Lodi wine educator raises glass to 30 years of classes
For the past 30 years, Brian Price has volunteered his time teaching wine appreciation classes in Lodi, where he has lived since 1996.
“I started in the (wine) industry with the intention of becoming a winemaker, but when I got there, I realized I wanted to focus more on the sales and marketing of it,” Price said.
After graduating from California State University, Fresno with a bachelor’s degree in fermentation science and viticulture in the 1980s, Price worked as a sales representative for various wineries for three years before moving to San Joaquin County in 1988, where he began working as a pharmaceutical and hospital sales representative.
“I noticed that, in a wine-centric community such as Lodi, nobody was teaching wine appreciation,” Price said. “People are intimidated by wine because it’s very complex, so I wanted to break down that intimidation and create a safe space for people to learn about wine.”
Price created a 21/2-hour “Wine Tasting 101” class for the City of Lodi Division of Arts and Culture at Hutchins Street Square for five years, he said, covering aspects such as wine history, grape-growing, fermentation, health benefits and more.
Although he wanted to offer the class for free, Price said the City of Lodi told him he had to charge his students something, so he set the registration price at approximately $34.
“What I charged was just to cover the cost of the wines and fees for Hutchins Street Square,” Price said. “What little I had left, I donated to the local Boy Scout Troop, so this has never been a money-making venture for me. I haven’t taught that class for five years, but nobody’s stepped in, so I may go back to it.”
Since then, Price has taught wine tasting classes for local clubs, college students, at medical and pharmacy conventions and even wrote as a columnist for the News-Sentinel, focusing mainly on wine education.
Most recently, Price has been teaching a one-hour wine tasting class to local physicians as a way for them to relax after work.
“I work with physicians, and one of the problems is that a lot of people are getting burnt out because their working environment is very demanding. There’s a lot of pressure,” Price said. “It’s something I thought I could do to help them relax and enjoy their time away from the office.”
Price’s current class focuses on what he calls “The Four S’s: See, swirl, smell and then sip,” as well as key terms such as aroma, bouquet, balance and tannins.
“It’s a lot of fun. Whenever I do the class, there always seems to be great interest,” Price said.
“People have epiphanies and breakthroughs because I’m teaching them the basics of what wine critics go through in evaluating wine.”