Getting the Boxed Wine Buzz Out in The Big Easy...

Greetings Voignier and Kind monitors of our progress,

We have had a rather protracted stay in the Big Easy, if you will. Our days have been spent organizing and executing one of the largest "word-of-mouth" advertising campaigns we have ever been engaged to conduct. This is the result of a very old contact referring our writings to a leading box manufacturer in the mid-west, who called us after reviewing several of our studies in boxed wine.

What began as "just us two girls talking", if you will, because a fast friendship and business partnership which has given us a vastly larger budget to conduct our marketing maneuvers across North America, and Parts of Chile on behalf of our clients and the Boxed Wine Association of North America and Parts of Chile. It turns out that our new client is a rather avid boatsmen, which gave us many interests in common, both firm in the conviction that boat ownership is a glorious, if losing proposition, not unlike owning a proverbial hole in the water where we owners must pour our money in order to remain afloat, if you will.

In short, we are delighted by this new business purpose, and needless to say, so are our friends who reside at The Riverside Park, who have been migrating down to New Orleans over these past two weeks. Almost the entire market research team that works for us at the 79th Street Boat Basin in Manhattan has made it, and several new faces have shown up in the hopes that they can "shape the job", as they put it. Many have come by train, but most have either hitched rides along the interstate highway system, or taken the bus, where they were able to scrape of the funds, as it were.


For our part, we are not fan of the free labor model of business (as in work for free in the hope of getting paid after you get a job offer), or those that would allow their employees to audition, or "to shape the job", if you will. Rather, we insist that everyone be paid something of fair value, either it be money, goods or services, which is not problem for us with the amount of boxed wine our clients have provided for our two ongoing road shows. We are no fans of the internship of the American work force, if you will, where over-educated applicants fresh out of college are forced to volunteer to staple and stamp as they audition for a real job. This trend is also a pet point of contention for Dr. Emily's, who has asserted that she would like to see a study showing the correlation breast size and attrition to full time jobs under such conditions. And so, we pay everyone who has come down to New Orleans for work for our new buzz marketing business unit on that we have entitled, Operation Push Strings, or "P.S." if you will.

We believe it is contrary to the better angels of the so called America way to use interns or volunteers to generate income for our clients. Doubtless, America was build on untold hours of free labor in the form of slave wages over the centuries, and to deny the 40 acres and mule economy that came before us would be denying the rather gigantic elephant laying dung in the center of the room. Nevertheless, we have no desire to honor that American tradition that would amount to us bring back the bad old days of indentured servitude and slave wages. And so, everyone on our modest ship of fools is paid according to their contribution to our boxed wine marketing efforts...

Our new Buzz Marketing division is has been in operation for just over 1 week now, with a strategy that focuses on word or mouth testimonials in New Orleans area bars, restaurants and in some cases, people's homes, where folks allow us to hold Boxed Wine parties in their homes the way tupperware or Mary Kay cosmetics are distributed. We however, do not try to sell anything, but instead aim to provide kind words about the products that have ponied you the funds to allow us to do Bacchus; work for him, if you will.

Most of our workers are happy to be in a warm place, having spent November and December "camping" in The Riverside Park, and without morning breakfast and hot coffee prepared by Dr. Emily each day, as it is when we hold court at the boat basin for the warm months. They also appear happy with the compensation, including free wine, "undercover" clothing, ample food and a warm bed each night. We have taken over an entire public campground just outside the city. Operation Pushing String is well underway, in the wake of the Bush visit to New Orleans, where he sat beside the mayor, who put us in mind of a cat with a turpentine ass, as they say. We expect there is no shortage of bad blood between the folks who suffered the wrath of Katrina, and I do not think it is reading into the situation to say, Bush's visit appeared to be going as smoothly as say, a clam bake at a Kosher Butcher's convention (okay, I'll stop) And so, the George Bush we witnessed, as we spread out across the Big Easy spreading good faith for Boxed Wines, seemed as busy as a one legged man in an ass kicking contest, if you will (sorry, last time).

In the wake of the Bush visit, we are having a pretty easy time working with the folks who have been drawn to the bar scene and restaurants. Many appear to be repeating the same thing over and over to us, and a quick eyeball analysis of the word frequency study we are putting together from our worker's notes and taped responses to our Buzz work shows the same 5 words coming up again and again in the same combination (over 84% of the time): "I could use a drink". This phrase is often (59% of the time) preceded by a "great", "cool", "Awesome", "outstanding" and two cases of "yer shittin me?".

We shall be starting a Boxed Wine Message Board, in the near future and are seeking a web manager to help run this project, one who would not mind being paid in boxed blends.