Last week I was at the Miami International Wine Fair and I always find these trade show tastings to be very interesting. There are a ton of boths, each with a number of wines for the attendees to taste. Many of the booths are filled with winery representatives, either from the actual wineries or from the regions that the wineries come from. The attendees of the Miami Wine Fair had varying wine knowledge levels. There were wine buyers from stores as well-known as Sherry-Lehmann, importers looking for additional wines to represent, and restaurant owners looking to stock their wine lists.
Then there were advertisers from magazines looking to talk to whomever will listen to them, seeing if there is any money they can convince a winery to spend with their publication. There are also a variety of press, both known and unknown that walk the show. There were two lovely ladies from Disfunkshion Magazine who were beautiful, extremely fashionable, and totally lost at a wine tasting. I talked with them for about 20 minutes, going through some tasting terms and about wine in general. Really great to talk to and soaked up the information enthusiasticly. I hope they keep trying new wines and integrate wine into their fashion magazine.
I always wonder how much business actually gets done at these events. It seems to me to be a who-knows-who event, where people look for the gems in the show to taste and remember, but mostly find their friends (the cliques are intense and jealously guarded, but not impossible to join). If you know the right people, they will all stop by your booth and taste your wines. If you do not know the right people you are just there to hope someone influential comes by. On the buyer side, there are so many choices and so many booths that it makes perfect sense to go visit your friends' booths first and then see what else is out there.
(upcoming work related mention... watch out!)
And Tuesday I am going to be doing it all again. This Tuesday, October 6 is the New York Great Match: Wine & Tapas hosted by Wines from Spain. I will be at the Drink Ribera. Drink Spain. booth, pouring some wines from Ribera del Duero. If you are enthusiastic about Ribera del Duero, or just want to learn more about the region, visit the Facebook page, Twitter page, and Drink Ribera. Drink Spain. website for more information.
And if you just want to say hi, swing by my table and I'll pour you a good glass of Spanish wine.
