Indicators of Individual Wine Reputation for Friuli Venezia Giulia

Abstract

The main objective of this paper is to study indicators of individual wine reputation and how they may affect the price of wines in Friuli Venezia Giulia. The analysis is built on the assumption that consumers base their wine purchase decisions on easily available information such as expert quality ratings and reputation builds on past awards for a wine. We estimate a hedonic pricing model using a data set of 1078 Friulian wines listed in the Gambero Rosso wine guide. The categorical nature of the dependent variable suggests the use of ordered response models. The results not only show that awards for the current quality of a wine carry a positive and substantial premium, but also that having received an award in the past (indicating individual wine reputation) has a positive effect on prices. Moreover, the province of production has a considerable effect on prices and white, older wines tend to be more expensive. The paper confirms the important role of current quality ratings and of individual wine reputation in determining wine prices. An important marketing implication is that wineries and retailers should communicate the current quality of a wine together with any past quality recognitions received as this should foster the reputation of an individual wine in the future.