From Rocks to Wine: Diana Khandilyan’s Unique Journey Through Terroir and Winemaking

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I don't want consistent wine because my

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life is not consistent. My year is not the same last

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year or this year. Right. We are getting older, we feel differently,

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we want different things. We want more of this and less of that. Why my

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wine should be the same year after year. Right. I want this

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excitement of opening the bottle and

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don't know what to expect and let it surprise me. Sit

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back and grab a glass. It's Wine Talks with

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Paul K. Hey, welcome

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to Wine Talks with Paul Kay. And we are in studio today. Beautiful Southern

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California here on a October day. About to have a

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conversation with Diana Kandiglian. Introductions in just a minute.

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You gotta pay attention. I was just looking at a video I put out with

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Violet Grgich. Her father was the founder of

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Gurgich Hills Winery, of course, the famed winemaker who made the

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Chardonnay in 1973 that won the judgment of Paris.

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It's a great conversation. Our second time around on the show and

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so have a listen to that. But not while we're here. We're here to have

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a multi talented conversation or conversation with multi

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talented Diana Kandelian. She is an energy expert in

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soils and terroir as, as a day job. But

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she's a certified sommelier as well as founding

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the Poor Across America Wine club. Welcome to the show.

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Thank you, thank you. Glad to be here. Paul. We had a brief conversation

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before just to sort of understand where we're coming from on this thing and it

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sounded so interesting because I found you, so to speak,

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on LinkedIn. You had written an article about the volcanic

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terroir of Armenia. Yeah. And that spawned

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an interest because you, at that moment, at least on LinkedIn, your, your trade

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was more about geophysiology. What do you call it? Geophysics.

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Geophysics. Geophysics, yes. And the impact of that. And that's what

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you do every day? Basically, yes. So tell me.

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I was trained as an oil and gas geophysicist

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and that's what I did for over 20 years across the

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world. So it is, it is very

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interesting profession because you need to understand a lot of physics but also to

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understand what rocks do and how they react and how we

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can read them. Right. So basically our job is to

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read the rocks and understand what is happening, where are they coming from,

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what they create for, for us as, as a

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human being in terms of energy. That's, you know,

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you just spawned a thought. I got to ask you this question and then we'll

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dig into that. But friends of mine invested in

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a gold mine in Texas and it was all based

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on, I don't know, the science of it, but they. They

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haven't hit anything, of course, and it's been, you know, years since they started

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drilling. Is that even possible to. To predict

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something like gold in the ground based on what?

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Surface, soil or core samples? Is that it? It

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is possible. It's. It's not that easy, but it is possible.

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Basically, if you have a lot of it in one place, then, yes, we have

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methods. Think about when you go to ultrasound or.

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Or other types of gamma rays or anything that you

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scan your body with. So we do the same for the.

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For the soil. And if there is a lot of that thing in

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one place, then we probably would detect it. Yes.

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For oil and gas, it's harder because we need to go significantly deeper

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under the ground. But, yeah, see, I kind of asked that question

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because my friends do listen to this, and I want them to know that they

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got accolades, if not just because they

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invested in a gold mine and the

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proverbial gold mine. So how did you do this?

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You're born in Armenia or were you born in. Yes, I was born

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in Armenia. And when I was born, it was still

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Soviet Union. And halfway through

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my adolescence, Soviet Union got dissolved.

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And fortunately, we had very big earthquake in

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Armenia that put us in a bad shape in

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terms of energy supply. Precisely. So after several

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years of fighting it and not being able to go to school in the winter

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because it's cold, my. My family decided to move

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to Mosc, and this is where I finished the school

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and got to Oil and Gas University and get my

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bachelor and master degree there. Wow. And how old were you when that happened?

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I was born in 79, so I. Didn'T want

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to put you on the spot for that, but. No, we

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moved to Moscow in 93, so I was 14. So

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was this interest in soil and rock and geophysics

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spawned from the earthquake? It was 1988. Right,

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yeah. So, you know, it's actually very interesting question, because if

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you ask me at the time, I would say no. But looking back,

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everybody who have been in Armenia will notice that the only thing we

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have is rocks. Right. The rocks are around you, everywhere

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the mountains are around you. There is nowhere you can look not to

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see beautiful mountains. It can be Ararat Mountain,

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our iconic landmark, or it can

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be Aragat's mountain. It can be any mountain, but there's mountains

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everywhere. And the most beautiful

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about it is they are different. The

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rocks are different, the obsidians everywhere are different, and the

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composition of the rocks are different. So Although

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I cannot say that I went to study this because I

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was in love with rocks, but rocks were part of my life for sure. Right.

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Well, you know, one of the first things I ever collected as a kid, and

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I'm certainly not a specialist in any of this, was obsidian. And.

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And Armenia is rife with obsidian, at least in certain

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districts. And it's such a beautiful stone and it's so diverse.

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Right? Yeah. And I wanted to bring some home, but I guess it's a rather

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substantial penalty for trying to sneak obsidian out of the country.

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Oh, no, no. You can buy it. If you go to the vernissage

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or somewhere, you can buy a piece of it and then you can bring it.

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Oh, you can? Yeah. I thought I was going to be arrested at the airport.

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Ernakian was going to arrest me or something. No.

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You know why we're on the subject. Does wine grow in that kind of soil?

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You know about wine more than I do, but wine grows in

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the places where nothing else does. Right. And sometimes you look at

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the Armenian hills and you think, how

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on earth something can grow there because it's all ash

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or it's all big rocks and. And somehow we build,

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build, because there is no other way. It's not just to grow this

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beautiful, beautiful R and E wines or whiskey heart

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grapes. And it's. It's amazing actually, because

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in some places, I mean, most of the Armenia is

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ungrafted still. Right. So it's pretty unique in the

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world. Most of it is dry farming. We don't have

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water to irrigate them. We don't have that much energy and electricity to bring water

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there. So if it rains, good. If it doesn't, well.

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So it is actually like nature

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phenomenon, I think, in Armenia. You know, that's an

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interesting thought. I just. That you just thought of because, you know, the argument goes

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on about where wine started and you know, hell, you could probably find

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remnants of fermented grapes, you know, that are maybe older than even the

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Armenian intact winery. But regardless, there's that argument

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that wine started in the Caucasus. The Armenians like to take credit for

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it. I listened to the ARPA thing the other day and

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they're talking about, well, there wasn't even an Armenia when that winery was

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established. So you really can't say that. But let's just suffice it to say

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that it was. It was in the caucus area where

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wine started as a consumable product for the, for humanity.

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I mean, we all know that Noah landed the ark and planet grapes,

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etc. Yeah, but what you just said is

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fascinating because it's naturally sustainable and this whole

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deliberate movement across the world in wine. And I think wine is

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one of the great products of the world that can lead itself to

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sustainability. But it's already naturally sustainable

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in Armenia, there's no water. It has to grow deep.

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It's almost inventively organic because of that, at least

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biodynamic to the extent of you only have so

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many days or certain days you can do things because of the fact there's no

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water. I never thought of that before.

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Is that significant in your mind when it comes to the soil and the

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way Armenian wines propagate themselves and the fact they've been there

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for so long and they still survive? Yeah. You know,

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we are facing a couple of crisis, wine crisis

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this day. Right. One is about the consumption,

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but the other one is about it's getting hotter and

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hotter every day, every year. And

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in a typical, typical grapes that were growing in

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certain location 20 years ago are struggling today. And

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if you think about the old world with Appalachians with very

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strict rules that simply don't allow you

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to adapt, it is becoming problem. Right. So one thing

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that growers are trying to do is going higher in elevation, if they

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have that elevation. Now think about Bordeaux. There is not much you can do.

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There is no elevation there. Right. Others are trying

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to pick earlier, not let

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grapes to ripen that much, and then, et

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cetera. Armenia is pretty interesting in that way because

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as you said, we are probably the oldest place in

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the world that made wine, but we are also very, very

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young. Right. And this is an

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interesting paradox because we can find 150 years old

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vines in Armenia that probably were not producing

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very good wine for 100 years. And then in the last

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couple of decades, we have entrepreneurs

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that came, Armenian heritage that came from all around the world

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to build this industry from scratch with knowledge, with

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understanding and with great respect and love to.

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To what they do and our soil. Right. So

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there is. There's two things. One is

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our crop resilience. They have been through everything in the

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last 6,000 years. Right. There was a global warming. There was

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almost like many ice ages. Everything happened in the last 6,000 years

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and the wine is still there. So on that point of view, I

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think our wines can adapt as Armenian people do as well.

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Right. On the other side, if we

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keep this industry as it is right now, I'm frankly in

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love with the state of our industry today, which is

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relative. They are all small producers. They

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deeply care about what they do. If we keep it this way.

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Armenia will be one of the few countries that can give this

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boutique wine experience with a taste of terroir

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without heavy machinery, without pesticides,

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and attending to, if it's not fully biodynamic, but

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attending to clean practices, sustainable practices,

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and this feel of, you know, homemade food or

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homemade wine, somebody made it for you. It's not just there on the shelf.

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You know, the. You said a little mouthful there, and I want to retract it

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a little bit for the listeners. Well, it's important stuff because it makes you.

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When I hear it coming from you, a scientist who's involved with. With

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geophysics, it. It adds an extra element of complexity

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and not only to the conversation, but the wine. If you think about Armenia's

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old world problem, the fact that it's old world is 6,000

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years old. We all talk about the suspension of the industry,

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so to speak, for 75 years with the Soviet rule, but. So that

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makes it Old World. But then we've done so much in the, in the recent

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years that you can call it New World. It's not.

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It's not plagued with the Appalachian rules that Bordeaux and Burgundy and those

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places of the world have. So that gives it a new world sense

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because you can plant whatever you want. But there is an identity

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crisis going on. And I've heard it many, many times, vintners,

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that there's that staunch Armenian pride that we're not going to grow anything

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but indigenous varieties, which is perfectly fine. There's plenty

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of them. And then there's the like, well, what's the world drinking and wine is,

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let's face it, wine's consumer driven and they drink Chardonnay and Cabernet

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Merlot, and those are the big grapes. And so why aren't we planting those? And

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that argument will go on. But what you

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said lends itself to. To

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eventually the quality of the wine in

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the sense of its complexity, because, wow, we

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have all this tradition and these old vines that are going to produce this

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character that you can't find anywhere else in the world, and that's going to be

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blended with newer technologies to make wines that extract

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their character. And all of a sudden, we've got layers of complexity that

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are going to show up on these wines. Maybe not quite yet, but there are

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a few. That's going to be rather dramatic. You

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know, this is. This is a conversation

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that I think we will go

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on and on around the world. But I would

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strongly advocate for some appellation type

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rules in Armenia. And I'll tell You why? Yes, we

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need to protect our indigenous grapes. Yes, we need to

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protect this. Very careful winemaking practices that emerge

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naturally. Nobody forced this winemakers to do it. They were doing it

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because this is the right way to do. But also, I'm

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sure in California and Texas, we, we don't have that. We don't see that much.

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But in California, you probably see a new wine, Armenian wine

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producer every, every day on the shelf, right? So

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there's a. There's a joke around. Like every Petros now

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have wine making facility or

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growing grapes. That

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can be a problem. I'm not saying it is yet, but that can be a

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problem. Because if we start to do what

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world has done 20, 30 years ago for the new

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world, we will be in the same troubles as everybody else now. And

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what is that? It's a clonal selection. It's

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pesticides, it's herbicides.

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Is choosing the side that are producing

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more grapes and eventually more wine rather than good

240
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wines or reduced yields, you know,

241
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and it's easy, right, to jump into this because, hey,

242
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Zulaal is producing I don't remember how many thousand bottles, but it's

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very small and it's incredibly good and it has such a reputation, right?

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So if I introduce a bottle of Zulao to one of my friends, they would

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see another Armenian wine. They will go buy it and I'm not sure they will

246
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like it. So I would want to keep this. Good.

247
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Because we can, right? We are small country, we are

248
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very limited resources and we can't keep it very, very small and

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boutique. Go ahead. Yeah. On the

250
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other side, what you said Chardonnays and Pinot Noirs and.

251
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Yes, but also no. How much more

252
00:15:40,180 --> 00:15:43,910
Chardonnay do we need? Do we need Chardonnay from Armenia? I don't need

253
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Chardonnay from Armenia. I'm happy with Kangun. I'm happy with

254
00:15:47,550 --> 00:15:50,270
Voskehat, you know, well done, well made.

255
00:15:52,670 --> 00:15:56,350
I don't know. I don't know. I think we. And when I

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say we, unfortunately it falls into people like you and

257
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I and our diaspora that we

258
00:16:03,510 --> 00:16:07,110
should make sure that world knows about our

259
00:16:07,110 --> 00:16:10,620
wines. That in WSET

260
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or court of Master Sommelier books there is a mention of

261
00:16:14,140 --> 00:16:17,340
Armenia, which today is not. I just completed

262
00:16:17,740 --> 00:16:20,860
the course and it struck me as

263
00:16:21,740 --> 00:16:25,260
terrible because not even once we

264
00:16:25,260 --> 00:16:28,900
talked about Armenia or Armenian heritage or the

265
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cradle of the world or here's a wine and try to drink it.

266
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I took it on myself to organize events, bring Armenian

267
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wines to the, to the people and make sure even at

268
00:16:41,190 --> 00:16:44,950
the W said school, they know, you. Know, well, you

269
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know, I had. This goes back many years, actually. And this is how

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00:16:48,550 --> 00:16:52,110
slow the industry is. And I have comments on what you just said, a couple

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00:16:52,110 --> 00:16:55,470
of them. But one Master Psalm,

272
00:16:55,550 --> 00:16:59,310
Emmanuel Kamigi, who makes wine in Pira, Spain. I've said this on the show before,

273
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was visiting California years ago. I'm talking about 10 years ago, probably. And he

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went to Sacramento, the famed Corti Brothers market

275
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and wine shop. Daryl Cordy is one of the world renowned experts

276
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on Madeira and port. And. And Daryl brought

277
00:17:14,570 --> 00:17:18,410
out an Armenian wine. I don't. Emmanuel did not tell me

278
00:17:18,410 --> 00:17:22,169
which one it was on this podcast. But as a psalm

279
00:17:22,169 --> 00:17:25,930
and that you studied and you got your certification, he said to

280
00:17:25,930 --> 00:17:29,730
himself, wow, this is really good. And I now I need to learn

281
00:17:29,730 --> 00:17:33,570
about this as an academic academian in the world of wine,

282
00:17:33,650 --> 00:17:37,500
as a Master Psalm, I need to learn about Armenia. Because when he went

283
00:17:37,500 --> 00:17:41,340
through the Master psalm test in 1996, you know, South

284
00:17:41,340 --> 00:17:45,100
America was like the new region. Yeah. Upcoming region. So

285
00:17:45,100 --> 00:17:47,540
that was interesting. That was 10 years ago. It still is in that sort of

286
00:17:47,540 --> 00:17:51,020
position that we got to teach what's going on. The second thing he said was,

287
00:17:51,100 --> 00:17:54,020
and it was really good. And I have to now, as a maker of wine

288
00:17:54,020 --> 00:17:57,660
in Purat, Spain, I have to compete with this wine at this price.

289
00:17:57,900 --> 00:18:01,100
But let me, let me just dovetail off of that. There are many, many districts

290
00:18:01,100 --> 00:18:04,780
of the world that have taken in my career of 35 years of doing this

291
00:18:05,230 --> 00:18:08,910
that have just come around from not being a bulk juice

292
00:18:09,390 --> 00:18:12,590
district. Languedoc is one of them. I mean, they're making some very fine wines of

293
00:18:12,590 --> 00:18:16,310
all kinds of varieties down there, and they're rather sophisticated. Yeah. There is

294
00:18:16,310 --> 00:18:20,070
Puglia, which we're going to be visiting next week. You know, here

295
00:18:20,070 --> 00:18:23,550
was a bulk wine district of Italy, and with

296
00:18:23,550 --> 00:18:26,670
amazing terroir, really now finally getting

297
00:18:26,750 --> 00:18:29,950
accolades about its quality and its

298
00:18:29,950 --> 00:18:33,240
sophistication that took 30 years almost.

299
00:18:34,040 --> 00:18:37,800
And so I think, I think your position is pretty interesting.

300
00:18:37,800 --> 00:18:40,680
Accurate. Interestingly accurate. That's even possible

301
00:18:41,960 --> 00:18:45,640
in that. Yeah. If you hold the line, you might

302
00:18:45,640 --> 00:18:49,360
stay away from that bulk wine mentality that plagued

303
00:18:49,360 --> 00:18:53,160
both of these regions and many more. And they had to fight to get

304
00:18:53,800 --> 00:18:57,650
some kind of worldwide presence on the wine, proverbially

305
00:18:57,650 --> 00:19:00,370
a wine table. Let me go back to something a little bit

306
00:19:01,330 --> 00:19:05,010
about the geophysics of this. And you talked about

307
00:19:05,010 --> 00:19:08,850
climate change and certainly from the

308
00:19:08,850 --> 00:19:12,490
UV situation and the way they canopy the vines. And that Bordeaux

309
00:19:12,490 --> 00:19:16,130
stuck with these grapes and Burgundy stuck with Pinot Noir and Chardonnay and a couple

310
00:19:16,130 --> 00:19:19,450
others. And they have to train

311
00:19:19,450 --> 00:19:22,530
themselves to deal with the changes in temperature.

312
00:19:24,260 --> 00:19:27,860
How does that affect the soil? What happens to the rocks that,

313
00:19:27,860 --> 00:19:31,180
particularly in a place like Grave, where it's all rocky, how does that change? Does

314
00:19:31,180 --> 00:19:34,660
that radically change the way the grapes are sensing heat

315
00:19:35,780 --> 00:19:39,460
ripening? Yeah. So I actually spent

316
00:19:39,460 --> 00:19:43,220
a month traveling through several regions of France, and

317
00:19:43,620 --> 00:19:47,220
I am in love with Chateaudon of the Pap, that area, and

318
00:19:47,220 --> 00:19:50,660
then eventually the Contrite, and up

319
00:19:51,060 --> 00:19:54,860
to Bordeaux, through Burgundy and then through Bordeaux.

320
00:19:55,340 --> 00:19:58,780
So it is very,

321
00:19:58,860 --> 00:20:02,540
very interesting. Think about regional Chateauneuf de Pap, right?

322
00:20:02,540 --> 00:20:06,380
They have 13 approved grape varieties that they can use in a

323
00:20:06,380 --> 00:20:10,220
blend. Of course, each of these grapes have their own

324
00:20:10,220 --> 00:20:13,820
personality. For example, one likes heat,

325
00:20:13,820 --> 00:20:17,180
like Grenache. It's okay under the sun. It doesn't care.

326
00:20:17,500 --> 00:20:21,250
The others may not be that susceptive to so

327
00:20:21,250 --> 00:20:25,010
much heat. When you have these big rocks, as in a terroir or

328
00:20:25,010 --> 00:20:28,690
Chateauneuf du Pape, they are big, literally boulders, and they

329
00:20:28,690 --> 00:20:32,090
are almost. Almost like white color. They

330
00:20:32,090 --> 00:20:35,890
reflect heat up. So in the past, it was

331
00:20:35,890 --> 00:20:39,690
very beneficial because it was cool. So grapes will

332
00:20:39,690 --> 00:20:43,450
receive the sunlight twice.

333
00:20:43,450 --> 00:20:47,130
They will receive it directly from the air, and they will receive it reflected

334
00:20:47,130 --> 00:20:50,800
from the rocks back. Right. So that

335
00:20:50,800 --> 00:20:54,280
was pretty cool. The other thing that is interesting is the

336
00:20:54,280 --> 00:20:57,880
soil underneath this big boulders and

337
00:20:57,960 --> 00:21:01,800
big rocks, it's not black, so it's still white,

338
00:21:01,880 --> 00:21:05,720
which means that it reflects most of the heat up. So it doesn't

339
00:21:05,720 --> 00:21:09,440
heat itself that much. So your roots are a

340
00:21:09,440 --> 00:21:12,520
little bit cooler, and that allows you to basically

341
00:21:12,920 --> 00:21:16,200
develop or keep the acidity for longer. Right. So we

342
00:21:16,710 --> 00:21:19,750
let it dry for longer and get these juicy, fruity,

343
00:21:20,550 --> 00:21:24,190
bigger reds. But on the other side, we can have

344
00:21:24,190 --> 00:21:27,830
the beautiful acidity. And depending on which grape

345
00:21:27,830 --> 00:21:30,950
variety we use, we can make the plant up to our

346
00:21:32,070 --> 00:21:35,790
liking. Right. Now, if you go to Burgundy, where there

347
00:21:35,790 --> 00:21:39,630
is only one Pinot Noir, then what do you

348
00:21:39,630 --> 00:21:43,270
do? Right. Couple of wineries throughout

349
00:21:43,270 --> 00:21:46,750
the last maybe hundred years or so,

350
00:21:47,070 --> 00:21:50,670
they were doing clonal selection, meaning that they were like a type of

351
00:21:50,830 --> 00:21:54,510
this Pinot Noir, and they would clone it to have

352
00:21:54,510 --> 00:21:57,870
the same type of this, of this grape. And today,

353
00:21:58,190 --> 00:22:01,830
this is a problem because they are comfortable

354
00:22:01,830 --> 00:22:05,310
to living in certain condition. They don't have that adaptability

355
00:22:05,710 --> 00:22:08,790
to adjust for a little bit warmer, a little bit cooler, a little bit more

356
00:22:08,790 --> 00:22:12,470
water, a little bit less water. Whereas non clonal selection,

357
00:22:12,470 --> 00:22:16,170
and there are very few of them today in. In Burgundy, non

358
00:22:16,170 --> 00:22:19,770
clonal selection, they are more resilient. The good,

359
00:22:19,930 --> 00:22:23,650
I don't know if it doesn't make any fair comparison, but think about

360
00:22:23,650 --> 00:22:26,890
your dog breed, right? If you have this very

361
00:22:26,890 --> 00:22:30,490
sophisticated small dog that was bred to be this

362
00:22:30,490 --> 00:22:34,330
small, they are more susceptive to disease rather than

363
00:22:35,370 --> 00:22:39,210
street dog. Nothing can kill that dog, right? So basically

364
00:22:39,210 --> 00:22:43,050
the same goes to wine. In some sense the clonal selection

365
00:22:43,050 --> 00:22:46,710
is more susceptive to problems or that less adaptive to

366
00:22:46,710 --> 00:22:50,550
climate change. Whether diversity is always better, even

367
00:22:50,550 --> 00:22:53,630
within one grape variety. That's so interesting.

368
00:22:54,910 --> 00:22:58,430
I think it's an ongoing academic argument and certainly

369
00:23:00,829 --> 00:23:04,350
many, many Burgundians are not testing other

370
00:23:04,350 --> 00:23:07,910
varietals, but in Bordeaux they are testing things like to Rio

371
00:23:07,910 --> 00:23:11,710
Nacional to see what happens. And wow, lo and behold, can

372
00:23:11,710 --> 00:23:15,160
you imagine, like Lafitte Rashield adds Tariga Nacional to their

373
00:23:15,630 --> 00:23:19,470
blend. That's probably not in the near future, but certainly the broader

374
00:23:19,470 --> 00:23:23,070
Bordeaux appellated wines might include that. And that's a, that's going to be an

375
00:23:23,070 --> 00:23:26,510
act, a serious act of, of, of

376
00:23:26,510 --> 00:23:30,270
intervention of all the vintners to try and even make those changes. But

377
00:23:30,270 --> 00:23:34,110
let me ask you this question. You mentioned it earlier, actually. The

378
00:23:34,110 --> 00:23:37,750
Armenian vines have gone through all these seasons, the 6,000 years worth of seasons,

379
00:23:37,750 --> 00:23:41,070
150 year old vines that are, that have survived all kinds of things.

380
00:23:42,030 --> 00:23:45,750
There was that, there was that cold snap right

381
00:23:45,750 --> 00:23:49,510
through the Veuve Clicquot Champagne days in the late 1700s, early

382
00:23:49,510 --> 00:23:53,230
1800s. And I wonder if they were, I wonder if they sat around

383
00:23:53,470 --> 00:23:57,030
the chateau and said, well, we better start testing new grape

384
00:23:57,030 --> 00:24:00,830
varietals. We can't live on Pinot Meunier and Pinot Noir and

385
00:24:00,830 --> 00:24:04,550
Chardonnay. Or do they just, you know, deal with it, which obviously they

386
00:24:04,550 --> 00:24:08,210
did. I just find it fascinating. I wonder if, if those

387
00:24:08,210 --> 00:24:11,930
conversations even existed back then. Not that this is a. Yeah, I.

388
00:24:11,930 --> 00:24:15,290
Think in the regions like Champagne or

389
00:24:15,450 --> 00:24:19,090
Chablis, even Sancerre, it is

390
00:24:19,090 --> 00:24:22,610
very cold and it was always cold. Right. So those

391
00:24:22,610 --> 00:24:26,170
grape varieties were, the problem was they were not

392
00:24:26,170 --> 00:24:29,810
ripening. They were resistant to cold during the

393
00:24:29,810 --> 00:24:33,450
winter. But the problem was that they were not ripening. That's why all

394
00:24:33,450 --> 00:24:37,010
this Champagne was created, because you eventually add sugar to it.

395
00:24:37,010 --> 00:24:40,530
Otherwise it's very, very acid driven wines. Right?

396
00:24:40,690 --> 00:24:44,370
That's true. Now they are living in a, in a fantastic boom because

397
00:24:44,370 --> 00:24:48,050
everything ripens. Yeah, it is amazing. So Champagne is one of those

398
00:24:48,050 --> 00:24:51,810
regions that, oh my God, they will be producing more and more of

399
00:24:51,810 --> 00:24:55,330
beautiful Champagne. They don't have a problem of vintage. They

400
00:24:55,330 --> 00:24:58,770
blend. Right. They can always blend amount of

401
00:24:59,570 --> 00:25:03,410
one of the three grapes or produce varietal or whatever they want to do. So

402
00:25:03,410 --> 00:25:07,140
they are actually happy right now. Let's see for

403
00:25:07,140 --> 00:25:10,580
how long. But for now, they are happy. Well, I guess on the flip side

404
00:25:10,580 --> 00:25:14,260
of that happiness, you know, now you can grow those grapes

405
00:25:14,260 --> 00:25:17,940
in. In England, you know, And I found some. I found some

406
00:25:17,940 --> 00:25:21,660
notes from my father on his trip to England, which is a very interesting story.

407
00:25:21,660 --> 00:25:25,460
I won't bore you with it now, but, you know, all the grape

408
00:25:25,460 --> 00:25:29,260
varieties in those days were German, and they were slightly sweet, and that's all

409
00:25:29,260 --> 00:25:32,730
they could grow there because they. The. The cooler temperatures. And now, you know, they

410
00:25:32,730 --> 00:25:36,450
can make. I mean, I've had fabulous sparkling wine from.

411
00:25:36,690 --> 00:25:40,050
Yeah, from the Isle of White. Right. It's amazing.

412
00:25:40,370 --> 00:25:44,090
Yeah. But so let me. Let me tell you

413
00:25:44,090 --> 00:25:47,650
the story, and then you tell me how this happens. Had a woman on the

414
00:25:47,650 --> 00:25:50,930
show, Stephanie Franklin. She. She was a descendant of

415
00:25:51,250 --> 00:25:54,890
a Texan who founded

416
00:25:54,890 --> 00:25:58,650
a city called Shankoville. It's south of Dallas, about southeast

417
00:25:58,650 --> 00:26:02,490
of Dallas, about an hour and a half in. And obviously not part of

418
00:26:02,490 --> 00:26:06,210
the wine trail in Texas. Not near Austin, not near Lubbock, all that

419
00:26:06,210 --> 00:26:09,970
stuff. But she's. She's determined to grow grapes

420
00:26:09,970 --> 00:26:13,810
there because her grandfather. I can't remember her great grandfather. Grandfather founded

421
00:26:13,810 --> 00:26:17,370
this town. It was one of the first cities in America that was for

422
00:26:17,370 --> 00:26:21,170
freed slaves post Civil War. And so she's

423
00:26:21,170 --> 00:26:24,650
intent on producing Shankoville appellated wines.

424
00:26:25,690 --> 00:26:29,010
What would she do to decide what to grow there?

425
00:26:29,490 --> 00:26:33,210
What's the process for that? Oh, great question. She

426
00:26:33,210 --> 00:26:36,850
would analyze the soil first. She would understand. By

427
00:26:36,850 --> 00:26:40,530
coring it. Yes, ideally, yeah. Or if you have

428
00:26:41,250 --> 00:26:44,930
some outcrops or cliff a little bit. We don't need

429
00:26:44,930 --> 00:26:48,650
much. We just need about 10, 15ft to understand what

430
00:26:48,650 --> 00:26:52,370
is going on, because this is how far your roots potentially can go

431
00:26:52,370 --> 00:26:56,080
there. Right. The problem that we have in Texas overall is

432
00:26:56,080 --> 00:26:59,840
we have too much clay. And the clay is

433
00:26:59,840 --> 00:27:03,480
very. It has very high. This is technically,

434
00:27:03,480 --> 00:27:06,840
I'll go technical, you know, it has very high porosity

435
00:27:07,160 --> 00:27:11,000
and very low permeability, meaning it absorbs a lot of water, but that

436
00:27:11,000 --> 00:27:14,320
water stays there. Like, think about in. In your

437
00:27:14,320 --> 00:27:18,080
sponges, vice versa. All pores are connected. So you

438
00:27:18,080 --> 00:27:21,760
put water. Water goes away, right. Whether in clay, just absorbs, it

439
00:27:21,760 --> 00:27:24,250
swells, but it stays there. It doesn't move anywhere.

440
00:27:26,000 --> 00:27:29,760
So grapes don't like that. Because grapes don't like their

441
00:27:29,760 --> 00:27:33,200
feet wet. If they reach this layer full of water,

442
00:27:33,760 --> 00:27:36,960
it's too much water. They swell, and

443
00:27:37,360 --> 00:27:41,040
the crop is basically watery. It's not good grape. It's not

444
00:27:41,040 --> 00:27:44,640
Grape you can make wine off. So some areas

445
00:27:45,120 --> 00:27:48,800
in Texas, like Hill country, for example, they have

446
00:27:48,880 --> 00:27:52,610
that clay layer very, very deep. So they have enough

447
00:27:53,090 --> 00:27:56,770
of diverse soil on top of it that is draining very

448
00:27:56,770 --> 00:28:00,490
well despite of high rain seasons

449
00:28:00,490 --> 00:28:04,170
and too much water that comes from the atmosphere, it

450
00:28:04,170 --> 00:28:07,970
drains out. So that's why you can grow some decent grapes

451
00:28:08,370 --> 00:28:11,570
in Texas. Not all of them are decent, but some are

452
00:28:13,090 --> 00:28:15,170
so interesting. Yeah. So

453
00:28:16,850 --> 00:28:20,600
I don't believe that in my studies. And I

454
00:28:20,600 --> 00:28:24,400
was invaded by the ta. Ta, what's the Texas Alcohol Beverage

455
00:28:24,400 --> 00:28:27,960
Control Board here? Tabc. They came here right where you. Where I'm sitting

456
00:28:28,120 --> 00:28:31,920
and audited me on wines we were sending there. And

457
00:28:31,920 --> 00:28:35,440
we were. We had featured wines from Lubbock, from the McPherson

458
00:28:35,440 --> 00:28:39,160
Winery. And it was. I thought it was great. But they're all Rhone varietals. And

459
00:28:39,160 --> 00:28:42,480
then you go to places like Messina Hoffa, outside of

460
00:28:42,480 --> 00:28:45,480
Fredericksburg or Kerrville, and they're growing things like

461
00:28:45,480 --> 00:28:49,320
Sagrantino. Was that natural selection by

462
00:28:49,320 --> 00:28:52,520
these people, do you know, in Texas? Or they just

463
00:28:53,000 --> 00:28:56,680
randomly picked them? I think the natural

464
00:28:56,680 --> 00:29:00,480
selection is happening now because everybody planted whatever they thought

465
00:29:00,480 --> 00:29:04,120
they want to drink at some point or they thought would go

466
00:29:04,280 --> 00:29:08,040
right at the beginning. But then now, little by

467
00:29:08,040 --> 00:29:11,440
little, they start to see that, hey, these

468
00:29:11,440 --> 00:29:15,290
grapes are growing better, more susceptible to. Less

469
00:29:15,290 --> 00:29:19,090
susceptible to rot, for example, or they

470
00:29:19,090 --> 00:29:22,770
are not getting burned by this scorching sun that you have

471
00:29:22,770 --> 00:29:26,410
in Hill Country. So naturally, we will

472
00:29:26,410 --> 00:29:29,690
adapt to some sort of grapes that will be better. That's why

473
00:29:30,970 --> 00:29:34,650
I moved to Texas in 2015 for the first time and

474
00:29:34,730 --> 00:29:38,250
somebody brought Texan wine to me. I was like, yeah, I'm never drinking this again.

475
00:29:39,530 --> 00:29:43,380
Of course, that doesn't mean that all of them were bad, but couple that

476
00:29:43,380 --> 00:29:46,780
I tried in 2015, I didn't go back.

477
00:29:47,340 --> 00:29:50,900
And now I'm doing this conscious effort to try

478
00:29:50,900 --> 00:29:54,580
different wines because I know I can find some

479
00:29:54,580 --> 00:29:58,100
good ones. A friend of mine is making movedre, for

480
00:29:58,100 --> 00:30:01,420
example, 100% moved. It's beautiful wine.

481
00:30:01,900 --> 00:30:05,580
You know, not every bit is beautiful because he needs to learn

482
00:30:05,580 --> 00:30:09,180
how to adapt to different climate conditions. And

483
00:30:09,180 --> 00:30:12,700
sometimes in around Fredericksburg, it can be really cold. But

484
00:30:13,020 --> 00:30:16,760
hey, there is a great potential there. I tried couple

485
00:30:16,760 --> 00:30:20,440
of viogniers in Texas. Some of them are still

486
00:30:20,440 --> 00:30:24,280
too chewy, but couples were very interesting and preserving this,

487
00:30:24,280 --> 00:30:27,160
you know, characteristic Viognier, honey,

488
00:30:27,880 --> 00:30:31,560
Honeysuckle, this beautiful flavors and aromas. So

489
00:30:31,960 --> 00:30:35,800
I think we will. We will see a great wines from Texas

490
00:30:35,880 --> 00:30:39,720
very soon. If. If somebody argue they are not yet there very soon we will.

491
00:30:40,770 --> 00:30:44,250
You Just said two important things, and I'll touch on them both. One of them

492
00:30:44,250 --> 00:30:46,930
is whether it's wine,

493
00:30:47,890 --> 00:30:51,650
food, restaurants, maybe even consumer products.

494
00:30:51,890 --> 00:30:55,650
You can only probably burn your bridge once or twice

495
00:30:55,650 --> 00:30:58,530
before you've scared the consumer away. And I'll highlight this

496
00:30:59,730 --> 00:31:03,250
locally. There's a restaurant here in Hermosa Beach. We go there all the time.

497
00:31:03,570 --> 00:31:06,970
We went one day and the

498
00:31:06,970 --> 00:31:10,770
meat in the. In the sandwich was just. Wasn't

499
00:31:10,770 --> 00:31:13,850
good. And we've been reluctant to try it again.

500
00:31:14,650 --> 00:31:18,450
And that's. That's just humanity. Yeah. So the same thing

501
00:31:18,450 --> 00:31:22,130
is going to happen with wine. And there's a lot of bad Armenian wines, let's

502
00:31:22,130 --> 00:31:25,730
face it. And you know, we're not in Texas. We are

503
00:31:25,730 --> 00:31:29,570
lucky. We just got the best ones. Yeah, of course. So my job

504
00:31:29,570 --> 00:31:33,290
is easier. I mean, just, you know, we know this is the fact you tasted

505
00:31:33,290 --> 00:31:36,330
a Texan wine, you said you'll never go back, and it probably took you many

506
00:31:36,330 --> 00:31:40,030
years. There's a restaurant. There's a restaurant here in the neighborhood that I. That I

507
00:31:40,030 --> 00:31:42,710
sometimes went to twice a day for breakfast and lunch.

508
00:31:43,830 --> 00:31:47,510
I haven't been there for 10 years because the last time I went, the meat

509
00:31:47,510 --> 00:31:51,310
and the hamburger was bad. And so we went the other day, I reluctantly

510
00:31:51,310 --> 00:31:54,950
went in, recognized the waitresses. They were so happy to see me after 10

511
00:31:54,950 --> 00:31:58,510
years. And I was glad to say that they changed purveyors and the meat was

512
00:31:58,510 --> 00:32:01,990
really good. And I'll go back. But it took 10 years to win that confidence

513
00:32:01,990 --> 00:32:04,710
back. Yeah. And that's why the restaurant, the Armenian trade.

514
00:32:06,070 --> 00:32:09,190
There's something happening in the Armenian trade which is not unlike any other part of

515
00:32:09,190 --> 00:32:12,710
the world. And that is in most glaring

516
00:32:12,710 --> 00:32:15,830
example is Napa Valley, where somebody makes a lot of money

517
00:32:16,390 --> 00:32:19,590
doing whatever they do, and then they go, I'm going to go retire in the

518
00:32:19,590 --> 00:32:22,790
lifestyle of wine. And they go to Napa Valley, they build a big chateau, and

519
00:32:22,790 --> 00:32:25,670
then they realize a, it's really hard to make money in this business. I'm tired

520
00:32:25,670 --> 00:32:29,110
of losing it. And they realize it's really farming

521
00:32:29,350 --> 00:32:33,020
and they don't have a lot of chances to be successful with it. And

522
00:32:33,100 --> 00:32:36,220
it's happening in Armenia, and you mentioned it earlier, there's a lot, a lot of

523
00:32:36,220 --> 00:32:40,020
new brands. I had Mariam Sagatalian

524
00:32:40,020 --> 00:32:42,780
from Envino on the show not too long ago, and she's like, yeah, we got

525
00:32:42,780 --> 00:32:46,300
a lot of new brands coming here. Yeah. Are there enough consumers?

526
00:32:46,940 --> 00:32:50,740
It is scary, frankly. It is scary. Especially one thing

527
00:32:50,740 --> 00:32:54,380
is, are there enough consumers? And the other thing is we

528
00:32:54,380 --> 00:32:58,070
are cannibalizing the

529
00:32:58,070 --> 00:33:01,670
few things that we have, right? And those few things is

530
00:33:01,910 --> 00:33:05,710
authenticity of our land. Because you can. There are not

531
00:33:05,710 --> 00:33:09,110
many wines in the world where you can sniff it and say, oh,

532
00:33:09,510 --> 00:33:13,110
I know where it's coming from. Right. And I actually, I did that.

533
00:33:13,110 --> 00:33:16,230
I took Vanardi

534
00:33:17,190 --> 00:33:20,230
R E Reserve to

535
00:33:22,390 --> 00:33:25,260
restaurant here in Houston that is on a Michelin wait list

536
00:33:26,370 --> 00:33:27,890
and I took it to their sommelier.

537
00:33:30,530 --> 00:33:34,130
We know each other from way back. I went to Rice university

538
00:33:34,210 --> 00:33:37,970
for our MBAs together. But I took the wine to him.

539
00:33:37,970 --> 00:33:41,650
I was like, I'm not going to tell you what it is. What do you

540
00:33:41,650 --> 00:33:45,250
think? You literally could see that

541
00:33:46,130 --> 00:33:49,570
his eyes were running around. He's trying to bring some

542
00:33:51,340 --> 00:33:54,780
safe heaven. What it is, how I can identify it. And he was like, I

543
00:33:54,780 --> 00:33:57,860
have no clue what it is, but I know for sure it is coming from

544
00:33:57,860 --> 00:34:01,340
high altitude volcanic soil. Wow,

545
00:34:01,580 --> 00:34:05,300
this is amazing. This is amazing. So I

546
00:34:05,300 --> 00:34:08,820
want to. I don't know if we can. You and I can plead to

547
00:34:08,820 --> 00:34:12,660
Armenian government to create some populations. Let's do it. Because we need to preserve

548
00:34:12,660 --> 00:34:15,580
it. If you want to do experiment. I actually did this.

549
00:34:16,300 --> 00:34:20,110
I had a wine tasting here in Texas and I brought

550
00:34:20,110 --> 00:34:23,470
them one wine

551
00:34:23,630 --> 00:34:27,390
or any 100% R&E. One is 100 and,

552
00:34:28,670 --> 00:34:31,790
sorry, 10 hundred meters

553
00:34:31,790 --> 00:34:35,150
altitude and the other one is 1600

554
00:34:35,229 --> 00:34:38,950
meters altitude. Right. So it's 500 meters about what

555
00:34:38,950 --> 00:34:42,030
it is. 1500ft difference between one and the other.

556
00:34:42,510 --> 00:34:46,110
Both are 100% irony. They taste completely

557
00:34:46,110 --> 00:34:49,480
different. But you can get this, you can get this

558
00:34:49,480 --> 00:34:53,200
volcanic minerality tension in it,

559
00:34:53,200 --> 00:34:57,000
but the taste is different. So I answer this, how

560
00:34:57,000 --> 00:35:00,760
to preserve that? Let me ask this question. This is a consumerized question.

561
00:35:00,840 --> 00:35:04,640
Maybe your studies as a psalm have, you know, presented this

562
00:35:04,640 --> 00:35:08,360
to you because of the consumer, because this is really a consumer reaction question.

563
00:35:08,360 --> 00:35:12,120
It's not about. We understand that. I mean, in Argentina they've

564
00:35:12,120 --> 00:35:15,380
been. They've been growing Malbec at all these various

565
00:35:16,020 --> 00:35:19,780
altitudes up the, up the Andes. And of course

566
00:35:19,780 --> 00:35:23,420
it makes different wines. But does anybody care? I mean,

567
00:35:23,420 --> 00:35:27,060
does the consumer care about. And I'm saying this tongue in cheek because,

568
00:35:27,300 --> 00:35:30,820
yeah, you and I were talking about soil and the heat exchange of the

569
00:35:30,820 --> 00:35:34,660
rocks. Does the super care? And I'm going to suggest that most consumers

570
00:35:34,660 --> 00:35:38,180
don't really give a crap. They just want to know what tastes good. And they.

571
00:35:38,500 --> 00:35:42,100
And that can they. Can they rely on that taste from year to

572
00:35:42,100 --> 00:35:44,940
year, despite the vintages?

573
00:35:46,860 --> 00:35:49,980
What have you sensed from that? I think.

574
00:35:51,180 --> 00:35:54,140
And I'll tell you, yes, they do. And I'll tell You why?

575
00:35:54,860 --> 00:35:58,660
So we are in a business for a long time and you

576
00:35:58,660 --> 00:36:02,460
see that lately everybody's talking about young people don't

577
00:36:02,460 --> 00:36:05,660
drink wine. Right. So we are worried about

578
00:36:06,300 --> 00:36:10,140
the Generation Z or Alpha or whatever will come afterwards

579
00:36:10,140 --> 00:36:13,680
and whether they will drink wine and whether they will jump on the

580
00:36:13,680 --> 00:36:16,200
train drinking wine as we do.

581
00:36:17,240 --> 00:36:21,000
So first of all, I

582
00:36:21,000 --> 00:36:23,960
don't think it's a problem because I didn't drink wine until I went to Argentina

583
00:36:23,960 --> 00:36:27,399
and I was 25 by then. So there's a personal

584
00:36:27,400 --> 00:36:31,080
example. Yes, that's the first thing. Second

585
00:36:31,720 --> 00:36:35,240
is the younger generation

586
00:36:36,200 --> 00:36:39,130
are curious or care

587
00:36:40,010 --> 00:36:43,290
about what it is they consume. Right.

588
00:36:43,770 --> 00:36:47,530
So instead of just, instead of just buying whatever

589
00:36:47,530 --> 00:36:51,290
$5 wine, they probably would rather buy

590
00:36:51,690 --> 00:36:55,170
10. And the value is irrelevant at this point. Just the

591
00:36:55,170 --> 00:36:58,930
magnitude, right. If they know that there

592
00:36:58,930 --> 00:37:02,610
is a story behind it. So I

593
00:37:02,610 --> 00:37:06,430
agree. If we, if we can ride

594
00:37:06,430 --> 00:37:10,070
that train in Armenia, we have so much to

595
00:37:10,070 --> 00:37:13,670
tell. We have such a beautiful stories like just take

596
00:37:13,670 --> 00:37:16,830
the Vanardy story. I think it's my favorite

597
00:37:17,150 --> 00:37:20,910
producer of reds in Armenia at this point. They

598
00:37:20,910 --> 00:37:23,790
ring a bell for their wines every morning and evening.

599
00:37:24,830 --> 00:37:28,590
That's what they do because they think this vibration and as a

600
00:37:28,590 --> 00:37:31,790
physicist, I can say I understand they think the vibration

601
00:37:33,360 --> 00:37:36,080
helps the wine. Wines like it and they grow better.

602
00:37:37,600 --> 00:37:41,160
Well, what a beautiful story, right? It's a great story. In fact, I have a

603
00:37:41,160 --> 00:37:43,360
wine in my cellar here that's from

604
00:37:44,320 --> 00:37:47,999
Sardinia. I believe it's a Sangiovese. And they're the ones that play

605
00:37:47,999 --> 00:37:51,120
music, classical music, because the rock and roll,

606
00:37:51,600 --> 00:37:55,320
they claim that the rock and the, the grapes don't like rock and roll, which

607
00:37:55,320 --> 00:37:59,040
I think is hilarious. But you know, there's some.

608
00:37:59,040 --> 00:38:02,160
The Gen these thing is interesting and I think a lot of that has to

609
00:38:02,160 --> 00:38:05,960
do with every generation thinks they're unique and they've

610
00:38:05,960 --> 00:38:09,200
got different approaches to everything and they just repeat the same problems. And that's why

611
00:38:09,200 --> 00:38:12,800
history repeats itself. And so the Gen Zs, I believe

612
00:38:12,800 --> 00:38:16,440
all wine generations, all generations come to the wine table.

613
00:38:16,440 --> 00:38:20,160
Eventually they realize it's a connection to the soil and the earth. Not

614
00:38:20,160 --> 00:38:23,800
maybe deliberately, but it happens. And like I said,

615
00:38:23,880 --> 00:38:27,590
they all think they're going through their own, own special unique situation.

616
00:38:27,670 --> 00:38:31,470
And why they do adult doing things like the neo prohibitionist right now, this

617
00:38:31,470 --> 00:38:35,230
non alk movement. Hell, we had prohibition in America, okay?

618
00:38:35,230 --> 00:38:37,910
And wine survived that. In fact, it started

619
00:38:38,230 --> 00:38:42,030
fabulously actually and actually came out of it better

620
00:38:42,030 --> 00:38:45,590
than it was because places like Napa were founded based

621
00:38:45,670 --> 00:38:49,390
on that Prohibition. Was it true? I read somewhere

622
00:38:49,390 --> 00:38:53,200
that There was more wine cell sold during Prohibition that before it.

623
00:38:53,680 --> 00:38:57,280
That's a good question. I've never reviewed that. You know, the. There certainly was a

624
00:38:57,280 --> 00:39:00,800
lot of wine made during Prohibition. And what people don't understand, it was not

625
00:39:00,800 --> 00:39:04,320
illegal to drink alcohol. It was illegal to make it

626
00:39:04,720 --> 00:39:08,280
for public consumption. You could make all, virtually all the wine you

627
00:39:08,280 --> 00:39:11,880
wanted in your garage. So one of the great latent industries

628
00:39:11,880 --> 00:39:15,680
of Prohibition were grapes being trained out

629
00:39:15,680 --> 00:39:19,450
to the east coast so people could make wine. And, and one of the great

630
00:39:19,450 --> 00:39:23,090
winemakers facilities in Los Angeles is still around and they

631
00:39:23,170 --> 00:39:26,610
survived because of Sacramento wine. But let me go to

632
00:39:26,850 --> 00:39:30,410
quickly when we jump on something called a woman, young

633
00:39:30,410 --> 00:39:34,130
girl. And this, this is this kind of bucks, this whole generation, this

634
00:39:34,130 --> 00:39:37,730
Gen Z thing. Her name is Jess Drewy and she

635
00:39:37,730 --> 00:39:41,490
created a brand four, only four years ago called Whiny Baby.

636
00:39:42,530 --> 00:39:45,410
If you were to pick an adjective for millennials, it would be

637
00:39:45,650 --> 00:39:49,020
experiential, maybe even lazy, you know,

638
00:39:49,260 --> 00:39:53,060
But Gen Z's, I tell you my experience with them

639
00:39:53,060 --> 00:39:56,860
in business anyway, they are whiny babies. I mean seriously.

640
00:39:56,940 --> 00:40:00,740
And so she created a brand for Gen Z's called Whiny Baby. You can look

641
00:40:00,740 --> 00:40:04,380
it up. She just got bought by Gallo. This is a

642
00:40:04,380 --> 00:40:08,220
huge success story for somebody in the consumer side of wine. She,

643
00:40:08,220 --> 00:40:12,020
she saw this idea, she came up with a name which is appropriate for their

644
00:40:12,020 --> 00:40:15,780
generation and they're flocking to us so much so

645
00:40:15,780 --> 00:40:19,630
that it's a brand like Gallo decided we better jump on this thing

646
00:40:19,630 --> 00:40:22,910
because it's going to take off. And I thought that was really interesting. So I

647
00:40:22,910 --> 00:40:26,430
think you're right. I think that the romantic side of wine

648
00:40:28,030 --> 00:40:31,790
eventually is the lure for every generation

649
00:40:32,350 --> 00:40:36,150
and its historical character and value to our, to our body

650
00:40:36,150 --> 00:40:39,710
and our soul, really, our soul. So how much of your day now, since

651
00:40:39,710 --> 00:40:43,070
you're transitioning from rocks

652
00:40:43,640 --> 00:40:47,480
and soil to wine, it sounds like it's an ambition of

653
00:40:47,480 --> 00:40:51,000
yours is spent with wine and spent with

654
00:40:51,320 --> 00:40:52,200
your day job.

655
00:40:55,880 --> 00:40:59,360
One thing that you learn in this life, I think

656
00:40:59,360 --> 00:41:03,200
it's integrity. I have a full time job and I'm paid

657
00:41:03,200 --> 00:41:07,040
by that job. So 100% of my daytime goes

658
00:41:07,040 --> 00:41:10,760
to that job. However, the other 100%,

659
00:41:11,560 --> 00:41:15,200
yeah, these, including the knives in my

660
00:41:15,200 --> 00:41:18,960
dreams and everything goes to wine because I

661
00:41:18,960 --> 00:41:22,120
think it's, I discovered this great

662
00:41:22,200 --> 00:41:25,840
passion and it's not only for Armenian wines,

663
00:41:25,840 --> 00:41:29,520
but it's also for more carefully

664
00:41:29,520 --> 00:41:33,080
produced wines, you know, curated wines, something. For example,

665
00:41:33,400 --> 00:41:37,080
you mentioned that you make wine in Spain. I was in Ribera del Duero

666
00:41:37,800 --> 00:41:40,590
about a couple of weeks ago. And

667
00:41:42,110 --> 00:41:45,630
I love Rivera wines always. But

668
00:41:46,670 --> 00:41:48,430
it struck me as

669
00:41:50,910 --> 00:41:54,630
they are having a problem. Although we don't think about Ribera as

670
00:41:54,630 --> 00:41:58,350
a problem. Right. They have altitude. They can always go higher. It's relatively

671
00:41:58,350 --> 00:42:02,190
cooler. But the DO appellation rules

672
00:42:02,190 --> 00:42:05,910
are so strict that they cannot pick grape when

673
00:42:05,910 --> 00:42:09,580
they think they should pick. They need to to wait until the appellations say you

674
00:42:09,580 --> 00:42:12,700
can. Right. And that makes, for example,

675
00:42:12,700 --> 00:42:15,940
tempranillo is a grape that is early ripening.

676
00:42:16,500 --> 00:42:19,980
So until they are allowed to pick the grape, there is no

677
00:42:19,980 --> 00:42:23,659
acidity left whatsoever. Wow. And you will not hear the

678
00:42:23,659 --> 00:42:27,500
stories from the big ones, like Protos or SEPA 21. They

679
00:42:27,500 --> 00:42:30,900
will not tell you that. But if you go to small producers who make 10,000

680
00:42:31,060 --> 00:42:34,860
bottles, they will tell you how much tartaric acid they need to

681
00:42:34,860 --> 00:42:38,140
add into the mix, because they

682
00:42:38,140 --> 00:42:41,970
can't make the wine to even hold for a couple of

683
00:42:41,970 --> 00:42:45,650
years unless they add acidity into it. Right. What they are

684
00:42:45,650 --> 00:42:49,450
trying to do is, and it's very interesting, you talked about different varietals.

685
00:42:50,810 --> 00:42:54,330
I think by the appellation, they must use 85% of

686
00:42:54,330 --> 00:42:57,890
Tempranillo. Most of the big ones

687
00:42:57,890 --> 00:43:01,610
claim that they use 100%, but the smaller ones, they

688
00:43:01,610 --> 00:43:04,910
use 15% or as much as they can of

689
00:43:04,910 --> 00:43:08,590
Cabernet Sauvignon because it is

690
00:43:08,590 --> 00:43:11,870
very acidic wine. So it can help

691
00:43:12,430 --> 00:43:14,270
compensate for this acidity.

692
00:43:16,030 --> 00:43:19,630
It ripens well. It's a good soil for CAB as well.

693
00:43:19,790 --> 00:43:23,630
But it has this acidity that can complement Tempranillo and

694
00:43:23,710 --> 00:43:26,990
help us drink this Riberas that we like so much. Right.

695
00:43:27,550 --> 00:43:31,230
So those kind of stories is something that I chase

696
00:43:31,230 --> 00:43:34,740
around the world. And my new discovery, I'll tell you,

697
00:43:35,780 --> 00:43:39,260
is a Brazilian wine. And I lived in

698
00:43:39,260 --> 00:43:43,100
Brazil for 10 years. And at the time, again,

699
00:43:43,100 --> 00:43:46,900
it was like, yeah, bring me Argentina or Chile. It's close and it's good.

700
00:43:47,540 --> 00:43:51,220
Every year I go for the last three or four years, I discovered more and

701
00:43:51,220 --> 00:43:53,940
more beautifully constructed wines.

702
00:43:54,820 --> 00:43:58,420
I'm not sure they will be consistent every year, but. Because it's new,

703
00:43:58,420 --> 00:44:00,700
right? But they are beautiful.

704
00:44:01,900 --> 00:44:05,620
I have a friend, he's a geologist who

705
00:44:05,620 --> 00:44:09,020
studied in Bordeaux, and he's making his own wine.

706
00:44:09,260 --> 00:44:13,020
The brand is Tactus. I have a couple of bottles

707
00:44:13,020 --> 00:44:16,700
with me right now, and they are beautiful, absolutely beautiful wines.

708
00:44:17,100 --> 00:44:20,860
You know, it's interesting. Brazil, I featured I personally, right soon

709
00:44:20,860 --> 00:44:22,460
after, I bought one of them

710
00:44:24,220 --> 00:44:28,070
featured brand called Marcus James, which

711
00:44:28,070 --> 00:44:31,830
cracks me up, because many times, especially in those days

712
00:44:31,990 --> 00:44:35,670
when they were bringing wines to America from a region like Brazil or

713
00:44:35,670 --> 00:44:39,030
Moldavia or something, they tried to make it sound like it was American.

714
00:44:39,830 --> 00:44:43,670
Oh, there was one Moldavian wine it featured called Hickory Ridge. You

715
00:44:43,670 --> 00:44:47,270
know, it's like, really? But

716
00:44:47,430 --> 00:44:49,350
tell me what you said when you said something earlier.

717
00:44:51,760 --> 00:44:55,520
How would you define then the term you use properly made

718
00:44:55,520 --> 00:44:56,000
wine?

719
00:44:59,520 --> 00:45:02,960
I think the role of winemaker is the least intervention.

720
00:45:03,760 --> 00:45:07,200
I would never go out and advocate, oh, don't put any

721
00:45:07,360 --> 00:45:11,200
fertilizer or any this or any that because it's

722
00:45:11,200 --> 00:45:14,320
not fair. We need to help the wine to blossom into.

723
00:45:15,040 --> 00:45:18,370
Help grapes to blossom into wine. And that's the

724
00:45:18,370 --> 00:45:22,010
winemaker job, to make sure that every step is done.

725
00:45:22,250 --> 00:45:25,530
Least intervention, but right to the wine. And that would be,

726
00:45:26,410 --> 00:45:30,050
in my understanding of properly made wine, you

727
00:45:30,050 --> 00:45:33,530
don't add, you don't subtract. You allow your

728
00:45:33,530 --> 00:45:37,130
grapes to talk for themselves. That's a good

729
00:45:37,130 --> 00:45:40,970
articulate definition. And it leads to this

730
00:45:41,050 --> 00:45:44,870
comment, and I brought this up with A lot

731
00:45:44,870 --> 00:45:48,670
of French winemakers have been through the show here, which is,

732
00:45:50,110 --> 00:45:53,790
if that's the case, which it should be, then

733
00:45:54,030 --> 00:45:57,669
it takes a lot of time to get to that

734
00:45:57,669 --> 00:46:01,230
point so that the vintage is the talking point of the,

735
00:46:01,390 --> 00:46:05,150
of the wine from year to year and not all the emaciations

736
00:46:05,150 --> 00:46:08,660
of additives and chemicals and the way you treat

737
00:46:09,460 --> 00:46:13,220
wine at, through the process of making it. And that

738
00:46:13,220 --> 00:46:15,780
leads me to a comment by Juliana

739
00:46:16,260 --> 00:46:19,220
Ernakian at Karas.

740
00:46:23,220 --> 00:46:26,660
And that is when Michel Roland went to see if

741
00:46:26,660 --> 00:46:30,460
kadas was even sustainable or, you know, could be even done. And our

742
00:46:30,460 --> 00:46:34,220
odd value was, yes, you can grow grapes here, but we

743
00:46:34,220 --> 00:46:37,790
won't know for a hundred years, you know, what's going to happen.

744
00:46:38,670 --> 00:46:41,990
And I thought, wow. And you should appreciate that as a

745
00:46:41,990 --> 00:46:44,910
geologist, that, wow. It takes a long time

746
00:46:45,630 --> 00:46:49,230
for the, the vines to reflect what they're doing and then to understand

747
00:46:49,230 --> 00:46:52,950
what that is and then go through so many emaciations of that, of the

748
00:46:52,950 --> 00:46:56,110
terroir changes that now we understand

749
00:46:56,670 --> 00:47:00,350
how this wine is going to be and that leads to the definition.

750
00:47:00,350 --> 00:47:04,070
There's no bad vintages if it's, if you know that much. There are no

751
00:47:04,070 --> 00:47:07,830
bad. There's ones that taste better than others or that you appreciate rather

752
00:47:07,830 --> 00:47:11,590
than others, but all of them will reflect a properly made

753
00:47:11,590 --> 00:47:15,310
wine. A free flex that place to

754
00:47:15,310 --> 00:47:18,870
that point. A couple of months ago I was in Finger

755
00:47:18,870 --> 00:47:22,670
Lakes and Finger Lakes, you get around. Yes.

756
00:47:24,030 --> 00:47:27,870
And Finger Lakes is this iconic place in United

757
00:47:27,870 --> 00:47:31,510
States. Right. First of all, the Dr. Constantine

758
00:47:31,510 --> 00:47:34,590
Frank and all the history of him bringing the

759
00:47:35,640 --> 00:47:39,160
vitis vinifera and etc. But one wine

760
00:47:39,160 --> 00:47:42,360
was very curious for Me. And it's a Hillock Hox.

761
00:47:45,000 --> 00:47:48,680
So they are very young winery. I think they have three

762
00:47:48,680 --> 00:47:52,520
or four vintages in a bottle. So it's probably

763
00:47:52,520 --> 00:47:56,160
like 10 years old wine by now. And I had

764
00:47:56,160 --> 00:47:59,720
opportunity to have this small vertical tasting. 2000,

765
00:48:00,850 --> 00:48:04,690
I think it was 19, 20, 21 and 22, something like that,

766
00:48:04,690 --> 00:48:08,530
if I'm not mistaken. And 19 again,

767
00:48:08,610 --> 00:48:12,330
if memory serves me well, was very bad year. It was

768
00:48:12,330 --> 00:48:16,050
cold, it was rainy, it was

769
00:48:16,050 --> 00:48:19,890
not very, very pleasant against 22. That was

770
00:48:19,890 --> 00:48:23,410
absolutely fantastic year for the wines. Right. And

771
00:48:24,530 --> 00:48:28,220
you taste, you taste this austerity

772
00:48:28,300 --> 00:48:32,140
in a wine versus the plush. And we are talking

773
00:48:32,140 --> 00:48:35,860
about Riesling, dry Riesling. Right. So you can taste the austerity in

774
00:48:35,860 --> 00:48:39,500
a wine of 2019 and the splashness

775
00:48:39,820 --> 00:48:43,620
and ripeness in 2022. However, it's not

776
00:48:43,620 --> 00:48:47,100
a bad wine. It's just different. That's

777
00:48:47,180 --> 00:48:50,620
right. So I. Yeah. And I'm actually,

778
00:48:51,910 --> 00:48:55,750
I don't want consistent wine because my

779
00:48:55,750 --> 00:48:59,270
life is not consistent. My year is not the same

780
00:48:59,350 --> 00:49:02,710
last year or this year. Right. We are getting older, we feel

781
00:49:02,710 --> 00:49:06,230
differently, we want different things. We want more of this and less of that.

782
00:49:06,470 --> 00:49:10,270
Why my wine should be the same year after year. Right. That should

783
00:49:10,270 --> 00:49:14,110
be wine. I want this excitement of opening the

784
00:49:14,110 --> 00:49:17,670
bottle and don't know what to expect

785
00:49:18,000 --> 00:49:21,760
and let it surprise me. I think that's the fundamental

786
00:49:21,760 --> 00:49:25,440
difference. And we all need the wines that are in the supermarkets,

787
00:49:25,440 --> 00:49:29,200
the Josh's and the Apothec reds and those, those are vented and bottled and

788
00:49:29,200 --> 00:49:33,040
sugared so that they taste the same. But there's also, there's

789
00:49:33,040 --> 00:49:36,840
also a move, not a movement. But there's also a functionality and study that shows

790
00:49:36,840 --> 00:49:40,240
that people will get bored of that. They got bored of white Zinfandel in

791
00:49:40,240 --> 00:49:43,960
1974. They'll get bored of that palette and they'll seek other things

792
00:49:43,960 --> 00:49:47,780
in. The complexity of a wine you're talking about will eventually come to the

793
00:49:47,780 --> 00:49:51,580
table. And there's always the argument that wine should

794
00:49:51,580 --> 00:49:55,420
react to the consumer, which I don't agree with. Yeah. And

795
00:49:55,420 --> 00:49:58,940
the consumer needs to react to the wine, as you just

796
00:49:58,940 --> 00:50:02,459
stated very nicely in that my life is not stable and

797
00:50:02,459 --> 00:50:06,260
consistent year to year. Why should the wines be? Why can't they reflect something

798
00:50:06,260 --> 00:50:09,820
different? So we're, we're at the end of our time here. But I wanted, I

799
00:50:09,820 --> 00:50:12,940
wanted to sort of point this out and get your opinion on the Armenian trade

800
00:50:12,940 --> 00:50:16,620
just for a second. Through this conversation, we discussed many little

801
00:50:16,620 --> 00:50:20,260
districts that, that are emerging districts. You just mentioned Brazilian

802
00:50:20,260 --> 00:50:23,500
wines. I mean, they've been around forever. Like I said, I Featured1 probably 20 years

803
00:50:23,500 --> 00:50:26,860
ago and really no movement on the shelves here in America.

804
00:50:27,340 --> 00:50:30,980
Mexico is another one. The Valley of Guadalupe is huge. Hugely

805
00:50:30,980 --> 00:50:34,620
popular now for resorts, cuisine, and now

806
00:50:34,620 --> 00:50:37,980
wines coming to America really slow. I mean, really

807
00:50:37,980 --> 00:50:41,800
slow. The Finger Lakes is another one. I mean, they've been around forever. I

808
00:50:41,800 --> 00:50:44,160
visited in 1994. I went to

809
00:50:46,400 --> 00:50:49,680
Millbrook, New York and I watched them, you know,

810
00:50:50,240 --> 00:50:53,440
prune the vines in three feet of snow going, what are you doing?

811
00:50:54,640 --> 00:50:57,920
You nuts? You know, but another place that is

812
00:50:57,920 --> 00:51:00,800
emerging, but man is so hard to get traction.

813
00:51:01,120 --> 00:51:04,640
Friuli. Even that, that part between Slovenia and

814
00:51:04,640 --> 00:51:08,220
Italy, you know, to try to make headwinds in American wine

815
00:51:08,220 --> 00:51:12,060
shelves is not easy. Haven't even talked about

816
00:51:12,060 --> 00:51:15,740
Croatia, which has incredible wines coming to the

817
00:51:15,740 --> 00:51:19,540
US which is one of the biggest markets in the world. How

818
00:51:19,540 --> 00:51:23,300
is Armenia going to do this? What do you think the path is? Is

819
00:51:23,300 --> 00:51:26,940
the vine and Wine foundation, the government side, going to be the people, the crux

820
00:51:26,940 --> 00:51:29,420
of all this, the fulcrum to make things work? Or is it going to be

821
00:51:29,420 --> 00:51:33,110
the vintners? What do you think? What do you think? I have two parts for

822
00:51:33,350 --> 00:51:37,110
that. First of all, let me share very quickly

823
00:51:37,270 --> 00:51:41,070
my passion that I'm working on right now, precisely because of what

824
00:51:41,070 --> 00:51:44,670
you said you probably

825
00:51:44,670 --> 00:51:48,510
know, but most of people don't, that every state in United States produces

826
00:51:48,510 --> 00:51:51,910
wine. Every state, including Alaska, Hawaii,

827
00:51:51,910 --> 00:51:55,750
Utah, any of them. How much do we know? I'm in

828
00:51:55,750 --> 00:51:59,010
Texas, I know Texan wine and I know California,

829
00:51:59,170 --> 00:52:03,010
Washington, Oregon. That's about it, right? And then the same is

830
00:52:03,010 --> 00:52:06,530
for they know their own wines and then California, Washington and Oregon,

831
00:52:07,650 --> 00:52:10,930
because I think it's incredibly unfair. And

832
00:52:11,090 --> 00:52:14,770
places like Finger Lakes or Arizona or Michigan,

833
00:52:16,530 --> 00:52:20,050
they need to get some spotlight. I'm building

834
00:52:20,050 --> 00:52:23,810
my Poor Across America wine club and I

835
00:52:23,810 --> 00:52:27,430
will be traveling around those states, selecting the wines and

836
00:52:27,430 --> 00:52:30,750
delivering to my subscribers. And it will be

837
00:52:32,510 --> 00:52:36,350
within, within the certain price range, the best I can find. And it's not only

838
00:52:36,350 --> 00:52:39,710
about the quality, it's also about the story, sustainable

839
00:52:39,710 --> 00:52:43,550
practices and, and everything like that. Right? So that's, that's

840
00:52:43,550 --> 00:52:46,030
the one thing. The second thing for Armenian wines,

841
00:52:48,110 --> 00:52:51,370
I think it will take our diaspora to step up, up

842
00:52:51,850 --> 00:52:55,410
and not just to drink it, but to do what you are doing,

843
00:52:55,410 --> 00:52:58,970
right? Invite people, talk about Armenian wine, try to promote

844
00:52:59,210 --> 00:53:02,410
the good wines and create this differentiation of

845
00:53:03,050 --> 00:53:06,730
why this is a good wine, why it should be on your table. And

846
00:53:07,049 --> 00:53:10,770
I don't think we need to replace neither Fruli or

847
00:53:10,770 --> 00:53:14,450
Puglia. We just add to this mix for the

848
00:53:14,450 --> 00:53:17,990
people who are curious, who are open to trying

849
00:53:18,070 --> 00:53:21,590
something new. And believe me, I can. I found so many people

850
00:53:21,590 --> 00:53:25,350
around me who tried my wines. Well, not my wine,

851
00:53:25,350 --> 00:53:28,950
Armenian wines, who tried Armenian wines, who went and bought

852
00:53:28,950 --> 00:53:32,630
bottles after it and who texted me, oh, my God, my mom. Love it.

853
00:53:32,630 --> 00:53:36,070
Or, you know, this was amazing. I served it at this table.

854
00:53:36,470 --> 00:53:39,910
So it will be slow, but it takes a lot of legwork.

855
00:53:40,790 --> 00:53:44,550
It's very slow. I want to add to your Pour Across America

856
00:53:45,170 --> 00:53:47,890
list of things to investigate. Okay.

857
00:53:49,170 --> 00:53:52,610
And I read about this gentleman in the Smithsonian magazine.

858
00:53:53,090 --> 00:53:56,930
His name is Eiserhold and the winery is

859
00:53:56,930 --> 00:54:00,690
called Terravox. T E R R A V O X. Okay.

860
00:54:00,690 --> 00:54:04,210
And he actually, I think he found some of these

861
00:54:04,210 --> 00:54:07,730
root stocks in Texas, but he read a book from the

862
00:54:07,730 --> 00:54:11,450
1800s about the grapes that were being grown in America pre

863
00:54:11,450 --> 00:54:14,290
prohibition. And you know, as you know, the

864
00:54:15,090 --> 00:54:17,710
Midwest of America is sort of the cradle of wine.

865
00:54:18,350 --> 00:54:21,790
Ohio, beginning. Right? Yeah, Ohio, Louisiana, Texas,

866
00:54:21,790 --> 00:54:25,150
Kansas. So he. He had planted 14

867
00:54:26,990 --> 00:54:30,710
indigenous, what would be, quote, unquote, indigenous

868
00:54:30,710 --> 00:54:34,270
wine grapes of America. They're not vitis vinifera, but they're what they

869
00:54:34,270 --> 00:54:38,070
made wine from in America. Yeah, they're hybrid. Right. And

870
00:54:38,070 --> 00:54:41,910
he's already supplanted four varietals. He like, just can't make

871
00:54:41,910 --> 00:54:45,070
anything you can drink out of these four wines. But he has

872
00:54:45,740 --> 00:54:48,860
12 or 10 other varietals that he's growing in Kansas.

873
00:54:49,180 --> 00:54:52,380
Yeah. And representing

874
00:54:52,780 --> 00:54:56,180
a, you know, a section of the wine trade in America that's really been

875
00:54:56,180 --> 00:54:59,980
unexplored. Yeah. And so maybe if you taste the wines,

876
00:55:00,220 --> 00:55:04,020
I'm not going to comment on their relative quality because one

877
00:55:04,020 --> 00:55:07,420
thing I did tell my subman, you have a lot of legwork to do because

878
00:55:08,380 --> 00:55:11,900
grapes that are unknown and what they're going to do and soil that's unknown and

879
00:55:11,900 --> 00:55:15,260
what it's going to do and, and. But he's built a winery, he's got an

880
00:55:15,260 --> 00:55:19,060
experience and it's called Terravox. Anyway, Poor Across America.

881
00:55:19,060 --> 00:55:21,900
Is there a website for Poor across america? Yes, it's

882
00:55:22,140 --> 00:55:25,260
www.pooracrossamerica.com al together

883
00:55:26,380 --> 00:55:30,220
and the. Listeners check it out. And if you need

884
00:55:30,220 --> 00:55:34,060
any consultation when it comes to direct to

885
00:55:34,060 --> 00:55:37,860
consumer wine sales. We did it for a long time, so I ended

886
00:55:37,860 --> 00:55:41,640
up here 35 years. Such a pleasure having on

887
00:55:41,640 --> 00:55:43,960
the show and it's so glad we could catch up. It took a little while

888
00:55:43,960 --> 00:55:47,520
to get us organized, but very interesting. I like to circle back

889
00:55:48,160 --> 00:55:51,920
in a few months when Poor Across America's got legs

890
00:55:51,920 --> 00:55:55,560
and you can tell us what's been going on. Yeah. My first delivery

891
00:55:55,560 --> 00:55:59,080
is going out in November. It's only here in

892
00:55:59,080 --> 00:56:02,760
Houston because I'm still small and growing, and the first

893
00:56:02,760 --> 00:56:06,600
region is Finger Lakes, so every quarter will

894
00:56:06,600 --> 00:56:10,290
be a different state. So I can tell you my first job.

895
00:56:10,690 --> 00:56:14,010
Well, I worked for my dad's wine shop in the 70s as a teenager. The

896
00:56:14,010 --> 00:56:17,130
first. The day I got my license and I turned 16. I guess this was

897
00:56:17,130 --> 00:56:20,930
illegal. Actually, I delivered in my dad's van

898
00:56:21,170 --> 00:56:24,050
the. The shipments of the Wine of the Month, the original Wine of the Month

899
00:56:24,050 --> 00:56:27,810
club. Now, by then, it was already a couple years old, but my very

900
00:56:27,810 --> 00:56:31,610
first job with a license was to deliver the

901
00:56:31,610 --> 00:56:35,330
club selection. So you've got a lot of room ahead of you to grow this.

902
00:56:35,330 --> 00:56:39,010
And congratulations on getting us started

903
00:56:39,010 --> 00:56:41,810
because it's a lot of work. Thank you. It's a lot of work, but it's

904
00:56:41,810 --> 00:56:45,650
very exciting talking to winemakers. And I collect so

905
00:56:45,650 --> 00:56:49,330
many beautiful stories. For example, one of the wine that I wanted to bring.

906
00:56:49,330 --> 00:56:53,130
And I just have 24 subscribers for now. Right. It's just two cases.

907
00:56:54,010 --> 00:56:57,130
One of the winemakers told me he doesn't have them.

908
00:56:57,770 --> 00:57:01,370
I cannot get it. He produced such a small

909
00:57:02,480 --> 00:57:05,440
amount of wine that I. I

910
00:57:05,760 --> 00:57:09,560
traveled to New York to Finger Lakes in June. I

911
00:57:09,560 --> 00:57:12,320
wanted to buy them in September. He didn't have them anymore.

912
00:57:12,960 --> 00:57:16,360
Wow. It's beautiful. I love this because it's history

913
00:57:16,360 --> 00:57:19,720
repeating itself. My father went to Napa Valley in

914
00:57:19,720 --> 00:57:23,520
1973 and was climbing over pallets of wine with Warren

915
00:57:23,520 --> 00:57:27,320
Winiarski at Stag's Leap. And my dad says, I'll

916
00:57:27,320 --> 00:57:31,080
take this wine. He goes, I don't have enough. Yeah. Now, we were small then,

917
00:57:31,080 --> 00:57:34,680
too, but that's 50 years

918
00:57:34,680 --> 00:57:38,360
ago. It's the same conversation. That's really cool. That's really

919
00:57:38,360 --> 00:57:42,160
cool. Yes. I. I was. I was really. I was like, okay, let me get

920
00:57:42,160 --> 00:57:45,600
some allocation for next year. I'll drink it by myself and get. Used to that,

921
00:57:45,600 --> 00:57:49,280
by the way. So, just so you know, not only we have

922
00:57:49,280 --> 00:57:52,280
that, you'll have the wine arrive, and it wasn't what you ordered or that it

923
00:57:52,280 --> 00:57:55,730
went through some. I had a whole container. I had a whole truck.

924
00:57:55,890 --> 00:57:59,530
17 pallets of wine bake on a

925
00:57:59,530 --> 00:58:03,290
truck just from Paso Robles to Southern. California to that

926
00:58:03,290 --> 00:58:06,770
point. The other thing is my. My subscribers are asking, why

927
00:58:06,770 --> 00:58:10,330
November? Why can't you deliver now in October? I cannot

928
00:58:10,330 --> 00:58:13,930
bring them to Texas. Nobody shipped them to me right now because it's

929
00:58:13,930 --> 00:58:17,690
hot. So. Have you ever heard about FedEx

930
00:58:17,690 --> 00:58:21,540
saying, no I'm not shipping. It's hot. They don't care. They don't care. But

931
00:58:21,540 --> 00:58:24,540
there are, there is a movement. Not a movement, but there's a.

932
00:58:25,900 --> 00:58:29,580
Shipping companies that now have algorithms

933
00:58:29,980 --> 00:58:32,940
that will, that will balance shipments across

934
00:58:33,820 --> 00:58:37,220
the States that have, don't have heat and then have heat, and then they'll release

935
00:58:37,220 --> 00:58:40,900
shipments that were the. It's part of, it's an integral part

936
00:58:40,900 --> 00:58:44,660
of software these days for shipping wine. I never, I never

937
00:58:44,660 --> 00:58:48,260
had a problem. I, I am, I appreciate that, actually. I

938
00:58:48,260 --> 00:58:52,110
appreciate my winemaker to tell me like you will have to wait when it's

939
00:58:52,110 --> 00:58:55,790
safe to ship my wines. I appreciate that. We, the, the thing

940
00:58:55,790 --> 00:58:59,150
we had and we were shipping, look, we were shipping 60,000 bottles a month

941
00:58:59,710 --> 00:59:02,990
was I would ship them if they froze

942
00:59:03,790 --> 00:59:07,390
because FedEx and UPS do not have temperature controlled warehouses.

943
00:59:07,950 --> 00:59:11,550
So they, the cork will pop on a very, very cold day

944
00:59:11,710 --> 00:59:15,550
and the wine will seep on a very, very warm day. But we have

945
00:59:15,550 --> 00:59:19,090
such little because it happens so fast. It just passes through those

946
00:59:19,090 --> 00:59:22,810
states. But I, I think it's prudent. I think it's prudent to do

947
00:59:22,810 --> 00:59:26,570
that because it's not worth. Again, we

948
00:59:26,570 --> 00:59:30,170
talked about earlier that one taste that somebody goes, oh, this, this is

949
00:59:30,170 --> 00:59:34,010
terrible. And the reason it was terrible because it was baked or been frozen and

950
00:59:34,010 --> 00:59:37,770
didn't, didn't survive. So I think you're doing the right thing. No,

951
00:59:37,770 --> 00:59:41,410
it's, it's a great journey, as you said and I'm looking forward to learn more

952
00:59:41,410 --> 00:59:43,900
from you anytime. Cheers.

953
00:59:45,660 --> 00:59:49,340
Thank you for the time today and cheers on your career

954
00:59:49,820 --> 00:59:53,500
and we'll talk soon. Thank you so much. Thank you for inviting

955
00:59:53,500 --> 00:59:53,820
me.