Education and Training Opportunities

Wine Education Course

Martignetti Companies is pleased to provide a series of wine education classes to its employees and trade professionals. Led by our Corporate Wine Educator, Len Presutti (CWE), these courses and certification are designed to further empower our team, supplier partners, retail store and retaurant owners and their employees, regardless of their current wine industry knowledge.

Wine Basics Class

The purpose of the Basics Class is to make one totally wine literate. Although no prior knowledge is required, virtually every aspect of wine will be discussed, with an eye to sales and marketing. This course has eight sessions, each consisting of an hour long exploration of a wine related subject such as wine and food matching, viticulture, and restaurant wait staff training, as well as in-depth discussions on specific wine regions followed a wine tasting from that region.

Collegiate Wine Course

This course is specially designed for those who have completed the Wine Basics class and have a desire to expand and update their knowledge. We will use the excellent Exploring Wine 3rd Edition, an 800 page tomb recently updated. We will use this text as a springboard to launch into discussions of major wine regions and topics.

Certified Specialist of Wine Course

The Certified Specialist of Wine (CSW) Exam is a rigorous exam, which tests a candidate's wine knowledge and mastery of key elements within the worlds of viticulture and wine production. This certification is widely recognized and regarded by the international wine and spirits industry.

This six-session study course is designed to prepare you for the CSW Exam, which consists of 100 multiple-choice questions. All question content is drawn exclusively from the CSW Study Guide, which is the only required reading for this course. The study courses are held in the Martignetti Companies offices. CSW Certification is granted by the Society of Wine Educators, one of the preeminent certifying bodies in the field of wine education for which Martignetti Companies is the official testing center in Massachusetts.

Spirits Education Course

Martignetti Companies is committed to staying updated on the latest spirits trends, enabling our team and retail and restaurant teams to stay on top of their spirits education.

The popularity of spirits has exploded over the last ten years and continues to accelerate due to three distinct yet interdependent reasons, making it even more important to continue learning.

First, the coming of age of the consuming public's collective palate has cultivated a healthy and fertile environment of sensory adventure. Never before in history have so many searched for more profound spirits experiences and challenges in all distillate categories.

Second, the public's burgeoning interest has been aggressively met by the distilling industry with the release of hundreds of new and cutting-edge spirits in all categories. The current plethora of spirits that is available in North America (at present, over 6,800) keeps perpetuating the grassroots interest. Consumers demand, producers supply; producers supply even more and consumers sample more.

Third, the public's acute fascination with high-end spirits has been fueled, in part, by the vibrancy of the New Golden Era of Cocktails, which in many quarters has been propagated by the emphasis on fresh ingredients and top drawer spirits. This third point is key because the trend toward better quality spirits has caused consumers to raise their standards and hone their palates.