Mind the Gap: Wine Marketing 101

Selling Wines Online: Two Different Approaches

Wines under the Wind Gap label are being unloaded. Garigiste.com offered several a few weeks ago, and today, two websites offered a Wind Gap wine at $15 a bottle.

As we start the New Year, which would you buy based on the website’s offer?

Here are your choices:

  1. Buy a wine associated with a guy in prison for fraud who claimed to be rich, spent lots of money, not always his own and also made by an excellent winemaker. And it was “millions” of dollars. And you are led to believe he, the guy in prison, spent tons of money on the wine.
  2. Buy a wine described in bright, uplifting terms made by an excellent winemaker.

#1 A Wind Gap Pinot Noir as offered by www.vivino.com

“What you are about to read may be the most significant cloak and dagger event in the wine industry ever!

June 27th, 2017 Wine Industry Tycoon Charles Banks was sentenced to 4 years in prison for fraud after excessively overspending to craft the best wines in the world.

The Players:

Charles Banks – His Resume:

✔️Screaming Eagle / Jonata: former co-owner / co-founder

✔️Managing Partner: Terroir Capital – $200 million in winery assets (including Wind Gap)

✔️Defrauds two NBA stars out of millions: (somewhere around $22 million)

Pax Mahle – The Winemaker:

✔️100 point superstar – founder of Pax Cellars and Wind Gap

✔️Possibly more 94-100 point scores than Heidi Barrett and Philippe Melka combined”

 

#2 A Wind Gap Syrah offered by  www.lastbottlewine.com

“BIG, bold, in your face Syrah from none other than Pax Mahle (yes, the guy who just scored 100 points for his $50 Sonoma Hillside bottling under the Pax label) that is made in a drink-me-now-with-gusto style. Bright, perfumey and juicy, this isn’t real heavy or meaty at all, just a warm, friendly, lovely, MIND-BLOWING DEAL if we have EVER seen one. Pax and his wines are all the buzz these days, so it’s particularly thrilling for us to have a little (little!) parcel to sell. PLEASE don’t miss! WILL sell out in the blink of an eye!

(oh, and Happy New Year, also, please hurry on this as Pax Mahle’s Wind Gap is more popular than a roomful of newborn kitty cats and we don’t have very much)”

 

So please cast a vote.

Shameless or frivolous?

 

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Author: robywine, norm roby

My career as a wine journalist/critic began in 1975 when my article about California Petite Sirah was published. My focus remained on California as I edited a monthly wine magazine and then moved on to The Wine Spectator in 1982. Over the following years, my column appeared under the banner of “Stormin’ Norman, and I also wrote articles about wine collectors and wine auctions. Without getting into a year by year bio, let me try to summarize here. During my time with The Spectator which I enjoyed immensely, I taught wine classes at a culinary school and at other venues in San Francisco. Before venturing into wine, teaching was my thing, English Lit and Rhetoric. After The Spectator I was the U.S. Contributor to Decanter Magazine, writing mostly about California, but also expanding into Washington State and Oregon. My Decanter years began in 1992 and after buying a summer home in France in 2000, I traveled throughout France and eventually published articles about St. Emilion, Castillon, Bergerac, Minervois, Roussillon, Luberon, Provence, and Alsace. Also, around 2000, my wife began working for Cousino-Macul in Chile, so we tasted and traveled our way through Chile and, of course, managed to fly over the Andes and explore and taste our way through Argentina. As travel lovers, we have also spent many interesting days visiting the wine regions of Spain, Italy, Portugal, Scicily, Greece, and New Zealand. And to come to a close, I was Director of Winesong, a Charity Wine Auction for 20 years, 1992-2000 that benefitted a local hospital. That brought me in contact with wine collectors and to the auction scene. And finally, I co-authored a book, The Connoisseurs’ Guide to California Wine published by Alfred A. Knopf. It went through 4 editions and sold over 500.000 copies.

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