#he looks like a vp at a regional bank
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BARBERâS LICENSE REVOKED
TYLER PAUL SEGUIN WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR HAIR
#do barbers have licenses?? unsure#but this one should not#he looks like a vp at a regional bank#tyler seguin#dallas stars
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This just running through my mind What do male VP agents do when F (reader) get catcalling ?? I got that today and itâs just made me frustrated.
For real anon, Iâm so sorry this happened to you cause itâs awful when it does. Pls rest assured that no one in the Valorant protocol would let that kinda thing slide. Hope youâre doing okay now xx
Male VP Agents x Fem!Reader: if you get catcalled
Breach
Breachâs care for you is only matched by his explosive personality. As soon as he catches a whiff of a shout or whistle, his eyes flare, veins pop and he just about charges over
âWhat the hell did you just call her? You feel brave enough to say that to her face? Youâre gonna say that to her?â
Of all the agents, probably one of the two most likely to straight up start a fight. He definitely grabs them by the shoulders, and most thinking people would yield and apologise at that point. Otherwise they will end up on the ground. Breach is a seasoned criminal, he doesnât lose street fights.
Once heâs finally satisfied that the threat is gone, definitely comes back over as fast as he can and his demeanour changes instantly to concerned and gentle.
âYou okay? Sorry about that, some people donât know how to act and itâs bullshit that you have to deal with it. I got you, yeah?â Grabs you in the biggest bear hug, like heâs scared of letting you go.
Brimstone
Whoof theyâre about to get disciplined.
As soon as he hears something, he cranes his head over, and anyone whoâs said anything will know theyâre in for it as soon as they make eye contact
Brim shoots you a quick, reassuring smile and a clap on the back before walking over, calm but imposing
âYou-er, say something about my lady friend there champ?â
Anyone who isnât stupid enough to apologise to the massive figure looming over them is about to get a serious talk. He gives them a chance to let the words sink in, levelling with them about respect and generally not being a dick.
If they still donât yield or they try to get physical, Brim puts his years of service to use by neatly sending them on their way.
Once heâs back over, heâs fussing over you, ruffling your hair and generally just placing himself between you and the world for a bit.
Chamber
Chamber is not stupid. He knows whatâs a compliment and whatâs grossly inappropriate.
Seeing you freeze up dislodges something within him
One rendezvous by you, one by them. The catcaller gets a voice right in their ear. âThatâs no way to speak to anyone, let alone someone like her. A grave mistake.â
Before they can respond, a flicker sends Chamber right back to you, now standing between you and the caller. His back fully to the guy, he turns to look at you
Heâs putting a brave face on it, but you can see the rage prickling quietly behind his eyes. âLet us go, ma belle. They are not worth your time.â
He brings you in for a chaste kiss, arm encircles your waist, and uses the rendezvous for a speedy exit.
The caller will get a shock when they get home to find a business card lodged in their jacket. On the back in an elegant font are the words âfuck offâ.
Cypher
With the passive programs heâs constantly running in any public place, Cypher knows the catcallerâs IP address before he turns around.
Having lost loved ones before, Cypher is hyper-alert around you in public. His eyes fix yours, and instantly he sees that this has gotten to you as much as youâre trying to hold it back. His arms go up almost involuntarily to hold your shoulders for a second, makes sure youâre safe, then he turns around to face the asshole
âYou should not be talking like that while you have left your second wife Vanessa to look after little Billie and Charlie while you went on a -shall we say- business trip my friend. I am sure Kingdom would not take to kindly to one of their regional branch managers using work time to sleep around in a different city with a younger woman.â
The catcaller is speechless. He looks like he wants to cry
Cypher continues by rattling off his three previous addresses, bank account number (including offshore redirects) and social security number. âThe walls have ears my friend. You should shut up more and listen to them.â
He hurries you home after this, and practically doesnât leave your side for the next week, peppering you with kisses and holding you close at every opportunity
KAY/0
For a moment, as bad as youâre feeling you would have thought Kay/0 had short-circuited. It almost distracts you from the initial shock of being cat-called.
Then you can almost hear his internals whirring as he processes the gravity of the situation. The visualisers start to turn red. You donât know they did that.
âUhh⊠Kay? You doing okay?â
âNegative. Hostile spotted on visual sensors. Preparing to engage.â
âHe was just catcalling, I donât know ifâŠâ you trail off. It was pretty shit, actually. This seems to snap Kay/0 out of his spiral for a second, and he takes a moment to grab you and assess your disposition.
Kay holds your shoulders. âNegative. That kind of behaviour is hugely damaging and objectively bullshit. Nothing about that is justifiable. He needs to know, and he needs to never do it again if he values his vitals. Unless you say otherwise, Iâm preparing to engage.â
Happy enough for Kay/0 to do his thing at that point, you lean into a quick hug, and watch as the caller starts to bolt it as a literal giant killer robot starts marching towards him. You donât think heâll do it again.
Omen
Ohohoho. Ufufufufu. Youâre not an easy target, youâre a highly skilled agent. Omen marvels at the fact that people feel entitled to say shit to you, just because you happen to be pretty.
Instantly, his voice is in your ear. âDid you want toooo, or should IâŠ?â
When you donât offer your usual dry remark, it gets his attention. âShit, this really got to her.â It almost hadnât occurred to Omen that youâd be bothered by anyone so insignificant, but as soon as he sees your frustration heâs ready to make it hurt.
He flickers and whirls around you for a second, cupping your cheek in his hands. âA moment please, then.â
Fade may be the resident haunting expert, but Omen is the OG. Suddenly, the catcallerâs world is dark. There are voices in his ears, ranging from whispers to screams. Heâs caught off balance, and canât really do much but stumble around and apologise.
Omen offers a sharp kick to the back to send him on his way, materialising by your side.
âI donât think heâll be doing that again, my love. But letâs eat in and have a quiet night tonight.â
Phoenix
âNah cause did he just say that?â
Phoenix turns to you. âYou hear this guy? He said that?â Seeing your deflated expression, this man is pretty livid.
Phoenixâs first instinct is to wrap you tightly, shielding you from the catcaller and calming your racing heart a little. It makes it a whole lot easier to block out the rising stress when your very own solar core is right there.
âWant me to go over there?â
You think for a moment. âMmhm. Please, if you canâŠâ
Phoenix reluctantly releases you from the embrace, and strolls towards the guy.
âIâm gonna give you ten seconds to give me a good apology that I can relay back to her. Uh-uh, not an excuse. A proper apology. Go.â
The guy legs it, and Phoenix comes back over to you.
âHey, you right? I got you, yeah? No one talks to you like that, not ever, and especially not on my watch.â He doesnât stray far from your side after that, getting you back home and ordering in your favourite for a chill night of movies and cuddles.
Sova
Oh you just know that Sovaâs keen eyes and hearing have located this guy before you can even comprehend whatâs going on.
Immediately, he tenses and looks over to you. Seeing you tense up and grit your teeth only serves to reinforce the quiet rage bubbling up in his chest.
âMy love.â
âSashaâ
âThis man should be taught a lesson, no?â
ââŠI think so, yeah.â
âOne moment please.â He gives you a quick kiss on the forehead and turns to walk over to the guy.
Towering over the catcaller, he very simply says; ânot her. Not anyone. You never know who might be watching.â
This guy is absolutely not going to try your tall, beautiful partner. He bolts.
âNow come, my love. Let me look after you this evening.â
Yoru
So remember how Breach was voted one of two most likely to start a fight? Yeah, hereâs the other one.
As soon and I mean as SOON as Yoru hears any kind of bullshit coming from that guyâs mouth, you practically have to hold him back.
âYoru, my sweet boy, listen to me. You remember what happened last time you got in a fight yeah?â
âHmm? Yeah they dealt with the hospital.â
âYoru, Brim dealt with the bill.â
â⊠So? This guy said shit, you think Iâm just gonna stand there and watch you take it? Worst comes to worst, he dies. Back soon.â He presses his lips to yours, brushes your hair out of your eyes, and then jogs over to the guy with a none-too-friendly look on his face
God forbid the guy try to square up. If he does, Yoru has him on the ground embarrassingly quickly.
Satisfied with his work, Yoru brushes himself off and flashes back to you. You can tell by his heaving shoulders that heâs still furious, and when you wrap your arms around him he draws you into a fierce hug.
The two of you let your heart rates settle back in, as Yoru slowly relaxes back into your embrace
âRyo..? You doing okay there buddy?â
âYeah. I just⊠hate that people think they can talk to you like that. Iâll make sure it never happens again.â
#valorant#valorant x reader#valorant breach#breach#breach x reader#valorant brimstone#brimstone#brimstone x reader#valorant chamber#chamber#chamber x reader#valorant cypher#cypher#cypher x reader#valorant kay/o#kay/o#kay/o x reader#valorant omen#omen#omen x reader#valorant phoenix#phoenix#phoenix x reader#valorant sova#sova#sova x reader#valorant yoru#yoru#yoru x reader#lozcanons
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3 Reasons Youâre Struggling in Your Job Search
While there is a myriad of reasons job seekers struggle with their job search, I believe the following are the top 3 reasons:
1. The ongoing narratives in your head. [The storm is in your mind, not in your life.]
You have a mental dialogue going on in your head that never stops. This ongoing mental dialogue [narratives] determines your actions, beliefs, values, and moods. When you tell yourself, "Hiring managers are scared to hire me because I'm overqualified. They think I will not stick around. This is why I'm not getting any interviews." you're not simply reacting to why you're not getting interviews. You're voicing the limiting narratives you bought into and anticipating the prospect of more to come.
The importance of the narratives you carry in your head cannot be overrated. Your mental narratives can inspire you, or they can deplete you. The single most significant predictor of success isn't the facts of your situation but the stories you tell yourself.
With determination and consistent, repetitive effort, you can reengineer the narratives in your head, so they serve you as opposed to hindering. Take some time and reflect on the narratives you mentally carry and whether they're creating limiting beliefs. Winston Churchill, during World War II, at the height of the Blitz, instructed Londoners to "Keep Calm and Carry On." These five words were a simple narrative reset that changed the course of history.
Small shifts in your mindset can trigger a cascade of changes so profound it'll leave you speechless. You'll wonder why you were holding onto limiting belief narratives for so long.
"I have lots of qualifications and experience. I just need to find an employer that'll see my qualifications as assets, not that I'm overqualified. That employer is out there, and I'll find them!"
You know the adage, "What you believe is what you'll achieve." As a job seeker, embrace this adage for all it's worth.
2. Your expectations
The key to happiness is having realistic expectations. Your expectations directly impact your attitude and mindset. When you meet or exceed your expectations, you tend to have a positive attitude and mindset. The reverse is also true: If you don't meet your expectations, you tend to have a less-than-stellar attitude or mindset.
If you want to prolong your job search, then make the biggest mistake I see job makers makeâtrying to duplicate your last job. Your previous job had a base salary of $90K, plus an annual bonus of $20K, full medical and dental, stock options, 3 weeks paid time off, 10 sick days, etc. 15 years ago, you had hit the mother lode. Hopefully, you had a good run. Unfortunately, like millions of others have experienced these past 14 months, you were forced to move on. Sometimes it's better to be let go from a job that wasn't working for you than from a job you enjoyed. If your job was grating against you, then consider yourself blessed to have been let go. Now you have the opportunity [time] to find the right job for you.
Your first step is to give serious thought to what you need compensation-wise to live comfortably, to cover your necessities [needs, not wants]. After removing all your "wants" spending, most of which is an attempt at buying happiness, trying to impress family, friends, and strangers, and seeking their approval, you'll surprise yourself with how much less than your previous salary you can live on.
It's much easier to find a $65K job than it is a $90K. Your goal is to get back to work, not to have a lengthy job search eating away at any savings you may have.
Think of the lowest hanging fruits possible.
Now take it a step further. Is it realistic [in your case] to find a job close to home? Hence, mitigating commuting costs, maybe even forgo owning an automobile? What about finding a job that's 100% remote?
Now's the time to evaluate your lifestyle and ask yourself if maintaining the "lifestyle you've become accustomed to" stresses you out? Is your lifestyle worth the effort it takes to maintain [seriously]? Then there's the big question: Is your lifestyle bringing you happiness or causing anxiety?
Was climbing towards the upper rungs of the corporate ladder worth the mental fatigue caused by the office politics you had to constantly navigate and the long hours to look like a "team player?
A job search is a chance to get to know yourself. Access your strengths and weaknesses. Where your passions lie. What brings you happiness, what makes your stomach tighten up. Would downsizing your lifestyle make you calmer? Answer these questions and contemplate your career thus far, then answer the ultimate question: How did I get to where I am today and why? Your answers will guide you in creating realistic job search expectations.
Realistic expectations are an integral part of any job search strategy, especially if you don't want to be out of the job market long.
3. Not looking for your tribe. [Where you belong.]
Finding your tribe means being honest with yourself about what kind of conversations, connections and social interactions feed your soul.
The best advice I can give job seekers: Look for your tribe!
Stop looking for a job and start looking for where you'll belong.
You put in 27 years with a bank. A few months back, you were called into the boardroomâyou know the rest. 27 years is an incredibly good run these days, as well you made a good middle-class living. You were able to raise a family in the suburbs, vacation every summer, cover your kid's university tuition fees, buy that' 64 Pontiac GTO you thought would recapture your youth. Life was sweet, but your true happiness came on the weekends when you barbequed for your family, friends, and neighbours. Marinating meats, experimenting with wood chips, grilling vegetablesâyou even learned to make a wickedly good pizza on your barbeque, which astonishes everyone.
Here is an idea: Why not go work for a barbecue grill manufacturer if one exists close by, or maybe work for a retailer that sells all things to do with barbequing? Do you think you'd happier spending your days talking about what brings you happiness?
Golf would be a better example. I know an ex-midlevel marketing executive and avid golfer who worked for a large global consumer good company. He thought he was tracking to be the next regional VP and therefore put up with the travelling, back-stabbing office politics, constantly having to sell himself and dealing with department heads with their own agenda. Then a shuffle in the leadership upstairs resulted in a new boss. Eight months later, at the age of 49, he was shown the door. More than once, he told me golf is what kept him sane. For the past 7 years, he's been an assistant manager at a local Golf Town and is much happier. [I got this declaration from his wife.]
Is he making the money he once did? No, but he is in a much better place. Having experienced the difference myself, working for the money and working where I belonged, I'll take "working where you belong" any day over money and being miserable.
Consider what you are passionate about. What values matter most to you? What skills do you enjoy using? Where someone your age would be considered an asset? Look for companies where you'll be a natural fit.
Make finding where you belong a priority is the best compass a job seeker can use.
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Just Lunch Dating Norwalk Connecticut
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We had a good conversation, I remember he was easy to talk to and it went by too fast. Things moved pretty quickly by our fourth/fifth date and not too long after we became pretty much inseparable.
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Anndy Lian Spoke at Economics Summit 2020: âCryptocurrency recreates the future of finance.â
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COVID19 has brought uncertainty to every sector. The financial industry has not been spared. There are vital concerns that are emerging for the Banking & Capital Markets. Economics Summit 2020, held on 2 November 2020, gathered a panel of industry experts to discuss current challenges and share future insights on the topic. Anndy Lian, one of the panelists, shared insights on Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDC) and its form in the future.
The panel consists of Kent Choi (Team Leader, Credit Suisse), Yvonne Zhang (Director, Risk Advisory, Deloitte), Andrew Colquhoun (Executive Director, Monetary Authority of Singapore), and Anndy Lian (Advisory Board Member, Hyundai DAC) and moderated by Pau Khua Mung.
The topic of Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDC) came up during the discussion. CBDC is known as a new type of currency that governments around the world are experimenting with. It is issued and controlled by the central bank is managed on a digital ledger or blockchain, the same technology that underpins cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin. CBDC also aims to expedite and increase the security of payments between banks, institutions, and individuals.
Andrew Colquhoun, MAS, mentioned that: "Digital currencies are a key area for MAS and central banks globally. Consensus views across different institutions show no immediate urgent use case for CBDC in this region. Many central banks are adopting a wait and see approach and still on a consultation basis."
Further accelerating central banksâ considerations for the issuance of CBDC, Anndy Lian, Hyundai DAC added: "CBDCs are very early-stage and I believe CBDC is here to stay. CBDC is a form of digital fiat powered by blockchain for many, is traceable and accountable. It works 24/7, nonstop around the clock." He also went on to clarify that CBDC is not a cryptocurrency. "We must be clear on this and not lumped this (CBDC) into the bucket of cryptocurrencies. There are also crypto companies looking at adding cryptocurrencies on top of CBDC and acting as a bridge. But this is a different concept."
Digital currencies are still early. It is essential to understand the pros and cons behind it. Digitalization has prompted both regulators and the public to demand increased privacy. Same for CBDCs. Many technologists believe that the right design structure for CBDCs will ensure privacy. "There are many misconceptions on the technology and concept. It will take time to design a suitable model. In my opinion, CBDCs complement and not replace cash. Cryptocurrency recreates the future of finance." Anndy sums up.
Economics Summit 2020 is an annual event organized by SIM Economics Society (SIMES). SIMES is a student-led society at the Singapore Institute of Management (SIM) committed to learning and researching global economic challenges.
Kevin Kristano, VP in Marcomm, SIMES thanked all the speakers and his colleagues for making this event possible and told the reporter: "Covid-19 has accelerated a vast array of technology adoption and digital transformation in several industries, like banking and finance. I believe that this change is imminent, regardless of the pandemic. I look forward to how this technological shift would affect the global economy."
The two days summit ended on 2 November 2020. To view the video recording for this panel, go to https://youtu.be/hwgfXNUuwsw.
Media Contacts:
Name: Jenny Zheng Title: Editor Email: [email protected] Website: www.blockcast.cc
The post Anndy Lian Spoke at Economics Summit 2020: âCryptocurrency recreates the future of finance.â appeared first on BLOCKPATHS.
source https://blockpaths.com/commentaries/anndy-lian-spoke-at-economics-summit-2020-cryptocurrency-recreates-the-future-of-finance/
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Appraising Real Estate Content Consumption [Analysis]
Can you remember the last time you worked in your office? Not just to grab your mouse and comfy chair, but actually entered the office before 9 AM and stayed until after 5? For me and my NetLine marketing colleagues, it was March 14th; weâve all been working remotely ever since. Iâm sure the story for many of you is the same.
Regardless of whether weâre talking about the commercial or residential side of the industry, the Real Estate profession certainly finds itself in a curious place. According to data from Realtor.com, and analysis from Norada, median listing prices are up 12.4% with properties selling nearly two weeks faster than in 2019. One of the biggest reasons for this is due to the lack of inventory in the marketâtotal listings are down a staggering 39% YOY.
The commercial side of the business, surprisingly, appears to be fairing a bit better than expected. According to Commercial Real Estate Trends & Outlook, a report published by the National Association of Realtors, the office market has been impacted by The Pause, but hasnât been crushed, fortunately. The report also states that commercial sales fell 5% year-over-year in 2020 Q2, with leasing volume fell by 4%, and construction down 5%.
With people staying in their homes in more ways than one, we wanted to get a better sense of how this has impacted Real Estate content consumption and the types of information these professionals are after. To answer these questions, we dug into Audience Explorer to find out just what the Real Estate profession is pursuing.
Getting a Lay of the Land for the Real Estate Audience
As we always do to start, letâs choose âReal Estateâ from the buyer selection dropdown menu and choose âUnited Statesâ from the Region filter. By selecting the U.S. as our Region, this brings our total number of content recommendations from 66,349 to 62,298 over the last 180 days.
Remember: even when audience numbers are smaller than other audiences within Audience Explorer, itâs important to recognize that niche is nice. Just like buying your first start home, itâs better to start smaller and work your way up and out than it is to go broad and work backwards.
Letâs begin to build the case from this report.
What We Can Decipher From the Top Trending Topics
From a B2B marketerâs perspective, there are only three topics here that appear to be directly connected to the world of Real Estate: Small Business, Commercial Banking, and Facilities Management. Every other trending topic on this list could be something youâd see on any number of Top 10 lists. Perhaps that is connected to something larger. Wonder what that could beâŠ
We hate to keep mentioning it but the influence of COVID-19 and its impact on everything in our lives is undeniable and ubiquitous. Each audience we seem to analyze shows the marks of COVID impact. Every Top 10 list includes one or more IT/Computer/Technology topics. Businesses that have always operated in a face-to-face capacity have been forced to adapt to a new Digital-First reality. It is this new reality that puts IT Reliability at the top of the Trending Topics list.
Innovation is an interesting topic on this list at 6. Given the obstacles before us, itâs clear that businesses have to evolve to compete. What does this look like in the world of Real Estate?
To answer those questions and provide more context around these trends, we asked Mary Byrnes, a realtor-marketer based in Philadelphia with over 30 years in the field, to share her thoughts around what life has been like for Real Estate professionals, how COVID-19 has changed her business, and what specifically is driving this new tech adoption.
Providing Context: An Expertâs Perspective
Since mid-March, Byrnes has had to use everything at her disposal to continue serving her clients and protect her business. How she has navigated this moment in time certainly has been innovative and showcases why technology is so prevalent on the Trending Topics list.
âThere are so many new ways that professional Realtors have reacted to COVID-19 that itâs hard to narrow it down to just a few,â Byrnes said. âRealtors were not allowed to leave their homes to sell Real Estate in Pennsylvania, so working around this took some ingenuity.â
On Business Intelligence and IT Reliability:
âCyber Security has been a hot topic for a few years but even more so during the shut-down. Gmail is a big factor in hackers getting into settlement rooms and stealing clientâs equity and funds right before closings.
Using secure wifi is so important and most Realtors are oblivious to this as you see them in Starbucks and in Paneras openly using the unsecured networks. WiFi sharing in a household of students and workers was debilitating, so I used my MIFI at home when the Internet was overwhelmed during school and work hours with 6 users at home. Using this also allowed me to protect my clientâs information.
On Innovation:
âOne client of mine was relocating and listed their house right before the shut-down. He had to leave town and his work was interrupted by having to do FaceTime tours with buyers. We used Facetime to âshowâ the homes which offered some interesting advantages to both sides because normally, they never get to talk.
In order to minimize the number of people inside of a home, a home inspector I work with went alone and recorded a live and interactive home inspection video in 3 segments: Interior, Exterior and The Lot using the Marco Polo App. Using this app, we were all able to watch the home inspection in real time and could ask questions or point out concerns from the App. This Marco Polo App interactive recording home inspection is an idea that I believe should stick around even after COVID-19 goes away.â
On Commercial Banking:
âCOVID-19 separated the men from the boys. Most lenders were flailing while the few good ones had sufficient funding and drive to get buyers over the finish line despite the constant curveballs. Digital signatures were not allowable with lenders but we found ways to work through that one eventually. Some Internet lenders collapsed because they had no backbone funding to sustain them.â
What the Buyer Stream Tells Us
What immediately jumps out here is the level of professional consuming content from this field. In the 8 examples provided, 6 of the buyers were at or above the VP level. If you want specific proof that the Real Estate field is moving on the fly, seeing the interest from these Job Levels certainly provides it.
The second interesting detail is that the topics theyâre consuming are all unique. Sure there are connections with the 5 technology topics, but theyâre not carbon copies. These organizations all have technology questions but their own priorities and needs.
While we see that one Senior Manager registered for a Live Virtual Event, itâs clear that text is the preferred format of consumption for Real Estate pros (which weâll confirm again later). White Papers, eBooks, and Research Reports were
quite popular across this sampling.
Slicing Up the Pie Charts
The most visual, and interactive, portion of Audience Explorer is the pie chart section. Here, content consumption data is broken down into 4 specific categories: Job Function, Job Level, Company Employee Size, and Company Industry.
Job Function
Almost 40% of the total content requests were made by Agents or Brokers. Considering that so many realtors are solopreneurs or partners in a smaller company, this is somewhat expected. However, there are still the big boys like Berkshire-Hathaway and other investment firms able to strike in a market starved for inventory, making it easier to connect the dots with Senior Management.
Property Managers are third on this list, followed by General Management and Leasing/Acquisition. As we saw with the NAR report, leasing is down compared to 2019 so these professionals are likely looking for content that can help them to position their buildings and office spaces in the best light possible. Itâs a complete guess, but perhaps theyâre more likely to consume Innovation content than anything else.
Job Level
The Job Level filter allows you to review which job titles/levels of seniority are interacting with content. In the Real Estate audience, Owners (18.1%) make up the majority of active consumers, followed by the VP (16.6%) & Manager (11.1%) levels. Knowing that the VP level was very engaged in the Buyer Stream, letâs filter this report by their Job Level.
By doing this we see that the majority of these professionals are also Agents or Brokers working predominantly in the field of Real Estate (58.9%). What is most intriguing about the industries following the Real Estate profession, however, is seeing Finance (9.8%) and Telecommunications (7.1%) surpassing Construction 4th (6.3%). Given the obvious relationship between construction and Real Estate, this may be a bit surprising initially. But when you begin to think about it, youâll remember that Real Estate doesnât happen with commercial banking (finance)âŠoh, and we love Netflix and Instagram (telecommunications) and they need wires in the ground and in the sky to make WiFI happen.
Company Employee Size
Admittedly, I was surprised to see 1 to 4 sitting at the bottom of the pile at 5.3%. Given that nearly 40% of the consumers in this audience are Agents and roughly 20% are Owners, I would have expected to see more shops in the 1 â 25 employee range with a greater slice of the pie.
Then again, when you look at the Most Active In-Market Companies, the 50,000+ at 12% begins to make a lot more sense. Anytime you see Walmart, CBRE, and Cushman & Wakefield, you know youâre playing with the big boys.
Company Industry
Naturally, Real Estate is the big winner here at 57.6%. Retail and Consumer Goods, Finance, and Service Industries round out the Top 4 fields with the rest of the market fighting over 2.5% or less, respectively.
Which Type of Content is Requested Most?
Despite the fact that eBook consumption is up nearly 2% overall from 2019, White Papers are the preferred format in this profession. White Papers are the most âscientificâ and âbuttoned-upâ of all the content formats. When you factor in the amount of legal, financial, and municipal knowledge that is required by those in the Real Estate, White Papers stand out as a logical choice.
Closing the Deal
The professionals in the Real Estate audience are a resilient bunch. Theyâre working day and night to serve their clients and acquire new tenants. If your business is in the technology, finance, or human resources industries, this is an audience that needs your expertise to improve their professional footing and improve their standing in their respective markets and meet the new needs of their customers.
Weâll be back next month with another Audience Explorer breakdown of a brand new audience. Let us know if thereâs one youâd like to know more about!
Special thanks to Mary Byrnes for providing her expertise and insight to this article. She is one of the Top 5% of Realtors Nationwide and has served the Philadelphia Suburbs for more than 30 years.
The post Appraising Real Estate Content Consumption [Analysis] appeared first on Marketing Insider Group.
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VinePair Podcast: What Happens When Summer Drinking and Social Distancing Collide?
Every summer brings with it a hugely important question: What will be the drink of summer? In 2019, all we could talk about was hard seltzer. The summer of 2020 is looking a little different, though, because it will be tempered by the Covid-19 pandemic.
As many, if not all Americans are still practicing social distancing through the summer months, this may change not only where we drink, but the very drinks we turn to throughout the season.
Will fruity drinks be in high demand? Will blended cocktails make a comeback? What beer will people be drinking? And should we still expect to see rosĂ©âs summertime surge?
These are the questions posed â and that Adam Teeter, Erica Duecy, and Zach Geballe attempt to answer â on this weekâs episode of The VinePair Podcast.
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Listen Online, or Check Out Our Conversation Here:
Adam: From Brooklyn, New York, Iâm Adam Teeter.
Erica: From Connecticut, Iâm Erica Duecy.
Zach: And in Seattle, Washington, Iâm Zach Geballe.
A: And this is The VinePair Podcast. Before we get rolling with this topic today which Iâm excited to talk about, Erica I do want to mention one thing. I am super, super, super craving your husbandâs new dishware line that is a special edition. These oval plates that he came out with are pretty dope.
E: Oh, the ombre!
A: Theyâre pretty dope!
E: People are freaking out about those.
A: People probably donât know what your husband does, but he is a very skilled potter. You want to give him a little plug?
E: Sure! Heâs Jono Pandolfi designs, so you can follow him on Instagram. He just hit 50,000 followers the other day. Itâs @jonopandolfi, and he makes dinnerware for restaurants and hotels â which isnât a great part of the business to be in right at this moment â but also for consumers. He does direct-to-consumer, so check out his dinnerware if thatâs something youâre into.
A: I am. Theyâre awesome. But, besides that, how are you guys doing?
E: I donât want to start off on a down note, but Iâve been having a bit of a tough week. I looked at my April bank statement and all I bought last month was groceries, alcohol, and stuff for my kids. That felt sad. Now hereâs why: None of the stuff that I love to do, which is going to restaurants and bars, and traveling to wine regions, and going to distilleries, and attending drinks conferences, all of that which is 80% of my life is on hold, and the reality is, we donât know when itâs coming back. This week it really hit me. We talked with Jack McGarry, the founder of one of the worldâs best bars, Dead Rabbit, for an article, and he said he doesnât know if heâll be able to re-open until 2021, and that was sobering.
A: Yeah, itâs a pretty big downer. What I thought was really interesting is this data that we were sharing in Slack today, Erica, that came out on CNN which shows that thereâs this massive divide in this country politically, amongst who thinks that weâre ready to open now and is saying that restaurants should be fully open and bars should be fully open. And many are saying no, we donât have this kicked yet and we need to wait⊠70% of Republicans believe that bars and restaurants should open and only 5% of Democrats.
E: It was shocking.
A: Until that divide comes together and we can all agree, this is also going to be this really haphazard thing happening across the country⊠depending on where youâre listening to us, you may be in a place where stuff is opening. Iâm in a city where I have no idea when itâs going to open again. Thatâs also going to be really weird to watch, as both journalists as well as consumers, to see who is going out and who isnât. I have to say, right now if stuff opened, I say I want to go, but I donât know if I would because I donât know if I trust that weâre making the right decision at this moment to open and that we would all be safe.
E: Right.
Z: Well, Iâm in a good mood because I just got three dozen oysters on the half shell delivered to my door.
E: No!
Z: About an hour before we started recording.
A: Thatâs pretty awesome.
Z: So, I know what Iâm having for dinner. Friends of mine, a couple of people in the industry, were saying one of the big suppliers around here, one of the big shellfish farms, is doing door-to-door delivery basically. If you order three dozen or more, you get free delivery and⊠well, my wife and I will eat three dozen oysters, no problem.
E: Nice.
Z: Theyâre in the fridge getting ready for this evening. That is my little bit of sunshine.
A: I know how you stand with oysters, too. Youâre a real snob about âem, real snob.
Z: You have yet to come out here and see for yourself. Weâll talk when you come.
E: Are they from Taylorâs Shellfish?
Z: Theyâre actually from Hama Oyster Company.
E: Oh, Hama, Hama! Oh! Jealous!
A: Are you also a âWest Coast oysters are better than East Coast oysters person,â Erica? We know Zach is.
E: One hundred percent, strong yes.
A: I like all oysters equally, but I will admit for the most part West Coast oysters are better.
E: And Hamaâs are the best.
Z: Iâll send you guys some pictures.
A: Please.
E: OhâŠ
Z: Erica, come on. I was going to say, you might be surprised. Maybe not in Connecticut, but Iâve seen some stuff about especially seafood purveyors looking to be able to deliver to homes and get to the consumer market. Seafood in particular and shellfish maybe even more than regular seafood, other kinds of seafood is so restaurant-dependent for so many of these things. How many people in a normal day or normal course of life will get raw oysters and eat them at home even if they love them out? So you might be surprised at what you guys could get delivered or listeners where they are.
E: Itâs a good idea! Iâm going to try.
A: Are you shucking them yourselves?
Z: Oh yeah, absolutely.
A: I donât know how to do that. That intimidates me. Godspeed.
Z: Itâs actually not that hard. You need an oyster knife, if youâve got one of those, which is a $10-$15 dollar piece of equipment. With one of those itâs actually not that hard.
E: I donât know⊠Itâs tough.
A: Iâm not in the position to do anything right now that would wind me up in a hospital.
Z: Fair enough.
A: And I could see this going straight through my hand and then all of a sudden, weâve got to go to the emergency room. It would be a really, really big mistake. But you enjoy them!
Z: Thatâs true. I will. I use a towel. Donât worry, I protect myself.
A: Before we get started, one of the things we wanted to talk about is this amazing new part of the VinePair website that we launched, that is a project of Ericaâs, which is VinePair Pro, which is aimed at the industry. Erica, before we jump into the topic today, I thought we could take some time to chat a little bit about VP Pro.
E: Absolutely! We have been reporting on the pandemic and its impact on the industry from the earliest days. We were the first publication to spin up a live blog and consistent coverage of Covid-19 and how itâs been impacting the drinks industry. We do almost daily podcasts talking with leaders in the industry about how they are pivoting their businesses or grappling with the new reality, and we really realized that there is a gap in the market among publications, for someone like us, VP Pro and VinePair to come in with its data-based insights and fresh ideas from leaders from throughout the industry to develop an entire content program. So, thatâs what weâve done. This platform is totally free, and itâs designed to help our listeners who are in the drinks trade find a new path forward. Weâve gone from reporting on the pandemic, and now we are shifting our focus to the rebuilding. And thatâs the very best thing we can do. We can help the drinks trade rebuild, and we are doing data-focused articles and reports every week. We will have a first look for our subscribers at our VinePair Audience Insights, which is our consumer insights product, and weâll have recaps of all of our industry-focused podcasts â so thatâs everything from this podcast youâre listening to right now to out Covid-19 Conversations, and a forthcoming Industry Night Podcast, which weâre really excited to introduce. That will be profiling different leaders from throughout the industry. Anyone in the industry, whether youâre a producer, an importer, a retailer, a sommelier, a Cicerone, etc. â anyone in the industry can benefit from subscribing to this platform.
A: And how do they do that?
E: They go to VinePair.com and in that top navigation there is a link that says VP Pro. When you go to that homepage for VP Pro, youâll find an easy way to sign up and youâll find all of our coverage already there.
A: Awesome. Zach, anything to add? Any questions?
Z: I was just going to say that⊠I will be doing that as soon as we finish recording, and I wish this existed when I had a restaurant to work in. But I will in the future, so, thatâs good.
A: Yes, you will. You will.
E: Nice.
A: Cool. Letâs get into todayâs topic which is summer drinks from home. Every year around this time we make predictions for what we think the big drinks for the summer are going to be. Last year no one could have predicted it would have been seltzer. Well we did, but a lot of other people didnât really see it coming. The thing to really focus on today is what do we think the big drinks are going to be and especially how is drinking going to change this summer because so many of us will still be at home and if we are drinking, weâre drinking in our backyards more than weâre drinking out at bars. Weâre drinking in parks. If beaches are open where we live, weâre drinking at beaches, etc. So guys, what are your predictions?
Z: Iâll start. Some of what Iâm expecting is an acceleration of trends that weâve already been seeing over the last couple of years. Adam, you and I have talked about this a couple of times and weâve all talked about it. Hard seltzer is one category. I really expect that anything that comes in a can to continue to grow besides maybe beer. And a lot of that is, we talked about this a few weeks ago. I was struck yesterday. Weâre recording this on May 6, so yesterday was Cinco de Mayo, and I couldnât believe the number of people I saw walking around my neighborhood with either beers or what appeared to be Margaritas. Full disclosure, my wife and I were two of those people walking around our neighborhood with them. It was also a really beautiful day in Seattle, so it made a lot of sense. Anything that allows people to get into these quasi-permitted spaces that are really suitable for enjoyment, that you can maybe be safe in terms of keeping some distance or at least not being in an enclosed area. And something that you can grab-and-go and obviously thatâs been a huge trend for years now is the thing that I expect to see everywhere. The other venues for summer drinking as Adam mentioned introducing the topic, are not going to be available or may not be available everywhere and certainly not for some or all of the summer.
A: Thatâs right. Yesterday I walked into my park, and it was crazy. It was nice here, probably not as beautiful as it was in Seattle⊠Tons of people on blankets, socially distancing, and all drinking what we call ready-to-drink RTDs. Or they had one of these kinds of cups: The manufacturers of these sippy-to-go-cups that you used to ask, âWho drinks out of those? Wine moms?â There are these cups where you can fill basically a bottle of wine in something that looks like a tumbler and seal it. Thereâs tons of people drinking out of those, too, and youâll see a lot more of that. Thatâs a pretty solid prediction.
E: One trend Iâm really excited about that weâve been seeing result in a ton of traffic on VinePairâs recipe database is people making cocktails at home. And this can be any type of cocktail but really, weâre seeing a lot of people make the simple classics. Margaritas right now are off the charts. And we in general are seeing the recipe database traffic higher than almost any other time of the year right now because people are really wanting to create some of the cocktails at home that they usually would have in a bar or restaurant setting. Margaritas we will see continue to pop between now and all throughout the summer. It actually does really well all summer long for VinePair. Also blackberry, you may not be thinking about blackberry, but I saw a ton of traffic going to blackberry Mojito, blackberry bourbon sours, blackberry Margaritas. Blackberry is actually having a moment right now.
Z: Makes sense.
A: I agree. Blackberry is going to be everywhere. But has blackberry always been having a moment?
E: I donât know. I havenât seen it as much in the past. What do you think, Zach?
Z: This is a great transition into the next thing I was going to say, which is that fruit in general is going to be huge this summer. To some extent this is true every summer, but so much of whatâs going to define summer drinking in 2020 is people looking for comfort and people looking for familiarity as you were talking about, Erica, with cocktails that theyâre well acquainted with. And maybe theyâre looking for twists on them, but theyâre looking for something thatâs going to, for lack of a better word, remind them of a different time. And that fruit the other part of this, right? It is such an essence of summer and yet in drinking has been poo-pooed. We went through a phase where infusions and fruit in drinks was trendy, and then we moved away from it. Everything became super serious. âLetâs do everything spirit forward. Letâs deal with liqueurs.â That is something that persisted year-round. 2020 is going to be all about sweet and fresh and fruit because again, those are the things that give us the most base pleasure. As we all know, thatâs going to be what a lot of people want. So blackberry is right at the top of that list. Theyâre delicious, theyâre sweet, and in certain parts of the country theyâre wildly abundant. They are here in the Northwest when theyâre in season. Again, they have that wholesomeness to them in a way that isnât necessarily what people look for in drinking all the time but this year, this summer, thatâs going to be what people want.
E: So, maybe itâs simple two- and three-ingredient cocktails. Whether youâre talking about a bourbon sour or a Margarita, those are three-ingredient cocktails and then you add that ingredient of blackberry or blackberry puree. Itâs the simplicity of adding that additional layer of flavor that makes I feel seasonal and festive and fresh that probably is going to have a lot of appeal this summer.
A: You guys are right. People are going to try to look for anything that feels like an escape, and fresh fruit often does feel like an escape. It reminds you of going to the beach and getting that really fresh cocktail from the local tiki bar or from the beach stand bar where you got a Piña Colada or a strawberry Daiquiri. Thatâs what people are going to be looking for because a lot of us arenât going to be traveling, or if weâre going to be traveling, weâre going to be traveling not very far, right? Weâll get in the car and drive an hour to a friendâs house who we trust and stay with them for the weekend or something. Or maybe thereâs a hotel that we trust the cleanliness of this summer. But for the most part, people are going to be kicking it at home or very close to home, so those kinds of cocktails make a lot of sense. Itâs a trend every year, but I really do believe weâre going to have a massive summer for rosĂ©. And depending on how much rosĂ© is on the market, right? So as long as thereâs enough thatâs made it here, itâll be pretty huge and the reason for that is again that same idea of escapism. People are going to be looking for something to drink that makes them feel like they are in a different place and nothing is more reminiscent of the seaside and the South of France and this idea of accessible luxury than what rosĂ© has become. We talked about it last week on the Top 25 RosĂ© podcast and we chatted a lot about how weâre already seeing that spike happening now and itâs only going to continue, again taking that same approach that Zach did about what heâs been seeing walking around. When Iâve been walking in the park Iâve seen a lot of people with bottles of wine and more often than not that bottle of wineâs color is rosĂ©. I see some white, I see very little red to be honest, but Iâm seeing lots of pink wines and itâs this idea that pink is what makes people feel like theyâre in a different place. And that theyâre not celebrating, sparkling will continue to not do super well in the next few months because sparkling feels so celebratory, but that they are having something thatâs delicious and makes them feel like theyâre somewhere theyâre in a different place than they are right now.
Z: Thatâs really interesting because I had almost the opposite intuition about sparkling wine, which is that I thought people were going to look for these small victories in their day or in their week and maybe that might drive them to a little more sparkling wine. Traditionally in this in the U.S., we have tended to reserve sparkling wine for celebrations with maybe the exception of Prosecco, but I was wondering if we might see more sparkling wine consumption in the summer because it is the kind of thing that fits the weather in general. But also, itâs that idea that if it doesnât transport you in the way that rosĂ© does. It is a smile in a glass, in a sense, right? You canât not be in a good mood drinking sparkling wine and so my intuition is that we might see an uptick when, typically, summer is not usually a super-busy time for sparkling wine.
E: Right now sales of sparkling wine are way down. Thereâs a little bit of a low point to come back from, but where we will see sparkling wine is with spritzes. Aperol spritzes, you can make a simple blackberry spritz, you can make really any type of spritz with a little bit of liqueur and some seltzer on top with a squeeze of lime or something like that. Weâll see a little bit of an uptick but people are generally thinking that sparkling wine feels celebratory right now.
A: It does.
E: And theyâre not in such a celebratory mood, which makes me a little sad, too.
A: The spritz will probably come back because youâre going to see the companies that are committed to marketing. This is the season that they still rely on to spend. Thatâs whatâs been really interesting on the business stance, on the business front is that you had all of these companies say, âOh, weâre going to cut back marketing budgets because of Covid-19.â But then all I saw the last few days is spirits companies that own tequilas, spending tons of marketing on tequila content. This is still the Super Bowl for them. Weâll still continue to see a lot of tequila consumption throughout the summer. Campari spends a good amount on the promotion of Aperol because this is a big time for Aperol. This is when we all think of the spritz and want to drink the spritz. But for sparkling wine in general, if you look at current data, as Erica is saying, consumption will be pretty down. Maybe Prosecco will be up still or be at least normal. People think about Prosecco more as a sociable beverage than they do maybe Champagne or Cava or something that might feel to them to be a little bit more, I donât know, as celebratory. With the rosĂ© trend, pink sparkling could do well. It bleeds that line. If thereâs anything thatâs been indicating this from what weâre seeing in terms of what people are reading, itâs going to be a brutal summer for Champagnes.
Z: Could be.
A: And that sucks for so many of these producers that we all like, but thereâs so much caught up in our collective thinking of when we drink Champagne and why we drink Champagne, and thatâs benefited that category for so long. Itâs the one thing that is going to hurt that category right now, which is that people donât feel celebrating anything right now.
Z: True.
E: Also, going into a recession when youâre thinking about value and value brands popping, Prosecco is really where itâs at. Champagne is going to have a tough time with that.
A: I think so, too.
Z: I have a beer-related thought here, which Iâve been curious to get your read on.
A: Yes!
Z: Typically, we think about this time of year, summer for beer being on the one hand your lighter beers, whether they like light beers, whether theyâre your clean, crisp pilsners, kolsches, etc. And then thereâs the fruit beer question, and we already covered my thoughts on how fruit will be a big feature this year. But I wonder, do you guys expect to see a real shift because, as weâve talked about on previous podcasts, this crisis from Covid is really hitting breweries maybe harder than anyone, do we expect that this is going to be a summer of beer drinking that looks like a summer from maybe 10 years ago â in terms of what is popular? Bigger brands? Or do we think that even if they donât have a lot of cases, a lot of parts of the country if they canât have taprooms open, if you canât go to a beer garden, do we still expect to see the normal slice of the pie going to craft beer?
E: I was talking with Cat, our beer editor at VinePair, and she said that she is seeing people, consumers and people in the beer industry and adjacent to the beer industry, walking miles and miles for beer from local breweries. Supporting them with online purchases, with curbside pick-ups, with delivery where available. The biggest trend she and I were talking about is that beer lovers are going above and beyond to support the breweries that they love, and she said that that is more apparent to her now than ever before.
A: Itâs going to be a little of both. Some of these breweries are not going to be in the consciousness because they havenât figured it out yet. What Iâve been seeing over the last few weeks has changed my mind a lot in terms of what I thought was going to happen. So I thought it was going to be all basically very well distributed big beer brands as well as the larger craft brands, and you definitely are seeing that in a lot of places. But in New York especially, a lot of these craft breweries have figured out the delivery model, and Iâm now starting to see people all over the city drinking them again. And also some people saying that theyâre being able to drink stuff that they wouldnât normally be able to get because they werenât going to venture to the brewery to get in line for its most recent release or something⊠Now, as long as they spend at least 50 bucks they get free delivery and it comes within the next day, and itâs two or three 4-packs usually of these beers that people are really interested in. Itâll be a mixed bag. Itâs going to lean still more to the larger breweries because of access, but the people who are really passionate will still support the craft breweries. In the same way, weâre seeing some of the people who are really passionate about some of the craft spirits and the boutique wine brands are still really going out of their way to support those. Itâll be really interesting. It depends on where you are in the country, to be really honest.
Z: True.
A: That will depend, right? And then thatâll determine what youâre drinking and how youâre consuming.
E: And then thereâs people like me who wanted to feel the sand in my toes and the wind through my hair, and I had a Corona with lime yesterday, and it was amazing.
A: See? People are going to do that. My favorite thing in the summer is going to the beach, and we talked about this on the podcast before and getting a cold draft beer of macro lager⊠No matter what country Iâm in, right? If Iâm in Greece and I go to the beach, or if Iâm in Florida and I go to the beach, or wherever, a cold macro draft lager when youâve been in the sun all day⊠Thereâs almost nothing better than that.
Z: Yeah.
E: True.
A: Iâm probably going to buy some macro lager and get it really cold and go to the park and try to recreate it as best I can. There is something about that in the summer to drink these things we refer to as lawnmower beers⊠Those are really great when it comes to summer drinking and feel somewhat escapist and refreshing in a very different way than what weâre experiencing right now. I definitely will try to do that. Iâm really hopeful that New York, even if we stay somewhat socially distanced, will open the beaches a little bit, and I can at least somehow get out to the Rockaways or something and socially distance myself at Fort Tilden and sit in the sand for a day and listen to the waves and drink a beer. Iâm really hoping that can still happen this year⊠and they wonât keep it closed because itâs still a city park. But who knows?
Z: I have one last thought about one other trend that ties into a couple of those things you were mentioning, and thatâs the other thing that is going to make a comeback this summer: Drinks made in blenders.
A: Yes!
Z: Thatâs the other category that really has been poo-pooed by the serious bartending craft, and not necessarily incorrectly. There are a lot of these frozen âwhateverâ drinks that when made poorly are pretty bad and most of the time they were made pretty poorly. But I love blending up drinks in the summer. There is nothing to me quite as refreshing as blended. Whether itâs a Piña Colada or a Margarita, thereâs something about those drinks that, yes, I will never claim that they are the pinnacle of cocktails, but I donât need them to be. And they are refreshing, they are fun, they are an easy way if you can socialize with people, a blender full of whatever the drink of your choice is. We will see this hybrid of what has become really popular with a throwback to a lot of classics, but I would say almost nostalgia drinks. That blender full of âwhatever drinkâ is something that feels very out of time. But because weâre in this unprecedented time, it makes a certain sense to me that I might want to sit on my deck with a blender, pitcher full of Margaritas with my wife, and talk to the neighbors and say âWell, this is what weâre doing now.â
E: Iâm so into that, I think thatâs a great idea.
A: Iâm super into blender drinks. My only thing is I donât have a blender, so do you guys have a preferred brand?
Z: Do you want to spring for the Vitamix? You got all the money in the world, then go for it. But otherwise, I donât know. I got mine as a wedding present, so youâre out of luck there.
A: Mine broke and we never replaced it, so I donât know what to get. A Kitchen Aid? Or an Oxo? ⊠If you have a preferred blender and you listen to the podcast, please email Adam at [email protected] and give him your blender advice.
Z: Exactly! Or as weâve been saying apparently on every episode: Send Adam a blender. Why not?
A: Iâll take it! Iâll take a picture of it, socialize it, let me know: [email protected]. Iâll let you know where to send the blender. If youâve got a preferred cocktail for that blender, let me know.
Z: You may not have Jonoâs 50K followers, but people pay attention.
E: Iâm sure heâs close.
A: Guys, this has been a lot of fun again this week, talking about some drinks trends. Itâs actually made me quite thirsty, so Iâm going to go pop a bottle of wine at the end of this. As always, everyone whoâs listening, thank you so much for taking the time to spend your Monday, Tuesday, or whenever youâre listening to this. We really appreciate it. Zach, Erica talk to you both next week.
E: Talk to you then.
Z: Sounds great.
A: Thanks so much for listening to the VinePair podcast. If you enjoy listening to us every week, please leave us a review or rating on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever it is that you get your podcasts. And now for the credits: VinePair is produced and hosted by Zach Geballe, Erica Duecy and me: Adam Teeter. Our engineer is Nick Patri and Keith Beavers. Iâd also like to give a special shout out to my VinePair co-founder Josh Malin and the rest of the VinePair team for their support. Thanks so much for listening, and weâll see you again right here next week.
Ed. Note: Transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity.
The article VinePair Podcast: What Happens When Summer Drinking and Social Distancing Collide? appeared first on VinePair.
source https://vinepair.com/articles/summer-drinking-social-distancing/
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VinePair Podcast: What Happens When Summer Drinking and Social Distancing Collide?
Every summer brings with it a hugely important question: What will be the drink of summer? In 2019, all we could talk about was hard seltzer. The summer of 2020 is looking a little different, though, because it will be tempered by the Covid-19 pandemic.
As many, if not all Americans are still practicing social distancing through the summer months, this may change not only where we drink, but the very drinks we turn to throughout the season.
Will fruity drinks be in high demand? Will blended cocktails make a comeback? What beer will people be drinking? And should we still expect to see rosĂ©âs summertime surge?
These are the questions posed â and that Adam Teeter, Erica Duecy, and Zach Geballe attempt to answer â on this weekâs episode of The VinePair Podcast.
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Adam: From Brooklyn, New York, Iâm Adam Teeter.
Erica: From Connecticut, Iâm Erica Duecy.
Zach: And in Seattle, Washington, Iâm Zach Geballe.
A: And this is The VinePair Podcast. Before we get rolling with this topic today which Iâm excited to talk about, Erica I do want to mention one thing. I am super, super, super craving your husbandâs new dishware line that is a special edition. These oval plates that he came out with are pretty dope.
E: Oh, the ombre!
A: Theyâre pretty dope!
E: People are freaking out about those.
A: People probably donât know what your husband does, but he is a very skilled potter. You want to give him a little plug?
E: Sure! Heâs Jono Pandolfi designs, so you can follow him on Instagram. He just hit 50,000 followers the other day. Itâs @jonopandolfi, and he makes dinnerware for restaurants and hotels â which isnât a great part of the business to be in right at this moment â but also for consumers. He does direct-to-consumer, so check out his dinnerware if thatâs something youâre into.
A: I am. Theyâre awesome. But, besides that, how are you guys doing?
E: I donât want to start off on a down note, but Iâve been having a bit of a tough week. I looked at my April bank statement and all I bought last month was groceries, alcohol, and stuff for my kids. That felt sad. Now hereâs why: None of the stuff that I love to do, which is going to restaurants and bars, and traveling to wine regions, and going to distilleries, and attending drinks conferences, all of that which is 80% of my life is on hold, and the reality is, we donât know when itâs coming back. This week it really hit me. We talked with Jack McGarry, the founder of one of the worldâs best bars, Dead Rabbit, for an article, and he said he doesnât know if heâll be able to re-open until 2021, and that was sobering.
A: Yeah, itâs a pretty big downer. What I thought was really interesting is this data that we were sharing in Slack today, Erica, that came out on CNN which shows that thereâs this massive divide in this country politically, amongst who thinks that weâre ready to open now and is saying that restaurants should be fully open and bars should be fully open. And many are saying no, we donât have this kicked yet and we need to wait⊠70% of Republicans believe that bars and restaurants should open and only 5% of Democrats.
E: It was shocking.
A: Until that divide comes together and we can all agree, this is also going to be this really haphazard thing happening across the country⊠depending on where youâre listening to us, you may be in a place where stuff is opening. Iâm in a city where I have no idea when itâs going to open again. Thatâs also going to be really weird to watch, as both journalists as well as consumers, to see who is going out and who isnât. I have to say, right now if stuff opened, I say I want to go, but I donât know if I would because I donât know if I trust that weâre making the right decision at this moment to open and that we would all be safe.
E: Right.
Z: Well, Iâm in a good mood because I just got three dozen oysters on the half shell delivered to my door.
E: No!
Z: About an hour before we started recording.
A: Thatâs pretty awesome.
Z: So, I know what Iâm having for dinner. Friends of mine, a couple of people in the industry, were saying one of the big suppliers around here, one of the big shellfish farms, is doing door-to-door delivery basically. If you order three dozen or more, you get free delivery and⊠well, my wife and I will eat three dozen oysters, no problem.
E: Nice.
Z: Theyâre in the fridge getting ready for this evening. That is my little bit of sunshine.
A: I know how you stand with oysters, too. Youâre a real snob about âem, real snob.
Z: You have yet to come out here and see for yourself. Weâll talk when you come.
E: Are they from Taylorâs Shellfish?
Z: Theyâre actually from Hama Oyster Company.
E: Oh, Hama, Hama! Oh! Jealous!
A: Are you also a âWest Coast oysters are better than East Coast oysters person,â Erica? We know Zach is.
E: One hundred percent, strong yes.
A: I like all oysters equally, but I will admit for the most part West Coast oysters are better.
E: And Hamaâs are the best.
Z: Iâll send you guys some pictures.
A: Please.
E: OhâŠ
Z: Erica, come on. I was going to say, you might be surprised. Maybe not in Connecticut, but Iâve seen some stuff about especially seafood purveyors looking to be able to deliver to homes and get to the consumer market. Seafood in particular and shellfish maybe even more than regular seafood, other kinds of seafood is so restaurant-dependent for so many of these things. How many people in a normal day or normal course of life will get raw oysters and eat them at home even if they love them out? So you might be surprised at what you guys could get delivered or listeners where they are.
E: Itâs a good idea! Iâm going to try.
A: Are you shucking them yourselves?
Z: Oh yeah, absolutely.
A: I donât know how to do that. That intimidates me. Godspeed.
Z: Itâs actually not that hard. You need an oyster knife, if youâve got one of those, which is a $10-$15 dollar piece of equipment. With one of those itâs actually not that hard.
E: I donât know⊠Itâs tough.
A: Iâm not in the position to do anything right now that would wind me up in a hospital.
Z: Fair enough.
A: And I could see this going straight through my hand and then all of a sudden, weâve got to go to the emergency room. It would be a really, really big mistake. But you enjoy them!
Z: Thatâs true. I will. I use a towel. Donât worry, I protect myself.
A: Before we get started, one of the things we wanted to talk about is this amazing new part of the VinePair website that we launched, that is a project of Ericaâs, which is VinePair Pro, which is aimed at the industry. Erica, before we jump into the topic today, I thought we could take some time to chat a little bit about VP Pro.
E: Absolutely! We have been reporting on the pandemic and its impact on the industry from the earliest days. We were the first publication to spin up a live blog and consistent coverage of Covid-19 and how itâs been impacting the drinks industry. We do almost daily podcasts talking with leaders in the industry about how they are pivoting their businesses or grappling with the new reality, and we really realized that there is a gap in the market among publications, for someone like us, VP Pro and VinePair to come in with its data-based insights and fresh ideas from leaders from throughout the industry to develop an entire content program. So, thatâs what weâve done. This platform is totally free, and itâs designed to help our listeners who are in the drinks trade find a new path forward. Weâve gone from reporting on the pandemic, and now we are shifting our focus to the rebuilding. And thatâs the very best thing we can do. We can help the drinks trade rebuild, and we are doing data-focused articles and reports every week. We will have a first look for our subscribers at our VinePair Audience Insights, which is our consumer insights product, and weâll have recaps of all of our industry-focused podcasts â so thatâs everything from this podcast youâre listening to right now to out Covid-19 Conversations, and a forthcoming Industry Night Podcast, which weâre really excited to introduce. That will be profiling different leaders from throughout the industry. Anyone in the industry, whether youâre a producer, an importer, a retailer, a sommelier, a Cicerone, etc. â anyone in the industry can benefit from subscribing to this platform.
A: And how do they do that?
E: They go to VinePair.com and in that top navigation there is a link that says VP Pro. When you go to that homepage for VP Pro, youâll find an easy way to sign up and youâll find all of our coverage already there.
A: Awesome. Zach, anything to add? Any questions?
Z: I was just going to say that⊠I will be doing that as soon as we finish recording, and I wish this existed when I had a restaurant to work in. But I will in the future, so, thatâs good.
A: Yes, you will. You will.
E: Nice.
A: Cool. Letâs get into todayâs topic which is summer drinks from home. Every year around this time we make predictions for what we think the big drinks for the summer are going to be. Last year no one could have predicted it would have been seltzer. Well we did, but a lot of other people didnât really see it coming. The thing to really focus on today is what do we think the big drinks are going to be and especially how is drinking going to change this summer because so many of us will still be at home and if we are drinking, weâre drinking in our backyards more than weâre drinking out at bars. Weâre drinking in parks. If beaches are open where we live, weâre drinking at beaches, etc. So guys, what are your predictions?
Z: Iâll start. Some of what Iâm expecting is an acceleration of trends that weâve already been seeing over the last couple of years. Adam, you and I have talked about this a couple of times and weâve all talked about it. Hard seltzer is one category. I really expect that anything that comes in a can to continue to grow besides maybe beer. And a lot of that is, we talked about this a few weeks ago. I was struck yesterday. Weâre recording this on May 6, so yesterday was Cinco de Mayo, and I couldnât believe the number of people I saw walking around my neighborhood with either beers or what appeared to be Margaritas. Full disclosure, my wife and I were two of those people walking around our neighborhood with them. It was also a really beautiful day in Seattle, so it made a lot of sense. Anything that allows people to get into these quasi-permitted spaces that are really suitable for enjoyment, that you can maybe be safe in terms of keeping some distance or at least not being in an enclosed area. And something that you can grab-and-go and obviously thatâs been a huge trend for years now is the thing that I expect to see everywhere. The other venues for summer drinking as Adam mentioned introducing the topic, are not going to be available or may not be available everywhere and certainly not for some or all of the summer.
A: Thatâs right. Yesterday I walked into my park, and it was crazy. It was nice here, probably not as beautiful as it was in Seattle⊠Tons of people on blankets, socially distancing, and all drinking what we call ready-to-drink RTDs. Or they had one of these kinds of cups: The manufacturers of these sippy-to-go-cups that you used to ask, âWho drinks out of those? Wine moms?â There are these cups where you can fill basically a bottle of wine in something that looks like a tumbler and seal it. Thereâs tons of people drinking out of those, too, and youâll see a lot more of that. Thatâs a pretty solid prediction.
E: One trend Iâm really excited about that weâve been seeing result in a ton of traffic on VinePairâs recipe database is people making cocktails at home. And this can be any type of cocktail but really, weâre seeing a lot of people make the simple classics. Margaritas right now are off the charts. And we in general are seeing the recipe database traffic higher than almost any other time of the year right now because people are really wanting to create some of the cocktails at home that they usually would have in a bar or restaurant setting. Margaritas we will see continue to pop between now and all throughout the summer. It actually does really well all summer long for VinePair. Also blackberry, you may not be thinking about blackberry, but I saw a ton of traffic going to blackberry Mojito, blackberry bourbon sours, blackberry Margaritas. Blackberry is actually having a moment right now.
Z: Makes sense.
A: I agree. Blackberry is going to be everywhere. But has blackberry always been having a moment?
E: I donât know. I havenât seen it as much in the past. What do you think, Zach?
Z: This is a great transition into the next thing I was going to say, which is that fruit in general is going to be huge this summer. To some extent this is true every summer, but so much of whatâs going to define summer drinking in 2020 is people looking for comfort and people looking for familiarity as you were talking about, Erica, with cocktails that theyâre well acquainted with. And maybe theyâre looking for twists on them, but theyâre looking for something thatâs going to, for lack of a better word, remind them of a different time. And that fruit the other part of this, right? It is such an essence of summer and yet in drinking has been poo-pooed. We went through a phase where infusions and fruit in drinks was trendy, and then we moved away from it. Everything became super serious. âLetâs do everything spirit forward. Letâs deal with liqueurs.â That is something that persisted year-round. 2020 is going to be all about sweet and fresh and fruit because again, those are the things that give us the most base pleasure. As we all know, thatâs going to be what a lot of people want. So blackberry is right at the top of that list. Theyâre delicious, theyâre sweet, and in certain parts of the country theyâre wildly abundant. They are here in the Northwest when theyâre in season. Again, they have that wholesomeness to them in a way that isnât necessarily what people look for in drinking all the time but this year, this summer, thatâs going to be what people want.
E: So, maybe itâs simple two- and three-ingredient cocktails. Whether youâre talking about a bourbon sour or a Margarita, those are three-ingredient cocktails and then you add that ingredient of blackberry or blackberry puree. Itâs the simplicity of adding that additional layer of flavor that makes I feel seasonal and festive and fresh that probably is going to have a lot of appeal this summer.
A: You guys are right. People are going to try to look for anything that feels like an escape, and fresh fruit often does feel like an escape. It reminds you of going to the beach and getting that really fresh cocktail from the local tiki bar or from the beach stand bar where you got a Piña Colada or a strawberry Daiquiri. Thatâs what people are going to be looking for because a lot of us arenât going to be traveling, or if weâre going to be traveling, weâre going to be traveling not very far, right? Weâll get in the car and drive an hour to a friendâs house who we trust and stay with them for the weekend or something. Or maybe thereâs a hotel that we trust the cleanliness of this summer. But for the most part, people are going to be kicking it at home or very close to home, so those kinds of cocktails make a lot of sense. Itâs a trend every year, but I really do believe weâre going to have a massive summer for rosĂ©. And depending on how much rosĂ© is on the market, right? So as long as thereâs enough thatâs made it here, itâll be pretty huge and the reason for that is again that same idea of escapism. People are going to be looking for something to drink that makes them feel like they are in a different place and nothing is more reminiscent of the seaside and the South of France and this idea of accessible luxury than what rosĂ© has become. We talked about it last week on the Top 25 RosĂ© podcast and we chatted a lot about how weâre already seeing that spike happening now and itâs only going to continue, again taking that same approach that Zach did about what heâs been seeing walking around. When Iâve been walking in the park Iâve seen a lot of people with bottles of wine and more often than not that bottle of wineâs color is rosĂ©. I see some white, I see very little red to be honest, but Iâm seeing lots of pink wines and itâs this idea that pink is what makes people feel like theyâre in a different place. And that theyâre not celebrating, sparkling will continue to not do super well in the next few months because sparkling feels so celebratory, but that they are having something thatâs delicious and makes them feel like theyâre somewhere theyâre in a different place than they are right now.
Z: Thatâs really interesting because I had almost the opposite intuition about sparkling wine, which is that I thought people were going to look for these small victories in their day or in their week and maybe that might drive them to a little more sparkling wine. Traditionally in this in the U.S., we have tended to reserve sparkling wine for celebrations with maybe the exception of Prosecco, but I was wondering if we might see more sparkling wine consumption in the summer because it is the kind of thing that fits the weather in general. But also, itâs that idea that if it doesnât transport you in the way that rosĂ© does. It is a smile in a glass, in a sense, right? You canât not be in a good mood drinking sparkling wine and so my intuition is that we might see an uptick when, typically, summer is not usually a super-busy time for sparkling wine.
E: Right now sales of sparkling wine are way down. Thereâs a little bit of a low point to come back from, but where we will see sparkling wine is with spritzes. Aperol spritzes, you can make a simple blackberry spritz, you can make really any type of spritz with a little bit of liqueur and some seltzer on top with a squeeze of lime or something like that. Weâll see a little bit of an uptick but people are generally thinking that sparkling wine feels celebratory right now.
A: It does.
E: And theyâre not in such a celebratory mood, which makes me a little sad, too.
A: The spritz will probably come back because youâre going to see the companies that are committed to marketing. This is the season that they still rely on to spend. Thatâs whatâs been really interesting on the business stance, on the business front is that you had all of these companies say, âOh, weâre going to cut back marketing budgets because of Covid-19.â But then all I saw the last few days is spirits companies that own tequilas, spending tons of marketing on tequila content. This is still the Super Bowl for them. Weâll still continue to see a lot of tequila consumption throughout the summer. Campari spends a good amount on the promotion of Aperol because this is a big time for Aperol. This is when we all think of the spritz and want to drink the spritz. But for sparkling wine in general, if you look at current data, as Erica is saying, consumption will be pretty down. Maybe Prosecco will be up still or be at least normal. People think about Prosecco more as a sociable beverage than they do maybe Champagne or Cava or something that might feel to them to be a little bit more, I donât know, as celebratory. With the rosĂ© trend, pink sparkling could do well. It bleeds that line. If thereâs anything thatâs been indicating this from what weâre seeing in terms of what people are reading, itâs going to be a brutal summer for Champagnes.
Z: Could be.
A: And that sucks for so many of these producers that we all like, but thereâs so much caught up in our collective thinking of when we drink Champagne and why we drink Champagne, and thatâs benefited that category for so long. Itâs the one thing that is going to hurt that category right now, which is that people donât feel celebrating anything right now.
Z: True.
E: Also, going into a recession when youâre thinking about value and value brands popping, Prosecco is really where itâs at. Champagne is going to have a tough time with that.
A: I think so, too.
Z: I have a beer-related thought here, which Iâve been curious to get your read on.
A: Yes!
Z: Typically, we think about this time of year, summer for beer being on the one hand your lighter beers, whether they like light beers, whether theyâre your clean, crisp pilsners, kolsches, etc. And then thereâs the fruit beer question, and we already covered my thoughts on how fruit will be a big feature this year. But I wonder, do you guys expect to see a real shift because, as weâve talked about on previous podcasts, this crisis from Covid is really hitting breweries maybe harder than anyone, do we expect that this is going to be a summer of beer drinking that looks like a summer from maybe 10 years ago â in terms of what is popular? Bigger brands? Or do we think that even if they donât have a lot of cases, a lot of parts of the country if they canât have taprooms open, if you canât go to a beer garden, do we still expect to see the normal slice of the pie going to craft beer?
E: I was talking with Cat, our beer editor at VinePair, and she said that she is seeing people, consumers and people in the beer industry and adjacent to the beer industry, walking miles and miles for beer from local breweries. Supporting them with online purchases, with curbside pick-ups, with delivery where available. The biggest trend she and I were talking about is that beer lovers are going above and beyond to support the breweries that they love, and she said that that is more apparent to her now than ever before.
A: Itâs going to be a little of both. Some of these breweries are not going to be in the consciousness because they havenât figured it out yet. What Iâve been seeing over the last few weeks has changed my mind a lot in terms of what I thought was going to happen. So I thought it was going to be all basically very well distributed big beer brands as well as the larger craft brands, and you definitely are seeing that in a lot of places. But in New York especially, a lot of these craft breweries have figured out the delivery model, and Iâm now starting to see people all over the city drinking them again. And also some people saying that theyâre being able to drink stuff that they wouldnât normally be able to get because they werenât going to venture to the brewery to get in line for its most recent release or something⊠Now, as long as they spend at least 50 bucks they get free delivery and it comes within the next day, and itâs two or three 4-packs usually of these beers that people are really interested in. Itâll be a mixed bag. Itâs going to lean still more to the larger breweries because of access, but the people who are really passionate will still support the craft breweries. In the same way, weâre seeing some of the people who are really passionate about some of the craft spirits and the boutique wine brands are still really going out of their way to support those. Itâll be really interesting. It depends on where you are in the country, to be really honest.
Z: True.
A: That will depend, right? And then thatâll determine what youâre drinking and how youâre consuming.
E: And then thereâs people like me who wanted to feel the sand in my toes and the wind through my hair, and I had a Corona with lime yesterday, and it was amazing.
A: See? People are going to do that. My favorite thing in the summer is going to the beach, and we talked about this on the podcast before and getting a cold draft beer of macro lager⊠No matter what country Iâm in, right? If Iâm in Greece and I go to the beach, or if Iâm in Florida and I go to the beach, or wherever, a cold macro draft lager when youâve been in the sun all day⊠Thereâs almost nothing better than that.
Z: Yeah.
E: True.
A: Iâm probably going to buy some macro lager and get it really cold and go to the park and try to recreate it as best I can. There is something about that in the summer to drink these things we refer to as lawnmower beers⊠Those are really great when it comes to summer drinking and feel somewhat escapist and refreshing in a very different way than what weâre experiencing right now. I definitely will try to do that. Iâm really hopeful that New York, even if we stay somewhat socially distanced, will open the beaches a little bit, and I can at least somehow get out to the Rockaways or something and socially distance myself at Fort Tilden and sit in the sand for a day and listen to the waves and drink a beer. Iâm really hoping that can still happen this year⊠and they wonât keep it closed because itâs still a city park. But who knows?
Z: I have one last thought about one other trend that ties into a couple of those things you were mentioning, and thatâs the other thing that is going to make a comeback this summer: Drinks made in blenders.
A: Yes!
Z: Thatâs the other category that really has been poo-pooed by the serious bartending craft, and not necessarily incorrectly. There are a lot of these frozen âwhateverâ drinks that when made poorly are pretty bad and most of the time they were made pretty poorly. But I love blending up drinks in the summer. There is nothing to me quite as refreshing as blended. Whether itâs a Piña Colada or a Margarita, thereâs something about those drinks that, yes, I will never claim that they are the pinnacle of cocktails, but I donât need them to be. And they are refreshing, they are fun, they are an easy way if you can socialize with people, a blender full of whatever the drink of your choice is. We will see this hybrid of what has become really popular with a throwback to a lot of classics, but I would say almost nostalgia drinks. That blender full of âwhatever drinkâ is something that feels very out of time. But because weâre in this unprecedented time, it makes a certain sense to me that I might want to sit on my deck with a blender, pitcher full of Margaritas with my wife, and talk to the neighbors and say âWell, this is what weâre doing now.â
E: Iâm so into that, I think thatâs a great idea.
A: Iâm super into blender drinks. My only thing is I donât have a blender, so do you guys have a preferred brand?
Z: Do you want to spring for the Vitamix? You got all the money in the world, then go for it. But otherwise, I donât know. I got mine as a wedding present, so youâre out of luck there.
A: Mine broke and we never replaced it, so I donât know what to get. A Kitchen Aid? Or an Oxo? ⊠If you have a preferred blender and you listen to the podcast, please email Adam at [email protected] and give him your blender advice.
Z: Exactly! Or as weâve been saying apparently on every episode: Send Adam a blender. Why not?
A: Iâll take it! Iâll take a picture of it, socialize it, let me know: [email protected]. Iâll let you know where to send the blender. If youâve got a preferred cocktail for that blender, let me know.
Z: You may not have Jonoâs 50K followers, but people pay attention.
E: Iâm sure heâs close.
A: Guys, this has been a lot of fun again this week, talking about some drinks trends. Itâs actually made me quite thirsty, so Iâm going to go pop a bottle of wine at the end of this. As always, everyone whoâs listening, thank you so much for taking the time to spend your Monday, Tuesday, or whenever youâre listening to this. We really appreciate it. Zach, Erica talk to you both next week.
E: Talk to you then.
Z: Sounds great.
A: Thanks so much for listening to the VinePair podcast. If you enjoy listening to us every week, please leave us a review or rating on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever it is that you get your podcasts. And now for the credits: VinePair is produced and hosted by Zach Geballe, Erica Duecy and me: Adam Teeter. Our engineer is Nick Patri and Keith Beavers. Iâd also like to give a special shout out to my VinePair co-founder Josh Malin and the rest of the VinePair team for their support. Thanks so much for listening, and weâll see you again right here next week.
Ed. Note: Transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity.
The article VinePair Podcast: What Happens When Summer Drinking and Social Distancing Collide? appeared first on VinePair.
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The United States from 1789 to 1816
The Federalist administration and the formation of parties
The primary decisions under the new Constitution were held in 1789. George Washington was consistently cast a ballot the nation's first president. His secretary of the treasury, Alexander Hamilton, framed an obvious program that before long offered substance to the old feelings of trepidation of the Anti-Federalists. Hamilton, who had accepted since the mid-1780s that a national obligation would be "a national blessing," both for monetary reasons and because it would go about as a "concrete" to the association, utilized his new power base to understand the desire of the patriots. He suggested that the national government take care of the old Continental Congress' obligations at standard rather than at a devalued worth and that it assume state obligations, drawing the interests of the leasers toward the focal government rather than state governments. This arrangement met solid resistance from the numerous who had sold their protections at extraordinary rebate during the postwar misery and from Southern states, which had renounced their obligations and would not like to be exhausted to pay other states' obligations. A trade-off in Congress was reachedâon account of the endeavours of Secretary of State Jeffersonâwhereby Southern states endorsed Hamilton's arrangement as an end-result of Northern consent to fix the area of the new national capital on the banks of the Potomac, closer toward the South. At the point when Hamilton next introduced his arrangement to establish a Bank of the United States, demonstrated on the Bank of England, resistance started to solidify. Many contended that the Constitution didn't trust this power to Congress. Hamilton, in any case, convinced Washington that anything not explicitly illegal by the Constitution was allowed under inferred powersâthe beginning of "free" rather than "severe" constructionist interpretations of the Constitution. The Bank Act passed in 1791. Hamilton likewise pushed plans for the help of nascent industry, which demonstrated untimely, and he forced the income raising bourbon extract that prompted the Whiskey Rebellion, a minor uprising in western Pennsylvania in 1794. A gathering restricted to Hamilton's financial arrangements started to frame in Congress. With Madison at its middle and with help from Jefferson, it before long stretched out its allure past Congress to mainstream bodies electorate. In the interim, the French Revolution and France's consequent presentation of war against Great Britain, Spain, and Holland further separated American loyalties. Majority rule Republican social orders jumped up to communicate support for France, while Hamilton and his supporters, known as Federalists, upheld Britain for financial reasons. Washington articulated American lack of bias in Europe, yet to forestall a war with Britain he sent Chief Justice John Jay to London to arrange a settlement. In the Jay Treaty (1794) the United States gained just minor concessions andâhumiliatinglyâacknowledged British maritime amazingness as the cost of insurance for American shipping. Related: Foundations of the American republic Washington, whose resilience had been seriously strained by the Whiskey Rebellion and by analysis of the Jay Treaty, decided not to run for a third presidential term. In his Farewell Address, in a passage drafted by Hamilton, he reviled the new party governmental issues as disruptive and risky. Gatherings didn't yet aspire to national targets, notwithstanding, and, when the Federalist John Adams was chosen president, the Democrat-Republican Jefferson, as the presidential candidate with the second most noteworthy number of votes, became VP. Wars in Europe and on the high seas, together with widespread restriction at home, gave the new administration little harmony. Virtual maritime war with France had followed from American acknowledgement of British maritime insurance. In 1798 a French endeavour to request fixes from American officials negotiating a settlement of contrasts (the alleged XYZ Affair) excited a rush of hostile to French feeling. Soon thereafter the Federalist greater part in Congress passed the Alien and Sedition Acts, which forced genuine civil limitations on outsiders associated with professional French exercises and punished U.S. residents who reprimanded the administration, making babble of the First Amendment's assurance of free press. The demonstrations were regularly invoked to indict Republican editors, some of whom served prison terms. These measures in turn considered forward the Virginia and Kentucky goals, drafted separately by Madison and Jefferson, which invoked state sway against intolerable government powers. War with France often appeared to be imminent during this period, however, Adams was determined to abstain from issuing a conventional affirmation of war, and in this, he succeeded. Tax collection, which had been demanded to pay foreseen war costs, brought progressively discontent, be that as it may, including another minor rising in Pennsylvania drove by Jacob Fries. Fries' Rebellion was put down without trouble, yet across the board difference over issues ranging from civil freedoms to tax, the assessment was polarizing American legislative issues. A basic feeling of political personality presently separated Federalists from Republicans, and in the appointment of 1800 Jefferson drew on profound wellsprings of Anti-Federalist restriction to challenge and thrashing his old companion and partner Adams. The outcome was the primary challenge over the administration between ideological groups and the main genuine difference in government because of a general political race in present-day history.
The Jeffersonian Republicans in power
Jefferson started his administration with a supplication for compromise: "We are for the most part Republicans, we are for the most part Federalists." He had no designs for a changeless two-party arrangement of government. He additionally started with a solid pledge to constrained government and severe development of the Constitution. Every one of these duties was destined to be tried by the exigencies of war, tact, and political contingency. On the American continent, Jefferson sought after an approach of extension. He took advantage of the lucky break when Napoleon I chose to relinquish French desire in North America by offering the Louisiana region available to be purchased (Spain had as of late surrendered the domain to France). This extraordinary securing, the Louisiana Purchase, purchased at a cost of a couple of pennies for each section of land, dramatically increased the zone of the United States. Jefferson had no constitutional authority for such an activity of official power; he made up the standards as he came, taking an expansive development perspective on the Constitution on this issue. He likewise looked for chances to gain Florida from Spain, and, for logical and political reasons, he sent Meriwether Lewis and William Clark on an endeavour of investigation over the continent. This regional extension was not without problems. Different dissenter developments intermittently emerged, including an arrangement for a Northern Confederacy planned by New England Federalists. Aaron Burr, who had been chosen Jefferson's VP in 1800 yet was supplanted in 1804, drove a few western connivances. Captured and gone after for treason, he was cleared in 1807. Related: The American Revolutionary War As CEO, Jefferson clashed with individuals from the legal executive, a considerable lot of whom had been late appointments by Adams. One of his essential adversaries was the late appointee Chief Justice John Marshall, most remarkably in the case of Marbury v. Madison (1803), in which the Supreme Court initially practised the power of legal survey of congressional enactment. By the beginning of Jefferson's second term in office, Europe was overwhelmed in the Napoleonic Wars. The United States remained impartial, however, both Britain and France forced different requests and declarations seriously restricting American exchange with Europe and appropriated American boats for violating the new principles. Britain likewise led impressment strikes in which U.S. residents were some of the time seized. Incapable to consent to arrangement terms with Britain, Jefferson attempted to constrain both Britain and France into ceasing to damage "unbiased rights" with a complete ban on American fares, instituted by Congress in 1807. The outcomes were catastrophic for American business and created unpleasant estrangement in New England, where the ban (composed backwards as "O snatch me") was held to be a Southern plot to decimate New England's riches. In 1809, not long after Madison was chosen president, the ban demonstration was cancelled.
Madison as president and the War of 1812
Madison's administration was dominated by outside issues. Both Britain and France submitted plunders on American shipping, however, Britain was more loathed, mostly because with the best naval force it was progressively powerful and incompletely because Americans were very touchy to British insults to national respect. Certain expansionist components looking to both Florida and Canada started to press for war and exploited the issue of maritime security. Madison's point was to safeguard the principle of opportunity of the seas and to assert the capacity of the United States to ensure its interests and its residents. While striving to go up against the European enemies fair-mindedly, he was brought into war against Britain, which was proclaimed in June 1812 on a vote of 79â49 in the House and 19â13 in the Senate. There was no help for war in the solid Federalist New England states. The War of 1812 started and finished in incongruity. The British had just rescinded the offending requests in committee, yet the news had not arrived at the United States at the hour of the assertion. The Americans were inadequately set from each point of view. Ideological issues with armed forces and naval forces had been liable for a minimal maritime power. Ideological issues with banks had been capable, in 1812, for the Senate's refusal to restore the sanction of the Bank of the United States. Trade opinion was threatening to the administration. The situation being what it is, it was surprising that the United States prevailing with regards to staggering through two years of war, in the long run winning significant maritime triumphs adrift, on the Great Lakes, and Lake Champlain. On land, a British raiding gathering consumed open buildings in Washington, D.C., and drove President Madison to escape from the capital. The main activity with long haul suggestions was Andrew Jackson's triumph at the Battle of New Orleansâwon in January 1815, fourteen days after harmony had been accomplished with the signing of the Treaty of Ghent (Belgium). Jackson's political notoriety rose legitimately from this fight. In recorded hindsight, the most significant aspect of the harmony settlement was a consent to define up a limit commission for the Canadian fringe, which could thenceforth be left unguarded. It was not the finish of Anglo-American antagonistic vibe, however, the understanding denoted the coming of a period of common trust. The finish of the War of 1812, which has now and then been known as the Second War of American Independence, denoted a chronicled cycle. It brought about a conciliation of the old feelings of pain and disdain against Great Britain and its kinâstill for some Americans a kind of fatherly relationship. And, by freeing them of tensions on this front, it likewise liberated Americans to look toward the West.
The Indian-American problem
The youthful United States accepted that it had inherited an "Indian problem," yet it would be similarly reasonable for a state that the triumph at Yorktown went up against the Indians with an insoluble "American problem." Whereas they had prior managed delegates of Europe-based domains seeking just access to chosen assets from a removed continent, presently they confronted an occupant, joined individuals yearly swelling in numbers, determined to make each section of land of the West their own and socially convinced of their supreme title under the laws of God and history. There was no space for a bargain. Indeed, even before 1776, each progression toward American independence diminished the Indians' command over their future. The Proclamation Line of 1763 was very quickly abused by men like Daniel Boone on the Kentucky outskirts. In the western pieces of Pennsylvania and New York, in any case, despite broad Indian land concessions in the 1768 Treaty of Fort Stanwix, they despite everything had enough power to bar a development toward the Ohio Valley and the Great Lakes. For equipped protection from have had any desire for progress, solidarity would be required between all the Indians from the Appalachians to the Mississippi. This solidarity basically couldn't be accomplished. The Shawnee chiefs were known as Tenskatawa, or the Prophet, and his brother Tecumseh endeavoured this kind of rallying development, much as Pontiac had done around 40 years sooner, with the equivalent absence of achievement. Some assistance was forthcoming in the type of arms from British dealers remaining in the Northwest Territory infringing upon the harmony bargain, yet the Indians neglected to protect triumph in a clash with American civilian army and regulars at the Battle of Tippecanoe Creek (close to introduce day West Lafayette, Indiana) in 1811. Related: Prelude to revolution- American Revolution The episode of the War of 1812 started restored Indian any desires for insurance by the crown, should the British win. Tecumseh himself was appointed as a general in the imperial powers, however, at the Battle of the Thames in 1813, he was murdered, and his eviscerated body parts, according to legend, were isolated between his heroes as horrifying gifts. In the interim, in 1814, U.S. Gen. Andrew Jackson vanquished the British-upheld Creeks in the Southwest in the Battle of Horseshoe Bend. The war itself finished in a draw that left American domain intact. Thereafter, with minor special cases, there was no significant Indian obstruction east of the Mississippi. After the healthy first 25 years of American nationhood, all streets left open to Native Americans ran downhill. Related: How America Became an Economic Superpower Read the full article
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Me: [Walking into the office] If one more MAN thinks he can touch me, my skin is just going to fly off my body. My body will flay itself. [I notice Regional VP is sitting in the GMâs office with her] Good morning. Regional VP: [Staring at his laptop] Whatâs going on? Me: This man at the BNI always kisses my cheek, and today he did it and another guy next to him goes, âOh, whereâs mine?â Like, shut up, Iâm not letting you kiss me. So he hugged me instead, but then he was so disgusting about it and he had his arm around my waist and he like, pinched my side and was like, âThat just made my day.â GM: Poor Erin. Iâm going to get you some pepper spray. Me: Please! Then when a guest is like, âYour banquet manager Maced me,â you can say, âWell, sir, you shouldnât have touched her.â Ohhh, but weâre supposed to just take this crap from them because theyâre our guests and weâre in hospitality, right? Regional VP: [Still staring at his laptop and very obviously not listening, like always] Thatâs right. [I look at the GM and gesture wildly toward the Regional VP like, âIs he fucking for real?â and she shakes her head] ââ GM: [Regional VP] is not someone to f-u-c-k with. You donât wanna mess with him. Heâs not someone you can say no to. If he tells me I have to do something and it doesnât get done, there are consequences. Me: Heâs a fucking asshole. I could maybe try to accept some of the things he wants from you if he were at least nice about how he approached it, but he just doesnât seem like a good person, at all. Can you tell me that heâs actually a decent person and heâs not as much of a dick as he seems? [Sheâs completely quiet] That silence says everything. ââ GM: Iâm running to the bank. Did you want to come along? Me: Sure. [In the car] Me: Iâm sorry about what I said before about [Regional VP]. That was out of line. Even if I think heâs an asshole, I shouldnât say it out loud. GM: What?! No, youâre fine. Oh my gosh, did you think I invited you to the bank so I could yell at you on the way there?! Me: Maybe a little? GM: No! Honey, of course not! You can always speak your mind with me. Always. And when weâre in that office, you can say anything you want and I promise I will never look at you differently or hold it against you. I absolutely promise. No, I invited you to go with me just because we havenât run any errands together in a while, thatâs all. [Pause] You hit the nail on the head, though. He really is an asshole. He is. He is not a nice person in the slightest.
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Joe Biden is in trouble over a fundraiser tied to a fossil fuel company
Democratic presidential candidate and former US Vice President Joe Biden addresses a crowd at a town hall event at Clinton College on August 29, 2019 in Rock Hill, South Carolina. | Sean Rayford/Getty Images
Biden says he may rethink going to a fundraiser held by the cofounder of a natural gas company.
Former Vice President Joe Biden was seemingly unaware that one of the co-hosts of a campaign fundraiser he is scheduled to attend on Thursday is the co-founder of a fossil fuel company â at least until he was asked about the fundraiser at a CNN climate town hall on climate change Wednesday night.
The man in question is Andrew Goldman, a co-founder of Houston-based company Western LNG, which produces and transports natural gas. Goldman was a senior adviser for Biden when the 2020 Democratic frontrunner was in the US Senate, and is co-hosting one of two high-dollar fundraisers for Biden in New York on Thursday.
Asked by audience member and Bernie Sanders supporter Isaac Larkin whether the public could trust Bidenâs pledge not to accept money from fossil fuel companies when he was attending a fundraiser hosted by Goldman, Biden quickly shot back that Goldman is ânot a fossil fuel executive.â
Joe Biden says he might reconsider a fundraiser scheduled for Thursday after being confronted and told about its hostâs connections to the energy industry #ClimateTownHall https://t.co/VDehXzZTW9 pic.twitter.com/6DhMi8wwed
â CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) September 5, 2019
CNN moderator Anderson Cooper challenged Biden to answer Larkinâs question, saying, âif youâre going to a fundraiser given in part by this company that is pulling up natural gas, are you the right guy?â Biden responded he would have to do more research.
âI didnât realize he does that,â Biden said of Goldman. âIf you look at the SEC filings, heâs not listed as an executive. Thatâs what we look at. The SEC filings.â
Asked by Cooper whether heâd still plan to attend the fundraiser tomorrow, Biden said, âIâll look at what you told me and find out if thatâs accurate, yes.â
Larkinâs question hits at a deep distrust among voters about how money influences politics and policy. Like many of his competitors in the presidential race, Biden has sworn off fossil money, as well as money from super PACs, corporate PACs, and federal lobbyists. But unlike his two biggest challengers, Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, Biden has continued to do high-dollar fundraisers (all of which have been covered by pooled press).
âThose fundraisers are where influence is peddled,â said Brendan Fischer, director of federal reform for the Campaign Legal Center recently told Vox. âItâs effectively buying access. We accept it, and itâs become normalized, but if a fundraiser requires a $2,800 check to get in the door, a candidate is selling access to themselves.â
The Biden campaign claimed Goldman is not technically a fossil fuel executive.
âWhat Anderson Cooper just said about VP Bidenâs fundraiser is factually incorrect,â Biden senior adviser Symone Sanders tweeted. âAndrew Goldman isnât a fossil fuel executive. Heâs not involved in the day to day operation. Heâs not on the board of the company, nor the board of the portfolio company.â
What @andersoncooper just said about VP Biden's fundraiser is factually incorrect. Andrew Goldman isn't a fossil fuel executive. He's not involved in the day to day operation. He's not on the board of the company, nor the board of the portfolio company.
â Symone D. Sanders (@SymoneDSanders) September 5, 2019
âVP Biden signed a pledge not to take money from fossil fuel executives. He stands by it, and he has not violated it,â Sanders continued.
As a company cofounder, Goldman is the second person listed on Western LNGâs leadership page. His description on the site says he helped âlaunchâ the company. Goldman also works as the Chief Investment Officer of Hildred Capital Partners. Hildredâs website says the firmâs âprivate equity currently includes investments in regional banks, real estate, energy, and a broad array of healthcare-related companies, including services, technology, IT and pharmaceutical oriented businesses.â
Money in politics has already become a big issue in the 2020 race, with Sanders and Warren telling voters they are free from influence of millionaires and billionaires because they are not doing high-dollar fundraisers.
That argument could be more difficult for Biden to make after this exchange.
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Bitcoins For Secured Loans â Indian Industry Still Doubtful
Secured loans in the digital lending space are witnessing a lot of innovations. But thinking of cryptocurrencies as collateral forms for these loans is still a big question, one full of regulatory and practical concerns.
Also read: Japanese Corporation Begins Offering Loans Secured by Cryptocurrency
Loans Secured Against Bitcoins
If there is anything that has undergone a change, thanks to digital players in the BFSI space in India, it is â everything. Just pick lending and you can see how big data, social media weight, machine learning, etc. have made KYC (Know Your Customer) and credit-checks different. Add to that the use of APIs (Application Program Interfaces) and virtual elements for fast disbursement, and one can see why speed and ease are making digital loans stand apart.
So why not use cryptocurrency instead of gold or property to cushion a secured loan? Truly âdigitizeâ a loan? News.Bitcoin.com surveyed players in the industry, and there responses can be categorized as skeptical.
Abhi Upadhyay, a professional in the mobile lending space, dismisses the hope. âTraditional financial institutions like banks are never going to come close to accept cryptocurrency as security.â
But this âtraditionalâ legacy is exactly where and why challengers have started to win. Digital lenders have compellingly questioned deep-rooted processes and red tape in the lending industry in India by experimenting a lot, such as with the use of social media instead of old-school documentation for KYC and credibility checks. So why not bitcoin?
Regulation, Regulation, Regulation
Manav Jeet, Founder and CEO of Rubique, a prominent fintech player in the digital space, says the use of cryptocurrency as a collateral in the case of secured loans is a long shot. The biggest difference is the amount of regulation India posits in comparison to other regions. âWe are the best regulated markets, and even in terms of awareness only a tiny portion of Indian population is using cryptocurrency. It will take a lot of time for us to get to the stage where we can imagine this form being used in secured loans,â Manav Jeet insisted.
For Piyush Kabra, VP, Finance at Lendingkart, warns the practical problems around encashing bitcoins and registration, again thanks to regulatory reasons, would be factorsas to why cryptocurrency will not work against a loan â not yet, at least.
The use of cryptocurrency in secured loans is a possibility if you ask Saurabh Shankar, head of marketing at Paysense, another digital lending disruptor in India, with data science behind its intent of serving mall-ticket loan segments as well. But he explains how collateral works. âIt is an additional security measure for us when we lend to a customer. Any other form of collateral can be used as security for sure, so why not bitcoin? But the current regulatory environment is not exactly an incentive to consider such options. This may also need additional work. Crypto-to-crypto lending may not be too tricky but crypto-to-fiat would be a whole new space to reckon.â
Crypto and Loans â Not Mixing Yet
India is a changing market, but one that is still under-served when it comes to instant, flexible, and small loans for the middle class. Estimates show how digitized customer journeys chop the cost of processing to about 33% of the original cost. Plus, servicing costs is almost 1/10th that of physical channels when we look at digital channels. Thatâs not impossible to achieve when a player banks on technology to break the loan chain and to disaggregate lumps of delays that weigh down a usual lending process. Using behavioral analytics, cash flows, social media signals, and peer reports instead of legacy underwriting processes or income-tax returns â this is what many smart digital lenders started doing early on.
We are staring at a global fintech software and services sector of $45 billion by 2020 (from what NASSCOM reckons). Interestingly, India has exhibited the second highest fintech adoption rate (59% while the global average is 33%) as per the EY Fintech adoption index.
Globally, players like Biterest, Coinloan and Abic have started offering such loans that are secured against bitcoin. There we can see advantages like variety, speed, automation and no limits. It matters when there is no need of liquidation of an asset to get money out of it (the reason people use fixed deposits in secured loans). Then, there is the side of significant appreciation of value over time (which can be higher than loan interest). Also, concerns around forked cryptocurrencies have been addressed by many such players. After all, fungibility, preservation potential, and liquidity are true tests when it comes to how people think of money.
Yet, talk of cryptocurrencyâs use in the BFSI space is full of hesitation and confusion, even for disruptors. Responses from other players like Innoviti and Capital Float could not be elicited. But as Saurabh pins it, conceptually the idea is not bad but the practical side here revolves around regulations and actual ease.
What do you think about the idea of bitcoins for secured loans? Let us know in the comment section below.
Images courtesy of Shutterstock.
Need to calculate your bitcoin holdings? Check our tools section.
The post Bitcoins For Secured Loans â Indian Industry Still Doubtful appeared first on Bitcoin News.
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Most local music venues remain closed, but one reopens with live music
KANSAS CITY, Mo. â Some of your favorite music venues across the region could be in jeopardy of shutting down.
Weekends have always meant big business for music venues, but Friday many of them were closed. Most will stay that way for the foreseeable future, citing safety concerns.
âOh yeah, itâs pretty bad,â said Steve Tulipana, co-owner of recordBar.
Tulipana worries almost daily over whether his business on Grand Boulevard will survive the pandemic.
âWeâre in kind of crisis mode,â he said.
Tulipana said this time of year is usually the busiest for his venue, which has been in the Kansas City going on 15 years and has hosted artists from around the world.
âLive venues and restaurants, we all operate at a pretty low profit threshold. So to survive more than a couple months is pretty devastating unless youâve got a good line of credit or some type of safety net,â he said.
The owners of The Rino in North Kansas City understand the struggle. The music venue drained its bank account a few days after the initial March shutdown. March was on track to be the best month in the venues four-year history.
âItâs been a bummer,â said Ben Wendt, the production manager at The Rino. âIf venues donât get some help right now, the exact current venues you like, theyâre not going to exist when this all clears up.â
The Rino and recordBar are among a dozen music venues in the metro to join the newly formed National Independent Venue Association. The group is calling on lawmakers to approve funding for music venues and for national guidelines for large gatherings to occur in a safe manner.
âI donât think anyoneâs looking for a bailout on the giant grand scheme, like the banks or something,â Tulipana said. âItâs just tools and funding to make sure we can come back and be safe because live music is part of our culture.â
The NIVA estimates that for every $1 spent on a ticket at a small venue, $12 is generated back into local economies.
Those in the industry warned that if music venues are to have a chance at ever getting back to business, there needs to be a plan in place to invest in that future.
âLive music is going to be altered and upended I think for at least a year,â Wendt said.
Knuckleheads in the East Bottoms was one, if not the only, music venue in Kansas City that reopened Friday with live music. The venue hosted local band Outlaw Jim and the Whiskey Benders.
âIâm the first one doing it, so Iâm either going to set the pace or Iâm going to screw things up,â said Frank Hicks, owner of Knuckleheads. âIâm not sure what Iâm going to do. I think Iâm going to set the pace.â
The venue, which has four stages and usually can hold up to 1,200 people, was limited to 100 guests, under the cityâs 10% capacity rule. Tables were placed, at least, 10 feet apart and guests were not allowed to roam around the venue.
Knuckleheads also installed clear shields at the bars, plenty of signage reminding guests to keep their distance and wait staff wore masks.
âOf course, weâre going to be safe about it because there is a deadly virus out there,â Hicks said. âWeâre not taking it lightly at all, but weâre saying we canât be cooped up and scared all our life either.â
âWe need to connect with people, and the telephone and text messages donât cut it,â said Deb Tallio, who attended the concert with seven of her friends. âWe need to be together, within guidelines. I definitely agree with guidelines.â
Hicks originally planned to have the band play on the venueâs outdoor stage, but he got a call from the health department reminding him that outside gatherings are limited to 50 people.
Knuckleheads has open jam sessions scheduled for Saturday and Sunday.
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VinePair Podcast: What Happens When Summer Drinking and Social Distancing Collide?
Every summer brings with it a hugely important question: What will be the drink of summer? In 2019, all we could talk about was hard seltzer. The summer of 2020 is looking a little different, though, because it will be tempered by the Covid-19 pandemic.
As many, if not all Americans are still practicing social distancing through the summer months, this may change not only where we drink, but the very drinks we turn to throughout the season.
Will fruity drinks be in high demand? Will blended cocktails make a comeback? What beer will people be drinking? And should we still expect to see rosĂ©âs summertime surge?
These are the questions posed â and that Adam Teeter, Erica Duecy, and Zach Geballe attempt to answer â on this weekâs episode of The VinePair Podcast.
Listen on iTunes
Listen on Spotify
Listen Online, or Check Out Our Conversation Here:
Adam: From Brooklyn, New York, Iâm Adam Teeter.
Erica: From Connecticut, Iâm Erica Duecy.
Zach: And in Seattle, Washington, Iâm Zach Geballe.
A: And this is The VinePair Podcast. Before we get rolling with this topic today which Iâm excited to talk about, Erica I do want to mention one thing. I am super, super, super craving your husbandâs new dishware line that is a special edition. These oval plates that he came out with are pretty dope.
E: Oh, the ombre!
A: Theyâre pretty dope!
E: People are freaking out about those.
A: People probably donât know what your husband does, but he is a very skilled potter. You want to give him a little plug?
E: Sure! Heâs Jono Pandolfi designs, so you can follow him on Instagram. He just hit 50,000 followers the other day. Itâs @jonopandolfi, and he makes dinnerware for restaurants and hotels â which isnât a great part of the business to be in right at this moment â but also for consumers. He does direct-to-consumer, so check out his dinnerware if thatâs something youâre into.
A: I am. Theyâre awesome. But, besides that, how are you guys doing?
E: I donât want to start off on a down note, but Iâve been having a bit of a tough week. I looked at my April bank statement and all I bought last month was groceries, alcohol, and stuff for my kids. That felt sad. Now hereâs why: None of the stuff that I love to do, which is going to restaurants and bars, and traveling to wine regions, and going to distilleries, and attending drinks conferences, all of that which is 80% of my life is on hold, and the reality is, we donât know when itâs coming back. This week it really hit me. We talked with Jack McGarry, the founder of one of the worldâs best bars, Dead Rabbit, for an article, and he said he doesnât know if heâll be able to re-open until 2021, and that was sobering.
A: Yeah, itâs a pretty big downer. What I thought was really interesting is this data that we were sharing in Slack today, Erica, that came out on CNN which shows that thereâs this massive divide in this country politically, amongst who thinks that weâre ready to open now and is saying that restaurants should be fully open and bars should be fully open. And many are saying no, we donât have this kicked yet and we need to wait⊠70% of Republicans believe that bars and restaurants should open and only 5% of Democrats.
E: It was shocking.
A: Until that divide comes together and we can all agree, this is also going to be this really haphazard thing happening across the country⊠depending on where youâre listening to us, you may be in a place where stuff is opening. Iâm in a city where I have no idea when itâs going to open again. Thatâs also going to be really weird to watch, as both journalists as well as consumers, to see who is going out and who isnât. I have to say, right now if stuff opened, I say I want to go, but I donât know if I would because I donât know if I trust that weâre making the right decision at this moment to open and that we would all be safe.
E: Right.
Z: Well, Iâm in a good mood because I just got three dozen oysters on the half shell delivered to my door.
E: No!
Z: About an hour before we started recording.
A: Thatâs pretty awesome.
Z: So, I know what Iâm having for dinner. Friends of mine, a couple of people in the industry, were saying one of the big suppliers around here, one of the big shellfish farms, is doing door-to-door delivery basically. If you order three dozen or more, you get free delivery and⊠well, my wife and I will eat three dozen oysters, no problem.
E: Nice.
Z: Theyâre in the fridge getting ready for this evening. That is my little bit of sunshine.
A: I know how you stand with oysters, too. Youâre a real snob about âem, real snob.
Z: You have yet to come out here and see for yourself. Weâll talk when you come.
E: Are they from Taylorâs Shellfish?
Z: Theyâre actually from Hama Oyster Company.
E: Oh, Hama, Hama! Oh! Jealous!
A: Are you also a âWest Coast oysters are better than East Coast oysters person,â Erica? We know Zach is.
E: One hundred percent, strong yes.
A: I like all oysters equally, but I will admit for the most part West Coast oysters are better.
E: And Hamaâs are the best.
Z: Iâll send you guys some pictures.
A: Please.
E: OhâŠ
Z: Erica, come on. I was going to say, you might be surprised. Maybe not in Connecticut, but Iâve seen some stuff about especially seafood purveyors looking to be able to deliver to homes and get to the consumer market. Seafood in particular and shellfish maybe even more than regular seafood, other kinds of seafood is so restaurant-dependent for so many of these things. How many people in a normal day or normal course of life will get raw oysters and eat them at home even if they love them out? So you might be surprised at what you guys could get delivered or listeners where they are.
E: Itâs a good idea! Iâm going to try.
A: Are you shucking them yourselves?
Z: Oh yeah, absolutely.
A: I donât know how to do that. That intimidates me. Godspeed.
Z: Itâs actually not that hard. You need an oyster knife, if youâve got one of those, which is a $10-$15 dollar piece of equipment. With one of those itâs actually not that hard.
E: I donât know⊠Itâs tough.
A: Iâm not in the position to do anything right now that would wind me up in a hospital.
Z: Fair enough.
A: And I could see this going straight through my hand and then all of a sudden, weâve got to go to the emergency room. It would be a really, really big mistake. But you enjoy them!
Z: Thatâs true. I will. I use a towel. Donât worry, I protect myself.
A: Before we get started, one of the things we wanted to talk about is this amazing new part of the VinePair website that we launched, that is a project of Ericaâs, which is VinePair Pro, which is aimed at the industry. Erica, before we jump into the topic today, I thought we could take some time to chat a little bit about VP Pro.
E: Absolutely! We have been reporting on the pandemic and its impact on the industry from the earliest days. We were the first publication to spin up a live blog and consistent coverage of Covid-19 and how itâs been impacting the drinks industry. We do almost daily podcasts talking with leaders in the industry about how they are pivoting their businesses or grappling with the new reality, and we really realized that there is a gap in the market among publications, for someone like us, VP Pro and VinePair to come in with its data-based insights and fresh ideas from leaders from throughout the industry to develop an entire content program. So, thatâs what weâve done. This platform is totally free, and itâs designed to help our listeners who are in the drinks trade find a new path forward. Weâve gone from reporting on the pandemic, and now we are shifting our focus to the rebuilding. And thatâs the very best thing we can do. We can help the drinks trade rebuild, and we are doing data-focused articles and reports every week. We will have a first look for our subscribers at our VinePair Audience Insights, which is our consumer insights product, and weâll have recaps of all of our industry-focused podcasts â so thatâs everything from this podcast youâre listening to right now to out Covid-19 Conversations, and a forthcoming Industry Night Podcast, which weâre really excited to introduce. That will be profiling different leaders from throughout the industry. Anyone in the industry, whether youâre a producer, an importer, a retailer, a sommelier, a Cicerone, etc. â anyone in the industry can benefit from subscribing to this platform.
A: And how do they do that?
E: They go to VinePair.com and in that top navigation there is a link that says VP Pro. When you go to that homepage for VP Pro, youâll find an easy way to sign up and youâll find all of our coverage already there.
A: Awesome. Zach, anything to add? Any questions?
Z: I was just going to say that⊠I will be doing that as soon as we finish recording, and I wish this existed when I had a restaurant to work in. But I will in the future, so, thatâs good.
A: Yes, you will. You will.
E: Nice.
A: Cool. Letâs get into todayâs topic which is summer drinks from home. Every year around this time we make predictions for what we think the big drinks for the summer are going to be. Last year no one could have predicted it would have been seltzer. Well we did, but a lot of other people didnât really see it coming. The thing to really focus on today is what do we think the big drinks are going to be and especially how is drinking going to change this summer because so many of us will still be at home and if we are drinking, weâre drinking in our backyards more than weâre drinking out at bars. Weâre drinking in parks. If beaches are open where we live, weâre drinking at beaches, etc. So guys, what are your predictions?
Z: Iâll start. Some of what Iâm expecting is an acceleration of trends that weâve already been seeing over the last couple of years. Adam, you and I have talked about this a couple of times and weâve all talked about it. Hard seltzer is one category. I really expect that anything that comes in a can to continue to grow besides maybe beer. And a lot of that is, we talked about this a few weeks ago. I was struck yesterday. Weâre recording this on May 6, so yesterday was Cinco de Mayo, and I couldnât believe the number of people I saw walking around my neighborhood with either beers or what appeared to be Margaritas. Full disclosure, my wife and I were two of those people walking around our neighborhood with them. It was also a really beautiful day in Seattle, so it made a lot of sense. Anything that allows people to get into these quasi-permitted spaces that are really suitable for enjoyment, that you can maybe be safe in terms of keeping some distance or at least not being in an enclosed area. And something that you can grab-and-go and obviously thatâs been a huge trend for years now is the thing that I expect to see everywhere. The other venues for summer drinking as Adam mentioned introducing the topic, are not going to be available or may not be available everywhere and certainly not for some or all of the summer.
A: Thatâs right. Yesterday I walked into my park, and it was crazy. It was nice here, probably not as beautiful as it was in Seattle⊠Tons of people on blankets, socially distancing, and all drinking what we call ready-to-drink RTDs. Or they had one of these kinds of cups: The manufacturers of these sippy-to-go-cups that you used to ask, âWho drinks out of those? Wine moms?â There are these cups where you can fill basically a bottle of wine in something that looks like a tumbler and seal it. Thereâs tons of people drinking out of those, too, and youâll see a lot more of that. Thatâs a pretty solid prediction.
E: One trend Iâm really excited about that weâve been seeing result in a ton of traffic on VinePairâs recipe database is people making cocktails at home. And this can be any type of cocktail but really, weâre seeing a lot of people make the simple classics. Margaritas right now are off the charts. And we in general are seeing the recipe database traffic higher than almost any other time of the year right now because people are really wanting to create some of the cocktails at home that they usually would have in a bar or restaurant setting. Margaritas we will see continue to pop between now and all throughout the summer. It actually does really well all summer long for VinePair. Also blackberry, you may not be thinking about blackberry, but I saw a ton of traffic going to blackberry Mojito, blackberry bourbon sours, blackberry Margaritas. Blackberry is actually having a moment right now.
Z: Makes sense.
A: I agree. Blackberry is going to be everywhere. But has blackberry always been having a moment?
E: I donât know. I havenât seen it as much in the past. What do you think, Zach?
Z: This is a great transition into the next thing I was going to say, which is that fruit in general is going to be huge this summer. To some extent this is true every summer, but so much of whatâs going to define summer drinking in 2020 is people looking for comfort and people looking for familiarity as you were talking about, Erica, with cocktails that theyâre well acquainted with. And maybe theyâre looking for twists on them, but theyâre looking for something thatâs going to, for lack of a better word, remind them of a different time. And that fruit the other part of this, right? It is such an essence of summer and yet in drinking has been poo-pooed. We went through a phase where infusions and fruit in drinks was trendy, and then we moved away from it. Everything became super serious. âLetâs do everything spirit forward. Letâs deal with liqueurs.â That is something that persisted year-round. 2020 is going to be all about sweet and fresh and fruit because again, those are the things that give us the most base pleasure. As we all know, thatâs going to be what a lot of people want. So blackberry is right at the top of that list. Theyâre delicious, theyâre sweet, and in certain parts of the country theyâre wildly abundant. They are here in the Northwest when theyâre in season. Again, they have that wholesomeness to them in a way that isnât necessarily what people look for in drinking all the time but this year, this summer, thatâs going to be what people want.
E: So, maybe itâs simple two- and three-ingredient cocktails. Whether youâre talking about a bourbon sour or a Margarita, those are three-ingredient cocktails and then you add that ingredient of blackberry or blackberry puree. Itâs the simplicity of adding that additional layer of flavor that makes I feel seasonal and festive and fresh that probably is going to have a lot of appeal this summer.
A: You guys are right. People are going to try to look for anything that feels like an escape, and fresh fruit often does feel like an escape. It reminds you of going to the beach and getting that really fresh cocktail from the local tiki bar or from the beach stand bar where you got a Piña Colada or a strawberry Daiquiri. Thatâs what people are going to be looking for because a lot of us arenât going to be traveling, or if weâre going to be traveling, weâre going to be traveling not very far, right? Weâll get in the car and drive an hour to a friendâs house who we trust and stay with them for the weekend or something. Or maybe thereâs a hotel that we trust the cleanliness of this summer. But for the most part, people are going to be kicking it at home or very close to home, so those kinds of cocktails make a lot of sense. Itâs a trend every year, but I really do believe weâre going to have a massive summer for rosĂ©. And depending on how much rosĂ© is on the market, right? So as long as thereâs enough thatâs made it here, itâll be pretty huge and the reason for that is again that same idea of escapism. People are going to be looking for something to drink that makes them feel like they are in a different place and nothing is more reminiscent of the seaside and the South of France and this idea of accessible luxury than what rosĂ© has become. We talked about it last week on the Top 25 RosĂ© podcast and we chatted a lot about how weâre already seeing that spike happening now and itâs only going to continue, again taking that same approach that Zach did about what heâs been seeing walking around. When Iâve been walking in the park Iâve seen a lot of people with bottles of wine and more often than not that bottle of wineâs color is rosĂ©. I see some white, I see very little red to be honest, but Iâm seeing lots of pink wines and itâs this idea that pink is what makes people feel like theyâre in a different place. And that theyâre not celebrating, sparkling will continue to not do super well in the next few months because sparkling feels so celebratory, but that they are having something thatâs delicious and makes them feel like theyâre somewhere theyâre in a different place than they are right now.
Z: Thatâs really interesting because I had almost the opposite intuition about sparkling wine, which is that I thought people were going to look for these small victories in their day or in their week and maybe that might drive them to a little more sparkling wine. Traditionally in this in the U.S., we have tended to reserve sparkling wine for celebrations with maybe the exception of Prosecco, but I was wondering if we might see more sparkling wine consumption in the summer because it is the kind of thing that fits the weather in general. But also, itâs that idea that if it doesnât transport you in the way that rosĂ© does. It is a smile in a glass, in a sense, right? You canât not be in a good mood drinking sparkling wine and so my intuition is that we might see an uptick when, typically, summer is not usually a super-busy time for sparkling wine.
E: Right now sales of sparkling wine are way down. Thereâs a little bit of a low point to come back from, but where we will see sparkling wine is with spritzes. Aperol spritzes, you can make a simple blackberry spritz, you can make really any type of spritz with a little bit of liqueur and some seltzer on top with a squeeze of lime or something like that. Weâll see a little bit of an uptick but people are generally thinking that sparkling wine feels celebratory right now.
A: It does.
E: And theyâre not in such a celebratory mood, which makes me a little sad, too.
A: The spritz will probably come back because youâre going to see the companies that are committed to marketing. This is the season that they still rely on to spend. Thatâs whatâs been really interesting on the business stance, on the business front is that you had all of these companies say, âOh, weâre going to cut back marketing budgets because of Covid-19.â But then all I saw the last few days is spirits companies that own tequilas, spending tons of marketing on tequila content. This is still the Super Bowl for them. Weâll still continue to see a lot of tequila consumption throughout the summer. Campari spends a good amount on the promotion of Aperol because this is a big time for Aperol. This is when we all think of the spritz and want to drink the spritz. But for sparkling wine in general, if you look at current data, as Erica is saying, consumption will be pretty down. Maybe Prosecco will be up still or be at least normal. People think about Prosecco more as a sociable beverage than they do maybe Champagne or Cava or something that might feel to them to be a little bit more, I donât know, as celebratory. With the rosĂ© trend, pink sparkling could do well. It bleeds that line. If thereâs anything thatâs been indicating this from what weâre seeing in terms of what people are reading, itâs going to be a brutal summer for Champagnes.
Z: Could be.
A: And that sucks for so many of these producers that we all like, but thereâs so much caught up in our collective thinking of when we drink Champagne and why we drink Champagne, and thatâs benefited that category for so long. Itâs the one thing that is going to hurt that category right now, which is that people donât feel celebrating anything right now.
Z: True.
E: Also, going into a recession when youâre thinking about value and value brands popping, Prosecco is really where itâs at. Champagne is going to have a tough time with that.
A: I think so, too.
Z: I have a beer-related thought here, which Iâve been curious to get your read on.
A: Yes!
Z: Typically, we think about this time of year, summer for beer being on the one hand your lighter beers, whether they like light beers, whether theyâre your clean, crisp pilsners, kolsches, etc. And then thereâs the fruit beer question, and we already covered my thoughts on how fruit will be a big feature this year. But I wonder, do you guys expect to see a real shift because, as weâve talked about on previous podcasts, this crisis from Covid is really hitting breweries maybe harder than anyone, do we expect that this is going to be a summer of beer drinking that looks like a summer from maybe 10 years ago â in terms of what is popular? Bigger brands? Or do we think that even if they donât have a lot of cases, a lot of parts of the country if they canât have taprooms open, if you canât go to a beer garden, do we still expect to see the normal slice of the pie going to craft beer?
E: I was talking with Cat, our beer editor at VinePair, and she said that she is seeing people, consumers and people in the beer industry and adjacent to the beer industry, walking miles and miles for beer from local breweries. Supporting them with online purchases, with curbside pick-ups, with delivery where available. The biggest trend she and I were talking about is that beer lovers are going above and beyond to support the breweries that they love, and she said that that is more apparent to her now than ever before.
A: Itâs going to be a little of both. Some of these breweries are not going to be in the consciousness because they havenât figured it out yet. What Iâve been seeing over the last few weeks has changed my mind a lot in terms of what I thought was going to happen. So I thought it was going to be all basically very well distributed big beer brands as well as the larger craft brands, and you definitely are seeing that in a lot of places. But in New York especially, a lot of these craft breweries have figured out the delivery model, and Iâm now starting to see people all over the city drinking them again. And also some people saying that theyâre being able to drink stuff that they wouldnât normally be able to get because they werenât going to venture to the brewery to get in line for its most recent release or something⊠Now, as long as they spend at least 50 bucks they get free delivery and it comes within the next day, and itâs two or three 4-packs usually of these beers that people are really interested in. Itâll be a mixed bag. Itâs going to lean still more to the larger breweries because of access, but the people who are really passionate will still support the craft breweries. In the same way, weâre seeing some of the people who are really passionate about some of the craft spirits and the boutique wine brands are still really going out of their way to support those. Itâll be really interesting. It depends on where you are in the country, to be really honest.
Z: True.
A: That will depend, right? And then thatâll determine what youâre drinking and how youâre consuming.
E: And then thereâs people like me who wanted to feel the sand in my toes and the wind through my hair, and I had a Corona with lime yesterday, and it was amazing.
A: See? People are going to do that. My favorite thing in the summer is going to the beach, and we talked about this on the podcast before and getting a cold draft beer of macro lager⊠No matter what country Iâm in, right? If Iâm in Greece and I go to the beach, or if Iâm in Florida and I go to the beach, or wherever, a cold macro draft lager when youâve been in the sun all day⊠Thereâs almost nothing better than that.
Z: Yeah.
E: True.
A: Iâm probably going to buy some macro lager and get it really cold and go to the park and try to recreate it as best I can. There is something about that in the summer to drink these things we refer to as lawnmower beers⊠Those are really great when it comes to summer drinking and feel somewhat escapist and refreshing in a very different way than what weâre experiencing right now. I definitely will try to do that. Iâm really hopeful that New York, even if we stay somewhat socially distanced, will open the beaches a little bit, and I can at least somehow get out to the Rockaways or something and socially distance myself at Fort Tilden and sit in the sand for a day and listen to the waves and drink a beer. Iâm really hoping that can still happen this year⊠and they wonât keep it closed because itâs still a city park. But who knows?
Z: I have one last thought about one other trend that ties into a couple of those things you were mentioning, and thatâs the other thing that is going to make a comeback this summer: Drinks made in blenders.
A: Yes!
Z: Thatâs the other category that really has been poo-pooed by the serious bartending craft, and not necessarily incorrectly. There are a lot of these frozen âwhateverâ drinks that when made poorly are pretty bad and most of the time they were made pretty poorly. But I love blending up drinks in the summer. There is nothing to me quite as refreshing as blended. Whether itâs a Piña Colada or a Margarita, thereâs something about those drinks that, yes, I will never claim that they are the pinnacle of cocktails, but I donât need them to be. And they are refreshing, they are fun, they are an easy way if you can socialize with people, a blender full of whatever the drink of your choice is. We will see this hybrid of what has become really popular with a throwback to a lot of classics, but I would say almost nostalgia drinks. That blender full of âwhatever drinkâ is something that feels very out of time. But because weâre in this unprecedented time, it makes a certain sense to me that I might want to sit on my deck with a blender, pitcher full of Margaritas with my wife, and talk to the neighbors and say âWell, this is what weâre doing now.â
E: Iâm so into that, I think thatâs a great idea.
A: Iâm super into blender drinks. My only thing is I donât have a blender, so do you guys have a preferred brand?
Z: Do you want to spring for the Vitamix? You got all the money in the world, then go for it. But otherwise, I donât know. I got mine as a wedding present, so youâre out of luck there.
A: Mine broke and we never replaced it, so I donât know what to get. A Kitchen Aid? Or an Oxo? ⊠If you have a preferred blender and you listen to the podcast, please email Adam at [email protected] and give him your blender advice.
Z: Exactly! Or as weâve been saying apparently on every episode: Send Adam a blender. Why not?
A: Iâll take it! Iâll take a picture of it, socialize it, let me know: [email protected]. Iâll let you know where to send the blender. If youâve got a preferred cocktail for that blender, let me know.
Z: You may not have Jonoâs 50K followers, but people pay attention.
E: Iâm sure heâs close.
A: Guys, this has been a lot of fun again this week, talking about some drinks trends. Itâs actually made me quite thirsty, so Iâm going to go pop a bottle of wine at the end of this. As always, everyone whoâs listening, thank you so much for taking the time to spend your Monday, Tuesday, or whenever youâre listening to this. We really appreciate it. Zach, Erica talk to you both next week.
E: Talk to you then.
Z: Sounds great.
A: Thanks so much for listening to the VinePair podcast. If you enjoy listening to us every week, please leave us a review or rating on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever it is that you get your podcasts. And now for the credits: VinePair is produced and hosted by Zach Geballe, Erica Duecy and me: Adam Teeter. Our engineer is Nick Patri and Keith Beavers. Iâd also like to give a special shout out to my VinePair co-founder Josh Malin and the rest of the VinePair team for their support. Thanks so much for listening, and weâll see you again right here next week.
Ed. Note: Transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity.
The article VinePair Podcast: What Happens When Summer Drinking and Social Distancing Collide? appeared first on VinePair.
source https://vinepair.com/articles/summer-drinking-social-distancing/ source https://vinology1.tumblr.com/post/617917959621459968
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Private search engine Qwantâs new CEO is Mozilla Europe veteran Tristan Nitot
French startup Qwant, whose non-tracking search engine has been gaining traction in its home market as a privacy-respecting alternative to Google, has made a change to its senior leadership team as it gears up for the next phase of growth.
Former Mozilla Europe president, Tristan Nitot, who joined Qwant last year as VP of advocacy, has been promoted to chief executive, taking over from François Messager â who also joined in 2018 but is now leaving the business. Qwant co-founder, Eric Leandri, meanwhile, continues in the same role as president.
Nitot, an Internet veteran who worked at Netscape and helped to found Mozilla Europe in 1998, where he later served as president and stayed until 2015 before leaving to write a book on surveillance, brings a wealth of experience in product and comms roles, as well as open source.
Most recently he spent several years working for personal cloud startup, Cozy Cloud.
âIâm basically here to help [Leandri] grow the company and structure the company,â Nitot tells TechCrunch, describing Qwantâs founder as an âamazing entrepreneur, audacious and visionaryâ.
Market headwinds have been improving for the privacy-focused Google rival in recent years as concern about foreign data-mining tech giants has stepped up in Europe.
Last year the French government announced it would be switching its search default from Google to Qwant. Buying homegrown digital tech now apparently seen as a savvy product choice as well as good politics.
Meanwhile antitrust attention on dominant search giant Google, both at home and abroad, has led to policy shifts that directly benefit search rivals â such as an update of the default lists baked into its chromium engine which was quietly put out earlier this year.
That behind the scenes change saw Qwant added as an option for users in the French market for the first time. (On hearing the news a sardonic Leandri thanked Google â but suggested Qwant users choose Firefox or the Brave browser for a less creepy web browsing experience.)
âA lot of companies and institutions have decided and have realized basically that theyâve been using a search engine which is not European. Which collects data. Massively. And that makes them uncomfortable,â says Nitot. âThey havenât made a conscious decision about that. Because they bring in a computer which has a browser which has a search engine in it set by default â and in the end you just donât get to choose which search engine your people use, right.
âAnd so theyâre making a conscious decision to switch to Qwant. And weâve been spending a lot of time and energy on that â and itâs paying off big time.â
As well as the French administrationâs circa 3M desktops being switched by default to Qwant (which it expects will be done this quarter), the pro-privacy search engine has been getting traction from other government departments and regional government, as well as large banks and schools, according to Nitot.
He credits a focus on search products for schoolkids with generating momentum, such as Qwant Junior, which is designed for kids aged 6-12, and excludes sex and violence from search results as well as being ad free. (Itâs set to get an update in the next few weeks.) It has also just been supplemented by Qwant School: A school search product aimed at 13-17 year olds.
âAll of that creates more users â the kids talk to their parents about Qwant Junior, and the parents install Qwant.com for them. So thereâs a lot of momentum creating that growth,â Nitot suggests.
Qwant says it handled more than 18 billion search requests in 2018.
A growing business needs money to fuel it of course. So fundraising efforts involving convertible bonds is one area Nitot says heâll be focused on in the new role. âWe are raising money,â he confirms.
Increasing efficiency â especially on the engineering front â is another key focus for the new CEO.
âThe rest will be a focus on the organization, per se, how we structure the organization. How we evolve the company culture. To enable or to improve delivery of the engineering team, for example,â he says. âItâs not that itâs bad itâs just that we need to make sure every dollar or every euro we invest gives as much as possible in return.â
Product wise, Nitotâs attention in the near term will be directed towards shipping a new version of Qwantâs search engine that will involve reengineering core tech to improve the quality of results.
âWhat we want to do [with v2] is to improve the quality of the results,â he says of the core search product. âYou wonât be able to notice any difference, in terms of quality, with the other really good search engines that you may use â except that you know that your privacy is respected by Qwant.
â[As we raise more funding] we will be able to have a lot more infrastructure to run better and more powerful algorithms. And so we plan to improve that internationally⊠Every language will benefit from the new search engine. Itâs also a matter of money and infrastructure to make this work on a web scale. Because the web is huge and itâs growing.
âThe new version includes NLP (Natural Language Processing) technology⊠for understanding language, for understanding intentions â for example do you want to buy something or are you looking for a reference⊠or a place or a thing. Thatâs the kind of thing weâre putting in place but itâs going to improve a lot for every language involved.â
Western Europe will be the focus for v2 of the search engine, starting with French, German, Italian, Spanish and English â with a plan to âgo beyond that later onâ.
Nitot also says there will also be staggered rollouts (starting with France), with Qwant planning to run old and new versions in parallel to quality check the new version before finally switching users over.
âShipping is hard as we used to say at Mozilla,â he remarks, refusing to be fixed to a launch date for v2 (beyond saying itâll arrive in âless than a yearâ). âItâs a universal rule; shipping a new product is hard, and thatâs what we want to do with version 2⊠Iâve been writing software since 1980 and so I know how predictions are when it comes to software release dates. So Iâm very careful not to make promises.â
Developing more of its own advertising technologies is another focus for Qwant. On this front the aim is to improve margins by leaning less on partners like Microsoft .
âWeâve been working with partners until now, especially on the search engine result pages,â says Nitot. âWe put Microsoft advertising on it. And our goal is to ramp up advertising technologies so that we rely on our own technologies â something that we control. And that hopefully will bring a better return.â
Like Google, Qwant monetizes searches by serving ads alongside results. But unlike Google these are contextual ads, meaning they are based on general location plus the substance of the search itself; rather than targeted ads which entail persistent tracking and profiling of Internet users in order to inform the choice of ad (hence feeling like ads are stalking you around the Internet).
Serving contextual ads is a choice that lets Qwant offer a credible privacy pledge that Mountain View simply canât match.
Yet up until 2006 Google also served contextual ads, as Nitot points out, before its slide into privacy-hostile microtargeting. âItâs a good old idea,â he argues of contextual ads. âWeâre using it. We think it really is a valuable idea.âÂ
Qwant is also working on privacy-sensitive ad tech. One area of current work there is personalization. Itâs developing a client-side, browser-based encrypted data store, called Masq, thatâs intended to store and retrieve application data through a WebSocket connection. (Hereâs the project Masq Github page.)
âBecause we do not know the person thatâs using the product itâs hard to make personalization of course. So we plan to do personalization of the product on the client side,â he explains. âWhich means the server side will have no more details than we currently do, but on the client side we are producing something which is open source, which stores data locally on your device â whether thatâs a laptop or smartphone â in the browser, it is encrypted so that nobody can reuse it unless you decide that you want that to happen.
âAnd itâs open source so that itâs transparent and can be audited and so that people can trust the technology because it runs on their own device, it stores on their device.â
âRight now itâs at alpha stage,â Nitot adds of Masq, declining to specify when exactly it might be ready for a wider launch.
The new CEOâs ultimate goal for Qwant is to become the search engine for Europe â a hugely ambitious target that remains far out of reach for now, with Google still commanding in excess of 90% regional marketshare. (A dominance that has got its business embroiled in antitrust hot water in Europe.)
Yet the Internet of today is not the same as the Internet of yesterday when Netscape was a browsing staple â until Internet Explorer knocked it off its perch after Microsoft bundled its rival upstart as the default browser on Windows. And the rest, as they say, is Internet history.
Much has changed and much is changing. But abuses of market power are an old story. And as regulators act against todayâs self-interested defaults there are savvy alternatives like Qwant primed and waiting to offer consumers a different kind of value.
âQwant is created in Europe for the European citizens with European values,â says Nitot. âPrivacy being one of these values that are central to our mission. It is not random that the CNIL â the French data protection authority â was created in France in 1978. It was the first time that something like that was created. And then GDPR [General Data Protection Regulation] was created in Europe. It doesnât happen by accident. Itâs a matter of values and the way people see their life and things around them, politics and all that. We have a very deep concern about privacy in France. Itâs written in the European declaration of human rights.
âWe build a product that reflects those values â so itâs appealing to European users.â
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