For Good Reasons

I’m on a mission and am driving all over the country, but where am I going and what for?

Fair Trade Wines- my passion and love. Finding distribution across the USA- my mission.

For me this is a journey that brings so much joy. Not only does Fair Trade help alleviate poverty, it unites us. Fair Traders across the United States and the world share a common viewpoint. We know that our consumption behavior has a large impact on the lives of the people responsible for making the products we purchase. We know that diving down into the depths of the bottom line can lead to economic hardships and we are tired of playing that game.

I love to be inspired. One of the very first Fair Trade wineries I visited was in Chile. The story behind the Cooperative de Curicó still motivates me today.

In 1939, an earthquake shattered small grape farms in central Chile. Houses, barns and winemaking facilities toppled. All that remained were vines.

Farmers worked together to help overcome the tragic events and a cooperative resulted. Building the community was their common goal. Over time the cooperative grew, through good times and bad. Through the Pinochet era, through financial crisis, through drought and through rain, the farmers united.

The Cooperativa is located in the picturesque town of Curicó (Hence the name.) I love it there. The people, the wine festival, the Andes, the food! I love the slower pace and the fact that wine is part of your daily experience.

The Cooperativa de Curicó is a unique anomaly in Chile, and in the world for that matter! A cooperative is an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social, and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically controlled enterprise. (I love Wikipedia).

The members of the Cooperativa also own their cellar- where their grapes are turned into wine and thus sent out into this brave world to be consumed by all those that love wine. Good wine at least.

Although cooperatives are interesting in themselves, the Cooperativa’s efforts toward community development are worthy of attention and definitely respect. A long time ago someone really smart figured out that when workers and farmers are sustainable, productivity increases and the community’s stability is affected favorably. Too bad there are a lot of people that have still not figured this out.

Through the Cooperativa’s Social and Economic Fund, the farmers have been able to assist workers reach their own goals of economic advancement. By paying fair wages, providing educational assistance, opportunities for advancement, access to medical insurance, health and retirement care, and access to loans for improving housing conditions, the Cooperativa has helped hundreds of families.

There are no handouts, just opportunities. For customers the result of technical improvements in the fields, more productive yields, better quality grapes, and a great new winemaker, Paula Bottero, means that the Cooperatva is now selling award-winning wines.

In the US we sell the wines under the brand name Calesa. My personal attachment to Calesa is beyond words. I feel like an ambassador and I am trying to share my love for the wine, the culture, the farmers, the workers, and all their families with everyone I meet.

My mission right now is to open up distribution in Texas and Louisiana. And I am not leaving until the job is done!

To be continued …

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Country Western Singer

There are places in this world that I would recommend everyone to visit. Then there are experiences in this world that help make life complete.

Friday luch at Galatoires on Bourbon Street is an experience in which I now feel completed. I can die, it would be okay.

Being mistaken for a country western singer and given a bottle of great wine.

Priceless Completion.

I Love NOLA

When your cousin calls and says she has room for you to stay in her apartment in the Garden District of New Orleans, you jump in your car and drive eight hours.

NOLA, as the bumper sticker on the car parked in front of mine says, is the hometown of my mother's mother. Kay Kay as we called her, grew up not very far from where I am staying now. She lived her life in a culture that seems extremely different from my own. I am a vagabond- this is not the first time I took off on an adventure- and she was a beautiful southern bell.

I loved Kay Kay very much. She desperately tried to teach me how to be a lady. When she visited us in Texas she would always sleep in my room and keep me up really late telling me stories. She would kindly remind me that ladies do not keep messy rooms and taught me the importance of great fabrics. Her love for Asian art affected me so much I moved to China!

To me, Kay Kay is New Orleans and I intend to explore as much as I can.

Keep Austin Weird

Austin is quite possibly the coolest town on Earth.

Boasting bumper stickers that are taken to heart, the Keep Austin Weird campaign seems to be working. It is not that Austin is weird at all but a liberally minded anomaly in Texas, a visionary of art and culture, an explosion of watering holes, and beautifully eclectic.

There is no place like it. Fair Trade wine is going to sell very well here. Everyone has been really receptive. Austonians care about these issues.

My favorite places: Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, San Jose Hotel, Austin Java and The Garden Room.

I cannot wait to go back and meet up with newfound friends and all my family I keep dropping in on and accidentally staying with for a week.

I will be back to finalize meetings with distributors. Keep your fingers crossed!

Home

I am originally from the country of Texas. Although I am an American, I am in fact also a Texan by birth. I crossed the border with the sun shining and Kashmir on the radio. It was a really great feeling.

No offense to all the other countries I drove through- I just wanted to get to my family and eat some real Mexican!

My first stop was Granbury, a once tiny town outside a huge Metroplex. Granddad lives in Granbury and now a Home Depot does too.

I pulled up around 5:30pm, got out and instinctively locked my car. The alarm beeped and the cows mooed. They wanted to make sure I knew where I was.

Beeping cars have no place here.

Go South- Find Warmer Weather

The very first goal of my journey was to get out of 12-degree weather as quickly as possible. Who could blame me? I could always pull off the highway and sleep in a warm hotel but I was not about to move 25 cases of wine out of my car…again.

(One case of wine equals 37.5 pounds- give or take depending on the size of the bottles. Wine is my workout.)

Besides, who in their right mind could sleep while 25 cases of gorgeous wine slowly froze to death? This wine is my livelihood. This wine is really special.

This wine's final home matters to a lot of people- those that planted the vines, those that cared for them throughout the years, those that picked, those that transported, those that helped turn grapes into wine, those that bottled and labeled, those that packed, those that drove, those that sailed, those that delivered the paperwork, those that unpacked, those that sold, those that bought and those who will drink.

I made it to Wichita, Kansas. 37 degrees. Relief.

Vagabond

I am a vagabond. More like a wine vagabond on a mission.

Wikipedia identifies one such being as a (generally impoverished) itinerant person. Such people may be called tramps, rogues, or hobos. A vagabond is characterized by traveling, lacking a fixed home, abode, or residence. Vagabonds are not bums, as bums are not known for traveling.

SWEET! I am not a bum.

A week ago I packed up my apartment, coxed my father in to helping me move everything into his barn, filled my car full of wine and hit the road.

“When you coming back?” Dad asks.

“I have no idea.”

I left Hudson, Wisconsin, waved goodbye to my old Minneapolis apartment, and headed down south on interstate 35W.