Diving Into Artificial Intelligence and Its Role in the Future of the Wine Industry

Cathy - wine consumers and artificial intelligence

Greetings this week from Prowein, the wine and spirits industry’s largest trade fair, held annually in Düsseldorf, Germany. I’m listed in Prowein’s program to offer a presentation on Artificial Intelligence (AI) for wine, and Matthew and I are finding that topic overflowing into Liquid Love Letter.

AI for wine?

Before we go any further, let me be clear: I am no fan of “robot wine,” mainly because I am a tactile, emotional lover of wine at my core, and also because I don’t think “robot wine” is a rationally feasible goal to pursue.

I do, however, believe that the wine industry needs to be thoroughly alert to AI, mainly because you (our consumers and our audience) are alert to AI, and it will inevitably influence both the production of wine, and the interaction between producers and consumers, moving forward.

So, although “robot wine” isn’t something I can get behind, I’d like to explore AI a bit for wine from the end consumers’ point of view.

Big picture, I’m going to guess that many if not most of you have experimented (and maybe even gotten playful) with general AI tools and resources, from ChatGPT to Bard to Midjourney. Good for you, and in a way that underscores my point: every day, and practically every hour, we are all becoming more familiar and also more comfortable with AI in our day-to-day lives.

Zooming in a bit, I wonder how many of us have also experimented with recent developments of wine-specific AI, such as platforms like somm.ai or Tastry or Vino AI. Even more “legacy” apps and recommendation engines are also driven (and have been driven for years now) by machine learning and AI behind the scenes, too.

The wine industry has been “doing” Ai for a lot longer than many of us realize. It’s just that now, we’re talking more about it with more frequency and curiosity. (And, okay, some trepidation too.) IMO every conversation is a step in the right direction, because AI is more and more a part of our every day lives and wine needs to be there too, “there” in our every day lives and “there” too in terms of technology.

Here’s a scenario that will be happening soon, if you haven’t experienced it already: asking AI to plan your next itinerary (one example is called, literally, “Trip Planner AI”). We’ll be asking AI to plan our next itinerary in wine country, in our case, based on our own preferences, location, travel trends, and maybe even our own wine purchasing history.

You’ll want to be tweaking it, of course; AI is no “magic wand,” not for any phase of the winemaking and consumption process. But it’s right here, right now, and each of us is stepping in, admittedly with various levels of enthusiasm.

Let’s hear what Matthew has to say.

Matthew - will the wine industry adapt quicker this go around?

My thoughts on Artificial Intelligence are vast. I'm human, I know what I know and I'm getting better at learning what I don't know. But how do I go about learning more?

The wine industry is notoriously slow to adopt change.

Look at Instagram, for instance. How long did it take wineries to accept the reality they had to start an IG page in order to engage their fanbase and continue to grow it? Some are still reticent!

So this technology we refer to as AI, that big brained individuals have been investing in for decades, now has the narrative that it will replace us (humans)—will a mechanical faced robot actually replace us in a wine store or restaurant setting?

AI is not scary. AI is not here to replace you . But someone who uses AI is very likely to replace you. The top image in this article was created via Copilot , and the prompt I wrote took me about 15 seconds to formulate. Four option images were created within 30 seconds, and less than a total minute later I had a useable image for the article.

So how can the wine industry adopt AI to save time, maximize reach, get more efficiency out of employees, etc? That's where the real value of AI shows itself to business owners.

How many of you looked closely at my AI generated image? Did you notice the woman in the image is double fisting ? Does the AI know I went to the University of California at Santa Barbara and we drank a lot? Double fisting was a way of life. It's not perfect, but sometimes these Freudian slips breakthrough the intention and mean more for an outcome. AI will push our boundaries. AI allows us to think big and showcase creativity. No longer do you need to sit back and wait for someone else to accomplish an idea of yours. Go out and do it. Use AI to your advantage.

I often (daily) get asked by friends and people who follow me on social media where they should go on their travels, what restaurants they should eat, what tasting rooms they should visit. I only have 24 hours in the day, but I personally respond with a tailors response to each request! It takes time. It takes knowledge. It takes an ability to source information. AI helps this.

I want the wine industry to welcome AI with open arms. Let's do it together.