On Being an Enthusiast and Sharing Useful Information

An excellent blog post popped up in my Flipboard Google Reader feed this morning. It has nothing to do with wine but it was useful, interesting and made me think a lot about the things I write about here on this blog.

The post is about procuring new wheels and tires for a BMW by Chris Parente. The steps Chris went though researching, ordering, tracking, negotiating, receiving and assembling the order were very familiar to me. They're eerily similar to what we go through as wine deal hounds.

With the exception of installation, I do all of these things when I'm buying wine. Sure, there's the occasional impulse buy at a local wine shop or grocery store, but the bulk of my buying these days is online, in response to email offers, or winery direct. Like Chris with his interest in specific wheels and tires, once you've gone Wine Berserkers you want very specific wines.

What I liked about the post is that he gave specific examples of resources he used and how he went about the process. I can see my way to leveraging his techniques and having a more enjoyable experience by getting better products and service at the best possible prices. Coincidentally, if I had once sentence to describe the mission of this blog that would be it.

What got me thinking the most about his post, though, is the question of whether it's worth it. Or rather, whether I'm interested in getting into another high involvement hobby. You can tell how much time and research went into tires and wheels for one of his cars - imagine extending that across the entire enthusiast experience. You've got to want it and it's got to be a priority to do it well.

I spend hours each week thinking about wine. Reading articles, blogs, consulting and contributing to CellarTracker, looking for deals on wine-searcher.com. Buying it, drinking it, visiting wineries, attending events - writing about it.

When I need new tires or wheels I just got down to DirectTire and they take care of it. Similarly when I needed a new bike for our 7 year old recently. We just went to a couple shops nearby and bought what seemed to be a good fit for our needs. And maybe that's fine for the occasional purchase. Spend the time saved burning up the web for the best deal on healthier pursuits. Life in balance, right?

But I wouldn't mind being more savvy in more domains. And that's why I enjoy acquiring and sharing knowledge via blogs and social networks. Mainstream publications just don't cover this stuff in a way that's as focused on the consumer experience.

You can't go too deep into too many hobbies. But you can learn a little from someone who's deep in a topic and can share useful information. Chris does that and reading his post reminded me to try to do a little more of that here on this blog.

Check it his blog here: Work, Wine and Wheels
You can follow Chris on Twitter: @cparente

I'd love it if you SUBSCRIBED to The Wellesley Wine Press

PS This post was written on an iPad with Blogsy.


Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/WellesleyWinePress/~3/LXDniNUTpz4/on-being-enthusiast-and-sharing-useful.html

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Berlin Tasting in Copenhagen

Berlin Tasting in Copenhagen" might sound a little confusing? However the Berlin Tasting is a reference to a famous tasting held in Berlin the January 23. 2004. It was held by the Chilean wine producer Eduardo Chadwick from Errazuriz and he had invited 66 wine journalists from all over Europe to taste the best Chadwick wines from Chile against the supernames from Bordeaux and Tuscany. 16 wines were tasted from the vintages 2000 and 2001, among them 2000 Chateau Latour, 2000 Chateau Lafite and 2000 Chateau Margaux.

Source: http://www.wine4freaks.com/37/berlin-tasting-in-copenhagen/

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Gift Baskets

It seems that every year the gift basket business gets bigger and bigger. From corporate gift baskets to those of us who simply don’t know exactly what to buy for our loved one’s…..gift baskets offer a real alternative and the industry is growing as a result. While I can appreciate that every business (like every [...]

Source: http://winewithmark.info/archives/668

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Follow My Wine Reviews on Pinterest

When I first got started on Twitter I had high hopes of posting frequent reviews there but it never really worked out. It was partially due to the 140 character limit but the transient nature of the medium ultimately kept me only reviewing wines there as part of an organized Twitter live tasting. But with [...]

Follow My Wine Reviews on Pinterest originally appeared on Winecast. Licensed under Creative Commons.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Winecast/~3/8_sv68XT8FU/

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Tasting notes - Berlin Tasting

Here follows my tasting notes from The Berlin Tasting in Copenhagen. No. 1 - 2005 Chateau Mouton-Rothschild (Bordeaux) Dark colour with intense smell of pencil, cigar, currant and spicy wood. It’s full-bodied, rich and concentrated but also with an upfront softness. 96/100. No. 2 - 2004 Sassicaia (Tuscany) Not so intense in the nose - a little cherry. The [...]

Source: http://www.wine4freaks.com/40/tasting-notes-berlin-tasting/

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Field Notes from a Wine Life ? Story Edition

Odds and ends from a life lived through the prism of the wine glass…

Words aren’t enough

I give to thee…the worst wine ad of all-time and that’s without delving into the ponderous name of the wine or, why, inexplicably, the back of the laptop in the photo has a big sticker for Ass Kisser ales

…In the main visual, three people are huddled around the boss giving him “Ass Kisser” wine…Isn’t the point of being a brown-noser to do it subtly?  Who randomly gifts their boss right before their employee review? 

image

Even if you view this ad as schlocky hipster irony, it’s still bad and makes you wonder if the advertising sales guy at Wine Enthusiast couldn’t do a solid for his client and suggest creative that, well, actually makes sense.

Or, maybe being horrible was the plan – like a movie that becomes a cult hit a decade hence…so bad that it becomes a lofty ideal for bad, enjoying a following because of its campy nature. 

Bad Week for Eric Asimov?

On both Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, Eric Asimov, the New York Times chief wine critic was taken to task for different reasons by Matt Kramer at Winespectator.com and Steve Heimoff at his blog of the same name.

This is interesting because wine writers of a certain stature very carefully call their shots amongst their peers.

Normally the shots are fired up (Parker) or down (bloggers), but usually never sideways amongst writers in the same strata. 

To watch Asimov, as seemingly decent of a guy as you’ll find, called onto the rug by two notable wine writers, to me, speaks to something much bigger.

With Parker stepping aside and Antonio Galloni receiving glancing admiration for hitting a stand-up triple by dint of his current position at the Wine Advocate, at the same time that the wheat and chaff are separating with wine bloggers, somebody has to step into the fray as a public foil for other wine writers to target.

Unwittingly, it might be Asimov for reasons entirely opposite of Parker’s hegemony.  Asimov’s palate for wine seems food-friendly and balanced; he takes an egalitarian approach to wine for the people without pretense and he doesn’t score wines.

In other words, Asimov is bizarro Superman to Parker’s swashbuckling empiricism and, perhaps, even a greater danger to the Ivory Tower of legacy wine media than the mere jealousy that passed for poking at Parker.

Just a thought…

It’s all about the story

The wine business has always been excellent at storytelling.  Virtually every winery has their origin story and that of their dirt down pat, even if not very compelling.

So, it is with interest that I’ve been watching Facebook’s recent changes keeping in mind that founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has emphasized emotional resonance, narrative and storytelling – factors that extend well beyond consumers using Facebook to “Tell the story of their life,” as Zuckerberg noted.  This will be inclusive of the brands that use Facebook for engagement, as well.

I was further intrigued after reading parallel news reports that Randall Rothenberg, President and CEO of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), is singing the same song.

He notes in an article in Advertising Age, “Technology innovations are irrelevant to the future of advertising and marketing unless a more fundamental activity is understood, honored and advanced: the craft of storytelling.”

A quick Google search for “Mark Zuckerberg F8 Keynote” and “Randall Rothenberg MIXX Keynote” will yield a number of stories all occurring in September.  There’s no question about Facebook’s influence and the IAB is the thought-leader for digital advertising.  Between the two of them, they present an imposing shadow of influence on digital marketing.

If I were a winery with an understanding that digital marketing is a tsunami of change that is important, I might start revisiting my winery story for some fine-tuning…

Two books that I recommend to bone-up on the elements of good business storytelling are:  The Story Factor and Made to Stick.

On Sweet Wines

In an article this week from the San Francisco Chronicle called “Beginner drinkers get a crush on sweet red wines,”  E.&J. Gallo VP of Marketing, Stephanie Gallo, noted:  “There is a major shift going on in the U.S. wine drinking culture.  First, we noticed that regional sweet red blends were doing particularly well in Indiana, Texas and North Carolina. Second, our consumers were asking if we produced a sweet red wine after tasting our Moscato at events.”

Good Grape readers had the scoop on this months ago when I wrote:

How Sweet it is – The Growing Sweet Wine Trend in early October, 2010

And

Move over Moscato and Make Way for Sweet Reds in February of this year

Just saying…

Source: http://goodgrape.com/index.php/site/field_notes_from_a_wine_life_story_edition/

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Thank You From the Bottom of My Heart

I’m sitting here in my new home office with a fresh perspective and a touch of the misties, as in misty-eyes.  Rich and I have been moved into the place for just over a month and it has made a huge difference in how we feel about things.  I now recognize that we were both [...]

Source: http://familylovewine.wordpress.com/2010/08/13/thank-you-from-the-bottom-of-my-heart/

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