Ep. 1841 Anthony Giglio | Masterclass US Wine Market With Juliana Colangelo

The Italian wine podcast is the community driven platform for Italian wine Geeks around the world. Support the show by donating at Italian wine podcast dot com. Donate five or more euro and we'll send you a copy of our latest book. My Italian GreatGeek Journal. Absolutely free. To get your free copy of my Italian GreatGeek journal, click support us at italian wine podcast dot com or wherever you get your pods. Welcome to Mastercross US Market with me, Juliana Colangelo. This show has been designed to demystify the US market for Italian wineries through interviews of experts in sales and distribution, social media, communications, and so much more. We will quiz each of our esteemed guests at the end of each episode to solidify the lessons that we've learned. To sharpen your principals, get out your notebooks, and join us each week to learn more about the US market. Hello. Welcome to Mass or class US wine market. Today, I'm thrilled to welcome Anthony Gileo to the Italian wine podcast. Anthony is a wine expert and writer presenting at the most prominent wine festivals from Aspen Food to South Beach and Moore. He is also the wine director for the Amex Centurion lounge network at a attributing editor at Food and Wine Magazine, and has also written for numerous other publications, such as travel leisure, Robertport, and more. Welcome to the show, Anthony. It's so great to have you here. I'm so happy to be here, Joel. Thank you. Yeah. Of course. We're talking today about some of my favorite topics, Italian Americans, Sopranos, and wine. So I'm thrilled. I I actually put on for you a special shirt thinking this was video. It has, an Italian American. It's a heart with a half Italian flag, half American flag. Representing our people today. Send us a picture. We can we can post it with the episode. That sounds great. Well, Anthony, before we dive into today's discussion, tell us a little bit boomer about your own background, how you ended up. In the wine world and doing what you're doing today as a writer and a presenter. I had my first glass of wine in Utero, but, there is actual video proof of this, or or actually a great film proof of this, but I did grow up in it in American American family in Jersey City, New Jersey where I, I still live now. And we were given wine, as children. Like, Sunday lunch was a big deal at my grandmother's basement, and the kids were in charge of decanting from the gallon to the, the carafe. And then all of us got rocks glasses with ice, a big pour of jug, you know, jug red wine, like, Fortis and Marasso or Carlarossi. If it was a special day, it might be, you know, Gallo Hardy Burgundy. But, we, we would then put a a ginger ale or a cream soda floater on top to teach us that wine belong on the table, but to, you know, to dilute it a bit and sweeten it. And the joke the joke is then as we got older, we got less soda. And more wine, and we realized how bad the wine was. Gosh. Yeah. I promise that it tastes pretty good with that that cream soda float, I'd imagine. Yeah. For sure. But so all to say, like, I didn't see what was right in front of me that wine was, you know, a part of my a life that didn't even think it was anything special, and it wasn't until, literally until my first job after college, where my my editor at, I was at a, a dreadfully boring, commercial real estate finance magazine writing, all the apartments. And my editor said, why are you here? And I said, you know, I wanna learn how to run a magazine and blah, blah, blah. And she goes, yeah, but why isn't it a wine magazine? And I was twenty two. And I said, well, the magazines I'm reading to Kant and the spectator, they seem to be all run by retired British lawyers. Like, who, who, who my age is gonna do it, and she said, well, I if I'm if I'm hearing you correctly, it sounds like an opportunity for a twenty two year old. Absolutely. And she planted that, you know, she her name is Nora Hatris, and we're still in touch. And she, she sprinkled the the the fairy dust over me, and and I was I was enchanted. And I studied with Rosier that going at the Soleay Society in New York City back in nineteen ninety one and, got my what would today be level one, just to to diploma in service. And I was I was coming at this as a journalist who wanted the tools of the trade and the vocabulary to to write about it, but, never planning to work on the floor, but then I went to work, at Kevin's really at Windows in the world. I was a a poorer in the wine school. I was hired by Andrea Robinson, and they wound up keeping me on, and and I worked in their private seller, another year and a half, and, straight up until they, the nineteen ninety three. Bombing that closed the restaurants, and then I never went back on the floor after that. So I've been writing about wine for about thirty something years now. Amazing. And how did you break into, you know, your first gig writing about wine? Tell us about that. So so that same angel Dora Hatris, my, my editor came to me after I got my diploma and said, please tell me you answered this ad in the New York Times that she, you know, this is way back before the internet. She literally cut out an ad and brought it in And it said Metropolitan Area wine magazine seeks managing editor. And I said, stop right there. I'm a editorial assistant. Why would I apply for a managing editor? And she goes, it's a wine magazine. How how hard can it be? So I she said call right now and I called and it was, it was wine enthusiast. And Bill Tisherman picked up and said, come meet me. And when I did, he said, okay, I like you. I wanna hire you. Here's the deal. I kind of exaggerated in the description. You're managing no one because it's just me and you. But that title will open doors. Give me two years. And I did. I drove up and, you know, back and forth to Westchester every day, which I was not happy about. And then, within two years, I was back to the city and and not, and and freelancing for a whole bunch of magazines. I had started to be, at the, like concurrently because of this this newfound sense of of taste and the, you know, being able to taste critically, I applied for a restaurant critics job as well and was, the restaurant critic for New Jersey monthly for ten years. And then Rob, Rob report hired me and worth and freelance gigs all over the place. So I was a restaurant critic for fifteen years as, you know, at the same time. Eventually landing at, a men's magazine called PoV, with my good buddy, Randall Lane, who's now the editor at Forbes. And that was a really fun time until ninety nine when the internet started to pipe up and Jim Gordon from the line spectator hired me to, get drinks dot com off the ground, which we thought was gonna be the greatest thing in the history of of the internet. But we will be didn't realize was this was way, way back before the Supreme Court intervene to open the states, a lot of the states up to interstate commerce. So, you know, I still think for a lot of us, and especially speaking to an Italian audience, when they look to us, they see fifty federal republics, not one country. Right. So every state has its own ridiculous rules and regulations. I, you know, I work in Manhattan, and I live in New Jersey, and I can't ship wine from my office to my house unless I call it I know. And say, walk the box shoes. Like, it's stupid. Is pretty insane. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Lots of archaic rules. Yeah. But the one other thing I'll I'll throw in there is that at the same time, one of my friends who worked with me at that, boring real estate magazine was, Kristina Gredovich who went on to become the publisher of Foodywine. And so we we we came up to this at the same time, and she is the one who brought me, to Aspen and asked Dana Cowen and letty Teeg to let me sub, but when Kevin's really had to cancel a last minute for, for a seminar, on Rioja, and I got up in front of two hundred and fifty people for the first time ever and started speaking about wine, during one of those amazing seminars and Letty was in the front row. And, they invited me back ever since. So this this June will be my twenty seventh Food Lion classic. And wall. While it makes me sound really old. Yeah. That's very cool. Italian wine podcast, part of the mama jumbo shrimp family. Well, that leads us into today's topic, Anthony. We're gonna talk about Italian American culture and how it's being utilized in wine marketing today. So we'll we'll talk a little bit more about the seminar you're hosting at this year's Aspen. So lutei to the Sopanos twenty fifth anniversary, which I love. I'm very excited for. We'll also talk more broadly about this topic. So our three key takeaways for today's master class, but we're really excited to talk to you about. Number one, how wine has played a role in Italian American culture. I mean, I don't think there's anyone better suited to talk about this now hearing about your, early days at the dinner table with the wine and the the cream soda. Number two, how the Italian American story is being utilized successfully in marketing today in wine and outside of wine as well. And then finally, how to successfully combine the history of Italian wine into the Italian American culture since after all we are on the Italian wine podcast here. So so, of course, we're both Italian Americans, both grew up in New Jersey. Let's talk a little bit more about the role wine plays for Italians in America. I mean, I think you did a great intro about being on the table, being injured juice young, but a little more broadly. How do you think Italian wine plays a role for Italian Americans? Yeah. It's it's so interesting to me. I mean, I think you and I would both agree even though we're not the same age and but we both grew up in in in the same state at least. In in the metropolitan area, let's call it. Italian Americans, even if they've never been to Italy, identify as Italian, which I've always find so fascinating. And, like, I didn't even think about it this way until I don't know who was a an Italian chef said to me once, if you're Italian, which football did you grow up watching? You know, and and he said, if it's not soccer, you're you're you're American. Like, it's just, like, it was, like, it was, like, there were three or four questions he asked to be funny. And I felt like it is true. Like, you know, like, my dad, I I always have my friends laughing. My dad, like, makes declarations, like, you know, amp his fist on the table and say, the Italian people don't do this or the Italian people believe this. And I'm like, you didn't you don't even have a passport. Like, what are you talking about? You've never been to Italy. Like, I took it to Italy when I was, like, when I was married. It's like, that's how long it took to get them over there. Anyway, just to say that I think we identify so strongly with Italy and our connection to it. And I also think it it it it's conjoined with the popularity of Italian culture among a lot of Americans that are that may not even be necessarily of Italian descent. It's like the made in Italy brand is so strong. That, you know, and and so successful across a million products, not just wine, that I think it makes it easy and and and offers a great, but, you know, feeling of pride for Italian Americans to identify with this country that is responsible for giving us so much beauty in the world and art in the world and deliciousness in the world. So that's what I I I just think it it makes sense why it's so prevalent, and I just think that we're lucky that we could claim a little bit of it. It has nothing to do with it. Yeah. Absolutely. And, you know, it comes like you said with all these great culinary traditions, the wine, of course, opera music art, all of those things. So, you know, let's talk a little bit about that, like, how out outside of the culinary landscape, Italian American culture has been prominent on the movies, you know, end on TV. What role has Italian wine played on the screen? You know, we have all these famous movies throughout history from the godfather trilogy to you know, the Sopanos. Right? And how do we see wine really playing a role on screen when it comes to these Italian American, cultural classics? I think, you know, it it's interesting. I was actually, having a conversation with some friends last night at dinner They were asking me about, a recent trip I took to Florence for the Consourcio County Classicco, hundredth anniversary. And I said, it's interesting because, you know, I I just wrote about, County for, food and wine magazine has a a blog. Right? For, called food and wine club. And and I talked about it, like, if it's if you haven't thought about accounting in a long time, it's time to, to revisit it. Because wine, you know, it's especially county. I mean, I'm I'm thinking way back even to, early episodes of, mad men when Don is, you know, seducing one of his many, many mistresses. He has a bottle of Kianti on the table at, like, one of the best white tablecloth restaurants in Manhattan in the early sixties. And it's like after world war two, the biggest exports to the US was Kianti, not necessarily Kianti classico, but Kianti in the emblematic, much derided strobe bottom bottle, which I love that it's called an Italian, the fiasco. You could imagine as an early wine writer. We all would someone someone would write the the the the fiasco fiasco, you know, like, the Italian fiasco fiasco because they they were really stuck with that. And, you know, like, so, like, just to remind us that it became so omnipresent and then the the quality level fell, Kianti expanded its borders and all these things, like, that kind of brought it down, but it's it plays it in the soundtrack. It's it's in the background of so many, so many movies, whether it's, you know, the Straub on a model or just red wine in general, but, you know, Kianti has a a deep, deep, deep resonance among I find among most of the tiny American friends I have because it just it's it's just there. It's always there. And and, you know, it wasn't until much much later than, you know, we also started talking about Breonna Montalcino and, Barolo and Barbaresco and learning the grapes, all those kinds of things I think a lot of Americans are comfortable speaking about now, but Chianti is, you know, even like a punchline for Archie bunker. Like, you know, like, it's just it identifies with Italian Americans because for a long time, it was it was cheap and delicious and and everywhere. Yeah. And it's also a a word too that's it doesn't sound American, but it's not as difficult to pronounce as Galiapo, right, or something like that. So you know, which goes back to I I actually, I love telling this that Robert Menddavi, when he wanted to introduce, Fume Blanc, it was because he crossed fell in love with Pue Fume in, in, in the lower valley. And he said, I don't believe that Americans will become saying Poule fume or Poule fume. So he took he said, I'm gonna get make it easy and give them Fume blanc to French words that sound pretty easy. And it it's the same with the time. Look at my last name. They you just said Galiopo. Right? People read Gagliapo, and they see my name and see Gigli oh, and I I, you know, I, I certainly so they grew up with a Gigli when I was young because I was, I was, I wasn't strong enough to fight people on how to say it. Yeah. But, now I correct everyone that it's Gilio, Right. And, and it's still, you know, I don't understand. Like, how's the word Ambralio spelled? Or, you know, like, at least that's something more common in English. Right. Gallioper. Let's say Galioper too today. Yes. Exactly. They spell Galiapo. Oh, add that one to the list. But, yeah, I mean, I think your example of Counties is a really good one. I mean, we we think about the Sabanos, speaking of your seminar at Aspen, right? We saw roofy note all over screen. Right? That was a roofy note was on lots of the tables and in those scenes and what happened with that brand. Right? So I'm trying to score some Refino, Reserve Ducale for the the seminar and I haven't had luck yet getting someone to give me some. So if if anybody's listening to this, who has a connection to Ruffino or, to, to Weibo. Let me know. Alright. Good. Putting it out there. Great. So, and then he talked about us a little bit about how we can take, you know, this global success of Italian American culture from you know, shows like the Sopanos, you know, musicians, etcetera, and use it as a platform to promote Italian White and, you know, talk to us a little bit more about maybe how you're doing that with your seminar at Aspen this year. Well, I think if if looked back to what we were just saying a few minutes ago about, like, how it's in the background, right, of of so many, pop culture movies and TV shows. I think the opportunity is to take advantage of the fact that it's know, it's like a best supporting actor and all our actor actress in a lot of these, in these, in in pop culture, it plays a role. It's like it's their supporting role. Right? I'm trying to make the sound much better than what this did, but it's No. I know what you mean exactly. Yeah. It's it's on the table. It's in the background. Right. And it's it's sort of like I didn't realize that wine was in front of my face. My whole childhood didn't think I could make a career of it, like, to say wine is is is there. It's always there in the background, and we should keep calling it out. I mean, it it's it's just part of the fabric of what we identify with anything, Italian, and also I think Italian American that wine is a part of the, the, the, the story, and it's, it's it belongs on the table no matter what's being served, and all the notions of perfect pairings. I always like to throw out the window because it's whatever's in the house that's gonna pair with whatever you have if if you're if you're caught with nothing else, and it's gonna be better than water. Right? So Exactly. But I think that it it's always on the table. It belongs there, and everyone should taste it with food and see what happens, which is a whole other big point that I always say I make up Julianna when I talk when I teach classes that we Americans, I I I say this broadly as an American, We drink often without, we judge often on one taste, one sip, and we're done. Like, you're you're having a Martini. I hand you a glass of my borolo, and you're like, you taste it. Like, I'm okay. And I'm like, right. Cause you have, you know, something else is on your palate blocking the the, the full power of this, this first taste. So take a second sip, take a third sip. Like, so I always say, like, you can't judge wine until you taste the release twice to judge on a clear palette and then add fat and salt a potato chip, a great piece of cheese, anything in the pantry or fridge that you could grab that's a little savory. Nothing with hot pepper, nothing sweet, but then taste whatever that wine is again, and you will see a completely different wine, completely. And in European wine, European wines in general, another blanket statement that'll get me in trouble, but it's I I like to say that, European, like, old world wines are made to be paired with food. We don't think that way in the new world. We think of wine as food. Like, it just better be delicious. And I say Right. It will be if you add a little salt, a little fat, everything changes. Totally. Like, I can never drink a glass of wine. A glass of sa Cyrentino, you know, on its own. Like that, I mean, some meat fat for is definitely, but I can definitely drink a glass of napa cab because It has, you know, the richness of the oak. It's usually ancient, like, the sugar content. Honestly, I can drink it like it's my dessert, but not, you know, like you said with the little world wines in a more general way they need food and they belong on the table. Like I said, they're meant be paired with food. And by design, to be paired with food, they are lower in alcohol, higher in acid. And, you know, when people are gonna be like, like, we don't talk about acid as a positive in food and but with wine, it's like squeezing a lemon over anything to make it taste better. So think of as acidity as the obvious pair. Even even when you make a delicious super or sauce, you add a little splash of vinegar in there, and it changes everything. So you add acid, and it makes everything taste better. American wines, thanks to our amazingly sunny West Coast. The wines are richer fuller. Often a little higher in alcohol, not much, but it just makes a difference for how, easy and delicious they are to drink. They don't challenge you, but yet let's open a beautiful bottle of morgown from, from southern, you know, from Southern Burgundy, and it'll be chalky and, dry and and kind of like, like sucking on a violet candy without any sugar. And people are like, this is interesting because they want, you know, they want they wanna impress me that they're impressed, but I think then you can't make you can't judge it yet now. Let's just grab a potato chip, grab anything and see what happens, taste it again, and it blooms. It just it's it's such a simple thing that I I never learned from anyone else, and now I just say it to everybody I can that a little food changes and everything, and these wines are meant for that. So, like, you know, there's so many Italian wines. We could, we could, we could talk about that on paper might not be so delicious on their own. Like, if one sip, two sips, you might be like, wow, this is Really, really powerful, really draw, like you said, Sacramento. I got one of the most powerful Italian reds on the planet. And then just a a beautiful piece of cheese no matter what it is except Velvita will make it taste amazing. Absolutely. So talk it sounds like, you know, in in your seminars and where you are presenting wine to consumers, you know, food is a big component. So talk to us a little bit about how you plan to approach the series, Aspen food and wine, and you're salute to the Sopanos, you know, seminar. What what kind of approach you're taking there? So what I love is that, in the last couple of years, food and wine has starting to allow food in the seminars. It used to be just too much of a hassle to to, to prepare food or have it prepared and delivered, and they were, you know, we were always being very green about trying not to create too much garbage and refuse and messing. I was thrilled when I said can we add some, even, like, even just if, you know, if if if food is a problem, can we add just like one piece of parmigiano reggiano cheese or any kind of a cheese that's easy to maybe buy packaged, to prepackaged in portions, and and they were like, no, we we can we can get a whole charcuterie board for you. Like, we have, a sponsored from money. For that money that's, working with the with the food and wine team this year. And they're like, would you like to order a bunch of salumi from them? And I'm like, holy cow. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. So we'll we'll have we'll have the fat and the salt on the plate by way of know, I haven't chosen yet because I haven't chosen the wines yet, but, like, you know, obviously there's gonna be some mortadella and prosciutto Di Parma or prosciutto from somewhere in Northern Italy and, some Capicolas and things like that, which of course will then sopranoize back to their Italian American Neapolitan pronunciations of Gabbagool and Gabbagol. I I plan on taking full advantage of of Jersey, Nepal, Italian American, mispronunciations throughout the seminar. I love it. I love that. Are you thinking you're gonna pair, like, specific wines with the salumi's and cheeses or No. No. No. No. I I never I never like to do that because then it makes people think, oh, if I have this, I have to have this, and it just reinforces that that nervousness about perfect pairings, which I I really, really try to impress upon anyone who listen to me. There is no such thing as a perfect pairing. There's certainly some things that go better with others, but I mean, I I've made a career of breaking that and and converting people to even have you know, chardonnay with steak. If that's all that's in the house or that's all that they really like because, you know, you go to a good place where there's steak free, there's gonna be butter on the steak. It's the same thing. Good buttery chardonnay. It's not hurt the steak, but and ultimately, it's better than water. Someone introduced me to that, a master some years ago, and I always remembered it because I'm more of a white wine drinker in general, and I love Chardon Day and steak. I actually think it's a a great pairing. Yeah. So the food will be more of the backdrop, like you said, to add that that salt to add that umami, so that as people are chasing through the wines, they're understanding how food changes their their profiles. And when it comes to the wine them themselves, it sounds like you're still evaluating which wines you're gonna include. I I heard roofie know. Obviously, that's a narcotic wine on the Soprano screen, but talk to us a little bit about how you're thinking about the other wines you're gonna select for the seminar. So so admittedly, The the bulk of wine. I've done so much research and rewatching the series again, but actually for the first time in about twenty years. So, like, it's so much new. So many things are so new to me. Like, I had no idea that Tony Soprano kissed Doctor. Melfie. I totally forgot that tried to kiss her in the office one day, like, I I just that's where I am right now in seventy one. But, and I've been there's tons of, conversations on Reddit and you could you could you could you could you could go into a deep rabbit hole looking for the wines. So, yeah, They all favor. They favor red over white, of course. Although, like, you know, they are as Blingy, like, Rotora Pristale and Don Perignon and Vodclico, which make, you know, they're usually for, like, the big parties and the toasts. Went Tony and, and Christopher Rob, the restaurant. The restaurant. The way they took, eighty six, Chateau Picville, poke at the salon. I love that scene. Right. In nineteen eighty four, Claude Pagasse, cab. Of course, there's always cabernet in the background. Yeah. And then the year, the two thousand two Ruffino, Reservative Calle. There's been Barolo, Carlo Rossy, Chiantes of all shapes and sizes. Furio's homemade Italian wine, which we're not gonna do before Ragali Ali, of course. And that that was, like, that's our actually early episode where they're on a date, Carmen Carmellette and Tony are on a date in Manhattan, and they're drinking Regali Ali. You know, like, it's it's so good. You know, the little sicilian thrown in there. I'm trying to see what I could find that aligns with that first, Broola, Barbara. Like, and there's so many choices. You know, I'm not necessarily, interested in in the French part of this. Like, you know, I'd love to get eighty six, peashan. Well, you know, that's not gonna happen. But, I think, Bordeaux might be part of the conversation, but I don't know if I'll pour one yet. I'm thinking about it. And, you know, it's it's fine. I have eight slots, and it's always, it's always, a race. Like, people start sending me a million, you know, offers, and and I'm grateful for all of them. And then I have to decide on eight and break a lot of, you know, disappoint a lot of people, but, it's all part of the fun every year to say like, okay, where can we take this and And I'm I love that, like, the create so many creative people have written to me telling me the personality of the wine, like, this one is Libya, the evil mother. This, you know, Furiya would love this or come you know, Camille was always drinking white wine, although we never really I'm not really sure what she was drinking, but there's so many great choices we could throw in there from from, Ola Really, but especially the Northeast where I think some of the most delicious white wines are from, up in, up in, freely in, the Veneto. That's where my mind went first too. It's like pairing the the characters with different lines that match their personality. I don't know. I think that's just a kind of a fun way to think about it, but there are a lot of different directions definitely you could take for sure. Yeah. You mentioned, you know, it's just still your mind. Just now, Anthony, we know that, you know, in the Italian American population, many people have Southern roots. There's over fifteen point seven million people in the US identify themselves as Italian Americans. That's about six percent of the population. So, obviously, a huge market for Italian wine. Do you think the Italian wine category has really exhausted marketing opportunities, you know, within this population? No. Not at all. Oh, my god. No way. No way. No way. No way. You know, what's actually interesting? I went to and this is I swear this is gonna come back to Italy, but I was at the great match, which is, a Spanish, initiative every year. There's a great match. I think it's a road trip across the country, but the New York chapter of it was, held at, Mercado, you know, Jose andres' place. And there were three speakers all in a row mentioned Italy, and they said, we need to do a better job marketing Spanish wines like the Italians. Like, no matter no no matter the rivalry, no matter the, you know, like, the consortio territoriality, they stick together when it's facing outward to us. And it's and it's been hugely successful, and I would have to agree. Like, Italy does a great job of of marketing itself to not just Italian Americans, but to to, you know, to the US market in general, and and we are a humongous market for Italy as a whole. And And I think that the opportunities are endless. Like, for instance, like, right now you're gonna see because of this, you know, Chianti classico, a hundredth anniversary, a lot of us are all writing about Chianti one way or another, and how it still represents some of the greatest value from Italy. In the face of, like, you know, other great regions like, you know, Barolo and, Amaroni, like, all the, you know, the, the, like, the kings of big Italian reds. The prices are, in some cases, six or eight times more than your average chianti bottle. Like, I think the average barolo is about one hundred and eighty dollars, and the average chianti is, under under thirty, like, for a a solid chianti classica. Like, you can do you'd find so many so many I I'm actually I could be wrong on that barolo, but you know what I mean? Like, the prices are so much higher. It's like looking at a wine level. I think I get burning immediately because it's gonna be the most expensive region on the morning. Yeah. But I I think the opportunities are there, and and and I think that, I I don't think it's exhausted at all. You can look at Sicilia, right, and, you know, we know that a lot of Italian Americans have Southern roots and the popularity of Sicilian wine, and, you know, we can't talk about that without talking about white lotus, not necessarily an Italian American piece of of of TV, but definitely, you know, took Italy, right, and and put it on the screen and and look with that stuff for the the popularity of that category. Yeah. Last year's seminar was the white the wines of the white lotus. It was so amazing. It was more. So we all hold on. I need to give credit to my wife, Antonio. She's, of Cecilia. Her parents came from Sicily, and so she's, she actually worked at forty one, and she's the director of marketing, and she's the one who last year when I was saying, oh, god. I have to come up with more, you know, seminars. I send the same thing. The joke of it in Food and Wine is that I I'll send over five ideas and no matter how great they are or or not. I will always get an Italian one, and I don't mind that at all. I'm happy to take it, but, like, I'm like, so I always have to throw an Italian one in there. And I'm like, okay. So what do you think of? She's like, oh my god, you should do the white lotus. And I thought, oh, that's genius and and in Rayisle went crazy for it. And then this this year, I sat down, like, okay. What do what do we do to make, you know, what do we do to be better than last year? And she said, how about the Sopanos? And I thought that is amazing. Yes. The Sopanos. Everyone about the Sop. I was like, well, I'm gonna rip I'm gonna rip Ray Isle right now. Like, we were texting back and forth. It's like, Do you think the surprises are still relevant? And I said, have you not have you not read anything, behind the last month? Like, everyone's going crazy revisiting it again. So I don't know if I answered your question. I feel like I wanted a bit of a tangent there. No. No. No. That's bring me back. Yeah. No. No. No. That that's so fantastic. I feel like it's a high bar you're setting, Anthony. I mean, what are you gonna do next year? Like We'll do pop culture offers us. Yeah. Exactly. We'll have to see what comes out there. But I I love the idea of using pop culture and and more marketing opportunities for wine. It's a complex topic. People get intimidated by wine easily. Although we hope we hope they don't, but they do. Right? It's it's undeniable that people are intimidated by drinking wine, and I think pop culture really can help equalize. That's like one of my the one of the things I've I've I've figured out over the three decades and and learned how to nail is that, whenever if if I'm in the room with a group of people and I start talking about why with them or they, you know, unless they're brave enough to start talking to a woman with me, they think that because I'm an expert that I have all the answers or that I think that there's a correct answer and an incorrect answer. And I always say, you know, it's such a break the ice. I mean, I'm like, listen, there is no wrong answer to any of these questions except White's infindale. Then, like, and people laugh, and then I'm, like, like, let's just, let's just, like, draw a baseline that. You really can't say anything wrong. And people want to they they want, they want, validation for what they like to drink. And I'm, like, well, of course, you're an American with a giant opinion about everything. You you drive every waiter crazy with all of your food requests from half the dressing on, half the dressing off, buttered. I'd like to bagel toasted on number seven diet. Like, like, oh, everything. We have we have so many prisnickety, thoughts, but yeah, when it comes to wine, a lot of people think, what do I know? I hear this all the time. Like, you know what you think is delicious, and it doesn't have to be what I think is delicious because I'm gonna order my steak mooing, and you're gonna order yours as a hockey puck. And even though I'm judging you silently, I'm not gonna say anything because your taste is yours, and mine is mine. And let's just raise a glass and and drink and have, you know, have a nice meal together. So I think it's all. It's, like, I I that's what I think. Attaching it to pop culture for me is is is an an added an added, element of of making it real for people that this is this is not like a, you know, a sommelier situation with me in a tuxedo and a test sedan and white gloves, which is what I had to wear when I took my tests in nineteen ninety one. This is a regular American kid. Like, I, you know, literally grew up in a blue collar family in Jersey City, in the seventies, and and, and was, you know, I I I like to keep that as a grounding principle for however I talk to people that, yeah, I could I could throw down on the five subsoils of the Rhineau in Germany if you need me to, but that's gonna put most people to sleep. So let's just talk about what makes it delicious, what we like about it, a little trivia, a little storytelling, and have get get people laughing and learning, and mission accomplished. Exactly. I mean, let's be honest, even among wine people, I don't think I I don't wanna talk too about the sodas oils of the Rhine Gower either. So I think we all want line there to be fun and to bring us together, right, when it when it comes down to it. I wanna make one funny distinction when you were giving those amazing statistics about how many people identify as Italian American. I don't know about you, Julian, where your family's from. My, my, all of my great grandparents are from Compania, but my wife and her family, they they don't say they're Italian. They say they're a sicilian. And I hear this over and over again, like, feels like, well, we're not Italian. We're sicillians. It's so funny. Like, I'm sure on the census, there's no line for that, but like Yeah. I wonder of those, you know, x million, Italian Americans, how many would answer if if given the right in choice, I'm sicilian, because there's a super strong quotient of of sicilians here. I think They came a lot of them came over in the sixties, when when, the rules were changed on immigration. Sure. And so there's that's like the freshest, of the Italians to come in. Yeah. Meanwhile, like, my family came over in the eighteen eighties. So, like, we're long assimilated. Right? Right. It couples with Sicily's massive recent popularity thanks to Mount Aetna. I mean, you know, like, the island itself has amazing wines that, you know, you'll find under DOC Sachella on the bottle. And then you have Aetna, which is just making a ton of headlines because it seemed to have been like a gold rush in the last twenty years of how many great producers from Northern Italy came down and sort of making wine there and adding to the hype that was already there from the locals who've been there for a century. Yeah. Exactly. And especially, you know, among the Sommeid community, right, Aetna just became immensely popular. But to your question, my family is all Southern, Calabria. And then on my dad's side, Cicily and, and avellino. So, yeah, my grandmother, she didn't speak Italian. She only could speak sicilian dialects. So I remember we all went to Italy, in the late nineties, like, twenty five of us, you know, this great calandula tour of of Italy, and she would just try speaking, sicilian dialect to Italians and they were, like, laughing at her. So, definitely that that sicilian pride is is there, and I I grew up with a very, prideful sicilian grandmother. So, I can identify there. So, Anthony, as we wind down, it's been so much fun talking to you today, but we'll do our rapid fire quiz that we do at the end of every episode. To really help our listeners better understand the US market and and share some tips and advice. So question number one, and if you can try your best to answer these in just a couple sentences, please. Number one, what is your number one tip for mastering the US wide market? From an Italian perspective? Sure, please. I mean, I think it's understanding that Americans in general drink wine by the grape. They don't necessarily understand that in the old world it's by address, so making that connection to them. So they understand, like, if you know, like, let's give, let's say Kianti Classico, a comparative to Piena noir, for example. Piena noir, and if Piena noir and Caba noir, it might be Kianti Glassico. Yeah. I like that comparison. Yeah. That's that's great advice, Anthony. Absolutely. Number two, what is something you might have told your younger professional self about working in wine in the US? Oh, gosh. I I have to say Julianna. I am so so fortunate to have caught the wave when I did. I mean, I was the youngest kid in my diploma class by twenty years. And Oh, wow. It was a different world back then. We were all in tuxedos and it was all so formal and terrifying. I would tell myself, to relax and and be my true self. I remember my first few articles I wrote for Food Lion were so preposterously, as the kids would say try hard, I was using crazy language and, a voice that wasn't my own. And I, I just wish that I could have relaxed into it and and and tell stories the way I do now to, to make everything so much more relatable. So I would just say, like, in a broader sense, like, speak plainly, you know, to be a great communicator, you have to speak plainly and and make everybody comfortable no matter what the demographic. I think that's great advice. And it plays into a lot of what we talked about today using pop culture as an equalizer to to really get people more comfortable with wine. And finally, number three, we all travel a lot in traveling to Aspen. In a few months, what's your know your favorite travel hacks? I always carry an eye mask in my pocket when I travel, plus an iPhone plug to to plug in my phone as I, you know, while I'm sleeping, hopefully, I love taking something to help me relax, and usually alcohol is not a great idea. So, like, maybe one drink when I get on the flight, and that's it. I'm not gonna lie being in New York, New Jersey, where, where Gummies are now, available and legal. I like, I like taking a gummy before, a flight to fall asleep after once we've left the, I mean, once the wheels are up, I'll I'll I'll take something to help me relax and then get as much sleep as possible before I get there. So I'm fresh and ready. Yep. Especially for those long red eyes, for sure. Well, Anthony, thank you again so much for joining us today on Master Class US wide market. How can our listeners connect with you? If you could spell my impossible name, Anthony Gio, d I g l I o. And at a dot com, you'll find everything on my website or on Instagram. It's at Anthony Gillio. And that's it. So I'm pretty easy to find if you Google. Great. Fantastic. Thanks again for being here, Anthony. Thanks for having me. Thank you for joining me today. Stay tuned to each week for new episodes of Master Class US wine market with me, Juliana Colangelo. I remember if you enjoyed today's show, hit the like and follow buttons wherever you get your podcasts.