Made In Piedmont Wines - Past, Present and Future.

Karina Imschoot, past-present-future of both Made In Piedmont Wines and Italia Incentives, where it all started

Yesterday I got a phone call from a European agency asking me how I actually ended up in wine-gastronomy tourism as well as wine importing. There have been pretty much "before" periods and intermediate steps. Ready for a catchy story? Here we go. A flashback to earlier periods but one is a consequence of the other.

After studying corporate translation- Interpreter English-French, I studied German for two more years and Italian evening school for three. years;  At home only RAI was on, especially the program Eredità was instructive. Did a few more "crappy jobs" but very soon I became self-employed.

The newly born baby of the self-employed was named "Dolce Vita Events". The first years this was mainly with the then hot item "teambuilding murder games" and "murder dinners" with actors and actresses at event location Het Kasteel Van Wippelgem near Ghent. I ended up in the VRT program "De Rechtvaardige Rechters" (vrt radio now, then Brt) and the next day I had an email box with 350 requests to do my thing, to go on the killing spree. Then came seminars, conferences, theme parties, staff parties, executive and sales incentives and ok Italy was included in this.

At the same time, I was also active at Vervecken's Artiesten Klub, impresario, international booking agency with a.o. Berdien Steinberg, Johnny Logan etc... Still about 16 years I had a background events. The Dolce Vita Events era ended in 2012, the last year I did almost no events. Forced decision because Kasteel Van Wippelgem was sold (our event location murder games/murder dinners) and in Sint-Martens-Latem location with our James Bond Teambuilding we were no longer welcome because of our "nuisance noise". Days from Thursday to Saturday working almost 20 hrs per day had overburdened me. I was living on the Red Bulls !!!

Meanwhile from 2006 I was already working from my base in Lede near Aalst ( Belgium) on small scale incentives in Italy (groups up to 20 people). The agenda of Dolce Vita Events with domestic and foreign events I managed quite well.

In 2011 it was decided to go public with an Italian bvba (srl), an accountant in Turin was sought, a notary and on March 8, 2011 (International Women's Day) a new baby was born, namely Italia Incentives. Finding an accountant in Turin was quite an undertaking. One of my suppliers told me: go with jeans, a white t-shirt or pullover, the cheapest shoes you can find and no jewelry. In other words, don't show who you really are. So done: visited 9 accountants, 8 of them looked at me as if I came from some undeveloped country. The last one gave me space.

For the sake of appearance, the new baby "Italia Incentives" was not located in Turin but in a business center in Viale Abruzzi 11 in the beating heart of Milan. Other than drawing up the contracts, have never been there. Mail was sent to me, and scanned in advance and quickly processed via email. The accountant's tip" take Milan as your business location" did work wonders.

What did Italia Incentives do? As the name implies, company incentives which may or may not be combined with seminars and congresses with event locations almost 70% Rome, 30% mix Langhe Cuneo - Milan - Sicily - Sardegna etc... Meanwhile I was also a guest at educationals (trips for travel agencies to get to know the regions) and got to know all the regions with food & wine except Calabria and Molise. Certainly 80% of the business was in months of May-June-September-October and then it was internal flying or tracks with the Frecciarossa from one location to another.

Spicy detail: between all those trips I rarely came back to Belgium. So how did I go about having clothes everywhere? I always travel with hand luggage (computer + film equipment). From Belgium to various locations in Italy, up to 7 suitcases were sent with DHL. Those suitcases all had to go to various hotels. Once there, event or incentive over, after washing and ironing at hotel service, one suitcase after another was sent via an Italian forwarding agent. Mailboxes has offices all over Italy and so the suitcases - each from separate locations - went to the next location at lightning speed. And so the suitcases  traveled independently all over Italy. Just to manage where which suitcase was, where it had to go, what clothes were in it (think dress codes) I had to keep a full accounting! One suitcase delayed and there was a mega problem!

May 2012 came an important decision: I was going to live in Italy, specifically Cherasco with a family-run coffee company on a heritage à la Melrose place but without the pool and without haughty women. From a 250 m2 house to a 75 m2 property. Shurgard had a fat customer in me because all that furniture had to be stored somewhere. The smell of roasted coffee beans was in my clothes. Italia Incentives just kept running but the moves became more difficult. It is easier to fly from Belgium to Rome than to track or fly from Cherasco to Rome via Turin. That so much time was going to be lost, I hadn't thought about that.

As of April 26, 2013, there was a new situation. Since I was getting questions from my Italia Incentives audience in the trend of "Can we also come to you to do this privately with our family" Italia Incentives was renamed Made In Italy Travel, BtoB and BtoC. (corporate/private public). This change was accompanied by the move to a really very large building of 220m2 in the most idyllic location of Barbaresco Tre Stelle with immense garden (a.o. 80 fruit trees) and 150 m2 of underground storage space for wines.

Customers were very rarely of Belgian origin but coming from countries like Netherlands, Russia, US, Switzerland, Brazil, Japan, China, Brazil etc... As their friends or colleagues were also other nationalities, I had to quickly switch between Dutch, French, English, rarely German and Italian for communication with event venues, interviews etc. That's where my training as a Translator-Interpreter came in handy. However, if you spend 8 hours a day jumping from one language to another, you are "exhausted" at the end of the day. And that situation is day after day. Communicating during Masterclasses or tastings in English became the standard but after the masterclass or presentation at the winery, the audience quickly noticed from my incoming phones that I spoke not only English, but also French, Italian, German, not forgetting my native language Dutch. Then people came to me with their questions, comments, etc., in their native language.

It became less and less easy for me to travel continuously and to follow the circus of sending and returning suitcases. Another change in 2014: the company that started as Italia Incentives, later Made In Italy Travel became Piemonte Travel. My love of wines was started with an additional addition to Piedmont Travel that was named Made In Piedmont Wines. English name because we were totally in the international sphere. No website first year yet, just Excel tables. Focus so only Piedmont!

The combination between Piedmont Travel and Made In Piedmont Wines went wonderfully well. Whoever visited Piedmont, bought wines. Whoever bought wines, sooner or later visited Piedmont. It was a pity that Made In Piedmont Wines did not really take off in Belgium, so additional events were launched in Flanders. That didn't really run smoothly, far from it. I rented a castle for one event, but there were far too few attendees. So my marketing wasn't working in Belgium at the time. Meanwhile, the Made In Piedmont Wines website was launched in three languages - Dutch, French and English.

Only the well-known wineries were visited with Piedmont Travel but with their approach to me I felt no click. I had enough of Blassonnés (people who think they outshine everyone else). Choice was made for the small, family-owned businesses. Those entities had no reviews from journalists, but there the winemaker still does the tasting himself. Since they had no social media, no marketing strategy, I included that part as well. However, it takes a lot more work to market an unknown shrimp. By my choice of unknown wineries to promote, to sell, I made it extremely difficult for myself.

On January 2, 2016, I returned to the Melrose Place of Via La Morra 44 in Cherasco. Stockages in Barbaresco were being sold. I was to attend a 3-year sommelier training at Associazione Italiana Sommelier, AisPiemonte, Turin branch. Realizing that the training, additional events with training purposes all over Piedmont partly organized by AIS (Associazione Italiana Sommelier) but also other entities would largely absorb my time, two important decisions were made.

Numero uno: Anita, a British from Alba, was incorporated into the company. Also with Irina - Russian based in Turin - with action area mainly Barolo, Barbaresco, Roero, ties had already been forged. I would devote myself to my training and outsource Piedmont Travel assignments to them. Both Anita and Irina were already doing whatever I was doing. Suddenly we were not "so called" competitors but close colleagues.

That diploma Ais sommelier I would and had to get. Classes were always in one language: Italian. And fast Italian! In addition, Made In Piedmont Wines continued to develop with shipments through our shipping agent IWS LOGISTICS from La Morra. Very smoothly the boxes of wine flew towards Scandinavia, US etc... but still to a very limited extent in Belgium, more precisely Flanders. That I as a Flemish in my Flanders had such a hard time getting off the ground, that was quite something. It gave me a splitting headache day after day! In life you can't change certain things and so I tried to avoid the migraines by simply throwing my ideals off the table in Flanders. 

I still ask myself how I worked that ball during that time. After all, there are only 24 hours in a day and I needed 48. Very hard focus, delegating, short contract termination times, and excellent agenda management were the basis.

Numero due: given a huge investment in personal growth, costs relative to profit margin had to be kept low, so I had moved back to Cherasco. From large-scale house, wine cellar and garden to an apartment with terrace and garden.

The Melrose Place in Cherasco was great: my upstairs neighbor Michela cooked, I provided the wines. I also often did the shopping considering with her work that was quasi-impossible. We walked the dogs together, made Turin unsafe with our private from " wine bar to wine bar tours" from early evening to late at night. In Turin we were two incognitos, which helped! Two women having the time of their lives with a huge tire, a Saab Areo Convertible, two dogs Baco and Joe. Sometimes we had parties with 12 people, 7 nationalities and everyone brought me one dish in sharing formula. Being in wine business, I was given tasting bottles here and there. How valuable this was to actually test out everything directly on 7 nationalities! I got real time reviews life on Michela's immense terrace, overlooking by the way the vineyards and hazelnut plantations.

However 2019 came to an end: my accountant with his 400% higher invoices compared to the start nailed me. Also the fact that Italy doesn't really have a solid social security plan. So at the end of 2019, I drove my silver Saab Cabrio Aereo back to Belgium. Joe- Australian shepherd dog- in the back seat with a hefty speeding ticket in Switzerland as a parting gift. A storage space at incidentally an Italian with son located in Charleroi was rented, everything moved from Cherasco to Bra and done. The stock of furniture etc... was picked up by my business partner at the end of the storage space rental period.

Returning to Lede was impossible as I had sold my very large premises. The prices in Flanders were mega expensive, so I gambled on Wallonia. Immoweb had its biggest fan in me, lived in a hotel for a few weeks (yes, with an Aussie sheepdog).

One so-called newly renovated property with very high historical value was announced without photos. Contacted the owner, pictures would be online by the end of the week. Continuous focus on Immoweb. I would and had to be the first to go to this property. The published photos were overwhelming. Decided in barely 10 minutes: this is where I'm going to live.

It did require some work. Of the garden which is 1.5 acres, at least 1.2 acres had to be fenced so that my now deceased Joe replaced by the puppy Asanka (also Australian shepherd) in all his enthusiasm could not dig to get away. The entrance was concreted with fencing up to 30 cm below the ground so that our highly coveted pup could not run into the street.

Important detail: there would be fast internet, only that still had to be installed from the street over about 50 meters. The owner thought this had already been realized a few years before. Even inside, I could take out the tube with so-called "fast internet". My business selling wine in Belgium suddenly began to take off. This was next to international, of course, but I had no internet for 4 weeks until Proximus - the internet operator - pulled the cables.

The only solution was that I went "internet camping" at the Five Nations Golf Resort, a mere 30 seconds drive from my property. I drank locks of coffee, set up in the bar AND was able to work. Continuous power outages on my property didn't make my life easy either.

After four weeks, all the cables had been pulled through. Everything went wonderfully well, may be for once, a warehouse was provided externally in extra on top of the underground cellars. The wine import & sales and Piemonte Travel business actually ran from Méan, even though we have the office in Mechelen. This is therefore where the Méan Estate was created in this beautifully renovated building.

Since 2019, Flanders went up in terms of sales and reached the same level as international sales for wines. However, my love for Piedmont was not yet extinguished to be back "alive and kicking" present. I was too homesick. After two years in Méan I decided to buy a design house in Zoalengo, Monferrato, which for all kinds of highly annoying technical reasons I sold within 6 months with still a nice profit margin. 

Briefly lived in other places in Flanders, but through our neighbor I learned that the property in Méan was vacant again. I jumped on it like crazy and now I absolutely never want to leave here in my life.

Anyway I breathe in Piedmont, I breathe out Piedmont, at least 14 hours in a day. Day after day, month after month, year after year. Let me lose that connection to Piedmont daily in telephone and written conversations with my suppliers, with other important Piedmontese characters and you can put me right in a coffin. In that case, life doesn't have to go on at all for me!

Just the day before yesterday I communicated with an influencer food, locations, lifestyle from Turin. Daniele told me "You are actually our Piedmontese". That's the best compliment I've had in 36 years of working life. This then sums up everything. Piedmont for me is not only 300% passion, but also my mission and values. This simply controls all my life!

Now I do have another project in mind for which I may have to use my Milan office and since I still have a VAT number in Milan, Viale Abruzzi 11 registered, it is small effort to reopen this VAT number. With that, for now, secret project, the circle just comes full circle. Then a third passion is also included in my goals!

I communicate very little about private issues or a path I have taken but since there is so much demand, the time has come to do so. This is therefore an exceptional blog!

So I think I have given an insight into the past, present and future because Piedmont must be lifted higher. The sky is not the limit. Alla prossima ! Karina - Méan Estate.

Photo was taken 2013 in my garden in Barbaresco Tre Stelle.

Would you also like to come and taste at the Méan Estate? Then surf via this link to our info page: Summer Tastings Méan Estate