<\/p>\n
A Poco Vino 187ml bottle next to a traditionally sized 750ml wine bottle.\u00a0 (ABC Mildura: Ed Gannon)<\/p>\n
Endeavour Group (EDG) manages several alcohol retail outlets, including Dan Murphy’s and BWS.<\/p>\n
EDG premium general manager Andrew Shedden said smaller wine packaging was only just hitting the shelves.<\/p>\n
“We’re at the genesis of packaging innovation for wine, and I see that as a really positive development for the Australian wine industry,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Wine can be an intimidating category \u2014 it’s vast, with so many producers and styles.<\/p>\n
“Smaller formats make it easier for people to try new varieties, regions, or brands without committing to a full bottle.”<\/p>\n
Reading the room<\/p>\n
The success of the aluminium can has drawn the attention of the wine industry, which has struggled in recent years due to a wine oversupply<\/a> and a change in drinking habits<\/a> of consumers.<\/p>\n Australian Vintage chief marketing officer Emily Harper said going small could be the answer to the industry’s challenge of reaching a younger demographic.<\/p>\n Brown Brothers recently released a smaller aluminium bottle.\u00a0 (ABC Rural: Annie Brown)<\/p>\n “When you think about Gen Z in particular, they’re quite promiscuous,” she said.<\/p>\n “They have a really wide variety of things that they like to try, and drinks that they like to buy.<\/p>\n “People don’t want to open a big bottle of wine, especially if they don’t know if they are going to enjoy it.”<\/p>\n Ms Harper said there were plenty of lessons to be learnt from the ready-to-drink (RTD) sector.<\/p>\n “I think the category has done a great job with small format, interesting flavours, vibrant packaging,” Ms Harper said.<\/p>\n “It has really turned the alcohol industry on its head.”<\/p>\n Wade Aunger says he was encouraged by a trial of aluminium cans. (ABC Mildura: Timu King)<\/p>\n In north-west Victoria, Mildura distillery Methanol Moonshine co-founder Wade Aunger said he had seen the change in the industry after starting five years ago with 750ml bottles.<\/p>\n Mr Aunger said preferences had shifted towards the small end of town.<\/p>\n “It’s all about convenience now, you can’t exactly walk into a party with a 750ml glass bottle of moonshine,” he said.<\/p>\n After trialling cans at a recent event, Mr Aunger said customers clearly indicated that was what they wanted.<\/p>\n “That was a one-off, but now \u2026 we’re gearing up to do more with cans right here in Australia,” he said.<\/p>\n Methanol Moonshine has moved its focus from large bottles to aluminium cans. (Supplied: Wade Aunger)<\/p>\n Growth and innovation<\/p>\n Anther Distillery distiller Sebastian Raeburn said he had been closely watching the smaller packaging trend.<\/p>\n Mr Raeburn serves as the head judge for the Australian International Spirits Awards, which included the smaller packaged spirits drinks (or RTDs) as a category for the first time last year.<\/p>\n “For years, they were seen as purely convenient or cheap \u2014 sometimes using low-quality spirits masked with flavouring,” he said.<\/p>\n “That’s no longer the case.<\/p>\n “Today, people are making thoughtful, innovative, high-quality RTDs that are absolutely worth seeking out, especially beyond the big mainstream brands.”<\/p>\n Sebastian Raeburn says the quality of RTDs has improved significantly.\u00a0 (Supplied: Sebastian Raeburn)<\/p>\n Mr Raeburn said wine producers were looking for ways to repackage wine for a younger audience who did not want to commit to a full-sized bottle.<\/p>\n “We’re seeing things like wine-based Limoncello spritzers, some of them are excellent; some are forgettable \u2014 but that’s true of any product category,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Small appears to be the next big thing for the Australian alcohol industry. A trend towards convenience has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":254301,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[150278,150277,150279,64,63,5246,99,132978,49570,150276,150275],"class_list":{"0":"post-254300","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-alcohol-downturn","9":"tag-alcohol-industry","10":"tag-alcohol-packaging-sizes","11":"tag-au","12":"tag-australia","13":"tag-australian-vintage","14":"tag-business","15":"tag-dan-murphys","16":"tag-endeavour-group","17":"tag-poco-vino","18":"tag-rtd"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=254300"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254300\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/254301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=254300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=254300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=254300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n
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