ONE OF LIFE'S GREAT MINOR IRRITATIONS: THE PARTY TRAP

     BE KIND TO YOUR GUESTS: PROVIDE THEM WITH WINE TRAYS.     

  Wine Trays are essential for events where everyone's networking and moving around; meet and greet affairs, parties on boats, gallery openings, symphony, opera and theatre intermissions, the bleachers at ball games. They are also useful for large social events like engagement parties, weddings, graduations, conferences and office parties.

Because they are light as well as elegant they can be essential accessories for a range of activities like hiking, biking, picnics, taking dinner from the kitchen to the living room, breakfast in bed, skiing and floating in the pool. The Sakonnet River Company Wine Trays can facilitate gatherings of friends and family at any time of the year, whether indoors, outdoors, in the mountains or on the water. 

 The Tray is very easy to use. We make both left-handed and right-handed Trays. Right-handers put the Tray in their left hand and use the palm of their left hand and thumb to hold the Tray--so their right hand remains free. Left-handers put the Tray in their right hand and use the palm of their right hand and thumb to hold the Tray--so their left hand remains free. We make both left-handed and right-handed trays.                

 Although a Tray can be held in either hand, the ergonomics and aesthetics are more harmonious and the Tray less visible or intrusive when they are used as suggested. 

 Our Wine Trays are cut from single pieces of solid Maple, Tiger Maple, Quilted Maple (as available), Black Walnut, Cherry and Mahogany. We also craft trays from solid Burmese Teak, as available.  
 

The wooden Wine Trays are all of the same dimensions. The Wine Trays are 10.375" long (26.355 cm) by 7.50" wide (19.05 cm) and 0.25" thick (0.635 cm). The glass holder is 2.4375" in diameter (6.191 cm). The glass-holder is 2.4375" in diameter. They weigh between 4.0 and 6.0 ounces each, depending on the type of wood. The Black Walnut Wine Tray weighs only 5 ounces (0.142 kg). 

We also make a carbon fiber Wine Tray (molded for us by Bristol-based Triton Products) that has the same dimensions.  However, it is only 1.5 millimeters thick and weighs 2.3 ounces.    

We hand-craft all of our wooden Trays at our studios in Warren Rhode Island. The carbon fiber Wine Trays are cut and molded in Bristol, Rhode Island and finished at our studios in Warren. 100% Made in the USA.

The Sakonnet River Company Wine Tray is practical. It is a single-handed Tray that holds both drinks and appetizers at the same time.  It gives you and your guests a free hand.  

In addition to being practical, the Tray  is elegant.  A key design objective was to make the Tray suitable for formal social events.  We selected the classic Georgian oval to maximize physical space while minimizing visual space: we made it large enough to hold sufficient refreshments without becoming a focus of the conversation, or impinging on the profile or the presence of the person holding it. 

  One of the distinguishing competitive attributes of our Tray is that you can carry it for an extended period of time. We have minimized the weight, while maximizing the strength. Many competing wine trays weigh more than 7 ounces. Our wooden Trays range from 4 ounces to 6 ounces. Our carbon fiber Tray is 2.3 ounces.  These super-light Trays are ideal for those long haul cocktail parties you often have to attend for business. 

  There is another feature that helps with the extended social event: most wine trays require the holder to grip the side of the tray with his or her thumb.  The result is that the thumb joint gets numb in 20 or 30 minutes.  This can be avoided: artists, for example, can carry their paint palettes for hours on end.  We borrowed the thumb-holder idea of from them.  The painter’s palette puts the weight of the tray on the part of your palm that is closest to your wrist, which bears weight much more efficiently than the fingers or thumb. 

Our Tray is also carefully balanced, with the greatest weight—typically the drink—placed as closely behind the wrist as possible.  This provides the most space for the hors d'oeuvres, which tend to be the lower on the tray, lighter and less long-lasting items, and therefore not as much of a burden at a distance from the wrist. 

In short, the design is super-light and ergonomically efficient—as well as elegant and practical.

These are the attributes that make our Wine Tray a perfect asset for strategic networking or just moving around and seeing the sites at cocktail parties, engagement parties, gallery openings and other social events.

We have a patent pending on the design.