R.I.P Max Zander

“This is a working warehouse, its not a museum.  Your job is to sell the wine in this warehouse, not complain about the wine that’s not available for sale in this warehouse.” – Max Zander

“(insert name of wine) has been untouched by human hands for a month now.  Do you realize it is your job to sell this wine?” – Max Zander

R.I.P. Max Zander.

The single most influential force in the history of the New Orleans wine business passed away yesterday.  Max Philip Zander died on Thursday, May 14, 2009 at Lambeth House Nursing Home two months shy of his 89th birthday and he forgot more about wine last week than most people will ever know.

Last night in New Orleans scores of people sat down to their dinner tables at home and in restaurants with a bottle of wine, entirely unaware that the reason New Orleans is so far ahead of the oenological curve from other like-sized cities is due entirely to the efforts of Max Zander.  Sure, we are a national, if not global, food destination but none of that matters in the big picture of wine if there isn’t a savvy, educated consumer base to generate sales.  For as romantic and passionate as the wine business can seem, there is a very real, “what have you done for me today” side to the business and, quite frankly, in this business people fish where the fish are – and in wine its usually the smart, with-it fish in the big ponds that are biting.

So, that brings me to Max.  A native New Orleanian (born on July 20, 1920 – one day and 51 years shy of my own birthday) and Tulane graduate, Max left Tulane Law School to join the U.S. Air Force during WWII.  On return home, he joined up with his family’s company, Zander & Company, which was a coffee import company where he spent over 15 years. As a fortunate twist of fate for anyone in the 504 that’s ever held a glass of wine in their hands, in 1961 Max left his company and joined Magnolia Liquor Company (now Republic National Distributing Company).

At that time Magnolia was the Seagram’s house, which at the time was certainly the 900lb gorilla in the liquor business, and the profit and focus and direction of the company was booze, booze, booze.  Its not just that in the 60’s when Max joined Magnolia wine wasn’t popular or not as omnipresent as it is today – it wasn’t available for sale!  At the time Max joined Magnolia the wine landscape was pretty bleak.  There were a few places doing great things in California (Inglenook, BV, Charles Krug) but by and large Napa and Sonoma were just few farmers fooling around, the Willamette Valley wasn’t even a glean in Dick Erath’s eye,  Burgundy really hadn’t yet begun in earnest Domaine bottlings, South Africa, Chile and Argentina were in the stone ages, Australia couldn’t grow a vine to save their lives because of a root louse epidemic and Robert Parker was popping open cans of Heileman with a Church Key at the University of Maryland.

So, with the wine business pretty much limited to Germany, Bordeaux and a few other dribs and drabs what does Max do?  He convinced the owner of Magnolia Liquor, the great New Orleans philanthropist Mr. Stephen Goldring, to start a sales division dedicated solely to wine.  He took the wines that were available to him and set out to turn New Orleans into a wine city.

With as bleak and limited as the offerings of wine at the time, one can only imagine how equally sparse wine offerings, wine service and wine knowledge was on the restaurant side of things.  Outside of a small fraternity of restaurants (LeRuth’s, Antoine’s, etc) wine list offerings were usually limited to house white, house red and house pink.  Max, though, slowly began momentum to change all of this in the City that Care Forgot and led the charge of change through education.  By the mid/late 1970’s Max was well known as the premier wine expert in New Orleans and he knew that the only way New Orleans restaurants would sell more wine is if New Orleanians bought more wine and the only way for that to happen was through education.  He taught wine appreciation courses at UNO and Tulane, hosted radio shows, led the charge on teaching wine classes at the Plimsoll Club – all in the name of creating a community of wine drinkers.  At a time when it wasn’t en vogue for someone to be passionate about the wine business Max was leading the charge with brute force.  He founded and headed up a local chapter of the German Wine Society, the International Wine and Food Society, the Commanderie de Bordeaux, and the Chaine de Rotisseurs.   His efforts did not go unrewarded and New Orleans took shape as a destination for European wine sales.  Unconcerned with the initials and titles that so many wine professionals feel necessary to validate their existence, Max was only concerned with rolling up his sleeves and opening bottles of wine.

Certainly, and slowly, things began to take root around Max.  By the early 80’s California was pumping on all cylinders, things were taking shape in Oregon, Italy was becoming more of a significant global player than they had been and wine was flowing like never before.  Moreover, a restaurant renaissance was taking place with fine people like Frank Brigsten and others opening up their own places.  Max’s wine division, Heritage House, was joined by F. Strauss, Bologna Brothers, Pan-American and other outfits that helped advance and grow the fine wine business in New Orleans.  By the 90’s the thing exploded wide open and wine was everywhere.  The flood gates could no longer be held back, wine had definitely come to the forefront of the alcohol business.

It was at this time, the early 90’s, when I joined Heritage House as a Wholesale Sales rep.  By then Max had switched from running day to day operations and had moved into the marketing and business side of things.  In this role he wasn’t responsible for sales, per se, but he did make it his mantle to teach us young pups how to educate people about wine, how to sell through education and how to never stop seeking to advance the enjoyment of wine for those who were unknowledgeable.  I also took great joy in sitting in Max’s office while he taught me about more than the slopes of the Cote d’Or or the varietal characteristics of Bordeaux grapes – Max taught me how to have a black and white, razor sharp, pragmatic approach to the wine business.  “It doesn’t matter whether you’re selling grape juice or Grape Nuts,” he would tell me, “”If you don’t make money at it you’re not going to be in business for very long.”  In many ways the approach that I take as a business owner – having an undying passion for both wine and the bottom line and making certain that you respect both and achieve both with integrity and honor – is due entirely to the lessons that I learned in Max Zander’s office.

Working as Vice-President of Marketing for Republic National virtually up until the day he died (even last year he was posting comments on British Wine article websites), Max is a person that can never be replicated.  So, to Max, to your vision, to your tenacity, to your courage, to your passion, to your ability to break barriers and your dogged determination, and for creating a generation of wine drinkers I toast you.  And Max, for your leadership, your guidance, for taking a mentorial approach to a young man who so immediately loved the wine business but was so confused by it, for showing me how to be tough but fair in business and for teaching me the most important thing of all – that in wine, or business, or family or life to act with dignity and integrity and passion, and the rest will follow – I thank you.  Tonight I’ll be opening a bottle of wine in your honor, a wine from the first property I ever visited, which was set up and directed by you – a 1994 Schloss Johannisberger Riesling Rosalack.  I can’t think of anything more appropriate.

Max Zander, thank you for your life’s work and may God bless you.

(thank you to The Times-Picayune for the use of some information from their obituary of Max Zander.)

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