Joe Dressner on the next Kosta Browne style sale of a "virtual winery"

WINE TALK
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Funny? Tragic? I can’t tell anymore…

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tragic and bitter. who would begrudge Richard & Dennis? i feel very badly for Joe and also Dr. Barbara Hirsch, be interesting to hear her side of things.

i need a shower after reading this.

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But the guy is wearing a WB shirt?

How bad can he be?

I’ve going to give JD a pass on this… & hope he recovers from cancer

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I like Joe and his wines but this is just sour grapes. Good for those guys, now if the buyer can continue the momentum [popcorn.gif]

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I think Dressner’s post is great.

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Are we entering an era of “wine derivatives” where the IDEA of a wine has as much value as vineyards and a cantina? I’ve got a GREAT idea for a wine that would be a huge seller, anyone got $10 million to trade for it?

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JD has always been ironic and sarcastic (which I like). But calling them “shysters” is OTT.

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You have to “calibrate” to Joe’s scale: that’s not even CLOSE to the top for HIM…

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Brent Clayton is wearing the tee shirt.

Joe is entitled to his opinion, although I am not sure I understand his point here.

Betts & Scholl is a world wide negociant making wine. Someone saw an opportunity that the “brand” was worth money and purchased the label.

Capitalism, no matter how stupid of a business decision it may be.

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I’d imagine his point is that there’s no involvement by the principals in winemaking… it could have been any product. Not sure if that’s fair to them (I’ve seen the wines on the shelf but that’s the extent of my knowledge about them). Given the small producers that Dressner reps, I’d read this as being the antithesis of his approach to wine - hands off, no involvement in the vineyards or winemaking but you want the rep of being an artisanal winery? Yeah, right.

I do think shysters is going a bit far - they built something, someone else found value in it… But it’s pretty obvious that they weren’t making wine primarily for the love of it but as a commercial venture.

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Hey! Lighten up everyone. It’s a blog!

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I think that’s exactly his point: It’s a brand rather than a wine that reflects a location and a winemaker.

I don’t read him as begrudging them the money. He’s just mouthing off about the fact that a mere brand is worth so much.

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And now he has apologized: captaintumorman.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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Wow, two people in totally different parts of the U.S. with an Australian label/wines selling the label alone for that much?

Damn, I’m in the wrong industry…wow.

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Roberto,

Your thread (both here and on that other place) are repugnant. You should be ashamed of yourself for implying that Michael and Dan are “shysters” or whatever Joe D. changed his term to.

I fail to see how your analogy fits, and am really annoyed to see that you have perpetuated both threads even after being called out on it.

Shame on you.

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How did I imply ANYTHING? I saw that a notable figure in the wine business (both as a merchant and eminence gris) had a very strong opinion about a trend. I linked to it. This is no different than someone linking to a controversial political blog or record review.

My problem with this new model (and especially the recent sales) is that the new owners of the brands may think that this is a SCALABLE business and things will start to happen like happened to Veuve Clicquot, Patrón, Vichon (remember them, WONDERFUL wines once) or even Charles Shaw.

A piece of land is a finite thing, a “brand” is very fungible…

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If this thread is “repugnant” there are no words left in our vocabulary to describe genocide, child molestation, and all those other things that actually are repugnant.

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Me thinks that personal issues (friendship and/or heavy patronage) of KB is the motivating factor in a lot of the posts here. If this was about some liquor combine buying Sammy Hagar’s Cabo Wabo brand (which had no agave farms or a distillery and was a marketing fantasy from the get), no one would care.

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John, I have to disagree with you here. Calling them shysters means they tricked the other party somehow into purchasing the brand-does JD know this and can back it up? Otherwise the word should have not been typed on a cocktail napkin or anything else.

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Just saw the JD’s “shyster” retraction, very good.