Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2001 3:40 PM
Subject: Wine at Orangewood Consulting - 11
To our Wine Aficionados,
We hope that you are all having a good holiday season. We have been having a low key,
relaxing time. Fortunately not involving any air travel.
As 2001 draws to a close and the prospect of writing the
wrong year on checks for a month or two looms, it's time to reflect on progress
of the wine business at Orangewood Consulting. One year ago we were
applying for licenses, this year we are looking at the size of the negative
profit! Fortunately the year did not end with November, because
December has been the breakthrough month. We shipped
twice as many cases in December as we had for the rest of the year. If we
could sustain the December rate through the year, we would be profitable.
Perhaps we can sustain it, but the holiday season is prime time for wine
purchases, so we should not give up our day jobs just yet!
At the suggestion of one of the WOC readers (thanks Bill),
the remaining content of this newsletter is as follows:
Sales
Restaurants
Pizzeria Bianco
Richardson's
Territorial Bar and Grill
Wine Bars
Duck and Decanter (Event)
Retail Outlets
AZ Wine Company (New)
Portfolio
Marinda Park
Wine
Tasting Event
Feedback
Sales
Restaurants
Overall we continue to work with
15 restaurants though only 4 have signed up so far. Our tactic is to
visit the restaurant to determine whether their approach to wine is
compatible. Do they have a wine list? Does it have room for one or more
of our wines? Do the waitroids help with wine selection? Are the
glasses big enough for me to fit my nose in? And so forth. This is tough
duty. Laurie asked me the other day "Are you going to make me go out
to dinner again tonight?" Perhaps there is a limit to how much
gracious service and exquisite food and wine we can stomach. Nah - not
while belt holes are still available!
Pizzeria Bianco (623 E
Adams - in Heritage Square)
Pizzeria Bianco in the news last
week: "On Tuesday, Wells met with Colangelo in Phoenix, and they attended
a Suns game that night. Diamondbacks first baseman Mark Grace joined them for a
time at the game, and again later at the same pizzeria where Grace was courted
as a free agent by Colangelo a year ago. "I think I'm 6-for-6 at Pizzeria
Bianco," Colangelo said.
I took the article down for Marco Bianco
- yes that's his lucky table over there he told me.
On another evening, while I was
waiting for Laurie to arrive, I was ordering a drink at their adjacent wine
bar. The guy running the bar is Matt Pool, who is co-owner Susan Pool's
brother. Noceto Sangiovese Riserva is on the list but not available by
the glass. However, Matt let me have it by the glass anyway. I love
that attitude.
Richardson's
(1582 E Bethany Home)
Although they have both of the
Noceto wines stacked in the dining room in Dick's Hideaway around the corner
from Richardson's, they have still not made it to the menu. I bet you
could ask for them anyway. Instead Laurie and I took home the better half
of our lunches to try them with the Noceto Normale at dinner. We were eating
the Green Chile Stew and Pasta Heidi, both of them very spicy dishes. The
Noceto is fruity enough to stand up to the spice and enhance the overall dining
experience. (Where did that marketing speak come from?) You may also
infer that the portions are significant.
Territorial Bar and
Grill (37645 N Cave Creek Rd)
The Territorial has a new owner
and now a new a chef. They are becoming Italian food
oriented. As a result they decided to carry, in addition to the Noceto
Sangiovese Riserva, the Noceto Sangiovese Normale and the Il Poggiolino Chianti
Classico. One of our readers reported that they "went to the
Territorial for dinner and tried some of their new Italian fare with a bottle
of Noceto Riserva. It was great! (Both the food and the wine!) We don't dine
out that often in Cave Creek, but we hope to return soon." (Thanks
for the feedback Mary.)
Wine Bars
Duck and Decanter
(Event) (1651 E Camelback Rd )
Michael has reserved January 24
for Orangewood Consulting to present our wines. I will be working the
details with him on January 9th and will let you know. His Thursday
evening wine tastings run 6 - 8.
Retail Outlets
AZ Wine Company (New)
(2515 North Scottsdale)
Richard Betts lived at the RustRidge
Ranch for 6 months and has a strong affection for their wines. He is also
the buyer at the AZ Wine Company so naturally he is now stocking the RustRidge
Chardonnay, Zinfandel and Cabernet Sauvignon. This is a neat place with
friendly people
Portfolio
Marinda Park
Orangewood Consulting is now
empowered to import wines. Next step is to get approval for the
labels. Marinda Park emailed us the proposed labels and via the magic of
color inkjet printing, I affixed them to applications for each varietal - Pinot
Noir, Merlot and Chardonnay. Other steps will include getting Marinda
Park to be have an AZ license as an "out of state producer" and
getting Orangewood Consulting to be licensed as an "out of state
producer" for the target states. The fun goes on and on.
Wine Tasting event
Continuing our tactic of
increasing consumer awareness of our wines and also to introduce the RustRidge
wines, we had a wine tasting event on December 18. You were all
invited Present were Laurie and I, 3 friends (thank you), 13lbs of cheese
and a bottle of each of the wines in our portfolio. Now 8 wines from Noceto, Il
Poggiolino and RustRidge. While we tried valiantly we did not manage to
complete the tasting of all the wines. But we shure had a goood time trying!
Feedback
Not enough support came back for
me to book a flight to Australia – but thanks Bob for the support that did
arrive. I received other feedback, noted in the "paragraphs"
above, it was appreciated, thank you. Keep those emails coming! On
a different note (B flat) if you wish to see these ramblings in the future you
need to do nothing. On the other hand, if you are not interested, see the
boilerplate "PLEASE NOTE" below.
Best wishes to you and yours for a Healthy and Happy New
Year.
Richard and Laurie