About Us and Blog Policies (including our Samples Policy)

Allison and I are recent transplants to the Sarasota/Bradenton, FL area.  We recently spent a year in Cincinnati, OH (where this blog was born) and before that spent more than a decade in Birmingham, AL where we both developed a passion for good food and wine.  




In addition, Gary has spent approximately 12 years working in retail wine and spirits sales, as well as teaching some wine classes and pouring more bottles than you can imagine at hundreds of wine tastings.  Finally, Gary is also in the process of developing some new class offerings as well as beginning to host some private wine tastings and offering other wine and spirits related services.  If you are interested, drop him a note.




Our goal with this blog at first was simply to have a quick reference available to us when we were out and about -- to help us remember what we had previously tried and whether or not we liked it.  Over time, we've begun to gather a small, but growing, following of readers and fans and we have expanded our scope to include not only wine but also restaurants, wine dinners, wine events, single malt scotch, small batch bourbon and even an occasional cigar (though the last 3 are primarily Gary's hobbies and not so much Allison's!).




We want this to be a fun place to come.  We don't take ourselves too seriously (well, at least most of the time we don't) and we certainly do not claim to be experts on any of this... these are our opinions only.




We welcome feedback and comments... just click on the comments link at the bottom of each post to leave a comment about that post or send us an e-mail by using the link on the right hand side of the page (or click here).  Please keep comments to posts relevant to the post at hand and keep it above board.  This is our blog, and we reserve the right to reject any comment that we deem inappropriate.




Finally, we've recently had a question about whether or not we accept samples.  As a general rule we review what we have paid for ourselves; this helps to ensure that there is no bias in our review.  However, if you wish to provide a sample or complimentary we have established the following guidelines:

1) We will fully disclose that the review is for a sample/complimentary. Additionally, we will try and determine if is available locally (Sarasota/Bradenton/Tampa, FL region) and what the local retail price is.

2) We are open-minded, but we may not like the sample and our review will reflect this. If we do not like the sample we will state the reason(s) why. WE WILL NOT REMOVE A NEGATIVE REVIEW IF THE PROVIDER IS UPSET WITH IT, but we will allow them to offer comments/feedback on the review. If the sample is defective (for example a corked wine), we will work with the provider to remedy the situation or not publish a review at all.

3) We will not accept payment for any review that we write, nor will we pay for any part of any sample/complimentary including any taxes, shipping, etc. If you wish to provide a sample/complimentary, it will be at your expense. For additional information, including shipping contact information, please e-mail gary@obrientastings.com or click on the 'Send Us an E-mail' link in the right hand column. BEFORE WE WILL PROVIDE CONTACT INFORMATION, WE REQUIRE THAT THAT WE ARE ABLE TO VALIDATE WHO IS CONTACTING US. GENERALLY THE EASIEST WAY OF DOING THIS IS SENDING AN EMAIL FROM YOUR COMPANY EMAIL SYSTEM (For Example: if you are ACME WINERY you should contact us as somebody@acmewinery.com). IF WE CANNOT VALIDATE THE CONTACT, WE WILL NOT PROVIDE PERSONAL INFORMATION.