Intervju: stvaranje vinskog brenda u srbiji
“Winery Aleksandrovic won the award in the traditional selection of Vino.rs online magazine for the best wine brand of Serbia. That was the reason we visited winery Aleksandrovic and discussed with its owner Bozidar Aleksandrovic about the topic of how to create a wine brand in Serbia.”
What is the significance of the brand in wine business in Serbia?
– Money was never my passion when I entered the wine world, but something else, a more sublime goal. That goal was to make the wine a star of development, both to my family and to the whole region. Probably following this ideal we came to the point that Aleksandrovic winery and our wines became recognized as a brand. This perseverance in the fight for quality has led to the fact that Aleksandrovic wines became a brand on the Serbian wine scene.
What’s the most difficult thing about building a wine brand?
– To produce quality that you will maintain for many years. In our production, which is a living thing and depends on knowledge and equipment, still the nature is the most important. The nature is the one who has a last word every year. So, the quality depends on the year, and in order to repeat it, you can not just keep nature under control. But every year you need to get the best out of the circumstances that have been in. In fact, what is the brand? The brand is a shoe that you learn to buy because it gives you some security and quality. Likewise, in wine world, there are wine producers who have managed to build a brand in the world, and who have been able to produce the expected quality for a long period of time.
How recognizable is the Aleksandrović brand outside of Serbia?
– Honestly, we did a lot of work in the previous years in the region and outside it. There are, of course, people in the region who have not heard of us, which is quite normal in the wine world, but we have almost a whole lifetime of efforts and hard work behind us, and for all those years we have participated in many events, fairs, panels in the region, lectures. We won a lot of awards and medals, from Ljubljana, through Zagreb, and beyond, but also from these international competitions, Decanter, Mundus Vini, varietal and style evaluations around the world. We appeared at various fairs in Europe, seasoned and led numerous wine dinners… I would say that the Aleksandrović brand is actually a synergism of several factors where wine is the backbone of the whole story. And the truth is that you can create a brand as much as you want and use all possible means of information, but when the final act comes, the tasting of the wine itself, if someone does not experience it the way you presented it, then that’s the end of everything.
Which wine brands from the region would you single out?
– Certainly, the Goriška brda were the first in the region to start with the story and the building of the wine brand, from Mova, Simčič, Šćurek, who were the originators of that story. Then, I can’t help but mention Istria and Malvasia, the winemakers who extracted more from that variety than it can practically offer, meaning Kozlović, Matošević… We should not forget Matuško from Pelješac or Slavonia with Graševina and Krauthaker as one of the top producers, then Chateau Kamnik from Macedonia, which perhaps did the most when considering their brand in Serbia. And of course, there are Zvonko Bogdan, Radovanović and not to mention others. Simply, the market just says. It is impossible to make a story all at once because, in a story about any child, that child cannot immediately start the first grade. It has to take some time for it to reach that point, and I am sure that Aleksandrović winery reached the first grade a long time ago.
Whole interview in Serbian: LINK
