Few articles investigate determinants of firm performance during market crisis times (Antonioli et al., 2011; Chowdhury and Lang, 1993) or attempt to analyze the situation of agricultural organizations in times of crisis (Grande et al., 2011). In this paper we present the case of the French collective strategy: Vin de pays d’Oc. We explain how few entrepreneurs have built this collective strategy proposing new vision of producing and selling wines within an industry chronically in crisis, structurally in decline. Since, this strategy has led to economic regeneration of the whole regional wine industry even during its hardest crisis years (2004-2009). Concerning the methodology, we agree that processual phenomenon such as the emergence of a strategy is difficult to study in reason of blurred aspects of the context and the large amount of information related to space and time (Langley, 1997). Therefore, we have built a single in-depth case study. We have adopted a qualitative approach as qualitative data collected over a long period of time show a strong power to explain (Miles and Huberman, 2003) while the specific context of the case is taken into account (Pettigrew, 1992; Yin, 1994). Concerning the findings, the success of this strategy found its roots in the mid-1970s. At that time, few entrepreneurs decided to challenge institutions in order to shape rules of the game to their own advantage. They used institutional processes to change the institution’s context in which they operate. These entrepreneurs also dared to implement their own vision by struggling against tradition (conservatism) and constrained rules such as the ones requested by controlled designation of origin – AOC. Concerning the implementation of the findings, as a majority of actors in a declining industry seem to face difficulties to deal with new competitive environment and changes in a globalized world, we think it is important to identify and promote practices implemented by audacious entrepreneurs. Nowadays SME facing economic and market crises need model to imagine in a common future collective strategies that work!
