Barrel Tasting 2010: Mopping Up!
April 1, 2010
Barrel Tasting 2010: Mopping Up!
By TR
Along the Wine Road, we look at the year as being divided into “Before Barrel Tasting”, “During Barrel Tasting” and “After Barrel Tasting”. Everyday routines stop, are altered, are forgotten. Everyone understands the blanket excuse: “Well, it was Barrel Tasting!” It is a life changing event for many of us, similar to having children, as after you have gone through it, nothing will ever be the same again. Along the Wine Road, there are those that participate in Barrel Tasting and those who do not – and never the twain shall meet. Barrel Tasting is now the largest wine event in the state of California- we had record breaking pre-sale of tickets to the event and also sold blockbuster amounts at the door- the dust is still settling on that one as member wineries are slowly but surely returning their BT Event supplies to our Wine Road warehouse and reporting on their ticket sales.
All in all, member wineries and guests seem quite happy- good times, good wines, good sales, good purchases. After BT, member wineries return to us any left-over glasses, DD mugs, wristbands, posters and their empty 5-gallon Calistoga Water bottles. Our warehouse, which was pretty much empty, and orderly, becomes awash with a mess of materiel being returned in random order and in a hurry. This is the time when I always find that I was too hasty in recycling pallets and cardboard. Glasses have to be re-staged onto pallets, shrink-wrapped and stacked for A Wine & Food Affair in November- ditto the mugs- the wristbands are stored for next BT- the posters are kept safe for any folks who might order them off our wine road website (click the callout for “Order 2008 Cookbook”- ironic.)
We enjoy seeing our members and hearing their stories of BT- and this is a time when we can fine-tune the event and make it better. This year, partially because we are right next door to Optima Winery, and partially because some guests actually sought us out, we had visitors during BT and were able to actually meet some of the folks that we knew formerly just from email or telephone. Now that is gratifying, to meet guests who we helped plan a whole itinerary for and then, wow- there they are.
Facebook and Twitter played a big part in making this BT even bigger than ever—and related to that, and staged partially with those tools, Beth (and I the following weekend) took part in photographic flyovers with auteur Robert Janover. Guests were coordinated to come out to wave and Robert captured it. We flew in a very small Cessna out of Dragonfly Aviation- two of us in the back and two in the front- you have to get in the plane very carefully and separately so that it does not tip over onto the nose or tail. Robert shoots out the open window- so it is cold enough in the plane to forestall airsickness. But I for one really hate getting into small backseats when there is a photographer just standing there all ready to shoot.
