All Working Papers

The main purpose of this study is to research buyer-seller cooperation in the distribution of Port wine. Eight research hypotheses were derived from data collected by case study, and incorporated into a quantitative questionnaire distributed to commercial directors of 52 producer companies and 49 distributors. A binary probit model was developed to analyze the Likert-scaled answers in valid questionnaires returned by 32 producer respondents and 29 of distributor respondents. The results of the study show that (1) conflict, when permanent and intense, inhibits the development of cooperative relationships; (2) trust is likely to solve conflicts; (3) a combination of trust and adaptation increases the potential for cooperation; and (4) the presence of a foreign employee at the interface between producers and distributors does not negatively affect the level of cooperation. Lastly, cooperation can be considered as an important means of developing skills and resources, which can then be applied to existing transactional relationships.

In 2006 the Irish wine market was growing rapidly along with its Celtic Tiger economy (Euromonitor, 2008). Total wine sales in Ireland more than quadrupled in the seventeen-year span from 1990 to 2007 (Geraghty and Torres, 2009). While wine consumption in Ireland was growing at a rapid rate, US consumption was growing, but at a slower rate. (Euromonitor, 2010). According to Moran, Ireland’s increased consumption of wine was due primarily to improved accessibility, affordability, and branding of wine. Geraghty and Torres conducted research in Galway Ireland in 2006 among 307 wine consumers and identified three clusters of wine consumers in Ireland: the casual wine buyer, the value seeking wine buyer, and the wine traditionalist (Geraghty , 2009). These clusters provided insight into the consumers behind the increase in wine consumption. The recent recession however, has caused the wine sector in Ireland to plummet (Euromonitor, 2010).
The purpose of this research was to compare the California market consumers to the consumers in the Irish market that was growing at a rapid rate to identify similarities and differences in the factors that impact wine demand in the two countries.

Social media use has surged in the past decade. Facebook has 900 million global users (Wall Street Journal, 2012). Recognizing that many of these 900 million users are potential customers (a search on Facebook in May 2012 revealed that there are 11.5 million US Facebook users that “like” wine, beer, or spirits), the wine industry has embraced social media (Vinography, 2012). Wineries are using social media as a tool to reach consumers and as a tool to reveal their brand quality and personality (The Tribune, 2011). In a survey of 118 of Texas’ 181 bonded wineries, nearly 80% of them were actively engaged in social media, with the majority not only using social media for customer connections, but also using social media for establishing industry connections and finding suppliers (Lau et. al, 2011). A survey by ABLE Social Media Marketing revealed that 94% of American wineries are on Facebook and 73% are on twitter (ABLE Social Media Marketing, 2012). They further found that 47% of wineries said that Facebook helps them generate sales and 72% sell wine on their websites.
Bradley and McDonald indicate that knowledge management is what company management tells employees they need to know. In higher education faculty practice knowledge management by telling the students what they need to know. Social media is a method peers use to show connections the content they think is important. Bradley and McDonald believe that organizations can gain value from social media through mass collaboration (Bradley and McDonald, 2011). Since industry, and in particular the wine industry, is using social media to enhance interactions between professionals and with consumers, how is higher education preparing their graduates to use social media in their careers? Have students pursuing wine-related higher education used social media to enhance their learning and prepare them for industry?
A 2011 survey by Pearson Learning among 1,920 professors of higher education, found that almost two-thirds of faculty are using some form of social media for their courses (Moran et. al., 2011). The purpose of this research is to examine how social media is being used to enhance learning among students at California Polytechnic State University. Further, this research aims to identify if there are differences in the attitudes and behaviors of wine and viticulture students compared to other students related to social media and industry information. The wine and viticulture students examined in this research are pursuing degrees in both enology and viticulture.

This study explores the climate change issue in the Tasmanian wine cluster. Following cluster theory, we predict knowledge exchange on climate change is widespread in the overall cluster, while component knowledge on climate change is exchanged more readily than architectural knowledge. We also predict knowledge exchange on climate change is more widespread within sub-clusters than between them. Using network analysis and a quantitative approach, all three hypotheses are rejected. A discussion of the findings and their implications is presented along with future research directions.

Wine for home consumption in Pennsylvania is, with the exclusion of winery sales, purchased from the state owned monopoly stores. The flow of wine from its sources, through the Pennsylvania monopoly system and to the consumer is tracked in this study. Volumes and values of wine from around the world are compared in the Pennsylvania marketplace. The popularity of many types, varieties, and styles of wine are compared. Seasonality of consumer preference is discussed.

This study explores the relevancy of climate change to business using a sample of wine firms operating in Margaret River, Western Australia, one of the premier wine regions of the world. Using a qualitative approach based on thematic analysis, the results challenge the extent to which climate change is a salient stakeholder, while demonstrating that the phenomenon may, in fact, be beneficial. Response actions towards climate change demonstrate both mitigative and adaptive actions, although differences in their level and rate of implementation appear to be attributable to a mix of normative and instrumental trade-offs. Implications of the findings are discussed, with a particular focus on location theory and economic barriers as a key driver of trade-offs between the choice of mitigative or adaptive response to climate change.

In this paper, we explore the developing wine markets of Japan and Singapore for New Zealand wine. Apart from several reflections from the authors regarding their experiences looking specifically at the prevalence of New Zealand wine in these two Asian markets, this paper is largely a conceptual review of the literature along with descriptive statistics illustrating the current state of affairs regarding the topic of interest.