As some of my friends know, I started blogging in French a few months ago. I decided to give it a try just before my French book got published. In spite of being located in France, I feel and work mostly like an Anglo-Saxon: I always get mildly irritated by the French way of doing business, their slowness in understanding social media and Web 2.0 strategies. But I must admit things are improving a bit and I look forward to confirming this impression during the European Wine Bloggers Conference held in Vienna from October 22nd to 24th. Why is that? I was checking the list of attendees today and I saw much more people from France than last year. There are also many Europeans attending, coming from UK, Germany, Hungary, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Belgium, Sweden. But the most striking thing is the number of people coming from outside Europe : China, USA, Thailand, India, Brazil, Australia, Mexico and even Mauritius.
What does it mean ? Just that the EWBC is becoming a recognized event among the international blogging community. It also means the blogging community recognizes the need to gather regularly to discuss issues, strategies, new tools and maybe just meet up. I am looking forward to meeting people in real life I’ve been in contact with for months, sometimes years to put a face and a voice on this blog URL and name on Twitter.
Blogging has now been the topic of various studies. We all know the outstanding study conducted by Prof. Liz Thach on 222 wine blogs in English as well as her article on : “Do Wine Blogs Impact Your Brand?” in WineBusiness.com. There is also a very recent one conducted by a young French marketer, Jean-David Camus, on French blogs and bloggers. It shows that 80% of French bloggers write about wine when Dr Thach’s study showed 9 major blog types.
Chart created by Prof. Liz Thach
English-speaking wine bloggers are less focused on tasting notes than their French counterparts. Is this trend true for all European countries? This is one of the points I’ll try to find an answer to while in Vienna, because I’m convinced that the blogging world has undergone tremendous changes in only one year. See you in Vienna, Austria?
A few weeks in the US are the best way to fuel inspiration in a sometimes overwhelmed mind. The last few weeks were no exception. I had the opportunity to go to various restaurants and noticed a few changes in the way some hospitality businesses are run in our lean times.
Two years ago, Leslie Thomas, a young wine consultant in Santa Barbara, CA, partnered with an organic local restaurant, Spiritland Bistro, to offer a rather creative program, BYOB wine and dine. Once a month, people bring their own bottles of wine to match the theme: Pinot Noir, Roussane and Marsanne, Zinfandel, or whatever fits the attendees or Leslie. The menu is designed to pair the wines. Of course, there is no corkage fee. At the beginning, there were about 20 to 30 people attending the dinner. The relaxed setting, the convivial tables, the quality of the wines brought by the attendees and the moderate costs – the price of your bottle and the dinner – brought an immediate success to the event. Nowadays about 50 people gather every first Wednesday of the month to the dinner.
While in Santa Barbara or in Napa, we brought bottles to several restaurants. Some of them lifted the corkage fee (ZuZu in Napa), one reduced it from $20 to $14 dollars and charged only once for our several bottles (Arts and Letters Café) while the last one, Olio e Limone, charged full price ($20 for each bottle) in spite of the fact the chef and the waiter were offered to share a glass with us. What did those various policies tell me as a consumer?
- Some restaurants really care about their customers: they want them to have a nice experience and to come back with more friends. After all, what is the extra cost to a restaurant for washing a few extra glasses and having a waiter opening a bottle?
- Some restaurants think it is more important to make money than to care about their customers’ happiness. Too bad but this “European” attitude is not what will make customers loyal, at least not in the uS and even if the food is good.
BYOB is a very good way to attract wine lovers to a restaurant but corkage fees can (and sometimes should) be lifted when customers are loyal customers or, on the contrary, new customers who could become trendsetters.
Wine by the glass is a different story. The price of bottles are sometimes a little extravagant. Why spend $50 or more on a bottle of wine you know you’ll buy from $15or 20 in a store? Consumers are usually ready for new experiences: why not a glass of a very good wine at $10 rather than a bottle of average wine at $30? A lot of restaurateurs understood this new trend and are now offering more wines by the glass. When a few years ago consumers had the choice between 6 wines and were not sure of how long the bottle stood open, they are now offered a more interesting and long list of wines: “The public has become more interested in different wines and different producers of different varietals, and there are more varietals available than there have been in the past”, said the owner of the Prohibition-Speakeasy Wine Club in Healdsburg, Richard Rosenberg, to The Fresno Bee. The quality of the experience is enhanced and the consumer happy. And it’s much easier to get back behind the wheel after moderate drinking.
BYOB if you are not sure of the wine list or select your restaurant by its offer of wine by the glass? The consumers’ choice, but now at least there is a choice.
And the question was “solved” by the EU: it had recently rejected a proposal to create an organic wine category. Sad? Maybe not. Those last few weeks, I traveled a lot and I met many wine makers in France who are already working their vineyards and making their wines organically without advertising it or seeking some kind of certification. What’s the point, would some ask? According tothe producers, there are several points:
- working organically is an ethical decision: it is the promise of a better product with less chemicals for their customers. More and more people are suffering from allergies and knowing that the wine they buy have less sulfites and the grapes were treated with mineral products instead of chemicals is reassuring.
- working organically is also good for the environment: agriculture (and viticulture as well) were very often accused of polluting the water or destroying the natural environment of a place. It is a way to protect our planet from further destruction.
- working organically is a personal choice, based on convictions and values.
Why not share those values with the consumers? The various wine producers I talked to said they mention their choice to their customers and to visitors. They also explain to them why they made that choice and how they hope to increase the quality of their wines but also leave a better soil to the next generations who will work their vineyard.
Does the Europe of wine really need an other intrusion of the EU? Mmmm… Consumers should trust the wine producers: they know their work, they love to make great wines and they care about their property. Let’s raise our glass of organic wine to a better world!
Do you know this fun, energetic and innovative beverage magazine, The Mutineer? If you don’t, run to your local newsstand and get one. It’s the most relaxing, entertaining and informative magazine on all trends in the beverage industry. I’m not talking sodas, but spirits, cocktails, wines… “fine beverage…redefined”, as stated on the cover.
I heard of Alan Kropf, the young entrepreneur who started The Mutineer about two years ago. He was then launching his magazine mostly in .pdf format with a very reduced distribution. Two years later, his magazine is distributed nationwide and has a strong following. Alan is like his magazine: fun, innovative, creative. When we met him “in person”, he was traveling in France to taste wines on a press trip. We shared a nice evening talking about the wine and beverage industries, comparing notes on a few wines and exchanging ideas on the state of the Internet.
There is a big generational gap between Alan and myself but I didn’t feel I was in foreign territory. Alan is so open and learned about everything beverage related it is a real pleasure to talk to him. And I learned so much about cocktails in the last issue of The Mutineer. One of my favorite cities in the US is New Orleans, its heat, its music scene and its inhabitants. But I’m not much of a cocktail drinker, which is a problem in New Orleans. Try to drink a glass of wine in a bar! I managed but I had to insist heavily. I feel sorry for myself now: what a mistake! I should have visited the Museum of American Cocktail , tried the famous Sazerac cocktail or gone to Crescent City Brewery.
What does the success story of The Mutineer tell us about wine marketing and innovation? There were so many wine and food magazines, so many lifestyle magazines available when Alan started that it seemed difficult to succeed. But his positioning, young, trendy and centered on beverages, was exactly what was needed by young and inexperienced consumers. Alan and his team found the right way to address this younger consumer who is not interested in the technical Wine Spectator, or in the too food oriented Wine and Spirits or very serious and a litlle off putting Saveur. The impertinent but informative tone of the Mutineer went directly to the heart of the young consumer. Congratulations to a bright entrepreneur! And long live The Mutineer!
