Archive for the ‘Wine Gossip’ Category
Yesterday I spent a little time looking over the recently issued “Top 100 Most Influential People in the U.S. Wine Industry” after a couple of friends alerted me to the 2nd annual listing by IntoWine.com. The way I know they were friends is that they didn’t smirk, laugh or guffaw when they said I made the list. I take list making seriously primarily because I know other people do too. Also, the act of ranking things can entail some pretty…
Press releases are interesting tools. They are, even within the wine industry, almost in every case a matter self-aggrandizement. One rarely sees a company issue a release informing the media that “XYZ Winery Sales Suck” or “Administrative Chaos Reigns at XYZ Wine Company”. Rather, press releases are almost always issued to point the media and readers to a virtual smiley face the company issuing the press release has drawn. What follows is a tale of one such smiley face and…
The wine industry is one in which “damage control” is rarely a required skill. Controversy rarely arises. The general public’s attention is rarely focused on industry’s or individuals’ misdeeds—real or imagined. Taking time to learn the art of response to criticism or claims is probably better spent exploring the mysteries of Twitter, proper pumice removal or the circuitous route for permit approvals. Given this, it’s nice to see a member of the wine industry respond so well to criticism and…
The recently concluded conference of wine bloggers in Portland, Oregon was, as always, enlightening, a great source of ideas for this writer, full of surprises, great fun, dashed with a few disappointments and provided and up-close opportunity to examine the state of wine blogging. With that in mind, I’ve culled the Top Ten Things I learned at the 2012 Wine Bloggers Conference: 1. Marketing Aside. Wine Bloggers remain somewhat uninterested in marketing their work beyond posts on Facebook and Tweets…
One thing you learn after watching an election campaign being carried out is that in this country the media will jump on any inadvertant "misspeak". It doesn't matter what the intent was, if a candidate misspeaks it will be used against them. And it's not just in the context of electioneering that the media jumps on such a thing. A person of any standing can be castigated by the media and others for the inadvertent words. I was reminded of…
