Using winery web sites to attract wine tourists: an international comparison Leighann Neilson Sprott School of Business, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada, and Judith Madill Telfer School of Management, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada Abstract Purpose – This paper aims to report on a study of wine regions in five countries that assessed whether and how wineries use their web sites to provide information to and attract wine tourists. Design/methodology/approach – Content analysis of winery web sites from wine regions in five countries (Australia, Canada, Chile, France, USA) was conducted. Findings – While the majority of wineries in the study utilized web sites to provide information to consumers, there were significant differences in the effectiveness with which they did so. Wineries desiring to attract tourist visitors should ensure that basic information content is present (e.g. hours of operation, directions to the winery). Although some wineries have begun to engage consumers on mobile platforms, more can be done to ensure access to information at all stages of the tourist visit process. Research limitations/implications – Due to time and budget constraints, the study evaluated the web sites in only some wine regions of five wine-producing countries. Future researchers can build on this study by evaluating winery web sites in additional wine regions and countries. Practical implications – The authors identify practical ways in which wineries can enhance the information they provide via their web sites to attract winery visitors and augment cellar door sales. Originality/value – Previous research has examined winery web sites at the level of the destination marketing organization or individual winery within a country; the authors look at individual winery web sites in international comparison. Wineries seeking to attract tourists to their cellar door operations can thus evaluate their online communications in comparison with national and international competitors and best practices. Keywords Marketing, Content analysis, Wines, Tourism development Paper type Research paper Introduction Tourism is an important and growing part of the wine industry internationally. In California, the largest wine producing region of the USA, 20.7 million wine tourists spent an estimated US$2.1 billion in 2009 (Wine Institute, 2012). In the Napa wine region of California alone, the number of visitors increased from 3 million in 2005 (MKF Research, 2007) to 3.5 million in 2008 (Stonebridge Research Group, 2008), an average annual growth rate of over 5 percent. Similarly, wine tourism in the Niagara The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at www.emeraldinsight.com/1751-1062.htm This research was funded by a grant from the Ontario Research Network for Electronic Commerce (ORNEC), a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Institutional Grant, and the Paul Desmarais Professorship in Marketing. The authors wish to thank Nicole Ives-Allison for her assistance with data collection and Dr Jose Rojas Mendes for his generosity in sharing information about the Chilean wine industry. Received 13 July 2012 Revised 14 August 2013 Accepted 29 August 2013 International Journal of Wine Business Research Vol. 26 No. 1, 2014 pp. 2-26 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 1751-1062 DOI 10.1108/IJWBR-07-2012-0022 IJWBR 26,1 2