Approachable, enjoyable, charitable and fun; welcome to the Gargoyle Wine Club Experience

BY SIMONE J. SMITH

“It is our intention to be as meaningful as possible.” Scott Zebarth & Will Predhomme (Gargoyle Wine Club)

What do you get when you put a reporter, two sommeliers, wine, whisky, and a great charitable organization together? Well, of course; a fantastic story!

It was a Tuesday afternoon, and like many of you, I was living the Covid life. I was lazily drifting through my emails, and getting prepared for my interview with Will Predhomme, and Scott Zebarth, two sommeliers that are responsible for what is soon to be the only way to enjoy wine, The Gargoyle Wine Club.

Before I go any further, let me explain what a sommelier is. A sommelier, or wine steward, is a trained and knowledgeable wine professional, that normally works in fine restaurants, and who specializes in all aspects of wine service as well as wine and food pairing.

So, what is The Gargoyle Wine Club?

Gargoyle is a subscription-based service in which curated wines and whiskies are sourced to create a wine experience that is approachable, enjoyable, and fun. That’s right, every month, you could have a team of experts at your disposal to find you the right wine for the right occasion.

Being in a wine club has some great advantages. You have a team who searches through the best wine selections around the globe, looking for the perfect combination of quality and value. If they don’t love it, then you are not getting it. All you have to do is choose a subscription that you like by visiting https://gargoylewineclub.com/. You can cancel or place on hold your subscription at any time before the first of the month. Yes ladies, just like some of your shoe subscriptions.

What you get depends on you. They offer two bottle, four bottle, and six-bottle subscriptions. Each wine subscription features different wine selections each month, with one bottle of each included in your shipment.

Sounds pretty good right; let’s take it a step further. If you ask Scott and Will what type of business they are in, and they will say the water business. They took it a step further with their business idea by making it a socially responsible one. Their responsibility of choice is to provide access to sanitary water for those around the globe who do not have it as readily as many have it here in Canada.

Scott, Wiill and their team at Gargoyle started the Drink Better Initiative. For every bottle of wine or scotch its members receive, Gargoyle gives one person in need a full year of clean, safe water. So far, Gargoyle has given over 120,000 people in need access to fresh, safe water.

As much as I LOVE wine, what really caught me about this story was the giving back aspect. So here I was, wine glass in hand about to jump on this interview with Scott and Will.

“We are a water business,” Will began, “We come from the hospitality industry, we wanted to take what we know, and share it.”

 “Everything is based on integrity. Integrity focused choice,” Scott jumped in. “Our super power is wine, and if you are going to drink anything, it might as well be good.”

We talked for a bit about the different selections, how they select, and how business has been for them during the pandemic.

“There were massive stock outages during COVID-19,” Will explained. “At times it was difficult to get certain wines, so we had to rebuild our shipping model. I truly believe that all business owners had challenges, and we have all had to navigate this pandemic the best way we know how.”

 “Tell me more about your initiative, “I queried. “How did that get started?”

“We felt that it was our responsibility to do more,” Scott tells me, “We know how important water is to wine and whisky, and we started to learn more about how people did not have access to clean water. One of the most devastating facts I have learned is that every two minutes a child dies from a water shortage, and unfortunately, it usually affects women and children.”

 “We wanted to solve problems,” Will chimes in. “We have the ability to make a person’s life better. We don’t want to just do things for profit. We decided to join forces with Water.org because we saw the work that they were doing, and it resonated with us.”

Water.org is among the Top 10 Charities in the world (https://water.org/). Matt Damon and Gary White founded it in 2009. Together they wanted to bring awareness of the water crisis to the world. They saw how this crisis was negatively impacting the health and livelihood of more than one-third of the global population, and they wanted to change that.

They have successfully unlocked education, opened up economic opportunities and improved on the lives of millions of women and children just by assisting them in accessing safe water.

“To think,” Will shares. “every time our customers pay for subscriptions, they are donating to charity. It is not just accessing clean water, it is also building infrastructure to water that our donations support. The goal is to get more people involved.”

“We have a great team,” Scott tells me, “The weather is getting nicer. People are looking to relax more. Why not enjoy a nice glass of wine, knowing that while you are doing it, you are helping someone else.”

 I thanked them for their time and sat back and sipped my wine. What else can we do within our communities that will allow us to enjoy ourselves, and change the lives of others? Hmmm!