San Francisco Prep High School churns out Winery Owners and Winemakers

St. Ignatius High School has produced a very impressive list of alums working in the world of wine. The Alumni Department at S.I. forwarded me this list of graduates affiliated with wineries in the Napa Valley, Sonoma and beyond. Continue reading

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Source: http://www.winecountrygetaways.com/napablog/san-francisco-prep-high-school-churns-out-winery-owners-and-winemakers/

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?Lafite is out, Conti is in.?

China pivots to Burgundy. Source: Theatlantic Via: The Atlantic Thankfully, the wine market’s sour turn could also just be a sign of changing tastes. Eighty-six of the 100 bottles Liv-ex tracks are Bordeaux, the traditional king of fine wine. But as the Financial Times wrote in May, recent auctions suggest that Hong Kong buyers, perhaps [...]

“Lafite is out, Conti is in.” originally appeared on Winecast. Licensed under Creative Commons.

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SEO Services

It’s hard to find reliable SEO Services these days. Heck make a single seo related post on Twitter and you’ll magically find yourself with 25+ new followers all trying to sell you their seo services. Get yourself on the first or second page of Google and you’ll start getting phone calls. It’s annoying because if [...]

Source: http://winewithmark.info/archives/676

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The Lifestyle of An A-List Wine Critic

A-List wine critics are the celebrities of the wine geek but we don’t get a chance to learn much about them. Just Google for interviews of Robert Parker or James Laube and you will see very little outside of promotional stuff. But Antonio Galloni of The Wine Advocate seems to be more open and has [...]

The Lifestyle of An A-List Wine Critic originally appeared on Winecast. Licensed under Creative Commons.

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Napa Valley winter trip

Should you consider a Napa Valley winter trip in December or January? Napa Valley during these two months is undoubtedly the quietest time in this spectacular wine country. As one long-time Napa Valley resident once mentioned to me, ?Winter is … Continue reading

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Source: http://www.winecountrygetaways.com/napablog/napa-valley-winter-trip/

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Massachusetts Lawmakers Comment on Wine Shipping Laws

This post is sponsored by Metro West Wines, serving Wellesley and Weston, MA delivering wine to your doorstop in under an hour.

As we learned earlier this year another Massachusetts legislative session has come and gone without enacting legislation that would enable the direct shipment of wine from out of state wineries to Massachusetts residents. 

It's a shame since (1) the state continues to be non-compliant with a 2010 federal court ruling and (2) the state is leaving significant revenue on the table by barring shipments.

The two bills failing to make it out of committee for a vote are HB 1029 and HB 1882.

An interesting piece by Colleen Quinn of the State House News Service sheds some rare and precious light on the issues holding up passing of direct shipment bills.

Representative Speliotis comments:

Rep. Theodore Speliotis (D-Danvers), who chairs the Consumer Protection Committee that gave the wine buying bill an unfavorable rating this week, said Thursday that while he favors removing the buying restriction, the state needs to find a way to protect local sellers
?The biggest fear is package stores will go by the wayside like hardware stores,? Speliotis said. ?The object is to try to allow new technology into an old profession without costing Massachusetts jobs. 
Speliotis said he hopes the wine industry and the local package store owners will reach a consensus on a bill. They frequently discuss the issue to come up with a solution, he said.

This commentary is interesting to me because in my view the central issue in this battle has always been out of state entities (wineries and to a lesser extent out of state retailers) against Massachusetts distributors. But here the issue is painted as out of state wineries and in state retailers.

Next time you're in a wine store ask the owner whether they're concerned about the direct shipment of wine. The ones I've asked couldn't care less. The primary concerns I've heard from in-state retailers are laws which prohibit them from shipping out of state, high markups from Massachusetts wholesalers relative to other states, and wine being sold at an increasing number of nearby grocery stores.

Further, the commentary is eerily similar to the protectionist stance that got the state into trouble in the first place by limiting shipments to small out of state wineries. The reason Massachusetts should allow wine shipments is simple: Because a federal court said they need to. It shouldn't be a negotiation that involves the concerns of in state retailers.

Here's commentary from Frank Anzalotti who collectively represents the package stores in the state:

Frank Anzalotti, executive director of the Massachusetts Package Store Association, said that if online purchasing is allowed, they want local brick and mortar stores to be able to sell online too. Otherwise, he said, they would be at a disadvantage. 
?We are not, in general, in favor of online purchasing,? Azalotti said. ?The obvious reasons are we want a reliable responsible party doing a face-to-face transaction to make sure it is legal.? 
This is another strange misdirection. Massachusetts retailers are split on whether they want to sell online. Many old guard package stores don't want things to change, while other retailers are already selling online - albeit limited to shipping only to Massachusetts addresses.

I agree that Massachusetts retailers absolutely need to be able to ship out of state in conjunction with allowing out of state wineries to be able to ship to Massachusetts. But at the same time out of state retailers should also be able to ship to Massachusetts - a provision that's never been any bill proposed to date.

Finally, check out this quote from House Minority Leader Bradley Jones - who's on our side as wine enthusiasts since he's the one who sponsored the bill:

Jones said only a handful of residents have contacted him upset they cannot buy wine out of state. But he added, ?There are court cases that say we should change this.?
Our call to action is pretty clear: We need to write our representatives.
Don't know who your representative is? A list can be found here.

An authentic, personally written email with your address goes a long way towards getting the message to our legislators that this nonsense has gone on for long enough. Let's Free the Grapes!

Related Reading:

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Winners of the Louis Roederer Wine Writing Awards 2012

Congratulations to the many winners of the Louis Roederer Wine Writing Awards presented tonight in London. Whilst the awards that Vrazon helped to create,the Born Digital Wine Awards, recognise the growing talent of content written specifically for online media, it is fair to say that this is not yet the mainstream of wine writing. Tonight’s categories [...]

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