Local Winemaking Clubs

[Wall_of_Paul]

Just curious about how many of you participate in community or local winemaking clubs and what the experience is like and how the gathering function and activities occur.

I've been unable to locate or identify any such clubs in my city and I am interested in possibly trying to organize something but I don't have the first clue about how to go about doing so. I've got a number of big picture ideas of what it could look like when well established but that's getting a little to ahead of myself.

Has anyone organized such things or are there larger organizations that you can join as a chapter or resources out there to help you go through the basics of getting started?

I've got hopes one day of possibly going into business to compete with two other home brew supply stores that focus more on beer and stock wine related items as their selections are limited and rarely change. Only brand of kits you can get are WineXpert and no fresh/frozen juice options or staff that can offer a lot of help. I'm not very knowledgeable in running a business as my background is in technology but the wine bug hit me several years ago with my first winery visit and winemaking followed shortly after and if I could turn it into something resembling an income I could do something way more fulfilling and enjoyable. With the amount of talent, experience and diversity i've seen on this forum over the last few years of mostly lurking, I figured the best place to ask would be here.

 

[cmason1957]

I live near St. Louis, MO and am actively involved in one of the three clubs in the area. Actually President for a few more months. We have approximately 30-35 fairly active members and I believe 50 members. Starting a club is relatively easy, find a place to hold meetings, hopefully cheap, decide how often to meet, and then get the word out to the people you know, who tell the people they know, etc. We meet monthly in the basement of a bank, after hours and have been doing it long enough that they let us use the space for free. Many other clubs may meet in folks homes. Every month we have a short education topic. Topics have included backsweetening, how to measure PH, we have put together a few wine kits as a group, sanitation, beer making, wine tasting, wine judging, blending, pretty much anything that is wine related. We also do a monthly wine competition, where everyone who has made a dry red, sweet red, fruit, whatever the month is type of wine and gets some somewhat unbiased feedback about it. And we always have two parties a year, summer party at someone's house and Christmas party, where the winners from the monthly comps compete for "Best of Show", bragging rights is the prize.

We used to do a fairly large winemaking (~500 wines entered) competition, but that has been discountinued due to the effort involved in getting judges, people to work, food, etc.

 

[salcoco]

I live in Overland Park Kansas. we have 50 member club with about 20 very active. we meet in members homes. Members volunteer to host on specific months. we have a happy hour followed by a business meeting and finally a technical presentation on some aspect of wine making. Happy hour is wines supplied by attendees to meeting. we also solicit appetizers and desserts for consumption during meeting. We have a wine competition in January which has been averaging about 200 entries each year.
I would suggest advertising in your wine supply businesses and host the first couple of meetings. then go forward with a meeting concept and other events.

 

[Wall_of_Paul]

I live near St. Louis, MO and am actively involved in one of the three clubs in the area. Actually President for a few more months. We have approximately 30-35 fairly active members and I believe 50 members. Starting a club is relatively easy, find a place to hold meetings, hopefully cheap, decide how often to meet, and then get the word out to the people you know, who tell the people they know, etc. We meet monthly in the basement of a bank, after hours and have been doing it long enough that they let us use the space for free. Many other clubs may meet in folks homes. Every month we have a short education topic. Topics have included backsweetening, how to measure PH, we have put together a few wine kits as a group, sanitation, beer making, wine tasting, wine judging, blending, pretty much anything that is wine related. We also do a monthly wine competition, where everyone who has made a dry red, sweet red, fruit, whatever the month is type of wine and gets some somewhat unbiased feedback about it. And we always have two parties a year, summer party at someone's house and Christmas party, where the winners from the monthly comps compete for "Best of Show", bragging rights is the prize.

We used to do a fairly large winemaking (~500 wines entered) competition, but that has been discountinued due to the effort involved in getting judges, people to work, food, etc.

I know of a few other couples that make wine besides myself but in a city where the metro area covers close to 300k population, I figure there are a lot more out there. The two homebrew supply stores here seem to sell plenty of supplies but the people who manage it don't have any experience in wine, just beer. Do you do demonstrations with the education topics at all or more discussion, pictures / videos?

How do your competitions work, are the members of the club judging? Does any one work with any sponsorships to do things like giveaways or materials to use with education and technical skills or food?

 

[mainshipfred]

Don't want to burst your bubble but there is probably a reason the local establishments cater to beer. It's way more popular, consumer faster thus the demand for the raw ingredients is higher. As for Sal and Craig I think it's really neat you have so many local winemakers that you are able to hold such an event.

 

[salcoco]

judging at the competition is done by members and volunteers who enjoy wine but.are not winemakers. presentation productions are meeting are minimum but usually controlled by presenter. visit our web site www.cellarmasters.org for results of this year competition. We do solicit sponsors for the competition and there donation augment the standard medal awards.

 

[cmason1957]

Judging at our meeting competitions is done by members present. But when we ran a big wine competition, we pulled in a few certified judges and many judges from statewide wineries. It was always a full couple of days for the club and couple of weeks for the guy who organized it. We did work with sponsors, both local and nation-wide wine suppliers. They guy who organized ours had a great talent in getting shops to donate stuff. If you ever think about running one yourself, don't have any illusions that the club will make much money on it.

@mainshipfred is absolutely correct about the reason local shops cater to beer, speed of turnaround and number of home brewers. I think all shops are more beer-centric than wine centric. Sometimes a shop is lucky to have one or two people who know a bit about making wine.