Wine Tasting- A sensory experience
Tasting wine is a truly sensory experience. From the moment the cork comes out of the bottle with a faint “pop,” to actually drinking and tasting the wine, all the senses are engaged.
First, you hear
Once you’ve chosen your bottle of wine and you’re ready to enjoy it, it’s time to open it! The first sense is stimulated – your hearing. Your sense of hearing is continually stimulated as the wine is poured into the glass.
Second, you touch
The wine glass influences the temperature, bouquet, taste, balance, and finish of the wine. There are many different types of glasses, but generally glasses with smaller bowls are for white wines, larger bowls are for red wines, and flutes are for sparkling wine and champagne. Riedel is a company known for their extensive collection of wine glasses and the science behind each design.
Then, you see
The third step to wine tasting is checking the color and clarity of your wine. It is easiest to distinguish color on a white background. When you are determining color, look past just red and white, because a closer look can enable you to gauge the grape and age of the wine. Red wines tend to lighten as they age, whereas white wines become darker in color.
When tasting, you can also look at the “legs” or as the French say, the “tears” of the wine. When you swirl your wine in your glass, the rate at which the legs fall is a result of the Marangoni Effect, and can help determine alcohol content of the wine.
Next, you smell
When you smell your wine, you first take a quick whiff and gain a first impression of the wine. Next, put your nose into the glass and take a deep breath. You may smell oak, berry, tobacco, pepper, vanilla, or many other scents. Then swirl the wine again, and sniff. You may identify more scents than you did the first time!
Don’t underestimate the power of smell, because what you smell greatly influences what you taste. A master sommelier once said, “You can only taste 5 things – bitter, sweet, sour, salty, and umami – but the number of things you can smell is endless.”
And finally, taste
First, take a small sip and swirl it in your mouth. Different areas on the tongue are sensitive to different types of taste, and incorporating them all enables you to experience the full taste of the wine. After the first impression, your palate gets the chance to distinguish the taste. Finally, after you swallow the wine you are left with the finish. This is the lasting impression the wine has in your mouth, the taste you continue to experience even after the wine is gone.
We hope you enjoyed this break down of the senses and wine tasting, and we’d love to know your thoughts and comments! If you liked this, there will be more, we will be writing soon on how label design and brand image influence your purchasing decision and maybe even how you perceive the taste and quality of the wine. CNN also has added a great addition to their Eatocracy blog- a series called Leggy and Luscious that’s all about wine tasting and experience.
Special thanks to John Banquil, Regional General Manager at Ling and Louie’s Asian Bar and Grill for his input and help writing this article!
Posted by on June 27, 2011 Speak Your Mind
Brand Sense
Brand Sense by Martin Lindstrom is a must read for the progressive marketer. Lindstrom focuses on the immense power the five senses have in influencing how consumers feel about brands. He analyzes how the most successful brands today, like Apple and Coca-Cola use sensory branding to entice consumers and create a community of raving fans.
Lindstrom delves into the psychology behind consumer preferences and translates the science into something readable, giving examples of brands that incorporate scent, sound, touch, taste, and sight into their brand experience. This multi-sensory encounter makes the brand more memorable, and increases brand loyalty.
Lindstrom’s other works include Buyology, Brand Child, Brand Building, and Clicks, Bricks & Brands.
If you’re interested in reading Brand Sense, click here to order!
Posted by on June 21, 2011 Speak Your Mind
Can you smell that?
Can you imagine a life with anosmia?
Probably not, because you have no idea what anosmia is, and if you do – we’re impressed. For those of you that don’t know, it means you can’t smell. Think for a moment what it would be like to lose this sense. No aroma of freshly baked cookies, cut grass, or roses; no detection of sour milk, a gas leak, or smoke from a fire. Our sense of smell is important to our other senses of as well. When we have a cold or stuffy nose, we lose up to 80% of our sense of taste.
It’s clear that our sense of smell is useful, but how does it relate to business? Using smell in branding can really help a brand stand out. The sense of smell is most closely linked to our memory – probably because it influences 75% of our daily emotions. Think about an up-scale open house. The sense-savvy realtor may have put cookies in the oven just before the showing was about to start. The scent of freshly baked cookies probably evoked a positive memory in every person walking through the house, whether they noticed it or not. Those potential buyers may not remember the realtor’s name or what the neighborhood was called, but they will remember how walking into that house made them feel, and that feeling will stay with them long after they leave the house.
So, what does your brand smell like? Some are easy, Starbucks smells like coffee and Crayola crayons have a distinct smell; but some are more difficult. What is the scent of a landscaping company? It doesn’t have to be as cut and dry as an actual smell, a brand’s scent can be more abstract. It might be a feeling of relief that comes from freshly cut grass – something that has a scent. You can use this aspect of your sense profile to develop marketing collateral and find imagery, colors, and other designed aspects that are consistent with your brand.
Still skeptical? Think of a baby, it has a very distinct “baby” smell. Now answer this: does Johnson and Johnson smell like a baby, or does the baby smell like Johnson and Johnson? Talk about being sensitized!
Posted by on June 8, 2011 Speak Your Mind
Restaurant’s brands are greatly influenced by front of house staff
Does a restaurant’s brand reflect in the front-of-house employees’ appearance, attitude, and guest interaction? These employees are communicating with guests from the moment the guest walks through the door and is greeted by a host. That host just made a first impression, and that hello was an opportunity to reinforce the brand. Every impression the staff makes on a guest is a reflection of a restaurant’s brand.
The following are a few guidelines to ensure employees are reinforcing the core brand values of a restaurant:
1. Appearance. Are the employee’s uniforms consistent with the company? A steak house and sports bar usually have different uniforms for a reason. Giving uniforms a more unique appearance by adding design work can make your brand stand out and reinforce the brand in the employee’s mind.
A restaurant’s logo should always be visible to the guest. This means more than just signage at the door and on the menu. Everything from the pen used to take an order or sign a credit card receipt to an after dinner mint can have a logo on it. The more times a guest sees a logo, the more likely they are to recognize it.
2. Talking to guests. All restaurant owners want their guests to feel comfortable and welcome, and try to hire friendly, personable employees to fit this need. But employees should be interacting differently in different restaurants. This can be as simple as referring to the guests by the name that was taken down with the reservation, as opposed to just “sir” or “miss”.
Remember that negative interactions between guests and staff are more memorable than those that are positive. Here is Aaron Allen’s encounter with Le Bernadin and how his experiences were broadcast to thousands of followers via social media.
Communicating expectations for how employees are expected to interact with guests can be done through proper and continuous training. Creating a brand book as part of an employee handbook is a great way to reinforce a restaurant’s brand.
3. Sales. Restaurants need sales to survive. Employees should be trained to go into specific detail about each and every item on the menu. It is much more persuasive to hear about the preparation, marinade, side dishes, and taste than it is to hear “it’s good.”
Servers with photographic memories are few and far between, so this goal may seem far-fetched. Creating an insert for the check presenter that servers take down orders with is a great way to give employees a cheat sheet.
4. Attitude. We’ve all had that tired server that seems to hate their job. That server probably affected not only your dining experience, but everyone they waited on that night, that week, or even that year. You, and everyone else that encountered that server, might have told friends, or posted a review on Yelp, or Tweeted about their experience. Many opinions were shaped and affected by one server. Companies can make certain they keep employees happy by hiring people that have similar core values, expectations, and brand vision as the company. Do you want to use your employees to your advantage in the online world? Here is a great blog on the subject!
The best employees are those that love coming to work because it doesn’t seem like work – it’s a passion. At Miss Details Design, our passions combine to create exceptional work for our clients. Remember that the employees in your restaurant are a team, and their efforts in working together are what create a memorable and enjoyable experience for your guests.
Have you had an exceptional restaurant experience lately? We’d love to hear about what stuck in your head after you left! Please share your stories.
Posted by on June 6, 2011 2 People spoke their mind... How about you?
June Calendar
It’s the first of June, and that means a few new desktop calendars to choose from! This month we will be featuring two images from Mark Susan and one image for our animal lovers out there from Cactus Canine.
About the images
These ducks were photographed in downtown Phoenix’s Encanto Park. This image is classic, and vintage!
Beautiful summer blossoms, these orange-yellow flowers are sure to brighten your day!
Cute and snuggly, everyone needs a little puppy love sometimes!
To enjoy (instructions): Click the image of the wallpaper you’d like, and a larger version will open in a new window. Right click on this image, and select “Set as Desktop Background”. If that size doesn’t fit, click on the link that’s the right size for your screen and then right click the bigger image. You’ll never forget what day it is!
Enjoy and look forward to more calendars next month!
Posted by on June 1, 2011 Speak Your Mind