Yeah! More posts about the Natural Wine Movement

He Said: "He does it with a better grace, but I do it more natural".... She Said: I, too, have been reading about all of these tiny, French producers who have been telling everyone who will listen that they make better wine because they do it 'naturally.' But as you point out, what does naturally mean??  Continue »

Dear Marketing Department: It's Willamette, Dammit!

He Said: The US has gone Sub-AVA crazy.... She Said: Marketing a wine region is tough business. There's all manner of back and forth regarding how to best go about this.  Continue »

Bee's Paradise

We celebrated Equinox in the vineyards 21 days ago and it is starting to look and feel like Spring.  Continue »

Adaptable Strategy

Strategic plans probably fail more often than they succeed. Perhaps the most prevalent reason is the practice of starting from the numbers and working backward toward strategy, a tendency common to financially driven companies that set their goals for revenue and earnings growth then cast about for a strategy to underwrite those goals.  Continue »

The Silicon Valley Bank State of the Industry Survey: How Reliable are its Responses?

Too often, desired conclusions skew analysis to produce self-fulfilling results. While keeping faulty data from contributing to sampling error is simply a matter of objectivity and basic arithmetic, more subtle are the subjective factors that yield non-random samples. In the case of the Silicon Valley survey, the psychological disposition of the respondents is a significant distorting factor.  Continue »

Size Matters: Quality & Scale in the Wine Industry

He Said: A recent article in the Wine Spectator suggested that small wineries are better than large wineries, for a variety of reasons.... She Said: It does seem that many of today's wine writers write for the niche market, rather than the Gary's of the world, doesn't it?  Continue »

Biodynamic Farming: Following the Moon

Biodynamic farming is complex, sometimes hard to explain and sometimes hard to quantify. It involves many areas: preparations, compost, biodiversity and an awareness of the rhythms happening all around us. I want to talk a little about using a Biodynamic calendar and the intention behind our practices during certain periods on the calendar by highlighting the thoughts of Rudolf Steiner and all those who have continued what he started.  Continue »

Biodynamic Farming: Following the Sun

Biodynamic farming is complex, sometimes hard to explain and sometimes hard to quantify. It involves many areas: preparations, compost, biodiversity and an awareness of the rhythms happening all around us. I want to talk a little about using a Biodynamic calendar and the intention behind our practices during certain periods on the calendar by highlighting the thoughts of Rudolf Steiner and all those who have continued what he started.  Continue »

Dear Pinot Noir and Chocolate: I Hate You

He Said: I'm not sure who to blame for this. Probably Hallmark for their insistence in sissifying February 14th into the willowy, cream-puffed doily that it has become, perpetuating the notion that chocolate, pink stuff, tulle and a dozen roses is everyone's idea of romance.... She Said: I'm going to have to disagree with your chocolate and hot tub assessment. Other than that, I concur. The chocolate and Pinot Noir pairing has been a pet peeve of mine for many years.  Continue »

The Capital Shell Game: Liquidity & Value

A principal tenet of shareholder wealth theory is that excess returns beyond those necessary to operate the business and fund capital expenditures should be returned to the shareholders who will most optimally reinvest. In a goods and ideas producing economy, this mechanism worked reasonably well. Shareholders would reinvest dividends and capital gains in companies that innovated and produced high quality products at competitive prices. This very much characterized the American economy from the end of WWII until late in the last century.  Continue »