08/02/06 Guinness Book

Welcome to Vine to Wine this is your host Linda Moran and I bet you are wondering what Sherry and the Guinness Book of Records have in common. I sure was! Recently I was visiting the website for the marketing arm of the Spanish wine industry and I ran across a reference to Sherry having made it into the Guinness Book of records. I immediately assumed it had something to do with older wines. No, in fact, the recognition goes to a restaurant in Japan, Ginza's Sherry Bar. It is actually a Spanish restaurant and bar featuring a minimum of 227 selections of sherry at all times. The club was the brainchild of its owner Michiko Takahashi who on a vacation fell in love with Spain and recognized that there were similarities between dry sherry and sake. She felt as though sherry was a beverage that would appeal to Japanese tastes. Although they did not start out to become the largest purveyor of sherry it happened due to a clever marketing tactic at the restaurant. Each customer was assigned a card listing the initial 40 offerings of Sherry. As they tasted each of them it was marked on the card. When the cards were completed, they ordered new sherries for the guests to try. It was the dedication of the customers, not the goal of a Guinness record, that caused the list to grow. So the next time I am in Tokyo I know where I will be dining and sipping selections from the world's largest list of Sherry. Remember to send your wine questions to Linda at vine to wine dot net and thank you for joining me on today's Vine to Wine.