If you follow me on Twitter, you’ll know I attended Wineries Unlimited (#WU2011) this past week. I ate richly in Richmond with my dad and my Interior Muse—we had a great time, but it was time to get back2basics. A quick trip to my local Shoppers Food Warehouse for my Recovery Soup cost-effective ingredients led to a pleasantly surprise in finding two of my new friends’ wine nestled next to each other. I think I was mostly surprised that Shoppers offered not only local wine but that they offered Breaux’s Equation for under $12. I snapped it up and also snapped this pic with my iphone—the low light and my creaky knees account for the blurriness.

Attending Wineries Unlimited gave me the opportunity to meet with so many great wine people—many established peeps like Jen/Breaux Vineyards (thanks for taking the time and talking to me!!), Brian Roeder/Barrel Oak Winery (who should be asked to present at Wineries Unlimited next year!) and Helen/Duplin. Helen pretty much stole the show from Paul Wagner/Balzac Communications, who had challenged us marketing track attendees to come up with one word to describe our winery. In a question and answer portion, Helen stood up and proclaimed,

Duplin Winery is Cool. Sweet. Easy. We’re from the South and we are known for our Sweet Tea, Sweet Women and Sweet Wine.

She absolutely brought down the house. It was awesome. Check out Duplin’s website. They came to play in a big way, marketing-wise. Don’t let that homey, down South/feel good/slow&easy vibe fool ya’. They will sell you some muscadine,—even if you think you are above sweet wine.

I also was able to meet plenty of new friends, as well—here’s a shout out to Karen at Parker-Binns Vineyards! Tell your story, girl! And Paul at Tabor Home Vineyards and Winery in Iowa who totally befriended me and kept me from eating lunch alone—which, as an introvert, I totally appreciate. Michael Falcetta at Sparkling Pointe talked about their mobile app, Long Island Wine Country, which is based off of the Finger Lakes Wine Country app—and that was pretty much like meeting a rock star. Useful mobile apps are difficult to pull off, so I’m following those efforts with interest.

There were many Maryland wine peeps representing our state and it was great to catch up with Jennifer Layton at Layton’s Chance and talk with Regina at Maryland Wineries Association. Layton and Port of Leonardtown Winery are on the Patuxent Wine Trail, so I’m looking forward to working with Jennifer and the other Patuxent Trail wineries and local partners this upcoming year in order to raise all of our regional boats.

But where is the content?! What did I learn at Wineries Unlimited’s marketing track? Why all the name-dropping? For Winery Unlimited summaries, please visit Terry and Kathy’s Wine Trail Traveler. They did a great job and their site chronicles not only their wine travels, but also offers links to lodging and local eats to help you plan your next winery trip.

As for what I learned, why not add me to your RSS feeds or check in on the Almanac regularly. I’ll be putting much of what I learned into action this year. I was really happy to hear that my philosophy of “Wine = Community” and the Port of Leonardtown Winery’s marketing message: “Local Wines from Local Vines” fit Paul’s challenge for us to craft marketing messages of no more than 3-5 words.