Strategic winery reputation management – exploring German wine guides

Purpose – Positioning via quality is key for German wineries. The aim of the study was to explore reputational variables (collective and firm reputation) the study as well as limits of reputational effects. Design/methodology/approach – A multi-dimensional approach, taking a supplier perspective, accessing multiple sources and evaluating Germany serves to explore exogenous factors on reputation. Descriptive and regression analyses examine individual and collective reputational effects for jury grades as proxy for quality and price as the dependent variables. Findings – For collective reputation, region and cooperative memberships strongly matter, whereby region can be a competitive disadvantage and membership shows superior impact. Being a private but managed winery and belonging to a closed quality circle maximizes quality reputation. Strategic grouping has a distinctive effect, not size. Germany specificities and illustration to the obstacles of free-ridership are delivered. Practical implications – Strategic management (including location) help to create a reputational profile. Growth should not be motivated by reputation. Different strategies for the wine guides to build reputation can be pursued, but conquering the top league is a challenge, especially in case of negative collective reputation. Originality/value – For academia, the value of the study consists mainly in the discovery of the dominance of membership in a quality circle and its impact on collective reputation, and the creative multi-dimensional and multi-source approach. Also, cross-guide analysis is new. Practitioners can tailor a specific strategy vis-Ã -vis guides on the basis of the created transparency.