Cameron Hughes loves to talk - to anyone. Which is probably what makes him a natural-born salesman. To watch his in-store pitch is to see someone channeling unmediated, the spirit of salesmanship, of top-hatted carnival barkers of yore, of infomercial kings like Ron Popeil and anyone who's ever mounted a soapbox. In Hughes's case, he's talking wine.
The pitch comes rapid-fire, all bluster and spectable: "Step right up: You've got to taste it to believe it," he calls from his table in the wine section of the Costco in Danville, California. "You, sir, do you like wine? If so, you must try this one. Thirty-dollar juice for nine-ninety-nine. Won't believe it until you taste it. No, sir, I'm not allowed to give a sample, but buy a bottle and taste it in the parking lot. I guarantee you'll be back to buy a case." Dressed in jeans and a collared shirt, the tall, lean Hughes is kinetic, speaking quickly, confidently, without seeming to stop to breathe. Shoppers passing by can't help but notice him and when they do he beckons them over. Unable (by law) to offer samples, he provides 30 seconds of his spiel instead, hammering away constantly at the notion of value. Handsome in a nondescript way and emanating palpable confidence, the 35-year-old Hughes leaves an impression reminiscent of a slightly grown-up brat-pack actor from the 80s- C. Thomas Howell or maybe Tom Cruise from RISKY BUSINESS.
Hughes is a negociant: that is, he buys finished wine from producers and resells it at a profit. Sometimes he blends separate lots of wine together to make something superior to the individual components. And sometimes he just purchases a lot of wine in bulk (or even sometimes in a bottle) and repackages it under his name and sells it. It's a classic wine business niche, a la negociants like Drouhin or Duboeuf in France, though Hughes has put his own stamp, and a very contemporary one, on the profession. Unlike these two mainstays of Burgundy and Beaujolais, respectively. Hughes does not confine himself to one region; he is currently sourcing wine from five countries and over a dozen appellations. Another difference between Hughes and the classic negociant is that Hughes doesn't simply make one big blend from the small lots of dozens of small grower-producers. He buys lots almost exclusively from established, highly regarded wineries that have a surplus in one area or another. And once he has the wine, Hughes works rapidly - the elapsed time between buying a tank of wine and selling out of it can be as short as a few weeks - via the Internet and Costco superstores.
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