Experiential Learning Takes a Sweet Turn in Wine Marketing Project

Hospitality and Retail Management Graduate Students Develop Marketing Strategies for Texas Winery

Associate Professor Natalia Velikova, Ph.D. tasked her RHIM 5345 graduate course with designing a wine marketing plan for real wineries in Texas. In the Wine Marketing and Tourism course, students are divided into 5 different groups: distribution, tasting room, social media/website, packaging, and wine events/wine club. Each group evaluates the current winery situation in their respective area and develops a plan for improvement.

"By working with a real winery, students are getting a hands-on experience and a true connection with the industry," Dr. Velikova said. "It's one thing to read a chapter in the textbook and it's a quite different experience to create an actual plan for the winery development."

At the start of the semester, students conducted a virtual meeting with the winery owners to gather what direction the winery wanted to take in the marketing plan projects. After the virtual meetings, Dr. Velikova explained that her students' desire for their plans to succeed grew having met the people behind the wine labels.

Hospitality and Retail Management master's students Sierra Snyder and Bailey Martin were able to travel to Bertram, Texas to gain a better understanding of Finegan's Distillery and Winery.

"It was awesome being able to meet the owners and learn more about Flanigan's from first-hand experience," Sierra said. "We were able to learn more about the history of the building, watch how they do their tastings, and get a feel of the crowd we need to be targeting in the marketing plan."

Bailey's focus in her project is the tasting room portion with goals to transform the patio area in order to make the space more functional. In addition to transforming the patio layout, Bailey's group will present a redesigned menu that incorporates new food items.

"Being able to visit the winery and see it in person gave me a better understanding of what I needed to focus on and how they run their business," Bailey said. "Having a visual grasp is beneficial in understanding what/who I am working with, and better prepares me for doing the best work I possibly can."

First-year Hospitality and Retail Management graduate student Kristyn Crawford said that the hospitality marketing project is preparing her to work in a team setting in her future career.

"I believe this is especially important because that's how the real-world would work," Kristyn said. "When you are in a real marketing position for a real company you don't work alone, you work within a team. Each person has their own department with a unique vision, and then those ideas are threaded together to become one cohesive project."

Kristyn plans to incorporate what she has learned in courses like RHIM 5345 when she pursues a Ph.D. in Texas Tech University's Hospitality Administration program after she graduates with her master's degree in the fall of 2019.

"This experience has also shaped my research skills. Both my masters and doctorate programs will be primarily research-driven," Kristyn said. "I have found my other courses are more understandable since working on our project in wine marketing."

Dr. Velikova stresses the impact that projects like these can have on the future of graduate students in Hospitality and Retail Management.

"Projects like this one make students realize that the course content is not something distant; they are actually the ones building the content," Dr. Velikova said. "Such projects let the students master professional skills prior to working in real-world environments."