institute were eager to get involved.
The challenge was to create a social media-based marketing plan for Terra Fossil Wines, which has pledged to donate $1 from each bottle of wine sold to local university and junior college scholarship funds; the campaign is called Stomp Out Student Loans. “It’s exactly the type of project I look for in my classes,” says Dr. Liz Thach, Professor of Wine Business & Management at the WBI. “Hands-on opportunities really help lessons come alive.”
Thach’s students were broken into seven teams, each of which analyzed the wine, it’s branding and messaging, and designed a 30-day launch campaign to bring it to the North Bay. “Terra Fossil is a custom-crush wine that, until now, has only been available on the East Coast and in some Whole Foods Markets in the Pacific Northwest,” says Thach. “We approached our friends at Oliver’s Markets and they not only agreed to sell the wine using the marketing materials the students created, but they’ve decided to match the $1 scholarship donations as well.” That means a total of $2 will be donated for each bottle sold (there will also be a donation box onsite for those who wish to contribute but not buy wine).
Students came up with “so many great ideas,” says Thach. “It was a shame we couldn’t use them all.” The winning team (pictured), she continues, “went above and beyond. They created point-of-sale materials, designed posters and produced videos for YouTube. But they also created a budgeting and cost/analysis plan—which none of the teams were asked to do. It was very impressive.”
The 30-day trial campaign will run at all Oliver’s locations from April 25 to May 25, but may be extended once the results are tallied. Terra Fossil will likely use the SSU project to extend the campaign to other universities in the future.
Wacky Wine Laws
Here in Wine Country, it’s hard to imagine limiting access to the bounty of the vineyards. But elsewhere around the globe, that’s not always the case. Here are some of the world’s wackiest laws surrounding wine:
• A 1954 decree states that no flying saucers may fly over, take off from or land on the vineyards of Châteauneuf-du-Pape in France.
• Women aren’t permitted in the wine region of Mount Athos, Greece—ever—and this has been the case for the last 1,000 years.
• At Dublin’s Trinity College, any student can demand a glass of wine during an exam, so long as they’re wearing a sword.
• Since 1902, sparkling wine in Germany must be kept under lock and key, and the German tax office imposes a “luxury” charge on it.
• In Pennsylvania, a man who wishes to buy a bottle of wine (or any alcohol for that matter) must have a written note of permission from his wife.
• In Ohio, state law prevents feeding booze to a fish.
Price Matters
The Wine Market Council has come up with an answer to the question: “What kind of wine do most of us buy, even those of us with deep pockets and subscriptions to the wine magazines?” Cheap wine, of course.
A quick summary of the study surveyed two groups of respondents—all buyers and high-end (HE) buyers—about their monthly wine purchases. It found that wine costing less than $10 was purchased by 61 percent of all buyers and 56 percent of HE. Here’s how things measured up:
