Raise a glass to Pinkie Tremble

Tremble was the editor of Straight from the Grape, an in-house newsletter for Spar supermarket wine managers, from 1985 to 2007. Armed with a diploma in wine from KWV, she started the magazine when she retired after working for Spar for more than 20 years.

Her newsletter featured digest-style tips for busy supermarket managers and pointers for the training and empowerment of receiving clerks, shelf-packers and cashiers whose general training hardly prepared them for the specific requirements of wine.

During her supermarket years, Pinkie published three magazines for Spar - for housewives, dealers, as well as in the ethnic Black languages. She was also the national judge for Operation Upgrade and speaker at various Spar dealer conventions.

She was an honorary member of the SA Wine Writers Association, and a prolific freelance writer on a wide variety of subjects - ranging from food and wine to entertainment and the arts. In her heyday her articles appeared in popular magazines such as Personality, Car, Wynboer, the Cape column of the now-defunct The Retailer and the Malawi Airlines in-flight magazine Reflections. She also produced material for the radio medium, with more than 400 radio scripts to her credit. Her series They made the headlines, ran for over two years on Springbok Radio and her Requiem for a Superstar - the Judy Garland Story - was broadcast on the old English Service at prime listening time. She was also a regular contributor to the Woman's World programme.