Chilean winemaker introduces rebranded digital experience
Digital presents a challenge for premium alcohol brands. Communicating the differentiating value of a spirit, wine or beer – largely reliant on taste and packaging – can be difficult online, where tactile experiences are limited to sight and sound.
For Chilean vintner Clos Apalta, the digital sphere has offered a new way to communicate its heritage and brand offer. It worked with design consultancy Nucleus to craft a digital experience worthy of a premium winery. Peter Matthews, founder and CEO of Nucleus, has discussed the project in more detail below.
The digital rebrand has put into a place a simple UX and stripped back site that still speaks to the nature of winemaking. It does so through the use of richly toned images, often of tightly-cropped elements of the winery and winemaking process, to communicate both heritage and luxury.
In terms of the tone of voice, the site uses an elegant, yet accessible style that discusses the winery and wines themselves to impart a sense of the tasting experience. It relies largely upon endorsement in the form of commentary from the company’s own leaders and industry experts.
A short animation of the Clos Apart packaging on the ‘wines’ section of the site help bring a more tactile element to the digital space. Highlighting the packaging in a dramatic light allows what is a key brand touchpoint to shine online as it would on the shelf.
The website launched in English in December and will be translated into French, Spanish, Portuguese and Chinese.
Crafting a perfect wine’s website
Peter Matthews, founder and CEO, Nucleus
Perhaps surprisingly, not all the great wines of the world tell their stories well online. Translating an evocative story into a unique digital narrative requires interpreting the very passion and essence that created this 100 point wine.
When Charles de Bournet, Clos Apalta’s CEO approached us to do just that we went on a discovery tour of the stunning Chilean vineyard his mother founded, high in the Apalta Valley. We benchmarked the best wines in the world to learn what we could from them before identifying the unique ingredients that make Clos Apalta so special.
Creating an immersive digital experience required communicating the owners' passion for their venture, bringing to life Clos Apalta's spellbinding location, its award-winning winery and the spectacular wines themselves.
Harmony is at the heart of everything at Clos Apalta, where hundred year-old vines are grown using biodynamic techniques, harvested by hand and vinified in a state-of-the-art winery that relies on gravity to work its magic.
Our classically simple design implies harmony, with every detail carefully considered and any embellishment pruned away as there is no need to gild the rose. Typography is restrained and photography enveloping, while the copy itself draws the user into an engaging narrative that explains the philosophy and teamwork behind this great wine.
A bespoke winery tours booking system has been developed which will be launched in early 2020 to allow online booking and the website also showcases the Clos Apalta Residence, which brings together wine and hospitality with a link out to Relais & Chateaux for hotel booking.
