At the 2nd Wine Graduates’ Forum organized by the German Winegrowers’ Association (DWV) in mid-April, the two Geisenheim doctoral students Barbara Richter, M.Sc., and Meike Strobach, M.Sc. were honored for their outstanding presentations and awarded euros 250 each.
Barbara Richter, who writes her dissertation under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Jon Hanf, Professor for International Marketing Management, was awarded in the category “Strategic Marketing and Management”. In her presentation, she explored the question “Which competitive strategies can wine cooperatives pursue in the German wine market?”. In Germany, wine cooperatives account for approximately one-quarter of the total vineyard area. The decreasing number of wine cooperatives and their members indicates that they have difficulties adapting to changes in the market. Market-oriented production and the implementation of a competitive strategy are vital. So far, the intensity of competition has not yet been analyzed from the perspective of wine cooperatives. The aim of her research is to fill this gap and, as a result, come up with competitive strategies for wine cooperatives in the German wine industry. According to her research, the cost leadership strategy is difficult to implement successfully, whereas the strategy of differentiation can be applied in this context. However, she came to the conclusion that most quality attributes do not contribute to differentiation, e.g. for “organic”, “vegan” or “sustainable produced” wines it is important to keep up with competitors. Thus, a level playing field must be established to avoid a competitive disadvantage.
Meike Strobach from Geisenheim‘s Department of Enology was honored in the category "Analytics, Sensory, and Data Processing Methods“. In her presentation she discussed the "Impact of real and virtual reality (VR) tasting environments on the sensory evaluation of test samples and wine“, which is also the subject of her doctoral thesis. Her research consists of two parts: (a) initial tastings in real environments and (b) sensory tastings in VR environments. The real environments are realistically reproduced for the VR tastings and presented as a three-dimensional 360-degree VR experience via a head-mounted display.
Hochschule Geisenheim University congratulates Barbara Richter and Meike Strobach on their achievements!
