Whale Cottage Portfolio Blog

A recent blog post by chef, Eat Out Top 10 restaurant judge and owner of Wild Woods restaurant, Pete Goffe-Wood, is the inspiration for evaluating how ready Cape Town’s restaurants are for the World Cup, a mere three months away today, and for becoming world class.

Goffe-Wood wrote that the local restaurant industry is “teetering on the brink of greatness”, and encouraged his colleagues to “make the leap” to offer the “foreign market waiting to be fed, educated and entertained and we must make sure that we give them what they came for”.    Goffe-Wood identified complaints about high food and wine prices, poor service, and inconsistent food quality as being reflective of problems facing the restaurant industry.

He explained how wine-markups of 200 %, whilst creating outrage, are the norm, and that restaurants have to follow wine producers when they increase their prices every year.   Goffe-Wood is critical about the lack of restaurant reviews in “print media”.  He believes that the industry needs “positive input from informed and educated sources”.   Service , he says “is not to be subservient”, and he seeks a “more professional attitude towards the service we provide”.

So what do we as customers say to restaurants in response to Goffe-Wood’s self-analysis, and to guide them to greatness:

1.  First, well done Pete, for acknowledging that not all is perfect, and for wanting to lift the standard for the restaurant industry in Cape Town.

2.  We expect consistency in a restaurant’s food quality, service, and value-for-money, plus an attractive and interesting decor, and an undefined feel-good factor of “I like it here - this is a restaurant for a person like me - I will be back”.

3.  Please answer your phones when we call to make a booking, rather than letting us speak to an answering machine, which may or may not return our call.  Have friendly staff that understand the language we speak, and that can spell a basic name like “Chris”!   Even better, recognise and acknowledge our voice as regulars when we call

4.   Trust us as customers when we have made bookings at your restaurants - confirmation calls are soooo irritating.  Allow a 15 - 30 minute cut-off time, for late arrivers, and then offer the table to the next walk-in.  By all means ban customers if they are habitual late-arrivers, or even worse, non-arrivers!

5.  Retain your staff - we see staff turnover even in the best of establishments, and it is often the staff relationships that maintain the relationship consistency and that influence the service perception we have of your restaurants.  Please do not let your new waiter train on me!   Start an industry initiative, to not appoint the waiter/kitchen person running off (often without notice) from one restaurant to another.

6.  Train your staff - start with the wines.  When the waiter does not understand the word “vintage”, I shudder, and wonder why you did not start at the beginning with your training, or why your winelist cannot list this important detail.

7.  Why do we as patrons have to pay the salaries of your staff via tips?  It is the only industry where the onus lies on the client to make such a payment.  Almost two years ago the Department of Labour promulgated the Sectoral Determination for the Hospitality Industry, and it demands that staff be appointed on a full-time basis, with a monthly salary.  I know of few restaurants where this legal requirement is being applied. 

8.  Charge fair prices.  It’s tough for everyone at the moment.  Price increases of up to 50% (Reubens) and exorbitant World Cup prices (Beluga and Sevruga) alienate customers and make you look greedy.  The days of hoping that tourists alone will fill your coffers because of their foreign currency are over. 

9.   The marketing of restaurants is very poor.  Blond sexy “poppies” in ads does not crack it for most of us!  Few restaurants have websites, and the fewest restaurants seem to understand search engine optimisation, in making sure that patrons can find more information about their restaurants on the internet.   If one does a Google search, restaurant websites often are ranked lower than reviews written about them by industry websites such as Eat Out, or by bloggers.   This means that prospective clients are not hearing the restaurant marketing message directly.   The fewest restaurants in Cape Town understand the power of Social Media (Pizza Club, Cafe Max, Nook Eatery, Arnold on Kloof and Jardine are the few on Twitter) and Goffe-Wood Twitters and blogs very occasionally only.  I am not aware of any restaurant which has an integrated social media marketing strategy! 

10.   Your customers have become your reviewers, horror of horrors, and they say it as it is.  No more white-washing, no more ‘incestuous’ relationships between reviewers wishing to remain best mates with the chefs.  Bloggers are evaluating restaurants as the man/woman in the street would experience them, and the more honest they are in writing about what they experience, the more their evaluations are valued.   Banning them from your restaurants, as Le Quartier Francais, Carne and Beluga have done, if they have given you a critical review or feedback, is not productive, and it means that the restaurants will not improve if they cannot accept feedback.

11.  Treat us with honesty - do not con us with a marketing claim on your website, that is not true - as does Carne, which claims that all its meat is organic and comes from the Karoo, which has proven to be not true.  The dishonest claim remains on the website!

Restaurant patrons will forgive a restaurant many sins if they feel comfortable and “at home”; if they feel respected, even if the feedback provided is not always positive, provided in the interest of making it better;  if they are kept up to date with information from the restaurant; and if restaurants learn to say thank you for regular patronage, for a review, or for business sent to them by a regular client.  Not too much to ask, is it?!

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com

A Danish photographer’s love-affair with Cape Town, and its wine, people and food, led to Linda Suhr publishing “A Passion for Wine & Surf”.

The book contains beautiful photographs of seafood, the ocean, surfers, wine-makers, winelands, and a restaurateur, with his recipes.  

Wine-makers Miles Mossop from Tokara, Sebastian Beaumont from Beaumont Winery, Rudi Schulz from Thelema, Duncan Savage from Cape Point Winery,  and Italian Luca Castilione, owner of Lemoncello, are featured in the book, both as passionate surfers, and as passionate wine-makers.   Other wine-makers who are profiled are Adi Badenhorst of A.A. Badenhorst, and Sebastiaan Klaasen from Vuurberg.

“A Passion for Wine and Surf is the portrait of a lifestyle.  It’s about wine-making, summertime and wide open spaces.  A beach, togetherness, a country of hope and dreams. It’s about a group of friends with roots deep in South African soils who are riding the wave of the country’s transformation.  It’s also a brief, indulgent journey into some of life’s simpler pleasures - fresh tuna on the braai, a cold glass of Chenin Blanc and the luminous beauty of vineyards on an autumn afternoon”, says the author.

“This book is my love affair with South Africa and the spirit and soul of this country.  It’s about great wines, irresistible food, soul-living and love.   It’s about hauling a battered cooler-box down to the beach sharing a bottle of wine with friends while the sun slowly sets.  These are some of the special moments that make life worth living.  It’s a celebration of spirit and an expression of my gratitude.   I hope one day you get to visit this extra-ordinary country, taste its wines, savour its food and experience its magic for yourself” she adds.

Once a year about 40 wine-makers meet at Stilbaai for a long weekend, and participate in a surfing competition, drawing parallels with wine competitions that they participate in throughout the year.

“A Passion for Wine & Surf”, Linda Suhr, www.suhrphotography.com. Available at Exclusive Books.

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio www.whalecottage.com

The Hermanus Hemel & Aarde Valley has some of the country’s best wines, and its pinot noir and chardonnays are legend.   The growing number of wine producers in this fertile valley at the entrance to Hermanus have formed the Hemel en Aarde Winegrowers’ Association, a blend of the Hemel-en -Aarde Valley, Upper Hemel-en-Aarde Valley and Hemel-en-Aarde Ridge wine wards in the Walker Bay Wine District.   A new Hermanus Wine Route has been created.

The wine estates in the new Association are Hamilton Russell Vineyards, Southern Right, Ashbourne, Bouchard Finlayson, Vrede, La Vierge, Sumaridge, Newton Johnson, Lelienfontein, Pearly Gates, Southend, Tokara - Siberia Vineyards, Hemel-en-Aarde Country Retreat, Deja Vu, Hemelzicht, Klein Hemel, Spookfontein, Ataraxia, Babylon Farm Vineyards, Creation, Mount Babylon, Jakob’s Vineyards, and Domaine des Dieux.

The area is characterised by small production runs and produces cool-climate wines of exceptional quality.  Wines from the region are characterised by their above average natural acidity and below average pH, a below than average alcohol level, and more ‘tightness and minerality’.    It is strongly influenced by its close proximity to the ocean - interestingly defined as the Atlantic (rather than the Indian Ocean) in the media release of the newly formed association.

Johan Holtzhausen of Mount Babylon is the first Chairman of the new Hemel-en-Aarde Winegrowers’ Association.

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio www.whalecottage.com

Franschhoek is saluting spring and celebrating its wine wealth with its third annual Franschhoek Uncorked festival this weekend.  Instead of celebrating the best Franschhoek has to offer in one central venue in the heart of the village, 24 of the village’s best wine estates are inviting winelovers to visit the wine estates.  Each participating wine estate is offering something unusual for the weekend.

So, for example, L’Omarins, Rickety Bridge, La Bri and Glenwood are each laying on boules courts; Lynx Wines will offer live flamenco music; Mont Rochelle offers a fun photo session with barrels, bottles and wine props; Plaisir de Merle will serve their yummy crepes for the third year running; Rickety Bridge is serving gourmet picnics and helicopter flips;  Topiary Wines are serving sandwiches, curry, and other treats from Cafe’ Bon Bon; Vrede & Lust is launching its new Mocholate Malbec Wine Blending competition;   Alle’e Bleue is offering a sushi demo and the Sterling Electric Quartet will perform on Saturday evening; Boekenhoutskloof will offer a barbeque prepared by Reuben’s; at Cabriere one can see Achim von Arnim’s art collection, and compete in the Pierre Jourdan Strongest Throwing Arm Competition; Chamonix has a French style “Marche’ de Bourgogne” at Mon Plasir restaurant, with French treats such as terrines, snails, puff pastries, cheeses and breads for sale;  Dieu Donne’ offers a jazz band;   Graham Beck is serving sushi and oysters; Grande Provence offers an art exhibition by Jenny Groenewald; La Bri is having a snoek-braai;  La Brasserie goes ‘Uncorked and Unplugged’ on Friday evening; and La Motte serves Claude Bolling’s classical jazz on both evenings, 

Winetasting tickets cost R 60 each, and can be bought at Vrede & Lust (at the Simondium end of Franschhoek), at the Tourism Bureau (Info Centre) on Huguenot Road in Franschhoek, or online at www.webtickets.co.za.   The ticket allows unlimited access to all the participating wine estates.  More details and the full programme are available on www.franschhoek.org.za. 

Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com

An alliance of New World wines, including South Africa but excluding Australia, has been formed for wine marketing purposes, reports The Sunday Times.

South Africa, Argentina, Chile, New Zealand and California will package themselves jointly at international wine trade shows, as the New World Wine Alliance, thereby combating the strong European presence at such shows. 

The first exposure of the new wine marketing Alliance will be at the Prowein trade fair in Germany in March next year.   The trade fair attracted 35 000 delegates from 50 countries, 3 200 exhibitors and 1 000 journalists this year.   Not only will the Alliance exhibit jointly, but it will also use the platform to offer seminars and talks by leading wine retailers, academics, growers and producers.

Su Birch, CEO of Wines of South Africa, said: ” Although we are all competitors, we are confident of the potential to further advance the New World’s share of the global wine market by working smarter in these difficult economic times”

Whale Cottage Portoflio: www.whalecottage.com

The Franschhoek Month asked the Vignerons of Franschhoek what effect the recession is having on their wine sales.

The majority of the estates that replied stated that their wine sales have increased relative to the same period a year ago.

Dieter Sellmeyer of Lynx Wines writes as follows: “Non-cellar door wine sales locally come mainly from restaurants and from mail campaigns and neither of these have suffered – in fact restaurant business is up, which may partly have to do with the evolution of the brand. We have never done a lot through retail outlets as the competition there is massive and yes, cut-throat.”

This article was written by Chris von Ulmenstein and was first published in the July 2009 issue of The Franschhoek Month.

Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com

Wines of South Africa (WOSA) is planning to bring wine journalists to South Africa during the 2010 World Cup, to enjoy the soccer and wine feast the country has to offer next year, reports Cape Business News.

Su Birch, CEO of WOSA, said that many wine producers are planning to bring European importers to the country for the top soccer event, and have designed incentive programs.   “Our intention is to ensure visiting foreign trade and media are exposed to our producers and activities in the winelands while they are here.   We’ll give them a taste of true South African hospitality for which we have become famous.   They’ll experience the spontaneous African warmth and excitement surrounding the games and get to taste our wines in a new context” she said.

Given the 2010 World Cup focus, WOSA will not be putting on Cape Wine in 2010, and will next host it in 2012.

Birch recently received the honour of being named “Woman of the Year” by The Drinks Business, a British journal, “for her role in the enormous advances made by the South African wine industry on international markets over the past decade.”  South African wine exports have grown three-fold in the past ten years.

South Africa is the ninth largest producer of wines, and represents 3 % of total world wine production.  Currently just over 400 million liters are exported from South Africa, a growth of 17 % compared to the year before.  Sales have grown by 27 % to the UK, by 12 % to Germany, and by 26 % to Sweden, the top three South African export markets.

Stellenbosch wine brand Kleine Zalze is the largest South African brand in the British hospitality trade, according to a survey conducted for ‘UK On Trade’, reports Bolander. 

The ‘Wine On Premise UK 2009′ evaluated 12 500 wine lists of 560 wine distributors in the UK, and selected Kleine Zalze as the most sold South African brand in hotels, restaurants, and pubs.  The brand is also ranked the 14th most distributed wine in the UK.   The report attributes Kleine Zalze’s success to its wine quality, packaging and PR.

Kobus Basson, the Managing Director of Kleine Zalze, says that his company talked to the UK hospitality industry on how they could improve their wines for greater consumer enjoyment, and feels that his company has achieved its success as a result of this.

Nederburg will become the official wine supplier to FIFA for the 2010 World Cup, being one of the largest selling South African wines in “many international markets”, reports Just-Drinks.

The limited edition range World Cup 2010 Nederburg Sauvignon Blanc, Rose and Cabernet Sauvignon will be sold for about R 100 a bottle in the UK, Ireland, Canada, Sweden, Germany, South Africa and selected other countries.