Good Grape

Nestled between Olive Garden’s populist promotion of wine, the explosion of wine bars across the country, the resurgence of restaurant and micro brewery concepts and emerging trends like community hubs that make wine (City Winery in New York), is a growing restaurant concept that has its eyes set on importing wine country culture to the heartland.

A rising tide raises all ships; the more that a pragmatic wine culture is understood as comfortable, and not the province of the elite, the better.

Related to this, I was talking with family friends recently who are keen wine lovers (of the ‘normal’ buy and drink variety), who are aware of my total immersion in matters of the grape.  They asked, “Is it hard for you to find a wine culture here?”  “Here” being Indianapolis, IN, the Crossroads of America.  My answer was something along the lines of, “You have to work at it.  It would be easier if I were on the East Coast and living in a place that has a legacy, euro-centric wine culture and wine bars or the West Coast that has the embedded wine sensibility from production.”

Yet, slowly, but surely, the Midwest is chipping away. 

Local wines and the quality thereof are making inroads across the country.  New York State, Michigan, Virginia, Texas, Missouri and other states all make wine that can hold their own against West Coast wineries if only perception met reality in a favorable way…

Taking a slightly different twist on what it means to be a winery while borrowing heavily from the aforementioned restaurant and microbrewery concept is Cooper’s Hawk winery and restaurant based in the ‘burbs of Chicago.

Founded by entrepreneur Tim McEnery in 2005, Cooper’s Hawk is the Midwest’s first winery and restaurant concept under one roof. The name, an homage to both the art of barrel making and the Cooper’s Hawk, a bird of prey found in the Midwest, is a clever and catchy take on the rootedness that denotes most winery names.  And, the concept is a mash-up of familiar, but uniquely combined elements that has created a new category of restaurant.

Plus, there is a little bit of genius involved in the concept, as well.  Given that upscale restaurants rely on their wine and beverage program to fuel profits, there is something simple and smart about cutting out the middleman to make all of your own wine and then have that wine program be simpatico with the restaurant concept.

Making their own wine akin to an on-premise microbrewery and restaurant, using the wine sampling concept that is de rigueur at Olive Garden, while creating an atmosphere that is super-charged winery tasting room and direct-to-consumer marketing program with a casual upscale restaurant attached, Cooper’s Hawk is poised for growth. 

With four existing locations blanketing Chicagoland, the “don’t call it a chain and please call it a winery before restaurant” (my reference) is venturing out of state for the first time and opening a winery and restaurant in Indianapolis with additional expansion plans for two to three additional locations in 2011, with Missouri, Minnesota and Ohio potential destinations.

With a full winery production facility in Countryside, Illinois, and using varietal grapes from the west coast as appropriate, Cooper’s Hawk makes approximately 10,000 cases (50,000 gallons) of wine served in their casual upscale restaurants and via sales to their wine club.

According to Melanie Pierce, Director of Marketing at Cooper’s Hawk, “We really have a wide demographic range, mostly 21-65.  Our menu is designed to have something for everyone and part of our success is attributed to our broad appeal.”

She continued, “The restaurant drives most of our sales revenue, but the wine club is instrumental in the growth of the restaurant.”

Sarah Stukas, a Psychotherapist from Darien, IL commenting on the comfortable nature of the restaurant concept said, “The vibe at Cooper’s Hawk is lively and there is a lot going on at a time. On a typical Saturday night you will find a small group having a tasting party in the front of the restaurant, people in the bar watching a game or listening to the piano player, a private gathering in the barrel room and a dining room full of patrons.  It’s a fun place with attentive, professional service and consistently good food.”

She continued, “One of the great things about Cooper’s Hawk is that there’s something for everyone. While you will often see singles and couples in the bar or wine-tasting areas, the dining room is filled with groups, families or couples out for a romantic evening. We never feel out of place dining with our two children (8 & 11 - who actually order from the adult menu), but we’ve also enjoyed it quite a bit out with other couples.”

A scan of Yelp.com for Cooper’s Hawk yields similar exuberantly positive feedback with the occasional grumble bunny mixed in.

Of course, being based in the Midwest, it wouldn’t be an appropriate winery concept if there weren’t wines to suit all types of wine drinkers.  Their wine list is an eclectic mix of sweet fruit wines, White Zinfandel, and varietal wines that cover the gamut of tastes and entry points for wine lovers across the spectrum of education.  And, this might, ironically, explain why Cooper’s Hawk has both a Shiraz and a Syrah at the same price on their wine list.

According to Pierce, Riesling is their number one selling wine. 

Overall, I’m somewhat ambivalent that a non-native restaurant is moving into Indianapolis, the capital of the free world for concept restaurants.  Yet, at the same time, I’m excited that the place is well reviewed, planning to grow in other parts of the Midwest and, most importantly, that they’re bringing a higher level of mindshare and acceptance to a wine tasting room environment coupled with high quality food that pairs well with their wines.

As I mentioned, a rising tide raises all ships and the tradeoff of exported culture (or imported based on your geography) seems to be a reasonable one if it brings a greater level of appreciation for wine to the province of cultural morass, truly bringing the U.S. into a wine culture from sea to shining sea and not just the coasts.

Yeah, yeah, yeah ... I know ... real wine enthusiasts—learned folks who have sense enough to understand their palate and form an opinion about wine—typically run in the opposite direction of wine scores, leaving the score whoring for the Chiropractor with the half full cellar of Mollydooker and Marquis Phillips. 

I get that. 

And, I also get that you can have a commanding knowledge of the New World and still not know how to pronounce “Gironde.”  For the record, it sounds like “Jerome” after a six-pack and a buddy’s dare to gargle a bag of marbles.  It could be worse, though – you could call it a “river” instead of an “estuary.” 

For that reason, and for every other wine enthusiast who started in the New World before moving backwards, I’m thankful that the Bordeaux marketing people are pulling together an iPhone application that will release in October.

As reported at Decanter.com, the iPhone application (and the CIVB) hopes to provide a wine fact sheet based on a user photograph of a bottle. Brilliant!

All that’s required is for Bordeaux’s 9,000 wine estates to upload the appropriate information for some 15 -20,000 different wines from now until October 1.

Um, if a bookie handicapped this one I’d take the under.

Thankfully, for the inveterate learner, there are options for navigating the Bordeaux maze:  Like the WineBlueBook (WBB).

I’ve long been a fan and have written about WineBlueBook on several occasions.  Publisher Neil Monnens aggregates wine scores from popular wine publications and produces a monthly buying guide that groups individual wines by score, lists them by price, and then assigns a value percentage.  He helped popularize the notion of quality-to-price ratio (QPR) in wine, a phrase that has taken on its own life and is reasonably unique to the wine world. 

Really, Neil’s system is a beautiful way to provide meaning to scores and flatten the hegemony of a singular palate, as well. 

Plus, it takes a yeoman’s effort to do the data aggregation and WBB does what CellarTracker does except it’s based on professional criticism.  As I mentioned, I’m a fan.  And, I use it for value judgments.  As aggregated by WineBlueBook, if at least three professional critics profess a wine to have a mean average score of 92 and it’s a $35 bottle, I’ve just given myself a bit of purchase insurance, all for $25 while receiving 12 issues measuring 1000s of wines over a year’s time.

Now, my point in bringing up WineBlueBook in a reasonably non-sequitar fashion is Neil published a Bordeaux special edition issue this month – it’s 107 pages of aggregate scores and value rankings on thousands of Bordeaux wines.

If you are even slightly Bordeauxlexic, this is a tremendous resource.  Now, don’t get me wrong, the WineBlueBook isn’t going to impart wisdom or pontificate about the resplendent joys of a particular varietal, region or country, but it does get down to brass tacks regarding what professional critics think of the wine, how much that wine costs and whether that wine is a value relative to its price in peer rankings.

A copy of the WineBlueBook and Wine-Searcher.com and you’re in business in cutting through significant morass in the wine aisle on Consumer Saturday.

And, Neil, good guy that he is, at my request, is giving a PDF copy of the Bordeaux report to Good Grape readers for FREE.  Personally, I email my issues to my Kindle and read them there, but you can view it on your PC or print a copy off for leisure reading, you’ll receive the issue as an attachment to email.

To get your Bordeaux issue, leave a comment on this post and tell me the first name of the first person you French kissed (you don’t really have to do that, but you do have to leave a comment … or, just send me an email at jlefevere AT gmail DOTCOM) and I will have Neil send you a no obligation / no additional harassment copy of the August Bordeaux issue.

Yeah, yeah, yeah ... I know ... real wine enthusiasts—learned folks who have sense enough to understand their palate and form an opinion about wine—typically run in the opposite direction of wine scores, leaving the score whoring for the Chiropractor with the half full cellar of Mollydooker and Marquis Phillips. 

I get that. 

And, I also get that you can have a commanding knowledge of the New World and still not know how to pronounce “Gironde.”  For the record, it sounds like “Jerome” after a six-pack and a buddy’s dare to gargle a bag of marbles.  It could be worse, though – you could call it a “river” instead of an “estuary.” 

For that reason, and for every other wine enthusiast who started in the New World before moving backwards, I’m thankful that the Bordeaux marketing people are pulling together an iPhone application that will release in October.

As reported at Decanter.com, the iPhone application (and the CIVB) hopes to provide a wine fact sheet based on a user photograph of a bottle. Brilliant!

All that’s required is for Bordeaux’s 9,000 wine estates to upload the appropriate information for some 15 -20,000 different wines from now until October 1.

Um, if a bookie handicapped this one I’d take the under.

Thankfully, for the inveterate learner, there are options for navigating the Bordeaux maze:  Like the WineBlueBook (WBB).

I’ve long been a fan and have written about WineBlueBook on several occasions.  Publisher Neil Monnens aggregates wine scores from popular wine publications and produces a monthly buying guide that groups individual wines by score, lists them by price, and then assigns a value percentage.  He helped popularize the notion of quality-to-price ratio (QPR) in wine, a phrase that has taken on its own life and is reasonably unique to the wine world. 

Really, Neil’s system is a beautiful way to provide meaning to scores and flatten the hegemony of a singular palate, as well. 

Plus, it takes a yeoman’s effort to do the data aggregation and WBB does what CellarTracker does except it’s based on professional criticism.  As I mentioned, I’m a fan.  And, I use it for value judgments.  As aggregated by WineBlueBook, if at least three professional critics profess a wine to have a mean score of 92 and it’s a $35 bottle, I’ve just given myself a bit of purchase insurance, all for $25 while receiving 12 issues measuring 1000s of wines over a year’s time.

Now, my point in bringing up WineBlueBook in a reasonably non-sequitar fashion is Neil published a Bordeaux special edition issue this month – it’s 107 pages of aggregate scores and value rankings on thousands of Bordeaux wines.

If you are even slightly Bordeauxlexic, this is tremendous resource.  Now, don’t get me wrong, the WineBlueBook isn’t going to impart wisdom or pontificate about the resplendent joys of a particular varietal, region or country, but it does get down to brass tacks regarding what professional critics think of the wine, how much that wine costs and whether that wine is a value relative to its price in peer rankings.

A copy of the WineBlueBook and Wine-Searcher.com and you’re in business in cutting through significant morass in the wine aisle on Consumer Saturday.

And, Neil, good guy that he is, at my request, is giving a PDF copy of the Bordeaux report to Good Grape readers for FREE.  Personally, I email my issues to my Kindle and read them there, but you can view it on your PC or print a copy off for leisure reading, you’ll receive the issue as an attachment to email.

To get your Bordeaux issue, leave a comment on this post and tell me the first name of the first person you French kissed (you don’t really have to do that, but you do have to leave a comment … or, just send me an email at jlefevere AT gmail DOTCOM) and I will have Neil send you a no obligation / no additional harassment copy of the August Bordeaux issue.

It’s true; I have never been affected by a wine book as I have been by Terry Theise’s “Reading between the Wines,” a book that invites both searching introspection and external exploration (review here).  Therefore, when Theise waxes philosophic about Scheurebe (SHOY-ray-beh) in his book, a heretofore-unknown German varietal wine that has just 4,400 acres under vine in Deutschland, I take the sleuthing challenge.

And, so too should you …

Now, I am not always so moved to search out answers, particularly when you consider that my consumer jade-o-meter realizes that Theise has a stake in inviting intrigue about such things.  Yet, when Theise describes Scheurebe in his book as, “… Riesling just after it read the Kama Sutra,” the intrepid wine explorer in me becomes curious.

Then, when Theise notes, “Put another way, (Scheurebe) is what Riesling would be if Riesling were a transvestite.  If Riesling expresses all that is Noble and Good, (Scheurebe) offers all that is Dirty and Fun.  It is Riesling’s evil, horny twin,” I’m called to action …

And, I’m called to action not because I have a particular fondness for panty hose and transvestites, but because I do have a curiosity about the fringes of societal norms, understanding, expectations and the neglected margins in any subject matter, Adam’s apples, razor burn, lipstick and stilettos notwithstanding.  That, and, well, anything that contextualizes wine as more “reverse cowgirl” than “missionary” is intriguing …

The fact is Scheurebe is on the fringe, a niche before anybody knows it is a niche.  It’s Harvey Fierstein in Hairspray to the layperson. 

Scheurebe might not be as obscure as a transvestite in Indianapolis, but it’s obscure nonetheless … In fact, according to a Google keyword search analysis, the keyword, “Scheurebe wine” garners just 36 global searches a month.  And, near as I can tell, the only domestic bottling of this mercurial grape is a late harvest dessert wine from Joseph Phelps.  So slight is the awareness of this grape varietal in the pantheon of varietal esoterica, the Wine Century Club, known for highlighting esoteric grape varietals, doesn’t list Scheurebe on its varietal worksheet.

Developed by German viticulturalist Dr. Georg Scheu in 1916 as a cross between Riesling and an unknown wild vine, the science experiment was an attempt at developing cold hardiness by creating a Riesling hybrid. 

The resulting wine is aromatic (as you might suspect) and has a reputation for picking up aggressive and unpleasant grapefruit aromas and flavors if picked underripe, or if it’s planted in the wrong location – Riesling sites being the top choice for plantings, obviously a conundrum for a varietal that is scarcely known.  It makes little sense to rip and replace the proven for the quirky.  That is, unless Theise has his way.

In a Wine & Spirits article by Peter Liem, Theise is quoted as saying, “I liked it from the first sip I had, because I thought there was something joyful in its gaudiness.”

And, indeed, the Scherebe you’re likely to run across would come from Theise’s portfolio, significantly mitigating the chance of picking up a wine that is a drag (pun intended), with the aforementioned under ripe grapefruit notes.

As commerce goes, so to goes plantings.  If Theise is successful, he may single handedly create a category of interest amongst wine enthusiasts.

That said, finding this rare German wine is difficult.  Based on Theise’s description, you might think you could find the wine in the classifieds of your local alternative weekly.  Close, but not quite. 

According to Wine-Searcher.com, unless you are a habitué of online wine retailers in NY, NJ and CA, it is doubtful you’ve ever run across a bottle, or seen it at your local bottle shop.

I purchased three different bottles of the reasonably priced wine ($13.99 - $19.99) from Chambers Street Wines in New York City, a wine shop known for its selection of natural, artisanal and quirky wines.

• Darting 2008 Pfalz Durkheimer Spielberg Scheurebe Spatlese ($19.99)
• Gysler 2009 Rheinhessen Scheurebe Halbtrocken ($13.99)
• Geil 2009 Rheinhessen Bechtheimer Heiligkreuz Scheurebe Kabinett ($13.99)

While it’s an outlier to actually review the wines because I have so little frame of historical reference and Theise is a part of the anti-points brigade, suffice to say that Scheurebe merits your own investigation and inquiry making it a wine varietal that is a part of your vocabulary – honeyed, with predominant stone fruit flavors, balancing acid and a subtle herbaceousness that is completely in tune with its larger surroundings. 

Scheurebe is, indeed, a wine, that may be, “Riesling after it read the Kama Sutra.”  More important (and fun) for the curious wine enthusiast, however, is the ability to describe a wine as, “Riesling’s evil, horny twin” and have the wine deliver for you.  Scheurebe does ... in spades ... or pantyhose, as it were.

Trend watching in the wine world is something of a sport as Sommeliers, writers and pundits observe, parse, distill and then explain what is happening in the wine zeitgeist as the stories develop at the micro-trend level.  Reporting on the ripple in the pond, something that can penetrate the wine lover’s consciousness over the coming years as the story grows larger, influencers act as an agent for isolating and highlighting what is next.

Sometimes this subtle focus from influencer’s and wordsmiths is noticed, other times not so much (witness:  Riesling’s status as the next big thing for the last decade, consumers never quite receiving the memo).  Yet, this never-ending exploration of what’s new and interesting ends up being a self-fueling machine that fosters and builds intriguing storylines until the ideas become acknowledged reality, or are replaced by the new, new thing.

An example in the realm of wine (and an emerging trend to pay attention to) is the contrast between declining Bordeaux wine sales here in the states at the same time that Old World-styled California wines grow in mindshare and sales.  I call it the “Nü California” style – fruit forward, food-friendly, and dimensionally blended wines with a component of place evident.

Not only is there a restrained “Old World-ish” style of California wine taking shape, but there are also specific nods that vintners are making to Left and Right Bank-style blends from Bordeaux.  Left Bank-style blends lead with Cabernet and Right Bank-style blends lead with Merlot and/or Cabernet Franc. 

What we are seeing in a post-Sideways world, related to Right Bank-style wines, are an increase in blends that lead with the formerly forsaken Merlot along with Cab Franc (sometimes taking center stage), despite long ago being given a Scarlet Letter as a, “blending varietal.” 

Here are three recent press examples highlighting the emerging trend of Right Bank-influenced wines done in a “Nü California” style (example one, two, and three).

Of course, emerging trends do not occur in a vacuum.  Sometimes, they are given lift.

The Meritage Alliance has been working to grow mindshare and influence regarding Bordeaux-style blends since 1988.

Started by a group of winemakers who wanted to acknowledge the vintners art form of blending, paying homage to Bordeaux-style blends, yet creating a new name to be respectful of names and origins, Meritage, a made up combination of the words “merit” and “heritage,” has become wildly popular, joining the English lexicon in ways not normally associated with marketing-oriented naming conventions.

In an interview with Bill Smart, Director of Communications for Dry Creek Vineyard (DCV) and a marketing contributor to The Meritage Alliance helmed on a volunteer basis by Kim Stare Wallace of DCV, he noted:

“(We’d) like to have (wineries) use the term Meritage, whether it’s on their label or not to describe their blend.  Using the word Bordeaux to describe these wines is incorrect in my opinion.  Sure, the wines incorporate the Bordeaux varieties; however, that is where our similarities with Bordeaux end.  We are California wineries, producing wines in our style, to our taste, using the noble Bordeaux variety grapes.  In my opinion, the correct name for these wines is Meritage blends or Meritage-style blends.”

With firsthand experience with the Mariner, a consistently fabulous Left Bank-style Meritage blend from DCV, Smart knows that which he speaks …

The Meritage Alliance boasts 220 members in the organization.  In 2011, they are poised to launch a consumer-oriented tasting in San Francisco similar to ZAP and the Family Winemakers of California tastings, increasing awareness of Bordeaux-styled California blends as a “Meritage.”

Of course, an emerging trend must have an upstart hero, as well.  Within the scope of growing awareness of Meritage blends and the niche of Left and Right Bank-styled wines, a pre-launch wine company called Virage is focusing on Right Bank-styled Nü Californian wines.

Named for the French word meaning a “turn in the road,” that’s exactly what has happened as a former investment banker and assistant to Karen MacNeil, Emily Richer, has swerved right and teamed with winemaker Aaron Pott of Quintessa and Blackbird fame.

Focused on the cooler climate growing areas of Napa Valley, Virage will highlight blends based predominantly on Cabernet Franc and Merlot.

The Virage blend won’t be released until the fall of this year. I received an early, unlabeled bottling from Richer.  If early tastings hold true, you’ll be hearing a lot about this upstart.  Priced with a value sensibility at $45 a bottle with initial production slated at 900 cases and focused on re-shaping the perception of Napa as a hot weather Cabernet Sauvignon playground, Virage is poised to be a breakout star of 2010.

In addition, unbelievably, the Virage matches up with Pott’ bold quote in the San Francisco Chronicle when he told writer Jon Bonné that, “The best expressions of Cabernet Franc are much more interesting than the best expressions of Cabernet Sauvignon.”  The Virage, offering layer upon layer of nuance, is a tapestry compared to a Napa Cabs afghan of primary flavors.

Pay attention to Meritage blends and Left and Right Bank styles coming from California.  Below are reviews of the Virage and a Left Bank-styled wine from Napa compatriot Beaucanon.

Illustration #1 and #2 credits:  Christophe Vorlet and copyright holder(s)
Interested in California Meritage/Bordeaux blends? Buy Wine Online: Purchase 6 or more bottles and get 50% off shipping with coupon code “grape35”

There is a cottage industry of people writing self-help books and giving trade show speeches about following your passion.  “If you love what you do, you’ll never work a day in your life,” goes the mantra.  But, if you’re a wine enthusiast is following your passion crazy talk?

In fact, there’s a perfectly easy way to enjoy the fruit of the vine and it doesn’t require masochistic tendencies … it’s mostly at the kitchen table with a glass … as a consumer after work from a day job that presumably pays you commensurate with your capabilities.  It’s a lot easier that way, surely.

Yet, the notion of jumping into the wine business has been top of mind lately … I’ve been thinking about it because there are precious few wine enthusiasts who are passionate enough to write online or engage in leading social media activity who don’t have a desire to make their way into the wine business either as a member of the media, on the production side, in marketing, or in the supply-chain.

That’s a lot of people ready to pounce on an opportunity if it presented itself.

Some have acted on it; others are attempting to act on it.  I’ve already made a sojourn in and out of the business and I still think about it.  It’s the genteel nature, the collegial spirit, the rhythm of the seasons.  It’s the unfolding drama of watching something grow from nothing in between bud break and harvest and then turn into something magical during the winter quiet, the end result fostering conviviality and joy.

However, despite the mind’s eye mental picture of idyll, the question about going into the wine business has to be asked:  Why invite the agony?

It’s not like it’s easy.  In fact, I know it’s hard—harder and less lucrative than the industry and job that most people are coming from.

I’ve been reading the stories about the difficult sales environment that persists for most small vintners.

I’ve been reading the stories and watching acquaintances with marketing chops hang their own shingle.

I’ve been reading the stories about the weather in California and the stress of whether grapes will ripen, Mother Nature’s sub-plot this year.

Privately, I’ve been talking with a Mendocino vineyard owner who has 120 tons of very good fruit ripening at this moment.  Its 120 tons that’s separate from what goes into his own luxury wine from the same vineyard—and he can’t find a buyer this year after contracts weren’t renewed.

Production in California is “rightsizing,” as they say.

Here’s the math he gave me:

A ton of Chardonnay costs about $1300 to grow and get to market.  If he’s lucky, on a contract, he can sell it for $1100 a ton – it’s a paper loss, but a loss that can be rationalized as profitable against hard costs, but certainly not good business by any standard; it’s not “get ahead” living, more “get by” living.

However, if he makes wine from the tonnage, that creates another set of circumstances that has to be dealt with—there isn’t a market for expanded volume with his luxury label so he has to look at a second label.  One ton of grapes will yield about 60 cases.  So, our grower/vintner has a potential 7200 cases on his hands.  This grower can produce an exceptionally high quality wine from these grapes, but would have to forsake oak barrels for oak by-products.  Why oak at all you ask?  Because the price point and style of wine that’s selling right now requires it.

If he has $4 in costs per bottle and he sells the wine for $8 a bottle wholesale so the wine can go on the shelf at $12 a bottle he has a chance to earn a nice return on the grapes.

But, here’s the rub.  The second label hasn’t been created yet and creating a brand takes time and money.  Nor is there a sales channel for this to-be-created wine, either.

This marketing and sales activity is outside of his manpower and capabilities, so he would have to get outside assistance – branding, web development, marketing, sales activity.  Those are all costs with uncertain returns.

Of course, forget about bank financing because that has become exceedingly difficult to earn, especially for efforts that can’t be associated with hard assets like land or buildings.

It all adds up to this – take a total loss on the grapes by not doing anything with them OR take a huge financial risk by making wine that doesn’t have a brand and doesn’t have a sales destination.

These sorts of stories aren’t isolated to one person, or one segment of the wine business.  Every aspect of the wine business supply-chain has a similar tale of woe where getting ahead of “getting by” meets consequential risk.

Yet, undaunted, the allure of the wine business holds steadfast for most.

Getting into the wine business?  Crazy talk?  Not unless you have an iron stomach, a penchant for hardship, a love for “poker chips in the middle of the table” risk and an opportunity for success that that gives the house a material edge.

Me? I just might simply open a bottle after a hard day’s work of doing something else, passion notwithstanding.

On a daily basis the wine world has its own bizarre but true “news of the weird.”  It could be another celebrity wine, another wine-related health benefit, or more madcap antics from the French.  What we don’t always get however are clear signals that society is careening off the tracks. Without further ado, I present to you two examples of society lurching perilously close to the cliff’s edge.

Wine Flavored Swisher Sweet Cigarillos

Rumor has it that Winston Churchill used to dip his cigars in port.  Somehow, I’m guessing that modern day dignitaries aren’t buying up the already flavored Swisher Sweets, though.  The only people I know smoking them are wayward Jr. High kids and people that think Purple Haze is something you put in a bong and not on the stereo.

I fancy myself a culturally literate guy even though my frame of reference for these sorts of things ended at the keg in college, and I’m guessing that a Brand Manager at Swisher International determined that women who smoke blunts need a wine flavored cigarillo ... no word on whether James Suckling has bridged his dual passions and reviewed the smoke ...

Psychological Warfare in the HR 5034 Campaign

A couple of months ago, the advertising community had a “great idea” smack to the forehead moment when an enterprising creative talent named Alec Brownstein bought Google adwords next to the names of five Creative Directors at advertising agencies he wanted to work for.

When the Creative Director Googled their name there was a Google ad that said, “Googling yourself is a lot of fun.  Hiring me is a lot of fun, too.”  The ad linked to Brownstein’s portfolio site.  From the five ads, Brownstein had interviews with four of his targets and earned two job offers.  He now works for Young & Rubicam, one of the largest agencies on Madison Avenue.

Clever idea, right? 

It’s so clever that it has been copied. 

A few weeks ago, I wrote about a change in leadership at WineAmerica.  At the time, what I alluded to, but didn’t explicitly state is that WineAmerica was getting seriously outworked by Tom Wark, author of Fermentation, wine Public Relations pro and the Executive Director of the Specialty Wine Retailers Association.  In the fight against HR 5034 Tom has been a one-man wrecking crew.  And, when the dust settles and the HR 5034 story ends happily (hopefully) every wine lover in the country can thank Tom for acting as the pivot in fomenting consumer awareness and coalescing industry wide support.

A guy like Tom, who already wakes each morning with intentions of fighting the good fight for wine shipping, has risen to the occasion in regards to creating awareness around HR 5034. 

Other people have noticed, as well.

Without further comment, I’ll direct you to Google in order to do a search for “Tom Wark” and see the Google Adwords that our friends from the National Beer Wholesalers Association have purchased.

if you feel particularly mischievous go ahead and click on the link and charge the NBWA a nickel for the ad placement.

Keep at it Tom.  Like a cornerback jamming a wide receiver at the line scrimmage, you’re in their head!

Last week, Wine Spectator and several international news outlets reported on recent developments in Bordeaux that merit watching. 

In a long line of plans and gambits intended to restore worldwide luster to the wine and the brand that is Bordeaux, changes are afoot … again.

In the latest attempt to stanch the bleeding of the diminished value of Bordeaux worldwide (economically and intrinsically), Bordeaux’s Wine Council (CIVB) unveiled a new strategy designed to address the stark dichotomy between the two polar realities of their wine market: the increasing value of classified growths into unobtainable and precious territory (driven by China and Japan), and the rest of their wine which is seemingly viewed like a trip to Great Grandma’s house – interesting as an antiquity, a little dusty, and not entirely contemporary (nor relevant).

Of course, it’s not a marketing program unless it has a name.  This one is called, “Bordeaux Tomorrow:  The Reconquest” which has a certain James Bond girl double entendre ring to it.

Addressing an issue that has bedeviled French imports since time immemorial, and taking a significant page from the Aussie playbook, Bordeaux’s Wine Council is attempting to thin the herd (so to speak) by reducing poor quality wine at the very low-end while simultaneously stratifying quality into four categories and upping the friendliness of their labeling which is notoriously impenetrable to the casual wine drinker.

If the category development works and the image categories of “Art,” “Exploration,” “Fun” and “Basic” take hold, then the CIVB anticipates that production and revenue will grow correspondingly – 12 percent and 28 percent respectively with the increased revenue attributable to higher price points from higher quality.

According to the Wine Spectator reporting from the CIVB report, the Bordeaux team believes that their image needs to be more “fun,” competing more effectively with New World marketing.

Personally speaking, I view Bordeaux and Old World wines in a similar frame of reference as I do Notre Dame Football – love it or hate it, college football is better off when Notre Dame Football is winning and a part of the national conversation, even if that conversation is side taking.  You cannot truly know college football until you know the tradition of Notre Dame.  And, despite the polarizing feelings Notre Dame provokes, they make college football better for everybody. 

Likewise, the wine world is better off when Bordeaux wine means something to the majority of wine drinkers, and knowing the cradle of the Old World, where Mother’s Milk comes from, is an imperative even if wine drinkers have mixed feelings.

The Bordeaux marketing challenge is daunting, however – particularly in its current construction.  With the goals sketched out and determined to be achieved by 2018, is seven years enough time to acquaint wine drinkers with Bordeaux in its complexity, even if distilled into four categories? 

The odds are long.

Other countries like Chile, New Zealand, and Argentina aren’t going to roll over.  And, this is to say nothing of countries like Greece that want their own U.S. mindshare and slice of the sales pie.

That said, I think the CIVB folks might have their sights on treating symptoms instead of treating the root problem, at least in the states.

While the program is focused on more countries than just the U.S., the challenge state side, in my opinion, is getting wine drinkers to think of Bordeaux and Old World wines as the touchstone – Notre Dame in college football.  Anecdotally, the current day reality is actually the reverse of that.  Wine drinkers may eventually graduate to French wines, but not before they go through a long list of New World countries.

Therefore, the Bordeaux challenge is to flip that notion and create the impression that a growing interest in wine starts in Bordeaux (or ‘BDX’ as wonks on Robert Parker’s message board call it) and then grows personalized with awareness.

However, the key to doing so is in message simplicity.  The French marketing message has always been obfuscated in a maelstrom of mixed priorities. 

Take for example the Planet Bordeaux initiative. Intended to bring awareness in the U.S., the goal of the program according to marketing organizers is, “…show Americans that Bordeaux is about more than classified growths and wine reviews.  It’s about the people who make the wine, the land that grows it and the lifestyle that surrounds it.”

Of course, these are all good goals, but the way that Planet Bordeaux is doing so is a little incongruent with the message – they are focusing on the “ABC’s” – appellations, blends and class of Bordeaux at reasonable price points.  This, of course, doesn’t completely jive with “people,” “land” and “lifestyle.”

I’m hoping for the best for Bordeaux.  Any sub-culture is better off when derivations of traditions that are co-opted are balanced by a market understanding that can pay homage to the source material.  To paraphrase Terry Theise, the New World is a movie and the Old World is the book the movie is based from – a distilled script from the nuance of a novel.  In fact, that’s the Bordeaux marketing message right there.  Repeated over and over.  Then, let consumers decide whether they want to align themselves with the glamorized Hollywood treatment, or the source material, a classic.

Most would agree that the book is always better than the movie.  Let’s hope that the Bordeaux “Reconquest” is able to achieve the same – the wine world will be better off for it.

Good Grape / Ed. Note: Riesling is everybody’s Charlie Brown, a lovable loser possessed of abundant charm and talent waiting to be tapped if only the marketplace, the proverbial Lucy pulling the ball away before the would-be successful kick, would see what the rest of us know …

With the permission of the publisher, the below is an excerpt from Terry Theise’s new book, Reading between the Wines.  Excerpted from chapter 6, Of Places and Grapes, Theise riffs on Riesling:

My favorite grapes are those so woven into where they grow that grape and place are no longer extricable, like when you pull one thread and whole sweater unravels.  But when pressed to consider grape alone, there’s no question in my mind at all which is the greatest grape, of either color:  Riesling.

If there’s any problem with Riesling, it’s that it will spoil you for anything else.  Hans Altmann of the Jamek estate in the Wachau once said, “There are times when I think that any sip of wine that isn’t Riesling is wasted.”  Riesling is so digitally precise, so finely articulate, so pixilated and pointillist in detail that other wines seem almost mute by comparison.

And if you grow Riesling where it belongs, its wines come out of the ground already perfect.  They are inimical to the diddlings of hot shot “winemakers” eager to strut their cellar chops.  Riesling resists the face-lift depilation tummy-tuck breast implant school of vinification. Riesling does more than just imply terroir:  it subsumes its own identity as fruit into the greater meaning of soil, land, and place.  Riesling knows soil more intimately than any other grape, perhaps because it ripens so late in the fall and is thus on the vine longer than other varieties, and because it trives in poor soils with deep bedrock strata into which it can sink its probing roots.  Riesling is beloved of all who grow it for being so cooperative—the furthest thing from a diva.  It survives all but the most brutal frost, is hearty in its resistance to disease, and yields well without sacrificing flavor—perhaps because it ripens late in the fall when everything is taut and crisp and golden.  Riesling wines are the afterglow of the contented world.

Riesling will thrive in any idiom.  Its dry wines can be superbly focused and expressive, its almost-dry wines can be even longer and more elegant in flavor, its going-on-sweet wines are the apotheosis of fruit and mineral flavor, and its truly sweet wines are uniquely piquant.

It is also food’s best friend.  If, from this day forward, you swore to drink nothing but Riesling and eat only the things that went with it, your diet would hardly change, unless it consists of rare unsauced red meat and eggplant Parmesan.  You would also discover the wine you’d been seeking for any number of dishes you’d thought were too “difficult” for wine.  Riesling wine may be the most complex in the world, but it’s never boastful; it is a team player, there to make food taste better.  Riesling isn’t shy or demure, it is modest and tactful, but if you pay attention to it—which it never insists you do—you’ll discover how deep these still waters run.  Ironic, isn’t it?  The grape with the most to say is the very one that speaks in a moderate voice.

If Kerouac’s On the Road had a ménage a trois with Palahniuk’s Fight Club and Thoreau’s Walden, resulting in a love child, it might approximate Terry Theise’s book, Reading between the Wines.

And, while this may be the very first book review you will read regarding Theise’s new book from UC Press, it will not be the last.  As I speak, they’re likely inscribing the James Beard Foundation book award for 2011, just ahead of the adulation and commendations for a book that’s an instant classic and rightful companion to what is now a holy trinity of modern wine books.

Joining Lawrence Osbourne’s The Accidental Connoisseur and Matt Kramer’s Making Sense of Wine on the thoughtful wine enthusiasts bookshelf, Theise has written a book that is so wholly singular to his point of view, yet so persuasive that he may yet convert thousands to the wonders of small, artisanal wines from around the world, joining the insider cadre that have followed his German, Austrian and grower Champagne import selections and annual catalog-cum-stream of consciousness manifesto.

To be sure, Theise isn’t the first to espouse a conviction about the value of Old World wines that are authentic, terroir-based and in possession of a bent toward the transcendental, he’s just the first in the last decade to write with enough clarity and generosity of spirit to potentially turn New World agnostics into Old World disciples, connecting with a new generation of wine enthusiasts for whom the lifestyle mavens and old media dogs are as relatable as a narc at a biker rally. 

While reading the slim volume, losing myself in the theatre of my mind, I imagine Theise sitting across the table from me in the dining room of an old row house in a hardscrabble town, maybe Cleveland, Pittsburgh, or Upstate NY, somewhere suitably unfashionable, explaining to me his philosophy on wine—and by proxy—life.  The education is just getting started when Theise says, at the end of the introduction, just pages into the book, “Confected wines are not designed for human beings; they are designed for ‘consumers.’ Which do you want to be?” At this point, he has removed my defenses, punched me in the gut and put his arm around me whispering reassuringly that I am not that big of an asshole, there is still time to see the light; there is hope.

What follows in Reading between the Wines is as thoughtful of a rumination on small wine and the beauty of being human, in all of our fragility, that you are ever likely to find in a wine book.

A few dozen pages later, nearly seduced in the narrative, soaking in a painters eye for detail and a lyricists pen for the unexpressed connective fiber in humanity, Theise says, “We were suburban folk, and a certain existential disconnect was a defining parameter of our experience.” Theise later notes, “If you’re sinking into ennui as yet another corporate type presses his marketing strategies on you, as yet another former dermatologist or veterinarian lords his milk-and-honey lifestyle over you and you wonder what any of it has to do with wine, with why you first fell in love with wine – I have places to show you.”

And, he does.

Theise shepherds us down a meandering path of enlightenment that encompasses a practical and metaphysical take on understanding our palates, a highly subjective take on the world of wine including a set of principles for what matters in vino, an assault against the dumbing down of wine, a parenthetical reference that lasts nearly 30 pages, a vivisection of sacred cows like points scoring, a carving of his Mount Rushmore of wine varietals and a discrete tour of his portfolio of wine via anecdotes.

It’s not a perfect book, no.  But, then, that’s the point.  Life isn’t perfect.  Wine isn’t perfect.  The best that we can do is create something that respects the land, engenders respect in the bottle and acts as a vehicle for a higher understanding.  Wine, in all of its glory, is an attempt to bottle nature’s attempt at perfection as captured by man and his foibles.  Ultimately, the result in book form is as wine luminary Karen MacNeil says, “…the single best book I’ve ever read on why wine matters.”

Indeed.

If Kerouac’s On the Road had a ménage a trois with Palahniuk’s Fight Club and Thoreau’s Walden, resulting in a love child, it might approximate Terry Theise’s book, Reading between the Wines.

And, while this may be the very first book review you will read regarding Theise’s new book from UC Press, it will not be the last.  As I speak, they’re likely inscribing the James Beard Foundation book award for 2011, just ahead of the adulation and commendations for a book that’s an instant classic and rightful companion to what is now a holy trinity of modern wine books.

Joining Lawrence Osbourne’s The Accidental Connoisseur and Matt Kramer’s Making Sense of Wine on the thoughtful wine enthusiasts bookshelf, Theise has written a book that is so wholly singular to his point of view, yet so persuasive that he may yet convert thousands to the wonders of small, artisanal wines from around the world, joining the insider cadre that have followed his German, Austrian and grower Champagne import selections and annual catalog-cum-stream of consciousness manifesto.

To be sure, Theise isn’t the first to espouse a conviction about the value of Old World wines that are authentic, terroir-based and in possession of a bent toward the transcendental, he’s just the first in the last decade to write with enough clarity and generosity of spirit to potentially turn New World agnostics into Old World disciples, connecting with a new generation of wine enthusiasts for whom the lifestyle mavens and old media dogs are as relatable as a narc at a biker rally. 

While reading the slim volume, losing myself in the theatre of my mind, I imagine Theise sitting across the table from me in the dining room of an old row house in a hardscrabble town, maybe Cleveland, Pittsburgh, or Upstate NY, somewhere suitably unfashionable, explaining to me his philosophy on wine—and by proxy—life.  The education is just getting started when Theise says, at the end of the introduction, just pages into the book, “Confected wines are not designed for human beings; they are designed for ‘consumers.’ Which do you want to be?” At this point, he has removed my defenses, punched me in the gut and put his arm around me whispering reassuringly that I am not that big of an asshole, there is still time to see the light; there is hope.

What follows in Reading between the Wines is as thoughtful of rumination on small wine and the beauty of being human, in all of our fragility, that you are ever likely to find in a wine book.

A few dozen pages later, nearly seduced in the narrative, soaking in a painters eye for detail and a lyricists pen for the unexpressed connective fiber in humanity, Theise says, “We were suburban folk, and a certain existential disconnect was a defining parameter of our experience.” Theise later notes, “If you’re sinking into ennui as yet another corporate type presses his marketing strategies on you, as yet another former dermatologist or veterinarian lords his milk-and-honey lifestyle over you and you wonder what any of it has to do with wine, with why you first fell in love with wine – I have places to show you.”

And, he does.

Theise shepherds us down a meandering path of enlightenment that encompasses a practical and metaphysical take on understanding your palate, a highly subjective take on the world of wine including a set of principles for what matters in vino, an assault against the dumbing down of wine, a parenthetical reference that lasts nearly 30 pages, a vivisection of sacred cows like points scoring, a carving of Theise’s Mount Rushmore of wine varietals and a discrete tour of the Theise portfolio via anecdotes.

It’s not a perfect book, no.  But, then, that’s the point.  Life isn’t perfect.  Wine isn’t perfect.  The best that we can do is create something that respects the land, engenders respect in the bottle and acts as a vehicle for a higher understanding.  Wine, in all of its glory, is an attempt to bottle nature’s attempt at perfection as captured by man and his foibles.  Ultimately, the result in book form is as wine luminary Karen MacNeil says, “…the single best book I’ve ever read on why wine matters.”

Indeed.

If Kerouac’s On the Road had a ménage a trois with Palahniuk’s Fight Club and Thoreau’s Walden, resulting in a love child, it might approximate Terry Theise’s book, Reading between the Wines.

And, while this may be the very first book review you will read regarding Theise’s new book from UC Press, it will not be the last.  As I speak, they’re likely inscribing the James Beard Foundation book award for 2011, just ahead of the adulation and commendations for a book that’s an instant classic and rightful companion to what is now a holy trinity of modern wine books.

Joining Lawrence Osbourne’s The Accidental Connoisseur and Matt Kramer’s Making Sense of Wine on the thoughtful wine enthusiasts bookshelf, Theise has written a book that is so wholly singular to his point of view, yet so persuasive that he may yet convert thousands to the wonders of small, artisanal wines from around the world, joining the insider cadre that have followed his German, Austrian and grower Champagne import selections and annual catalog-cum-stream of consciousness manifesto.

To be sure, Theise isn’t the first to espouse a conviction about the value of Old World wines that are authentic, terroir-based and in possession of a bent toward the transcendental, he’s just the first in the last decade to write with enough clarity and generosity of spirit to potentially turn New World agnostics into Old World disciples, connecting with a new generation of wine enthusiasts for whom the lifestyle mavens and old media dogs are as relatable as a narc at a biker rally. 

While reading the slim volume, losing myself in the theatre of my mind, I imagine Theise sitting across the table from me in the dining room of an old row house in a hardscrabble town, maybe Cleveland, Pittsburgh, or Upstate NY, somewhere suitably unfashionable, explaining to me his philosophy on wine—and by proxy—life.  The education is just getting started when Theise says, at the end of the introduction, just pages into the book, “Confected wines are not designed for human beings; they are designed for ‘consumers.’ Which do you want to be?” At this point, he has removed my defenses, punched me in the gut and put his arm around me whispering reassuringly that I am not that big of an asshole, there is still time to see the light; there is hope.

What follows in Reading between the Wines is as thoughtful of rumination on small wine and the beauty of being human, in all of our fragility, that you are ever likely to find in a wine book.

A few dozen pages later, nearly seduced in the narrative, soaking in a painters eye for detail and a lyricists pen for the unexpressed connective fiber in humanity, Theise says, “We were suburban folk, and a certain existential disconnect was a defining parameter of our experience.” Theise later notes, “If you’re sinking into ennui as yet another corporate type presses his marketing strategies on you, as yet another former dermatologist or veterinarian lords his milk-and-honey lifestyle over you and you wonder what any of it has to do with wine, with why you first fell in love with wine – I have places to show you.”

And, he does.

Theise shepherds us down a meandering path of enlightenment that encompasses a practical and metaphysical take on understanding your palate, a highly subjective take on the world of wine including a set of principles for what matters in vino, an assault against the dumbing down of wine, a parenthetical reference that lasts nearly 30 pages, a vivisection of sacred cows like points scoring, a carving of Theise’s Mount Rushmore of wine varietals and a discrete tour of the Theise portfolio via anecdotes.

It’s not a perfect book, no.  But, then, that’s the point.  Life isn’t perfect.  Wine isn’t perfect.  The best that we can do is create something that respects the land, engenders respect in the bottle and acts as a vehicle for a higher understanding.  Wine, in all of its glory, is an attempt to bottle nature’s attempt at perfection as captured by man and his foibles.  Ultimately, the result in book form is as wine luminary Karen MacNeil says, “…the single best book I’ve ever read on why wine matters.”

Indeed.

At some point in every wine lover’s journey, there comes a time when having a historical perspective becomes important – not only from the perspective of, “Old World” versus “New World” wine, but also the important context of understanding chronology of events within the wine world.

The dual truisms of, “To understand the future, know the past” and “The more things change, the more they stay the same” are definitely apropos to the corner of the world that we enthusiastically call home. 

To be fully indoctrinated in wine, to own your participation by understanding and driving your awareness instead of riding shotgun on the journey, requires knowing the long and the short version of the story – what happened long ago, and what happened within the scope of recent generations. 

For example, aside from the 1855 Bordeaux classification, perhaps no more important historical event affects our current wine culture than Prohibition and the creation of the three-tier system.  Therefore, any modern day opinion has to be tinged with the hue of understanding of the events that have led to today’s politicized climate.

Likewise, within the realm of mainstream wine media and the democratized participation of the online wine scene, there can be no more important bridging of the generational divide than an appreciation for what has occurred in the past.

Every generation wants to feel respected and ennobled and the easiest path to do so is for the younger generation to understand, if nothing else, near term history – what is always referred to on an evolving basis as the, “modern era” – usually the last 30 years.

I find the schism occurs (in most any generational situation) when a younger crop of earnest would-be world-beaters comes along thinking they invented the stuff, when, in fact, the story has been the same for decades.  Sure, the names and the places change, but the stories remain the same.  As Shakespeare noted, there are only seven types of stories.

Alternatively, by analogy, it is like being a music fan and not giving props to the Beatles or the Sex Pistols, the forebears for today’s pop rock and punk.

Thomas Pellechia, a frequent contributor to this site, has acted as the igniter of this historical reverence epiphany for me.  Thomas is something of a mentor.  He frequently pushes my thought process, calls my bluff and acts in a near consultant-like capacity via comments on this site and private emails, taking an intelligent man’s approach to the grape. 

Thomas is also the author of several books, one of which is:  Wine: The 8,000 Year-Old Story of the Wine Trade – a book that, not so coincidentally, shows that the wine trade is materially the same over the millennia.

Thomas knows that which he speaks …

Many argue that such reverence to history, searching for legacy cues in the world of wine, is positively antediluvian, and an inhibitor of progress – the past acts as an albatross for the future, they say.  I am not one of those people, though.

I have recently taken to picking up my own wine education with a step back into the 70s, at the nascent beginning of the wine culture explosion that occurred in the 80s, a period of time when the East Coast’s Eurocentric bias was slowly, but surely being balanced with California wines moving from the West in sensibility and sales. 

Certainly, there are a number of books available on various aspects of wine history, but what is often overlooked are magazine archives, particularly for “modern era” insight, the stuff that engenders the new guard to mainstream media wine professionals by demonstrating an understanding of the origin of contemporary wine trends deeper than a Google search.

Case in point, a review of a Time magazine article on Gallo from 1972 could be written EXACTLY the same today (must read article).  Change the dates and it stands up as valid some 37 years later, with some foreshadowing regarding Gallo’s ongoing place in the wine world.

The deeper I get into wine, the more I view my participation as a part of a long legacy of people who have gone before me – people who have a rich knowledge and a legacy to respect.  Just as I mentioned, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” Yet, I’m also realizing that, “The more I know, the more I realize I don’t know anything.”

Here are some good magazine archives for your own research purposes:

Saturday Evening Post

New York Times

Time magazine

Gourmet

The New Yorker

Summary:  An examination of Latitude Beverage Co. and their négociant label 90+ Cellars – a newer entrant in a wine business niche that has been successfully updated for modern times by Oriel Wines and Cameron Hughes wine.  90+ Cellars includes the marketing hook of sourcing wines that have scored at least 90+ points in previous vintages.

90+ Cellars founder Kevin Mehra might be a modern day P.T. Barnum, a new millennium consumer crusader like Ralph Nader, or, perhaps, a poor man’s Cameron Hughes, a serviceable if unoriginal knock-off of the man and company who reinvented the domestic negociant trade for modern times. 

It is perhaps ironic that the growth of his nascent business—Latitude Beverage Co.—creator of the wine label 90+ Cellars, is predicated on the latter, a Cameron Hughes-lite with a slight marketing hook. 

Unfortunately, rare is the time when a knock-off deserves a rooting interest, particularly when the differentiating marketing hook is something as polarizing as that alleged and mystical quality line of demarcation – a 90-point score.  Of course, that’s on top of a model that already has its detractors.  To quote top California winemaker David Ramey from a Wall Street Journal profile on Cameron Hughes, “A guy like Hughes has a business model that revolves around other people’s misfortunes.  He’s like a vulture feeding on carrion.” By that rational, a derivation of the Cameron Hughes model makes 90+ Cellars not a vulture feeding on carrion, but by analogy, more like the hot, “now you see them, now you don’t” boy band knock-off O-Town who fed on the leftover carcass of ‘tween female scraps created by the Backstreet Boys years ago.

Quoting a 90+ Cellars company blog post from October of last year, “90+ Cellars is just like Cameron Hughes’ Lot Series except that the wines Latitude Beverage purchases come with a ratings pedigree. While we don’t necessarily advocate buying wines based on their ratings (because everyone’s personal taste is different), we think only selecting wines that are well-structured enough to earn a 90+ rating in the first place is a great place to start.”

Started in early 2009 and located at Faneuil Hall in Boston, MA, a building with deep historical roots that has been co-opted for the tourist trade, Latitude Beverage Co. is doing much the same – trading on wines historical roots to those interested only enough to act as tourist in the wine aisle.

The business model, as indicated by the comparison to Cameron Hughes, is very much what you might expect from a négociant model in this period of economic distress.  Latitude Beverage Co. buys finished wine (in the states it’s through a broker, somebody like Turrentine or Ciatti Co., and internationally it’s directly with the winery) and labels it at a discount to the retail value of the wine that might have gone on the shelf if the source winery had bottled it.  In doing their sourcing, Latitude Beverage Co. looks for wines that have a pedigree of being scored 90-points or more, have “Best Buy” accolades or have won a gold medal at a wine competition.  According to a press release, Latitude “…sources only finished wines that have a pedigree of 90+ ratings.”

It’s that particular marketing spin on the 90+ point pedigree, or third-party accolades where the 90+ Cellars business starts to unravel, in my opinion – it stretches the boundaries of what is good marketing in a skeptical age and the transparency that fosters a “suspension of disbelief” with consumers.  90+ Cellars operate at the dangerous intersection where the positive power of suggestion, and its evil twin, “This is bunk marketing hooey” take hold.

If the wine delivers, 90+ Cellars is a hero, and if not, they’re a goat; it’s a black and white equation based on expectation setting.

Cameron Hughes, largely has built a reputation for putting exceptional quality juice in the bottle and more than validating their price point, as validated by mainstream wine criticism.  Not so, I fear, with 90+ Cellars.

In reviewing four wines from 90+ Cellars, a California Pinot, a Spanish Garnacha, a Napa Merlot and an Australian Shiraz-Viognier, I found myself ponderously scratching my head after trying each.  Not bad wines, and, perhaps, even an arguable value based on their price, each under $16 a bottle, yet, by the same token I found nary a wine that came close to a threshold of quality that I would qualify as a 90-point wine.  I found myself muttering to myself, “Not bad, but they should have called it 83+ Cellars.”

In an interview with Mehra, I sought some clarification on my initial impressions, wanting to believe that, perhaps, my palate was a tougher than most, my suspicious nature more keenly negative than the average consumer; the suspension of my disbelief would be overcome, could be overcome.

As it turns out, the business is not intentionally disingenuous, but nor does it deserve the sort of blind faith that is implicit in its labels’ name.

Consider the following:

90+ Cellars gives itself plenty of wiggle room by sourcing wine that has a lineage of a 90+ point score, “Best Buy” accolades or gold medals in competition.  However, the 90+ points isn’t related to current vintage, it’s naturally declassified if it’s on the bulk market, the consumer never knows the provenance by source winery name and 90+ cellars doesn’t submit their vintages to traditional critics for validation, instead relying on bloggers.

It is a lot of blind faith for a regular wine consumer, to say nothing of the perceptive.

In particular, most egregious to me is the fact that according to Mehra, they are not submitting the wines to traditional critics noting, “They can take 6 to 8 months to taste a wine and in many instances our wine is already gone. We like online wine bloggers much better (because) they aren’t biased to big name brands, taste quickly and get their information out much faster.”

What’s left unsaid by Mehra is the fact that wine bloggers are susceptible to the sway of free samples, often have a lack of insight into wine business models, are as easily swayed by marketing shtick as the consumers who read their sites, and they lack a penetrating influence that moves markets.

Quite simply, the quantity of good reviews from wine bloggers will likely outpace bad reviews and the bad reviews can be easily discounted.

Overall, it’s disappointing that a wine whose marketing is predicated on mainstream wine reviews doesn’t close the loop for wine reviews with the same mainstream critics.  In my opinion, the way forward for this wine business is to have their quality claims—natch—the name of the label, verified.

Live by the sword, die by the sword, that’s what I say.  Otherwise, Mehra and 90+ Cellars aren’t just merely Cameron Hughes-lite, it’s P.T. Barnum and his sideshow ...

Alas, a sucker may be born every minute, but I’m not one of them.

Most days I try to write something that acts as a legitimate article or an op-ed piece – usually there’s a beginning, a middle and an end, mostly with a point, too and enough facts to make my case.  Today isn’t that day, though.  I have other things on my mind. 

I am traveling to Texas to see my Mom and Grandma at the end of this week and I’m excited about that.  My Grandma will be 102 this year and she’s still sharp enough to think the economy is headed for more trouble … I think Depression-era folk have an economic rader akin to divining for water … they know.  Thinking of my Grandma also reminds me of her sister-in-law, Virginia, the widow of one of my Grandma’s brothers, Glen, who passed in the early 90s.  Virginia occasionally writes letters to my wife and I – in longhand, of course.  I always feel bad because I have a hard time writing a birthday card anymore.  I am so used to typing.  My quid pro quo isn’t that great and I know I’ll be regretful at some point for not taking the time to return her gift in the form of my own letter, longer than a note card.

Virginia’s letters are usually seven or eight pages, mostly non-sequitar remembrances of times gone by—an anecdote about my Grandpa, what a kind and generous man he was, how clever he was with inventing useful things, or my Grandma, what a cook she used to be, the best in the family.  Sometimes Virginia will note how happy she is that my Mom is in possession of a family antique that holds special memories, like the radio that acted as evening entertainment after supper.  I’m lucky if I make it through with dry eyes.  I reread them every now and again when I need to exorcise a burden that only tangential tears can relieve.

I saw some press last week about a new iPad application called the “Flipboard”—it takes all of the content from your Twitter and Facebook accounts, linked articles, photos and such, and turns it into a readable magazine of sorts.  Virginia doesn’t have this in mind when she tells me about my Grandma catching a chicken for supper, life’s riches didn’t cost much back then.

Mostly, though, I have been thinking about the end of summer.  I’ve been talking about going to see my Mom since earlier this year when the end of July seemed like forever away.  We’ve all heard about seasonal affective disorder – the winter blues, right?  Is there such a thing as the summer blues?  The sadness that happens when you know the summer is getting ready to blow by you, before you even had a chance to say, “hello.”

It’s one of life’s cruel jokes – we spend January til May waiting for summer to get here and then it’s gone in a blink.

Here in the Midwest, you know August is coming furiously because corn and tomato’s are available on the side of the road, the suns’ intensity wanes in the afternoon sky, the locusts sing their symphony, the grass in the front yard starts to wither from its June greenery, football practice starts up and I count down the weekends till kick-off, trying hard not to forsake the glory of August because November will be here soon enough.

Yet, there is an internal body clock that shifts with the seasons.  My fall cravings for a cheese plate with salumi, port wines and IPA beers happen subconsciously, and happened early this year, too; perhaps owing to the early spring we had, 80-degree temperatures through much of April.  This past weekend I bought a mixed six-pack of bruising IPA’s and stouts, and opened a bottle of Port, all without too much conscious thought; it’s happening – fall is around the corner and I have a bunch of Sauvignon Blanc to drink, not to mention the Rosé.

One good thing about this summer has been I have not been without ice cream.  Not at all.  My waistline and my scale verify that, as well.  I have my winter fat layer ready to go.  Perhaps that is part of the reason for the Port – that 9:00 pm sweets craving can be mollified with a finger of Port instead of a big bowl of ice cream.

I like to follow the grinders of the wine business, the folks that are passionate about wine without the gravitas to make the juice, working on the periphery instead, trying to make a mark.  I identify with people that start with not much and end with not much, despite the effort.  There’s a nobility in the struggle. 

StemGrip is one company I’m going to profile in the near future, a device that holds your glassware upright in the dishwasher.  There’s always an interesting story in the development of a product.  My latest inspiration is trail mix for dessert wines.  Forget stinky wine cheeses.

Ports and dessert wines need a revolution – and the answer is …, well, the answer isn’t blue cheese.  Who eats a hunk of blue cheese at 9:00 pm at night at home, before going to bed?  Nobody, I tell ya.  No, instead, the world needs dessert wine trail mixes, a delicious mix with a sipper.

My fave dessert wines are the Quady Essensia and any 10 year Tawny Port.  To make a trail mix for the Essensia, or any non-Port style dessert wine, get some white chocolate baking chips, some vanilla almonds and unsalted cashews and mix that up with some dried chopped apricots, and peaches.  Add in anything else that sounds like a good complement. 

For the Tawny Port trail mix, Sandeman is nice, take toffee, butterscotch, and dark chocolate baking chips, mix in some dried blueberries, dried cherries, diced dried plums, maybe some cocoa roasted almonds and some unsalted cashews and nibble alongside a generously scant pour of the Port.

Heaven.

I’ve been going on too long, but I get that way when time is more of a function of operating between now and then, and not a milemarker to an unknown destination.  Love to you and yours and best wishes on the rest of the summer and travels to visit family.

It is no secret, and definitely not a revelation: wine business marketing is all about the story.  But, what does that really mean?

A story carries value only if it’s memorable, and connects with an audience – an audience of one or an audience of hundreds, if not thousands.  A litany of facts does not a story make.  If a “story” does not connect then it’s merely information, soon to be forgotten like a kids’ math lesson over the summertime.

However, if a story is memorable, it becomes shareable, like a good joke that can be recalled on command.  And, when something is shareable, well, that is the good stuff—that’s when a winery has other people doing their marketing for them because customers are sharing stories with their friends, and oftentimes including a dash of brand ambassadorship and a hint of positive projection all wrapped in an anecdotal, personal brand package.

I have been thinking about the nature of stories and was motivated into further research by a recent Wine Business Monthly (WBM) article (magazine only).

WBM offered a recap of the Fine Wine III conference held in April of this year in Ribero del Duero, Spain.  Presenting research from U.K. based wine research firm Wine Intelligence, the research breaks down demographic data for luxury wine buyers (over $25 a bottle).  The research is drawn from the U.S., U.K and Switzerland.  According to Wine Intelligence, a stunning 60% of all luxury wines is based on 12% of luxury wine buyers – these are the regular high-end buyers.  Put a different way, 88% of all luxury wine buyers are occasional purchasers and drive 40% of the high-end market.

In a nutshell, based on a deduction even I can make, the reason the upper end of the wine echelon has seen a protracted buying recession is because 88% of luxury wine buyers who buy occasionally, driving 40% of the market, reduced the frequency of their “occasional.”  Simple enough.

However, as the market rebounds, and if reports are true that occasional trading up is by this buying segment may be stunted by the quality consumers are seeing at lower price points, how does a winery induce interest?

It’s all about the story.

The WBM article and the Wine Intelligence research went on to detail the top cues for occasional wine buyers, noting: “…Unlike their luxury counterparts, they seek reassurance in their purchasing because they are not as familiar with fine wine.”  Reassurance in the form of a story. 

The article continues, quoting Erica Donoho of Wine Intelligence, “It’s important for them when they are buying less frequently to have some sort of measure of safety.  A well-known wine producer is a safe bet for them.”  Left unsaid is the fact that “well-known” is a relative term, but “familiar” is obviously the antidote and stories can create that sense of familiarity.

However, as news articles are wont to do, they provided the list of story cues that occasional luxury wine buyers are looking for, but no larger context for what constitutes a good story.

I did some additional research analyzing two books on the topic – Made to Stick and The Story Factor.  The below acts as sort of recipe book for a winery to create their own story that resonates. When viewed sequentially, the first visual offers the six fundamentals of a “sticky” idea, ending with a good story.  The second visual offers the six types of stories.  The third visual offers the seven types of story themes that occasional luxury wine buyers are looking for and the fourth visual, well, that’s when you know you’re hitting all cylinders.

Made to Stick:  6 Keys to a “Sticky” Idea

The Story Factor:  Six Distinct Types of Stories

Wine Intelligence Research: The Seven Top Buying Cues / Story Angles for Occasional Luxury Wine Buyers

What Happens when a Story Hits the Spot?