Mivino - Story of a Wine Bottled in a Jar

Mivino is a Georgian-based bottled wine manufacturer company. It entered the local market a few years ago. Its founders are Giorgi Machavariani and Saba Sakhvadze.

"The idea of ​​creating "Mivino came up at a party, where after breaking a few forks due to lack of corkscrew while opening the wine bottle, we realized that the wine should not have been in awkward packaging. We started thinking about alternative packaging, which would be much more convenient, portable, and most importantly, compatible with wine, in order to maintain the structure and quality of the wine for a long time. After considering many alternatives, we opted for 330ml jars."

"Mivino" offers its customers wine free from complexity, created for relationships. Founders behind the brand are going to produce only two types: white and red dry wines, and then they will add sparkling, semi-sweet, as well as fruit wines and everyone's favorite cocktails.

"We raised the first funds within Yes Georgia with the support of Crystal, a financial engagement organization, and USAID. At the beginning of 2019, "Mivino" appeared in bars and chain markets.
During this period, we tried our best to test all possible marketing channels, and get essential sales statistics from them, which would allow us to predict future sales, as well as received direct customer feedback from festivals and other external events would create a basis for product development."

In the summer of 2020, due to the pandemic, we completed test sales. After that, we built the plant for "Mivino" enterprise with our own resources and started to take care of attracting additional investment."

As for the challenges, the founders mention that due to the innovativeness of the product, there is no technical knowledge and practice in terms of bottling wine in jars.

"That's why we had to learn everything from scratch. It was also difficult to gain trust directly from the suppliers of the jars, reach partnerships, etc."

The company's future plans involve entering the local market, developing export markets; as well as increasing the product range, including adding cider, sangria, and other cocktails.