Mark T. Norman's Page

Two days ago, I received my copy of the November 15th issue of Wine Spectator – Rich and Powerful Cabernets. Before dinner, I started to skim through the pages. I stopped on Sr. Editor James Laube’s page. Entitled “Napa Cabernets on the Brink”, I hit the pause button and started reading. I know that there are many mixed feelings towards the magazine but personally I find that James makes a lot of sense about what he writes.



He starts this editorial by saying that a Napa winemaker… Continue

I spent 7 years as a Scoutmaster where I tried to instill an attitude that the scouts in my troop planned for the best, prepared for the worst, & tried with every ounce of energy to succeed. The BSA simplified that as their motto of “Be Prepared”.



During the past weeks every time I turn a page or click the mouse I see an article about next year’s wine business & predictions for 2010. Some are upbeat, many are neutral, but very few paint a dark image. No one likes to read doom… Continue

Four weeks ago I published a blog entitled “It’s Not Social Media it is a Total Change in Our Way of Life!” http://hubpages.com/hub/ItsNotSocialMedia; where I wrote about the future impact of phone apps on the wine industry. In that blog (and also in ”United You May Stand, Divide You May Fall”) I mentioned that wine associations should start thinking about developing phone apps for their members. Last week I received an… Continue

As I see it there are seven groups involved with the wine business; an industry in turmoil. I have always felt that whenever there is chaos there is opportunity. If you are in the wine business are you ready to do that?



Domestic Wineries – I could write pages & pages on just this topic (but not now). This is the sector where I believe that there is the most chaos. After a decade of grow (for the most part) we are seeing one of the most challenging business environments in… Continue

About two months ago I reached out to a number of winery owners around the world trying to get a sense of how cooperative various wine association members were with each other in terms of sharing valuable data.



Since those inquiries went out (and answers returned) a lot has happened in the wine industry but I would bet that nothing has changed. It is my contention that most wineries were too busy selling wine to really pay much attention to the direct to consumer sales over the last… Continue