Cirque Du Salahi: Be Careful Who You Trust by Diane Dimond Read Free Book Online Page A

have played a big part in is something we can be very, very proud of. So thanks for all your service to The Commonwealth and bon appétit!
     
    With every new business and political event, Michaele and Tareq began to amass an impressive rolodex of important contacts, both professional and social. The handsome couple loved being out on the social scene and was genuinely well liked. She was beautiful and vivacious. Tareq was described variously as having “a brilliant marketing mind” and as “a businessman with the skill of a P.T. Barnum.” Their popularity wasn’t confined to Virginia. In Washington, DC they became regulars on the social scene at Café Milano in Georgetown and other hot spots. In 2003, shortly before they were married, Michaele remembers being introduced to Democratic National Committee Chairman, Terry McAuliffe, at Café Milano.
    “We spoke for a few minutes and he told me he could get me into a big upcoming (Democratic National Committee) cocktail party. He said, ‘Please come! We need your spirit and enthusiasm at that event!’ I told him I had already been invited and planned to be there.”
    As evidenced by the size of their wedding and the parties they threw, Tareq always thought bigger was better, and there was no more enthusiastic and visible promoter of the Virginia wine country. He never stopped thinking about the next business opportunity. He envisioned Oasis, which by then had grown to include over 100 acres of prime land, would one day have an inn, a spa, another fancy tasting room and even a food and wine culinary center.
    The year before he met Michaele, Tareq had set up a companion company to Oasis Vineyard with offices in the same building at the winery. He wanted something of his own—something his mother couldn’t interfere with. Oasis Enterprises, Inc. concentrated on attracting tourism to the Blue Ridge Wine Way district and offered guides for selfdrive tours, custom limousine tours of the region and motor coach tours for groups of people.
    Matt Carson, a former employee who worked at Oasis during its most successful time, declared Tareq a marketing genius. “The limos would drive people all around the area but the last stop of the day would always be Oasis. By then the tourists were tired and maybe a little tipsy and they’d be in the mood to buy some bottles to take home.” Tareq, says Carson, “is extraordinarily driven and talented and one of the greatest PR people of all times. He legitimately built the Virginia wine industry.”
    Tareq’s innovative mind lead him to do business with Independence Airline, headquartered at Dulles Airport. He made a deal with the carrier to offer Oasis wines on hundreds of flights each week. To accommodate the airline, Tareq bought an expensive new bottling machine so the airline could offer specially packaged small blue bottles of Oasis wine. Tareq says he also made a deal with the Outback Steakhouse franchise to carry both a red and white Oasis wine in every restaurant, nationwide. He traveled extensively to Outback Steakhouse locations to give the staff seminars on Oasis products and tips to selling more and better wines. So many business deals, so little time!
    Independence Air went bankrupt in 2005 and Tareq says because, “Oasis was not a secured creditor. We lost more than $100,000 practically overnight.” His mother chided him about being stuck with a new bottling system he really had no more use for.
    “But we’re optimistic people,” Tareq explains, sitting up tall in his chair. “We have big dreams, high hopes for success and we try hard. We’ll work and fail 100 times, then try 101 times.”
    Over the years some of Tareq’s business schemes looked like sure winners but became too bloated along the way, and far from admirable, as victims of his unpaid bills piled up. Tareq’s creed seemed to be if he lost money then no one else in the business chain should expect payment either. It was an explanation he would use