Uncorked Hosts Virtual Beer Tastings And A ‘Picnic At Home’
SAINT JOHN —With so many people isolating at home due to COVID-19, one New Brunswick company is working to give them the experience of trying some new beers with friends using technology.
Uncorked Tours, a company that offers food and drink experiences in Southern New Brunswick and was set to open its new location in the Saint John City Market, has taken a huge financial hit since the coronavirus crisis began. With group gatherings banned and non-essential businesses being closed, all of the Uncork’s tour reservations have been canceled.
“Financially, it’s put us in a stressful situation because we want to continue the build. We want to get to a point where can use the space in whatever capacity we’re allowed to use it,” says Uncorked’s owner Gilliane Nadeau
“I’m optimistically telling my team, let’s pretend that we’re going to open for June 1 in some way. Let’s try to continue. But it’s been really strange, we’ll say.”
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But like businesses of all kinds, Uncorked has been trying to leverage the internet to help both the business and its customers get through these tough times.
“We’ve been talking about virtual tours, augmented reality tours, a lot of these concepts for a couple of years now,” says Nadeau. “There was never really a push to explore it and see how we would go about that, how we would turn it into something. It was an idea we had toyed with before COVID-19 came and turned the world upside down.”
But now that idea has become a reality. Uncorked has teamed up with DrinkNB.ca to offer weekly, guided beer tastings, using Zoom as a virtual tasking room.
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Beer lovers can check out the selection each week and pick-up some, or all, of the brews from DrinkNB.ca where they will be delivered to their door. The delivery also includes a code that will allow them into the live Zoom tasting that will be held Saturdays evening.
“Our new tasting concept really was born out of a partnership with them in that we had a way to get the beer or the cider to people’s homes,” says Nadeau.
The setup will allow participants to interact with others, or just following along from home if they wish.
“Our new setup will allow us to have a tasting room that also streams live,” says Nadeau. “You can interact with us and the people leading the tasting, or you can sit at home with your friends, put us on the big screen, and just taste along with us. You don’t actually have to interact in the room.”
Another big attraction of the Uncork Tours experience is its showcasing of local food. The company has also teamed up with the Saint John City Market to bring that experience into people’s homes.
Its new “Taste of the City Market” at-home experience is a delivered-to-your-door tasting that includes everything you need for a decadent charcuterie board for up to four people. Something Nadeau describes as a “picnic at home.”
“This concept is that we have taken that picnic idea,” says Nadeau. “But instead of letting you take a blanket and a basket and a map of where to go picnic, we’ve actually wrapped it up for you and will deliver it to people’s doors. It’s purchased online and it’s basically a picnic in a box.”
Though these new offerings may not completely replicate the real-life social aspect of the Uncorked Tours experience, Nadeau says it’s pretty close.
“We’re really working to create that virtual experience that makes people want to come and hang out with other people that are tasting the same beers,” she said.
“We really tried to take everything that’s awesome about our in-person tours and put as much of that into and an online form as we can. We can’t replace in-person contact, but we can get pretty close I think.”
Like many other businesses in the hospitality sector Uncorked has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. Though there is still much uncertainty around the future, Nadeau says she’s trying to focus on the opportunities.
” I feel that the opportunities are really endless if we can figure out how to give people what they need and how to give people what they are craving,” she says. “Not just now, but as we’re navigating our new normal. We have no idea when the large events are going to come back.”