March 8 is officially our day, Women’s Day.  We should pay more often a tribute to those women, wine producers or professionals, who are often the source of interesting initiatives. This article aims at mentioning just a few of those ideas or different approaches on various wine related topics. This is my way to tell them “Thank you” not only for some of the best wines I tasted but also for being great human beings and friends.

A few days ago, I received an email from Laetitia Mauriac, who owns and manages with her brother Arthur Château La Levrette in Blaye near Bordeaux, to join a group of women wine professionals.  I knew Laetitia’s wines and strategy from various tastings and events.  Her name is famous in France as she is the great-niece of the writer François Mauriac, who owned Château Malagar and placed many of his novels in the Bordeaux region. But Laetitia is more than the heir of a prestigious name. She is a nice, bright, creative and imaginative wine producer and woman. The label of her wines is a delight in the conservative Bordeaux world: on a white background the design of the letters and the little greyhound, elegant and delicate like Laetitia’s wines, makes the bottle stand out immediately on a shelf.  Laetitia and her brother Louis are also responsible for one of the funniest video I ever saw going viral on the Web: how to seduce a woman with Château La Levrette. And the wines themselves are so good: I especially enjoy her white wine at various tastings.

During this meeting with several wine women, I was also surprised by the design of an other label, Château Saint-Barbe. According to the marketing director, Claire Lescanne, the design was the result of a study on what kind of labels women like. The idea behind it was that women are mostly buying wines and they love elegant and original labels that enhance the quality of the experience. It does not mean they are not able to make the difference between a bad wine in a nicely designed packaging and a good wine in a so-so packaging. They just enjoy a nice looking bottle: it is part of the wine experience.

During the same lunch I also met a woman who is going to open a wine store in Paris dedicated mostly to wines produced by women. The world of wine is so rich in great people I always enjoy spending a few hours talking to wine professionals.

And there are so many great women with whom I spent many delightful hours talking about and tasting wines – theirs and others’. In that very special day I would like to raise my glass to Joan Dillon, Duchess of Mouchy who opened the doors to great wines, Caroline Lestimé in Chassagne-Montrachet, Joëlle Brouard, founder and director of the Wine Management Institute in Dijon, Burgundy and many others I crossed paths with and am very grateful to. Cheers to you, ladies!

Yesterday, the 2011 edition of Vinexpo opened in Bordeaux and Burgundy was the guest of honor of the ESC Dijon Institute of Wine Management conference. Three keynote speakers presented the success stories of their business or organization : Florence Ragonneau of the Bureau of Burgundy wines (BIVB), François Desperriers, founder with Aurélien Ibanez of BourgogneLive.com blog and Jean-David Camus, who manages the Albert Bichot Hospices de Beaune sale every year.

The BIVB is the “official” voice of Burgundy wines on all markets. Florence Ragonneau’s mission was to carry the image of Burgundy wines on the Net and all social media.  First of all, she launched a web site in 8 languages to reach the most important international markets. The site provides information targeted to professionals, journalists and bloggers, influencers and consumers as well as e-learning facilities. Then she took the BIVB on Facebook and created a strong community of about 2,500 “friends” around the Burgundy wines.

Jean-David Camus is a young entrepreneur who saw the strong possibilities of taking in the 21st century a 200-year old brand, Albert Bichot.  For various historical reasons, Bichot is one of the biggest buyers of wines of the Hospices de Beaune during the famous November auction sale. Camus gave the opportunity to consumers to get together to buy a barrel of the Hospices de Beaune wines: a barrel allows 48 people to buy each a 6-bottle case for a price between 30 to 70 euros a bottle. It puts the buy at a reasonable financial level for lovers of great Burgundy wines.  What is new is that the auction and the buy take place on the Internet: the prospective buyer registers on the dedicated site and agrees on a price (usually around 4,000 to 6,000 euros a barrel): if the barrel costs less during the auction, the buyer pays less. If the auction takes the price of the barrel over the agreed maximum, the sale does not take place. It is a wine-win deal for the Hospices and the consumer. To promote his action, Camus resorts to all available media: Twitter, Facebook, web site, links to blogs. The results are convincing: he brought over 1,500 new customers to Albert Bichot and sold several barrels of wines.

last but not least, François Desperriers told the amazing success story of Bourgogne-Live.com. Launched in January 2010 by a few “tweets” on Burgundy wines, Desperriers saw his audience grow because of the consumers’ interest in Burgundy wines. In March desperriers and Ibanze launched their blog, Bourgogne-Live.com. They were rapidly frustated by the lack of comments and of conversation. They then created a Facebook page where conversations regularly engaged on their blogs’ articles and videos. Meanwhile they also carried out links to news and other blogs they thought of interest to their community.

Those success stories put Burgundy wines on the digital map. Burgundy producers also got involved, helping to spread the word about their wines. By now, consumers would have to be very distracted to miss Burgundy on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and any other media. Enjoy!