Ep. 770 Andy Morton | Get US Market Ready With Italian Wine People

Thanks for tuning into my new show. Get US Market Ready with Italian wine people. I'm Steve Ray, author of the book how to get US Market Ready. And in my previous podcast, I shared some of the lessons I've learned from thirty years in the wine and spirits business helping brands enter and grow in the US market. This series will be dedicated to the personalities who have been working in the Italian wine sector in the US, their experiences, challenges, and personal stories. I'll uncover the roads that they walked shedding light on current trends, business strategies, and their unique brands. So thanks for listening in. And let's get to the interview. Hi. This is Steve Ray, and welcome to this week's edition of Get US Market Ready with Italian wine people. My guest this week as you'll hear from his accent is definitely not Italian, but that doesn't mean he can't speak of it. It's Andy Morton, who is now writing for a newspaper in Scotland, but had been an editor at just drinks. One of the major, web only newsletters in the industry. So Andy, welcome to the show. Hi, Steve. Happy to be you. Don't you give us a little biography, a view and how how, how, how we all got to have this conversation together? Yeah. Well, for the past ten years, I've been the dictator on Just drinks, which is global beverage newsletter that covers the the global drinks industry. Before that, yeah, yeah, So that's been for the past ten years. And within that, I've been covering drinks in all sorts of angles. Before that, I lived out in Asia for quite a few years. I worked on a number of English lamb newspapers over there. I owned a bar in China for a for a short time, in Chengdu and Southwest China. And I've been around, a number of places, including in New York and seeing you a few times to see, well, I met you in many places around the world, including in London. But, yeah, I And basically, I like to think of myself as a journalist first, a drinks journalist second, and someone who has, a great interest and love of the alcohol and drinks industry. Which is really the subject of of today's interview, I think you and I have a similar journalism background. So yours, of course, is in Scotland. One of the the points that you're writing now for the press and journal is in Aberdeen. Is that right? Aberdeen. And as one of the oldest continuously published newspapers in the world dating back to seventeen forty seven, and I was proud to comment even though we're not as old. We don't have old things like you guys do, but, I live in a town where I still subscribe and maybe the last one, subscribing to the Hartford current, which started in seventeen sixty four, which is kind of interesting. So that's kind of the journalism focus. So you're not a drinker, but you've written about the industry. Do you think there is a difference in perspective and how you write and what you write about being someone who doesn't drink versus someone who does? Yeah. That is a good question, Steve. I I I like to think that because, you know, I, as I am a journalist, So I I have therefore, I'm sort of predisposed towards, you know, a neutral viewpoint anyway, and we've I guess we could discuss that for a long time. But I think that the reason that I the fact that I don't drink does allow me to to have maybe a broader view over the whole of you know, I'm maybe a slightly more disciplined view of of what is happening within the drinks industry. And from my perspective, because I'm very much a trade journalist or certainly was when I was at just drinks. I'm not in any way interested import things taste like. Which takes one huge subject off the table, which is usually the first thing the new suppliers say to people in the US. I make a really great whatever, and it's absolutely not relevant at that point of the conversation. Completely. Completely. I I have a I have an there's an understanding for me in a way with with within my own head that everything has there's a base level of quality these days. Everything that I was that I would probably drink would be nice, you know. It's it's it's not and so as you say, I don't drink, but I think it would be rare for somebody to drink something that is absolutely disgusting. Yeah. Any more than you'd have a shoe that falls apart when you bought it or You know? Yeah. There's a base level of quality and certainly, and certainly when it comes to the big companies, which, which I cover, as part of my job. So when it comes to drinking things, it doesn't matter what it tastes like as far as I'm concerned. All eye concern about how much it sells, what it shifts, what the marketing is, and and what the presence of this, this particular product, it means for the industry as a whole. Okay. So that's kind of the area that I'm most interested too. And one of the issues I see with a lot of people historically in the United States in the business is they don't distinguish messaging and communications and benefits that are oriented towards the trade as opposed to consumers when we're dealing with trade magazines, meaning whether someone's writing an article, whether they're being interviewed, or those kinds of things. And so the default is always, oh, let's run our consumer ad and it comp because the consumer ad that that is not speaking anything of interest to the trade. So define to me if you would how you view trade communications. We'll get it to trade marketing in a minute, trade communications versus consumer communications. Yeah. That that's an interesting point. And I would define trade communications as, you know, it's always a two way street in trade journalism. I'm very much aware that as a trade journalist, I've arrived at industry, but in also some ways I am part of the industry. And that means that my job is maybe it walks a more of a a a finer line perhaps than it would in in consumer publications. My readers are people that work in the industry. So when it comes to writing about the industry, there is a motivation perhaps to to write positively about the industry and also to convey the type of information that those companies want to be conveyed and want to be out in the world. And and that that that that is always there was always that kind of those competing sites in trade journalism, but I I think also as as a as a trade journalist and and this is and something that trade publications have to do is to, to be able to criticize the industry and talk about the industry in an independent way so that when or if mistakes are being made, then the then we're able to to talk about that to write about it and for the readership to to read about it. It's it's easy to and sometimes I worry myself that that's my role in with in trade journalism, what my role as a journalist within the industry is to be something of a useful idiot for companies. I mean, quite I've been quite hard on myself here, but That's a great term, though. I like a useful idiot. I think I would fall under that heading too. Well, you know, I'm sure everybody's been one of those some time in their life, but, you know, I'm really just a means for a company to get their message out. That's sometimes how I think I'm viewed by by wine companies, alcohol companies, whatever whatever they might be. And I I, you know, I think you know, that that is perhaps useful for the companies to have that kind of message out there, but I don't think it's useful for the industry as a whole. I think the industry needs, criticism and needs independent voices to be able to look dispassionately at the industry rather than just give what the what might be the line coming from the largest companies. Okay. And I happen to agree with that. And there are a couple certainly in the US. I'm not that familiar with to some degree of what's going on in the UK, but two guys in particular pop into my mind. One is Blake Gray, who is the US editor, and I don't know if you've seen any of his stuff, the US editor from wine searcher dot com, and the other is Tom Wark, w a r k, who is a PR guy, but he is also head of the NHR National Association of wine retailers. I'll talk about each of them individually because I think they're significant. Blake is a bit of a rack on tour and he loves to create controversies explore them and, expose them when they're maybe not seen for the true controversy that they are. And that's great. And that's what you're talking about that the journalism, journalist as a critic to say, no, no, no, no, no, no, you can't gloss over this you know, like the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico killed a couple of birds. No. No. It's a little bit more than that. Okay? And I love reading him, Blake. And he's really developed a voice, not only just on what he does online searcher, but in other things, and you kinda know when you're gonna read something from him gonna be entertaining because he's gonna pick a fight and we like that. And, similar, but less, incendiary, maybe, is Tom Work. And I don't know if you know him. He writes a blog called fermentation, very much focused on, direct to consumer sales and freeing up in the within the three tier system retailers being allowed to ship directly to consumers, which is a contentious issue in the US. We won't go into it in detail here, but Tom's been an an advocate of freeing that up for a long, long time. It's really interesting talking to them because you get a very, very different less what's the word I'm looking for cleaned up version of what's happening. There there tends to be a dominance in the US of the conversation by entities who have, the ability to dominate a conversation either by money or by exposure. One of them being WSWA, and their interest is in preserving the status quo. Do you see much Do you see much going on in, US oriented trade publications? But I would include Decantor and, you know, that's crossover magazine there, but, you know, drinks magazine in the UK and so forth. Speak about that. Within wine specifically, there is that crossover between those two sides. You know, you have the the trade press, but it is always heavy insulin slightly by the the consumer side of things. Because wine has wine publications, I would argue are quite distinct from publications about anything else. You don't really have, you know, and within trade publications, you don't have that kind of history in other industries. That you do in, in, in, in wine of those kind of legacy publications, those publications that been around for a while, that talk about wine, that kind of straddle that, the two categories, whether it's consumer, or whether it's, trade, and that I think has led to, or maybe is, is part of the, the slightly different way that wine has talked about in trade circles. Are you talking about the preciousness of it and all that kind of stuff, the geekiness of it? It is certainly more flowery. The the types, the type of language and type of prose that is used within what wine specific trade publications. It they're far more prone to to go over to the the the type of, you know, whether it's the the tasting not style of rating. Oh, the whole thing about sauteed gooseberries. I know that's kinda my metaphor for it. Yeah. I never had a gooseberry. I wouldn't know if it hit me in the face and they surely wouldn't know what a sauteed one. Tastes like Definitely not. Butter or olive oil. But anyway, keep going. Yeah. But that kind of writing is very much part of the wine industry as a whole. But I I I personally don't like to see it quite so much appear within your your kind of hard nosed or, you know, your more kind of business sides of of the wine industry, but you know, it's there. It's it's there in in everything that that we do in wine. I mean, it makes it such an interesting category to cover, and it makes a lot of the competence and acts, but the exhibitions that you go to a lot more interesting to go to because because it is people who are passionate about what they do. And that definitely comes through. But when it comes to the actual business of wine, put trade publications tend to perhaps be more, you know, more and more about the lifestyle perhaps rather than the, the, than the trade itself, which I would say is maybe not quite so good for the industry as a whole when it comes to making those hard and those business decisions. So take that that perspective and think about, I'm, I'm obviously interested here with a focus on Italy, but it could be any exporting, country to the US. Is there anyone that you've worked with? And you don't have to name names if you don't want to that you think is doing a good job. And if so, what is it that they're doing that makes it a good job and and that their support or their input or the the ideas they they come up to and pitch to or through you works. Yeah. I'm definitely not gonna name any names. Sorry. But what I would say is that it there are perhaps two two types of information that you can give as a journalist or when you're writing about an industry. And and that is, you know, there is the the news of of the industry as a whole, whether that's about you might want to sort of define it as as industry gossip Which is great fun. And, and the dating. Who's acquiring who and who got what job and all that kind of stuff? Yeah. Right. And and that is how you, you know, the kind of innovation which you can use to make business decisions and help you to sell more products and certainly gives you an idea of what is happening with the industry that you're in. That that's one side of it, but then there's also, suddenly more so nowadays, the the other side of it, which is the data, giving the readers access to to data, whether that's export volumes or, you know, whether that's growth levels for certain types of categories or the, you know, the the minds of, whether Chilean wine is is or or Argentinian wine is is finding growth within certain markets in the UK or, you know, it's Italian wine versus French wine, Austrian wine, whatever. And and this this is a newer part of journalism and and brushes up against the the the strategy desks of of large companies. Because when people are brand owners, and brand directors, owners of of of companies are putting together their strategy, this is the kind of information that they they need to base their future projections and and strategy on. So that's becoming a more important part I think of of of of journalism. It's maybe, as far as I'm concerned, it's not as much fun as writing about the more gossipy side, but it is a a hugely important side. So this is where journalism now is brushing up against the strategy desks, if you wanna put it like that, of of companies, of the the people that are hired within within companies to to make those forward looking projections. Yeah. But but then also, you know, not every company and certainly in wine, not every company can afford to have that kind of stuff. So they look to their trade publications to give them that kind of information. And I think where you might have been heading. I'm gonna overstate it here, but, that information can be sanitized, you know, I love that phrase research work, research proves research works. I mean, you know, you you Mark Twain said it. There's lies, damn lies, and statistics. But I my recommendation to most people I talk to who are looking at the US market is subscribe to all of the publications that you can. Most are free. Just drinks, and it's just hyphen drinks dot com charges, but it's it's not nominal, but it's not not not that significant. And there's a couple of others that charge. Wine and spirits daily, Shank and News daily, but some of them like Mark Brown's newsletter is free and a bunch of others are. And my point is if you go and read all the newsletters, daily and weekly, for about two to three weeks. You're gonna have your finger on the pulse of what's going on in the US. You're gonna know who the players are. You can know what the biases are. You can know what the trends are. And some of it will be dated. Some of it will be insight, and some of it will be gossip. But the idea is by reading and assessing rather than somebody else taking the data distilling it and giving you the conclusions makes a huge difference. And I'll use one example. Doing a project now for a client. I have this very, very, rigorous way of identifying which markets, to target in the US, looking at both quantitative and qualitative data that I access because I get all of these reports and, you know, can boil them down. And all of that is is not even worth the paper that it's printed on because it's not printed on paper anymore. When it boils down to in the US, the decision of where you're gonna go to is made by the distributor who says yes. So whatever distributor say yes, those are the states that you're going to go in do. Now they may be your priority straits and states that may be something to talk about. But at the end of the day, the the decision, the the weight of the decision falls on the importer and the the distributor, they're almost a filter. You have to go through. I look at them as not an obstacle, but like, when you're doing the hurdles, a race of the hurdles, you gotta hop over these things. You know, they're there. You plan for them in your pace, but they can determine whether or not you're going to be successful. That's not the way it works in the rest of the world. Is it? Well, you know, you have a specific issue in in the US, which is that your three tier, system, which is unique to to the US. So you don't have, you don't have quite the same challenges in other countries. Here here's what I'm trying to say is is there's data and that you need to turn data into information and then turn information into insight. And only people who really understand the market can do what I just said. I'm not patting myself on the back, but this was perfect example of what happened literally yesterday where I went through this whole analysis and we got to the conclusion. And so what state should we go into? And the answer was the ones who say yes first. Now that doesn't mean I shouldn't have done the analysis and that we shouldn't have had that very deep dialogue with the client so that they understand the differences between how South Carolina works in Georgia, which is a franchise state where they only recently allowed, in store tastings. And those are some critical assets that you wanna be able to leverage when you're there. So you do need to know it. You need to see it there. But, I think you need someone in the US market who can interpret that information and say, okay, here's what it means, and here's how you can apply it strategically. Well, I'd be interested to hear your opinion on what you think of the, the level of, could you save some expertise within, wine writing or wine publications these days? You, you might you you've been in the industry for a long time. Thank you for that. I appreciate it. You've seen the publication come and go and some stick around for for a long time. But then as the industry, and I'm talking about the wind industry as a whole and all across the world, it, as a doing business has certainly become more complicated perhaps, but over the years, you know, we you have your you you have some things, obviously, don't change, but, you know, there are far more markets and far more certainly more consumers to, to target these days. So you could argue that, you know, things are a lot more interesting. I thought a lot more, complicated. But at the same time, as has been happening in newspapers all over the US and around the world, the resources for publications is is becoming smaller. The amount of people that perhaps that that reports or talk about the US wine industry is is is less than it would would have been in the past, certainly for the size that it is. So would you say that the the expertise and the knowledge from the people that are writing about wine in the US? Do you think that is not the that the same kind of level as it used to be? I I I've got a couple of answers to that. One is it's a function of scale. I'm talking about numbers here. So one spectator, I think their, actual circulation number is about four hundred thousand, you know, plus or minus a hundred thousand. And you know, with pass along circus, we'd like to talk about it in the advertising industry. Move apply that by three. So maybe you get one point two million. Right? Vinepair states that they have twenty million client interactions or customer internet interactions. Everything from someone referencing something or reading it or downloading a an article passing one or sharing one. But you can kinda compare who's reading these things, and it's online gets the scale and the scope and that the subject matter seems to kinda settle based on its specific gravity. So for example, on I don't even know if you're familiar with Vinepear, but it's a big publication here, but it's very focused on newbies. So a lot of people who are first discovering wine for the first time and here's things like whether it's a difference between Bordeaux and Burgundy. Oh, you know, that kind of stuff. So it it it's kind of in that that phase. There are a bunch of others wind searcher being one, and and the people who are writing the editorial content for that, we're deep in the weeds. But what they do is they present, their data based on searches And as we all know from search engine optimization and watching that whole, category grow evolve, and become professional. There's a big difference between searches and relevance and purchases. And you have to differentiate amongst in between, all of those to understand what the so for example, wine searcher most of the searches are for First Grove Pordeaux. Okay. Well, ninety nine point nine percent of the people who are reading this thing are never going to taste the first growth board out. It's purely interesting and and maybe, you know, I don't know, but that that's kinda u usually that's what the numbers show. We see some similar things, but not as extreme from Vivina, which and drizzly with boat which both report their lists of wines that people are referenced and so forth. But if we do everything by the numbers like that, we get we get the same problem that we had with the reason blockbusters no longer in business. Right? And the concept is a long tail. You're familiar with that too. That if if there only, if there are, you know, a thousand movies that are popular get seen more than, you know, a couple of times a month, that's what blockbuster in the stores. It's an old, place where you used to be able to buy video tapes of movies for those young people who are listening. But they only stopped, you know, the the top, call it a thousand, whatever. But there's probably a gazillion and, you know, movies that have done that if you can inventory them at no cost, which you can do electronically, then any watch can be a profitable, you know, watch the movie, could be a profitable one because you have no cost of maintaining the inventory of those things. So it changed it. Not only is access different, storage is different, and retrieval is different, and that's where search comes in to be able to find out what's going on. So the point I was gonna make earlier was that when I talked about, industry newsletters, eighty percent of the traffic that comes to my website, block site and the podcast stuff comes through a post I originally wrote four years ago listing industry newsletters with links on how to subscribe. Now I've refreshed it every year, but at the end of the day, I have Google juice on just that, and that exposes that many people to more of the other stuff I'm writing about and doing. It could go away tomorrow when Google changes their algorithm. I recognize that. But up until now, that's been the one constant through everything I'm doing, and that's why trade marketing is so important to me. And on the journalism side, it's, you know, what is the story? I'll ask another question in a moment, but I did wanna pay tribute to a friend of mine who I've known for years and years who died recently. Jack Robertsiello, who was most recently editor of beverage media. And he was the guy I would always go to when I was struggling. You know, I'm trying to figure out this PR thing and what angle it is. And what do you think I should go with? Right? If somebody I felt comfortable talking to him, you will be receiving the pitch. But I I knew him well enough that he could say, well, why don't you shape it this way? This is what's of interest. This is what what I'm seeing. There's almost this clubby, connection, like, when we all get together at various conferences, there are different conversations that take place between journalists and other journalists or podcasters or people are, you know, varying ends of the spectrum of whatever journalism is these days. Can you comment on that? I mean, I'm going all over, but No. I will. I'm you know, you those those kind of relationships are very important, but then you saw that as an important relationship because you wanted to be able to get your message out there through the trade publications. And and that's I think that relationship is different now because previously perhaps it straight publications are a very important way to get your message out, and and still are to some extent, but there's so many different ways that companies can, get their message out. And that was my point about, you know, the the the scale of why spectator to online publications being, you know, ten hundred, a thousand foot orders of magnitude. Definitely. Which in itself sort of diminishes perhaps the the power of of of trade publications. They they can be kinda stepped in a way, and also means what is their point anymore? Is is it? I suppose originally they started out as an idea for a, you know, this is our community. We need to report on our community in the same way that a local newspaper would report on the town and what what's what affects the people within that town. And there's still a role for that, but whether that is a role that, publications are able to make money out of. Yeah. Well, the revenue generation is the big question mark and, a parallel subject to what we're talking about is trade shows because it used to be the only time you were able to get to see other people is when you could do it efficiently when everybody gathered in the same place at the same time. Now just like you and I are doing on a Zoom call, we're not in the same place, and it surely isn't the same time because you're five hours ahead of us. Now, obviously, we're talking simultaneously, but what's your point of view from a trade writer's perspective of the role of trade shows And I'm talking about Vin Italy, VIN Expo, Provine, and W SWA in the US going forward. Yeah. I I think I think they're still hugely important. And something that's even though there was a lot of talk before COVID or during COVID about how this was going to change, the the way that conferences and exhibitions, are run and they did for a while. Every everybody went virtual and fought for some time, and it turned out to be, oh, actually, this is quite easy to do. Company I worked for made the pledge that's or decided that it was not gonna do live shows ever again. And this is a company that did a whole host of events, through all sorts of industries. And their plan was, oh, actually, we don't need to do this anymore. We can do it a whole lot cheaper. Get everybody in on Zoom. And reach more people. In in some case, I know it tastes things. You can reach hundreds of people where if you take them on a on a press trip, you might only have twenty. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. So so that was the the sense that are gonna be different from now on, but it hasn't turned out like that. The com my company has decided that, oh, actually, people do like live events, and with, you know, COVID, it's certainly still, as not go anywhere, as not gonna wait certainly yet and may we never do, but there is a sense of urgency, I think, among people within the the the alcohol industry, especially the wine industry, to get back to those live events. And it's not just about meeting your old friends so that that plays a big part of it. It is that sense of, you know, the the the event in the calendar that, you know, the the would thing that you look forward to and getting out there and meeting your clients and meeting your customers and and maintaining those those sort of networks and those relationships that that you've built up. People believe or seem to believe that the the virtual sphere is no replacement for actually doing it in real life. Have you ever had the opportunity to attend AWSWI? No. I haven't. No. It it's an a very has been a very structured event that is very different from any other trade event I've ever been to where you make prearranged appointments and the the suppliers and or distributors have suites and all the meetings take place in the suites and the whole the idea of the trade floor is secondary to it. My understanding is that's going to change going forward that that there's a recognition on the WSWA part that they have to be play a major role in helping new brands come into the US market rather than one of the things that the three tier system gets tagged for is preventing brands from coming into the US system. I don't know the details. I'm sure we'll hear more about it from when this goes on, but I think that alone is significant because it's the US industry, the guys who really represent the biggest power, more than the importers, the distributors of the power in the United States, with all the consolidation we've had, that that recognition and that, application of that change is really, really significant. I'm really interested to see what the structure is like because it used to be the way I would do business, oftentimes WWA has two hotels, and there's a hallway between the two hotels, one in Las Vegas and one in Florida, Orlando. And you could talk to and see everybody who you want to talk to in the industry over a period of four days by just standing in that hallway. People who would never return your phone call, but are too polite to say, man, I wanna talk to you. When walking down the hall, you can kinda call them over. And that's what I mean about the value of a trade show is this business table that see eye to eye with somebody. It isn't just you and I looking I'm looking at a fuzzy picture of you with the reflection of the computer screen in your background. That's not the same as sitting down in a table, not even tasting anything, but talking to one another about the weather or whatever is going on. Everybody, and certainly when I go to, exhibitions, I'd love to talk to, you know, the veterans, the old handlers who have been doing this for some time and to get their stories of of what it used to be like back in the gurriel days. Whether that was, you know, slushes of wine, down the aisles as as, you know, on the final day, people would would would have a couple of a couple of extra bottles, before they had to clean out the hull. And and in some places, you know, that's, if you go by twenty, thirty years, the kind of cigarette stained. I'm thinking of the old newspaper city rooms, right? The guys with the sleeves are all up in the hats and the the cigarettes coming up, pet hunting and pecking on the typewriters. That's the Right. Right. And and there'd always be a agreement that I as people was reminiscivate this kind of stuff. And and I think, you know, everybody has, memories recollection of the of their first trade show or, trade shows of of the past. And I still think it is, an an an important part of the industry. And one that Well, one of them that you're probably more familiar with than than most, and we'll probably make this the last question. I have one actually in question after that. Is the London wine fair? That that used to be kind of a major thing as your point. It was, you know, it was a date on the calendar that you scheduled your calendar around. Has really shrunken importance has become very regionalized or provincial, if you will, mostly oriented towards the UK market. It used to be kind of international. Can you comment on that? It they decided to ago, I think a few years ago, they decided to to move away from the the kind of global reach, the that they that they arguably had before into one that was more about local customers, local clients. I think much of it was that they were unable to get the kind of audience that they had previously, and that is because the because of the success of, of of trade shows in in other countries specifically proving. And then they were doing they were doing the job a whole lot better. And were they were doing it in, exhibition centers that were that were better suited to to that kind of business minded event. We're, more, like, fifteen. The, yeah, seven or eight in the case of ProBA, in the case of in Italy, it's fifteen. And it's huge, which, you shouldn't amaze me, but it it is about how diverse Italian wines are with the number of indigenous grapes and how many people are involved in the industry. More so, I think than any other country Yeah. I'm finnately still a very important shoe, and I think it'll continue to be. It's one that it definitely is on everybody's calendar. Okay. So we're we're gonna wrap it up tonight, but I I usually I'm I'm kind of blindsighting you on this question, but I I meant to tell you this. I usually end my conversations by asking for what's the big takeaway of all the things that we just talked about. If someone were listening to this broadcast and they were in the industry, could be a producer, could be a importer, could be, you know, somebody like freight forward or whatever, what can they take away from the conversation that we had? What one thing can they take action on right away? You take action on, oh. Well, put it to use. You know, we've been talking theoretically, but is there anything we told them that they can do? Certainly, from my perspective as somebody in trade journalism, you can send a little bit of love out to your, your relevant publication. I think they may well need it, but also to, to be aware perhaps that the the way that that's I I I think the way that journalists write about the industry is gonna change a little bit over the next few years and that and it is going to be more it's gonna be more data led because there is more of an ax more of an ability and a lot, certainly, a lot more data flying around there. And and the way this is true of journalism as a whole, there are trends far more towards digging deeper into the data and using the data as a basis rather than, you know, interviewing people and talking to people within the industry. So I I think that that is gonna change it, and that is gonna be good for businesses because this is if it is solid data, if it's data that you can trust, it's gonna be the kind of data that you can hang businesses business decisions are off. It can make a right. It can make a pitch that has a, as a solid business reason and foundation for it. Yeah. We we saw that, I think, in popular culture with the movie Money Ball that it it took baseball from a game. Now it's just a game of statistics. And for those of us, I used to love baseball. I can't watch it anymore. The statistics are overwhelming. The it was the cops. Wasn't it? What's the team that that Billy Vaughn. Billy, what's his name? Was the the the coach and the chief guy of in Moneyball. Billy, what's his name? Oh, I don't remember the movie. I just remember the concept that it was all about statistics, and now all professional sports are all about statistics and data, corollary to your thing. Some space in there for the personal, for the gossipy. Well, you said love. What do you mean by love? You mean, like, add dollars to the publication gives you access to the the writers? How about that as a question? Yeah. Well, money is the the the one true love. No. It's just recognition or willingness to take part within the the the community of of of these publications. And it's and especially in WhiteNet's community has been built up over over many years. And I think with, a sort of a newer generation of people coming through that are not coined, so you know, they don't have they don't have the the kind of habits of of going towards a a a trade publication as a place to get their news. You know, younger people are formula like to get it from, from other sources, but I think there is still I hope, anyway, there's still a role for that that kind of industry publication that that acts as a as a local newspaper, but but for the industry. I think that's the most important thing that that you said, or that we've talked about in this conversation. And I tell I no longer have a staff, but when I had a staff, it would be read what they're writing, understand what their interests, biases, and habits are, then when you're pitching, you're gonna be pitching relative to a conversation that's already in their head rather than saying, let me tell you how wonderful my product is. I mean, at the end of the day, do you wanna get fifty pitches with a, a news release about the next, I don't know, yogurt wine single serve e commerce, whatever it happens to be, or somebody saying, hey, I saw that article you wrote about e commerce changes in the United States. Here's something that's another take on that. You might be interested in. That's kind of the way I've always done it, and you're not pitching money so much. You're you're pitching a story angle that is relevant not only to the publication, but particularly to the readers. And, I've never been an editor. Well, yeah, I kinda have. But I suspect that that's something that's more interesting to an editor, then let me give you a pitch about my new client's product here is the release. Call me if you want a picture. Of course, he's gonna want a picture. Every time. We always want a picture. And what's the MSRP? You should leave with that. Anyway, great conversation. I'm afraid I talked way too much, but it was fun. Andy's moving on. To, the press and journal out of Aberdeen. As I said, he's had a long tenure at A rock is the the company name which publishes just drinks, just food, and what's the other publications in the in the group? Just also and just style. So we bid you farewell to the beverage alcohol community, but something tells me, you know, it's kinda like al pacino and Godfather three. And every time I try and get out, it drags me back in. We hope to see you back into the industry. Alcohol is a habit of doing that, doesn't it? For many reasons. There's there's a metaphor you could use. Okay. So, this was Andy Morton joining us, and Andy, thank you very much. It's always a pleasure to talk to you. Absolutely, Steve. Great. It's our team. This is Steve Ray. Thanks again for listening on behalf of the Italian wine podcast. Hi, guys. I'm Joy Livingston, and I am the producer of the Italian wine podcast. Thank you for listening. We are the only wine podcast that has been doing a daily show since the pandemic began This is a labor of love and we are committed to bringing you free content every day. Of course, this takes time and effort not to mention the cost of equipment, production, and editing. We would be grateful for your donations, suggestions, requests, and ideas. For more information on how to get in touch, go to Italian wine podcast dot com.