EU project The Wine Lab - Generating Innovation between Practice and Research creates the foundation for a dialogue among research, business and regional communities, including Universities in Agriculture, Oenology and related fields, and small wineries, mainly those located in disadvantaged areas, to stimulate knowledge flow, share challenges and solutions, and jointly generate and accelerate innovation in the wine sector. The project fosters clustering and networking, provides for learning opportunities, applies action alongside experiential research and learning and capitalises on knowledge towards new methods and approaches in policy planning. This model of intervention can be further mainstreamed to other fields such as food production and agri-tourism.