Masters to watch: Founder VINVIN Wines

MASTERS speaks with prominent figures from the business world, including Frank Laurentius, Founder & Managing Partner of VINVIN Wines. The company's exclusive portfolio focuses on established, authentic and emerging family wineries that work with passion and often practise organic viticulture.

MASTERS will talk to prominent figures from the business world, including Frank Laurentius, Founder & Managing Partner of VINVIN Wines. The company's exclusive portfolio focuses on established, authentic and emerging family wineries that work with a lot of passion and often organically.

Champagne

“My love for wine started when I was nineteen. I did business with a Swiss man and he said to me: 'Sie sind wie ein Tignanello.' Little did I know, that was a famous wine from Antinori! I tasted that wine during lunch with him. Later I also worked a lot in France in my position as managing partner of Piecom, which trades in semi-finished products for cleaning products. I went from one lunch to dinner with the French distributors and got to know wines and how to combine them with food.
Eventually I came across a woman who had studied in London at The Institute of Masters of Wine and has now been in wine for twenty-five years. Corinne Hofland worked for a large importer and purchased 12 million liters of wine and champagne annually. We shared a love for Champagne. Galeotto fu lo Champagne! goes an Italian saying that sums it all up: it's all because of Champagne. Based on this passion, we organized Champagne events and also trips to Reims with a number of enthusiasts. It turned out that we didn't just click when it came to wine and champagne: we have been living together for almost eight years now. Then one and one becomes two. From the moment we were together, I organized my time in such a way that I could go to trade fairs with Corinne. It quickly became clear that her passion, and mine, lies with the premium segment of wines.”

VINVIN

“During our travels I had quite a lot of interaction with the winemakers. One of them, Pascal Jolivet, a top winemaker from the Loire region, Sancerre, became a good friend. I talked a lot with Pascal about entrepreneurship and new business opportunities in the world of wine. Corinne left her job in 2020 after more than twenty years. When they started the new challenge. Pascal thought out loud: '2020... twenty twenty. We call the company VINVIN!' In the wine world, the better producers know each other. Chateau La Tour de l'Eveque from Provence, Domaine d'Henri from Chablis and Famille Hugel from Alsace joined in and eventually many other winemakers.
What particularly moved me emotionally is the fact that Champagne Taittinger chose us. It is incredible that our current portfolio was created within a year. We now have more than three hundred wines, mainly classic world. A colleague of Corinne's, Marcel Just de la Paisières, also left the company where she had just said goodbye. I had already said to him: 'If you ever do something else, call me' – purely based on my entrepreneurial passion. He eventually became a partner in VINVIN Wines. He knows a lot about sales and marketing, Corinne about the international wine world, purchasing and the portfolio and I add my lessons and experience from entrepreneurship on top of that.”

Gamechanger

“VINVIN was able to visit the Consensus Group office, which I run together with Rob Boele, for free, so that costs were kept low at the start and the facilities could be used. We advertise consensus as a 'gamechanger in hygiene & health, hospitality and happyness', with VINVIN I also want to be a gamechanger. Sustainable en innovation driven as I am, I want to do things differently than what is currently happening in the wine world. So we focus in our exclusive portfolio on established, authentic and emerging family wineries, who work with a lot of passion and often organically. It says so for a reason 'Let's change the world of wine' above our website. Not only our range is game changing, but also the way we started: we work together with contemporary artists, including Pablo Lucker, who designs our Favorite Boxes. You can put together the contents of these boxes yourself and then hand them out as a promotional gift, for example, with a personal message under a QR code.
Also quite unique is that we are active on three fronts. We started online in B2C, we expanded that to B2B and then we have selective distribution started for the specialist trade. Nowadays, together with our partner for this specialist trade, we supply more than four hundred better wine and specialty specialist shops throughout the Netherlands. Add to this that we are the first wine company in the world with a metaverse environment. And that we, as a Dutch company, will launch a new wine brand worldwide with Bon Vivant - that was Marcel's big dream. All these developments make us the talk of the town. "

VINVESTORS

“We are innovative in another respect: as VINVIN Wines we have 34 certificate holders, including ourselves - all individuals and entrepreneurs who have invested in the company. The commercial value of the certificates has now increased to three times the initial value. In addition to a nice return, a certificate also comes with benefits such as discounts and events. And later we will also pay dividends. But let's be honest: no one does it for the money. It's fun! They just enjoy doing something with wine, with us and with each other.
Through this healthy and fun structure we have created many ambassadors. Our so-called VINvestors also include a number of well-known Dutch people, including Klaas Jan Huntelaar and Pierre van Hooijdonk. But our employees and various wine producers also have certificates in VINVIN Wines. My best wine experience? I was able to drink a Taittinger Comtes de Champagne Blanc de Blancs from 1976, a top-top-top year. Wine has now become my job, but it has also remained my passion. I never drink rationally, but always with pleasure. Our slogan is 'drink less, but better'. Life is too short to drink bad wine.”

Click here for the VINVIN Wines website and get to know the exclusive wines. 

MASTERS EXPO

Visit VINVIN Wines at MASTERS EXPO. From December 8 to 12 in RAI Amsterdam: MASTERS EXPO – The Colorful Edition. Ticket sales for MASTERS EXPO 2022 have started. Purchase here your tickets.