Winemaking and gorgeous goats: how AgriMedia is building agricultural communities
When AgriMedia acquired Wijn en Wijngaard magazine in 2024 it came with a very modest subscriber database. Two years later it has blossomed into potent brand that’s branched out into conferences, newsletters based around Dutch and Belgian wine, tastings, trade shows and a festival.
At this year’s FIPP World Media Congress, Jean-Paul Reparon, Managing Director, AgriMedia, revealed how the Dutch specialist publisher has built agricultural communities beyond publishing through trusted content, events and partnerships.
“Everything we do at AgriMedia at is about our mission – knowledge that enriches you,” he said. “That’s what we do as a business-to-business publisher.
“We are publishing in the arable farming, dairy farming, goat breeding, milking and winemaking area. We have a small event about exotics coming from outside, and then we talk about plants and the problems they have in open green maintenance.
“And a special word for the National Goat Event, attended by 1,000 people and 200 goats. We hand out an award for the most beautiful goat of the year.”
AgriMedia serves communities between 500 and 4,000 people, 70% of which are decision makers.
“So, they make their decision about their processes, about their investments, about the way they are farming,” he said. “It’s a small audience, but also a profitable business due to the valuable content we create and the high prices we can achieve for our subscriptions.”
The content AgriMedia produces is set against an often-turbulent agricultural sector in the Netherlands.
“There are challenging emission targets from the European Union and there are a lot of uncertainty among farmers at the moment. They have a lot of unrest, and that means that they are sometimes going with their tractor on a motorway, or that they are going to the Hague, to the government, because there is no direction.
“On the other side, climate change is not only a problem – there are also opportunities.”
Seizing the moment
It was one of these opportunities that led to acquisition of Wijn en Wijngaard. With the climate heating up in southern Europe, northern France, Belgium, the Netherlands and even Denmark are producing wines.
It is against the backdrop that AgriMedia purchased Wijn en Wijngaard, a small hobbyist magazine organised by a wine farmer on his vineyard in the south of France. More or less produced by volunteers, it came with subscriber base of just 500 copies and I around 1,500 email addresses.
“We said we believe in it. We are going to make a new niche, and we are going to develop it,” said Reparon.
AgriMedia’s strategy to grow Wijn en Wijngaard was built on seven fundamentals. First, make sure the magazine is relevant and the content is worth a subscription.
Next, build a 360-degree ecosystem and reach readers through the right channel. Also, identify, engage and expand the audience through paid marketing; use personalised newsletters to build loyalty; develop propositions which add value for readers and advertisers; and be trustworthy to readers and earn their attention and engagement.
“In the last year, we invested in especially Facebook marketing,” said Reparon. “We have a fully automated AI workflow, so every content article we publish is sponsored on Facebook. And by using Facebook, we are not focusing on traffic, but we are focusing on collecting email addresses.
“On the other side, we don’t want to be focusing on Facebook alone, so we also invest time and money to be at agricultural trade shows, and we always have a brand activation just to collect email addresses.”
AgriMedia also recently made a deal with one of the schools in the Netherlands so youngsters can have access for free to its content.
“At the start of their education they are able to get a free student subscription, and teachers are also helping us with getting the brand known for people who are 16, 17 years old until they die.
“When people register on our website, we also ask them to add a profile ,so we know who they are, what they do, what kind of brands they love.
“We are doing that now for a few years, so that means that the data is getting more enriched, and our next step will be: what are we going to do with the data and what kind of products and services are we able to create?”
The next harvest
Since the acquisition of Wijn en Wijngaard in 2024, AgriMedia has hired an editor, created a new editorial format and redesigned the magazine. They have also moved the brand into the event space.
“We are organising the first trade show ever between 10am and 5pm, and at the end of the day we have a festival with the audience selling their wines in the evening. So, in one day, you can get your knowledge, you can visit the sponsors, and wine growers will sell their wines in a little booth they have hired.”
The next phase of the AgriMedia’s development will see them collect first-party data from existing audiences and in arable and dairy farming; connect the Champagne area with the Low Countries through a partnership; expand partnerships with universities and foundations; and investigate how Dutch agriculture will evolve over the next decade.
AgriMedia also want to deepen its connections to its communities even further.
“We want to be a lighthouse for our community, a trusted guide,” said Reparon. “We would like to empower professionals with independent, valuable content.”
