Ep. 906 Jono Le Feuvre | Uncorked

Hello, everybody. My name is Holly Hammond, and you are listening to Unquarked. The Italian wine podcast series about all things marketing and communication. Join me each week for candid conversations with experts from within and beyond the wine world as we explore what it takes to build a profitable business in today's constantly shifting environment. In this episode, we are joined by Jono Lefebvre, wine writer, and founder of the Hand Drink Solo wine community. Johno's extensive wine knowledge paired with a keen sense of humor and a love affair with pop culture. Has seen his popularity skyrocket at a time when many people are asking if there is a future for wine writing. In this episode, we talk about talking about wine and what new wine journalists can learn from Johno's approach to communication. Let's get into it. John. Welcome. I'm so pleased to have you here today. Thank you. It's been a long time since we've channeled properly. Three weeks at least. Right? So It's been a while. And, you know, I just got that VINmark link in my mailbox today. So it is serendipitous that we are talking again. But that having been said, I have known you for yolks to use a good old fashioned Kiwi term. Like, I've known you since you were a little teeny wine writer. Many years ago. And now you are a, you know, world famous, humorous, slightly irreverent, extremely knowledgeable line rider. I mean, it feels like the planet isn't quite big enough to to deal with my fame, you know, and Well, this is true. Yeah. So This is certainly possible. I'm working on that. It's life goals, later on increased size of planet to deal with fame. That's that's Back at list. Yeah. There you go. I I'd ask you to talk today because there's this ongoing discourse that wine writing is dead. You know, there's no more room for wine writers, the only new wine writers we get, are bloggers. There's no money in it. Just like sort of a constant, whatever you do, don't become a wine writer. And what I think is really interesting is that you have proven that that is not true and you've done it, for instance, without an NW behind your name. And you've done it in a very it's funny because I use the word irreverent, but even when I say that word, I don't think that you are irreverent. I think that your humorous. I think that sometimes you can take the piss out of our industry, which is needful, but I I don't think that there's any irreverence for the wine itself ever. So Let's talk about your brand, Han drinks solo. Well, I thought off off the bat, I mean, when when you said you you don't think I'm a reverender. I I just wanted to touch on that because that I think is is one of the biggest, problems I find with my own interaction with the wine industry is that I read writers who I greatly respect and who are light years further down the road, and I often read their very serious pieces and I'm bored to tears while simultaneously realizing how good they are at what they do. And I think that's it's I I live in that little space of going so this is what a real wine writer is like. One day, I'll grow up and put on my big boy wine writing pants. And at the same time ago, I can't think of anything more I'd rather not be. So it's, I think that in that was the challenge of of coming up with handling soda in the first place was how to find a way to to really communicate how much I deeply love and respect the industry and the people, but also feeling like, man, it's something has to be done differently. I just don't know what. So it is a very amorphous place for me to start, I think. So you didn't know what so you started just kind of backing up even pre wine. You were a journalist, and you wrote for all kinds of magazines. Right? Like Yeah. Yeah. I'm Let's just talk about who you were writing for. Yeah. Yeah. So I came I came out of out of university. I mean, even before university, I remember my parents saying, son, don't chase money, chase your passions. I think back now, possibly, I wish they'd said chase money a little bit and then chase your passions. But, I took their advice and, I thought, okay. Well, I love science, and I love movies, and I love music. And, so at the University of Capeton at that time, I was like, lo and behold, there is a bachelor degree of science and music. So I applied for that. And in between me applying, I think I probably was only one of five people because they then, took that degree off the list and left me with either science or arts. And, and I went into the arts doing film and media just because I loved Sean. I once was trying to impress a girl in my bossy holidays and her sister not knowing that I was within Earshoft holder. I said, you cannot date this guy. He talks in movie quotes. So, so that was Whereas in my house, that would've been like, yeah, date that guy. Yeah. So then it's so Tom, I've always, had the kind of from the beginning, it was it was there was a lot of music and film and but also, at my soul, I'm deeply pretentious. So so I wanted to talk about movies and music, but I also wanted to appear fancy. And so when I graduated with what was in the end a journalist degree in film and media majoring in print when that was a thing. I am I started writing for men's lifestyle magazines about whiskey and cigars and cologne and That is pretentious. Good lord, Donna. I mean, I was like, how do I make myself look better from the outside? That was pretty much. When really you're like, how do I get the girls? Yeah. Is is that what it is? Yeah. That was kinda how it started out. Although, ironically, given that wine definitely fits into that category, that was not how I got into wine. Because one of the one of the most, one of the elements that I chased down in my Oh, maybe you'll laugh at this. Sorry. I just interrupt myself. I did my kind of thesis, my degree thesis. We had to produce our own print magazine. And my mind was entitled the fundamental elements of a charming man. So I mean, you really can't get much more pompous than that. Wow. Yeah. So, People who don't know you are not gonna realize what a sweetheart you are. They're gonna think that you're like mystery and you're writing the things about how to how to catch the chick. You're the pickup artist. He's a super sweet guy. He's been married forever. His family loves him. I'm gonna throw that in there. I mean, isn't that isn't that part of isn't that part of the thing, right? I think I think one of the keys to good communication is owning your foibles and and being honest. I think that's I think that's one of the things that makes me different. Oh, this is a wine podcast. Yeah. Remember? Yeah. Okay. We gotta be we gotta be willing to talk about wine with honesty. I mean, mean, that's a we can touch on that later. Right? How do you how do you support an industry when you're asked to write about wines that are bad? That's a whole another. That's a whole another care position. I'm getting distracted, I think. Sorry. Well, no. It it's good because we We can talk about your transition from being independent to now, you know, being in the employ of some big name publications, but I just wanna go back to something that you said, and I I completely love this question years. Your website. Wine riders love using terms like unfurling and poised and weightless. And one would be forgiveness forgiven for thinking they were writing all of this in the middle of a monstrous shroom trip. So, you know, some of your earliest, if I remember you had articles back in the day about, like, Tara Reed and Wine, you know, there was wolverine. There was so much pop culture reference. And I guess my question is if we just look at that before you were, you know, had by lines and wine magazines. What was the response from the wine community, say five years ago when you were writing like that? Did they look at you and say that you were high? Well, I asked for a fair fair question. I think if at the beginning, I think people really, thought thought it was harmless, but amusing. And I think that most people were really they're really warm to it. I actually started writing as a as a on about wine is a hobby on the app Vavino, when it was it was very, very new. And so it was it was quite I think my highest ranking in South Africa was fifth or fourth. Because there weren't that many people on, but so I I would always say, oh, this wine age is better than Raquel Welch or, you know, or or goodness gracious. This is Nikki Rourke in a bottle, you know, looks twenty years old, but it's only eighteen months. So that I kinda do that sort of thing, which is also tricky, I guess, when you're being mean about people. But for the most part, people loved it and would send me models of wine and say So you're Vivino people loved it. So the public Well, thanks. It's awesome. Well, yeah. Well, the wine industry is actually quite embedded within the Vavino app. So you you you think you're chatting with, you know, Ken F twenty three, and that might turn out to be Ken Forrester Stellenbosch legend, you know, or so so there there was a lot of kind of interplay there. And that was actually how I started getting invited to events and being asked to write more serious pieces was a lot out of weirdly, a mobile app. But because I was a business sorry. Yeah. Yes? Are you still do you still use Vivino much? Every now and then, I, more as a reference. I think it's a great, I think it's a great reference guide. So it's such a huge body of data, and it's But you're not still, like, deeply involved in sort of that social space because I remember when Vivino had really good communities, but like you, I've not I I use it to say, oh, there's a wine list, which one of these should I pick when I don't know any of them. But not so much for kind of the rating and reviews and the humor in the community. And I I didn't know if that had shifted across the platform or not. Yeah. I mean, I think I think when when we first chatted, I mean, I met your husband through Vavino, or if not for Vavino, I don't think we'd be talking right now. And there was a great chance. Yeah. So, yeah, I did. I felt like there was a time when I needed to move onto onto the platform, and that was actually when we started talking about about a blog platform and and moving into more serious writing. But I never wanted to lose those pop cultural references mostly because I, like, I don't like the idea of wine being this, like, fetish that either or or, I don't know, artifacts that either belongs in a dark covered somewhere or on your mantelpiece, like, all static. It's gotta be part of your everyday life. And so for me referencing films that everybody's watched to a wine that only some people might have tasted was a kind of kind of hedging my bets going, well, I can hook you in with a reference that and then whether you agree or disagree, you're still gonna be engaged in what I'm talking about. So Well, and and the interesting thing if we come back to that quote is that I understand that you're actually kind of laughing, not laughing out, but, you know, you are pointing a finger at some of the language that we use in line, and you have gone down a completely different track with your independent writing and your independent content that you don't use traditional wine language. So beyond just the pop culture references, you know, that there's it isn't highfalutin for one of a better word. And I'm just curious in your audience as your brand has grown. You know, have you seen the audience shift? Do you feel like that, maybe more people are open to that now who were not five years ago, Or do you think that there are any, generalizations that we can make? Like, oh, you know what? Younger people really love it. The older set, they're just not so keen on the on the pop culture and on the down to earth language? Yeah. There's there's definitely a very, stark contrast. When it when it comes to, I mean, first of all, just the videos that I make, because a lot of it is is spoken, obviously. The audience. I'm gonna get to those too. Yeah. So that's a lot of that stuff. And and the stuff that I publish on my own platform is, as far as I can tell, read by a younger audience. I mean, obviously, we are ripe for some other bigger, platforms, something like Tim Adkin, the readership itself feels a lot older. So so you you get very different feedback, I guess, depending on what audience you are writing for. And how much did you have to learn to adapt your voice? Was it the kind of thing? And I'm not gonna pick on Tim too much, but where a publisher came in and said, we want you to do exactly what you're doing, or we want you to bring the knowledge, we want you to bring maybe ten percent of the humor, but, you know, we need it to be more wine language y. So I've been I haven't felt any pressure like that in my writing. I mean, I've been very lucky to have, editors who are who are kind of happy to lead me to be, but I have had a lot of pressure in when performing, media, like moderating panels or doing webinars or podcasts, There has been quite a lot of pressure to, you know, just can you be a little more straight laced? In fact, there was a time where some of the some of the clients that I worked for would refu would refuse to mention hand drink solo in my blurb. So they they wanted me to be wants me to be John Ola Hiva wine journalist, full stop, as opposed to founder of the handling solo wine community. So, I mean, that that was an interesting time, but I think that also slowly faded as even the more conservative platforms saw that. And I think what we touched on in the beginning, that my respect and love really is for wine and and the sharing of that. So maybe people were suspicious of my motives because they just say I can poke fun at the industry And if you've devoted your life to an industry and up comes this punk and starts making fun and implying that you do your day job well on psychedelics, then you can see why they would have been a little suspicious, but, that that seems to fade over time. So you talked about the videos, and I want to encourage anyone, who's listening to please go find Handdrink Solo on YouTube because the videos are so funny. And like I said, I've known you for so long and I sit there and I still laugh at them. Because, you know, like, instead of me talking about the videos, you talk about the videos. So you create one video per wine for your wine community. Correct. Yeah. What's the formula on your videos, John? I mean, I do have a formula, but it feels like like doing that would, you know, it's like pulling back the curtain and showing the magicians special cables or whatever. I I do try and for starters, I pick wines that are hard to access that I think are important. So that was really the birth of the of the wine community was that I was writing about these amazing wines and I drive all into remote places and, you know, awkward dusty roads and then find this incredible wine and then say, okay. So how can the public get hold of this? And they look at me perplexed and say, well, you just drove down the dusty road, you know how to get here. That's how the public can find this wine. And I'd be so frustrated that I'm trying to share this experience. And because distribution is a is a gap or because the creative team is too small, there's no way for the public to actually taste what I'm writing about. So the videos were born out of me going, well, I'm gonna then, I'm gonna buy these these wines and distribute them to people who follow my content so that I can connect people with the wine and the knowledge. So in fact, every wine that comes in my club has a has a QR code in the shape of a millennium falcon. I will get sued for that one day. And, you then get the bottle and you scan the QR code and it takes you through to a video where I talk about you know, how it's made, who made it, you know, what their weekend hobbies are. And the point again is, I I think the kind of single idea there is like wine reviews to make you more interesting at dinner parties, which again, comes Yep. Comes back to being, yeah, that pretentious guy who's just trying to be cooler at dinner parties. But, but I think that's the thing. Right? We wanna trigger conversation. And no matter how much you love wine, the chance of you having a pure Wine geek conversation at the Loomshead was very, very slim. But if you can talk about a movie that's current or a a weird political decision that someone made recently and tie that into the wine, it's so much easier to so it into conversation at a dinner table. Right. Right. So you work or or traditionally, in the beginning, you worked with South African wine brands. Are you still wholly focused on South Africa? Has that shifted as you've kind of acquired a louder voice in the wine community? I I have a personal passion for for Italian wine, and I'm and I'm starting to explore that, but I I feel like I really do want to contribute to this community down on the southern end of Africa. So I would say that my ninety percent of my focus is on South African wine, but, you talked about doing, you know, doing the work I do without any fancy wine letters behind my name, but I I have set aside time to study wine bovee just because I think that the wine world, if you understand that, then you can understand what makes South Africa so amazing. It's also we can't be amazing in a vacuum. You have to be able to compare us to what else is going on to say, well, this is what we have that no one else has. So Well, and when I say that about not having the fancy letters behind your name, it's more the point that there is a perception that if you wanna be credible in wine writing or just in wine knowledge nowadays that you have to go out and you have to go and get some of the letters. Instead of understanding that we can have a deep love, we can be self taught. Yes. We can have a lot of skills. We can have the language. And we don't have to be completely entrenched in, oh, just the establishment of it. And and I actually think that it's really, a significant for the work that you do that you're not because it does come across as extremely independent reporting, and something that I do think that the wine world needs. Although what I'm going to ask about that is do you believe that the voice and the content style that you have could spring up in the traditional old world? Or do you think that it's something that because you were in South Africa when you started this, it gave you, a freedom of not being, you know, not being part of that mean, I'm gonna use the word entrenched again because that's really what it is, establishment. Yeah. I I guess the short answer is I don't know. And that's and and one of my one of my goals is to find that out. I really want to especially pushing into to more established regions, and starting to write about some of the important players there, especially given example, like Italy, I I don't know yet. I'm, I feel like the this is a challenge I still need to overcome. But what I do wanna touch on is what you said about about that knowledge and the institution is I think we we all hear the the old average but knowledge is power. Well, I feel like in wine, it's only a predator knowledge that is power. And I think I'm wanting to to shift that. I'm And that's only recent in in some sense too. What the the you know, that it hasn't always been that way in mind. Yes. Perhaps. I suppose there is maybe in a little more regulation of expertise, I guess. But but it's a sense of that the knowledge is static. Like, this is what, so many unblanc from Bordeaux tastes like. You know? And it's a and that's what it is, and you need to learn that. And if you know that, then you're better than someone who doesn't know that, or if you can rattle off all the appalachians in the law that make Shannon Blanc, then, you know, that clearly you are to be trusted. But if you could turn around and know none of those things, but say, did you know they found Shannon Blanc clones in South Africa that do not exist anywhere else in the world and the French are now shipping them from Africa back to France to grow them there. That's I find that infinitely more interesting, but I'm not gonna get a certificate for that. So I I think the the second one is far more conversational than the first one, but in the wine world, the first one is what hap gives you the credits and the status. And I'm always been trying to turn that on his head. So we went from you being a journalist. And in your bio, it says that you wrote, What was it? Episode Snopsies for the young and the restless, which I really love. So we jumped from that to now you being in line. But in doing so, we left out this very big important middle space, which is You ran your own coffee roastery for how many years? Lots of years. Yeah. It was been around now for thirteen it was coming up for thirteen years, and I stepped out of it after ten years to focus full time on wine. So my business partner owns that now. It's called Rosetta Roastery. Yeah. I also have a really funny story about, the Roastery that I think you and I discussed some years back. I was because I was flipping through a magazine. I was driving down the street. Anyway, on the back of a bus is this picture of you. And I was like Yeah. Why why is your picture on the back of a bus near me and my house a world away? And you have an interesting story that I really want you to share because photography is such an important part of wine marketing and nobody ever discusses weird things that can get fucked up. So Yeah. Tell me the story of how you ended up on the back of a bus in New Zealand when you own a roastery in, South Africa. Well, so, obviously, being in specialty coffee, it's a it's quite a grind. That wasn't a deliberate plan, but Sort of a bunch. And and we and we understood that we needed great photography in order to get our brand out there, and we found this amazing Polish photographer called Marias who he said, okay. You give me your roastery and your cafe, which we poured all our settings into design and Kita. If you let me shoot for two days in here and use you guys as as models, I will give you all of this stuff. For free, you just let me sell it to a stock library. So We were like, that is no problem. That's a great deal. We're gonna get a couple of hundred high quality images and whatever. It's gonna go to a stock library. And and really, that was it. And we did it, and we got the images and we started using it. And then I think the first time I got sent an image of me standing in my apron looking very artisanal was when I was, the image was used as, the the kind of landing image or landing page image for Hero image Yes. The hero. It was the hero image for conservative american dot com. No. No. Really? Got it. Anyone who looks at you would not peg you as a conservative American. Well, I think they were trying to, yeah, appropriate the, artisinal culture perhaps, who knows? Wow. You were the swanky conservative American. Yeah. That's hysterical. Okay. So conservative american dot com. You've just had your face splashed all over their website. Okay. And then it was also on the back of buses in Glasgow as well. I mean, there there is the argument that I had the face like the back of a bus quite literally. And Italian banks have used it. And right right now, in Johannesburg, that same images is a double story spread on the corner of a shopping center called Lamar. So it is bizarre how but probably the funniest was at the time the, the specialty coffee industry is quite small, and we would have competing roasteries sending out promotional material using my face to promote their, their event or whatever, which is fine because they paid for it, from a stock library, but when I emailed them saying I don't mind, I have no creative rights to this image whatsoever. I just thought you should know that I am your direct competitor. And, at least two occasions, like, I just got very angry emails back going. We used this. We were within our rights to use this image. So I didn't push it further than that. And now I keep a little folder of interesting places that my face pops up. So I was Oh my god. I'm gonna have to find that photo and link it in the bio or in the description for this episode so that everyone can start amassing use cases of those stock photos because it's just hysterical. One of the reasons I bring it up besides it's a really funny story is that we see this all the time with wine. And, and it comes back like your photography on your site is equally, you know, Unusual for the wine industry. It's all very comic book styling, your, videography on YouTube. I love the memes. I love the clips, all of it that gets put into it. So we talk a lot, if I force with our clients around being representative in our photography, but also being more modern and more contemporary. And we see so many instances, you know, the line with hands, you, in fact, are the wine with hands for the For the car. Artisanal coffee commune. It's just Jada's picture. It's Jada the Rosetta Rostery all over the place. Yeah. It's a complete Is it something Continue. Yeah. I'm saying it's complete with the apron and the patchy beard. It's like, that is that is specialty coffee to a tee. It it re yeah. So so coffee. I mean, I will tell you and I'm about to get myself kicked out of the wine community when I say this. If I had to give up wine or I had to give up coffee, I'm I'm giving up the wine. Like, I am so much more of a coffee addict. And, and traveling the world, I realized the extent to which many countries just aren't. I'm quite fortunate to the AntIF Dean where we have excellent coffee. Were there were there things that you just knew going into wine that you knew because of coffee? Were there things that surprised you that there are the overlaps between, you know, the crazy fan base. What were some of the lessons that you learned being self employed in an artisanal product that has, you know, taste profiles and technical sheets so that then when you moved into wine, you were like, Okay. It's all exactly the same. There's probably a butter contingent out there that does the exact same thing. Well, I mean, it's it's kind of funny that you ask. From from the beginning, we were looking for slightly more creative ways to express coffee as well. So we we never wanted to be too staid or stuck. In fact, we we once found an old yogurt wrapper. I think for, for, it was a UK yoga brand. I'm trying to remember. Where's there? They were a small little artisanal yogurt or smoothie brand that would hold these host these events, and and they'd have a little bit of extra space on their label. And they would just use that space on the label and say, hey, join us in the park. There'll be strawberries and cream on the blanket. By the river. You know, it was it was this weird kind of little bit of poetry that was an invitation, but it was also part of the branding. And so we, well, we started to go, how can we do that in coffee? And and my thought was imagine if we found, like, the fifty most timeless movie scenes and then started weaving the flavor notes into these timeless scenes. So, I mean, I remember doing one, you know, from the card farmers opening scene in in the office with Marlon Brando in the office and I was talking about how how the, you know, the the toffee, the the toffee colored desk, you know, repeat with maple panels and and weaving and things like sweet caramel and toffee and smoke and all the things that were in that particular coffee. And then we'd run competitions. About, trying to get people to guess what scene we were describing. So it was always about, trying to connect a niche product more centrally to someone's lifestyle. And again, that's that's kind of what I've been trying to do in the wine space as to is to lean away from the geekdom because your followers, especially in that kind of pro, will always be geese, and I am to, to the core, a wine geek. But if we ever want to speak to anyone other than just ourselves, which is what I think I end up doing a lot of the time, that we have to be a way to to pull back to employ empathy and to remember what it's like not to be at the eye of the the Geek storm, I guess, to mix many metaphors. So that is that is such a good segue because I wanna ask you a little bit about the YouTube channel, about the content, your independent work, and then the work that you do for other people, all of that in one big question, which is to what extent are you paying attention to your own, for what of a better word, marketing analytics as you grow, you know, when with the community, are you actively trying to reach people who don't know a lot about wine? Or, you know, with your wine writing. So let's say, for some of the larger publications, when you're writing for someone, are you writing for an audience who knows nothing about wine? Are you writing for an audience who's already halfway toward that geekdom? I think I'm trying at all times, not at all times. I'm trying to communicate to each section of that engagement funnel in different ways. Part of part of what gets me great access to incredible winemakers that I wouldn't otherwise have is the fact that I do write quite serious articles about quite serious topics. And I think that's very important to do because It's almost like you you have to earn your stripes a little bit. So I do actually understand the dynamics of this industry. But but then once I've done that, I also want to take that knowledge and communicate it in a way that is is palatable for someone who's never take who's who's never got into wine at all and will still find it interesting. I'm not And how do you no. No. That's good. That's actually really good. How do you make the decisions around segmenting that information across channels. Do you say, okay. Well, when I go out to Tim Mack, Ken, I know that it's going to be more erudite. But when I am on my YouTube channel, I may be talking to someone who knows nothing about wine. Do you do it by so is that done by channel specificity? Yeah. I'm so very much so. If I'm if I'm almost all of my long form writing, which is on other platforms, I'm trying to I'm trying to make an impact in in an area that will see change amongst industries, change makers. You know, I I want to I wanna put writing out there that makes the important players have a second think about the way they do things. So so that's almost like it. I feel like that's separate to the Handrich Solo brand. It's it's me understanding that we're dealing with people, and I wanna engage with these people so that we can see change, in the industry. And you can't do that necessarily by making pop culture references in video. So That's that's really interesting because one of the things that I notice in I'm not gonna pick online. I I think it's anyone who is extreme niche you know, content or knowledge is that the ability to adapt that voice isn't easy. We've certainly dealt with it with copywriters, and this is not journalists, but this is copywriters that we use that they've got a very specific style. And if we ask them to bust out of that too much for the purpose of some client work that it's really difficult for them to do. That isn't your isn't your background in, or your education and journalism that allows you to adapt your voice for different channels of communication. Or or is that do you think that that's something anyone today growing up in the blogosphere can perfect as a skill? I really think answer does lie in empathy. Again, I and I'm probably gonna bring that up a number of times. I think having got a lot of negative criticism from editors in the past is something we can all learn from. So sure that's That's a result of training and time. But Yeah. But the editing process I mean, like, let's just stop right there. One of the things that you went through getting your education is that you did have an editor. Yeah. And that does not always apply to everyone who's writing in the line space. Yes. I suppose that, and maybe that's the difference between just a, a blog where you are where you are publishing your own voice, and it is purely about you and having to deal with other clients. But again, and that's, I think, your question is, how do you adjust? And my answer would be, is that you really try to get to know the person that you're writing for. I mean, we've gotta ask why why do we communicate surely? It's not to make a noise or to scream into the void, but it's to make an impact. Right? Well, I don't know for a lot of people nowadays, they write in order to sell something. A lot of wine writing is based on, you know, it's content writing. We need to pitch the wines. We need to get them out the door. And this kinda comes back to what you said at the very beginning of the call, which is what do you do when you've been asked to write about a wine that you know, is not of a quality that you would normally write about. And we hear all of our wine writers, of course, you know, in the public spaces talk about how this is a really big challenge. Yeah. Right? And that's also So how do you handle that? So where where there are wines that I genuinely don't like, I usually say nothing. I know that some of my colleagues are, a little more front footed. We'll actually email back to say, Hey, I really didn't enjoy the wine, so I'm not gonna write anything about it. But I I found that that's never been a positive experience. They've never been like, wow, thanks so much for the honesty. We appreciate it. So so I say nothing. And if if, you know, I'm pushed hard on the topic, I then will eventually say that. But I I think that can be avoided. There's always something that will trigger a conversation. It's very seldom that I'll be given a line where there's absolutely no redeeming qualities. So if I really don't like it, but I think the initiative is incredible, it is quite easy to focus on, I don't know, say the fact that they have this incredible vine training program where where people are being given employment where otherwise they would be destitute. That is something I can focus on and steer right away from the quality of the wines. And and where possible. That's exactly what I do. But, obviously, I'm happiest, as I said at the beginning, where I'm talking about a wine that is important, not only because it brings pleasure, but because it is a little glimpse into perhaps a trend that is rising or an important change in ethos. So those are the things that I I'm gravitate towards. And and a really nice lead into what's been happening with South African wine, you became very public during the lockdown as one of the people who was, you know, a voice around concerns for the financial stability of South African wine industry during a very tough time. And since then, and I, you know, I I know that you had taken on a lot of responsibility for, for instance, running panels moderating, being the face for certain, certain brands. Can you use this as a chance to talk to us about what you see changing in either South African wine or possibly it's the perception and the understanding of South African wine? Let's so so we wanted to talk about So what do you think we know now? We being non South Africans, those who are not immersed in the South African community that we know now that we didn't know in February twenty twenty before we all ended up locked down. And in this case, having to rally around a community that was going through some pretty severe financial hardship. Well, I mean, first of all, I think what we need to touch on is just how effective that international community was. In that a lot of brands grew in that time because of the the international support and, campaigns like, save S A Y, which is run by a friend called Erica Taylor. And so Sorry about my beagle in the background. But, so it it was the first thing to say it's just that the the support was incredible. And I think we saw South African wine featured in a number of places that it wouldn't have poked its head previously. There was an interesting, some interesting data out of, a a paper published by Pauline Dicar from Arini Global. And I got to talk to her about it and I said, what what can South Africa learn about the world of of fine wine. And one of the things she said was that while critics recognize that South Africa is producing some incredible so called fine wines, by and large the public don't get that. Were seen as a kind of bulk producer of of moderate quality. And I think over the last two years, because we've had some serious publications, talk more about our wines, the public is waking up to the fact that South Africa really is producing fine wine. So that's been a process that has changed almost purely through density of communication. I think that's that's in has been incredible for us to see. I mean, we last year, two wines out of Constantia, both, saw huge auction records. One selling for almost an Yeah. A million rand, which I guess is what that would be about eight hundred thousand dollars. Well, my math might be a bit off there. Yeah, I mean, a little bit less than that. Seven seven, seven, seven, two hundred thousand dollars. Which is incredible. Yeah. And then, absolutely. And then, and then also to see some, some very old, South African red wine still want some sixty or seventy years old getting also auctioned off for, again, between five thousand and six thousand US dollars, these were things that would never have been possible paired up. We had not seen our profile rise. So I think that that that message of South Africa reducing incredible age worthy fine wines has finally begun to penetrate. And that I don't think was even on the public radar two years ago. Yeah. And I I don't wanna say that we wanna profit from a terrible time, but I can't help but think that in some sense, the the industry rallying in support of South African wine was one of the things that has brought that to the fore. And I guess what I'd like to think is that we can look at that as a case study of what collective action can do. You do quite a bit of consulting now. Isn't that correct? You've got the community as well as your consulting. Can you just talk a little bit about what that means? To nowadays consults to these brands? Well, and you asked earlier about some of the pressure, to change or conform. And now I've probably felt that most in in the consulting section of my job, and that'll be where people would see my videos and and read my more irreverent reviews and then say, oh, we've been totally overhauling our brand. We wanna change our communication voice. Can you help us develop this voice? We we love what you do. And they're coming to you because you have because you just have a a new and different voice in a way. Sure. So the thing that's attracting them to you is that you are not you are not traditional? Yeah. I mean, it's, you know, the the it's the purple cloud. Right? Into the consulting, and that's where you feel like you have to kind of tamp some of that down. Is that what I'm hearing you say? Yeah. Well, what they'll say is we we love what you're doing. Can you do that? And I'll turn around and say that your brand is nothing like handling so. So if you're if you're wanting to if you're wanting to change it up, there still has to be some authenticity. And so the way I've solved that problem in the past is gone, okay. Well, let me get to know the people behind the brand. And it's almost like you, you know, you you wanna know them well enough to deliver a really good best man speech at their wedding. If you can do that, you can probably find the most personal elements of the brand and bring that out in a way that feels authentic to them. And, again, coming back to you're not dealing with brands so much as you're dealing with people, or at least that's my approach. What what I find most no noteworthy in that, because we do a very similar thing. But a lot of brands, and this is not just wine brands. I don't want it to be like I'm picking on our industry too much, is that a lot of brands, they want the quick fix. They no. No. No. No. No. I don't want I don't want you to take the time getting to know me well enough to give the best man speech. Just want you to, you know, I want you to write it right now. Can you just make it happen and and that that expectation that the hard yards don't need to be put in, is sometimes what gets us in a lot of hot water in our marketing. I always equated to making friends. I mean, good marketing and communication is something that we all do all day every day because we all are civilized beings with all various levels of friendship. Wow. Some of our just our best friends. Yeah. No. A hundred percent, but I also wanted to touch on that thing or they don't have time. They want the instant fix. But, I mean, even if it's if it's a little bit of testimony in reverse or something, I remember chatting to you in the early days about trying to formulate hand drink solo as a as a brand. And I remember you saying, well, look, you know, you really have to sit down and give us a long hard thing. And I think you asked me to you asked me to come up with fifty names or something. I can't remember the effect. I have no memory of this. So, apparently, I was useful back then. Ma'am, I saw I sat down and came up with fifty names and, like, scratched all the terrible ones, but I'm I came up with them. You know, I made sure that I wrote them all down and then and then we had to to go through it. I was going through stock video library to find some some footage that I think would be relevant. And it was funny how I've had all these clips of, as you say, bottles with the hands and the and the label and the and the shadows and the soil and the vines, and and it was just not resonating. And eventually, I came across a little clip of a of a man and woman sitting at what was obviously a very awkward first date. And there was this this comedic clip, and and all of a sudden, like, that is exactly where where what I'm doing lives. Now the point of all that is it doesn't matter what I was doing or wasn't doing, but it wasn't a quick fix. It was it was sitting, and, like, it was a deeply creative process that was both reflective and creative, and it was about trying to discover the kind of authentic core. Maybe I've taken too many words to say that, but I don't think there is. I don't think there's a question to meaning I I think that I think that there's something there that's that's really significant when I think about kind of empathy and empathetic marketing was that it wasn't I'm picturing myself in the vines or I'm picturing myself behind a desk or I'm picturing myself, you know, at wine awards or whatever it is. It's I'm looking at a picture of where what I do fits into the lives of my market. And that, that's a great exercise. I'm gonna use that with my clients of of, you know, actually going through that process of going through stock photography, which you can do for free. It's all over the internet. Right? Going through stock photography and being like, where is your story told? You know, find the picture that shows me where your story is being told. And let's build out who those customers are from that story. You are very clever. That is smart. Stop. I followed instructions. That's what I did. Yeah. So just just I I kinda wanna come back around to the thing that I really, really wanted to start and end this conversation with, which is the notion that wine writing is dead. Which when I look at you is not the case at all. What would you say to someone who right now is starting out and they wanna make a name for themselves? But man, we're a hard gate kept industry. How do they do that? I think I think the there's two parts. I think the first is to engage with, we were talking about that accredited knowledge, right, that you need you need to know the textbook. You need to know the rules in order to break the rules, which I think is a good shape. Old rule of art. Right? You have to know the rules before you can break them. But it will exactly. Exactly. And and I and I think it's this this idea that Once you've learned all the static knowledge, if you're not asking the questions, but why do those rules exist? Then then you're dead in the water. Then maybe your writing is there, because I think that why question is far more important than the what question? And and, I mean, I we give an example of, I don't know, like, what is the what of South African wine, for example? Elgin is a cool region. It's great for chardonnay and Pineau. But what does South African cool region mean? And and is it really cool? What other regions is it like? Well, it's not unlike Bordeaux, certain parts of Bordeaux. Do they grow chardonnay and Pineau there? No. Actually, there's a lot of great cab and Murlow based wine. So is it possible that Murlow would grow well in Elgin? And this is just one of the theories I'm working on now, and and it came about because my question was, but why? I hate a lack of coherence. And I think I think the best writers are always challenging the the existing knowledge leaning back on the framework. They're not coming in guns blazing, going, everything's wrong. You guys all suck, but what they are saying is this is amazing, but can't we connect these dots in a way that they haven't been connected before. So, I mean, I don't know. That's that's what I'm trying to do with with what I I live in a very young wine region, so maybe that's more appropriate. Perhaps it's less appropriate when actually people have made Maybe it's important necessary in an in an established wine reason or a more established wine reason region. I can talk. Maybe it's more necessary in the established spaces where things often are done just because that's how they've always been done. Maybe that's where we need the the critical Q and A. Yeah. A hundred percent. And I and I suppose it's, I spent the last couple of days reading about fascinating sustainable agriculture initiatives in Bordeaux and how there's some there's some movements that are trying to trigger young people to view themselves as having careers in something like Viticulture, which is apparently really difficult. Very difficult. And I and and so I suppose that sort of stuff is happening, but I think that's the most exciting place in the wine industry to be is to be with the people who are going not how not asking, well, how are things? I'm gonna report on how things are. Instead they're choosing to report on how things could be. I think that that's the that's an exciting space to be, and I think that's gonna be at the heart of any good wine writing that brings life to the industry. And I I guess to that, I would only add, give it some time. Yeah. You know, like, don't expect that it's going to be overnight claim to fame. Yeah. Well, and also perhaps be willing to be wrong as well and be willing to apologize for that from time to time. I think that's really important, especially. What? You you don't you don't even need? No. I'm just like, oh, we can't end an episode on that. That's a huge topic. Nobody's allowed to be wrong right now. Awesome. I I'm so grateful to you for joining me today. I know that, you shoehorned this into a very busy schedule, and it would be lovely to see you when you had Europe way soon. So I will let you get back to the business of being a super awesome wine writer. Thank you, John. Thank you, Paula. It was great to chat with you. And that's a wrap for today. Thank you for listening, and a great big thanks to Johno for joining us. The Italian wine podcast is among the leading wine podcast in the world, and the only one with daily episodes. Tune in each day and discover all our different shows. Be sure to join us next Sunday for another look at the world of wine marketing. 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.