Are you a small or mid-sized winery struggling with inventory issues? Maybe you’ve run out of your best-selling wine mid-season or ended up with excess stock you can’t sell. If so, you’re facing the classic problem of misaligned supply and demand.
In this episode of Expert Talks, we break down how wineries can match production to demand, with insights from Andrea Savaiano, a strategy and operations consultant who has helped wineries like Duckhorn, Kosta Browne, and DuMOL increase sales while optimizing production.
What is Supply and Demand Alignment in a Winery?
Supply and demand alignment for wineries is the process of ensuring that the wines you produce match what your customers will actually buy. To put it simply: produce exactly what you can sell, and sell exactly what you produce.
When alignment is off, wineries end up in one of two costly situations:
• Oversupply: Extra inventory ties up cash, fills your warehouse, and often forces discounting.
• Undersupply: Popular wines sell out too quickly, leaving frustrated customers and lost revenue.
Many assume this kind of planning is only for large wineries producing hundreds of thousands of cases. In reality, the stakes are even higher for small and mid-sized wineries. With tighter budgets, limited storage, and less flexibility to “wait it out”. Producing too much, or too little, has immediate cash flow consequences.
Andrea Savaiano, who has led DTC and marketing strategy at Duckhorn, Kosta Browne, and DuMOL, puts it simply:“When you align supply and demand, you move forward with confidence. You know you’re producing exactly what you can sell, and you’re going to sell exactly what you make.”
Why This Matters for Your Winery
- Protects cash flow by avoiding excess or underproduction
- Improves customer satisfaction by keeping the right wines available
- Reduces reliance on last-minute discounts or channel shifts
- Builds a more sustainable growth path for your business
How will this impact your business?
Supply and demand alignment isn’t about perfection; it’s about clarity and confidence. By bringing together production, sales, marketing, and finance around one shared plan, wineries gain:
- Visibility into where they’re long or short by SKU and varietal
- Data-driven decisions on production volumes, pricing, and sales channels
- Confidence that every case produced has a clear path to market
Whether your winery is production-driven (craft-first) or marketing-driven (demand-first), alignment doesn’t change your philosophy. It simply ensures both sides of the business are working together toward the same goal: a healthier, more profitable winery.
Follow Andrea’s proven six-step process to align your supply and demand to get to a more confident place of smart production and sound sales.
6 Step Process to Align Supply and Demand in Your Winery
Wineries of all sizes struggle to align supply and demand. It’s hard to guess what you should produce more or less of based on what their customers are interested in. The biggest challenge is knowing where to START.
Here is Andrea’s practical, step-by-step process for how to get started with aligning supply and demand in your winery. The best part? Wineries looking to align their supply and demand can get started right away! No special tools needed, just a focused process and tactical plan.
1. Set Your Time Horizon
- Look 3–5 years out, which usually covers 3 vintages and 5–6 sales years.
- This lets you adjust vineyard contracts, production, and marketing without scrambling.
2. Pull Your Supply and Demand Data
For Supply, pull:
- Case goods inventory
- Wine in barrels or tanks
- Current and future production estimates, and convert to volumes to cases
For Demand, pull:
- Historical sales by SKU and channel
- Sales projections for the time horizon
- Factor in vintage aging: e.g., vintage 2028 may sell through 2030
Andrea suggests to bring key leaders in across marketing, sales, production and finance to help → collaboration is the key to success!
3. Map Supply to Demand
- Compare your production and projected yields against expected sales.
- Identify overages and shortages.
- Having everything on one page is incredibly valuable. Incorporating visual charts (even simple Excel graphs) also help teams quickly see gaps.
4. Create an Action Plan
Once you understand where your supply is long or short relative to your demand, bring cross-functional leaders together to decide how to address the gaps.
Some Examples include:
- Launching corporate gifting programs to move slower SKUs
- Sourcing more fruit for high-demand varietals
- Opening new wholesale or DTC channels
- Adjusting pricing to influence demand
Every winery’s levers will look different. No single person or department has the full picture.
5. Assign Accountability
- Designate a single point person to oversee execution.
- Track metrics (e.g., sales through corporate gifting, progress on vineyard sourcing).
→ Andrea points out that this is potentially the most important step in the process. Without a single point person to ensure the action plan is followed, it risks getting swept under the rug.
6. Revisit Annually
- Choose a consistent time each year. Andrea recommends spring – after harvest but before summer sales.
- Update your baseline data and plan for the next vintage.
- Over time, the process becomes faster and more accurate.
Tools to Use:
- Excel or Google Sheets are sufficient
- Advanced inventory/accounting software or solutions like InnoVint SUPPLY can streamline the process
Keys to Success
So, perhaps you have tried to map out your supply and demand in the past, or you made a plan but had issues following through with it. Thats a common situation that happens to the best of us, but Andrea maps out 4 keys to success that define a winery who is successful at this, and those that aren’t.
Successful wineries focus on:
- Stakeholder Buy-In: Engage winemaking, sales, and leadership.
- Accountability: Assign ownership for both the process and action items.
- Consistency: Make it part of your annual planning cycle.
- Transparency: Share insights so the team knows where the winery stands.
Quick Action Items You Can Start Today
If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the with the 6 steps above, try Andrea’s mini process. You don’t have to wait until you have all the stakeholders in the room, or until the right time of year rolls around, here’s three mini steps to get started today:
- Pick 2-3 of your biggest SKUs
- Map current inventory vs sales velocity
- Decide whether to sell, hold, or offload
Final Thoughts
Supply and demand alignment isn’t just for big wineries, it’s a strategy that helps any winery operate smarter, leaner, and with confidence. Start small, focus on clarity, assign accountability, and revisit annually. Once implemented, you’ll never want to go back.
For more expert insights from Andrea Savaiano, connect with her on LinkedIn. And if you want more Expert Talks with other industry leaders, subscribe and listen on your favorite platform.
Common Questions About Supply and Demand Alignment
Q: Can small wineries really benefit from supply-demand planning?
A: Yes. In fact, small wineries face higher risks from misaligned production.
Q: Do I need expensive software to start?
A: No. Excel or Google Sheets is enough to map supply and demand. Tools like SUPPLY can make it much easier, and add additional visibility.
Q: How far in advance should I forecast?
A: Ideally 3–5 years, covering 3 vintages and 5–6 sales years.
Q: Who should participate in this process?
A: Winemaking, sales, and leadership teams. Collaboration is key.
Q: How often should this process be updated?
A: Annually, integrated into your planning and budgeting cycle.