2014 RAW dates!! London and Vienna + go Norse young man!

RAW 2013 in London in May  

News from Isabelle Legeron MW, the really very sensible French woman, except she thinks she is crazy!! 

Isabelle Legeron MW

RAW, the artisan wine fair, is back:

'Not once, but twice!

As the behind-the-scenes of the 3rd edition of RAW London picks up steam, we are delighted to announce that this year we're spreading our wings a little further afield with our first out-of-London fair. May and June will now see growers not only pounding the streets of London but also Vienna. RAW Vienna will coincide with Vievinum, Austria's bi-annual wine trade event, enabling international trade travelling to the city for the show to explore natural wine as well.

The new dates for your diary are as follows:

RAW London: Sunday 18th & Monday 19th May 2014

RAW Vienna: Sunday 15th June 2014

A few basics:

RAW London will be back at the Old Truman Brewery. The venue for RAW Vienna will be announced in January.

As with previous years, we expect over 150 growers to attend RAW London, while RAW Vienna will be a much more intimate affair showcasing the work of around 50 growers. Details will follow in due course.

So, if you are based in central or eastern Europe, there's no excuse. Come and experience the delights of fine natural wine for yourself. We already have keen tasters travelling in especially from Berlin, Budapest, Bucharest and Transylvania, so we can't wait to see where else Vienna touches.

Trade and press registrations will open in the new year and tickets will go on sale shortly after. If you are a grower who would like to participate in London and/or Vienna, please get in touch. Alternatively, please visit our website for more information: RAWfair.com

We look forward to seeing you at one or the other or both!

Best wishes from all of us at RAW.

---

In the meantime, why not go Norse...:

VinNatur in Oslo - Tuesday, 19 November 2013 -

RAW is a keen supporter of, and collaborates closely with, various world renowned, international associations of growers. One of these is the phenomenal VinNatur, based in Italy, which not only facilitates the sharing of knowledge and working practices amongst its members to help them develop their natural wine producing skills, but is also totally unique in spearheading research into natural wine. VinNatur and its growers have, over the years, teamed up with a variety of research institutions in Italy, in order to explore alternative farming practices and gain a deeper understanding of what makes natural wine so special.

Their latest collaborations with the University of Rome Tor Vergata and the Council for Agricultural Research and Experimentation in Conegliano Veneto, are the focus of next week's conference in Norway - 'Natural Wine & Human Health' - which has been organised by VinNatur. Dr. Laura di Renzo, Dr. Alberto Carraro and Dr. Diego Tomasi will be sharing brand new research demonstrating why natural wine is better for your health, and our very own Isabelle Legeron MW will be heading up the talks. The conference will be followed by a tasting showcasing over 200 wines from the group.

Entry to the tasting and conference is free for the trade and press, so if you are a journalist, blogger, restaurant owner, or perhaps run a wine shop in Scandinavia, we highly recommend getting your skates on and joining us for a look behind-the-scenes at the workings of one of Europe's most avant-garde grower associations.

To find out more visit the VinNatur website or contact Olivier Fauvel, who is marketing the event.'

***

A few further scenes from RAW London May 2013:

Some thoughts on the 3rd European Wine Bloggers Conference

The popularity and size of this conference (http://winebloggersconference.org/europe/) continues to grow. The first conference in Logoño Rioja attracted between 30 and 40 participants. The second in Lisbon was up to around 130. This year it is just under 200.

The level of sponsorship is also increasing with Austrian wines leading the way not only with wine dinners and wineries showing their wines, but making it possible to hold the conference in the Orangerie of the Schônbrunn Palace and associated buildings and to have the closing party in the Österreicher im MAK (http://www.oesterreicherimmak.at/). Other major sponsors included Wienwein, Rona (glassware), Wines of Chile, Wein Burgenland and The Wine Management Institute.

It is surprising that the only UK print media represented here is the Drinks Business with no sign of any editorial staff from the commercial press: harpers, Off Licence News, etc. Also the consumer press – there was no one from Decanter or The World of Fine Wine. My impression is that the UK is far from unique here with few editorial staff of Europe’s wine magazines present.

I happened to ask an editor at a specialist magazine just before I set out to Vienna whether they were sending anyone. “No I can’t see the point of going to Vienna to hear Charles Metcalfe tell me about blogging. He ought to come to see us.”

Sadly he has spectacularly missed the whole point. Charles was here to chair just one of the discussions. The conference was an opportunity to meet wine bloggers from 30 different countries, to hear two very good keynote speeches as well as seminars on various issues and the latest technical developments. The keynote speeches were by Elin McCoy and Evan Schnittman – both were excellent and thought provoking.

Elin, who writes for Bloomberg News, presented on the future of the wine critic and talked about the change from the old system of wine criticism (the ivory tower critic) to the new more democratic wine criticism that the internet, especially blogging, has allowed to flourish. She stressed the difference between the small number of ‘ivory tower’ critics and now the large number of bloggers on the net.

Elin posited Robert Parker as the now archetypal ivory tower wine critic - tasting many thousands of wines a year giving them scores out of 100, probably assessing many wines from countries he has never visited but wielding, particularly in the case of Parker, remarkable and enduring power.

This, Elin said, is changing.  The ivory tower critic is less influential than they were, especially amongst the younger generation who are more confident in their taste and also more adventurous. The younger generation are now used to sharing opinions and tasting notes with their peers on blogs, Facebook, Twitter, etc. Clearly Elin sees the era of the wine critic gurus ending. This may be true in some areas but in Bordeaux the established critics, especially Parker, still surely hold sway. At the start of the en primeur campaigns it is scores and comments from Robert Parker, Jancis Robinson MW, Andrew Jefford (etc.) that are consulted by potential buyers and listed by fine wine merchants rather than any coverage they may get on the blogosphere. Neal Martin is the sole example of someone who first established his reputation on the net and has now joined this elite group of critics who matter in relation to top Bordeaux. Perhaps the top end of the Bordeaux market really is different, especially the en primeur market where many of the top wines are now bought for investment and the 'ivory tower' critics are in effect investment 

Evan Schnittman, managing director of group sales and marketing, print and digital, at Bloomsbury, talked about the arrival of ebooks and how they had their ‘iPod moment’ in 2007 with the arrival of the Kindle reader from Amazon. This has transformed the market and possibilities for ebooks, making it attractive for immersive reading (novels etc.) as well as extractive (reference works etc.). This also provides opportunities for self-publishing. It is noticeable that more and more members of the Circle of Wine Writers are turning to self-publishing.

Unfortunately the webinar session run by The Wine Management Institute showed only too clearly the current limitations of video conferencing across the globe. Doubtless it can be a very useful tool when it works properly but to claim that it could make ‘the press trip … obsolete’ is purely foolish, at least for the moment. Although press trips are not perfect, journalists have a chance of selecting what they see whereas with webinars you see only what someone wants you to see.

Towards the end of the conference’s formal sessions, the organisers Robert McIntosh, Gabriella and Ryan Opaz announced that they are setting up a new series of awards for on-line journalism called Born Digital. The new awards have some interesting criteria: an entry has to have been published on-line first and not in traditional media and then made available on-line. It has to be available to all on-line. Perhaps the biggest innovation is that entries can be in all languages. Articles will be translated and the judging will be carried out in English. Details are here (http://borndigitalwineawards.com/).

Post conference there was a choice of three day trips on the Sunday to Burgenland, Weinviertel and one up the Danube. Then on Monday two longer trips to Burgenland and the Danube returning on Tuesday.

The 2011 European Wine Bloggers Conference will be in Franciacorta (Italy) next year: 14^th-16^th October.

••

Our thanks to the organisers – Gabriella, Ryan and Robert – and to all the sponsors who made this conference possible.

EWBC: Vienna 2010

Now arrived at the Renaissance Hotel. We used the combined airport train and taxi and it worked brilliantly at a very reasonable cost: €28 single for between one and four people. Fast, comfortable train from the airport to the centre. Get off the train, up the escalator and there waiting is our taxi driver! The driver had a small built-in TV in his Mercedes dashboard. The Juventus match was on. At least it was when the car was stopped. As soon as it moved the picture disappeared. Presumably a safety device. Could have over-excited taxi-drivers piling into each other!

Dinner was a little less smooth. Gareth Groves (Bibendum Times), CRM and I had fancied going to the Strasser Brau just across the road and open until one am. Unfortunately the kitchen closed at 10pm and we got there some 10 minutes late. However there was an excellent noodle bar nearby, so we went there instead as did Allison Morrall of PR company Dillon Morrall and two from The Drinks Business. Several beers, a sushi starter and three main courses for 41€. Again excellent value.