67 Wine Case Study
MANHATTAN WINE & SPIRITS RETAILER GROWS SALES AND CUSTOMER LOYALTY WITH ITS OWN APP, POWERED BY DRYNC
Competition in beverage alcohol retail is intense right now: Big box stores with razor thin margins are moving into new markets across the country, driving prices down, and luring customers away from local retailers. Antiquated laws hinder development, while changes in legislation and developments in technology are quickly opening the playing field to new competition.
So, how does a single-store retailer in NY grow their revenue by 4%, their email list by 25%, and their delivery business by 10% in just four months?
Growing Pains
For over 75 years, 67 Wine has been the “go-to” store for wines and spirits on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. The family-run business has been known for its expansive selection, expert staff and excellent customer service — and built its brand and customer loyalty around that.
While businesses remained healthy, 67 Wine could sense a shift in their customers’ buying behavior. Their weekly ads in the New York Times drew attention, but the audience wasn’t new. They found an engaged new audience growing on their social media pages, but had a hard time tracking that to sales. Their email list was large, but it wasn’t really growing — and more than 50% of their emails were being opened on mobile devices.
When Seth Weiser was brought in to grow the business, he wanted to see instant results.
From day one, 67 Wine has offered above and beyond services, like local delivery. So when alcohol delivery apps started appearing on the scene, working with a popular one seemed like a fine idea. They got an instant boost in orders, but soon realized it was a lot of work for little profit.
Moreover, 67 Wine didn’t own those customers — they belonged to the delivery app. When Seth noticed a regular customer of 67’s ordering through the new delivery app, he realized that instead of gaining new customers, the store was actually losing existing customers to the delivery partner.
“It doesn’t take a detective to see that all of our customers are on their phones. If we want to reach them today, we need to be on mobile too,” said Seth Weiser of 67 Wine, “and the only way to do that AND actually grow our business was with our own app.”
“67 Wine has been doing this for 75 years,” added Seth, “We are experts in wine and spirits, we have long standing relationships with the best producers in the world, and we have been delivering in New York for over three generations. We are all about our customers and staying ahead of the competition — today, both are on mobile.”
67 Wine RUSH App
In late February 2017, 67 Wine announced its own mobile ordering app, 67 Wine RUSH.
Built on Drync’s mobile commerce and loyalty platform for liquor retailers, the 67 Wine RUSH app allows customers to order from their phones for delivery in an hour in Manhattan. Integration with their Lightspeed POS system lets customers to shop real-time inventory, while Apple Pay and Android Pay offer one-touch mobile purchases.
67 Wine controls their own app promotions, which they can change as frequently or infrequently as they wish. They market directly to their customers through the app, via push notification, and through email. And, importantly, they own 100% of the customer data and the sale.
Within two days of announcing the 67 Wine RUSH app over email, 10% of the customers on their email list had downloaded the app. Social media promotions, search ads, local mailings, traditional marketing and staff enthusiasm continued to grow the audience. Month over month, their app audience doubled in size, also growing their email audience by 25% over the quarter.
A few months later, a whopping 26.5% of app users purchase through the 67 Wine Rush app, and 60% of them are already repeat buyers. To put this in perspective, typical buyer conversion rates are 1.5% on mobile web and 3% on desktop internet.
Order sizes on the 67 Wine RUSH app are 3x as large as in-store orders. When customers aren’t using the app to order products, they are still using it to shop the store. An astonishing 72% use the app 3+ times in the first month, and four months after the initial launch 70% are returning users.
In part, it’s the attraction of convenience — The 67 Wine RUSH app, literally puts the store in their customers’ pockets and brings products to their doors in minutes. But it is also the power of personalization that their mobile app delivers so seamlessly. Things like automated recommendations tailored to the customers taste preferences, and the ability to chat 1:1 with the store’s expert staff through the app, make consumers feel more connected to the store and build loyalty and trust.
In addition, having their own app gives 67 Wine customer insights they did not have before, allowing the store to target promotions to the customers who would be most interested in them.
“To be honest, I was a little nervous we might canabalize our in-store business with the app, but the opposite was true,” said Seth Weiser. “We are attracting new customers and getting our current ones to buy more.”
The Mobile RUSH
When 67 Wine thought about promotions a year ago, it went something like “Let’s sell a lot of XYZ this month.” They purchased ahead, trained staff, built displays, planned out print ads, and sold “a lot of XYZ.”
Today, they say, “Let’s sell a lot of XYZ TODAY.”
“The 67 Wine RUSH app has drastically changed how quickly our promotions take off,” said Seth Weiser. “It is instant.”
As an example, let’s take their spring promotion for the popular Provence rosé, Whispering Angel. They offered an attractive price on the rose for purchase of 6 bottles, or more.
Traditionally, a promotion like this might move a couple hundred of cases over the course of the month. 67 Wine sold 250 cases of Whispering Angel Rosé in 2 days.
That weekend, 31% of app users placed an order — nearly all of them included Whispering Angel. On top of that, 67 Wine saw 80% cart lift for app users adding other products to their mobile orders.
67 Wine promoted the offer through email, social media and push notifications using a customized “deeplink” that brought current app users directly to the promoted item in the app, desktop users to the same product on their website, and encouraged mobile users who didn’t have the app to download it.
On social media, thousands of followers “liked” 67 Wine’s Whispering Angel post. But what made this post even more effective, was that it was actionable and frictionless. Customers could have their favorite rose delivered to their door in a hour in three clicks.
The customer experience was so magical that the customers started posting pictures of the Whispering Angel deliveries on Instagram and Facebook. Those posts caught on and new people downloaded the app — overall, 33% of the app traffic in the following hours came from new users.
The value of a good promotion, just went up exponentially.
The Secret Sauce
Even the best “Secret Sauce” won’t cover up a bad sandwich, so the pillars of good customer experience aren’t going anywhere. Good service, selection, and value ultimately set you apart from your competition. Having your own mobile app powered by Drync, gives you a way to bring everything you offer to your customers — giving them yet another way to have a magical customer experience and a reason to keep coming back to your store whenever they want, wherever they are.
If you are ready to offer your customers mobile shopping for your store, contact us at sales@drync.com or www.drync.com.
