Arno Hofer
... the creative head and founder of winePad, is not only an innovative entrepreneur. From the many stations of his career as a chef, sommelier, maître d'hôtel, trainer and management consultant, he brings a wealth of experience from the upscale gastronomy, hotel industry and beverage trade.The idea
In a globalised world, knowledge about the origin of products is steadily gaining in value. Stories sell much better than faceless names, and we all know that when it comes to emotional purchasing decisions, classic, price-sensitive (or price-sensitive?) consumer behaviour takes a back seat. Especially for wine lovers and gourmets, there are many dimensions of enjoyment. For them, a wide range of information and background knowledge is just as much a part of good eating and drinking as taste, consistency, colour and finish. At the same time, however, well-trained salespersons and sommeliers with the appropriate expertise are becoming fewer and fewer. Is a targeted "outsourcing" of this challenging service perhaps possible? A vision that Arno Hofer developed many years ago and thus laid the foundation for winePad.
The foundation – winePad 1.0
With the first iPad, which Steve Jobs presented in 2010, the optimal tool for the realisation of the "digital wine list" was finally found. For Arno, this was a project of the heart and a challenge in equal parts. In the end, it took 2 years of intensive work and development until he held the prototype in his hands. This definitely was a milestone in the history of wine lists, which was also directly recognised with the Tyrolean advertising prize 'Tirolissimo'.
2016 – winePad 2.0
In cooperation with the gifted programmer and self-confessed Tyrolean by choice Maxim Danilov, the software is raised to a new level. With our "in-house" programmer, many of the specific customer wishes can be implemented directly - just one of our many USP'S.
2018
The enormous demand and rapid growth require new structures. From now on, a professional team of web designers and content managers will take care of perfect presentation and professionally impeccable content. Wine is our central theme and so, in addition to Arno, all team members are self-confessed gourmets with a solid background in gastronomy and the wine trade.
2020
The virus that is keeping us all on our toes this year demands new approaches. In addition to the additionally developed winemaker app and private cellar app, we are organising legendary online tastings with participants from half of Europe and many long-held ideas for the further development of the winePad app are being concretely tackled.
2021
Today, the winePad team supports 500 customers from the gastronomy, hotel, beverage trade and wine business in 4 countries: Austria, Italy, Switzerland and Germany. Every day, thousands of people around the world navigate our app and are playfully inspired by the perfect presentation.
The future - winePad 3.0
In addition to the pure presentation, we would like to connect the customers directly with the producers: Our vision is that a guest can access our wine list during a visit to a restaurant by scanning a QR code or taking a photo of a label, order a wine digitally and, if he or she likes the wine, order 6 bottles for home directly from the winegrower or retailer.
With winePad, the revolution of digital map presentation and wine management began 10 years ago. winePad is efficient, independent, sales-increasing, informative, modern and unique due to the enormous variety of application possibilities.
You too can become part of our success story!
