After earning a Master degree from the Université de Paris (a.k.a Ingénieur), Emmanuel spent 10 years learning business from the inside of Silicon Valley startups in California in the heyday of the Dot.Com boom. 

When he invited American friends and acquaintances over, he often heard, “We were scared to bring a bottle of wine. You’re French and we didn’t want to bring the wrong one!” 

He was baffled that people should take him for a wine-snob just because he was French but, for the first time, he realized that French wine is admired, yes, but also intimidates people, even people from other wine world-renowned regions. 

Partly to live up to his reputation as a Frenchie wine expert, Emmanuel began to spend more and more of his free time in the Napa and Sonoma wine country. Sharing his enthusiasm and growing knowledge about wine became a driving passion.

On returning to France, Emmanuel rediscovered the concept at the heart of the French wine-growing tradition, the terroir, the land itself that expresses its character in the wine grown on it. He also expanded his wine experience: visiting the domains, sitting on wine juries, even spending time working the fields for his favorite vintners. After spending one year near Vouvray and furthering his understanding of the wine, Emmanuel returned and settled near Nantes.

Vins Voyages is the product of Emmanuel’s passion for wine, pride in the beauty of the Val du Loire, and his cross-cultural and language skills. The mission of Vins Voyages is twofold:

• teach visitors about the relationship between the delicious wine they drink and the beautiful landscape they see;
• demystify French wine so that everyone can enjoy it in the same way that French families do, not as a competition or a test, but a grand moment of conviviality and pleasure.

You can follow Vins Voyages on twitter. Emmanuel has created his "Loire Valley Unique Wine" group on LinkedIn, a breed between blog and networking among aficionados of the Loire Valley. You'll be welcome to join. Emmanuel relentlessly works with vintners in the Loire Valley to help them communicate more efficiently and promote their wine. For this purpose, Emmanuel has also started promodivin.