Production practices in the Australian wine industry

Abstract

Abstract This paper presents the findings of a major research project aimed at developing production strategies for the Australian wine industry. The research focused on production strategies in the winemaking process, including fermentation and maturation, cellaring, bottling, packaging and inventory management. It does not include vineyard management issues. The objective was the identification of a set of competitive priorities that applied to the Australian wine industry and a corresponding set of key decision areas for wine‐manufacturing strategy development. Competitive priorities are operational characteristics which the organisation uses to compete in a given market and key decision areas are the choices the organisation makes about the management of the wine production process which create the competitive priorities. The most important competitive priorities for wine production identified were product quality, cost and price, market scope, supply dependability and supply flexibility. The main key decision areas identified included quality control/ assurance, top management involvement, communication and product design.