Wineries Worth Flying for with Sarah Myers
Sarah Myers is the Executive Officer of Ultimate Winery Experiences Australia and she's just come back from pitching our wine regions to travel advisors in Paris, London and Munich. Markets with hundreds of years of wine history behind them. I asked her how it went, half expecting her to tell me it was a hard sell.
It wasn't. They were met with real warmth. But the way she got there was not by leading with the wine, because in those rooms the wine is assumed. "Think more about what the visitor is going to feel and do when they're with you, because they are going to remember you, your stories, your place, your view far longer than unfortunately they're going to remember what was in the glass."
The five-minute chat they're still talking about in New York
Sarah told me about a group of high-end American clients on an Australian itinerary packed with fabulous things. When their tour operator asked what the highlight was, it wasn't the tasting or the dining. It was a five-minute chat with the person pruning the vines.
That guest is still telling that story in New York right now.
I think about this a lot with my own clients. Everyone wants to talk about what's in the bottle, and fairly so, it's the thing you've worked hardest on. But the thing a visitor repeats at a dinner party six months later is usually the person who poured it.
The numbers are better than the mood
It's been a hard year and nobody needs me to tell winemakets that. But Sarah gave me a number that stopped me mid-sentence: inbound tourism expenditure was up 15.9% in the year to May 2026. Volume was up 9.5%.
Tourism isn't a consolation prize for a hard year in wine sales. It's a different path to the same customer, and right now it's the one that's working.
What it takes to be worth flying for
"Engage with your regional tourism operator organisation. It's absolutely the number one thing. Many of them run amazing programs in terms of getting internationally ready."
Most operators skip this step and go straight to building the experience. Sarah's point is the opposite order: get the pricing and positioning advice first, because these organisations already have relationships with the buyers you're trying to reach.
She also flagged the part people forget to budget for. "Up to 25% commission is what many tourism product pay. You've got to be able to factor that into your pricing and be willing to pay that."
Everyone wants to sell direct. But direct only gets you so far, and if international visitors are the growth you're chasing, distribution is the cost of reaching them. Price it in from day one, not the day a booking lands.
This is the part small operators need to hear. "You don't have to have an enormous budget to develop experiences. What you need is a strong sense of yourself, what's special about your place, your people, your story."
Sarah's favourite example is Printhie Wines in Orange, New South Wales. A dam already on the property and a staff member who happened to be a passionate fly fisherman. Now it's a private fly-fishing lesson by the water with a glass of bubbles, then a walk up through the vines to a tasting and lunch.
No capital spent, just an honest look at what was already there.
Five questions I'd ask if I were in the room
Take these into your next tourism or experience planning session. The most useful thing I do as a consultant isn't giving answers, it's asking better questions.
What's special about our place or our people that we've been taking for granted?
Who on our team has a story or a character worth putting in front of a guest?
Have we spoken to our regional tourism organisation, or just assumed we know what they offer?
If an international booking landed tomorrow, have we priced in commission, or would it eat our margin?
Have we built anything around the wine, or are we still asking it to do all the work on its own?
Sarah's closing line to me was about patience and I think it's the right note to end on. "You do have to be a little bit realistic in your expectations and realise that you're in it for the long haul, and build over time."
Listen to the full episode
Episode 20 of The Growth Edit, Wineries Worth Flying For with Sarah Myers, is out now on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Sarah goes further on the European trip and on what the travel advisors asked her for than I've covered here.
I hope some of this is useful, and please do get in touch if you'd like to talk it through.
Cheers to your growth!
Holly