Table 4 Qualitative analysis of business...

Table 4

Qualitative analysis of business diversification and the benefits and barriers of tribally owned wineries

Topic	Identified themes	Illustrating quote
Business diversification
	Supporting Existing Tribal Businesses	“There are casinos it would directly support. Cherokee Nation is growing, and they're building onto their casinos all the time. They're adding hotels, they're adding so much to it that I think it could only get better and better”
		“They have some fantastic existing resources they could use. The casinos could sell the wine; they could use it in their restaurants. I mean, there are so many aspects. Even their banquets that they do—they could utilize it there instead of having to pay some other company for their wine. Why pay someone else when you could be growing it and pay yourself?”
		“Well, initially just the uh, a tribe having a winery is a no, you know, a negative thought because they want a healthy tribe. But then you think about all the other operations that they have to bring in funding for all their different operations, the casinos serve alcohol. So, it's kinda, that's why its neutral”
	Applying Tribal Resources	“Just like any business that the tribe might engage in, if they can find a way to be good at it, I do not know if they can apply any sort of tribal tax breaks to it or not, there might be business or tribal or some sort of other advantages they have, but aside from the possibility of those, you've got a group of people who already have contacts to each other, and so off you go with a business. I would think it would be the same as if they were starting a stationery or tech company. You know, as a tribe you have some networking built in there”
	Applying Tribal Resources	“There's plenty of examples around here of other people starting wineries not affiliated with the tribe … if this comes through (successful tribal winery operations) and it all goes well and people see the value and start going at it down there, boy it would be awful nice if they would forward that data up here. They're going to get you to build a model and go off it, and it would be nice if we could too”
	Land Issues	“The land is going to be the hardest thing to find. A lot of it is all wrapped up already, and people who have it are not particularly interested in letting it go. So, you're going to have to go in there and given them an offer they cannot refuse as far as money goes”
		“I know there are some Oklahoma wineries but I do not know of any in our area, so I do not know if it would be viable”
		“Is it [the winery] located on the reservation? It raises the statistics of alcoholism, of violence and abuse, then it just helps the everlasting circle that's already going on in our reservation, in our communities, and you know were the highest number of alcoholism, incarcerated, suicides, and it's just going to contribute to that”
	Matters of the Wine Market	“So, I'm sure they'll be like hey it's a billion-dollar market! even if we got 10% of it, that's a lot of money. Even if we got 1% of it, that's a lot of money for our tribe. If you start at 1%, then it's only going to grow”
		“It would probably depend on the revenue base. If they thought they could make a dollar on it or tax it or not give money to the tribes. If they were, you know, if they could defund another programs because they have this instead”
		“I think they could get you know how they get the tax breaks on the cigarettes and different liquor licenses, and probably loophole some other things that the federal government would let them because they're on sovereign land”
	Being New/Novel	“I never thought about tribal wineries before. But I think it'll be, because we live in a nation where people are like, oh they built the iPhone? I Want to build a phone too. They came out with a movie about toys? I'm gonna … so it's like copycat industry. So, I think so, once they see it as a sustainable income, and like I said now that people are more, I think social drinking is more acceptable now”
Perceived benefits of tribal winery operations
	Increased Tribal Revenue	“The money they make, they could funnel it back into the schools, that money can go all over. Healthcare, schools, there's just so many places they could benefit from what they earn from this”
	Increased Tribal Revenue	“Continue the housing projects or the education projects or the elderly projects, something like that. Just increased revenue would be it [the biggest benefit] in my opinion”
	Keeping the Community Close	“Keeping those jobs here is also preventing the whole next generation of … they're needing to move away. They're needing to move for those jobs and for school and all of that, because our very small band … there's colleges that are close to here, but it's just such a new focus, and it's such an adjustment I think in one generation that has not happened yet. And keeping these traditional ag jobs is a big deal for the younger kids that, they're not making that shift yet. So, it has far reaching implications as far as its not just the ag and keeping the jobs for them. It's keeping our community close. Once you separate us … so yeah, it's a bog connector factor to have everybody together and have everybody go into that line of work”
	Employment Opportunities	“The jobs alone would be amazing because there are so many people still that have no jobs, and in our area where there are so many tribally owned businesses, if you're Native American there should be no problem getting a job if you want it”
	Employment Opportunities	“They could lease some fields to wineries or to the Nation or whoever was doing it [making wine], and that would increase maybe some farmers type, maybe create a few jobs. There would be revenue”
	Establishing Presence of Native Americans in the Modern era	“Getting a tribal name out there and your own tribal interests. I think it would be good for the indigenous community at large just to show that, uh, there is still a presence of Native Americans. We're not just in the past, we have current and future projections. In our area, it's just smallish tribal communities but a lot of them. Having a specific name out there is incredibly beneficial … we are a small tribe and we're always looking for expanding knowledge and awareness that we're there and we have a name”
Perceived barriers to success of tribally owned wineries
	Social Resistance	“They want a healthier Nation and a healthier tribe, versus a bad image. And any alcohol would be unfavorable to the positive image of the tribe and of their people. Because they want good people in the tribe and raise them all up good”
		“You have health issues with Native Americans having a high instance of fatty liver disease and alcoholism, as a rule. The tribe would have to deal with that. But then there are the health benefits of wine—there's moderation. You have to – if you're not doing something in moderation then that has to be on you and not on your tribe because they bottled your wine. It's just something they have to take it in moderation and they have to know just because they do this does not mean that they're necessarily the one contributing”
		“The cultural backlash - it's just. It's just such an ingrained thing in culture and Native American culture with alcohol. My own mother committed suicide when we were kids because of alcohol”
		“I think, because we live in the Bible Belt, which I consider myself a Christian, but in the Bible Belt you'll have a lot of people seeing wine as a big alcohol thing, but you know most wine is a very low point alcohol and it's not like
		hard liquor or a high point alcohol so like, I do not get that. But I think the majority of people around here would. They'd say ‘oh they're making booze over there!’ I mean, we even have counties next door to us in the south that used to be dry counties, and I think there's still a lot of that mindset”
	Stereotypes Concerning Native Americans	“Just having Native American on a label is an automatic bias. In my area, it's an automatic negative. It's automatic that, when people think about a Native American winery, it's not the traditional image of something that would be very classy, that people with money are going to go to and they're going to want to enjoy themselves or anything. The first thing they picture around here is that ‘Oh shit, there's a bunch of drunken Indians.’ So, it's a lot of marketing work”
		“Big thing is the stereotype of the drunk Indian … even cartoons from the 1940s and things, the black and white cartoons, it was always the Indians with the jugs”
		“People still picture us living in teepees and, uh. I had a guy once ask me how I got WIFI in my teepee, and I was beyond offended. People are stupid – I was playing an online game and he found out I'm from Oklahoma and I'm Indian, and he went back to the 1800s. And I said I live in a house just like you, you know, you're just living in the dark ages –open a book. Another thing is that I think if people educate themselves a little bit, those stereotypes and those hindrances, they would see there's no need to feel them. They're more perceived than they are real”
	Resources and Delayed Gratification	“There is this whole generation of kids who have grown up with this instant gratification of casinos. I think more so now with us with other generations just because everything is so instant gratification and it's so fast. When you make the decision to build a new housing development, it's all pre-fab, and it's up in a week. Your decisions are just instant”
	Resources and Delayed Gratification	“A winery, to grow real good grapes, it takes a long-term investment you know what I'm saying. To have a real good vineyard takes years and years of sitting back and watching it grow, and I think that's tough. I think it's tough because, like, you know what happens if drought and disease? It just brings a lot of doubt to people that are used to easy investments and easy returns”
	Authenticity	“It does not seem like a Native American business enterprise. Wineries seem like something that would be a European thing, so a tribe running one, while it's fine, it seems like it might be hard for them to tie in the tribal history/Indian business side of it into the winery side of it—putting those two together, you could do it, though there does not seem to be a synergy there”
	Authenticity	“For instance, like a basket weaving or leather type business that has an obvious tribal tie in. And I say obvious, like obvious to most other non-Native type populations. There's no obvious match [with wineries]. It just does not tie in”
Agriculture in the preservation of tribal heritage
	Tribal History	“This land they operate on, we were close and we were used as slaves. It was just all up and down the west coast. We were the ones who set the original posts that are still there. The rows and lines for all the wineries and vineyards—that was us, making perfect lines”
	Tribal History	“Lots of our family and out tribe, we're a very small band, they traveled to the [winery] for work. That's all there was. In the vineyards and in agriculture in general. [Wineries] were big hirers, and we could not get a lot of jobs in like offices or jobs that required higher education or a degree. So they did stringing for hops and they did stringing for grapes. They put the poles in. they tilled the ground, they planted the grapes, they harvested the grapes”
	Preservation of Heritage	“We did not really have friends outside our family. It was a huge family and it was just us, and they went to work in the same fields and in the same area. The men worked in the woods in the logging industry. The women went further down they would camp and stay and work in the fields … the younger generation has moved to different places. There's a huge disconnect … that the last probably decade we've been working to bring all of our family back together. The agriculture industry really did keep us together to a certain extent”
	Preservation of Heritage	“So yeah, it's a big connector factor to have everybody together and have everybody go into that line of work. A lot of older generation, like my mom's generation, they were sitting around after the funeral. I Brought my mom's photo album and they were talking about “Oh yeah, this is when we were down there working on um, the tomato farm” and “down here” and “blah blah blah.” and they were just down there working, the family would stay together. And then you knew other families from other areas that were doing the same things. And come ceremony times, everybody was really close because they had worked together all summer”
	Preservation of Land	“Talking about how nobody is looking at saving all of this land - that is being developed so fast - for agriculture, because that's what was here. And traditionally, our traditional agriculture was there, and we're losing our plants. We're losing all of our traditional foods and our medicines that were growing in these areas. We've lost one whole area that used to be volcanic rocks for sweat, and now it's all shopping malls. It's just gone”

Topic	Identified themes	Illustrating quote
Business diversification
	Supporting Existing Tribal Businesses	“There are casinos it would directly support. Cherokee Nation is growing, and they're building onto their casinos all the time. They're adding hotels, they're adding so much to it that I think it could only get better and better”
		“They have some fantastic existing resources they could use. The casinos could sell the wine; they could use it in their restaurants. I mean, there are so many aspects. Even their banquets that they do—they could utilize it there instead of having to pay some other company for their wine. Why pay someone else when you could be growing it and pay yourself?”
		“Well, initially just the uh, a tribe having a winery is a no, you know, a negative thought because they want a healthy tribe. But then you think about all the other operations that they have to bring in funding for all their different operations, the casinos serve alcohol. So, it's kinda, that's why its neutral”
	Applying Tribal Resources	“Just like any business that the tribe might engage in, if they can find a way to be good at it, I do not know if they can apply any sort of tribal tax breaks to it or not, there might be business or tribal or some sort of other advantages they have, but aside from the possibility of those, you've got a group of people who already have contacts to each other, and so off you go with a business. I would think it would be the same as if they were starting a stationery or tech company. You know, as a tribe you have some networking built in there”
	Applying Tribal Resources	“There's plenty of examples around here of other people starting wineries not affiliated with the tribe … if this comes through (successful tribal winery operations) and it all goes well and people see the value and start going at it down there, boy it would be awful nice if they would forward that data up here. They're going to get you to build a model and go off it, and it would be nice if we could too”
	Land Issues	“The land is going to be the hardest thing to find. A lot of it is all wrapped up already, and people who have it are not particularly interested in letting it go. So, you're going to have to go in there and given them an offer they cannot refuse as far as money goes”
		“I know there are some Oklahoma wineries but I do not know of any in our area, so I do not know if it would be viable”
		“Is it [the winery] located on the reservation? It raises the statistics of alcoholism, of violence and abuse, then it just helps the everlasting circle that's already going on in our reservation, in our communities, and you know were the highest number of alcoholism, incarcerated, suicides, and it's just going to contribute to that”
	Matters of the Wine Market	“So, I'm sure they'll be like hey it's a billion-dollar market! even if we got 10% of it, that's a lot of money. Even if we got 1% of it, that's a lot of money for our tribe. If you start at 1%, then it's only going to grow”
		“It would probably depend on the revenue base. If they thought they could make a dollar on it or tax it or not give money to the tribes. If they were, you know, if they could defund another programs because they have this instead”
		“I think they could get you know how they get the tax breaks on the cigarettes and different liquor licenses, and probably loophole some other things that the federal government would let them because they're on sovereign land”
	Being New/Novel	“I never thought about tribal wineries before. But I think it'll be, because we live in a nation where people are like, oh they built the iPhone? I Want to build a phone too. They came out with a movie about toys? I'm gonna … so it's like copycat industry. So, I think so, once they see it as a sustainable income, and like I said now that people are more, I think social drinking is more acceptable now”
Perceived benefits of tribal winery operations
	Increased Tribal Revenue	“The money they make, they could funnel it back into the schools, that money can go all over. Healthcare, schools, there's just so many places they could benefit from what they earn from this”
	Increased Tribal Revenue	“Continue the housing projects or the education projects or the elderly projects, something like that. Just increased revenue would be it [the biggest benefit] in my opinion”
	Keeping the Community Close	“Keeping those jobs here is also preventing the whole next generation of … they're needing to move away. They're needing to move for those jobs and for school and all of that, because our very small band … there's colleges that are close to here, but it's just such a new focus, and it's such an adjustment I think in one generation that has not happened yet. And keeping these traditional ag jobs is a big deal for the younger kids that, they're not making that shift yet. So, it has far reaching implications as far as its not just the ag and keeping the jobs for them. It's keeping our community close. Once you separate us … so yeah, it's a bog connector factor to have everybody together and have everybody go into that line of work”
	Employment Opportunities	“The jobs alone would be amazing because there are so many people still that have no jobs, and in our area where there are so many tribally owned businesses, if you're Native American there should be no problem getting a job if you want it”
	Employment Opportunities	“They could lease some fields to wineries or to the Nation or whoever was doing it [making wine], and that would increase maybe some farmers type, maybe create a few jobs. There would be revenue”
	Establishing Presence of Native Americans in the Modern era	“Getting a tribal name out there and your own tribal interests. I think it would be good for the indigenous community at large just to show that, uh, there is still a presence of Native Americans. We're not just in the past, we have current and future projections. In our area, it's just smallish tribal communities but a lot of them. Having a specific name out there is incredibly beneficial … we are a small tribe and we're always looking for expanding knowledge and awareness that we're there and we have a name”
Perceived barriers to success of tribally owned wineries
	Social Resistance	“They want a healthier Nation and a healthier tribe, versus a bad image. And any alcohol would be unfavorable to the positive image of the tribe and of their people. Because they want good people in the tribe and raise them all up good”
		“You have health issues with Native Americans having a high instance of fatty liver disease and alcoholism, as a rule. The tribe would have to deal with that. But then there are the health benefits of wine—there's moderation. You have to – if you're not doing something in moderation then that has to be on you and not on your tribe because they bottled your wine. It's just something they have to take it in moderation and they have to know just because they do this does not mean that they're necessarily the one contributing”
		“The cultural backlash - it's just. It's just such an ingrained thing in culture and Native American culture with alcohol. My own mother committed suicide when we were kids because of alcohol”
		“I think, because we live in the Bible Belt, which I consider myself a Christian, but in the Bible Belt you'll have a lot of people seeing wine as a big alcohol thing, but you know most wine is a very low point alcohol and it's not like
		hard liquor or a high point alcohol so like, I do not get that. But I think the majority of people around here would. They'd say ‘oh they're making booze over there!’ I mean, we even have counties next door to us in the south that used to be dry counties, and I think there's still a lot of that mindset”
	Stereotypes Concerning Native Americans	“Just having Native American on a label is an automatic bias. In my area, it's an automatic negative. It's automatic that, when people think about a Native American winery, it's not the traditional image of something that would be very classy, that people with money are going to go to and they're going to want to enjoy themselves or anything. The first thing they picture around here is that ‘Oh shit, there's a bunch of drunken Indians.’ So, it's a lot of marketing work”
		“Big thing is the stereotype of the drunk Indian … even cartoons from the 1940s and things, the black and white cartoons, it was always the Indians with the jugs”
		“People still picture us living in teepees and, uh. I had a guy once ask me how I got WIFI in my teepee, and I was beyond offended. People are stupid – I was playing an online game and he found out I'm from Oklahoma and I'm Indian, and he went back to the 1800s. And I said I live in a house just like you, you know, you're just living in the dark ages –open a book. Another thing is that I think if people educate themselves a little bit, those stereotypes and those hindrances, they would see there's no need to feel them. They're more perceived than they are real”
	Resources and Delayed Gratification	“There is this whole generation of kids who have grown up with this instant gratification of casinos. I think more so now with us with other generations just because everything is so instant gratification and it's so fast. When you make the decision to build a new housing development, it's all pre-fab, and it's up in a week. Your decisions are just instant”
	Resources and Delayed Gratification	“A winery, to grow real good grapes, it takes a long-term investment you know what I'm saying. To have a real good vineyard takes years and years of sitting back and watching it grow, and I think that's tough. I think it's tough because, like, you know what happens if drought and disease? It just brings a lot of doubt to people that are used to easy investments and easy returns”
	Authenticity	“It does not seem like a Native American business enterprise. Wineries seem like something that would be a European thing, so a tribe running one, while it's fine, it seems like it might be hard for them to tie in the tribal history/Indian business side of it into the winery side of it—putting those two together, you could do it, though there does not seem to be a synergy there”
	Authenticity	“For instance, like a basket weaving or leather type business that has an obvious tribal tie in. And I say obvious, like obvious to most other non-Native type populations. There's no obvious match [with wineries]. It just does not tie in”
Agriculture in the preservation of tribal heritage
	Tribal History	“This land they operate on, we were close and we were used as slaves. It was just all up and down the west coast. We were the ones who set the original posts that are still there. The rows and lines for all the wineries and vineyards—that was us, making perfect lines”
	Tribal History	“Lots of our family and out tribe, we're a very small band, they traveled to the [winery] for work. That's all there was. In the vineyards and in agriculture in general. [Wineries] were big hirers, and we could not get a lot of jobs in like offices or jobs that required higher education or a degree. So they did stringing for hops and they did stringing for grapes. They put the poles in. they tilled the ground, they planted the grapes, they harvested the grapes”
	Preservation of Heritage	“We did not really have friends outside our family. It was a huge family and it was just us, and they went to work in the same fields and in the same area. The men worked in the woods in the logging industry. The women went further down they would camp and stay and work in the fields … the younger generation has moved to different places. There's a huge disconnect … that the last probably decade we've been working to bring all of our family back together. The agriculture industry really did keep us together to a certain extent”
	Preservation of Heritage	“So yeah, it's a big connector factor to have everybody together and have everybody go into that line of work. A lot of older generation, like my mom's generation, they were sitting around after the funeral. I Brought my mom's photo album and they were talking about “Oh yeah, this is when we were down there working on um, the tomato farm” and “down here” and “blah blah blah.” and they were just down there working, the family would stay together. And then you knew other families from other areas that were doing the same things. And come ceremony times, everybody was really close because they had worked together all summer”
	Preservation of Land	“Talking about how nobody is looking at saving all of this land - that is being developed so fast - for agriculture, because that's what was here. And traditionally, our traditional agriculture was there, and we're losing our plants. We're losing all of our traditional foods and our medicines that were growing in these areas. We've lost one whole area that used to be volcanic rocks for sweat, and now it's all shopping malls. It's just gone”

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