Caution: Blogging can be good for your winery

I asked Amy Lillard at la gramiere about how to get a hold of some of her wine (reading her blog has whetted my interest), and she mentioned that

...We're hoping to get our wine imported into the States. I've had a couple of people contact me about it, just waiting until it's ready to get samples out.

Being curious, I asked her about the source of those contacts, to which Amy replied:

The contacts were, in fact, a direct result of blogging. One was a serious inquiry, wanting to come and taste, the other was an email of encouragement from an importer. Funny how blogging can open doors huh?

Indeed.

Here's a question for any winery bloggers reading this post:  How has blogging helped (or hurt) your winery?  Enquiring minds want to know!  Please add your experiences to the comments.

Comments

[Josh]

Blogging has helped. Tremendously.

Our initial vintage mailing list has grown to over 30 members due to pinotblogger. Because we are so new and won’t actually be producing wine for another year or so, much less selling any (add 18 months), this is a really wonderful development.

The $64,000 question for me was: How do you get people excited about a product that they can't yet buy? The answer, for us on a shoestring marketing budget at least: blogging.