New Zealand Winegrowers' fourth annual Wine Business Forum runs for a single day on 27 August 2026, 8.00am to 5.00pm, at Te Papa on the Wellington waterfront. Themed 'Winning in Changing Markets', it targets wine industry decision-makers with sessions on the United States, India, South Korea, AI and digital, and wine tourism. It is the anchor day of the wider New Zealand Wine 2026 industry gathering.
The Wine Business Forum 2026 is a one-day industry conference staged by New Zealand Winegrowers at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa in Wellington on Thursday 27 August 2026, running 8.00am to 5.00pm. The organiser's own event page confirms the date, times, region and venue, and titles the fourth edition 'Winning in Changing Markets'.
New Zealand Winegrowers describes the forum as a key gathering for industry leaders focused on where the next phase of growth will come from for New Zealand wine. The stated intent is commercial rather than technical: understanding a continually changing operating environment, identifying where growth opportunities lie in emerging markets, and examining how wine tourism can drive industry growth.
New Zealand Winegrowers is the national industry organisation for the country's grape and wine sector. Its own website states it represents more than 600 grower members and 700 winery members, and it carries out research, promotion, marketing and advocacy on behalf of New Zealand growers and winemakers domestically and in export markets.
The forum is now in its fourth year. The 2025 edition, carried on the organiser's NZW25 pages, was themed around the fast-changing landscape of the global wine industry and coincided with 30 years of the Sustainable Winegrowing New Zealand programme. In New Zealand Winegrowers' own trade column in New Zealand Winegrower magazine, the third forum was reported under the title 'Embracing Change and Sustaining Growth', drawing what the organisation described as a strong turnout of members and wider industry. The 2026 forum is sponsored by eShipping by Hillebrand Gori.
New Zealand Winegrowers has published a four-theme structure for 2026.
'Winning in the United States' addresses New Zealand's largest and most valuable export market during a period of vineyard removals, softer sales, distributor disruption and shifting consumer behaviour, covering entry and adjustment strategies and where growth still exists in overlooked segments.
'Winning in New Markets' splits into India, positioned as a timely opportunity now that the Free Trade Agreement is in place, and South Korea, presented as a recent case study in New Zealand wine growth.
'Winning Through Digital, Data and AI' is aimed squarely at small and medium wineries without the resources for advanced marketing, covering content creation at scale, prompting, AI across marketing workflows, affordable market research and first steps for upskilling teams.
'Winning Through Story, Food and Place' builds on Tourism New Zealand's food and beverage storytelling and examines how wine sits alongside cuisine in New Zealand's global reputation.
The published speaker list is genuinely international. Sonal C Holland MW is India's first and only Master of Wine and founder of the Sonal Holland Academy and the India Wine & Spirits Awards. You-Jin Lee is Head of Business Development at NZTE Seoul. Erin Kirschenmann is managing editor of Wine Business Monthly. Justin Noland leads digital acceleration and AI enablement at The Duckhorn Portfolio. Domestic voices include Tourism New Zealand GM Marketing Brodie McLeish, Invivo Wines co-founder Tim Lightbourne with CMO Rachael Everitt, and Destination Wairarapa chief executive Anna Nielson. A panel brings together Wendy Trolove of the Ant Moore Group, Pip Goodwin of Palliser Estate Wines and Joanne Deitch of Craggy Range.
New Zealand Winegrowers states the day is designed for decision-makers within the wine industry. A programme overview PDF, a full programme page, a speakers page and a list of attending companies are all published on the event site.
Te Papa sits on Cable Street on the Wellington waterfront, within walking distance of the Courtenay Place and Te Aro hospitality districts and a short walk from the central business district. New Zealand Winegrowers lists the venue itself as one of the reasons to attend, describing it as New Zealand's premier waterfront cultural venue.
Te Papa's own venue-hire material describes a purpose-built conference capability within the museum, with the Soundings Theatre seating 328 and an adjacent foyer accommodating up to 200 for functions. New Zealand Winegrowers has not published which internal space the 2026 forum occupies, so the exact room configuration and delegate count are unconfirmed.
The forum's proximity to the rest of the week matters for delegate movement. The Celebration Dinner for New Zealand Wine 2026 takes place the same evening at Takina Wellington Convention and Exhibition Centre, which stands directly opposite Te Papa on Cable Street. Delegates can move from the day programme to the evening function on foot in a couple of minutes, which removes the transfer problem that usually complicates a conference-plus-gala day.
New Zealand Winegrowers has published four Wellington accommodation options with negotiated codes for the event: the Copthorne Hotel Wellington Oriental Bay, TRYP by Wyndham, Ramada Wellington and Microtel Wellington. Block dates run 25 to 28 August 2026, and the organiser explicitly warns that August is a busy month in Wellington and recommends booking early. Wellington Airport is roughly a fifteen-minute drive from the waterfront precinct in normal traffic, and delegates arriving from Marlborough, Hawke's Bay, Nelson and Central Otago have direct or one-stop domestic connections into the capital.
The forum is a compact illustration of how a primary-industry body uses the capital. New Zealand Winegrowers assembles a single national industry week in Wellington built around a museum conference day, a convention centre gala dinner across the road, and a morning-tea networking session, then wraps it in an accommodation block. The result is a genuine national delegate draw into Wellington in late August, drawn from every winegrowing region in the country plus international speakers, without any single element needing a large-format exhibition hall.
It also signals where the sector's conference content is heading. A programme that gives equal billing to AI adoption in small wineries and to wine tourism as an export lever reflects a broader shift in New Zealand primary-industry events away from purely technical content and toward market development and visitor economy themes.
The Wine Business Forum is not a standalone conference. The organiser nests it as a component of New Zealand Wine 2026, its annual industry event, alongside the Celebration Dinner and a Women in Wine Connect session. The forum occupies 27 August; the wider New Zealand Wine 2026 programme spans 27-28 August.
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