Joshua Greenstein is the Vice President of the Israeli Wine Producers Association (IWPA), an organization devoted to the promotion of Israeli wine as an emerging quality wine region. The IWPA represents 30 Israeli wineries in the USA, showcasing the wines at trade and consumer events throughout the country. Greenstein usually spends a lot of time on the road and in the air, meeting with wine buyers and consumers and introducing them to the unique qualities of the wines from the Holy Land.
With the impact of Covid-19 on travel and gatherings, Josh Greenstein had to adjust and find different ways to promote his wines. Erik Segelbaum, a renowned wine consultant and Food & Wine Magazine’s Sommelier of 2019 award winner teamed up this past month with the IWPA, offering many of the country’s leading somms the opportunity to get to know Israeli wine better. The IWPA put together professional masterclasses via the Zoom videoconference app with the participation of the winemakers and proprietors of many of the wineries it represents. Among others Eli Ben Zaken, the legendary founder and winemaker of Domaine du Castel, certainly one of the best-known producers of the modern Israeli wine industry talked about his old-world style wines which have won multiple 90+ ratings. So did Ido Lewinsohn Master of Wine (MW), head winemaker of Barkan, the largest Israeli winery which produces 1.2 million cases annually. The success of these masterclasses will be soon repeated with the inclusion of journalists and bloggers.