Washington, D.C., public relations officer David White was honored last weekend at the annual Wine Bloggers’ Conference in Charlottesville when his Terroirist won best new wine blog in the 2011 Wine Blog Awards.
White created Terroirist last November as a site to point fellow wine lovers to the most interesting stories about the fruit of the vine. The blog is updated daily except weekends, and its audience has grown to about 6,000 unique readers a month, White said after the awards ceremony. He has added a team of seven bloggers to help with the workload, though he still writes most of the posts himself.
Each Friday, Terroirist publishes an interview with a winemaker, which White started as “a way to get to know the people who make the wines I love to drink.” Each winemaker answers the same 16 questions, starting with, “What’s open in your kitchen right now?”
“It’s fun to find the Napa cab producer who loves drinking pinot and chardonnay from the Sonoma Coast or the pinot producer who’s passionate about German Riesling,” White said.
Despite the success of Terroirist, White isn’t contemplating quitting his day job. He’s co-owner and chief operating officer of Keybridge Communications, which he describes as “a boutique public relations firm” in Georgetown.
“My hobby and passion is wine and I love writing, and the blog allows me to combine the two,” White said. “I certainly think it’s the next career for me, but I don’t think that career is for at least a decade.”
On Thursday, White posted his views on the sexy topic of Millennials and their love of wine, in which he mentioned that he was born in 1982. I was already old in 1982.
Virginia was, of course, in the spotlight at the conference, the first held on the East Coast since wine bloggers began gathering in 2008. Swirl, Sip, Snark, a Virginia-based blog by the husband-and-wife team of Grape Envy Guy and Virginia Wine Diva (they don’t use their real names), was nominated for best single-subject blog. That award went to New York Cork Report, which also won the category in 2009 and 2010. But I give a special award to Grape Envy Guy for his hilarious post on a “Celebrity Death Match” comparison of different features of the conference. Love the Raiders of the Lost Ark reference!
Dave McIntyre's WineLine 
Alas, we lost our deathmatch.
Don’t take it too hard. I’ve seen lots of sniping about the Drink Local panel, too! 🙂
I blame the fact that is was post lunch, pre wine tasting.
Michael, I have to give you guys credit for staying on topic and having a set of points to hit probably better than any session at this conference. It was just, for what I do, VERY focused on one narrow part of legal issues re: wine. I went to the session because I’ll occasionally write a post about an issue that catches my eye, and they’re often related to legal issues (usually county ordinances) affecting farm wineries. You guys clearly know your stuff, it was just not a part of the legalities of wine that was as relevant to my style of blogging. Don’t worry, post-lunch food coma played no role in the judge’s decision!
Thanks, I appreciate that. I know it was a tough topic for some. I even made light of that when I went down my regulatory “laundry list”.
And Dave – thanks for the special award! It was disappointing not to topple the colossus that is New York Cork Report, but knowing that we at least made some folks laugh makes it all better.