The Buyer | VOGA Italia: the disruptive life-style Italian wine model of our instances

James Burston admits that when he first noticed the cylindrical bottle design that has made VOGA Italia a hit in over 70 countriesaround the world, he didn’t see a future for it in what was on the time a much more threat averse, value dominated UK wine business.

“The UK market was not yet ready to embrace such an innovative proposition, capable of challenging the traditional codes of wine,” he says.

In different phrases, VOGA was not out of step; the market merely was not prepared but.

VOGA Italia has regarded to focus on wine drinkers with its breakthrough cylindrical bottle design

Some 20 years later he’s now tasked, as a part of the staff at Italian Wine Brands, that took over VOGA Italia from its earlier father or mother firm, with masterminding its buying and selling technique for a really completely different wine sector.

A wine market that has arguably fallen fully into VOGA Italia’s lap. Whilst up to now it could been laborious to get the all vital gatekeepers guarding the cabinets of the most important UK supermarkets and massive on-trade teams to spend money on a model that packages itself in a cylindrical bottle. Those identical consumers are actually very conscious that customers are searching for drinks which can be related to their life-style and the way it makes them really feel.

Which is strictly how VOGA Italia was delivered to the market, initially within the US, all these years in the past. A disruptive wine model that was keen to problem the norms of the normal wine market with a shopper first technique targeted on interesting to a youthful drinker that was seeking to purchase into manufacturers that shared their values and understood the experiences and varieties of merchandise they need to purchase.

VOGA Italia got down to seize the creativeness of youthful customers world wide with its iconic, trendy packaging that evokes the perfect in Italian style and elegance, whereas establishing itself as the right alternative for ‘Aperitivo Time’ – an internationally recognised event for socialising, sharing and having fun with life in model. It was constructed to be bold. It was created to be completely different, to face out and be seen. That angle nonetheless drives VOGA Italia as we speak.

VOGA Italia, because it says, “quickly became a collection of concept wines for the modern consumer looking for the perfect combination of style and pleasure, with an innovative, recognisable and distinctive style that has earned the brand prestigious international design awards”.

Creating the wine business’s first cylindrical glass bottle for its Pinot Grigio, a particular design that was subsequently prolonged throughout all the vary of nonetheless wines and subsequently the breakthrough diamond reduce bottles for its vary of Proseccos. All made to make sure they seize the wines “stand out intensity, richness and balance”.

Or because it says: “Packaging is not only decoration. It is part of the product experience and helps VOGA stand out on shelf.”

A bottle of VOGA Italia was not only a bottle of wine “it was a statement of style” designed to make anybody ingesting out of it really feel “sophisticated and cool”.

“I, too, have come to believe that we are bringing genuine product innovation to the market at exactly the right time,” stresses Burston.

The proper time

Numerous components have now come collectively to make this the fitting time for VOGA Italia to fulfil its potential, notably inside the main grocery retailers.

It has the disruptive packaging on the level of sale that main retailers need. It has the approach to life relevance that youthful customers are searching for and the way it suits into their lives.

“The iconic bottle plays such an important part in the buying decision for consumers at the point of purchase,” stresses Burston, which is a vital consider why the most important retailers are actually so serious about itemizing it.

Crucially it’s completely positioned to attraction to increasingly more individuals seeking to get pleasure from ‘Aperitivo Time’ on the again of the success of drinks corresponding to Aperol with its vary of celebratory Prosecco DOC wines.

“It is a new drinking occasion that we can appeal to,” says Oliver Yemm.

VOGA Italia appears to be like to face out versus its friends on shelf and in bars and eating places

He says a key a part of its bold development technique is to advertise itself as a drink for any “modern occasion” be it at a rooftop bar, an aperitivo earlier than dinner, or to welcome buddies at residence.

It is seeking to again up its drive into grocery retailing by working with vacation spot bars, golf equipment and lounges in key cities throughout the nation utilizing the slogan – “Aperitivo Time. Drink in Style” – as broadly as it will possibly.

It all additionally continues to align itself and promote the model at main style and elegance occasions corresponding to the massive style weeks in London, Paris and Milan in addition to concentrating on different key cities and events just like the Miami seashore get together scene.

Special packaging

To assist mark its twentieth anniversary VOGA Italia is releasing a Limited Edition vary of specifically designed bottles from celebrated Italian illustrator Ale Giorgini one in every of Italy’s best-known illustrators, who has labored with main worldwide manufacturers together with Adidas, Armani, Jeep, Lavazza and Ferrero. He has created eye-catching wrap round designs for its Pinot Grigio DOC cylindrical bottle vary that includes a person and girl sharing a drink, expressed by means of a contemporary graphic model that resonates with youthful generations and captures the spirit of Aperitivo Time.

Oliver Yemm says it has grow to be a practice for the model to work with an Italian designer throughout key model milestones to create a collectable bottle, corresponding to for the twentieth anniversary this yr. Which additionally performs properly on its sustainability credentials as so lots of its bottles are used once more for quite a lot of makes use of like water bottles or vases.

Huge aspirations

VOGA Italia has been recognized as one of many key world manufacturers that its new homeowners, Italian Wine Brands, desires to drive and take to new ranges of development and success.

This is absolutely aligned with Italian Wine Brands’ broader technique to strengthen its place as one in every of Italy’s most vital and influential wine producers and suppliers, with a portfolio spanning glowing and nonetheless wines from the nation’s main wine areas. The Group ended 2025 as Italy’s main privately owned Prosecco producer and can be a frontrunner in Pinot Grigio manufacturing.

As a part of the IWB Group, VOGA Italia performs a key strategic function inside this portfolio: strengthening the group’s presence within the globally recognised Aperitivo Time event and interesting youthful customers by means of a particular mixture of wine, iconic design and up to date Italian model.

Yemm explains: “We have huge aspirations for the brand. Italian Wine Brands stated strategy over the next seven years is to build true global iconic wine brands and VOGA Italia’s appeal as a modern, lifestyle-focused wine brand is very much part of that strategy.”

The VOGA Italia vary

The VOGA Italia vary is cut up between its glowing, Prosecco DOC types, with its standout distinctive diamond reduce embellished bottle design, and its collection of Italian varietal wines in its breakthrough cylindrical bottle.

In all there are presently 9 wine choices within the vary and so they embrace:

Cylindrical Bottles:

• VOGA Pinot Grigio DOC
• VOGA Merlot IGT.
• VOGA Rosato Tre Venezie IGT
• VOGA Moscato Frizzante Provincia Di Pavia IGT
• VOGA Prosecco DOC nonetheless

Sparkling Range in Diamond Cut Bottle:

• VOGA Prosecco DOC Spumante Brut
• VOGA Prosecco DOC rosé Spumante Extra Dry
• VOGA Sparkling Moscato Gold Edition
• VOGA Prosecco DOC Black Edition

* You can discover out extra about VOGA Italia here.