Author Archives: Aleksandra Selenic

Winery visit

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This image requires alt text, but the alt text is currently blank. Either add alt text or mark the image as decorative.For the winery assignment I decided to visit  Whitecliff Vineyard and Winery. Whitecliff is an artisanal family run winery created from the ground up by owners and founders, Michael Migliore and Yancey Stanforth-Migliore. Whitecliff Vineyard and Winery is located at 331 McKinstry Rd, Gardiner, NY 12525 and it has one of the largest vineyards in the Hudson Valley, with over 20 varieties of grapes. They are growing: riesling, reserve riesling, dry rose, cuvee, sheer chardonnay, reserve chardonnay, oaked seyval blanc, vidal blanc, pinot noir, syrah, cabernet franc, merlot, malbec, dessert wines, sparkling wines etc. They also have wines that are blended with different grape varieties. Their vinification process is very simple: they harvest the grapes, then crush them when ready, they do fermentation process and bottle the wine. They have wines that mature in the barrel, and some that mature in a bottle. While they do use machinery for spraying, all the other field work is done by hand. They also try to follow an Integrated Pest Management Program (IPM). Viticulture at Whitecliff winery is to spray the grapes to protect them from diseases, netting and machinery. I had a chance to take a tour through the vineyard and I was fascinated with acres and acres of vines. Their customer service was very good, they had different options for wine tasting. They had various tasting flights from $8-$16, depending on a wine type and also depending on a quantity. They also have something called “GOLD TASTING”  which costs $35 per person for groups of 4 or more. They are offering tasting of 8 premium wines, cheese plate & brief winery tour and they Include souvenir glass.The knowledge of tasting room personnel was very good and very professional. I had many questions for them about winery itself, grapes, making wine process and they answered each question very patiently. I also asked about food pairing, and I learned about some great dishes that could be served with different types of wine. I

Overall, I had a very good experience and this assignment was very helpful for my future career. I would recommend this winery to anyone who is looking to try good wines and also enjoy wonderful atmosphere and spacious tasting room.

www.whitecliffwine.com

https://www.newyorkwines.org/

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Omega Fine Wine and Spirits, 23-18 31st street, Astoria NY 11105

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I live in Astoria, Queens and I frequently visit Omega Fine Wine and Spirits, so I decided to write about them. The owners are from Greece, so they have a really big selection of Greek wines. It is a small retail wine shop, located in the shopping plaza near Ditmars boulevard subway station. Alex, who works here is an enthusiastic young man, always in a good mood and ready to answer all of the customer’s questions. Also, everyone that works there is so friendly and helpful.The staff is always willing to take a walk around the store with you to recommend something that fits your needs. They make you feel like a friend and this is why I like coming here so often.They have a wonderful selection of really nice wines for any budget and they are always coming up with different deals for loyal customers.

Front of the retail wine store

As I said, the store is really small, but they really offer many different choices. They have wine from many different countries.

Red wine selection

Sparkling wine selection

I asked about their best red wine from Spain and they recommended those 3 choices:

Red wines from Spain

Emilio Moro is the most popular Spanish wine among customers and it costs $25.99.

While I searched for the sparkling wine, one specific area caught my attention-it was marked as SUPER SALE and all the wines were under $5. I picked up one bottle and I saw that it was from Slovenia, which is so close to where I am from, Serbia and I couldn’t believe that Slovenia actually makes wine. The dust on the bottle and super sale tells me that many people don’t know it either.

Wine from Slovenia

My further research resulted in finding wines from Bosnia and Herzegovina, which I also didn’t know existed !! I was very excited to find wines from my sister countries.

Wine from Bosnia and Herzegovina

I only found only one shelf talker, but there were several deals and discounts throughout the store:

Shelf talker

One of the store’s deals and discounts

I chose to write about particular sparkling wine from Italy because Alex told me it was the most popular in the store. With its low price and great taste, many customers choose this wine over many others

.Sparkling wine from ItalyThis image requires alt text, but the alt text is currently blank. Either add alt text or mark the image as decorative.

I also stumbled upon very interesting label that caught my attention. It had very interesting picture up from and very little information about wine, I found it very interesting and mysterious.

Interesting wine label

And, for the end of this assignment I wanted to leave a comment about the store weakness. As I said before, the sore is very popular among customers due to amazing wine selection, low prices and very friendly staff but the only thing that I find as the should improve is- marking the wine countries and making it easier for people to find what are they looking for. For example, I think they should mark the different areas of the store as : Wines of Italy, Wines of France, Wines of Greece etc. I believe that would be very helpful for their business.

I enjoyed this assignment very much.