Business Planning, Marketing, and Economics

Getting Started

• WineryWise: A Washington Guide to Sustainable Winemaking – WAWGG
• Writing a Business Plan: An Example for a Small Premium Winery (.pdf) – Cornell University
• Winery and Vineyard Feasibility Workbook – Agriculture Marketing Resource Center
• Small Farm Funding Resources – USDA-NAL
• Starting or Diversifying an Agricultural Business – Penn State
• Agribusiness Planning: Providing Direction for Agricultural Firms – Penn State
• Small Farms Team – WSU Website
• Financing your Business – WSDA
• Vine to Wine: Successfully Establishing a Vineyard or Winery – WSU #OM41

Operating Economics

Vineyard

• WESTERN WA – Establishing an Organic Vineyard (2009) (.pdf) – A report from the WSU-Mt. Vernon wine grape trials. Includes a budget for establishment costs, as well as methods for determining establishment costs.
• WESTERN WA –  Establishing a Pinot noir Vineyard in W. Oregon (.pdf) – OSU #EM8969e.  The Willamette Valley budgets have some similarities to western WA production.
• Northwest Grapes: Cost-of-Production Calculators – online tool that replaces printed enterprise budgets for establishing a vineyard in Washington. Tools exist for both wine and juice grape production, using conventional or ORGANIC methods. It provides establishment and annual maintenance costs, based on different scenarios identified by the user.
• AgProfit™ – estimates machinery, labor, and production input costs as well as fruit size, grade, and total yield for calculating returns for crops with multiple establishment and production years. The program allows you to inflate specific return and input cost items over time to analyze the net present value, internal rate of return, and financial feasibility when implementing a particular technology, making minor changes to returns or input costs, or comparing cropping systems.

Winery

• Northwest Winery Cost-of-Production Calculator
• Small Winery Investment and Operating Costs (.pdf) – WSU #EB1996
• Bulk Winery Investment and Operating Costs (.pdf) – WSU #XB0997E

Grape Production Statistics

• National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) – Washington Fruit Reports: https://www.nass.usda.gov/Statistics_by_State/Washington/Publications/Fruit/index.php
  • Historic WA Wine Grape Prices (1985-2013) (.pdf) – (NASS)
  • Historic WA Juice Grape Prices (1934-2013) (.pdf) – (NASS)
  • Historic WA Grape Prices – All (1908-2013) (.pdf) – (NASS)

Marketing and Contracts

• Small Farms and Direct Marketing – WSDA
• International Marketing – WSDA
• Farm-To-Schools – WSDA
• Marketing Washington Wines at the Wholesale Level (.pdf) – WSU #XB1015E
• Getting Paid: Tools for Washington Grape Growers (.pdf) – Washington Wine Industry Foundation
• Grape Contracts (.pdf) – 2009 Wines and Vines Magazine

Liens and Commercial Codes

• Filing a WA State Uniform Commercial Code (UCC) – Used for filing a public notice that you (grower) have interest in the property sold (grapes) to another party (winery). This does not replace a contract, but rather, is complementary to one.
• WA Processor Liens – Washington State WAC Code – What you can do if you do not get paid for delivered, contracted wine grapes.

Succession Planning

• Succession Planning – Washington State Conservation Commission
• Succession Planning: For Wineries and Vineyards – Penn State Extension Blog

WSU Viticulture & Enology Certificate Program

Expand your knowledge by taking one class or an entire program online through WSU.