My Blog: Wine Future, Future of Wine (#1)

January 16, 2012

Wine Future Hong Kong was a cool event that brought some of the top names in the wine business together in the hottest wine market in the world. More than 600 people attended. Dozens of subjects were covered in presentations and tastings over the three-day event from Nov. 6 to 8. The main topic that I spoke about was "New Media, New Consumer," but I also moderated a panel on "Large Scale Artisan Wineries."

My speech on new media seemed well received. I was honest and straightforward about my experiences creating www.JamesSuckling.com. I emphasized how new media is great, but tools such as Facebook and Twitter can be both time consuming and expensive in the end, and may not give you the results you want. You need to always remember that new media puts you out in the public eye, and there's a lot of love and hate out there.

I said that I originally believed videos were the way forward for communicating about wine in a new and innovative way, but perhaps I was a little ahead of my time, considering the usual response from people was, "But where are your scores?" It’s now more scores and continuing with high-quality videos.

My conclusion was that communicating effectively to new and old consumers around the world should be a combination of new and old media – both print and internet based.

In any case, I used this video to open my speech, saying, "We have been talking about new media, so I think it's time to experience some."

As the video says at the end: "Tasting wine in a whole new way." That's me. That's us.

However, I think it's more about communicating about wine in a new way. And establishing a dialogue with new and old consumers.