It was 2018. CrossFit Games athlete Margaux Alvarez messaged me, somewhat randomly, through Instagram.
She wanted to talk to me about YouTube.
At the time, I was heartily employed at a quickly growing media firebrand. She was hoping to better market her wine marking and was seeking talent and ideas.
An epiphany
Margaux wasn't selling wine. She was selling a lifestyle of accomplishment.
More specifically, that one could be a gym rat, a health nut, and wine connoisseur without the annoying puritanical tenets of any of those tribes.
Fertile ground
In 2018, CrossFit was at its peak.
With boxes popping up like teen acne. The Keto Diet hadn't yet overtaken the then popular Paleo Diet. Everything was kipping pull-ups, AMRAPs and dreading Fran.
The idea someone could be a high performing athlete, or even a low performing athlete, while admitting to drinking wine, was scandalous. After all, no caveman or woman ever swirled or sniffed a merlot. At least we haven't the cave scratchings to prove it.
But Margaux thought both would work, that you could "work hard and wine down."
The seeds which formed into a vine
We are more than just one thing.
For Margaux the highlights were: Athlete. Health nut. Business executive. But human too. I wanted to position her wine to be a part of life. Not a reward. Not an exception. Nothing taboo to be "earned" or hidden.
But a ritual.
Video concept pitched:
A morning breath in.
Followed by a montage filled with quick cuts of Margaux's day: her morning run, her morning coffee, checking her emails, making her calls, consulting with her partners, hitting the gym. Shots of her with kettlebells, barbells rising fast, dropping with drama. Interspersed with laughter, sweat. All set to the tone of her heartbeat that quickens throughout the day.
And suddenly, it slows.
The wine pours in a clean long shot.
Margaux smiles, raises the glass, takes a sip.
She breathes out.
Bottled, shelved and waiting
A vintage waiting to ripen
I wasn't paid to consult. The trip was the payment. We even took a helicopter ride into the Grand Canyon.
The trip was a "soft poach" that never came to be. Funding reasons on the winery's behalf. But I never lost touch with Margaux, we became friends. The wine business, like many industries, took a hit in 2020.
But what I realized was I wanted more creative work to fuel my life.