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August 1-15, 1996
Chinook Wines - From crushing grapes to crunching numbers

Chinook Wines

Index
Software tracks fine wines and connoisseurs
Cultivating a bright future
Chinook Wines, of Prosser, Washington has a problem most small business owners only dream of: the popularity of its wines is so great that the owners, Kay Simon and Clay Mackey have difficulty meeting demand. "If someone calls and says, ‘Hey, can you put away a case of Merlot for me?’ I have to make sure that we allocate and record the purchase in inventory." Chinook has to take great care in tracking its inventory so that it doesn’t over-promise its limited supply. Over-promising and under-delivering would damage the distribution networks that Clay and Kay have spent so much time cultivating.

vineyard Making wine is both a capital and labor intensive business. Clay explains: "We have to store the wine for years before it is bottled-and so it can be a long time before we realize income from sales. We thought that by working for ourselves we'd have more free time-it turns out we work seven days a week growing grapes, producing wines and managing retail operations-but, we love it. Time is precious to us and anything we can do to save time in our operations is great-I sure wouldn't mind having a little time for fishing." Kay and Clay have to make the most of their limited resources.

Time is precious to us

Like all wineries, Chinook Wines has to do a tremendous amount of inventory tracking and reporting to federal and state agencies. Federal requirements mandate that wineries track every aspect of wine making for excise tax purposes. Kay explains: "We have to account for every pound of grapes that we use, as well as all of the bulk and bottled wine that we produce. We have to submit a highly detailed report every month! It used to be tremendously time consuming to track all of this inventory." Microsoft technology has helped Clay and Kay streamline many aspects of their inventory tracking.

Software tracks fine wines and connoisseurs

During harvest season, Clay and Kay are working non-stop to get their wines made. "We lose track of what day it is," says Kay. Chinook Wines depends on the ease-of-use and reliability of Microsoft applications. Clay notes, "Microsoft Access has made it much easier for us to track our inventory and create the myriad of reports for the various state and federal agencies. I simply enter the data once and then have it pumped into all of the report templates that I have created in Microsoft Excel. The integration between the Microsoft Office products is really what matters to me because it saves me time. We used to use WordPerfect, Lotus 123 and Pagemaker-but it was never easy to get those programs to work together. With Microsoft Office the integration is seamless."

With Microsoft Office the integration is seamless

Windows 95 and Microsoft office for Windows 95 have built- in fax support; Clay can fax his Microsoft Excel reports directly from his computer using his fax modem, saving him valuable time.

Tracking customer purchases is another important part of inventory control. Clay notes: "We were looking at purchasing an inventory management application specifically designed for the wine industry-but it was nearly $10,000- and that simply isn't in our budget. Instead, I have customized a ready-made template that came with the Microsoft Small Business Pack-and it works great." Chinook can track its purchase transactions and use the tracking information for financial and inventory reporting.

Clay & Kay

Recently, Chinook wines made the switch from Windows for Workgroups to Windows 95. "Our transition was an easy one," said Clay. "We made the entire move in one day. There were no snags-everything works. We still have the same peer-to-peer network and we share printers and our fax modem without any problems-and we have increased our functionality with Windows 95 and Microsoft Office for `Windows 95." Chinook's MS-DOS-based applications made the transition as well, preserving their initial software investment. "We still use a MS-DOS-based accounting package," says Clay, "it's easy and we've had it for a long time. It runs great on Windows 95."

Our transition to Windows 95 was an easy—we made the move in one day

The tasting room at Chinook Wines provides visitors with a remarkably personal experience. The bright tasting room is in a farm house with wood floors. There is a warm, friendly feel to the place. Clay and Kay greet guests and pour glasses of their fine wines. "The tasting room is one of our most important marketing opportunities-it really makes a difference when people can meet the people who make the wine," says Kay. Personal contacts are vital to Chinook-but technology plays an important role as well.

Kay enters the names of visitors to the tasting room into a Microsoft Access customer database. Kay exports the names and addresses from the customer database and merges them into a direct marketing piece in Microsoft Word. A flier created in Microsoft Publisher finishes the direct mail package. She explains, "The customer database helps make our direct marketing more effective because it allows us to identify customers who are the most responsive such as those people who buy a case of wine on their first visit. Microsoft Access makes it easy for us to track specific wines our customers like, how much they purchased and when they bought the wine. This has helped us target our marketing efforts-and gets the most of our marketing dollar," Kay explains.

Access makes it easy to track the type of wines our customers like

Cultivating a bright future

With all their success, Clay and Kay like the size of their business. "We really enjoy the hands-on process of making wines and prefer to remain a small winery," says Kay. "A visit to Chinook," wrote Chuck Hill in Tasting and Touring, "is a must for serious wine lovers. The two owners are not only charming and friendly but hold a wealth of knowledge about all aspects of wine, both art and science." Their knowledge of information technology is first-rate too.

Barrels For more information about Chinook Wines or for tour arrangements please contact: Chinook Wines, P.O. Box 387, Prosser, Washington 99359, telephone: (509) 786- 2725.

Chinook Wines uses the following Microsoft Products

  • Windows 95
  • Office for Windows 95
    • Microsoft Excel
    • Microsoft Word
    • Microsoft Access
    • Microsoft Schedule+
    • Microsoft PowerPoint
  • Microsoft Publisher
  • The Small Business Pack