Independent winemakers in Australia could soon have a gateway to international sales with distributor Digital Wine Ventures (ASX: DW8) set to integrate their distribution services into Vivino – the world’s most downloaded mobile wine app and largest online wine marketplace.

The integration will come through a partnership between Vivino and WineDepot which has completed the technical integration and onboard testing, making wine discovery and purchase fun, accessible and effortless for wine drinkers through the Vivino app.

“If you want to understand what the future of online wine sales looks like, then Vivino is without a doubt the one to watch. Their mobile first approach is a key differentiator, which combined with 10 years of accumulated user generated content, including over 1.5 billion wine label scans, puts them in an enviable position,” said Digital Wine Ventures CEO, Dean Taylor.

“I have no doubt that Vivino will play a much larger role in online wine sales in the future. Our partnership provides Vivino’s users more product choice and an unparalleled buying experience.

“For us, it provides us access to a powerful direct-to-consumer sales channel that allows the wineries we work with to generate incremental and high margin sales.”

Australian wineries are already able to list their wines for online distribution through Digital Wines’ WineDepot platform but this integration into Vivino will enable them to access global customers without opening a separate Vivino account.

Products listed on WineDepot will instead be automatically uploaded to Vivino while WineDepot will continue managing the packing and delivery of wines purchased on Vivino by their 50 million users worldwide.

Under the partnership, WineDepot will pay a fixed percentage of marketing fees to Vivino where purchase prices will also include WineDepot’s distributor margins.

In 2020, Vivino sold wines from 700 independent wine businesses which generated more than USD $265 million in sales as consumers around the world shifted en masse to online purchasing. With further growth plans to capitalise on the rising preference towards online channels brought upon by the COVID-19 pandemic, Vivino recently raised USD $155 million to expand its presence and bolster its technology.

For the Quarter ending 31 December 2020, WineDepot generated $712k revenue which represented a 78% increase on their September Quarter.