It was a chance biography summary of Anna Trapido that made me pick up that she referred to her relationship with the Diners Club Rossouw’s Restaurants 2015 guide in the past tense. A call to her yesterday confirmed that she is no longer writing reviews for Rossouw’s Restaurants, nor working on its 2016 Guide.
Trapido was quick to confirm that the relationship with JP Rossouw, publisher of the Platter’s
Wine Guide and his Rossouw’s Restaurants, ended amicably, and that she is working on a very exciting project, of which she cannot yet reveal the details. She was associated with Rossouw’s Restaurants for just over one year.
One wonders if Trapido, who comes across as a free-spirit, and not a corporate order-taker, was annoyed with the poor handling of the launch of the Rossouw’s Restaurants guide, only held in Johannesburg and ignoring Cape Town completely, and the Diners Club Winelist Awards, both events receiving most unprofessional media support from their PR agency African Sky Communications last year!
A Google search picked up that Trapido is now writing restaurant reviews on Winemag.co.za and for City Press.
It must be of concern to Rossouw to lose Trapido just six months before the restaurant guide should go into print, and to have to eat his way around the country in this period. It may well mean that the Rossouw’s Restaurant guide may not be published this year, as happened in 2013! We will follow up with Rossouw and the Diners Club Marketing Manager Lee-Ann Shepherd, but both parties are not known for their interest in returning calls and responding to e-mails.
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Tel (021) 433-2100, Twitter:@WhaleCottage Facebook: click here
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