Someone once told me that you know what your ideal job is when you enjoy it so much, are so motivated to get up and crack on every morning, that you’d do it even if you weren’t paid. That’s perhaps a bit unrealistic for most people whose primary motivation is to earn money to live, but the point is clear. It helps a lot if you love what you do.
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A spokesperson for Vagabond Wines, the popular ‘self-pour’ wine bar chain founded by Stephen Finch in 2009, has confirmed the business will continue to trade as usual despite running into financial difficulties.
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Andrew Catchpole caught up with Thibault Lavergne of Wine Story at Vin, London’s leading French tasting, to find out what makes this specialist importer tick
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Back in the good old days when my life involved selling millions of bottles of Hungarian wine to the UK’s major retailers, I made an appointment with the buyer at Sainsbury’s. They bought from one of our competitors and were proving a hard nut for me to crack. Buyers often kept suppliers waiting beyond the appointed time, so I settled down with my copy of The Guardian in anticipation.
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Izzy is a twenty-year-old student at York University. Many decades ago I was one there too. In my time students received grants for living costs and tuition fees were paid by the Government. Today those are dealt with by repayable loans. But the loans may not be enough to allow access to all. Like Izzy, for example.
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The Wine Society CEO Steve Finlan calls out the government’s lack of engagement with the hard-pressed UK drinks trade.
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The Scottish Licensed Trade Association (SLTA) is pleading for more support to help protect the hospitality sector, as venues report the crippling impact of staff vacancies and ‘a continued wave of cost increases’.
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Many years ago I was asked to act as a strategic consultant to a Chilean wine business. They wanted help with reformulating their strategy, first to achieve break even, then to reach sustainable profitability. The business was 100% targeted at export markets, with the UK a key priority.
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The percentage of the UK’s largest restaurant companies turning a profit has doubled in the last year, according to new figures. However, further interest rate rises now hover over the horizon. As a result, hospitality’s biggest operators could be facing new challenges on their return journey to profitability.
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The government claims new proposals to enable businesses to ‘blend’ and ‘transform’ bulk wine on UK turf will ‘put a rocket’ under UK trade, by allowing businesses the flexibility to blend across countries of origin – though some say this will sound death knell for wines of provenance.
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In the early days of my wine business career an experienced trader told me to hang onto an important insight. He said that wine is one of those subjects where the more you know the less you understand.
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The straight-talking northern distributor is a company with many hidden talents, writes Jo Gilbert.
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We’re now at a crossroads in the UK. I don’t mean economically or politically. I will leave others to comment on that. Having worked previously for a wholesaler and now as a distributor, it’s the changing wholesale drinks market I want to discuss.
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The evolution of the bartender during Covid and beyond continues to define a role that calls not only for impeccable drinks and cocktail-making skills, but commercial savvy, too. Clinton Cawood reports
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After 30 years in business, Ted Sandbach, owner and chairman of The Oxford Wine Company, says moving to – and staying in – Oxford is still the best decision he’s ever made. Jo Gilbert reports
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Here’s a quiz question for the work Christmas party: what have Amazon, the cost of bottling wine and Ofgem got in common?
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Nick Gillett, MD of Mangrove UK, on the uphill battle smaller brands face with ever more powerful players dominating the industry.
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‘Net Zero’, ‘Carbon reduction’, ‘Sustainability’, and ‘Offsetting’ – all good stuff and we’re now used to bandying these terms around like they’re going out of fashion. But whilst brands are waxing lyrical about their green credentials and how they’re busy saving the planet, how many actually are?
Whether intentionally or not, more than a few drinks brands at best ‘polishing’ their green credentials to look better than they are – and some are just lying. Beyond misleading conscious consumers and reaping undeserved competitive advantages, it pisses me off, because it’s actively halting the industry’s Net Zero progress which is where we should be placing our focus.
Mike Veseth doesn’t just make wine economics understandable; he makes it thrilling.
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With the first half of 2022 already history, Harpers asked key trade figures to highlight the current challenges, ongoing trends and opportunities.
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