MILAN – Traceability has become an increasingly important requirement in fashion but it’s also key in other sectors, including the wine industry.
Further upping the level of its wine offer and fine dining experience, premium seafood restaurant and fashion industry favorite Langosteria has inked a partnership with Crurated, the online retailer that allows one to trace the journey of a wine bottle from the producer to the customer’s table.
Langosteria will now exclusively offer Crurated’s rare and exceptional wines and spirits across its restaurants.
Valentina Bertini, wine corporate manager of Langosteria, said that “the assurance of provenance and authenticity is provided by Crurated’s blockchain technology,” and is aligned with the restaurants’ “commitment to excellence and transparency.”
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Alfonso de Gaetano, founder and chief executive officer of Crurated, said the collaboration “benefits both producers and venues, ensuring that the latter can demonstrate to their clients that every bottle, regardless of its age, comes directly from the domaine.”
Crurated stems from de Gaetano’s passion for wine and his technological experience. He spent the past decade at Google, where he was the director of Google Publishers’ business across the Europe, Middle East and Africa region, and then director of Google Global Partnerships, Emerging Markets.
Crurated was founded in 2021, working with wine producers in the Burgundy region during the pandemic aiming to deliver the wine bottles directly to the homes of collectors, “creating a link between producers and final customers,” he said.
De Gaetano said that Crurated is the first blockchain-based, high-quality wine community that certifies the provenance of every bottle it sells with an NFC, and the company is quickly expanding with prestige spirits through direct partnerships with the world’s best-known distilleries. This technology will reinforce the bottle’s quality assurance, tracing movements and storage locations that could potentially affect the quality of fine wine.
De Gaetano has overseen the creation of the Crurated Metaverse, a virtual embodiment of each member’s private cellars, using the latest spatial technology and allowing them to access, organize and virtually walk guests through their wine and spirits libraries, interact with the virtual sommelier and ask questions to the Crurated AI.
There are several issues the wine-making industry shares with fashion. While Crurated relies on the Polygon blockchain platform, the fashion industry has also been increasingly working with blockchain technology. In particular, the Aura Blockchain Consortium was established in 2021 by founding members LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, Prada Group, Compagnie Financière Richemont‘s Cartier brand, Diesel parent OTB Group and Mercedes-Benz Group. Aura promotes the use of a single blockchain solution open to all luxury brands worldwide to help consumers trace the provenance and authenticity of luxury goods. It offers a range of solutions to more than 25 member brands, including NFTs and a Multi-Token Minter.
As in fashion, Bertini and de Gaetano explained that there is a gray, or parallel, market in the wine industry, and that Crurated will help thwart this problem.
“Additionally, we are opening new avenues and visibility for producers to reach Langosteria’s loyal customer base,” said de Gaetano.
Langosteria has earned, for the fifth consecutive year, Wine Spectator’s 2024 Best of Award of Excellence.
Founded by Enrico Buonocore in 2007, Langosteria counts seven restaurants across Milan (Langosteria, Langosteria Bistrot, Langosteria Café, Langosteria Cucina); Paraggi, Italy; Paris, and Saint Moritz, and new openings are planned for London and Miami.
Langosteria is backed by Moncler chairman and chief executive officer Remo Ruffini’s investment vehicle Archive and helmed by his son Pietro Ruffini.
Langosteria will be able to buy from the Crurated centralized logistics infrastructure, making the order process more efficient, in larger quantities and at a more correct and consistent price, improving processes and having priority of access.
“Langosteria will benefit from real-time inventory centralization at Crurated’s state-of-the-art temperature-controlled warehouse in Burgundy, with shipments based on the specific needs of each restaurant’s requirements via Crurated’s logistics hub,” said de Gaetano. “Guests will have access to rare and unique bottles, on a dedicated Crurated Collection wine list, which they can browse and request at the time of booking.”
This partnership will allow the community of more than 5,000 Crurated members priority access to reserve tables across the Langosteria restaurants, along with a full program of unique wine-related events, and to create opportunities for producers to showcase their portfolios in all the Langosteria units globally.
