08/07/06 New Grant Co. Wine

New Grant County wine coalition. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report. In May of this year the Grant County Wine Promotion Coalition was formed by the Port of Quincy, the Port of Mattawa, the Port of Royal Slope and the Quincy Valley Chamber of Commerce. The four organizations decided to combine and coordinate efforts to better promote and increase awareness of Grant County wine grapes and wines. Denise Arango is the Promotional Director for the Coalition. ARANGO: What people don't realize is that here in Grant County, this is where most of the wine grapes are produced so we want to being attention to that and bring in a lot attention to benefit the tourism and economic development in Grant County. The Coalition applied for a Market Promotion grant from the Washington State Department of Agriculture to develop signs and promotional materials and initiate a marketing campaign to help increase awareness and sales of Grant County wines. ARANGO: We received a grant in the amount of $8400 and then we also have matching funds in the same amount from the Coalition members as well as several in-kind donations. Arango says the marketing campaign is just getting underway ARANGO: We're very proud of what we have to offer here in Grant County. We hope that people will come to see us. As soon as the brochure is out they will be able to find it in Chambers, most of the major cities here in Washington State. We plan to put some in Oregon and Idaho and that way we can direct the people to the county so they can taste some of our great wines.. That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.