Pugsly - 4 the Grapes Manager

Rachell Coe worked in the wine industry before opening her own business – 4 The Grapes. It was while working at the King Estate Winery as their webmaster and photographer that she realized that she had found her passion. Rachell loved the whole business of winemaking – from the nursery to marketing. In this interview, learn how Rachell took the skills she learned on the job and started her own business – 4 The Grapes, a photography, marketing, and design firm targeting small wineries and vineyards.

Your company 4 the Grapes provides photography, marketing, and design services to small wineries and vineyards. This is quite a niche market. What made you decide to focus on the wine industry?

I had never been interested in wine before, but when I was hired by King Estate Winery as their webmaster and photographer, I was involved in all aspects of winemaking – from the nursery, through organic vineyard management, the wine process on to marketing. And I LOVED it! How you could be outdoors in the vineyard one minute and then working up an ecommerce marketing plan the next – it kept me busy and interested. After a year and a half of this, I realized I was really missing being with my kids and when King Estate started scaling down its employees, I took this as my sign to go back into business for myself. Only this time, I decided to focus on what I now knew – the wine industry.

Tell us more about the services that 4 The Grapes offers?

Most of my business is web design, but I also do some print work (business cards & brochures), photography (vineyard, winery & bottle shots) and am starting to offer marketing services. I also have a successful blog where I provide website and marketing information (it’s even listed in Wine Business website as one of the blogs they check regularly).

I see you are currently offering a FREE website review to any small, boutique and micro winery website. What typical design flaws do you see during a website review?

Good question!!! The most common problems seem to be:

• Lack of consistency from one page to the next
• Code bloat (where there is a lot of extraneous coding that effects performance and download speed)
• Image files not optimized for quick downloading
• Not optimized for the Search Engines.

Do you provide ongoing support to clients who do not have the time to maintain their sites?

Yup – I still have most of the clients I started with 5 years ago.

How is the wine industry utilizing social media to increase exposure to potential customers?

Many wineries are using Social Media to further their brands – FaceBook is the most important and then Twitter.

What advice would you give aspiring entrepreneurs?

Find a niche!!!!!! Even before I started ‘Love Your Wedding Site’, I wasn’t doing so well because I was catering to EVERYONE – which means my clientele was so spread out that I never really had a chance to get my name out there and didn’t know who exactly to market to. By finding a niche, you know exactly WHO to market to and can learn enough about the business you become indispensable to your clients.

I always like to ask entrepreneurs – are there any books that you would recommend that have helped you along the way on your entrepreneur journey?

Hands down, ‘The Creative Business Guide to Running a Graphic Design Business’ by Cameron S. Foote

Is there anything else you would like to add?

The only thing I can add is to have patience – it takes a long time to build a successful business. But if you can hang in there, it’s definitely rewarding!

For information on Rachell and 4 The Grapes visit http://www.4thegrapes.com

Follow Rachell on Twitter at http://twitter.com/WineryMarketing

Become a Facebook friend at http://www.facebook.com/pages/4-the-Grapes/123373531673?ref=mf

Connect on LinkedIn at http://www.linkedin.com/pub/rachell-coe/5/881/b8a

Julie Barnes is the author is this post. Julie is excited to be living in Generation E – the age of the Entrepreneur. As a writer, she enjoys writing about all aspects of the entrepreneur journey. She enjoys interviewing entrepreneurs whose experience and wisdom can inspire others to follow their entrepreneurial dreams. Julie lives and works in the Kansas City suburb of Overland Park, KS with her husband Ron and lovable dog Hank. You can visit her site at www.julieabarnes.com. Follow Julie on Twitter at @JulieBarnesKS. Become a Facebook friend at Julie Barnes.