Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/11486
THE MESSAGE Educate Your Audience A lex Guarachi, Founder and President of TGIC Importers, Inc. showed what it is to truly teach your audience recently when he guest lectured recently at UCLA Extension in Los Angeles, one of the nation’s oldest and largest continuing higher education providers. Guarachi acknowledges his responsibility as a teacher and educator: “We, the industry, talk all the time about educating the consumer,” he says. “But really, what does that mean? Marketing, yes. Distribution, yes. What it truly means is to teach those willing and wanting to learn about wine. Educate them in the classroom, in the store or restaurant, through tastings. In turn, you will help develop discerning palates,” he explains. Guarachi created TGIC Importers, Inc. in 1985, when he began importing Chilean wine into the United States. What began as a one-man show operating out of his garage has since grown into a globally recognized company boasting a portfolio of some of the fi nest wines from not only Chile and Argentina, but also Australia, New Zealand, Italy, Spain and California. Shelby Ledgerwood, CWE, who heads up Savant Wines and runs the Introduction to Wine syllabus at UCLA Extension, invited TGIC Importers founder Alex Guarachi to guest lecture, with particular focus on the Chilean and Argentine wine business. Rice the Bar! I magine your customer wants to order a saké. Your restaurant is not Asian fusion; not a sushi bar. But you have a small stash of sakés available. What do you recommend? Can you or your wait- staff even pronounce the brands available? Can your customer? Seth Podell experienced this conundrum. “I was always a huge saké fan. I would try a saké that I liked and even fi nd out what its name translated to in English, then ask for that when I ordered it again. No one had a clue what I wanted.” Podell’s frustrations set him to thinking about branding a saké. “People don’t order by category,” he told THE TASTING PANEL. “They order by brand. There was a need for a branded saké.” The name Rock Saké—not to mention Podell’s success in California and his burgeoning growth in Nevada—always elicits a mantra from his newfound customers: “Why didn’t I think of that?” Will it help the saké category? We believe it will. With its pre- mium ingredients (all-natural rice from the Sacramento Valley and fresh mountain spring water from Oregon) and its mixability, Rock Saké Junmai Ginjo and the slightly sweet Rock Saké Cloud (nigiri saké), should not only be a memorable name, but also an alternative to the choices we have to sell behind the bar. —Meridith May Seth Podell is the founder of Rock Saké. He is pictured at the Montage Hotel in Beverly Hills with their signature “Midnight Moon” cocktail made with Rock Saké Cloud (unfi ltered nigori), fresh lemonade, muddled blueberries and honey. 18 / the tasting panel / june 2010 PHOTO: MERIDITH MAY