Menswear Style Podcast
The Menswear Style Podcast is a leading men’s fashion and menswear podcast exploring men’s style, clothing, grooming, lifestyle and the business behind some of the world’s most exciting fashion brands. Hosted by Peter Brooker, each episode features conversations with menswear designers, fashion entrepreneurs, innovative brand founders and industry experts from across the global fashion and apparel industry. Discover the stories behind established and emerging clothing brands, from the first idea and challenges of launching a fashion start-up to building a successful international business. Guests share their experiences and insights across fashion design, sustainability, manufacturing, marketing, branding, eCommerce, retail, social media and business growth. Whether you’re interested in men’s fashion and style, discovering new menswear brands, starting your own clothing label, or learning how successful fashion businesses are built, the Menswear Style Podcast takes you behind the scenes of the modern menswear industry. New conversations with the people shaping the future of menswear, men’s style and fashion.
Menswear Style Podcast
Raul Diaz of WSET, Nathan Hill of Honest Grapes & Christian Ress of Wine Bank
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
We're off to Wine School this week with some of the Founders and teachers of wine clubs around the world. We speak to WSET Speaker Raul Diaz from Wine Training School and Channel 4's Sunday Brunch. We also speak to Nathan Hill from Honest Grapes and we speak to Christian Ress from Winebank which is taking Germany by storm.
Whilst we have your attention, be sure to sign up to our daily MenswearStyle newsletter here. We promise to only send you the good stuff.
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Menswear Style Podcast with me, your host, Pete Brooker. And on this week's episode, we're going to be speaking to the founders of the wine clubs. Some of the founders and some of the similiers associated with those clubs. Clubs such as Honest Grapes, we're going to be speaking to Nathan Hill. He's going to be telling me about how to stay sober during wine tastings.
SPEAKER_03We visited 14 of our producers within just over two days, two and a bit days, and tasted many hundreds of wines. And yes, you've got to stay sober right throughout that. So I'd be tasting uh 15-20 wines an hour, making notes on all of them, um, and then going to the next vineyard.
SPEAKER_04Yes, wine. Don't we just love wine? Don't we just love wine, Dr. Fraser Crane? Let's celebrate life with a bottle of Chateau Satan 75! All in good time, Doctor. We're also going to be talking to Rial Diaz. He's a similar for WSET, which is the Wine and Spirit Education Trust. He also does the wine presentation for the Channel 4 program Sunday Brunch. I'm going to be talking to him about what you can achieve when you take on a course at WSET.
SPEAKER_01I think, as I said to you, it's a very simple and direct way to go into wine because this is not wine poetry. This is not like, you know, like blah blah blah blah wine. You go straight to a systematic approach to learn and also to taste.
SPEAKER_04That interview coming up shortly. How's that 75 working out for you, Dr. Frazier Crane?
SPEAKER_05I thought it was dark, dusky, and supple.
SPEAKER_04Excellent choice, Doctor. We also spoke to Christian Rez. Christian co-founded the Wine Bank, which is a very exclusive wine club. Sweeping the German nation. He also runs the Balthazar Rez Wine Estate, so stay tuned for that at the end. Stay tuned also for an interruption by my girlfriend's cat, who was very keen to get on the podcast. Awesome. Sorry, I've got the cat that's moaning. Philly, Philly, get out of here. Yeah, the cat's just moaning at me. I shut the door thinking I locked him out, and he's I must have shut him in. Philly, keep keep it down, keep it down. All that to come before we get into the podcast though, a little bit of housekeeping. So if you're not there already, head over to the website, it's www.menswearstyle.co.uk. There you'll find all the features, interviews, reviews, competitions like winning a 200 pound swole panda voucher. So head over there and also like us on the social at menswear style. Lastly, make sure you subscribe on iTunes, punch in menswear style in the app store, download the app, and I do believe that is it. We can now get into the podcast and we can talk about wine. Here is Nathan Hill, one of the founders of Honest Grapes.co.uk if you want to go to the website. How are you doing today, Nathan?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, great, thank you. Busy getting up to Christmas now.
SPEAKER_04Yes, thanks for taking the time out. I appreciate this is a busy time of year for you. Um Nathan, could you just tell us a little bit about yourself, please, and also about Honest Grapes?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so first of all, myself, I actually don't come from the wine trade. Um I'm a physicist by training, um, and uh I wrote the business plan that put Tim Peak on the International Space Station. I'm quite involved in uh in uh space technology. Uh, but I've been a keen wine collector for many years. I felt that as a I felt that as a wine somebody interested in wine that I was being really badly served by the UK wine trade. Um and so I set up Honest Grapes as a wine club, together with my brilliant and charming business partner Tom Harrow, uh, to do something better for uh people who enjoy wine in the UK.
SPEAKER_04Excellent. And so the website honestgrapes.co.uk, I had a look at it earlier today, um, and it's it's bulky, it's so comprehensive. I mean, um, if people haven't been there already, I recommend that you go over. We'll put all the details in the show notes. But you can pick out a wine, whether you like it zesty or spicy. Uh, how long did it take to actually get the website together?
SPEAKER_03Oh, it's been it's been a labour of love. We're a couple of years in and we're still doing things to it. So basically, um what we are is a wine club. You don't have to be a member to buy from us, so feel free to browse and buy stuff. Uh, but we're a wine club where members get involved in selecting the wines that go on our wine list, and that's unique. Uh, the dirty secret of the wine trade is most people who are in the wine trade are enthusiasts, buy loads of wine, and then have to flog it to you because they've got loads of stock. We do it the other way around, more like an Etsy for wine where or an eBay where growers ask us to list lovely artisan wines. Tom and I tend to know the growers personally. We do a short listing of them, and instead of bewildering you with thousands of wine to choose wines to choose, we have a list of about 200 or so wines where they've all been curated, and it's more like a great restaurant list. The third step of our selection is we invite our club members um to my apartment every two or three months to taste the short list, and then our members decide which wines finally go on the wine list. Oh, right, okay.
SPEAKER_04So, what happens to the wine that doesn't make the cut?
SPEAKER_03Uh, it doesn't get listed. So the wine the wines that get listed we then bring in on a just-in-time basis. Generally, our club members will get together and say, right, we'd like to bring the first import of these from a grower. These are mostly quite small family growers all around the world, and we bring in our first import, and from then on we bring them in on a small um batch basis so that we can offer them to people just browsing and buying from the site. But we also crowdsource shipments, and we do it we're doing quite a lot of that, particularly since the euro has swung against the pound. We're trying to keep costs down by providing our members with those wines brought in in small small batches of usually 300 bottles at a time.
SPEAKER_04Right. Um Nathan, I'm curious, what's a typical day like for you? Um, do you have like a self-imposed curfew where you're not allowed to drink wine before 12 o'clock or before lunch?
SPEAKER_03Being quite international in my business outlook, the sun never sets over the yard arm, so and never rises over it. So um I I can spend a day, and in fact, I was in Burgundy um a fortnight ago with Tom looking at all of the marvellous, amazing Burgundy 2015 vintage. We visited 14 of our producers um within just over two days, two and a bit days, and tasted many hundreds of wines. And yes, you've got to stay sober right throughout that. So I'd be tasting uh 15-20 wines an hour, making notes on all of them, um, and then going to the next vineyard. And uh that's uh you know, it's a tough job, but somebody has to take it for the tea.
SPEAKER_04Definitely. Uh I remember um I did a podcast on whiskey not too long ago, and I spoke to the brand ambassador Colin Dunn, and I had a similar conversation with him. I said, What do you do in terms of fitness? I mean, you can't do your job, have about five or six tastings, and then go and hit the gym, for example. And do you do you ever have to go, well, look, I can't have looking down the barrel of my day, I can't start at 9 a.m. and finish at 9 p.m. at night. You know, I'll be I'll be absolutely wrecked. So it must be a constant challenge for you, is one thing.
SPEAKER_03Uh yeah, I mean it's definitely, you know, it's definitely an evening business as well. We do lots of tastings, both for private individuals uh and companies. Um, and so late nights and evening tasting is an important part of it. Um I I'm an early riser, I get up at four or five in the morning, I hit the gym first thing in the morning. Ah, there you go. And uh quite seriously, in terms of responsible drinking, I try and give myself two or three days off a week in terms of not having any alcohol. So that that that's those are my juice days, other days of my fermented grape juice days. You sound like a seasoned veteran, Nathan, in terms of discipline. Two years into it, and I have to stay focused. It's all about it's all about creating thrilling wines for people.
SPEAKER_04And could you tell us a little bit more about the wine tastings? So is it mainly London-centric? Do you go out to places in London and do businesses and friends' events, etc.?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so um we we're doing about 250 events a year at the moment. Um, a lot of those are grower tastings, where our growers will come over and introduce their wines to members, but we also sell tickets to the public. Um, we do parties literally where we'll show off, like we did just did a Christmas uh tasting where we showed off a portfolio of Christmas wines for people, but we also do quite nice tastings for um corporates. Uh we did a brilliant event about women winemakers um in the city a few weeks ago, and that was fantastic just to see the diversity of winemaking techniques, where these where the different growers had come from, and it's a great way of doing it. We do a lot of corporate parties and events, and we're actually this time of year we're packing a lot of corporate gifts at the moment as well, really busy time of the year for us, as well as getting ready for Burgundy 2015, which will be launched in January, uh, Bordeaux 16, which will be introduced in March, and Brunello 12. So there's all of these new ones that's from Tuscany, so all of these new ones that are coming along that we're getting ready to offer people uh in January.
SPEAKER_04Wow, excellent. It sounds like it's just going from strength to strength as well. So, I mean, you've got a great following on Facebook. If people want to check that out, it's at Honest Grapes, I believe. Um, and the same on Twitter as well, they can find you there, I guess. Um Nathan, could you just tell me a little bit about the UK industry when it comes to homegrown wines? You mentioned on the website that you don't just go to Spain or France, you have uh some investment here in the UK as well.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, absolutely. So um our our philosophy is about having a short list, uh, like as I said earlier, restaurant list of great wines. Um, and those come from all over the world. And um the increase in production of stunning top quality British wines is a pleasure to behold. Um, in blind tastings amongst professionals, English sparkling wines are performing very, very well nowadays and even beating um champagnes and other sparkling wines. Um, in terms of what we offer, it's a limited but absolutely stunning selection. I'd say that English production is going in two directions now. There's the the big multiples who are now making more in somewhat more industrial scale wine, but still preserving decent quality. And those are the ones you'll see in the supermarkets. As a small club, what we're focused on are the artists and producers. Um, one of my favourites being uh um Nick Hall of Herbert Hall Vineyards in Marden in Kent. You hop on that commuter chain down at Charing Cross, trundle out um half an hour, um, walk over the little bridge behind a primary school through some fields where you've got marvellous hops and apple orchards, and of course, vineyards at the end of it. And there they've got the famous grapes of champagne, Pinot Noir, Pinot Mernier, and Chardonnay, and making the most wonderful uh brute and rose sparkling wines that we have on our wine list. I'm very, very proud to represent them. Um, and we're one of the only places to get those outside of restaurants in the UK. We're also doing Aix and marvellous estate, uh absolutely award-winning uh rose and uh um Blanc de Noir, so white, as it were, white of red, uh one made from the Pinot Noir grape. So it's all about selection. Um, and in a sense, because the pound obviously has changed against the euro, but not against itself, uh prices are suddenly uh 20% more attractive. So it's a great chance to go out and buy uh English sparkling wine.
SPEAKER_04Um it sounds like uh not just that wine, but a lot of the other wines I saw on your website. Uh it's you're dealing with the artisan wines like you said, but it's these best kept secrets that you're you're uncovering for everyone else to know about, and that's perhaps is that your typical client, the person that comes to you, basically to go, look, give me something different, give me something that no one's really heard of, or give me something to talk about at my next dinner table.
SPEAKER_03There, you know, there's there's loads of cheap plonk around, and the supermarkets do a wonderful job in selling us alcoholic ribena and alcohols. Um, our wines are not elitist, they start from nine or ten pounds. Um, below that, it's all dominated by that DUTM packaging. So we're starting from about that level. But the real brains behind our business is my brilliant mate Tom Harrow. He has one of the best noses in the world, and he's consistently spotted uh winemakers producing brilliant wine, sometimes up to five or seven years before the critics. Uh, for example, San Leonardo in Trentino, Northeast Italy, discovered about seven years before the critics got onto them. So he is brilliant at spotting those marvellous wines. And basically, what we're doing together is using Tom's nose like a truffle hound uh to sniff out to sniff out brilliant wines, be they extremely luxurious wines, or indeed those uh Trentino wines from San Leonardo, which go from about uh 13, 14 pounds up to about 50 pounds, or indeed your brilliant 10 pound Bordeaux or Chianti, these wines have got to be at every wine has got to be thrilling, stunning, exciting, and orgasmic at whatever price point it is. It's got to be something that is going to be an award winner. And and a great example, we've just started to um uh bring on board a new prosecco uh called uh Dalbello Don Gallo Extra Dry, and it's just been voted the Independent's best uh prosecco for Christmas. The critics get there after us. It's Tom's nose ferreting around that discovers.
SPEAKER_04He sounds like the cooler in a casino. No, it's not the cooler, it's um like the Sam Rothstein character that would lay a bet on, and then as soon as he lays a bet on, all the odds in Vegas change.
SPEAKER_03Exactly. He is he's he's the guy you want to know, whether it's a ten-pound bottle or a thousand-pound bottle. He's he's seriously, he's got the most amazing uh ability. And I have to say, as well, as a wine enthusiast, I've been collecting Burgundy for a long time. When we were out there a couple of weeks ago, um we were writing our notes on our laptops, we compared them at the end of the day. Um, our tastes are actually pretty compatible, um, and so we agreed broadly on almost all of the wines, but his understanding, his knowledge, and his notes on each of the wines were absolutely brilliant. And that's that's just the sort of guy you want to have in terms of rooting out those wines for you. His mind, his our personal sommelier, basically, and every club member's sommelier.
SPEAKER_04Do you ever get disagree on anything, Nathan?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and when we when we disagree, if it's numbers, I win, if it's wine, he wins.
SPEAKER_04Okay. So yeah, the business and the science head um falls on your side of the tennis court.
SPEAKER_03I I'm the boring guy with the calculator and pencil sharpener.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, but you can get Tim Peak round for a wine tasting, so that's surely it.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely, absolutely literally, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Um Nathan, it's been fascinating. I just got a couple more questions. What's your wine seller look like? You say that you have members that come around every two or three months, but do you have like a special stash that not even they're allowed to tap into?
SPEAKER_03Do I really have to broadcast this? Uh yeah, I mean, I I lived in Germany um a number of years ago when I was working in technology sales, and I've been an avid collector of German wines. The key people to look out for there are the amazing Clemens Busch from Punzerisch in the Mosel, the amazing Ludwig and Sandra Noll in uh Wurzburg, uh, Rangstein, and the a complete rock star who is um Rainer Schneidmann from just near Stuttgart in Wurtemberg. So German wine's amazing, and a big Burgundy collection, so that's me.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_03A bit more Italian recently since I got to know Tom as well.
SPEAKER_04Right. Um just one thing on Swiss wines. I've been spending a lot of time in Switzerland recently, and they've got so the tiny, tiniest of vineyards, and they only produced a certain amount of produce, I guess, so they they have it all themselves. But do does the world know about Swiss wines? I mean, do they are they clued on to how delicious the Swiss wine is?
SPEAKER_03Well, Pete, I won't be inquiring into your tax affairs or banking. Why you spend so much time on the water? I'll cut this part out. One of my reasons were rather more modest in that I had an office at CERN, the uh particle physics laboratory for about eight years. So I go out in the evening and uh and taste and taste wines then. No, I mean, rather like Austria, Switzerland is a wine producer of boutique and stunning wines, um, and they don't really produce enough to export very much. So brilliant to buy on holiday, not so easy to buy back in the UK. We have a small Austrian selection uh from a marvellous guy by Weingethirsch in Langenlois, uh, which is the most beautiful, picturesque place down by the Danube. Swiss wine, rather harder to come by and pretty expensive outside of Switzerland, but some fascinating wines. And uh, you know, it's not all I see there. Um there are lots of low-lying vineyards uh producing really stunning wines.
SPEAKER_04Yep, yep, I uh I entirely agree. And if anyone's going to Lake Lugano, they should definitely check out some of the vineyards around there. The grotto's fantastic. Right, um Nathan, thanks for taking the time out. Uh, what's next in the event calendar? I see you've got something down for the 20th of December.
SPEAKER_03Oh god, so yeah, loads of events coming up to Christmas. Um so for our club members um um who join the Premier Crew and Grand Crew Classe wine clubs, um, we're doing our first previews of Burgundy, a secret tasting in Soho um on the um, oh gosh, the 10th, I think it is, 12th, sorry, of January. Um, and then um a collector's introduction to Burgundy um in Pal Mall on the evening of the 13th of January. And then the world all the world all gets going again. So uh yeah, very much into Burgundy in January. And also we have a hectare, the final hectare of production of a famous British winemaker in Bordeaux, a guy called Jonathan Maltus, who's made uh 100-point wine full of its own. We have his last hectare called La Ponte, and we're just launching the 2016 version of that, and so we'll be doing an introduction to that in January and February for people who want to get into collecting Bordeaux. So that we move from being lots of Christmas stuff now into being uh people who are starting to collect wine and join our club sort of in January, February, March.
SPEAKER_04Fantastic. Uh I recommend everyone join the club, as it says in the advert. It's honestgrapes.co.uk. Uh drop by there and also give them a like on the social. Thanks, Nathan.
SPEAKER_03Uh cheers. Enjoy Christmas and uh drink responsibly, but drink plenty.
SPEAKER_04Alright, thanks, mate. Take care of yourself. Take care. Thanks, bye-bye. Bye for now. Nathan Hill there from Honest Grapes. And now a word from our sponsor on Pinot Noir.
SPEAKER_00It's a hard grape to grow. As you know, right? It's thin-skinned, temperamental, ripens early. It's you know, it's not a survivor like Cavernet. Which can just grow anywhere and uh thrive even when it's neglected. No, Pinot needs constant care and attention. You know, and in fact it can only grow in these really specifically tucked away corners of the world. And and only the most patient and nurturing of growers can do it, really. Only somebody really takes the time to understand Pinot's potential and then coax it into its fullest expression. Thrilling and subtle ancient on the planet.
SPEAKER_04Paul Diamati there talking about his love affair with Pinot Noir from the film Sideways. Moving swiftly on, we're gonna talk to Rao Diaz, wine sommelier from W S E T and presenter of Wine for Sunday Brunch. On the podcast now, I'd like to introduce Riau Diaz Samilier and W S E T Educator, also the wine presenter for Sunday Brunch. Rao, welcome to the podcast. If you could just tell us a little bit about yourself, please, and what is W S E T?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I've been working for 15 years as a sommelier. I lead a uh a really good wine school based in West London, Chelsea. Uh, and I have this really good gig for Sunday brunch and channel four uh on Sunday. So I do lots of teaching, consultancy, and events, and when I'm teaching, I basically use all the material from the WACT, the Wine and Spirit Education Trust, which is the best school in the world to learn about wine. So I'm I'm basically a provider of the courses, so I can teach the courses, I can use the material, and the students can go through the sort of the journey of learning uh with a very systematic approach, very easy, very simple and straightforward. So that's what I do.
SPEAKER_04And how did you get into it yourself?
SPEAKER_01It was very, very, you know, very simple because when I grew up in Chile, so I'm from a wine country, which makes things a little bit easier than for other people. And when I started to get serious with wine, I just took the W Course and started to move up, and then obviously other experiences, and then I became a WCT educator, and things were very easy. So after that, things came quite easy.
SPEAKER_04So if I'm to enroll on a course with WSET, what am I likely to expect?
SPEAKER_01The good thing about the courses, as I said to you, I'm a provider of the courses, so I invite lots of people to come to my school, obviously, or to the WCT main school. The good thing about these courses is that they're open to anyone who wants to learn about wine. So this is not a trade exclusive sort of like if you want to be a semelier or if you work selling wine. No, the good thing about the WCT courses is that they're very open, which means yes, if you work in a trade, if you work in a restaurant, amazing qualification. But if you're a wine lover, if you're someone that really wants to learn a little bit more, if you want to start collecting wine, if you want to show off, I don't know, you know, whatever you want to do, it's a very open course that anyone can take. Uh, and and as I said to you, because they have this systematic approach to learning, anyone can do it basically. You don't need to come from France or Italy or Chile or Argentina. This is a very democratic school, and that's why I'm I'm very pleased to be able to teach these courses in my school.
SPEAKER_04I see. How long are the courses, Rao, and what qualifications could I get at the end of it?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's all depending. Obviously, uh there is very popular, uh, the first three levels of WCT, the level one, two, and three, they're very, very popular. Then you have other levels, but also requires a more, I would say, serious commitment to it. But if you have, for example, the level one takes one day. I'm I'm I'm just saying based on what I offer in my school, one day at the level two takes three days, from like 10 to 4, 6 hours. Uh, and then the level three takes five days. Uh so this is more or less also the school follows up a little bit something similar. Obviously, in the main school they have more options. Uh, but yeah, amazing wines. I would definitely recommend to take any of the courses. I really like the level two, particularly, but because if you don't know much about wine, it's such a good course. It's only three days, you really love the wine and learn lots. So it's a, I think it's, as I said to you, it's a very simple and direct way to go into wine because this is not wine poetry. This is not like you know, like blah, blah, blah, about wine. You go straight to a systematic approach to learn and also to taste. So it's it's a very simple thing, what I'm trying to say. If you don't know much about one yourself, but if you can follow a system, then what I like to obviously to show off a little bit from my own school is that I learned lots of things from the past. I've been working 15 years with wine, I was a head somel for a celebrity chef in a mission star restaurant, lots of things. I'm not gonna bore you with the CV. But I learned a lot about that. I wanted to offer a very simple, fun, and approachable way to learn. So I, you know, I I found the WCT, I learned my craft, I became an educator, but in my school, it's a very, I would say, modern approach to it, non-traditional. So the learning experience for me is very important. Also, the quality of the wines. I I select very expensive samples, which makes a big difference in my own school. And I try to, you know, it's all about the details, you know, when you want to learn. So we try to offer something very different from the rest.
SPEAKER_04Rao, you hear a lot of misconceptions with wine and a lot of myths like red wine with the meat, white wine with the fish. Are there certain rules that should strictly be adhered to? And are there any myths that need to be debunked?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, definitely. I would love to talk about probably the three most common uh I would I wouldn't call them mistakes, but you know, it's just very misleading. First of all, uh there's no raw uh rules or laws, as you said before. Forget about that. Today, when you talk about food and wine matching, it's only about what you like and some little guidelines, some suggestions to see this could do well with this because of this profile of the wine. But forget about the the laws and the rules of 1950s. That's gone. It's all gone. Whatever you like is how you're gonna do it. And if you enjoy it, you know, you should be served wine or you should get wine in that way. Second, you know, is the fact that the dryness of the wine, lots of people have problems. And we were doing some a really cool radio program before this. Um, we were talking with the guys there in a live show, and we're talking lots of people, they have a problem with the dryness of the wine. So the I think it's very important to educate and to pass around the message that the majority of the normal wine that you drink, the steel wine, is going to be a dry wine. The difference will be the levels of fruit content. So lots of people, I think they say, Oh, I don't want a sweet wine. And don't worry, we have lots of dry wines that can have lots of fruit content, but they're not considered sweet wine. So that's the second big thing. And the third misconception that I'm always behind this one is that delicious wine can be found in all the price brackets.
SPEAKER_04Oh, that's interesting.
SPEAKER_01Because most of us, when we don't know about this, oh, give me the spensive bottle, give me the expensive bottle, I want to show off. Oh, yeah, if it's expensive, it's good. No, my friend. No, no, no. You can have delicious wine all the way from a very humble price to a very premium price. You can find good wines. What's the difference? Education. What's the difference? Go to a little course, take the course, go to an event, because then you will know, and and you're gonna pay you know the money that you want for a certain quality, and you can, as I said to you, you can have an amazing wine for eight pounds retail, and also incredible for 50. But not all the 50-pound bottles of wine, they're not gonna be all amazing. I can guarantee you that.
SPEAKER_04And with regards to the uh the events that you mentioned, uh, these are all London-centric. We can find these in and around London.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so basically, if if if I can uh give you some info in 20 seconds, so my company is winetraining.co.uk. We have a killer domain, as you can see, it's very easy. winetraining.co.uk. My uh my Twitter company is the same, Wine Training, and my Twitter uh account is Raul Diaz39. So I normally post all the events, all the WCT courses that I'm doing in advance, all the promotions, all the wine clubs that I'm doing a lot uh in London for different clients, all the wine events that I'm doing. So if you follow me, um you will get access to all the course information and all the other events, the more informal events as an introduction to probably a more formal course.
SPEAKER_04Raul, throw out your Twitter handle one more time. Make sure our listeners get it with you, please.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. So basically, uh uh Raul Diaz39, so R-A-U-L-D-I-A-Z 39. That's my my personal one. And the company one is wine training at wine training, and the company website is wine training.co.uk.
SPEAKER_04Well, I imagine every other phone call you get must be about what wine to buy for a date or a business function. How many times do you look at your phone and it's a text about wine? Also, what does your wine seller look like?
SPEAKER_01Okay, so first question. I have quite a lot of friends that call me actually. Sometimes it's embarrassing because and also I got a lot of phone calls from ex-students, uh, which I don't mind. I'm always happy to answer the phone. Um if they're preparing something special for you know, the girlfriend, the boyfriend, or a little thing with the family, or sometimes like a bigger thing, and say, Oh, you can always call me if it's five minutes, uh it's gonna be cool. So I'm on the phone quite regularly, um, and also with my friends. That's that's that's something that I do uh commonly. Um, what was the second question? Remind me. Um, what's your wine cellar look like? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that I I'm I'm gonna be very honest with you. Uh when I was a little boy with wine, when I was a kid, I used to have lots of stuff, you know, and I'm kind of really, oh, I want to keep this, these burgundies, these Bordos. And I'm I'm an older guy, so now I I keep very, very few. I only have a cellar with 60 bottles. Uh, if you were with wine, 60 bottles is not a lot, huh? So um, and I just kept very fresh wine. I I definitely drop all the aging dreams of keeping wines. I just have everything really fresh. I have my ricks from Germany, uh my nice Italians and Spanish wines, and I don't keep wine longer than six months, to be honest. Because I keep drinking them and because I know what to buy. So I never I never buy a wine and keep it for years because for me it makes no sense.
SPEAKER_04I imagine also you must have one bottle of wine stashed away for that special occasion. A bit like that guy in the film Sideways. He had that bottle for that special occasion. I think he cracked it open at a McDonald's and drank it out of a plastic beaker or something.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That was a Cheval Blanc, which is a very good, very good bottle of wine. Um, yeah, I had it, but I drank it because my life changed and you need to move on. Yeah, you need to do lots of things. So um yeah, I mean, I mean, you know, I mean, with experience, um I I I was saving a couple of bottles, but I drank drunk drank them all, and then honestly, now I'm like, you know, just drinking very fresh, very easy drinking wines. And if we come across a big bottle, I would just buy it and have it with my friends, or you know, like just enjoy it. But I I kind of um I stopped the the aging to be honest. Because today with wine, it's so easy, you can buy it anywhere. And the main problem that I probably can pass on to the listeners of the postcard is that if you don't have the right conditions to keep wine, don't keep wine. If you don't have a temperature control room, away from the light, away from vibration, makes no sense to buy wine and keep it at home because you don't have the right conditions.
SPEAKER_04Raul Diaz. Thank you, Raul. God, I love talking about wine. What do you love, Doctor?
SPEAKER_00A nice big wine with excellent health.
SPEAKER_04Who doesn't? We're gonna finish off now by talking to Christian Rez, who runs the Wine Bank, a wine club, an exclusive wine club over in Germany, hopefully coming to the UK soon. He also looks after the vineyard for Balfassar Rez. So stay tuned for this one. This is Christian Rez. Okay, so I'd like to introduce Christian Rez on the podcast. Christian is the founder of the Wine Bank, a very exclusive club that's going on over in Germany right now, soon to be coming to the UK. He's calling me from Hattenheim. That's Hattenheim in Germany, right, Christian? Very good, very good. Hi, yes, Hattenheim in Germany. Christian, if you will, tell us a little bit about yourself, the wine bank, uh the club, the wine bank, and also uh the Balfassar Res, a vineyard, I believe, that's been in your family for about five generations.
SPEAKER_02Um yes, I mean what I uh I I spend a lot of time on, obviously in my daily business, is the own wine estate, which uh uh which has been founded already in 1870 by uh by Balthasar, who was um the first guy in our Res family to to invest into winyards. And uh I'm number five since then, so it's uh it's been four more generations after Balthasar, and I'm the one who takes care of the wine state now. Um so that's certainly one of the uh things that I uh have a lot of passion for and uh which I spend a lot of time. And one of the other projects over the last few years has been the wine bank, which has created a lot of attention, um especially in Germany, but starts uh to create a lot of attention in other uh countries as well now.
SPEAKER_04Awesome. Christian, I'm really excited about the wine bank. Tell us about the club, please. Tell us about its exclusivity and how you founded it.
SPEAKER_02Well, first of all, the wine bank is a um uh let's call it a wine storage um uh solution. That's the basic idea. However, it's uh at the end, it's much more than this. Um because of course people have the uh the chance to store their wine in lockers, which we which we rent in lockers of different sizes. Um but I I think the the great thing that that has turned this into a great success is actually the fact that people have permanent access 24 hours to their compartment uh with their chip cards and actually can enjoy the whole facility, which is always, and that's a very important part of wine bank of the wine bank concept, have access to a in terms of architecture, a fantastic um uh place or room or seller. In in uh so far, it has been um uh especially historic wine cellars that have has have been turned into um uh into wine banks. So people have actually a place to enjoy the wines that they have stored in in these places, to to enjoy these uh these wines with other people, to meet other people. It's actually like a let's call it like a semi-private uh wine bar or social or business club uh idea around uh around wine storage.
SPEAKER_04And what does it take to get something like this off the ground? Is it uh does it start as a well-kept secret, a couple of friends in the know? How do you bring it from concept to the marketplace?
SPEAKER_02Well, um if if we look at at the very first wine bank, which I opened in 2009, um what I did was actually well sort of keeping it secret because I I avoided to to let anybody know about the project during the whole construction um uh during the whole construction process. Um and um the idea behind that was was actually to open the wine bank after it has been uh finished with like a big bank to the to the public. And uh I introduced the whole wine bank idea with uh a big party to um uh for for like uh 300 people which I had invited, which were of course uh carefully selected, being potentially wine bankers or owners of a of a locker, but at the same time, you know, media uh uh uh people that I know would would talk about this um uh in the region. Um and um and uh yeah, so I did this great party. I invited people they didn't even know to to what they were invited for, actually. And um and and and and that and that whole whole thing made this uh well the ideas start right away because when those uh those people got home, you know, on that weekend, everybody the whole region was talking about it. I had a media press conference the day before or the afternoon before the party, so this was at the same time next day in the newspapers. So this was the big bang that I was looking for, and which was actually which was actually there. And then it started right away.
SPEAKER_04I see, yeah. And wine bank is no longer a well-kept secret in Germany, is it, Christian? It's literally ripping through the country like a hurricane, like hurricane wine bank. Uh how many places are you stationed?
SPEAKER_02Uh well, we are right now at seven seven places altogether. Um you know, it became very obvious to me after my own one, the first one, got uh quite uh got a very good success, even commercially, a very good success quite uh quite quickly. For me, it was obvious that's that I should not stop by by just running one, you know. I I just saw that there is a huge potential. And that's how we turned this into a franchise concept, which which now is uh is is on the market for like two years. And uh so all the the the new upcoming wine banks are franchised wine banks um that we do with people we trust in different cities um uh of mainly Germany, but uh of Switzerland and Austria as well now. And uh we are we have seven um uh which are which are operational by now um and some more to come next year, so it won't stop at this level, so it's continuing.
SPEAKER_04It's continuing. And you're not gonna stop anytime soon. It's coming to London, yeah?
SPEAKER_02Well, um uh actually uh London would be perfect, and we we would love to be there, obviously. And actually, we are already talking to people uh about it, so so it might happen. It might happen.
SPEAKER_04I hope it does happen. I hope you can bring the wine bank over to London. It's winebank.de for anyone that uh to check that out. I asked this question to Real Diaz earlier on, another wine familiar. I asked him, why do we impose these strict rules on ourselves, like the white wine with a fish, red wine with meat, etc. We seem like we're censoring ourselves when it comes to exploring the different tastes of wine.
SPEAKER_02Well, you already uh mentioned some some very good ones, you know. The the the meat red wine thing is uh something um um that we uh we don't like too much actually. We promote um to do it uh the other way around actually um because what honestly works great with um especially beef that has been or pork actually as well that has been made on on barbecue so has some some flavors from um from the fire or from the from the smoke. This is truly fantastic with um aged um uh sweet wheelings. So this is uh a fantastic combination which which many people would not think about. Um but but if I I I show them, you know, I'm doing a lot of barbecues at my place in summer uh and I'm always convincing people by by showing them this uh this combination. So that's one of the myths that I I would like to uh to get rid of.
SPEAKER_04Get rid of sure. Uh Christian, tell me, uh I'm curious, what does your wine cellar look like?
SPEAKER_02Well, we have um well my cellar, obviously I have my compartment in my own wine bank, I have uh my little wine fridge uh uh at home, and I have the the the private cellar of the family, which belongs to the whole family in uh um in one of the tr the old buildings of the family. Um so this holds the treasures of and the history of Baltasares actually of my own wine estate, of our own wine estate. Um there we have vintages going down to 1911. So that's the wow uh that's really the heritage of um um of our family, which is in this in this private setup. Um then uh at my home, you know, I have uh a lot of of of um of wines from other wine producers, uh mainly German. I'm very interested, obviously, to see you know how the competitors do and what they do, and uh so so I drink uh at home a lot of wines from from other German wine producers, actually. That's that's what I'm very interested in.
SPEAKER_04Excellent. And Christian, tell us a little bit about Balfassar Res. How hands-on are you uh with what goes on down there? Yes, of course.
SPEAKER_02I mean, this is um, you know, especially on those wines which are blended. You know, some wines are not blended. So so uh you know, in Germany it's a tradition to actually vinify by wineyard, a little bit like you found in Burgundy, you know, where you have uh a tank or a barrel per wineyard, you keep everything separate. So that's not about blending. So you just you know you take what nature gives you, and um obviously for the very good vineyards in in uh usually it's it's excellent. Uh when it comes to blending, and that's for the more basic wines, um, uh, and there we have some some very important blend. That's a that's a long process because there we want to be sure to do the right blending, because there we we're actually blending different, for example, different Rieslings from different uh villages or different uh vineyards. And that's a process that normally works uh in a way that my winemaker, my uh my chief winemaker actually presents his first ideas, his selection of let's say uh four, five, six, seven options, uh, which we then um taste together, uh including uh including my father, including myself, uh, including uh some of the other winemakers, uh, and then we try to come up with a decision. And um and and when we think we have taken a good decision, then we we we check it the next day blind again to to just check if we if we end up with the same decision, you know, to to really uh find out if it's uh uh a true, a truly true decision. Um and uh so that's how it works actually. So that's a process that usually goes over several uh several days. And it's available in the UK, right? Yes, yes. Baldur's ice ones are available in uh in Great Britain. Uh uh we are working with one of the the top five uh importers and uh and distributors that's uh Berkman, Berkman One Center.
SPEAKER_04So Christian Red there. I'd like to thank Christian. I'd like to thank all my guests this week. I'd like to thank Raul from WSET and the Channel 4 show Sunday Brunch. I'd like to thank uh Nathan Hill from Honest Grapes. I'd like to thank Dr. Fraser Crane and his brother Niles, who was in the background. Uh what did you think of the show, Niles?
SPEAKER_02It was Janny and Plummy, Dennis and Chewy.
SPEAKER_04Thank you, Niles. And thank you, the listener, for joining us. Uh that might actually not just wrap it up for this episode, it might wrap it up for this year. So perhaps we'll speak to you again in the new year. Like I said, we do love it when you leave us the reviews and iTunes and you share it on the Facebook and the Twitter, etc. It does mean a lot to us. It supports us and it keeps me in a job. Hopefully, I will have a job in the new year. Until then, take care, everyone.
.jpg)