If you run a cellar door in Aotearoa, you’re not just selling wine – you’re selling memories that need to survive a suitcase, a road trip or a long‑haul courier label.

Recent tourism releases show New Zealand is still in a strong visitor upswing, with international arrivals and spend tracking above pre‑pandemic levels. At the same time, global wine tourism research points to solid growth ahead, with forecasts of around 13% compound annual growth through to 2034 as travellers seek more immersive food‑and‑wine experiences.

That’s a huge opportunity for New Zealand wineries – if the bottles visitors take home arrive in one piece.

Who today’s wine tourists are

International studies describe a core wine tourist who is often in the 45–65 age bracket, but with strong growth in visitors aged 25–44 who build wineries and restaurants into their travel plans. These younger visitors are more likely to discover regions online, pre‑book tastings and actively look for producers that talk clearly about sustainability and authentic local stories.

Market profiles also show that New Zealand travellers themselves value food and wine highly when choosing destinations, and that NZ remains an important “high‑value” source market for nearby wine regions. Within New Zealand, the government has signalled the importance of wine tourism by investing nearly NZ$1 million into the Classic NZ Wine Trail to attract more visitors into regions like Hawke’s Bay, Wairarapa and Marlborough.

The pattern is simple: more high‑value visitors, more small mixed‑bottle purchases that have to survive travel.

How they taste – and buy

Most wine tourists now engage with your brand in three ways:

Cellar‑door tastings and direct sales
Global wine tourism reports show that cellar‑door experiences, guided tastings and vineyard visits remain the backbone of wine tourism, and that wineries see tangible revenue benefits from these activities. Visitors often leave tastings with a handful of favourite bottles and at least one question about how to get them home safely.
Multi‑day wine trails and road trips
Initiatives like the Classic NZ Wine Trail are designed to link cellar doors across regions and encourage travellers to visit multiple wineries over several days. On those trips people tend to buy a bottle or two at each stop, then need to drive them around in the car or campervan, or consolidate everything into one shipment before they fly home.
Clubs, shipping and repeat orders
The major global wine tourism studies highlight how many wineries now use visits to recruit direct‑to‑consumer buyers and wine‑club members. That makes the first shipped case a critical touchpoint: if it turns up broken or in packaging that feels at odds with the winery’s values, it undercuts the positive experience built at the cellar door.

All of this makes packaging part of the tourism experience, not just a back‑room cost.

The “how do I get this home?” problem

If you pour wine for tourists, you’ve heard some version of these three questions:

**“Can I put this in my suitcase?”**
Travel operators and regional tourism sites routinely advise using hard‑shell suitcases and cushioning bottles in clothing in the centre of checked bags if customers are determined to DIY. It can work, but it is slow, stressful and offers no guarantee if a bag takes a hit or gets handled roughly.
**“Can you ship this home for me?”**
Many wineries either ship directly themselves or work with specialist carriers, and general shipping advice for consumers now emphasises proper packaging, leak protection and clear labelling. That’s convenient for visitors, but it puts pressure on your packaging – a single broken bottle can ruin a whole order and trigger an expensive resend.
**“We’re driving a campervan – will these survive in the back?”**
Self‑drive tourists move bottles around for days or weeks over rural roads and through temperature swings, which increases the risk of scuffed labels and broken glass if bottles are simply laid on their sides or loosely packed.
As wine tourism expands, so does the number of one‑off, mixed orders that have to survive airlines, road trips and courier networks rather than a controlled pallet shipment.

Why packaging is now part of your visitor experience

From a winery’s point of view, wine tourism has become a serious business lever:

International visitor survey data shows that New Zealand is attracting a growing mix of higher‑spending tourists again, with strong per‑visitor expenditure trends.
Global wine tourism reports find that a large majority of wineries consider wine tourism to be important for profitability and brand‑building, not just a side activity.
Sustainability has moved from “optional” to expected; research notes that environmentally conscious practices, including packaging, increasingly influence how visitors choose wineries and how they talk about those experiences afterwards.

If the bottle a visitor buys from you in Marlborough arrives in London, Sydney or Los Angeles cracked, leaking or wrapped in layers of plastic, that final impression can outweigh the view from your terrace and the care taken in the tasting.

How Flexi‑Hex helps you look after wine tourists

This is where a purpose‑designed system like Flexi‑Hex makes life easier for cellar‑door and e‑commerce teams who are dealing with tourism‑driven sales.

Serious protection in real‑world transit
Best‑practice shipping advice highlights using sturdy outer cartons, good cushioning and leak‑resistant inner protection to reduce the risk of damage and claims. Flexi‑Hex is designed to deliver that protection with a honeycomb paper sleeve that locks around the bottle and pairs with right‑sized shippers, giving wineries a way to reduce breakage without defaulting to plastic‑based void fill.
Quick, compact options at the cellar door
Operators moving wine for tourists stress the importance of efficient packing workflows – particularly where staff are dealing with small, frequent orders. A system based on sleeves and dedicated wine shippers allows staff to protect bottles in seconds, without bulky rolls of bubble wrap or complex packing benches, which is ideal when tour buses and last‑minute buyers appear at once.
Suitcase‑ready and courier‑ready in one system
Many consumer guides now advise travellers to either use purpose‑designed wine packaging or have wineries ship directly, rather than relying on improvised clothing padding. Having a single system that can safely handle both “take it in my luggage” and “ship it to my door” use cases keeps things simpler for your team and clearer for your customers.
Packaging that supports your sustainability story
Global wine tourism work notes that sustainability messaging and visible practices on site influence how visitors perceive a winery and its region. Using a paper‑based, plastic‑free protective system helps ensure the packaging customers see at the cellar door – and open back home – is consistent with the environmental story being told in the vineyard and the tasting room.
A premium unboxing moment back home
Research into wine tourism consistently describes how visitors are seeking experiences and memories, not just purchases, and how they often share those experiences with friends and online communities. When a customer opens a thoughtfully packed, well‑protected shipment, it reinforces the feeling they had on site and makes it more likely they will talk – and post – about your brand.

Simple steps you can take now

If you want to bring your packaging in line with how visitors are actually travelling, a few practical moves can make a big difference:

Add a clearly signposted “Take me home safely” option at the cellar door using dedicated wine sleeves and boxes for 1, 2, 3 or 6 bottles, so staff have a default solution when tourists ask for advice.
Train cellar‑door staff to suggest suitcase‑ready protection or shipping cartons whenever they hear “We’re flying out tomorrow” or “We’re in a campervan for two weeks,” so safe transport becomes a natural part of the conversation.
Build your shipping and packaging approach into wine‑club and “ship home” offers, so international visitors know their bottles will be properly protected, not just dropped into a spare box.
If you are on or near the Classic NZ Wine Trail, consider aligning basic packaging principles with neighbouring wineries so visitors can consolidate mixed cases into one robust, paper‑based shipment before they leave the region.

Wine tourism will keep growing – and so will expectations. The wineries that win are the ones that make it effortless for visitors to get bottles home safely, in packaging that matches the quality of what’s in the glass.

To explore Flexi‑Hex sleeves and wine shippers, and see how they fit into your existing workflow, take a look at the wine packaging range and downloads on the Woodhill Distribution site.

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References

Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment. “International Visitor Survey (IVS).” Updated 2 March 2026.
Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment. “International Visitor Survey – December 2025 quarter.” 2026.
The Beehive. “Uncorking the Classic NZ Wine Trail.” 13 November 2025.
The Drinks Business. “Classic New Zealand Wine Trail gets NZ$991k in tourism push.” 13 November 2025.
Hochschule Geisenheim University. “Global Wine Tourism Report 2025.” 2025.
Great Wine Capitals. “Global Wine Tourism Report 2025: Landmark international study unveils the current state of the sector.” 7 October 2025.
Winetourism.com. “Annual Global Wine Tourism Report 2025.” 30 April 2025.
The Drinks Business. “Global wine tourism to see growth of 13% by 2034.” 2 February 2025.
Marlborough Wine Tours. “Packing Wine for Travel or Not? Our Best Tips.” 5 December 2023.
Newzealand.com. “Can I have New Zealand wine shipped home?” Accessed May 2026.
NZ Couriers Blog. “5 Mistakes Merchants Make When Sending Wine (And How To Avoid Them).” 18 November 2025.
South Australian Tourism Commission. “New Zealand International Market Profile 2025.” 2025.

Wine Tourism Is Booming. Is Your Packaging Keeping Up?