Covid-19 continues to wreak havoc across the hospitality sector and even with government support and the furlough scheme thousands of businesses are at risk of closing down, which in turn means their employees are at risk of losing their jobs, if they have not already. The Hospitality Gig is a new platform that has been set up by three highly experienced hospitality professionals to offer a new flexible way for on-trade companies to find the most suitable talent, to work on both short and longer term projects that will be needed to help the industry get back on its feet throughout 2021. Co-founder Rachel Moosa explains how it is going to work.
As we finally say goodbye to 2020 there is still time to share the experiences and memories of a key member of the wine trade as we ask Mattia Scarpazza, head sommelier at Petersham Nurseries, what were his personal takeaways from such a turbulent year. It might have meant spending a lot more time away from the restaurant floor, but he has kept himself busy and creative launching his own wine podcast to great acclaim. Over to you Mattia…
Whilst 2020 will go down as the year, the world over, when we all went through the same emotions of lockdown and coming to terms of living in a global pandemic. But the impact of Covid-19 on ourselves as individuals has been very different. Here Victoria Sharples, wine buyer at St John Restaurant in London, shares what it has been like to have been on furlough for most of 2020, and how it is actually been a hugely rewarding time to stop and reflect and make the most of our unique circumstances.
As we emerge from our Christmas bubbles and our thoughts start to turn to New Year, we turn to Shane McHugh, wine buyer and head sommelier for the Goodman group of steak restaurants to share his thoughts on 2020, just what impact Covid-19 has had on him personally and the restaurant group, and what he is doing over the festive period to hopefully take some time to relax, reflect and look forward to the year ahead.
The Ritz, The Stafford, The Connaught Bar, Gleneagles, Roka, 45 Park Lane and Dukes Hotel are just some of the prestigious names represented on the judging panel for the 2021 London Spirits Competition. For any distiller, brand owner, producer or importer the competition is an opportunity to have your products assessed by the top premium on-trade spirits buyers in the country. Here’s how you can enter this year’s competition and who is doing the judging.
The Bibendum training team has seen demand for training fall by about a third this year due to the pandemic, but that hasn’t stood in its way of innovating harder than ever to bring training to those who still want it. After all, when consumers can go out for dinner and a glass of wine they are still expecting a high-quality experience and that is best delivered by well-trained, confident staff. Jessica Broadbent talks to Bibendum’s head of customer training, Julia Bailey, about taking its training online.
“We need to diversify. One voice, one perspective cannot understand and guide the complex myriad of new faces and backgrounds that are making their way into the wine trade. There are issues and experiences that I am going to face that a man in his 50s simply cannot understand. If we don’t act upon this, we run the risk of continuing the monoculture vacuum that characterises the wine trade.” This is how Amber Gardner, in this detailed and personal account, sets out the opportunities, but also the challenges involved in offering much needed mentoring in the drinks and hospitality sectors.
We continue our Onwards & Upwards series featuring key figures in the drinks and hospitality sectors that are now looking for new roles and opportunities in the industry with the highly experienced national account manager Matt Lindsley, who has worked at a number of major importers, most recently at Castelnau Wine Agencies, who looks back on his career, his experiences and what he hopes he can offer in his next role.
When Roger and Sue Jones announced they were to close their much loved and celebrated restaurant, The Harrow at Little Bedwyn, there was a rush to book a table before their final service in March. In the end the outbreak of Covid-19 meant they had to close their doors before their final date. Rather than enjoy an early retirement, the couple have never been busier launching a series of initiatives to first cook and feed hundreds of vulnerable people in their local community, before switching to running a gourmet takeaway service which it is now using to raise money for a series of charities in December. For all their efforts during Covid-19 The Buyer salutes Roger and Sue and we’re sure you will join us in Raising A Glass to them.
Fiona McLaughlin has enjoyed a wide and impressive career that has seen her rise through the ranks at Majestic before switching over to the on-trade to head up sales in the south west for Enotria&Coe. She is now looking for her next role in the wine industry and hopes to be able to find the right company to share her experience, and passion for working with and developing teams.
As pubs, bars and restaurants across England prepare to close until at least December 2 here’s an uplifting story of how one north London restaurant, Top Cuvee, has already shown in the first national lockdown how it was able to set up an ecommerce model from scratch and even open up a separate Shop Cuvee retail store. It means its owners, Max Venning and Brodie Meah, are as well placed as they can be going into another four weeks of uncertainty. Harry Crowther paid them a visit and tells their story.
Even if you know someone well in the trade it’s only if they happened to come for an interview that you get to find out so much about their career, their past experiences and what they could potentially bring to your business. Which is what the Onwards & Upwards series is all about. Giving people a platform to share what they have done in their career. This week the vastly experienced sommelier and wine buyer Guillem Kerambrun talks about his life in hospitality working in some of the best restaurants in the world, experiences he now wants to share through his new consultancy business.
Training and consultancy support are so often some of the first things to go when businesses are forced to make cut backs in difficult times. But here in our latest Onwards & Upwards article to give a voice to those in the trade looking for new opportunities, Harry Crowther makes the case for why now training has never been more important in hospitality to help operators get even more out of the assets – their wines and spirits – through the skills and quality of their staff.
Like so many of his peers in the wine trade Toby Sigouin first started out on a shop floor working at his local Fuller’s making ends meet as a student. But whilst he first discovered a passion for wine, re-stocking shelves and hosting in-store tastings in a subsequent role as a store manager for Oddbins he also realised if he was to have a serious career in wine he needed to widen his experience. So he was brave enough to step outside the sector and learn the skills you need to succeed in sales by joining Landrover where he was soon one of their top 10 best sales specialists in the country. On returning to wine he joined Forth Wines and following the acquisition by Inverarity Morton he progressed to the senior wine buying role where he has enjoyed considerable success. He has, though, due to Covid-19 now been made redundant and is looking for a new start. Here he shares his experiences and story in wine and how he hopes he can now help others with his new wine consultancy business whilst he also looks for a new senior buying role.
Last week The Buyer launched its ‘Onwards & Upwards’ initiative to provide a platform for anyone in the drinks, retail and hospitality sectors who has lost their job, or is looking for a new start due to the impact of Covid-19. Today we introduce a new series that features a round up mini profiles from individuals who are keen to tell their story, share their experiences and explain what their next dream job would be.
We might all be struggling to travel, visit and explore the best restaurants and wine lists in the world, but that does not mean they are not there for us to discover when we can. Which is why Star Wine List is continuing to roll out its new ‘Best of’ wine list guides for different countries and cities. Here we look at how it has pulled together the best wine restaurants in Barcelona and Bangkok and which outlets won Wine Lists of the Year in Denmark and Finland.
Doesn’t time fly. We are now two months on from when restaurants, bars and pubs were able to re-open and allow customers back into their outlets across England, with Scotland and Wales following a little while after. So how has it been like for those tasked with working on restaurant floors? Here Mattia Scarpazza, head sommelier at Petersham Nurseries in Richmond, south London, shares not just his experiences over the last two months, but those of fellow sommeliers working at leading restaurants across London and the steps and changes they have had to make in order to keep everyone safe.
Milan Wine Week 2020 is not quite what founder Federico Gordini had in mind as he closed the successful 2019 event a little over nine months ago. A repeat of 300,000-plus attendees is clearly no longer on the cards. But a little thing like a global pandemic wasn’t going to stop this Milanese entrepreneur and, as Mike Turner found out recently, the plans in place look set to lay a benchmark for the weeks and months to come across the global wine trade.
With the South African government banning all domestic sales of alcohol for a second time, what was already a tough lockdown has become even harder. There have been numerous charity drives and initiatives worldwide to encourage people to buy South African wine – to give wine producers a financial lifeline. The latest move sees CAPREO backing the Eat Out Restaurant Relief Fund that is, in turn, helping restaurants get back on their feet.
When was the last time you went out of your way to order, buy or drink a Dolcetto wine? With so much competition from other Italian classic grape varieties it has plummeted down the popularity stakes for many years, overtaken in its homeland of Piedmonte by Nebbiolo, in particular, and the Barolo and Barbaresco wines it makes. But sommelier Mattia Scarpazza believes the best quality Dolcetto wines, made from the DOCG vines, are very much worth a second look.