SALISBURY — Potential patrons, wine lovers and more descended on Salisbury last Friday for the annual Wine About Winter event.

For a couple that recently relocated to Salisbury, the evening was a great way to familiarize themselves with downtown while having a good time.

Cole McCallister works for Food Lion’s corporate office. His fiance, Sophie Czarnecki, is a dietician.

“As a person new to Salisbury, I did not even realize how many different shops there were just in the downtown area,” McCallister said. “I was very impressed and thought it was a great way to get us into some shops and check out some places we might not have found either via Google or even word of mouth.

“Sophie found a couple of different clothing stores and such that she has already gone back to and picked up some merchandise.

The way Wine About Winter works is visitors check in at the Paul E. Fisher Gateway Building, where they receive a map of all the participating stores and a bag of tokens to be exchanged for one-ounce pours of various wine options, with each store offering something different.

“I thought that the map was really innovative and cool,” McCallister said. “I was impressed with the number of businesses that participated in the event.”

McCallister has years under his belt in the food and beverage industry, so he knows what he is looking for.

“I have to say there was a South African pinotage offered from a man, I believe his name was Clyde,” McCallister said. “That was probably my favorite. It was nice and dry, but it still had big, bold, earthy, woodsy flavors.”

Clyde runs Off Main Gallery on East Council Street.

With so many wine options and storefronts, McCallister sees an opportunity to make the evening slightly more user-friendly.

“If it was possible to set up a QR code with a map and a list of wines that was a little bit easier to navigate everywhere,” McCallister said. “All the shops are pretty close together, but we ran into this, if you wanted to seek a specific wine, it was a couple of extra steps you had to take to figure out where that place was. So maybe like an interactive map that you could bring up with a QR code to make it a little easier after you had a few.”

All in all, he’s glad they took the chance and gave it a shot. He’s looking forward to going back next year.

“I think there was more to discover,” McCallister said. “I would definitely do it again. Just the value that you get from the wine alone is a pretty solid value.

“There are more stores participating in the event than there are tokens that you have, and there is only so much time to explore, so I would say, ‘absolutely I would go back,’ and I think there is more to discover in Salisbury. Wine about Winter is a great way to do it.”