The Hard Life

Probably one of the hardest parts of my job here at Highlands Road is the “wine and dine.” Now, to the outsider, it may seem easy and even enjoyable to take long, leisurely lunches with potential clients, of which the constant fixture is a full glass of fantastic wine, but trust me—this IS hard work. I mean, how many of you have to sip on wine in the middle of the day? And how many of you have to concentrate on the finer points of pairing delicious food with even more delicious wine? Like I said, it’s hard work, but someone has to do it.

So today, at the vineyard, we played host to two very interesting chaps. One, a French expat, has been living in South Africa for 7 years. Turns out he grew up in Francophone Africa, switching from the Ivory Coast to Gabon and back again, before returning to France for university. After a short exchange at Berkeley (I informed him we could still be friends, rivalry and all,) and some work in the European wine industry, he headed down to the Western Cape to push his wine interests African style.

The second guy was a New Yorker. Because he was from Long Island, he had a decidedly mild New York accent and five children whom, he claimed, loved the outdoors ;). It was actually quite a nice surprise to have a fellow patriot at the farm. Since there are virtually no other Americans in the Valley, I value the chance to sit through a lunch and talk about the finer points of Saturday Night Live or the college basketball season. He is a distributor in the good ‘ol state of New York and is looking at bringing our wines into his corner of the world. The high population density of NYC along with the geographical spread into the Northeast would be invaluable to us, so we were more than happy to host this "yank" for a day!

So, fighting the difficulties of sitting down to a long wine lunch with the Frenchman and the American,

we were able to have a very productive afternoon discussing the importing potential of Highlands Road Estate and Belfield, (another amazing boutique winery here that produces an amazing cab called Magnifica.) Though my blog entries are often sparse about the business side of the wine industry, it suffices to say that wine deals are never made in a day. It often takes excessive wining and dining to build the personal relationships necessary to facilitate wine distribution. Thus, this lunch was a relative anomaly in the wine industry; in just one sitting, we were able to go from introductions to tangible steps for exportation. I guess I should work with New Yorkers more often!

The next time you are at a business lunch, try and add a little wine. See if it doesn’t make everyone just that much more amiable and amenable, and, while you’re at it, make it a bottle of Highlands Road Estate, I guarantee that it smoothes the way. J