eighteen twenty wines, Maine's Woman Owned Small Business of the Year 2022
If there are two things that people love, it’s locally grown quality foods, and good wine. Amanda O’Brien knew this, and after giving her friend’s home-brewed rhubarb wine a try, decided to make it a full fledged business. Since 2015, eighteen twenty wines has refined its recipes and built a reputation for making flavorful wines with Maine grown rhubarb, blueberries, strawberries, and even peaches. The business gradually grew, until eventually, in 2018 Amanda became the sole owner.
It was at this point that Amanda decided to reach out to the Women’s Business Center to develop a financial plan, secure financing for growth, and to rework the operations strategy of eighteen twenty wines. This planning and the advice of the WBC clearly paid off, as sales nearly doubled between 2018 and 2021, and Amanda started bringing on her first employees to help with the continued growth of the business. By the end of 2021, eighteen twenty wines had five employees, where previously it only employed the owners. This growth was achieved partly from the sustained effort Amanda put into the online marketing strategy, quadrupling her audience online and taking advantage of the great visuals her products gave her.
Throughout the pandemic, Amanda continued to find ways to ensure the success of eighteen twenty wines. Online ordering was added through VinoShipper and Square, and more wholesale accounts were added, eventually reaching 60 stores across Maine. Eighteen twenty wines was able to keep up with demand thanks to the procurement strategy Amanda had built, sourcing over ten thousand pounds of ingredients from Maine farms in 2021, with a particular focus on rhubarb, a low intensity crop that’s perfect for small farmers.
With the success of eighteen twenty wine, Amanda and her husband Alex have thought about how they can support their community and other local businesses. In the tasting room, eighteen twenty features products from other local businesses to raise their profiles, all the ingredients are sourced in Maine, and Amanda has helped run programs like Maine Center for Entrepreneurship’s Top Gun program, and the upcoming Advanced Marketing program at the WBC. In addition, Amanda helped establish Social Media Breakfast Maine, a monthly event that ran for 13 years to help small businesses work on their social media marketing strategies.
By building a truly unique product, using local ingredients, and giving back to the community that supported her, Amanda O’Brien has exemplified the best of Maine’s small business owners. For her efforts, the SBA is honored to award eighteen twenty wines the 2022 Woman-Owned Small Business Award for Maine.