Nicolla Greaves of the Wine & Spirit Education Trust is also the WSET’s lonely hearts’ expert apparently. She has launched wine dating at the WSET’s headquarters in Bermondsey Street, London SE1 but is over-supplied with women. (Isn't it always the way?)
Three events have been held so far, culminating in one five-month relationship and what we are assured were “countless good nights out”. The next two events cost £25 each and are lined up for 12 oct and 16 nov in Bermondsey Street, for 28 to 39 year olds and 40 to 55 year olds respectively.
According to Nicolla, “The ladies’ spaces at both events have already sold out, begging much psychoanalysis from women’s magazines. During the evening, ten men meet ten ladies over five-minute interludes. The couples taste a wine blind, discuss, amongst other things, its provenance, then partners and wines rotate. A prize is awarded at the end of the night for the individual who identifies the most correct wines, before some elect to continue chatting at a local pub and others to head home. The following day I email some lucky participants with email addresses of plucky daters that showed an interest in them, and the rest is up to them!”
For more information, or to nominate yourself or anyone else as a possible speed taster/dater, contact Nicolla Greaves on ngreaves@wset.co.uk or 020 7089 38819.
I told Pepi Schuller who runs WSET courses at the Austrian Wine Academy in Rust about this scheme and he immediately pointed out that his Academy has so far been responsible for no fewer than three marriages. I can’t help feeling there must be some licence needed for for this kind of supplementary service – as well of course as the licence to serve alcohol which the UK government are insisting that British wine educators apply for (see UK wine educators asked to get a licence).