Online wine merchant seeks £150k to end wine snobbery

Smashed Grapes, a UK online wine merchant, has launched a fundraising drive to gain £150,000 in a bid to introduce wines to a wider range of customers and end wine snobbery.

The platform was set up in 2020 by former restaurateur Sam Tendall with the help of marketing and brand development specialist Dan Thomas.

The two co-founders aim to bridge the gap between the low and high ends of the wine industry. Their ‘real life’ wine categories aim to introduce consumers to a wider range of wine producers, ending wine snobbery through access to more information about different types of wine.

As many as 86% of regular wine drinkers in the UK drink just three types of wine. A statistic that the brains behind Smashed Grapes want to alter.

The business aims to raise the £150k through angel investment and a crowdfunding campaign, launching later this month.

“While the drinks industry continues to expand with choice, the freedom to explore tasty new wines remains blocked and behind the times,” Tendall said, as quoted by The Grocer. “Consumers are left with a choice between mass-produced and often uninspiring big brands, or with a world of historic snobbery, complex language and superiority.

“This results in many wine drinkers being forced to stick with what they know, choosing the familiar over the baffling.

“We help wine lovers by making good wine accessible through our ‘real life’ wine categories, no-bullshit descriptions, ‘try before you buy’ kits, and our Good Wine Guarantee. This helps consumers broaden their wine drinking horizons, get better value and make trusted choices, eliminating what we call fear of ‘wine letdown’.

“Our approach is gaining traction across the UK and we now see a prime opportunity to develop the Smashed Grapes brand. We’re aiming to do this at B2C level, through additional investment in marketing and brand-building, and at wholesale level.”