Welcome to Betty's Wine Musings, where you'll get fabulous wine tasting tips and wine tasting notes, discover personalized wines, and more! Whether you are a wine veteran or just getting started, there’s always something more to explore about the wonderful world of wine.
Many of us were taught that white wine goes with fish, and red wine with meat. But what if you are a vegetarian? The good news is that there are all kinds of good wine pairings for vegetarians. As a long-time “pescetarian” who eats dairy products, eggs and fish, I am excited to share some recommendations for wine pairings for vegetarian dishes. [Read more…]
Last week I wrote an article called “Looking for a Great Side Gig?” where I talked about why you might enjoy becoming a wine consultant. In the article, I said that our wine consultants lead fun wine tastings in people’s homes and offices, giving guests the chance to try fantastic wines made by Napa winery WineShop At Home before they buy them. This week, I thought it would be fun to tell you about what a WineShop At Home wine tasting is. I’ll do this in a Q&A style, since you are likely to have many questions.
If hosting a wine tasting sounds like fun, let’s talk. If joining my team so you can lead wine tastings for others sounds like fun, let’s also talk. I’ll share my contact information at the bottom.
WineShop At Home is a Napa winery that doesn’t sell their wine retail or wholesale. Instead, they sell through independent wine consultants like me who lead private wine tastings in your home or office.
The standard tasting is 5 wines. But you can upgrade your tasting to have as many as 8 wines.
A typical tasting lasts 1 ½ to 2 hours.
A WineShop At Home wine tasting costs $40 (plus tax) for a 5-bottle tasting. You get about $150 worth of wine for $40! For additional bottles, the cost is higher.
Our goal is to sell you and your guests a lot of wine at the tasting. The $40 fee is a loss leader for us. Rest assured, I don’t hard sell. The wine does a good job of selling itself. This is really no different from going up to Napa to taste – only you get to do it in the comfort of your home. And each person doesn’t have to pay $20 at each winery J
WineShop At Home wines range in price from $16 to $45.
The ideal size for a tasting is 12 people. You can have as many as 18, but that means the sips are really small.
This is often the case for company tastings. With more people, I need more wine, and I would need to sell you the additional bottles at full price.
Everybody shows up at the same time. I get people to fill their plates with food. We then do introductions. Once we’ve done introductions, we start with sparkling wine. We then do whites followed by reds. With each wine, we talk about what we’re tasting and smelling and how we’re liking it. We try each wine with the different foods the host provides and figure out which pairings we like best. Very importantly, we do a lot of laughing. I even tell a few wine jokes.
I share my most important rule up front. I tell people not to yuck anybody’s yum. Why? If you’re the leader of the crowd and you don’t like a wine, you might embarrass other people who really like it. So I tell people to share their opinions gently.
When you decide you want to do a tasting, we come up with a date and talk about your wine preferences (sweet, drier, more red, more white, etc.). I then send you a coaching email with everything you need to get ready for your big event, including:
WineShop At Home tastings are simple and fun! And they don’t take a lot of prep. You just need some fun wine-loving friends and a few good hours. And your house doesn’t even need to be clean.
If you’re in the San Francisco Bay Area and you’d like to book a tasting, please call me at 650-714-7009 or email me at betty@winetastingsandmore.com. If you’re in the United States and you’d like to join my team so that you can lead tastings for other people, please check out my Wine Business page and call or email me.
Cheers!
As an independent wine consultant with WineShop At Home, I absolutely enjoy bringing a taste of the Napa wine country home to you one sip at a time. Whether you simply love to drink wine, seek a special personalized wine gift, or are in search of a new wine jobs opportunity as a wine consultant, feel free to contact me for a truly unique wine tasting experience!
Do you have a serious day job but fantasize about having a fun side gig? How about a side gig with wine?!? Let me introduce you to my favorite side gig: being a wine consultant with WineShop At Home. I’ve been a consultant with WineShop At Home now for 13 years now. I love it, and I’d love to have you join me in the fun!
As a wine consultant, you will lead really fun wine tastings in people’s homes and offices, giving guests the chance to try fantastic wines (made by Napa winery WineShop At Home) before they buy them – in a fun, unintimidating environment.
If you lead one to two tastings each month, you will earn between $50 and $200. You are likely to spend 10 hours doing this: recruiting hosts, coaching hosts, leading the tastings and doing the follow-up computer work.
If you lead three to four tastings each month, you will earn between $200 and $500 and spend probably 20 hours to accomplish everything.
If you lead more tastings each month, you will earn more money.
If you build a team of wine consultants, you will earn even more money.
You like wine. Your enjoyment of wine and interest in leading fun, educational in-home wine tastings will go a long way in ensuring your success.
You enjoy people. This business is all about relationship building. So being a people person is critical.
You’re persistent. Growing a successful business takes time, commitment and consistency.
If becoming a wine consultant sounds appealing to you, let’s talk! The cost of getting started is just $149 or $299. Call me at 650-714-7009 or email me at betty@winetastingsandmore.com. Also, read my Wine Business page to learn more.
If you know someone else who might be interested, please share this information with them and have them contact me. Cheers!
Betty Kaufman, WineShop At Home
As an independent wine consultant with WineShop At Home, I absolutely enjoy bringing a taste of the Napa wine country home to you one sip at a time. Whether you simply love to drink wine, seek a special personalized wine gift, or are in search of a new wine jobs opportunity as a wine consultant, feel free to contact me for a truly unique wine tasting experience!
Last week, in my article called “The Joys of Zinfandel,” I looked at the origin of the Zinfandel (Zin) grape and some of its key characteristics. This week, I’m happily talking about tasting of the grape. As some of you know, I’m a member of a tasting group that gets together every 4-6 weeks. Each tasting is focused on a specific grape, a specific region, a specific vintage or something else. Yesterday, we had the pleasure of doing a Zin tasting. I hope you enjoy the fun we had by reading this article.
Next Saturday, my wine group is doing a Zinfandel (Zin) tasting! So my article next week will likely be on the wines we try. But this week I thought it would be a great opportunity to explore Zinfandel. I happened to look back at nearly 10 years of blog writing and saw that I’ve never written an article on this wonderful grape and wine. That blows my mind. Today’s the day!
