Archive for the ‘wine’ Category
Wine wholesalers talk a different language from you and I that needs translating. And they’ve been doing a lot of talking recently. In states across the country, the wholesalers have realized that it’s unconstitutional to allow in-state wineries to sell direct to retailers and restaurant, but not allow out of state wineries to do so. So, they started to try to strip this privilege from small wineries to prevent out of state (read: California) wineries from legally bypassing them. In…
PROGRAM NOTE… It’s the first Monday of the Month and that can only mean it’s time for my monthly appearance on WineBiz 2.4 with Kaz and Erik. A great show on the wine business from a Sonoma perspective. I’ll be on to….well, to be on. I guess I’m considered a "guest commentator." You can listen in by heading over here to KSVY.or….THE VOICE OF SONOMA!! Kaz is one of Sonoma’s true originals. He’s a winery owner with an intense sense…
Alice Feiring has a blog! This is good news. While I don’t agree with her on a number of topics (she buys into the "Mondovino Line" and appears to believe biodynamic farming works), this woman can write!!! Feiring writes regularly for Time Magazine. She’s been published just about everywhere. She the kind of writer who would be the perfect "wine correspondent" for The New Yorker if they those doyens of coastal culture would cover wine. Feiring is opinionated, well-connected, a…
Rodney Strong Died. Many of you may know the wine brand that carries his name. But there was a real, and very impressive, person behind the brand. Rodney strong was a very important person in the Sonoma wine industry; a promoter of the industry and the region. He started in wine in the late 1950s after a career as a Broadway dancer. He and his wife Charlotte, also a dancer, were a ubiquitous couple around Sonoma County and within the…
I’ve never actually met a "headline writer". I’ve met a professional obituary writer. But never a headline writer. It strikes me, however, that the headline writer might be the most important person in the media when it comes to establishing the conventional wisdom. Example 1: "Australians Lose Taste For Wine" Example 2: "Wine Sales Slip over Past Year" Same story, same media outlet. One true, one so completely off the target as to defy imagination. If you are browsing headlines,…
