In Vino Veritas (2 page)

He walked over to where two of his men were screwing wires on to the stout wooden crosses which were to carry the first crops of the new red-wine grape they had planted. ‘Morning, Walter,' he said to the older of the men, glad that he was able to remember the name. The man had been one of his first workers here and was now a veteran of viniculture.

‘Mornin', Mr Beaumont,' said Walter in his thick local accent. ‘'E's comin' on a treat, this new 'un.'

Nothing in the local parlance was inanimate: every plant was he or she, and any failure on their part to cooperate was taken as a personal insult. Martin liked that local trait, which meant that even a golf ball had a personality of its own, exhibiting a malignity when it ran into trouble and a friendliness when it bounced favourably for you.

Walter couldn't have much longer to work now. Though his movements had slowed imperceptibly with the years, he never shirked and he gave full value for his wages. He had touched the canvas cap he always wore in acknowledgement of the boss's status, and Martin was pleased despite himself by the gesture. It wasn't very long since ill-paid rural workers here had touched their forelocks to the lord of the manor who was exploiting them. It was surely harmless for today's much better paid workers to acknowledge their employer with a touch of the cap. The habit would die with Walter and his contemporaries; the younger workers didn't see the need for any such demarcation in their status.

Beaumont glanced at his watch. The meeting was in ten minutes: he had better get back to base.

He drove the electric buggy swiftly back to the long, low complex of buildings near the entrance to the vineyards. The bricks stretched out further here each year, but there was ample room for additions where once the old farmhouse buildings had sprawled. The dining room and the shop had been extended again during the winter. The single-storey range of rooms which had been built for holiday lets was a lucrative addition to the complex over the last few years.

His own large office doubled as a room for company meetings. He liked this sort of economy, because it showed his staff where their priorities should lie. He was always reluctant to increase office facilities, which he saw as non-productive. The available funds should go to making the shop, restaurant and residential accommodation more attractive, as these areas were self-evidently the source of the profits on which Abbey Vineyards depended.

This morning's meeting shouldn't occupy them for very long. Martin, as chairman, began by telling them that. It was no more than a necessary evil, his attitude implied. His preference was to act as a benevolent dictator, but a meeting of senior staff was one of those diversions necessitated by their status as a limited company. He looked round affably at the five people who sat around the table which had been brought in for the occasion from the restaurant. There were nervous half-smiles from two of them, but all of them stared down at their brief agendas for the meeting rather than at him.

Martin reported on a couple of items under the heading of ‘Matters Arising', then in more detail on the progress of new planting. ‘Abbey Vineyards continues to make excellent progress. I look forward to your reports on your individual sections and to highlighting any problems we may have in particular areas, so that we can give our attention to them.' Whether intentionally or not, he made the words seem like a threat to the people who were about to speak. ‘First on the agenda is the restaurant. Report from our head chef.'

Jason Knight coughed nervously and said quickly, ‘Things are progressing well, I think.' That didn't sound as definite as he had intended it to when he had rehearsed it the night before. He had been determined that when he came in here he would exude a calm confidence, would emphasize how much he was in control of this vital source of profits. But Jason was a practical man, used to achieving results under pressure and driving himself and his kitchen staff hard. Formal reporting like this, in a quiet room full of attentive and possibly critical listeners, was still alien to him.

But Martin Beaumont wasn't in the mood for criticism. ‘That's what we want to hear,' he boomed out into the quiet room. ‘The extension to the restaurant has given us room for sixteen more covers each evening: I'm sure that as the summer progresses we shall fill the place on most nights. The challenge will be to do that during the winter, when people are less conscious of us and there is less for them to see here. But I'm sure we're all confident of meeting this new task as efficiently as we have done such challenges in the past!' The chairman jutted his chin aggressively at the room. His attempt to stir the blood might have been more effective with a larger audience than five.

Jason Knight said a little defensively, ‘People have to be persuaded to drive out here through the winter darkness. There's a lot of competition from the pubs, which is going to increase during this recession.'

‘If other people can pull in the punters, Abbey Vineyards can,' said Beaumont firmly. ‘We have a wonderful, spacious set-up here. Plus the individuality offered by our own wines. That is a well-nigh unique selling point.'

Alistair Morton looked up from his notes, sensing that there was no way the chef was going to win an argument with the more fluent owner of the vineyard. ‘The fact that there is a vineyard around the restaurant has been fully exploited over the last twenty years, Martin. It probably still has some novelty appeal for visitors to our area, but the locals are well aware of it.'

Beaumont's forehead furrowed for a couple of seconds. Then he resumed his upbeat performance, as new arguments appeared to him. ‘It is still a pulling point, Alistair. People are well aware that they don't have to struggle into a cramped car park and file into crowded pub dining rooms when they come here. They appreciate the space around them and the expertise which drives this place. That applies even during the winter, when they cannot see the greenery beyond our windows.' He turned and smiled directly at Jason Knight, as a prelude to his concluding argument. ‘But of course the biggest trump in our hand when it comes to the restaurant is Jason's cooking. The quality which he and his staff produce in their beautifully equipped new kitchens is second to none. I'm sure that all of us are aware of that.'

There was a polite, slightly embarrassed mutter of approval from the people round the table, whilst Knight stared at his agenda and reddened. Beaumont, sensing that he had taken this as far as he could, glanced at his agenda and said briskly, ‘Residential Accommodation.'

Vanda North, a striking woman with a prominent nose and bright blue eyes, was, at forty-six, ten years younger than Beaumont. She nodded and spoke decisively. ‘We shall have to face the fact that the residential accommodation is not going to do as well as hitherto in the next two or three years.'

Beaumont glanced quickly at the other faces round the table before he said, ‘It's not like you to be gloomy, Vanda.' But he was cautious. Vanda North had been in the business from the early stages. She was his partner in the limited company, though a very junior one in terms of her financial contribution. She was also responsible for the hitherto highly successful operation of the site's en-suite bedrooms, through her management of the residential section staff.

‘I'm being realistic, Martin. We don't operate in a vacuum. If people tighten their belts in the world at large, we must expect this sort of stay to be one of their first economies. Very few of our clients use our breaks as their only holiday of the year; we might be their first economy. We shall need to be ingenious to occupy the rooms as fully as we have done in the past. It probably wasn't the best time to extend our provision to twelve rooms.'

Beaumont frowned. ‘That was done on the basis of our previous lettings, which had been almost a hundred per cent during the summer months. It made sound sense to extend our plant when we were making handsome profits.'

Vanda North smiled. She was much more used to sustaining an argument than Jason Knight had been before her. ‘The extension may still make sound sense, if we take the long view. I'm merely flagging up that I anticipate problems in the next two years. We have to be flexible. The signs are certainly that we'll need to extend our range of bargain breaks. Once we're outside the peak summer season, we're facing a vast range of competition. We'll almost certainly have to accept lower profit margins, to keep the rooms occupied and hang on to the excellent staff we've recruited over the last few years.'

‘Well, I'm sure you understand the problems of this area better than anyone else in the room, Vanda,' said Beaumont shamelessly. This sort of meeting wasn't the place to make policy decisions. Some time in the next few days, he would have a detailed discussion with Vanda North about strategy and how they were going to fill the new accommodation suites. He was better at enforcing his formidable will in a one-to-one situation than in this sort of formal meeting. ‘You are right to emphasize that we can't ignore what is going on in the world around us, of course. The worst possible thing any of us could do is to press ahead with our plans in a blinkered way and ignore what is going on in the wider world.' He paused for a moment, apparently to let them all dwell upon that thought, before looking down at his next agenda item. ‘Report on new initiatives introduced last year.'

A rather nervous voice said, ‘Yes. That's me. I have the figures to hand.' This was Sarah Vaughan, Director of Research and Development, at thirty-three the youngest person in the room. She had long blonde hair and the sort of delicate, pretty, brittle-looking features which often seem to go with fair colouring. Sarah had a Business Studies degree and some years of experience in the retail trade with a big supermarket chain. She helped to run the shop on the site, but also had the brief to initiate new means of developing the full commercial potential of Abbey Vineyards. She was normally self-confident and energetic, but she found herself a little overawed to be included today in this formal meeting of the six people who were the driving force in what was now a large company and a considerable local employer.

Sarah shuffled the papers which had been ready on the table in front of her since the meeting began. ‘The gift vouchers continue to enjoy a steady sale, but they are hardly a new or original idea. I think we can say that the guided tours we developed into a regular programme last year have been a success. It's a difficult thing to measure, because we're talking about the public's goodwill – there are no directly measurable effects from the tours. But in my opinion the indirect effects have been valuable.'

‘I'll vouch for that.' The words came from a stocky figure, with the build of a prop forward and the face of one of the swarthy Welsh miners who had dominated the valleys fifty miles to the south of here in the not-so-distant past. Gerry Davies was the shop manager. He oversaw the sales of wines and the multiple associated products which had been the heartbeat of the enterprise since the earliest days of Abbey Vineyards. ‘And I'd say there are direct results. We sell considerable quantities of wine to the people who have been on the guided tours. More now than when we started. In my opinion they're well worth while.'

The chairman nodded thoughtfully. ‘You think these sales result directly from the tours?'

‘Almost invariably. I'd say most people who go on one of Sarah's walks buy at least one bottle of wine. Quite often someone will buy a case. I can say that with conviction, because I've seen the improvement since we've had a regular programme of tours.'

‘And why would that be?'

‘I've no idea.' He shrugged his big shoulders and looked interrogatively at Sarah Vaughan.

‘I think I know why,' said Sarah Vaughan slowly, ‘but I'm glad to hear that you think things have improved.' She looked round the table, as if checking that she had a receptive audience. ‘You get better at anything by doing it. I noticed that I was getting more relaxed and confident myself, and I could sense that my talk was going better, that I had a better rapport with my audience as we went round the different areas. They began asking me more questions, for one thing, which I took as a sign of interest. So I didn't just work on my own little talks, I watched to see who else went down well. When we began the tours we used anyone who was free at the time. Now I assign them as far as possible to three people: Gerry, myself and Joe Logan, who works three days a week in the shop but seems to have a gift for communication with the public. I feel the tours are more interesting as a result. I'm glad it's paying concrete dividends in the shape of sales.'

There was a little murmur of approval from her fellow workers. Martin Beaumont said rather stiffly, ‘It's good to hear that people like you are thinking about the job and how it might best be done, Sarah. This is the sort of initiative we'll all need to show in the testing two or three years ahead. How is the “Adopt a Vine” scheme going?'

‘It's really too early to say. This is probably the time of year when we should sell most memberships. We've only sold seven so far this year but we've had quite a lot of interest expressed. The scheme has the disadvantage that you lay out £25 and wait for quite some time before you get anything back for your money, so take-up is probably going to be confined to real wine enthusiasts.'

The ‘Adopt a Vine' scheme was one of Martin's own, which he had brought back from a vineyards convention. He would have preferred to hear that there was a more enthusiastic take-up, but he had no idea how that might be achieved. He was more concerned to get his own ideas across than to listen to those of other people, more conscious of his own reactions to items than of those of the other five people in the room. He said abruptly, ‘Item Four. Shop Sales'.

There was a moment of tension. Everyone knew that it was the sales in the shop, and above all else the sales of wines, which drove the whole enterprise. It was a long process planting the long rows of vines, then tending them for years until they reached commercial production levels. Those years had been endured some time ago and Abbey Vineyards was now a prosperous business. But it needed perpetual vigilance, awareness and industry to keep it so. There was still much scepticism among the public about English wines; there were still yearly battles, first to bring in a worthwhile grape harvest and then to sell the steadily increasing wine yield.