Who are T&T: Two Succinct, Different, Complementary Personalities

Tom Lipton and Torben A. Weber

T&T e.K. and T&T, LLC, were founded in 2005 by Torben Weber, of Michelstadt, Odenwald Forest, in Hessia, Germany, and by Tom Lipton, "the Buckeye Bavarian from Brooklyn." A long-term Munich resident, he has also lived in France before returning to live in Bensheim, in Germany's Hessische Bergstrasse wine-growing appellation.

Love of thirst-quenching, hand-crafted, flavorful beers, and skillfully fashioned, fully-ripened and hand-cultivated wines brought Torben & Tom together, first as friends, later as business associates.

Torben Weber had been the Export Manager of an historical, traditional, local brewery in central western Germany, working in the United States and Korea. Tom Lipton sold both beer and wine in the US Military Resale System but was primarily involved in marketing and public relations in food & beverage areas. From his earliest years he loved foods and fine wines, cooking and hosting events. Thus, logistics and sales, journalism and promotion came together some eight or nine years ago launching the T&T entity.

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About Us

Founded in 2005

T&T Premium Brands Marketing, LLC, is an international Export-Import Sales Company, founded in Germany, with offices and corporate seat in the United States. It is owned and operated by Tom Lipton.

"T&T, LLC" is supported logistically by T&T Premium Brands Marketing, e.K. in Michelstadt, Odenwald Forest, Germany which is owned and operated by Torben Weber.

T&T Premium Brands Marketing specializes in seeking out better quality German wines, primarily Riesling, Pinot blanc. Kerner, Scheurebe, and Gewuerztraminer. We also sell German red varietals and cuvées made of Pinot noir and Pinot meunier pure or with Dornfelder, Dunkelfelder, Cabernet Sauvignon and Portugieser; also, Rosé wines from these and other varietals such as St Laurent and Trollinger from almost all of 13 German growing areas, for sale within the United States.

Purpose: With the explosion of interest in German wines within the United States, principally Riesling as food-friendly alternatives to the ubiquitous and frequently over-oaked Chardonnay with its increasingly higher alcohol content,

T&T felt that Riesling presented an exciting alternative. Also, several other unique German white wine varietals displayed those "Riesling-style" virtues and flavors that work well with any cuisine - French, Italian, the various Pacific Rim nations', and, of course, America's wonderfully diverse food, as well as Germany's various offerings.

Riesling's infinite variety of style, flavor, color and nuance, ranging from palest of white to rich gold and almost amber hues, and generally lower "octane" from 6.5% to under 14% , had been generally overlooked and neglected in recent years.

Previously, most German Riesling in the United States overwhelmingly came from just three or four of Germany's 13 growing areas. Thus Americans were familiar with a rather limited number of Riesling's expressions and were missing out on the stunning differences and flavorful nuances found in less-familiar appellations.

As red wine consumption and production have grown in Germany itself, and Rosés are becoming increasing popular during the warmer months, we felt that these wines with their solid structure, attractive colors, restrained-alcohol, and subtle differences would excite American palettes. too.

T&T had barely been launched in 2005, when respected-but-smaller producers from other nations including Italy, Austria, Hungary and France approached us, expressing interest in placing their wines for sale in the United States. Here, too, we are slowly preparing our own and their expansion.

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Grains as well as Grapes:

Fine quality, Crafted Beers from T&T Premium Brands

T&T also markets unusual, individually-handcrafted, specialty beers from smaller, private breweries, not aligned with nor part of the vast international breweries and associations producing look-alike/taste alike brews.

As both of T&T's principals, Torben Weber and Tom Lipton, were actively engaged promoting and selling beers from smaller, private German breweries either within the United States or in the U.S. Military Re-sale System, the concept of "grape AND grain" came naturally to both fine wine lovers who also cherish well-made beer's virtues.

Frankly, this aspect of T&T's activity has been far more challenging than the wine-side of our operations. With the universal homogenization of taste, the globalization of production, the lowering of standards and the consolidation of ancient, independent, hand-crafted breweries and their beers makes it nigh unto impossible to introduce new products with old, hallowed virtues.

Discovering those breweries seeking export possibilities while retaining the characteristics of their locally-cherished products is extremely difficult. Product stability, Succinct flavor retention, style of beer including "mouth-feel" and color, proper packaging and labeling in compliance with Federal and State regulation, nomenclature, type of bottle closure, bottle size, inner packaging and outer packing are all factors each brewery under consideration must investigate before investing in the American market.

Historically, Germany's ancient beer culture has been under siege for many years. In the former Federal West German Republic, there was virtually a brewery in every Postal or ZIP Code, no matter how small: some 16,000 breweries for West Germany's 60 million inhabitants. Today, 17 years after Reunification Germany's 83 million inhabitants in a country 50% larger than before are reduced to some 4,000 breweries!

The consolidation of respected producers by consortia located in Belgium and Holland resulting in wonderful brews and unusual varieties of flavors and styles being reduced to uniform Pilsner-style light beer-like beverages has destroyed thousand-year old traditions and quality.

With the advent of countless ersatz-sugar, chemical-laden non-alcoholic drinks, frequently laden with massive amount of lab-produced caffeine and other derivatives, and with the deluges of plain and carbonated waters, fruit-juice-based-flavor-enhanced beverages, well-made, regional, quality beer has taken a backseat, and is falling further behind.

T&T Premium Brands Marketing, e.K. & LLC has its work cut out trying to attain its goal in this area. For here, as with the wies, Taste & Value are our watchwords, "... in service of the discerning palette. "

( Other T&T products include top quality Tuscan Olive Oils)

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