Segmentation of China’s online wine market based on the wine-related lifestyle

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore China’s online wine market segmentation on the basis of the wine-related lifestyle (WRL). Moreover, this study can provide further understanding and reference about China’s wine market segmentation research, which is limited at present. This work can be helpful for those who want to do further research in the Chinese wine market. It is good for wine importers wanting to import wine to China to understand the Chinese wine consumers. Design/methodology/approach Survey data were obtained from a sample of 3,369 participants through cooperation between the College of Enology and the Yesmywine.com website. Questionnaire items included gender, age, area distribution, unit price, bottles consumed, drinking frequency, drinking time, wine-related knowledge, etc. Combined with the influence factors of the WRL, a structural equation model was developed. The data analysis, particularly employing principal component analysis, enabled the identification of five market segments. Findings Five distinct segments were identified within the wine market and designated as follows: wine official consumption type enthusiastic fancier; enjoyment consumption; fashionable consumption; and new, young wine drinkers. Research limitations/implications The research data were derived from Yesmywine, one of the largest online wine sale platforms. However, the impact of yesmywine is much smaller compared with Tmall and Taobao and Jingdong. In this paper, we can see that WRL is increasingly becoming a part of Chinese people’s daily lives, especially for the enthusiastic and fancier wine consumers, which is the official type of wine consumer. Next, an analysis of time series under the data of the near future years should be conducted to find the online wine segmentation market variation trend. Moreover, it is important to conduct cross-culture comparison between the Chinese and Australians. Brand positioning can be improved by better understanding China’s online wine market segmentation. Practical implications WRL segmentation is valuable for the wine importers and producers in west France, Italian, Germany and so on, as they want to develop China’s wine market and understand the mindset of Chinese wine consumers. The wine importers in China should focus more on consumers that enjoy wine along with newer and younger wine drinkers. Originality/value This paper analyzes a large sample (3,369) and therefore is useful for understanding online wine market segmentation and wine consumption behavior in China owing to China’s limited wine market segmentation literature. This paper is the first to use WRL tool to segment China’s online wine market. Moreover, the research data have reference value for those who want to learn more about China’s online wine market, as yesmywine is one of the largest online wine-sale platforms. It also gives some managerial implications for wineries and wine marketers that will be helpful to wine companies in understanding the emerging Chinese wine market and in enacting wine marketing strategies more effectively.