Pancho Campo defends Wine Future
Monday 7 November
“I’m doing my best”, says Pancho Campo, in response to his critics on day one of Wine Future Hong Kong 2011.
In an interview with Campo following the disappointing first day of Wine Future, there appears to have been some soul-searching in a bid to improve the rest of the summit.
If you read yesterday’s blog (if not, it’s below), I was less than impressed with the content of the discussions. Too much self-promotion and not enough fresh insight.
I have had a lot of response to the blog from delegates agreeing with my blog (although Tim Atkin MW did point out he doesn’t like being called old media: “I’ve got an award-winning website,” he said. Sorry, Tim!)
Campo said, “We send every speaker a list of questions we wanted them to answer” but he admitted many had gone off topic, talked too much about their brands and there had be more debate between speakers and audience, and this had been one of the failings of the last summit.
“In Wine Future 2009 the main things our questionnaires showed us that one, there were too many people talking their brands. And two, very few time for Q&A,” he said.
One speaker today did not talk about his brand very much – and it was one of the highlights. However, Campo revealed that gentleman had considered reworking his talk to include some infomation on his brand after hearing all the company guff yesterday. I’m glad he didn’t.
Campo added, “The only speaker that was a success in 2009 was Gary Vaynerchuk and that was not because of what he said but how he said it.”
“One of the problems the industry has is we have great minds but terrible speakers.”
So, we’re only part way through day two and things have picked up a little. But many speakers have been allowed to go on and time for questions has run out. Many people have been encouraged to write down questions but the speakers run over and then slope off without one question being asked. We have to go backstage if we want to ask the questions.
There have been some interesting nuggets of information (and there’s still plenty to go today) but there has continued to be a lot of ‘I’ll just tell you a little bit about my brand’. Please don’t; do your best instead.
Thanks for the update Rebecca; however, having attending the 2009 Wine Future, I will respectfully disagree with Pancho. Though Gary did a stellar job, I feel that Pancho is selling himself short saying that Gary was the only thought-provoking speaker. There were a few others who gave educational and inspirational information that proved incredibly useful to the audience. I think Tom Perry’s review was a fair assessment on how 2009 panned out. http://bit.ly/sym72D
I would also suggest that his comment about the speaking capacities regarding the wine industry as a whole is also a little harsh. I don’t feel there is a shortage of people who can speak eloquently, but where we might falter is how we moderate discussions. Is there a clear question that is trying to be answered? Is there a moderator who can guide the speaker to stay on track? Is there a thoughtful debate being laid out? Many speakers are great on a panel but not necessarily as a headliner. And most importantly, if a speaker wasn’t a hit the year before, why invite them back?
- by Gabriella Opaz
‘I have had a lot of response to the blog from delegates agreeing with my blog (although Tim Atkin MW did point out he doesn’t like being called old media: “I’ve got an award-winning website,” he said. Sorry, Tim!)’
Tim’s old media who has embraced new media – he is not pure ‘new media’ and that makes two of us.
- by Jim Budd
Ah, feels like old times. The group of us sitting in the stalls in Rioja, listening to endless self-promotional speeches ... and commenting about how the format didn’t really deliver on the promise of “Wine FUTURE” at all (with the exceptions of Gary, Ryan, WRAP, and a couple of others).
I have not been able to follow the content much, but have seen some of the commentary. I wonder whether the format is to blame. What happens when you organise something SO expensive (quite obscenely so ... $1m to put on a conference??), so over-baked, that you have to give time and space to the biggest players interested in cementing their position in the status quo in return for their support, rather than focusing on the up and coming, probably hungrier, more audience-focused names & speakers?
There is undoubted quality in the line-up of the speaking team, but like so many teams full of stars and famous brands, I wonder how much they are thinking of their role as team players and on winning the game for wine, instead of the paycheck?
Two more questions. What is Wine Future FOR? And what else could have been done for wine for $1m?
- by Robert McIntosh, London
Good to have some very honest feedback. It is an expensive event to attend, tastings looked good but did you feel it was worthwhile? Good value overal?
- by Susan Hulme MW, UK
Hi Susan, If you’d paid 1900 euros for that plus hotels and flights, you would have been sorely disappointed. Parker’s tasting was the star of the show, and was on a different level to the rest of the conference. It helps when you’ve got 20 awesome wines in front of you. Save your money and go on holiday instead!
Thanks Gabriella and Rob for your comments. I agree with you entirely. What is Wine Future for? A good question. The networking opportunities were excellent if you’re a member of the wine trade.
I think it’s also a good money-making scheme…
- by Rebecca Gibb
For me the highlight was the final day when we had the Asian perspective moderated by Jeannie Cho Lee. I wish we had had more of that. No one really wanted to hear about the UK or European markets.
I doubt Pancho made money on the event. The costs were massive and consumed many people (and sub-contractors) time and energy. I hope Pancho broke even. He did a serve to the industry.
It would be good to have mini-conferences like this in Asia every year on a much smaller scale to simulate the tremendous level of debate we’re seeing on tiwtter this week. I’m glad GrapewallofChina is attempting to catalog this conversation. Someone should be recording it all.
- by Joshua Hall