Call My Quaff

Simon Taylor

The Stroud Wine Co, Gloucestershire

In a nutshell: A wine-themed take on the beloved Call My Bluff TV show, in which punters have to decide which of two expert hosts is giving the correct information about the wine in their glasses.

Tell us more.

“Laura Holloway [the shop’s co-owner] and I have hosted a few of these events at our tasting room. It’s relatively easy to set up and a lot of fun for our customers to play.”

What are the rules?

“The game requires two hosts and it’s best if people play as teams of two to six. Teams taste six wines blind. For each wine, they will receive two descriptions, one from each host. One is correct, one is a lie.

“After each wine they mark who they think is telling the truth on a score sheet. You can award a bonus point for each wine by suggesting two bottle prices. Again, one is a complete lie. So, for six wines there is a total of 12 points on offer.”

What wines do you feature?

“We normally start with a fizz. Friendly banter between hosts is encouraged:

‘This is Champagne’. ‘No, no, no! This is Prosecco!’ and so on. The fizz is followed by two whites then two reds, and we finish with a fortified. The more varied the price and styles, the better.”

How do you choose the wines?

“We like to choose wines with an interesting story. We’ll sometimes choose new wines we would like our customers to get excited about and that we know will be unfamiliar; sometimes wines we love but are overlooked, and deserve a push.

“We like to mix traditional classics followed by wildcard unusual varieties and countries. Often the more obscure the grape variety, coupled with an interesting back story about the vineyard and winemakers, the more it sounds like a lie and it comes as a great surprise when they find out it’s true.

“Sometimes descriptions can be poles apart. Trying to convince people they are tasting a Spatburgunder when they are in fact tasting a Bordeaux can be fun – ‘This is a rare example of an unoaked Bordeaux by a maverick winemaker’ etc.”

That’s the tasting over with. How do you organise the scoring?

“We find that going through all the wines first, and then taking a short break before going through the results, works best.

“Teams should mark their own score cards as it makes for more fun for the players to see how they are doing.

“We print out a large TRUE and FALSE card for each host and hold them up at exactly the same moment when revealing each wine. This guarantees a cheer of delight or anguish.”

Is there a nice prize for the winners?

“Winning teams receive a bottle of something from the shop. We then reveal the bottles and quickly sum up the wines again. We write the order numbers on the bottles in chalk pen so it makes it easier for the customer to buy the wines.”

Can wine novices join in?

“This is a fun game, lasting around 90 minutes, that requires no knowledge of wine at all for players – in fact, the more people know about wine, the more difficult they find it – and it’s very informal. It’s also a game that you can run as often as you like. as you simply change the wines.”

Do you get sales off the back of it?

“Sales of the wines after the quiz are usually strong. The quiz sheet doubles as an order form. And we very often get a customer or two coming into the shop a few weeks later, asking for ‘half a dozen of wine number four’.”

Simon and the team win a WBC gift box containing some premium drinks and a box of chocolates.

Tell us about a bright idea that’s worked for you and you too could win a prize.

Email claire@winemerchantmag.com

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