Just read this article for breakfast on mashable. http://mashable.com/2011/03/15/digital-marketing-trends/

Always interesting to hear what the experts say will rule the day in 2011. As an entrepreneur I love checking out the latest and greatest in communications. Now if I could only figure out how to mash up articles like this from mashable. Arggg.

As the year draws to a close branding and marketing ideas keep flowing. Since starting up Bush I have often considered that wine would be a good thing to brand and market. Life is not always all about beer.

It seems perfect that a good idea would take root in a cellar. Here is an inspirational photo of what could just be the perfect start to a wine niche.

Before the year ends Alison and I are going to take a little wine tour of the Hunter Valley to seek out the pioneers in the Australian wine industry and all going well we will start to fill some of the lonely spaces in the beautiful cellar.

Here is a list and some information on some of the old Australian vineyards in the Hunter Valley we plan to visit:

Wyndham Estate-George Wyndham is considered the father of Australia Shiraz. He planted the first commercial Shiraz vines in the Hunter Valley in 1830.

Tyrrell’s Wines-English immigrant Edward Tyrrell established Tyrrell’s Wines in 1858 in the lee of the Hunter Valley’s Brokenback Range, New South Wales.

Tullloch Wines-The Tulloch family have been producing outstanding wines from the fertile soils of the Hunter Valley since 1895.

Audrey Wilkinson-The Wilkinson’s were true pioneers of the Australian winemaking industry. Despite two earlier ventures in Australia, the Wilkinson family returned after the brothers Frederick and John had studied winemaking in France and Germany . In 1866 the family acquired the present site of the Audrey Wilkinson vineyard.

Drayton’s Family Wines-The Drayton’s are one of the Hunter Valley’s pioneering winemaking families and it is one of the few companies that is still family owned and operated. It has been over one hundred and fifty years since the first Drayton trod on rich Hunter Valley soil.

Lindeman’s-In 1843 Henry Lindamen planted the first vines at Cawarra: Reisling, Shiraz and Verdelho.

McWilliams-Founded in 1877, McWilliams is one of Australia’s oldest and most respected family-owned wineries.

McGuigan Wines-The McGuigan love affair with winemaking began with Owen McGuigan who was born in the Hunter Valley of Australia in 1869.

For more information on the Hunter Valley and its wine heritage - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter_Valley_(wine)

Tom Homer and his family

There have been many ideas come out of the shed but yesterday’s session with Tom and Ben was a real doozy. The journey that we went on to end up with the mantra–It’s what God would want was quite extra-ordinary.

Here is how it started. Ben and Tom have been working on our farm for several months now. We were talking about opportunities for us to keep doing the hard and good work that we have been doing. This led us to discussing opportunities in Melbourne where Ben has shifted back to for family reasons. Property development and renovations are the sort of thing we were on about. Somehow this led Tom to one of his random brain explosions where he described in detail churches back home (England, Wales, Scotland, et al) that had been turned into pubs. Needless to say this idea got the group going and before we knew it a business plan has been hashed out and the Church Pub Group was born and then Thomas had another stroke of brilliance and he coined our good Christian Credo –it’s what God Would Want.

I am not sure what God would want but I do know that Alison would not want me to start up another business at the moment. So it is with unusual restraint that I am not going to go and register more domain names. By the way churchpubgroup.com is available and even more exciting so is churchpub.com.au. Instead of spending money right now on registering, hosting and developing these domains this idea of the moment is going to get started in one of my many other ideas that did make it out of the shed–centuryfarms.com.au

Our mission is to create a directory of churches that are or are very close to being 100 years old. Churches and Century Farms go hand in hand so the fit feels perfect and the best part is we can start right now. Time to have another coffee. It’s just past 5 am and with a little bit of work I should have something to show the boys when they wake up.

Ben just woke up. Better get this post up. Here is a link to the Century Farms Church directory.