The 75th Anniversary of the Ratification of the 21st Amendment (the end of Prohibition) arrives on December 5th. Guess who's celebrating the hardest? Yes, America's alcohol wholesalers and they are celebrating the end of Prohibition not because it allowed them to open their doors and start businesses. They are celebrating for the reason laid out so clearly by Tony Mauro, writing for Law.com: "the 21st Amendment led to creation of the three-tier (producers, wholesalers, retailers) state-regulated system for purveying wine,…
What makes a wine blog credible? What give a wine blog an authoritative voice? Does it matter? Can it be measured? These questions and other similar to them have been bandied about the wine industry of late in a variety of forums. I think the issues are under greater scrutiny for a number of reasons, not the least of which are 1) the fact that there are more wine bloggers than ever and the issue of credibility and authority is…
I've always wondered if the "Complete Idiot's" referred to in "The Complete Idiot's Guide" series referred to the people buying the guides or the people writing them.However, having had the chance to look over the just published "Complete Idiot's Guide To Starting and Running a Winery" I can now say with some assurance that they don't necessarily refer to the authors.This is niche publishing at its finest. Let's face it, how many people are really going to be serious enough…
The first Thanksgiving was something meant to thank God for having survived the harsh elements of the New World. Personally, the past twelve months have seen a number of things in my own personal orbit both survive and fail. It has been a tumultuous year, to say the least. But, as the Thanksgiving holiday comes upon us (seemingly out of nowhere since just a few days ago I think it was March), I start to think about those people for…
