Naked Wines hijacks airline pricing model for wine industry!

Regular readers will know that I'm a huge fan of Naked Wines, the UK online farmer's market for wine. After soliciting a good deal of feedback from loyal customers (Angels and Archangels) who frequent the site, Naked Wines have just today relaunched their site, along with a very exciting new initiative (more on that later).

A small band of regular customers were invited to a special preview of the new site a week or so ago, and the feedback was very positive. Having checked out the new site this morning, I was delighted to see that many of the bugs and minor irritations that customers had identified with the old site over the past 15 months or so since Naked launched, have now been ironed out.

Naked Wines' new look site

Some of the new features are as follows:

• Angels (i.e. sponsoring individual winemakers) and Cashback are now one, called Angels

• There is a new "naked me" section with personalised recommendations
   
• A "to do " list has been introduced, which details essential stuff to do, such as taking advantages of offers that are expiring shortly.
   
• Tastings are back...at £10 a ticket, which goes into the organiser's account, so you, as a customer can set up a tasting to showcase NW's wines, for which those attending will pay. The idea is that you then use the money to purchase the wine. Cool idea!

The best new feature (in this writer's opinion anyway) is that NW have launched a new service inviting UK wine drinkers to buy wines in the UK for less than they cost at the cellar door.

"Between 40-70% of the price customers pay for wine (exc. taxes) is dead money... the cost of selling, financing, picking it up, putting it down again, packaging, storage, risk, wastage," explains Naked Wines Founder, Rowan Gormley.

"From next week, our customers will be able to eliminate this 40-70%, by booking their wines in advance, just like an airline seat. In addition to the cost savings, this model will also mean an explosion in consumer choice - and a risk-free new route to market for producers.

If you look at Australia, for example, only 1/3 of producers currently export their wines to the UK. The barriers to entry are formidable - with hundreds of upfront costs, and no guarantee of making any money.

It's a gamble that most winemakers cannot afford to take - but by inviting winemakers to sell their wines BEFORE they incur any cost, Naked Wines is removing this barrier."

The new service, which includes wines from the Barossa Valley, Marlborough and South Africa, coincides with the website re-launch, featuring new ratings and recommendation functionality.

To find out more about the new service, called Advance bookings, visit http://www.nakedwines.com/advancebooking