How to Sell Fine Wines to Top Restaurants  (29July)

This has to come to me from an unimpeachable source, who assures me it is genuine. It is from a distributor of fine wine to a respected Sydney sommelier.

The names have been changed (by me) to hide the identity of the innocent. Never the less, can you believe this person actually wrote it! I don't know what surprises me more; that is was sent, or the reputed behaviour of the sommelier in question.

"Hey Xxz,

I am going out on a limb here, I know, but I want to ask you for your absolute honesty. Please…

I will be disappointed, but not unsurprised if you do not answer.

Tell me why you are and have always been uninterested in the wines from ABC wine? You are a true professional – I know this - that is why I am asking. What is it about our wines that does not attract you?

We obviously have all the right hatted restaurants on side - they easily sell out our wines in quick time in Sydney. We are favourably reviewed and have thre times as much demand as supply, yet there are always two or three very respected places in both Melbourne and Sydney that politely decline every year. You are one (at both your previous and current joint). I should not complain as my job is really very easy…I enjoy coming to Sydney three times a year to chat with the xxxx, yyyy, zzzz, aaaa (all respected Sommeliers) and yourselves….but to be truthful Xyz – you always come across as far too cool for school? Why is that? Most other professional Sydney Sommeliers are nothing if not honest and upfront. I have great respect for most of the Sydney Sommeliers. They certainly put Melbourne Sommeliers into a lesser league.

I don’t ask for you pity or your custom – just your honest opinion. I cannot be offended. I did not make the wine. I care for it, yes, but ultimately it is not my baby. I have a few goals in life (like you) that I am currently exploring. But I am truly interested why you apparently have a disdain for our wine brand (bbbb said she saw you roll your eyes several times when I was getting wine ready for you last week), yet you put on such an affected display of interest when I come to see you? Are you a fake wanker or merely misunderstood? Is the search to be truly unique and a trend setter in the Sydney wine scene/press enough for you to lose your objectivity?

Why not just tell me when I ring that you are not interested? I respect that honesty a lot more. I have little interest in wasting my time showing you wines we both know you are never going to buy.

I mean nothing untoward by this email Xyz. Seriously, I do not. I am just interested why such an intelligent well respected and influential Sydney wine guy would be so fake and disingenuous to us on a regular basis? You would be crucified for such behaviour in Melbourne.

We are one of small number of wineries in our area that Halliday rates with 5 stars year in, year out. We have exceptional vineyards, our vines are nearing 20 years of age, our winemaker was just nominated for the dddd award...... We keep yields lower than any others in our region (900kg per acre!), and pursue excellence over financial success all the time. Shit Xyz, I drink not much else but Champagne, Riesling, Italian reds, Gin, Beer and Single Malt Whisky – but if I had to drink New World Pinot and Chardonnay…I dare say, ABC would be in the mix with Tassie, Macedon, Mornington, Oregon and Martinborough.

But you are not a fan? Why is that?

Your honesty will be appreciated. I promise I will not ever bother you again if you respond truthfully."
 

 

Feel free to submit your comments!

From: Peter Kaplin: Wednesday 30 July

Well it looks like that if he wanted to sell wines before that email that will not be the case now , certainly a lot of frustration in that email. It would be fun to find out the blanked out names.....maybe you could run a competition ?

 

From Sam Barlow: Thursday 31 July

I think the best part of that email (I also had it come through my inbox) was the sheer number of identities that had received it and forwarded it on. Fairly career limiting move one would suspect.

 

From Denise Rowe: Thursday 31 July

I had to comment about this one because I am a salesperson. Whilst never having sold wine I have sold any number of things and understand the frustration that the salesperson exhibits. They have crossed the line, though. If they had kept it to a request for honesty I think they would have gotten a straight answer. But the letter shows not only frustration, but anger at the Sommelier – not cool. I sympathize, but had they kept their anger in check and seriously been seeking an answer it would have meant a better result for them and for the wine.

 

From Thors: Thursday 31 July

Having read the article posted I sense frustration leads to honesty. In the politically correct times we live in it is refreshing to see someone take honesty to the fore instead of pandering to pretentiousness. I for one have long wondered how objectivity in wine lists offered in restaurants effects sales and return custom.

 

Let us not forget that the sommeliers choice of wine is but one persons opinion of the available offerings and can in no way reflect or hope to encompass all tastes.

 

As for the marketing approach of the writer of this letter, no doubt their future sales may well be compromised but at least they are able to keep their integrity, something that the wine sommelier has forsaken if they fail to respond to the letter. I would suggest that the answer to the question raised is more truly indicative of the character of the wine buyer....and would make for far more interesting reading. I uphold the belief that showing faith in ones product and not prostituting that ideal allows us to stand up and challenge bias, or prejudice, with confidence. You can lead a sommelier to wine but you cannot make him drink.

 

From Deborah Gray: Sunday 3 August

Actually I felt rather sorry for this distributor/producer, although he unfortunately took his ire too far and will no doubt never be welcome in that establishment again. No loss there, as he won’t have to waste his time showing his wine to the disingenuous sommelier again, but it also probably turned said sommelier off sufficiently that there will be no reply, from which the producer will learn nothing.

Why not be diplomatically honest, in person, after several wasted trips? “Look, Mr. wine seller, I’m sorry, but I only have so much time to review wines and I don’t want to continue to waste your time. The style of your wines doesn’t suit my food…are too expensive for this restaurant’s list…aren’t quite to my taste…are too high in alcohol…” Whatever can be said that isn’t overly offensive, but gets the message across. If the sommelier is simply being polite by seeing the gentleman and doesn’t know what to say, then fair enough, but to roll his eyes and appear obviously impatient speaks volumes about his disdain for the wines, or the seller. He could simply be unavailable when the seller wants an appointment.

The problem with the email is that he’s committed a good deal of embarrassing and rambling comments to print, and the sommelier showed a considerable lack of class by circulating it. Apparently the same lack of class he displayed to the distributor in the first place.
TORB Responds: 
You last paragraph sums it up perfectly!

 

From Bert Werden: Monday 4 August

I agree 100% with Deborah Gray. I had this email come to me from 16 (I kid you not) different people.

Frankly, I also feel sorry for the guy who wrote the original email - he is also no longer employed by said winery. I'm not sure his crime deserved the time is has received/is receiving.

I guess you should never put anything in print you don't want the world to see.

 

From Carl Schneider: Tuesday 5 August

Dummy spit by the distributor and hard to tell if warranted or not because we only have half of the story. However, the circulation of the email demonstrates the lack of professionalism of the Sommelier.

Eye-opening to the uninitiated such as myself into the goings on when selling wine. Have to feel sorry for the salesperson. Shame he lost out by losing the account. As I don't know the sommelier concerned I shall attempt in my own small way to redress the balance by continuing to avoid non-BYO restaurants :)

 

From Campbell Mattinson: Thursday 7 August

I feel really sorry for the guy who owns the winery - or the guy who used to work there. It was a stupid email but I reckon most of us have written the odd dummy spit email - I wouldn't like some of mine circulated, that's for sure. I probably received the email a dozen times, and when I scanned through who had passed it on, I wasn't surprised to see the names of some people who have sent dummy spit emails to me over the years! Maybe I should dig out their vitriolic emails and forward them around the industry to see how they like it?

 

From Brian Miller: Thursday 7 August

"For a salesman, there is no rock bottom to the life ... He's a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine. And when they start not smiling back - that's an earthquake ... Nobody dares blame this man. A salesman's got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory."

- Willy Loman -'Death of a Salesman' - by Arthur Miller

 

 

 

 

Copyright © Ric Einstein 2008