Retailer Benefits
     From the retailer’s point of view, ChoiceMaster is a custom tailored answer to many of his or her problems.  First of all, it only shows the products that are in the inventory of the store in which the kiosk is installed, so customers are always presented with items they can purchase on site.  Because the kiosk is self-prompting, it often delivers more information to customers than the busy staff can.  As a matter of fact, store clerks do not need to be all that knowledgeable.  When a customer has a wine question, all the floor clerk has to do is say, “Let’s see what the ChoiceMaster says,” and then walk the customer over to the unit.  The kiosk will then present the customer with a series of questions that will narrow down a huge, complex store inventory to just those wines that will be of interest to the consumer.  The customer can then review and even print out a recommended list of wines that meet his or her needs.      

It is at this point that brand owner information can be presented to the customer.  For a cost of approximately 65 cents per label per store per month, a brand owner can provide the customer with up to three pages of detailed, full color product description with a color product shot or label on each page.  When a vintner pays to support his or her product in the ChoiceMaster system, that product name is highlighted on all ChoiceMaster recommendation screens on which it appears.

Advertised products are presented to the consumer on yellow buttons with a legend advising customers that More Information Is Available.  Non-advertised products appear on brown buttons that yield price information only when touched. Although it is true that all store products meeting a customer’s requirements are shown on the recommendation screen, products that are advertised always appear first in the list of recommended products.

ChoiceMaster Gives Consumers Many Ways to Find Your Wine

     Consumers can choose which path they want to take to find a wine.   If they are interested in finding a wine from a particular region like the Napa Valley, Australia or Bordeaux, they can choose the regional path.  All regional paths start out by asking what color wine is desired.  After selecting a wine color and drilling down the desired regional path (i.e. USA – California – North Coast – Napa Valley) and deciding what price level they are most comfortable with, customers will be presented with a list of recommended wines carried by the store.  These wines will all be from the region chosen by the customer.

Some consumers want to find wines that go with a particular food.  ChoiceMaster provides them with two ways to do this.  One is to look up general food preparations that they often serve at home (i.e., Quick & Easy – Meat – Beef – Broiled Steaks or Roasts).  The other is to look up specific food recipes that they like.    In either case, customers are presented with wines that go with the food preparation or actual recipe that they have chosen.

     Other consumers might be more interested in wines that carry a varietal label.  The top twelve varietal wines in the store are automatically shown when a customer chooses to look at a selection of red varietal wines.  The same is true for white varietal wines.  If the customer is interested in Cabernet Sauvignon, he or she would simply select Red Wine and then push the Cabernet Sauvignon button.  If there are a lot of Cabernet Sauvignon varietal wines in the store, customers are asked to choose a price range within which they are comfortable.  They then are presented with a list of varietal wines in that store, in the price range of their choice, that are labeled as Cabernet Sauvignon wines.  As is the case with all such recommendation lists, advertised wines are highlighted in yellow to show that more information from the producer is available to the consumer on these wines.     

     The ChoiceMaster system also has a Learn About Wine section where, for instance, a customer can learn about winemaking areas of the world, varietal wine grapes and the wines they produce, and how still and sparking wines are made.   Customers can also learn what the difference is between the five basic categories of dinner wine (Regional, Varietal, Proprietary, Generic and Sparkling).  In each case, customers can elect to see a list of applicable advertisers from which they can obtain further information leading to a purchasing decision. There is also a separate Learn About Liquor section that provides information about whiskies, brandies and other spirits.

 There are some consumers who know exactly what wine, liquor or beer they want to buy.   These consumers can simply enter the name (or a portion of the name) of the product they want and, if the store carries it, that product, and any others with the same name, will appear on a list for their review.

 It has been said that a good bargain is one in which the two parties walk away smiling.  ChoiceMaster is a bargain in which three parties - the brand owner, the retailer and the customer - all walk away smiling.  Now that’s a pretty good deal!

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