September 8, 2005
new voices
Other voices are beginning to pipe in over on the Stormhoek blog, including that of Nick Dymoke-Marr, the U.K. Managing Director:
I suppose the question a lot of people will be asking is, why are we bothering with a blog? Why not go with more conventional marketing practices? Why are we listening to this mad marketing anarchist Hugh MacLeod, when we could instead be basking in the re-assuring glow of a famous London advertising agency?
Because if we don’t rise above the clutter, we will fail. It’s that simple.
Stormhoek is a little winery in a country that is probably one of the least skilled exporters of quality wine in the world. The South African currency is weak and there are day-to-day challenges to their existence that most of the Western world has simply not had to deal with for generations. And lastly, and perhaps most importantly, Stormhoek is 6,000 miles away from the nearest significant market for their wines.
Also check out Graham Knox, Stormhoek principal and the guy in charge of wine production:
Stormhoek’s home is a 200 acre vineyard estate in the mountains overlooking Wellington, South Africa. Wellington is about an hour northeast of Cape Town. There are lots of vineyards in our area and we actually live in our very own little valley called “Doolhof” or The Maze. It is part of the magic of where we are and I will write more about that later.
The plot thickens.
"Hugh's Daily Cartoon" Newsletter.
A new cartoon sent out every weekday morning to your inbox [RSS version here.].
A wee chuckle to start your day off right etc.
Well done, Hugh. I believe that you have them on the right track now. I’ll add Stormhoek to my “provisional” folder in my aggregator.
–nick
nick is a good guy. he sent me a handwritten note to discuss my own take on stormhoek — *even though he knew I had not given the wine a favourable review on my blog*. I will therefore give the Stormhoek chardonnay a chance when i see it. what can i say. the personal touch is something wonderful.
oh, the truth hurts.
on jobhunting: perhaps, this is my only hope: (daddy, i knew that one’d make you proud.) for the blogosphere, check out gapingvoid by hugh mcleod. had me and dashiell cracking up for like, three minutes.