wine.co.za COVID-19 response

Friday, 20 March, 2020
Judy Brower | wine.co.za
Nobody is immune to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. wine.co.za has taken steps to ensure business can continue as usual, and that our staff are protected against any possible infection. We must all work together to #flattenthecurve to minimise the impact, with a particular view to protect the vulnerable in our society.

We have had plenty of notifications from wineries on their closures, and are keeping a list on our News - so if you are wanting to add your winery to the list - please email editor@wine.co.zaThe majority of wineries are still open - so no need to stay at home all of the time!

We don't only want to focus on the negative and would love to promote any wineries who are remaining open and also highlight any promotions anyone is doing.  Again - please email any promo info to editor@wine.co.za    

We are aware that public transport makes it difficult for social distancing and we are doing everything we can minimize any infections and #flattenthecurve, thus reducing the strain on our health system.

In light of this, and schools having closed, most of our team are now working remotely. We have set up work stations for our team at home with laptops and internet connections. Our telephone system is on VOIP and each staff member has their work phone at their home desk, which allows us to continue (almost) as normal – putting calls through to staff and making it easy for them to continue providing a professional level of service to our clients.  We are grateful to our staff who have helped out with sharing laptops where required.

We have not yet had our first virtual team meeting, but our telephone system facilitates tele-conferencing which we will be using soon!

In order to ensure our Shop Sales can continue and we can continue to receive and dispatch wines, our skeleton staff, Judy, Adele and Kevin are our new shop dispatchers!
Of course we have sanitizers at the door for receiving & dispatching wines.

We have sent our lovely cleaner home on full pay for a month, in order to protect her and her family, and to allow her to be with her children.

We have had a Team Whatsapp group for years anyway which works well to keep in touch, but having Whatsapp on our computers and chatting through that makes typing easier too!  Checking in at least once daily helps to keep connected.
We will keep sharing tips on self-isolating and working from home, as it can be lonely and feel strange.   

We are pleased that we have an efficient Online Wine Shop, which allows wineries to keep selling their wines online. 

We recently also launched our Direct to Consumer Sales platforms for wineries (called CellarDirect). This is great news for the consumer, as they can buy DIRECT from the producer at cellardoor prices. Of course our courier has measures in place to limit infection and for wines to arrive safely at consumers doors so that they can relax and enjoy their favourite tipple. See more on this: on our COVID info page.

There are various regulations around COVID and we will keep sharing them in our COVID Info Spotlight Page soon.

We would love to hear any tips for working remotely you are keen to share!

And remember to share your stories, promos, online sales discounts and more with us - editor@wine.co.za