How To Start A Wine Club
Start A Wine Club
From first pour to loyal member
Starting a wine club comes down to four decisions: what goes in the box, how often it ships, what members pay, and what they get back. Get those right and the club sells itself at the cellar door. Here is the playbook Australian cellar doors follow, and how Members One runs the busywork for you.
Five Steps
The cellar door club playbook
Design your clubs
Start with two or three clubs, not five. A mixed half-dozen, a premium dozen and a winemaker’s selection covers most cellar doors. Each club should have an obvious next step up, so upgrading feels natural rather than salesy. Name clubs after how members drink, not how you organise stock: an “everyday half-dozen” sells itself in a way “Club 2” never will.
Price the allocation
Members expect to do better than the walk-in price. A member discount plus first access to limited releases is the standard trade. Price each shipment so the discount is real but the margin still works once freight is included. Flat-rate or included freight reads far better at the cellar door than a surprise at checkout, so bake it into the shipment price from the start.
Set the billing rhythm
Monthly, quarterly or per vintage release: pick the rhythm that matches how you actually bottle and ship. Quarterly is the safe default for most cellar doors, frequent enough to stay in mind but spaced enough that boxes don’t pile up unopened. Members One bills each cycle automatically and retries failed cards for you, which is where most clubs quietly lose members.
Sign members at the cellar door
The minutes after a good tasting are the highest-converting moment your winery has. Sign guests up on the spot at the counter. A signup takes less time than pouring the next flight, and their tasting purchase already sits on their new member record. Train every pourer on a ten-second pitch: the discount, the first access, and that there is nothing to pay today.
Keep them renewing
Churn is the club killer. Give members reasons to stay, like member pricing at the cellar door, first allocation of new releases and member-exclusive nights. Then give them a portal where they can update cards and delivery details themselves instead of cancelling. Watch the first renewal closely: a member who takes delivery of a second box rarely leaves after that.
What Members One runs for you
The playbook above is the fun part. The busywork of billing, retries, member records and pricing at the till is what Members One automates.
- Billing on your schedule, with failed-card retries handled automatically
- A member portal for self-service card and address updates
- Club pricing applied automatically at the cellar door POS
- Member-exclusive access to events and releases
Starting a club, answered
The questions we hear from cellar doors planning their first club. For the deeper detail, see the Subscription Clubs page.