Inventory is ignorance! Now there's a mantra from supply-chain seminary, if there were such a place. It's actually just an abridged truism from the field of logistics: warehouses full of products represent a hedge against uncertainty. You stockpile because you don't have - or can't have - a comprehensive understanding of your suppliers or your customers. Indeed, most companies accept that as given.
Gin is currently one of the most active and interesting of all the spirit categories. Worldwide it sells over 50 million cases - right up in the international spirits market, making it a major force. But if we listen to the pundits, we could easily be convinced that gin's days are numbered, with all the signs indicating declining sales worldwide. There is no disputing that, in the past five years, the category has experienced a 6% fall in terms of volume; at the same time, the great gin renaissance shows no signs of slowing down. How can both these contradictory trends be true?
A group of rum producers are planning to front a generic campaign in the UK - with every bottle bearing the stamp Authentic Caribbean Rum'.
Will Duke, director of on-trade sales at HBJ Wines, told his business clinic session that nothing in his presentation was rocket science', but whatever you do in business, it is about making customers happy.
Government proposals to introduce a new category within the AOC system have been rejected unequivocally by winemakers in Bordeaux.
The Vinos Sin Fronteras (wine without borders) project has sent two volunteers to more than 15 countries to collect donations in the form of bottles of wine in aid of charity.
A new marketing campaign and bottle design highlighting Beefeater gin's London roots has been launched by Chivas Brothers, at a cost believed to be in excess of 10 million.
For more than five decades, Bardolino, as a region, has been tagged as one of the poor relations of Italian winemaking, famous only for making low-quality but pleasant easy-drinkers that non-involved consumers might choose to glug with their pasta or pizza.
As Tibor Kovcs of Htszl once said: Tokaji is world famous, but only in Hungary.' There's little doubt it has all the right ingredients - long history and tradition (Tokaj claims to be the oldest delimited wine region in the world), unique winemaking, memorable scenery and terroir. And it also has several passionate and charismatic evangelists for its wines, as well as a number of high-profile foreign investors. But the reality is that the wine industry in Tokaj as we see it today is only 15 years old and, like most teenagers, it has yet to fully make its mark on the world.
The Government has published a consultation document on the guidance to the 2003 Licensing Act, which has been heavily criticised since its inception.
Winemakers in Rioja are now able to use a greater number of white grape varieties, thanks to a change in the rules by the Organizacin Interprofesional del Vino de Rioja (OIPVR - the Interprofessional Organisation of the Wines of Rioja).
The team behind the shopping website jungle.com is preparing to launch a new company which will sell wine via a satellite television channel.
Young people are far more receptive to organic wine, according to the director of Millsime Bio, the organic wine fair held in France last week.
New Zealand's unique climatic conditions may protect its wine industry from the threat of global warming, a leading producer said at the country's annual trade tasting last week.
Penfolds Yattarna - dubbed white Grange' - will be bottled under screwcap for the 2004 vintage, released in May.
The chef and sommelier at the Balmoral Hotel in Edinburgh have won the International Copa Jerez 2007. Sous chef Kevin Sutherland and sommelier James O'Donnell created a food and Sherry menu, beating teams from the US and Spain in the process. Their winning menu included a dish of sauted Keltic scallops, chestnut puree, apples and smoked bacon lardons with Hidalgo La Gitana Manzanilla. The judging panel included award-winning chef Heston Blumenthal, who praised the duo's original and inspiring' dishes.
Read more...The New Zealand wine industry's major growth phase is over and with that will come consolidation, says the head of the country's 1,300 grape growers and winemakers.
Is Uruguay poised to become a major New World player in the UK market? Well, no. Even though the UK has been an important market for Uruguay historically, production is so small compared to other New World suppliers that major' is not a word ever likely to be used in the same sentence as wines of Uruguay'.
Katie grew up on the east coast of Scotland. Her father ran hotels in Elgin and Fochabers, near Inverness, and insisted she do anything but catering. So Katie failed her Highers and went to work at the Golf View hotel in Nairn, which she describes as one long drinking party'. She worked in the bar, and in the kitchen on her days off because she wanted to learn and learn quickly'. She moved to Nunsmere Hall, near Chester, where she met Paul Kitching, then left for Hambleton Hall in 1992, working there for three years and driving up to see Paul on her days off. She helped set up Juniper with Kitching in 1995, before leaving to work for Nico Central in Manchester, returning to head the front-of-house and manage Juniper in 2001.
Come January we're all prone to speculation about what the new year will bring. It's not that we're bored with our favourite wines, it's more that - as wine lovers - we know there's a great big world of wine out there, and I, for one, want to know about new wine styles. As a wine professional, I also want to know what innovations other people are putting into practice, so to find out, I canvassed opinion from a range of people: suppliers, restaurant wine buyers - both top end and middle market - and pub operators too.
