Steve Schattman Of Touton Selections Tastes His " New " Releases Here At Cleveland Park Wines & Spirits In February 2009

I have known Steven now for many years indeed and here he showed me some really nice wines that are in the Touton portfolio owned by Guillaume Touton that I once worked for indirectly. We had a falling-out that left a really bad taste in my mouth for years afterward as this happened back in the mid to late eighties I believe.

Couple that with someone else named Steve that I also had a disagreement with and no business occurred between us for years until Stan Katz and Steven Schattman came on board and smoothed out enough of the ruffled feathers to at least start a dialogue between me and the two of them.

I still have no readily available kind words for either Guillaume or Steve because they called into question both my honesty, my loyalty and my word about certain matters that will remain between us. Having said this I would say to both of them if I ever saw them again : " Don't you dare question my honesty,loyalty and word sirs! I value those the most above money and success and pomp and circumstance and almost everything else. How dare you both! "

I will probably never get this chance and that's okay. I can live with this. I tell Steven almost every chance that I get that it pains me to buy these wines of his because of my reasons. He always says that I am only dealing with him and no one else.

I buy the wines because they do represent some pretty extraordinary values in these tough economic times. They are great values for our Cleveland Park customers and so I bite my tongue and mostly suffer in silence. Am I selling out?! I suppose I am to a certain degree. I am, however doing it to bring affordable wines to our Cleveland Park customers that deserve all the deals that can be had and that I can bring to them.

I also do it for old times' sake when I once worked for Laurent Vonderheyden the owner of CHATEAU MONBRIZON in Margaux, Bordeaux , France. Laurent hired me away from Burka's Fine Wines years ago to come work for his wholesale company called Laurent Selections. He was a partner of sorts with Guillaume Touton and I never ahrdly ever saw him.

We made a great team with Alan Cohen and Pascal Salvadorie and Laurent : with back-up in the office from the talented and beautiful young blonds Susan and Linda that also were smart and very good at running the office back in Brentwood, Maryland many years ago. We were the successful team of six and we sure did sell a lot of wine together back then. We all worked really hard to do it, too. We could all be ( and still should be ) really proud of all that we accomplished back then as a team of six.

To all of these people I say " Happy Holidays and Happy New Year! May you and your families be safe and healthy and prosper.

I just saw Steven today and bought some more wine from him to bring to a close 2009 in the Washington N.W. D.C. Cleveland Park neighborhood that means so much to me. Bonne Annee Laurent en Bordeaux ... viens me voir la prochaine fois que tu es a Washington. Nous pouvons parler de nos jours dans les annees quatre-vints ici en vendant le Chateau Saint Laurent et les liters de Domaine Caton et tous le reste ... Cheers, et sante et salute ... TONY