7th March 2024 – Applications for the third edition of Bordeaux Mentor Week, created by Jane Anson and Chinedu Rita Rosa in 2022 to increase diversity, equity, and inclusion in the wine world, are now open. Applications will close on 30th April 2024.
Bordeaux Mentor Week will be held from 23rd – 27th September 2024.
For the third year in a row, the search is on for 7 lucky wine scholars from around the world to join Jane and Chinedu for an intensive and immersive week in Bordeaux. The impact of this week will inspire and motivate the seven mentees by giving them an incredibly hands-on experience focused on the wines of Bordeaux, from harvest to blending to production to tasting to marketing to navigating distribution channels, guided by two leading Bordeaux experts and a select group of industry partners. Bordeaux Mentor Week is designed to provide access to the wines and the people of Bordeaux for those young individuals who are starting out in the wine trade. In addition to working in the vineyards and cellars of Bordeaux, the scholars will meet with start-ups and wine innovators, explore La Place de Bordeaux, and learn to develop their tasting skills with a focus on older wines from Bordeaux’s top producers.
Anyone who wants to pursue a career in the wine industry and who doesn’t have access to adequate educational support or financial means is encouraged to apply.
One of the new elements this year is that one of the seven spots will be specifically reserved for an aspiring novice journalist or wine critic. According to Bordeaux Mentor Week co-founder Jane Anson, “Wine criticism, particularly around the wines of Bordeaux, remains a pretty closed field of the same names. I’d love to help introduce some new energy into wine criticism.”
According to co-founder Chinedu Rita Rosa, “Our goal is to increase inclusion, diversity, and equity in the wine industry. Bordeaux Mentor Week represents a galvanizing action to bring together aspiring wine scholars from disadvantaged backgrounds who are faced with barriers, financial restraints, and a lack of mentors.”
The seven scholars will be provided with spectacular accommodations by Château du Tertre in Margaux.
All accommodations and transport within the region (on the official programme) will be covered for attendees. Travel bursaries will be offered to each scholar to fund travel to the region.
The historic sponsors of Bordeaux Mentor Week are The Gérard Basset Foundation and The IWSC – Club Oenologique. For 2024, Wine Scholar Guild has agreed to extend free access to their Masters programmes for each of the seven scholars. The members of the Duquesne Club in Pittsburgh have also made a generous donation.
To apply, visit www.janeanson.com or email hello@janeanson.com
About Jane Anson
Jane Anson is author of Inside Bordeaux (BB&R Publishing, 2020, called a ‘category buster’ by Wine Anorak and ‘the Bordeaux bible’ by Le Figaro), Wine Revolution (Quarto, 2017), The Club of Nine (Katz Publishing, 2016) Angélus (Editions de la Martinière, 2016) and Bordeaux Legends, a history of the 1855 First Growth Wines (Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 2013), as well as co-author or translator of over a dozen wine and travel books. She has won several awards for her writing, including Louis Roederer Online Communicator of the Year 2020, and Born Digital Best Editorial 2020. Jane was the first woman to deliver the André Simon lecture for the Wine and Food Society since the lecture series began in 1971, speaking in June 2020 on the subject of terroir in Bordeaux. After almost 20 years as Bordeaux correspondent and columnist for Decanter, Jane launched her own website, www.janeanson.com, in 2021. She is a graduate of the DUAD tasting diploma with the Bordeaux Institute of Oenology and an accredited wine teacher at the Bordeaux Ecole du Vin.
About Chinedu Rita Rosa
A banker turned wine export consultant with over 22 years of experience in retailing and wholesale of fine wines in her native Nigeria, Chinedu now runs her own consulting firm called Vines By Rosa in Bordeaux and works with wine importers and exporters on both continents. She specializes in wine selection, branding, and marketing strategies tailored to Africa. Vines by Rosa is the first Nigerian and female owned wine export consulting firm based in Bordeaux. Chinedu writes about food and wine pairings from an African point of view. She is president of the French chapter of Circle of Global Businesswomen and founder and president of the Bordeaux Business Network.
About Jane Anson
Launched in October 2021 by Jane Anson, long-term Bordeaux wine critic for Decanter magazine and author of Inside Bordeaux, www.janeanson.com is a subscription site that covers Bordeaux and the international wines that are sold through the Bordeaux merchant system. It is aimed at those who drink, collect, buy, sell or just want to learn about Bordeaux and its related wines, and offers membership to a community with real world benefits, from NFT wine books to exclusive travel to the region to Bordeaux Mentor Week.
