THE EXAMINATION AND ASSESSMENT OF WINERY BUSINESS AND CONTRIBUTION TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF WINE TOURISM OF SERBIA

The tradition of winemaking on the territory of Serbia dates back to ancient times. Today the activities related to wine production are on the rise, as is the number of wineries, and they participate in the valorization of wine tourism activities as an important Serbian tourist product. The aim of this paper is to assess the business excellence of wine producers in Serbia via the application of BEX model while establishing a correlation with the data on the promotion of wine tourism activities on the analyzed wineries’ websites. The attained research results indicate a decrease in the BEX index in 2018 in comparison with the values from 2017 and are within the parameters for good values. However, there is no correlation between the performance of wineries and the promotion of wine tourism on their websites.


Introduction
The quality of business process realization and the business success of companies both depend on risk exposure and appropriate risk management (Regester, Larkin, 1997). According to Stanišić et al. (2017) what is especially reflected in the success of subjects in the economy is extensive exposure to business risks. It is important to bear in mind the significance of the correct choice of business model in order to prevent a negative business result, i.e. business loss (Berk et al., 2012). Among a great number of models for examining and assessing business success the most commonly used models are the Altman model, the Kraliček DF, the Quick Test model, the Zmijewski model, and The aim of this research is reflected in the analysis of business performance of wineries that valorize wine tourism activities and promote the same on their websites. The results of this research have a scientific and practical contribution. The scientific contribution is reflected in the pioneering endeavor of researching the success of the winery business in relation to promotional activities on their websites. This research gave an assessment of the current situation and recommendations for future business. The specific practical contribution is reflected in the possibilities of using the research results, both by wineries and stakeholders, in order to design certain promotional policies that would contribute to the improvement of winery operations and the development of wine tourism in Serbia.

Research background
According to the results of paleontological examinations, vine can be found in prehistoric layers of soil, in the Younger Stone Age, in the Bronze Age, in the Iron Age, and covering vast expanses of land. It was able to cover such a great expanse of land owing to the birds which fed on the fruit and carried the seed (Avramov, 2010).It is generally accepted that the first vineyards were built around 6000 BC, north of the Caucasus, in what is now Georgia and Armenia (Despotović, 2012). In many archaeological localities special silver vessels were found containing vine coils. The long tradition of wine production was also confirmed in research in localities from the Roman Empire period where artifacts serving as wine vessels were discovered (Pavlović, 2007).
Viticulture and winemaking in the territory of Serbia have a long tradition as well.
The exact time of the beginnings of wine production in Serbia is not known, but it is presumed that the history of winemaking in Serbia exceeds a millennium (Vlahović et al., 2008). It is thought that one of the Roman emperors, Marcus Aurelius Probus, planted the first vines in the space of Fruška gora and in the vicinity of Smederevo. Great devotees of viticulture and winemaking also included the rulers in the dynasties Nemanjić, Hrebeljanović and Branković who expanded the vineyards on Fruška gora and those around Smederevo and Vršac. Emperor Dušan had large vineyards and, in the vicinity of Prizren, the court wine cellar with a 25km long ceramic vineduct delivering wine straight from the vineyards and cellars in the surroundings of Velika Hoča. As a patron of viticulture and winemaking, Emperor Dušan established the Law on Wine which determined the rules of wine production, trade, and quality control. Medieval times in Serbia see an advancement and expansion in viticulture. Despot Stefan Lazarević, in the period of moving the capital city from Kruševac to Belgrade, also formed vineyard plantations in the vicinity of Belgrade, creating the then wellknown Ritopek vineyards . However, the arrival of Turks to these parts stemmed the development, and even led to a decrease and halt in winemaking in the territory of today's Serbia, bearing in mind the religious tenets written in the Kur'an, as well as the directives to uproot vineyards. In this period, the production of wine was preserved owing to monasteries within which traditional winemaking was continued (Pivac, 2012). In the XIX century the vines in the territories of France and the Austro-Hungarian Empire became affected by phylloxera transferred in seedlings from American spaces which led to the devastation of a large number of vineyards . This is when the production of grapes and wine was advanced in the spaces of today's Central Serbia, and Serbian wines makes their way into the European market. At the beginning of the XX century owing to the efforts of king Petar I Karađorđević and prince Aleksandar there were advancements in viticulture and winemaking in Serbia, and they personally grew large vineyards in the spaces of Oplenac and Topola, which in 1903 resulted in the formation of the Venčac vineyard cooperative, as one of the largest wineries in the Balkans (Pivac, 2012).
At the end of the Second World War, the renewal of the state began, as well as the revitalization and renewal of vineyards. In accordance with the economic and political ideas of the time, cooperatives, large state estates and large wineries (Navip, Rubin, Vino župa) were established. In that period, individual wine production was neglected, which leads to the interruption of the production tradition within family farms. The main goal of restructuring agriculture follows the old requirements in the field regarding the transformation and modernization of the agricultural sector and food industry . After what was perhaps the most difficult period of crisis in the history of Serbian viticulture, towards the end of the XX century, which saw the clearings of plots, the disappearance of large vineyard and winery complexes, an altogether dismal state, viticulture and winemaking in Serbia experienced important transformations, modernization and an overall positive forward movement. This represented a significant step towards nearing European standards and the practices of countries with good results in this area . Today in Serbia, the revival in viticulture was instigated owing to the interest and initiative of winoholics and enthusiasts. An intensive growth in new vine plots can be noticed, utilizing contemporary technologies of artificial intelligence in the processes of growth, processing vine, and producing grapes. It is characterized by the introduction of high quality, selected and certified plots with the introduction of organic growth of grapes and production of wine . Also, economic efficiency is slightly higher in organic system compared to conventional (Vasile et al., 2015). Wines from the spaces of the New World 3 emerged into the world market in the 1990s with acceptable pricing (Vlahović et al., 2017), but also satisfying the expectations of consumers in the younger population. Simultaneously, an initiative with the aim of defending the culture and tradition of producing and consuming wine were started in the countries which are traditionally the greatest European producers of wine. The instigators of the initiative are small/family wineries, and their aim was to stop globalization in wine production, and also revive the practice of wine consumption which was fully suppressed in certain parts of Europe along with modernization in food preparation (Darnay, 2016).
According to on-line data from the International Organisation of Vine and Wine in the year 2017 in the world 7,425,122 ha of soil was covered in vine plantations, and in the year 2018 the area covered was 7,445,129 ha. In Europe, whose spaces contain the countries which are numbered among the greater winemakers in the world (Italy,   Although there is great potential for viticulture, the economic crisis and loss of market during the 1990s led to a great reduction in the areas covered in vines compared to the preceding period. According to the Strategy for Agriculture and Rural Development of the Republic of Serbia for the period 2014-2024 the areas under vineyards are characterized by a significant fragmentation of allotments, as the average size of vineyards in Serbia is only 0.28 ha, and this fragmented structure of the plots considerably increases the overall expenses of grape production (Gazette of the RS 85/2014, p.12).
The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management of the Republic of Serbia has announced a public call for incentives for investments in the wine production sector for 2020. The subject of incentives in accordance with the Ordinance and the Public Invitation are eligible investments and costs in the wine production sector related to construction winery facilities, general cost and/or purchase of new equipment, devices and machines, in operation wine production. The maximum amounts of incentives for each type of incentive are: http://ea.bg.ac.rs 2) for the purchase of new equipment, devices and machines in the function of wine production -10,000,000 RSD; 3) for general expenses -1,000,000 RSD.
The highest total amount of incentives that an incentive user can receive in one calendar year is 41,000,000 RSD (www.uap.gov.rs).
The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management of the Republic of Serbia initiated in 2012 on the basis of a competition in keeping with the Law on Wine the formation of the Vineyard Register, which was created in cooperation with the Center for Viticulture and Winemaking from Niš. The Vineyard Register keeps a record of the areas of vineyards, their position, and the strains which are represented within these areas, as according to the Law on Wine and its bylaws all grape producers using allotments larger than 10 acres (but also smaller ones if they put their grapes on the market) are obliged to enroll in the Vineyard Register.
Also in accordance with the Law on Wine, an important database is the Winery Register, within which data is kept on producers, technological equipment that wineries possess for processing and bottling of wine, the production vessels, the raw materials and end products, the laboratory instruments, the volume of annual grape processing and wine production, the number of bottles and product sales. According to the Law on Wine and Rulebook on the Contents and Keeping of the Winery Register, it is mandatory to keep records of all the natural and legal persons, or entrepreneurs who have 10 or more acres of vineyards.

Wine tourism as a stimulating business activity
Along with wine production, wineries today also direct attention to the development of wine tourism, and vineyards give to a space a specific identity, which is important in the analysis of authenticity of tourist offers of different destinations (Štetić, Cvijanović, Šimičević, 2018). Wine tourism as a set of organized activities is based upon visits to vineyards and wineries, as well as wine-themed exhibitions and manifestations organized for recreational purposes (Johnson, 1997). Tourists join this type of travel tours, therefore, out of a desire to taste wines, to attain new knowledge about wine, to learn how best to combine food and wine, to enjoy rural areas, etc. (Milićević, Štetić, 2017). In this way, guests acquaint themselves with wine culture, a synergy is formed between the locality, gastronomy and experiences of visitors (Štetić, Cvijanović, Šimičević, 2018), and wine becomes a traditional resource forming the authenticity of a destination to the stage of forming and branding a tourist region with the aim of having it recognized in the tourist market, e.g. the regions of Bordeaux, Burgundy, Tuscany, Balaton, Rioja.
Bearing in mind that wine is the motivating factor here it is interesting to point out that moderate consumption of wine has numerous health benefits when analyzing its nutritious, hygienic, prophylactic, and medicinal value (Cindrić, 1990), with the important notion that wine is an integral part of a meal (Cvijanović et al., 2018) which makes the importance of wine as a food item in tourism (Pivac, 2012) specific and contributes to an increased demand in the tourist market, in terms of special interests of users of tourist services with the aim of valorizing wine tourism.
Wine tourism, education about wines and wineries are not merely a field of interest for wine connoisseurs, but also represent a segment of enriching the tourist offer in the rural spaces, and they should be viewed as such. Services are associated with wine routes, expanding their offer by including small wine producer (Štetić, Cvijanović, Šimičević, 2018). According to Pivac (2012) wine routes have as their aim representation of a region with significant wine production, with organized wine tasting. On the territory of Serbia a total of nine wine routes have been formed: Palić, Fruška Gora, Vršac, Šumadija, Smederevo-Beograd, Negotin, Župa, Niš-Kragujevac and Kosovo and Metohija (Stojković, Milićević, 2020).
Bearing in mind that research has shown that there is a linear relationship between the application of a marketing concept and actualized business profit, and that the application of a specific marketing concept enables a higher level of returns on investments (Cvijanović, 2016), this statement unambiguously points us towards the position that the choice of appropriate marketing concepts is important for wineries so they can position themselves in the market and achieve better business results.

Introduction of the BEX business excellence success model
Business excellence success models are used to assess business performance of companies, business weaknesses, as well as the negative trend that can cause business crises. One of the business performance success models is the BEX model.  After calculating the obtained values of the BEX index and determining the business excellence ranking according to the categories in Table 1, it is necessary to specify the situational analysis and give a future business prognosis of the analyzed companies based on the ranking by applying the information in Table 2.

Materials and methods
The aim of the research in this paper is to examine the business excellence of wineries in Serbia, wineries that deal with wine tourism (tastings, tours), via an application of the BEX model while presenting the assessment of the business success on the basis of the defined theoretical framework. The research success evaluation is based on data gathered by applying the "desk research" method from financial reports in the business of 50 commercial subjects from Serbia whose industrial classification code is 1102 -Producing wine from grapes. The criterion in forming the sample was that the selected economic entities are engaged in the production of wine exclusively, without the production of juices and other types of alcoholic beverages (brandy, cognac), as well as that the activities of wine tourism within their business are represented. During the Wine Fair in Belgrade in February 2020, the exhibitors/wineries were asked whether they organized wine tourism activities and the obtained data were implemented in the process of forming a sample of wineries which are the subject of analysis in this paper.

Research results
Based on the collected data, after calculating business excellence by applying the BEX model, Table 3 was formed within which is given a summary of values obtained for the BEX index of business excellence of winemakers for the business years 2017 and 2018, individually, per each company from the sample.  The task was to complete a unified analysis of the sample of companies producing wine in Serbia and the results obtained are given in Table 4. The results obtained enable us to perceive changes that occurred in the business of wineries in the business years 2017 and 2018, based on an analysis of the data from financial reports. Namely, in the analysis of the values for ranking in the BEX model for the year 2017 the value of the BEX index obtained was 2.66595, and in accordance with the data on the business success of analyzed companies the business excellence ranking is among companies with very good business, with the recommendation for future business to have the management try to keep this level of business while striving to advance business processes, and thus also the indicator values for the following years. According to Njegovan (2016) financial liquidity is a necessity from the aspect of doing business and survival of any agricultural estate, and bearing in mind the seasonal character of the business, non-simultaneous investments into production and problems with collecting payments it becomes clear that financial liquidity is achieved by going into debt or by diversifying business activities. The problem of liquidity in wineries occurs due to the lack of continuous sales and collection of receivables. Namely, wineries have certain problems with wine placement: a) due to the large amount of foreign wines with low selling prices on the market, b) due to the still low awareness of the population for wine consumption, c) still undeveloped export of Serbian wines, e) monopoly conditions of sales channels ie. conditionality of product placement in retail chains that often expect a long deadline to settle their obligations. This situation causes a limited inflow of funds in continuity, which causes the impossibility of settling fixed costs in regular operations, as well as settling receivables.
Analyzing the structure of the BEX model of the entire sample of wineries in Table 4 it is possible to perceive a major problem with liquidity(negative values of liquidity indicators in 2017 at -0.96061, and in 2018 at -0.10750), and this is confirmed in data on the indebtedness of companies. At the same time, the values of profitability and financial power indicators are in the rank of the bordering area, and the indicators pointing towards the potential to create value are ranked among very good results (in 2017 at 4.397756, and in 2018 at 2.40437). One of the reasons for middling business results can certainly be found in the natural resources upon which the business of this commercial branch is based, and that is the amount of grape yield for each year/season, which also determines the amount of wine produced. Source: Calculation by the authors Therefore, is we take into account the obtained values of the BEX index of business excellence for the years 2017 and 2018 and the presented data on amounts of produced wine in the analyzed years it is possible to notice a correlation between the values of amount of produced wine and indicators of business excellence in the business of sampled wineries in Serbia. Agriculture, Year 67, No. 4, 2020, (pp. 1103-1123), Belgrade

Economics of
After the analysis of BEX index, a "desk research" analysis of 50 sampled wineries' websites was performed in order to detect information on the promotion of wine tourism activities (tasting, tour of wineries). Of all the analyzed samples, 20 wineries promote activities included in wine tourism on their websites. Table 6 provides a comparative overview of the BEX index rank and information on wine tourism on the wineries' websites. Data on business success ranking and promotion of wine tourism on the wineries' websites were processed through the statistical package SPSS 22.0 by calculating the correlation coefficient and the ANOVA statistical method. Using the obtained results, the situational analysis of the impact of wine tourism activities promotion and business success was considered.
Within the value analysis, BEX model is defined as a dependent variable, and an independent variable is the data whether the information of wine tourism promotion is posted on the wineries' websites. When testing the existence of the mentioned information on wine tourism activities on the websites for 2018, the obtained results indicate that the value of R is 0.134, which means that it is an extremely small correlation (Table 7). Also, the outcome of the F test is not significant (Table 8) because Sig is 0.880 (more than 0.05), so we can conclude that the data from the websites on activities related to wine tourism realized in the analyzed wineries does not affect business success in 2018.
Values for 2017 indicate that the value of R is 0.069, which means that there is no correlation ( Table 9). The F-test is not significant because Sig is 0.229 (Table 10). Source: Autors adapted from statistical package SPSS 22.0 Bearing in mind that business success of some analyzed wineries is in the World class rank without promoting wine tourism activities on the website, and that the results of ANOVA analysis indicate no correlation, the research thesis that wineries which promote wine tourism activities on their websites have a better rank of business performance in line with the values of BEX model is not supported.

Conclusion
Two criteria were used when forming the sample of wineries whose business results were analyzed, that wineries are engaged in wine production as their only final product (activity code 1102 -Production of wine from grapes), and that they are engaged in wine tourism, which is confirmed by direct contact with wineries' representatives during the Wine Fair in Belgrade.
Bearing in mind the obtained results of the BEX index after processing and analysis of the business data of wineries, the suggestion is that advancement in business is desirable in order to maintain or increase the degree of business success. In accordance with the decrease in produced amounts of wine it is possible to emphasize the constantly high expenses of investing into and maintaining vineyards, as well as the equipment and technological processes in wine production, which characterize this commercial branch. Simultaneously, it is very significant to point out the seasonal nature of the business, in terms of grape processing and winemaking, and these facts contribute to an overall encumbrance in planning and conducting business successfully. Therefore, analyzing the obtained data and information and taking into account the fragmentation of allotments i.e. the large number of small producers, it is necessary to point out the importance of adopting the Strategy for the Development of Viticulture and Winemaking, as a significant document forming the basis for the development of the mentioned commercial branch. It is important to point out the potentials in the development of wine tourism on the territory of Serbia bearing in mind the current international thematic tourist product i.e. the cultural route of the European Council -The Roman Emperors and Danube Wine Route (since 2015), the wine routes included in this international project, as well as the other vineyards throughout Serbia. In accordance with the potentials which Serbia possesses, excellent spatial and climate conditions for successful viticultural endeavors, the suggestion is that autochthonous brands should be strengthened from the aspect of Economics of Agriculture, Year 67, No. 4, 2020, (pp. 1103-1123), Belgrade increasing the market share and export, and some research indicates that consumers see the wine brand, and not the price tag, as the decisive factor in their choice (Kuzmanović, Makajić-Nikolić, 2020).
Considering the results obtained after research and analysis, it was noticed that some wineries in the sample have a World class rank of business success and that they implement wine tourism activities without promoting them on their websites.
These wineries generate excellent business revenues from wine production/sales, but also from tourist visits in accordance with wine tourism activities as a result of the quality and trust that wine consumers have. Tradition and quality remain recognizable when it comes to choosing wine tourists.
The results of this research have a scientific and practical contribution. The scientific contribution is reflected in the unification and application of the results of research conducted in the process of analysis of the promotion of wine tourism activities on the websites of wineries. A significant scientific contribution is the analysis that was conducted for the first time in the assessment of business success of wineries in Serbia. Namely, bearing in mind that wineries are in a state of constant pressure in the processes of adapting to market conditions, minimizing costs and increasing profitability, the BEX model can predict difficulties in winery operations, and monitoring the value of indicators can avoid potential business risks. The practical contribution is reflected in the possibility of using the research results by wineries in Serbia that deal with wine tourism, but do not promote it on their websites. In addition, the practical contribution is reflected in the possibility of using the research results in order to create a Strategy for the development of wine tourism in Serbia.
Future research could analyze whether additional wine tourism promotional activities on the wineries' websites contribute to the increase in the number of visitors, as well as to the improvement of business results. In this way, winemakers would reach their products' buyers faster at the place of production and thus minimize the time of sale and charging for wine. What is more, a new research could be conducted on the business performance of wineries that do not develop wine tourism. The obtained results could be compared with the BEX index results of wineries that develop wine tourism so that new strategic decisions could be made.