Sunday, March 29, 2015

W20 Group and VinTank Settle Down

 

Its fair to say that I've been involved in the wine business for a long time. I'm old enough to remember Italian Swiss Colony Wine commercials in the 60's,the Judgment of Paris in the 70's, the wine cooler craze in the 80's, and the VinTech fraud that spanned both the 80's and 90's.

Sunday, March 22, 2015

Is Your AVA "Just Like Napa?"

 
Follow the Yellen Brick Road
 
     On March 16th I was invited to be THE keynote speaker at the 21st Annual Central Coast Insights. OK ... maybe I was just  "a"  keynote speaker ... OK fine. Just don't look at me like that. I was just a "basic speaker." There. I said it..... Are you happy now?

Anyway, speaking in Paso Robles I was reminded of something that has always bothered me. The region makes great wines; as good as any place on earth and yet it has gone through constant boom and bust cycles over the years. Grapes from the Central Coast go into both value priced jugs, and collectable wines too. How can that be?

You are probably a wine expert in some form if you are reading this, but do you know precisely where the Central Coast AVA is located? Are you aware of the varietals for which the AVA is best known?

Is the Central Coast "just like Napa?"

Saturday, March 14, 2015

What's the Average Starting Salary in Tasting Rooms?



I used to work in retail when I was a young man. It can be fun when you have a good dialogue with a customer but when alcohol is involved, customers like Miles and Jack in the scene above can make life pretty uncomfortable for public serving employees.

That's when you need someone behind the counter who is confident and knows how to handle those situations. And before that, you want someone who can balance sales and client experience but there is a cost to attract that kind of a person, but how much is that?