For speakers & presenters
Thirty curious drinkers. Eight of your wines. One good Wednesday.
Since 1978 we've invited wine educators, producers, distributors and merchants to pour for us — a friendly, knowledgeable room in central Basingstoke that turns up on the third Wednesday of the month and actually listens. The floor (and the fridge) is yours.
The shape of it
An evening, by the numbers
Doors from 7pm, you're on at 7:30 prompt, buffet break after the fourth wine, glasses down by 9:30.
- 25–35
- curious drinkers in the room
- 8
- wines in a typical flight
- 105
- minutes that are all yours
- ~13
- minutes per wine — pour, talk, taste, debate
What you get from us
You bring the wine and the story. We do the rest.
A room that's ready
Tables set herringbone-style facing you, two ISO tasting glasses per person, water, spittoons and crackers already out. You walk in and pour.
Hands, when you need them
The chairman lines up pourers for each flight, there's a fridge for your whites and fizz, and numbered bottle wrappers if you fancy running a blind round.
The kit
White screen for projection, digital projector, PA and a clip-on radio mic — all on request. The room is big and the ceiling is high: we'll make sure you're heard.
Orders, sorted on the night
Members taste, score and order your wines from their phones as you pour. You get one collated order — no chasing thirty people with a clipboard.
The clever bit
Your wines, scored and ordered live
Every member tastes with our companion app open: they score each wine, tag its flavours, and — the part merchants like — order bottles on the spot, card in hand.
- A live word cloud of what the room is tasting, up on the big screen while you talk.
- Wine of the night revealed from real scores at the end — a lovely moment when it's yours.
- One collated order lands with the committee when the evening closes: totals per wine, paid, ready to fulfil.
Prefer paper? Tasting notes, order forms and maps on the tables work too — the app just means nobody has to decode handwriting at 10pm.
Where we've been lately
We tour the world by glass
Bring us somewhere we haven't been — or show us somewhere we think we know.
- Bordeaux
- South Africa
- New Zealand
- South America
- Sherry, properly
- Independent vignerons of France
- English sparkling
- The Loire, top to bottom
Offer us an evening
Tell us what you'd pour
A few lines is plenty — the chairman replies to every enquiry, and we plan a season or two ahead.
Prefer email? Write to hello@nhws.co.uk — same humans, less structure.