The Hermanus Wine Route alone has around fifteen cellars along the R320 through the Hemel-en-Aarde Valley (Wesgro), and Stanford, Bot River, Elgin and Elim add many more. Visitors usually plan two or three stops in a day, and they make that plan on their phones. A wine farm website has one main job: give them a reason to choose you, and every detail they need to get there.
In short
Put tasting hours, prices, booking and directions on one clear “Visit” page. Show your wines with tasting notes and downloadable tech sheets. If you sell online, make sure your liquor licence covers it and that your website confirms buyers are over 18. Grow a wine club list with proper consent, and keep your Google profile as current as your website.
What visitors need before they set off
Most people looking at a wine farm website are deciding whether to visit today or this weekend. Make these easy to find, ideally on one page:
- Tasting room hours, including public holidays and the days you close.
- What a tasting costs and what’s included.
- Whether to book, and a way to do it online.
- Food: a restaurant, a cheese platter, or bring your own picnic.
- Who’s welcome: children, dogs, groups, wheelchairs.
- Directions, with a map pin and a note on the road in if it helps.
If any of these take more than a tap or two to find, visitors move on to the next farm on the route.
The pages a wine farm website needs
1. Visit
Everything above, on one page, linked from the top of every page. On many wine farm websites this is the page people open most, so treat it like your front door.
2. The wines
A page for each wine with a good bottle shot, tasting notes, the vintage and the price. Add a downloadable tech sheet for each one: trade buyers, sommeliers and wine writers look for them, and they save you answering the same emails.
3. Shop
An online shop lets visitors re-order the wine they tasted long after they’ve gone home. Before you sell online, check with your attorney or liquor licence consultant that your licence covers online sales and delivery. Liquor sold online still needs proper invoices and sales records, as Wineland’s guide to online wine sales paperwork explains. Selling liquor to anyone under 18 is illegal, so ask buyers to confirm their age before they enter the shop, and again at checkout.
4. Wine club
A wine club turns a good afternoon into a customer for years. Keep the sign-up form short, say clearly what members get and how often you’ll email, and add a consent checkbox. South Africa’s privacy law applies to every name and email you collect: our POPIA checklist covers what your forms need.
5. Events and weddings
Harvest days, music evenings, long-table lunches and weddings each deserve a page with dates, prices and a booking link. An events page also gives people a reason to come back to your website through the year.
6. Story and people
The winemaker, the soils, the history of the farm. This is where you stand apart from the cellar next door. Keep it honest and personal, with photos of the people who make the wine.
7. Trade and press
A simple page with your tech sheets, high-resolution bottle shots, labels, logo and a contact person. Writers and buyers will thank you, and it stops you sending the same files again and again.
Run a wine farm in the Overberg?
We build websites for wine farms and farm stalls with tasting bookings, a wine club sign-up and an online shop, and we look after your Google profile too.
Get found on Google Maps
Many visitors never open a website before their first visit. They open Google Maps, search “wine tasting Hermanus” and pick from what they see. Your Google Business Profile matters as much as your website:
- Choose the right category, such as winery, and add others like restaurant or wedding venue if they apply.
- Keep your hours exact, with special hours for public holidays and the December season.
- Add plenty of recent photos: the tasting room, the view, the food and the bottles.
- Ask for reviews and reply to them. Our guide on getting more Google reviews shows how.
Our Google Business Profile guide walks through the setup step by step.
Photos and speed
A wine farm sells a place as much as a product, so invest in good photographs: the vineyards in different seasons, the tasting room, the food and the people. Then make sure they’re sized properly for the web. Visitors often browse from the road or from a guesthouse with a weak signal, and a page full of huge photos will load slowly or not at all.
The same goes for farm stalls, olive estates and breweries
Most of this applies to any farm business that welcomes visitors: clear hours, directions, what’s on offer, a way to buy online and a current Google profile. Visitors plan their day around what they can find on their phones.
Common questions
Do I need an online shop if I already sell through retailers?
Not necessarily, but it lets visitors re-order the wines they tasted and gives you a better margin than retail. Start with a small range of your best sellers and grow from there.
Should tasting bookings be online?
If you get busy on weekends or in December, yes. Online bookings spread visitors through the day, cut down on phone calls and give you the guests’ contact details, with their consent, for your wine club.
Do I need a separate wedding website?
Usually not. A strong weddings page on your own website, with photos, packages and an enquiry form, is easier for couples to find and for you to keep up to date.