Dreaming of your own business in the country? Do you like quality wines and are an expert in this field? Do you have a sufficiently large start-up capital and the main source of income that will allow you to live comfortably until the moment your enterprise starts making profit? In this case, it is worth considering the option of opening your own wine production business. This business cannot be called either simple or low-cost. With a profitability of production of 100%, the invested funds can be returned, in the best case, only after five years from the start of work. However, with a competent approach and great luck, it can become a profitable family business, which will be passed on to next generations .
Types of wines
First, let's define the terms. What is wine? Wine is a product of the fermentation of grape juice, which is subjected to special processing in advance (such grape juice is called a must). But there are a lot of types and brands of wines. Experts know that the taste, color and other characteristics of the wine directly depend on the grape variety from which it was produced, the year of harvest, production technology, microclimate and even just the climatic conditions of the area where the production is located. According to the manufacturing technology, all wines can be divided into sparkling, still, natural sweet, fortified and aromatic.
Most widely used are quiet wines, which, in turn, are divided into dry, semi-sweet and semi-dry. These species are made exclusively from ripe grapes. Rosé and red wines are made only from red grape varieties, but almost any variety can be used to make white wines.
Wine Production Stages
The production of wine is not for their own needs, but for sale, the process is complex and expensive. The quality of the final product is the determining condition for the success of the entire enterprise. The main difficulty lies in the fact that the quality of products is influenced by a huge number of different factors - from the quality of the feedstock, which is used in production, to strict observance of the technological process. And if it is not so difficult to solve the problem with the choice and purchase of raw materials (albeit costly in time and money), then strict adherence to technological requirements at all stages of wine production can be ensured only with the direct participation of the owner of the winery. As for investments in such a project, there is no single figure here and cannot be. The amount of start-up capital is influenced by a large number of different factors - from the location of the economy to the scale of production. Unambiguously, we can only say that the figures of 1-1.5 million rubles, which appear in many articles on opening a business, no longer correspond to reality. Rather, it is possible to open a wine production for 1-2 million rubles, but it will not last for a long time, as it will simply be unprofitable (and also illegal). On such a scale, it is possible to consider winemaking not as a business, but as an expensive and prestigious hobby. In fact, you need at least 10 million rubles (in fact, from 15 million rubles). Keep in mind that with this money you will not only buy production equipment and raw materials, but also rent or buy a plot (in this case, the total amount will still increase), build premises, acquire furniture and office equipment.
Like any other business (all the more so, at such a considerable cost), you should start organizing your winery with the preparation of a business plan. For its development will have to turn to specialists. They will evaluate the market, do all the calculations, predict the profits and calculate the costs. A well-designed business plan will be required to arrange loans or search for investors for your project.
In general, there are several main stages to create a winery. At the first stage, it searches for a site for the construction of industrial premises. This plot can be rented or purchased as a property. It all depends on your financial capabilities and the location of your company.
When the site is found, you must register your organization and draw up the necessary permits (licenses and certificates). At the stage of resolving legal issues, construction and installation work will be carried out on the site of your choice. In parallel with this, start buying basic and auxiliary equipment, looking for workers and purchasing raw materials. At the last stage, commissioning is carried out, and your production will finally work.
And now we will analyze all these stages in more detail.
Registration of wine production
First of all, you will need to decide on the legal form of your business. In our case, the best option is a limited liability company (LLC). First you will need to choose a name for your LLC. It must be in Russian. In one locality, there cannot be several limited liability companies with the same names. And finally, the name of your LLC should correspond to the activity that you will be engaged in. The last paragraph is not mandatory, but still experienced entrepreneurs strongly recommend it. This is especially true for the field of activity to which this article is devoted. From the very beginning, consider the name of your LLC as a brand (even if for now, at the initial stage of your work, it is not one). If your imagination is not enough, seek the help of professionals - in an advertising or marketing agency. They have specialists who are engaged in naming (they come up with names for companies, products, etc.). The name of your organization should not be very complicated and long, memorable, recognizable and, most importantly, “speaking”.
When you finally chose a name for your organization, it's time to decide on the legal address at which it will be registered. This is the place where all information about your LLC will be stored and where the tax inspection will subsequently come with checks. In principle, the legal address may even be the place of residence of the founder (that is, simply put, his apartment). But this is not our case. The legal address of your company will be the address of your production. If you intend to rent a place for it, you will need to take a letter of guarantee from the lessor in which he will give guarantees that he will provide a legal address for your organization. A copy of the document confirming the ownership of the plot and / or premises is also attached to the letter of guarantee.
Then you will need to choose the types of activities that your limited liability company will engage in. You can find them in a special classifier OKVED. You will have one core code. In our case, it is OKVED 15.93 - Production of grape wine. This class includes: production of grape wines: table wines, ordinary and vintage wines, sparkling wines, sparkling wines. But this group does not include the production of wine from grapes grown by this farm (see OKVED code 08/18/2019) and bottling wine and packaging without processing wine (see OKVED code 08/18/2019, OKVED code 74.82). Although only one code you specify will be the main one, this does not mean at all that you cannot also prescribe additional activities. Moreover, experts strongly recommend that you do this at the stage of registering your company. Think about what areas you could deal with in the future, and be sure to add them to your code list. All types of activities indicated during registration are prescribed in the Charter of a limited liability company. Therefore, if in the future you want to expand the range or services, you will have to change the Charter, and this is quite difficult and not free.
It is also necessary to determine the size of the authorized capital. You risk this money in case of bankruptcy of your organization. The size of the authorized capital may vary depending on the type of activity. So, the standard amount of capital is 10, 000 rubles. In principle, for about 80% of the activities this is enough. But not in our case. The size of the authorized capital for the production of ethyl alcohol and alcohol with its content is 10 million rubles. So, at a minimum, you should have such an amount if you intend to open up even a small production of alcohol-containing drinks.
There is, however, one caveat. According to Art. 2 of the Federal Law of August 18, 2019 No. 171-ФЗ “On State Regulation of the Production and Turnover of Ethyl Alcohol, Alcohol and Alcohol-Containing Products”, alcohol products are food products that are produced using ethyl alcohol made from food raw materials, and (or) alcohol-containing food products with an ethyl alcohol content of more than 1.5% of the finished product. Alcoholic beverages are divided into such types as drinking ethyl alcohol, alcoholic beverages (including vodka), wine (including natural and fortified wine). Natural wine is an alcoholic product that is made from wine materials (produced without the addition of ethyl alcohol) without the addition of ethyl alcohol and aromatic and flavor additives, with an ethyl alcohol content of not more than 15% of the finished product, including sparkling wine, sparkling wine, sparkling wine wine, champagne. Thus, Law No. 171-FZ does not contain an indication of the minimum authorized capital for organizations producing alcoholic products with an ethyl alcohol content of less than 15% of the finished product (these are natural wines). That is, if your production does not meet the above criteria, then the authorized capital of the LLC may well amount to 10 thousand rubles. On the other hand, in order to obtain a license for the production of alcoholic beverages, the authorized capital of your organization should still be at least 1 million rubles.
If your organization has several founders, then the authorized capital is contributed by each of them according to its share in the organization (the size of the share is prescribed in the Charter of the LLC).
It is important to note that the authorized capital of an LLC can be paid in both money and property. If you intend to contribute the charter capital of the organization in money, then you must put the necessary amount into the organization’s bank account within four months after opening the organization. When depositing the authorized capital to the current account in the payment purpose, it must be indicated that this is the authorized capital of the organization. After the authorized capital is paid into the current account, the entrepreneur can use it for the organization’s personal needs, pay for goods, services, etc. The main requirement is that at the end of the year the amount of the authorized capital should be present in full on the organization’s current account. And from the new year you can use it again.
As for the introduction of the charter capital of LLC property, there were no problems with this procedure until the end of last year. The founder could independently evaluate his property and contribute it as his share in the authorized capital. This information was recorded in the minutes of the meeting of the founders or the decision of the sole founder (if the founder is in one person). However, from this year the founder does not have the right to independently evaluate his property. Now this requires an independent appraiser (who provides his services, of course, for a fee). It is no longer as profitable to bring in the authorized capital with property as before, so entrepreneurs, as a rule, prefer the monetary option.
At the next stage, it will be necessary to prepare a package of documents for registration of LLC and Application for registration of LLC (form P11001). The application is filled out and signed by the founder, and then numbered, laced with black thread. After the preparation of application P11001, it is necessary to prepare the Charter of the organization in two copies. One of these copies remains with the founder and must be kept at the legal address of his company. As well as the statement P11001, both copies of the charter must be numbered and stitched with black thread. Finally, you need to pay the state fee for the registration of LLC. Its size is 4000 rubles. Details for payment can be taken from the tax office. When paying, the basis of payment must indicate “State duty for registration of a limited liability company“ Name of the company ””. The original receipt of payment of the duty is attached to the package of documents.
If your LLC has several founders, then for each of them a separate copy of the foundation agreement is prepared, which is also numbered, laced and sealed with the signature of the director.
It will also be necessary to submit copies of the founders' passports to the tax office (copies of all pages are made).
After submitting the documents to the tax office about a week later, you will be able to pick up the documents of your freshly registered company: Certificate of OGRN LLC with the assigned registration number, Certificate of TIN LLC, extract from the USRN or instead of it there may be a register sheet in the form No. 50007, Charter of LLC.
After registering an LLC, you will need to go to the district statistics department and get a letter of statistics from your LLC from them, develop and approve the corporate identity and logo of your company, order a seal, issue an order appointing the director of the LLC, open an account for the organization, transfer the authorized capital of the company to it . The authorized capital must be transferred within four months, but it is better to do this as soon as possible, because you can immediately use this money for your company. Keep in mind that immediately after the registration of the LLC, your organization will automatically be subject to the OSNO tax (general system). If you decide to switch to a different taxation system, you must do this right away. For small production with the number of employees no more than 100 people will be suitable as a tax system and UTII (single tax on imputed income). In this case, the relevant data are entered into the main documents (an entry is made in the state register and the Charter of the company).
Finally, after registration by the 20th day of the next month, you must submit to the tax office a report on the average number of employees in your enterprise.
Obtaining a license for the production of alcoholic beverages
Companies planning to start producing alcohol are required to obtain a license to produce alcohol. Also, this document allows you to store and sell finished quantities of finished alcohol products.
The license is issued by a state licensing authority vested with authority from the Federal Service for the Regulation of the Alcohol Market and acting in accordance with the Federal Law "On State Regulation of the Production and Turnover of Ethyl Alcohol".
A license is required for the production of food-containing alcohol and alcohol products; ethyl alcohol; alcohol-containing non-food products. Types of products covered by the license: ethyl alcohol, methylated spirits, food ethyl alcohol, vodka, wine, natural wine, wine material, alcohol-containing food and non-food products, denatured alcohol-containing products, drinking ethyl alcohol, other alcoholic beverages.
Such a license can only be obtained by a legal entity with the legal form of LLC, OJSC or ZAO with a fully paid authorized capital of the enterprise.
A license for the production of alcohol is issued after considering the application of the applicant company. A very impressive package of documents (originals and notarized copies) must be attached to the application: certificate of state registration of a legal entity, certificate of TIN, a full package of constituent documentation, a receipt on payment of state fees, conclusions of SES and the Ministry of Emergencies on the conformity of production and storage facilities with sanitary facilities, environmental and fire safety requirements, agreement on the organization of control over the production of alcoholic and alcohol-containing products, certificates of conformity of equipment standards and production standards, a document confirming the payment of the authorized capital (not required for state-owned enterprises), a scheme for equipping production facilities with equipment, calculation of technological equipment capacities, confirmation of the right to use the premises for the production and storage of products: long-term lease agreement or certificate of ownership, technical documentation for measuring instruments for manufactured products.
The list of documentation may vary depending on the region. Since in each subject of the Russian Federation its own rules for obtaining a license may apply. Therefore, the exact list of securities must be clarified by the licensing authority at the location (registration) of the legal entity.
To obtain a license, you will also have to pay a fee. Its size may vary depending on the direction of the license: for the production (storage, wholesale) of alcohol and ethyl alcohol (denatured) you need to pay 6 million rubles; for the production of wine, sparkling wine and other products not containing ethyl alcohol, will have to pay 500 thousand rubles.
Immediately tune in to a long wait. The licensing authority reviews the submitted documents within 45 days. And be prepared for on-site inspection to establish compliance of premises and equipment with licensed requirements. If in the end a positive decision is made, you will receive an authorization document with a validity period of five years.
Note that obtaining a license for the production of alcohol is quite difficult. This process is lengthy and involves numerous bureaucratic obstacles. To reduce the waiting period and minimize the risk of refusal to issue a license, you can seek help from specialists - law firms. Pleasure is, however, not cheap. The cost of their services starts from 250 thousand rubles.
However, in order to obtain a license for the production of alcohol within the deadlines established by law, it is necessary to provide ideal training. Very often, independent attempts end in failure and loss of time - it is difficult to take into account all the requirements, it is difficult to correctly prepare the documentation.
Since 2010, the certification of wine means receiving a declaration of conformity for finished products. But first you need to get a sanitary-epidemiological conclusion (SEZ). After passing a sanitary and epidemiological examination, during which the quality of the drink will be analyzed, in particular the presence of toxic substances (for example, sulfur dioxide, ethyl alcohol, you will receive an official document that confirms the quality of the products declared by the manufacturer. According to the technological instructions, the wine product must comply approved indicators for strength, sugar content, the amount of extract in the drink, for acids and solids, etc. Wine samples should correspond There are current GOSTs: GOST R 51074-2003 - grape wines; GOST R 52523-2006 - table wines; GOST R 52404-2005 - special wines; GOST R 52195-2003 - aromatized wines; GOST R 52558-2006 - carbonated wines and wines carbonated pearl.
Wine Technology and Equipment
First, the grapes are delivered to the winery, where the raw materials are processed. First, it enters the comb-separator crusher, where berries are crushed and ridges are separated. It is necessary to ensure that during this operation the grape seeds are not damaged, as this can negatively affect the wine: crushed bones give the drink a tart and pungent taste. After the crusher, the grapes are moved to vats, where special substances that kill bacteria are added to the mass. Further, the grape mass from juice and peel is fermented. After receiving the wort, spontaneous heating of the mass occurs, as a result of which the sweet taste of grapes disappears. This stage of wine making is called alcoholic fermentation (fermentation). Fermentation is a rather complex chemical process. It is caused by yeast, which promotes the decomposition of sugar into alcohol and carbon dioxide, which produces heat. At a temperature of +12 degrees, the surface of the wort is covered with bubbles of carbon dioxide, which is a sign of the onset of fermentation. Typically, the fermentation process takes place at a temperature of 20-22 degrees (for white wines) and 28-30 (for red wines). Fermentation lasts from 4 to 10 days. The exact period depends on the type of future wine: red wines - from 7-10 days, pink and white - 5-7 days, local, table wines - 4-6 days. After 1-2 days, violent fermentation occurs, in which a large amount of foam appears. After 2-3 weeks, fermentation gradually subsides, and then completely stops. Sweet juice is replaced by a liquid that is completely devoid of sugar and enriched with alcohol. This young wine is muddy and full of gases. Then it is clarified, as a result of which the drink becomes transparent. If the wine is stored in small containers, it is necessary to decant it from time to time in order to saturate the liquid with oxygen. Centrifugation and filtration allows you to clean the wine from impurities.
For the production of table, dessert and liquor wines will require special equipment. This list includes a pneumatic grape press, a grape crusher with a comb separator, a pick-up tray, a conveyor belt, a filter press, a wine bottling line, a capping machine, an applicator for applying a self-adhesive label, a TRP conveyor. The cost of equipment depends on capacity, model and manufacturer. So, for example, a pneumatic grape press will cost 350 thousand rubles, a crusher for grapes with a comb separator - 15-20 thousand rubles, mezzanine receivers - 25 thousand rubles, conveyors - 45 thousand rubles, a filter press - 110 thousand rubles. A wine bottling line will cost about one million rubles. It includes a filling machine, a capping machine, an applicator for applying a self-adhesive label, a conveyor. The final cost of the production line is about one and a half million rubles, not including the cost of commissioning. But often the equipment supplier carries out installation and commissioning at his own expense.
If you plan to produce from a thousand bottles of wine per day, then you will need a grape processing line with a capacity of 500 kg / hour. To accommodate the equipment will require considerable area. In addition, it is desirable that your plant has the possibility of one-time storage. The entire production area is divided into several sectors. There will be a bottling shop, cellars for aging vintage wines (8 meters wide, 40 meters long and about 4 meters deep), alcohol storage (if you are going to produce dessert and fortified wines), a boiler room, finished goods warehouses with a total area of 200 square meters. meters, an auxiliary workshop for bottling, as well as an office where the administration will be located.
Since large areas are required for the placement of wine production, it is usually taken outside the city or placed on its outskirts. This is primarily due to the lower cost of rent and the ability to travel vehicles.
In addition to renting space, building premises and buying equipment, a separate item of expenditure is the cost of raw materials. The first batch of wine will require 50 tons of grapes, as well as additional consumables (sugar, alcohol) and the aforementioned containers (bottles, corks, labels, etc.). The cost of purchasing raw materials will be from 1.3 million rubles.
So, capital expenditures will amount to over 2.5 million rubles. With such investments, your factory will be able to produce 8, 000 decaliters of wine per month.
However, this is far from all costs. Do not forget about the salaries of your employees. The main salary fund will be about 270 thousand rubles plus taxes (total monthly payroll will be over 320 thousand rubles). Saving on staff is not worth it.
Finished Product Sales
But it is not enough to produce products. It is also necessary to establish its marketing. The best option is to conclude agreements with distributors and retail chains. However, getting to the shelves of large chain stores will be very expensive for a new product, so for the first time you will sell your products directly to shops and supermarkets. At first, try to keep prices as low as possible. Price dumping is not the best option for entering the market, in this case it will help to attract the attention of buyers. Think in advance about favorable conditions for wholesale buyers.
Advertising is worth starting from the very first months of your company’s existence. It is advisable that your marketing campaign be developed by specialists. And in this case it will be wiser (and in some cases cheaper) not to hire an advertising specialist, but to outsource this area of work. The advertising campaign will be aimed at increasing brand awareness and increasing customer loyalty (for this, various discounts and special offers are used). In the future, when you raise the price, competent advertising will help keep customers and increase their number due to a well-known brand and a positive reputation.
In the future, it is worth thinking about opening your own outlets (and ideally branded stores). Here, your visitors can get expert advice, purchase their favorite wine and even taste new varieties. A separate income item may be conducting excursions on the territory of your winery. Of course, one should not have high hopes in this direction. This is rather a good marketing move, and not a way to increase the profit of the enterprise. Do not forget about the additional costs. At a minimum, you will need one guide who will acquaint visitors with the process of creating wine, tell the story of the company and offer a tasting of different types of wines with their description.
With investments of 10 million rubles, the payback period of such a difficult, but very interesting and promising business will be at least five years. There are many prospects for its expansion. In the future, you can grow grapes on your own, which will significantly reduce the cost of a noble drink and increase its quality (even the most reliable suppliers experience annoying mistakes, which affects, first of all, the quality of your drink and your reputation as a producer).
Sysoeva Lilia
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08/18/2019