Sent: Friday, July 20, 2001 11:02 AM

Subject: Wine at Orangewood Consulting - 2

To recipients of this newsletter,

It has been a month since I put out the first edition of this newsletter, even sporadic newsletters have to go out from time to time. We have been busy over the last month, but not visibly so from your perspective. I hope that the next month or two will have some activities that you can attend.

In "Wine at Orangewood Consulting - 1" (WOC-1 - gotta get some acronyms going here) I mentioned that the Vino Noceto Sangiovese 1999 would be available for release to restaurants in August. In support of that plan, we ordered and have now received a shipment of the wine. Laurie and I tried it last night, we pronounce it good!

Other things that we have been doing is to try to find restaurants interested in carrying our wine. The sales approach has been first to qualify the restaurant . We do this by going to the restaurant and having a meal, reading the wine list, talking to wait-staff. (This part of the process is calorie intensive and is a real chore.) If the restaurant qualifies, then the next step is to talk to the owner or whoever is responsible for the wine list to try to arrange a tasting. Of the tastings we have conducted, the restaurateurs have all been impressed with the wines. Overall so far we have visited 13 restaurants, conducted 6 tastings and have 5 saying that they will carry the wine. A further 3 are still in process.

What we have learned in going to these places is first, they are mostly trying to stay in business through the summer. This was demonstrated to me at Bistecca. I had lunch there, chatted up the bar staff and got the General Manager's card and the name of the person to call to set up the wine tasting. Next day when I called management had shut them down. Other restaurants generally are trying to reduce their wine stocks not add to them. Secondly, even if they were willing to buy wine, they do not see their customers drinking medium to full bodied wines. The good news is that they do have time to talk to us during the summer.

Three of the restaurants have said that they would like to start carrying the wine once the "Normale" is available. I will be trying to close the orders with them in the next week or two - then I will have something to tell you about.

From a retail standpoint, Tom Hamilton at www.winesupply.net will supply cases of wine at a small markup. Michael Fine at Sportsman's Fine Wine and Spirits said it was a good solid wine and will carry it in the fourth quarter. I am arranging a tasting for two of the AJ's Cellar Masters.

The other activity has been exploring expansion of the portfolio. I go into restaurants they ask for my "Catalog". They are surprised to see three lines on a page. While we are not interested in having a phone book catalog, some other offerings could make sense. We are trying to figure out a strategy for selecting wines to offer. I did get some samples from a small winery in Tuscany. Now I need to evaluate them. We do not think of ourselves as connoisseurs so any suggestions for the evaluation process will be welcome.

In the meantime enjoy your wine drinking.

Richard and Laurie Corles