Taste Washington - Seattle 2007

Jennifer and I have safely returned back to Masquerade Corporate World Headquarters after our very first trade show, Taste Washington held at the Qwest Field Event Center in Seattle last Sunday, April 15th. On a day typically reserved for late-night number crunching and frantic midnight rides to the post office to file income taxes, we along with 200 other wineries from Washington State, instead poured our wares for several thousand Northwest winos who descended upon us. It was a smashing success on many levels. We got a reasonable amount of traffic for a winery that no one knew much, if anything, about. But we were helped out by being sandwiched between a couple bigger wineries on either side (Matthews Cellars to port, Maryhill to starboard) which brought more people our way. And just our luck, the one and only exhibitor who was serving beer, Pike Place Brewery, were only two tables away from us! A hop, skip, and a jump to the Dark Side! Overall we were very pleased with the comments and feedback we received, not to mention the many wishes of good luck as we are just starting out. Lots of great comments on the logo and labels too. We spent a lot of time talking with a very nice gentleman whose name I cannot remember, who had been past president for 20 years of the Boeing Employees Wine Club. He loved our story, and our wines. He came back to our table with a group of friends in tow and announced to them that we were his "find of the night". And by this point in the night, well he'd had a few and he said it REALLY LOUD so that all the neighboring wineries could hear! No, we really didn't put him up to it, but we were very thankful and grateful for the commendation anyway.

Early in the program a guy representing a non-profit group called Farestart came by our table and asked for a bottle as a donation for their raffle. Farestart provides meals and counselling for homeless men in Seattle. They wanted to assemble an "instant wine collection" to raffle off for their charity. Sounded like a fine and noble endeavor so I handed him a bottle of 2005 Masquerade Cabernet Sauvignon, and didn't think much more about it. Towards the end of the evening as Jennifer and I were finishing off the dregs of our remaining opened bottles along with Mumsy and Dadsy, we kept hearing repeated "last call" announcements to enter the raffle for this 200 bottle instant cellar. The four of us conspired briefly and off I went to buy a couple tickets. I returned to our table and had barely sat down when we heard over the PA system, "And the winner is Bill Kimmerly". I have never won anything in my life. So much so, that my first thought was "What are the chances of two people named Bill Kimmerly here at Taste Washington?" But no, it really was me. So we returned to Richland the following day with a much bigger payload that we'd arrived with. Not the way it's supposed to work when you're giving wine away, but hey we'll take it.