Drinks Trade
The platform behind Australia’s leading drinks-trade publication
- Owned by The Drinks Association
- Audited circulation of 18,000
- Rebuilt on Wagtail (Python / Django)
- Editorial CMS, subscribers and directory in one platform
Drinks Trade is Australia’s leading B2B trade media publication for the drinks industry, covering wine, spirits, beer and hospitality since 2007. It is owned by The Drinks Association, the peak body for Australia’s liquor industry, and reaches an audited circulation of 18,000 trade professionals. Red Crow Digital built and runs the digital platform behind the publication.
The challenge
The Drinks Association’s original site was built on WordPress and held together with plugins, and it was becoming slow and hard to run as the publication grew. They needed a single, purpose-built platform that could handle the full publication lifecycle - editorial workflow, subscriber and advertiser management, and the trade directory - keep their audited subscriber data clean and reportable, and be fast and easy for the team to manage themselves. And the move had to happen without losing years of published content.
The solution
- A full rebuild on Wagtail (Python and Django), replacing the old WordPress site with a cleaner, faster, purpose-built platform
- A tailored editorial CMS - article scheduling, image and asset handling, and multi-section publishing - so the team runs the whole publication lifecycle in one place
- Subscriber records, advertiser listings and a searchable trade directory of suppliers, distributors and venues, all in the same system
- Clean, queryable subscriber data that keeps audited-circulation cycles running without surprises
- Hosted on AWS in Sydney, with the full historical content archive migrated across
The results
- Years of published content migrated to the new platform with no loss
- Supports the publication’s audited circulation of 18,000 trade professionals every edition
- A faster, on-brand platform the editorial team can manage themselves, evolved and supported by Red Crow as a long-term partner
Take a look at Drinks Trade for yourself at drinkstrade.com.au.