Five Questions with Tanisha Townsend, Girl Meets Glass

Five Questions with Tanisha Townsend, Girl Meets Glass

Tanisha Townsend is the Chief Wine Officer of Girl Meets Glass, a wine lifestyle and education agency. She currently lives in Paris, France where she creates wine and food pairing experiences for expats and tourists, hosts a wine podcast named Wine School Dropout, and teaches wine courses at universities in Paris.

Your wanderlust and passion have taken you across the country and around the globe. As you've built your wine, beer, and spirits empire in Paris providing unique gastronomical experiences, COVID came over. What would you like guests to know about the new normal? How have you adapted your business model and what'st next  for you in your tourism role?

What I want people to know is things are different now. For sure. People have struggled. People have been confused what to do and how to handle things. Some people have had their business decimated. Some people are scared. These are all things to be taken into consideration.

How have I pivoted - I have moved it online – virtual tastings and webinars. I’ve also drafted tourism and wine guides that can be printed. When the world opens up again, they can use the guides to plan their trip. They can also simply download them now and it will help with their wanderlust.

You've been a student with numerous certifications (WSET 3, CSW, and more) and also an instructor. You've taught at various venues and have moved to online more especially with "Wine School Dropout" a podcast developed by women of color. What is your teaching methodology? If students leave knowing only one thing about wine, what would you like them to leave with?

That’s an interesting question. Because I don’t just have one methodology. I teach different types of students. I teach at two different universities – Anglophones and French students. With French students they are focused more business such as the business of wine. I talk to them about packaging, distribution, import and export, and wine technology. I’m not about to talk to French students about grapes and regions. That’s not how they drink.

American students want to know that. They think they need all of these words and knowledge to drink wine. I am able to expose them to other aspects of the wine world. They are interested in tasting classes and all of that.

In regards to Wine School Dropout, they don’t have to know everything about wine to enjoy it. The first thing people say is I don’t know that much about wine. You don’t have to! You order a Cosmo at the bar  and you enjoy it! Or perhaps you drink a gin and tonic? Do you know the difference between Hendrick’s and Bombay? You just need to know what you like and be able to articulate your preferences and flavor profile. That’s what I want people to get. I want a listener to be able to go to a store and ask questions or read label and pick out what they want. I don’t want them to be be scared or intimated.

You've joined Black Wine Professionals among other award winning writers, educators, sommeliers and more. There's been numerous articles appearing in the wine world for over a year now, but more so recently on racism and discrimination. So many finally coming to terms with racism, bias, and discrimination they may have benefited from or may have done it themselves. You posted in June on your website, "So much is happening in the world right now, protests, riots…the idea of racism is really sinking in with some people." and included your quote from "The Many Hues of Wine Talent" piece. In that quote, you talk about finally people are changing the way we talk about wine. For those that don't know, how was wine talked about in the past? How has it changed for the better? Who is leading that charge to making it better?

I think the younger generation is leading that charge to make it better. We are coming to wine from  a simple enjoyment of it. We are traveling more. In your travels and fine dining you come across wine. Wine is being talked about and poured. We are coming to wine in that way.

Unctuous – no one uses that word. Who talks like this? Nobody. Stop those shenanigans. Get people to use regular words – fruit, acid, alcohol. Stick with those.

You've been a trendsetter for years in wine and more. What do you see as emerging wine trends? Are they different based on country such as France vs the US?

Different yes. Natural wine is one of the most polarizing topics in the industry. The trend of people actually caring more about what’s going into their bodies. What makes it natural? Currently, natural wine is simply natural wine - nothing added or taken away. What does it really mean and how do we define it?

Wine marketing is a trend that needs to be improved greatly. There are these crazy laws as why wine is marketed in a certain way in France. People can’t look like they are enjoying it and can’t have a glass of wine in their hands. That’s a French law. That doesn’t  get people going and that doesn’t get people excited.

A trend towards differences in marketing, natural wines, online wine sales (direct to consumer) especially during COVID. Tasting rooms are closed. If their main mode of sales was in tasting room that has since moved online. Different shipping and pick ups – they need to keep those in place. It works, so why not keep this new form of sales in place?

If you were a wine, what wine would you be? What would be on the label?

Chardonnay because Chardonnay is a chameleon. People discount it on first glance. People will blind taste it and it’s fantastic. People usually have strong feelings that they love it or hate it, but it can function in any situation. Depending on where it originates from, there’s different flavors that come out. I have many different facets of my personality, but in the end…it’s still all me.

I would have as the label a silhouette of a curvy woman or an abstract. That’s me. People are down on women’s bodies or persecute them. That’s something I want to highlight, but a different type of body.

Do you remember the first Girl Meets Glass logo? It was a woman’s body in a glass. People used to ask constantly, “Is that your silhouette?” I used to laugh and respond, “No, but that would be dope.”