I trained as a winemaker before I ever touched a brand brief. I completed my BScAgric in Viticulture and Oenology at Stellenbosch University in 2024, obtaining the invaluable experience in the vineyard and cellar - the full production side. I then moved into the retail and distribution end of the industry and saw first-hand the challenge that our industry is facing: cellars making genuinely good wine that the market never finds, because nobody resolved what the brand is actually for before spending money on how it looks.
Global wine consumption is at its lowest point since 1961, and it's not because the wine got worse. People have drifted to seltzers, non-alcoholic beers, and cocktails because of what wine has come to mean: empty calories with a debunked health halo, a slow two-hour ritual that doesn't fit a 6am gym schedule, and a gatekept, special-occasion image that still scares off anyone who doesn't know the "right" way to talk about it. Estates with real substance keep losing ground to brands with bigger ad budgets and no clearer sense of who they're for, because more content and a better-looking feed can't fix a position nobody's resolved. They just spread the same confusion faster. What the industry needs more than ever is a positioning change that competes on the terms people actually drink by now: fitting real life instead of demanding a ritual, and standing for something specific instead of leaning on outdated health claims or old-money prestige. In other words, wine is made by real people for real people.
That gap is what I work on now. With training and experience in graphic design and digital marketing, alongside my degree in winemaking, I offer an all-in-one, turn-key solution in brand establishment and positioning, visual identity, and creative execution. I believe that they are one decision made at different resolutions; that successful marketing isn’t saying 100 things at once, but finding 100 different ways to say one thing. A label is a positioning decision. So is a caption, a flyer, and a tasting experience. Split that decision across an agency, a designer, and a social media manager who've never spoken to each other, and you get activity with no direction behind it.
I work strategy first: a positioning statement that defines what the brand stands for, who the brand is for, and what it refuses to be. Everything downstream, such as label direction, website, social content, campaigns gets built from that, in that order. I handle the whole process start-to-finish. No handoffs, no watered-down brief passed between five people. One person carrying the thinking from the boardroom to the bottle.
If you're a wine or beverage brand that knows your product is good but can't get anyone to notice, I'd like to talk.