Letter From the President of FBV

Peter Fland, President

ontheroadpj@yahoo.com  or 908 406 2503

 

 

 

Dear FBV Members;
Your Executive Board met on 8/27/13 to finalize the By-Law revision.  You may
review the revision on our blog site shortly and submit any questions or concerns for
additional consideration.  The blog address is:
http: www.frenchbroadvignerons.blogspot.com

We are now moving forward with our membership initiative.  Jaime Fish has agreed
to serve as membership chair and coordinate the initiative.  In conjunction with that
effort the Board has funded a gift basket of wine for a drawing between members
who bring in new members during the period of the initiative.  You will hear more
about this from Jamie shortly. In the mean time, if you know of people you think
should be members, feel free to approach them and encourage them to join and
bring them to our October meeting. 

One of the things we enjoy is drinking wine.  However, when we get together as a
large group this can inconvenience our hosts.  I am suggesting that we all come
equipped with our own glasses suitably marked whenever we get together.  We are
expecting a donation of glasses and we will distribute them among any members
that may want one.  You may even want to have a tasting kit consisting of wine
glasses, some crackers, and a corkscrew in your car.  By doing this, we can make
things a little easier for our hosts.

We are developing a value added benefits program for members.  This may take the
form of a coupon book or use of a membership card that would result in discounts
and accommodations for our members at supporting businesses.  It may take a while
to set this up, but I am hopeful that we can pull this off.  We already have worked
out a deal on wine and vine purchases and winemaking supplies.  We will let you
know as we move forward with this.

The Board will announce a meeting schedule for general membership meetings in an
email shortly.  Some of these meetings will be more like an event instead of a
meeting. The form of the meeting will also be modified so that there is more time
for wine tasting, information exchange, socialization and our regular pot luck dinner.
In preparation for the Asheville Wine and Food Festival and other evaluation events
we purchased a set of stemware, pitchers, waste bowls, bottle tools, and a cooler for
use by our evaluators and at training classes.  In addition a hand truck and plastic
storage containers have been donated.

Our major activity this month was the Asheville Wine and Food Festival.  We
evaluated the wine competition and staffed a both for the French Broad Vignerons. 
Tom Mincarelli served as the Wine Evaluation Coordinator and he assembled the
judging panels, coordinated the training and scheduled the actual tastings including
the “Grand Tasting” on Saturday.  The only way to describe the results of his efforts
would be - “flawless”.  Thanks to all who made this effort a success.

Please be on the lookout for notes from Jamie about meetings and membership.
Please do not forget to pay your dues we are starting to use the treasury for our
activities now.

Pete