The Challenge
Clavis Wijnimport imports wine from family estates across Europe and sells only to the trade: restaurants, wine shops and wholesalers in the Netherlands and Belgium. The wine is good, the logistics are better than most (one company from vine to bottle, 12 to 16 °C all the way to delivery), and none of that was doing any selling online.
The real problem was a trap in the market. Trade buyers choose on price. The moment John talked about quality, they heard “expensive”, and he never got invited in to pour a glass. The old website said nothing that got him past that, and brought in about two new leads a month. We measured that before we started, so we would know whether the new site worked.
What We Built
Brand first, website second.
- A brand book before a single page. Positioning, tone and the rules of what the brand never says: never position as the cheapest, and claim exclusivity for the wines, not for the estates.
- Copy that answers the price question first. The homepage opens on what the buyer checks first: affordable, and it costs no more than what you buy today. The proof sits right under it: the cold chain, one company from planting to bottling, wines that are exclusive to Clavis in the Netherlands.
- Two ways to ask, both one tap away. Message us on WhatsApp, or ask for the price list. No prices online, on purpose: the conversation is the point.
- A page for every wine estate, with the story from John’s own notes, in Dutch and English.
- A CMS he runs himself. Every field labelled in Dutch with an explanation underneath, so news, estates and texts change without calling anyone.
- Fast on any connection. The estates page went from 14.7 MB of images to 2.5 MB, and the hero film from 7.3 MB to 2 MB.
Results
The site went live in September 2026.
- New trade requests every week since launch, where the old site brought in about two a month.
- A 5 out of 5 review from John on the work itself (below).
The Lesson
A B2B website does not have to win the argument. It has to get you invited. For Clavis that meant saying the price thing out loud in the first line, then proving quality underneath, and making the next step a WhatsApp message instead of a form.
In John's words
Working with Wouter was fantastic. Where you'd normally have to supply all the content yourself, Wouter writes the right copy straight away and all you have to do is refine it. He knows what your customer wants to see and how to present the information on the website in a smart, attractive way. On top of that he works super fast, replies quickly and completely, and took a huge amount of work off my hands. In short: a 5-star experience!John de Bruijn, Clavis Wijnimport
14 years in sales, 8 of them B2B SaaS. €4M+ career revenue. Building sales systems for founders who are tired of winging it. LinkedIn