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May 10 2010
In the search for a glimmer of hope during uncertain times, perhaps it’s not surprising that many have taken Silicon Valley Bank’s, “State of the Wine Industry” report as an endorsement that our economic nuclear winter is over and business can resume under the auspices of the halcyon days of the last decade.
The headline to the press release for the report even said, “SVB Predicts End of Trading Down Trend in Wine Sales.”
It’s a regrettable takeaway from an otherwise dandy report, perennially one of the best reads in the wine business.
The principal issue I have with the headline and sound bite is when phrases like “trading down … will end” are bandied about the immediate assumption is that the price tiers above $20 a bottle (the wines hit by ‘trading down’ in the first place) are the benefactors of the recovery.
Not so.
In fact, according to the same Silicon Valley Bank report (excerpted from multiple passages):
“We do not believe the improving customer climate will catapult fine wine sales to the high point of the past decade anytime soon.
Prices have reset to lower tiers and it will take some time to fully recover to the point which has been built over the last 15 years.
Today we think the consumer is trading sideways and bumping along the bottom of a recovery.
…We are not even close to suggesting a V-shaped rebound in the fine wine segment is on the way. We expect recovery to be muted and a long process.”
That creates a less inspirational headline, of course.
There are some other interesting nuggets in the report, including some from the author’s analysis of macroeconomic issues in the context of consumers – the affluent, market segmentation, purchasing power and such. All of this is fairly benign, but not the most provocative question posed in the report, a question that is left nakedly unanswered:
“… The U.S. consumer is not homogenous. If your customer’s attitudes are changing, what will you do to stay relevant with them? How will you get the answers? What strategic decisions will you make this year to position your winery for future success?
The new normal for your winery should not be fully defined by the fate of a damaged consumer, but by your own sales strategy.”
That’s the crux of the biscuit, so to speak: 24 pages distilled into four words—damaged consumer, sales strategy.
The hard, cold reality (irrespective of trading up, down or sideways) is that recovery is going to be long and slow and how the consumer psyche will be impacted along the way is, if anything, a moving target. How the upper-tier of the wine industry responds will go a long way towards future success. Old rules don’t apply. It’s a drum I’ve been beating for a long while. As a consumer on the frontlines, aspirational wine marketing and luxury appeal are quickly waning for many, if they even appealed to them in the first place.
As supporting evidence, enter Trendwatching.com.
Trendwatching is a web site I pay religious attention to. Frequently, these monthly trend reports put things into context that I sense, but don’t have the time, talent or resources to fully put into mental order. It’s a valuable service and something I unequivocally recommend for anybody that works in a marketing capacity.
In the May trend briefing, they covered the fragmentation of “status” – insights that have a direct impact on the wine business.
From the report:
“…In a traditional consumer society, where consumption is one of the leading (if not the leading) indicators of success, those who consume the most (and especially those who consume the rarest and most expensive), will typically also attain the highest status. This is why brands have, for decades, gladly provide people with goods, services and experiences that help them (boldly or subtly) impress their peers and help alleviate their anxieties about how they’re perceived by others. However, mature consumer societies are changing, and so is the ‘Statusphere’: an increasing number of consumers are no longer (solely) obsessed with owning or experiencing the most and/or the most expensive.”
The point of the trends report is that the acquisition of luxury goods is no longer the only status marker that people seek to obtain. It’s one of them, but not the only one, and there are shifts happening within “status.”
You can read the entire brief here, but excerpted they are:
1) Bigger, Better, Harder
Traditional consumption is about buying (and enjoying and showing off) more and better stuff than fellow consumers … The recession is just a blip on the radar to some consumers’ appetite for expensive, in-your-face brands and products that feed off status anxiety.
Within the scope of luxury status, as described above, status can only be achieved from being seen by others, or by telling others about the experiences afterwards. Therefore, ‘status stories’ become more attractive as more brands (have to) go niche and therefore tell stories that aren’t common knowledge for the masses … expect a shift from brands telling a story, to brands helping consumers tell their own status-yielding stories to other consumers.
2) Generosity
Owning is no longer the only way for consumers to get their status fix: the act of giving reflects well (if not better) on individuals, too. Work harder on helping your consumer-donors show and tell others about their donations and contributions!
3) Green credentials & Unconsumption
As entire societies have embraced sustainability in everything as the (only) way forward, and as millions of consumers are now actively trying to greenify their lives, green credentials are an endless source of status. Consumers’ interest in green credentials will lead to even more eco-friendly goods and services sporting bold iconic markers and design that help their eco-conscious owners show off their eco-credentials to their peers
4) In the Know & Skills
Growing pockets of consumers find pleasure in mastering skills and acquiring knowledge. They attain status from finding an appreciative audience that’s impressed with what they know, and can create, instead of what they consume. This is an established source of status … anything you as a brand can do to assist the pursuit of deep or trivial knowledge will be appreciated.
5) Connectivity
When it comes to online status, it’s all about who you connect to, and who connects to you, tribal style. It is still about being unique, but it’s about belonging, too: belonging to tribes whose membership renders status to its members. Be sure you help your customers collect, communicate and display online badges of honor in every way possible.
In sum, while breaking the slide in “trading down” makes for a snappy headline, the reality is that the upper-tier of the wine industry is in for a long, transitory period marked not just by price sensitivity, but also a shift in what we value as important from a wine outlier—an expensive bottle, not a “value” wine.
No longer can wineries shellac a varnished patina of “luxury” with a back-story on a tasting room, bottle and web site. More important will be a takeaway that resonates in a world more complex than keeping up with the Joneses, many of whom showed themselves as ill-advised credit-spending fools with trophy wines, and cellars that feel as outdated today as disco, big hair and grunge music.
May 5 2010
The wine book that’s been written thousands of times, the one with the beginner information, the one that will teach you all you need to know about wine without being a snob, is quickly becoming a dinosaur, lazily grazing on grass as a meteor hurtles toward imparting imminent doom.
And, in my opinion, the reason these types of books are becoming dinosaurs has more to do with the nature of community than it does the relative value of these books.
Yesterday I had a lot of driving time, a lot of highway in front of me, and time to think – about wine, the online wine scene and other diversions.
One of the things I thought about was the book agent who approached me last year and wanted to do a genre-busting wine book, something she didn’t have an idea for, but knew there was an opportunity.
At the time, in a sort of performance anxiety meets flaccid economy and an “I can’t afford another distraction,” scenario, I didn’t have an idea either.
I do now, and apropos to what could easily be the title of the book of my life (not the title of the wine book) it would be called, “A Day Late and a Dollar Short.”
Increasingly, our online activity is moving away from being the third dimension of our life (with work and personal) and becoming an omnipresent blanket that wraps our physical reality.
In doing so, knowledge of a particular subject becomes less important than context to a situation.
In what is currently a normal circumstance, people seek out wine information for individual knowledge. However, increasingly, in a community model, people seek out information for context and subtext in order to understand the lay of the land.
It’s the difference between wanting to understand a subject and wanting to understand a situation.
Think about it like a new job.
When you start a new job there are the functions of your responsibilities that you need to learn and know. That’s knowledge of a subject. And, while very important, what is frequently even more important than the knowledge of your job (the subject) is the context and dynamics to the job: who is who, what is what, politics, cliques, short-term history – basically all of the good stuff that doesn’t necessarily help you do your job better, but definitely helps you navigate the landscape and become a part of the community that is your company culture. Do this successfully, along with good work and that’s how you get ahead, or at least feel fulfilled.
Since 2005, related to online wine writing, there’s been an online wine circuit. When there’s a circuit, there’s a scene. When there’s a scene, there’s a community. And, when you have a community, you have something interesting.
When something is interesting, people want to be a part of it, a partial explanation for the continued explosion in new people continually joining in on what’s happening in the online wine scene.
Yet, in doing so, it’s also forbidding. How do you ingratiate yourself in a community, how do you understand the issues, the topics, the people?
Again, it’s the difference between wanting to understand a subject (wine) and wanting to understand a situation (online wine scene).
Enter a need for a new type of wine information.
It’s my firm belief that instead of the warmed over trope in book form giving the same advice about how to select wine in a restaurant, a new model will emerge that will provide context to the wine business and scene so people feel more comfortable joining the community.
Example A: Lettie Teague wrote a recent piece for the Wall Street Journal about Cameron Hughes. I immediately know that while she is a gifted wine writer, she isn’t a part of the online wine community. At all. A community, that I believe, is now becoming an enveloping blanket, again, in which in situ wine context is more important than wine knowledge.
How do I know she isn’t a part of the online wine community? She wrote a profile on Cameron Hughes in which she acknowledged that she wasn’t aware of the business or the wine just a couple of months ago.
How is it possible that the former writer for Food & Wine and current writer for the Wall Street Journal hasn’t heard about Cameron Hughes wine?
Cameron Hughes started his business selling to the largest wine retailer in the country (Costco) and has been something of an internet darling for several years. Their list of media placements both off and online is significant and lengthy. In addition to this, Cameron Hughes also helps a wine newcomer understand the negociant model of wine.
I would dare suggest that if anybody serious about wine isn’t in tune with CellarTracker, Crushpad and Cameron Hughes then they aren’t trying and are missing some significant developments in the wine world, more important than teasing out the varietal characteristics of Carmenere. Blithely unawares in a community setting is more egregious then lack of knowledge of first growths in France.
How Lettie Teague, seemingly a writer that is paid to be versed in trends in wine, could not know of Cameron Hughes is ponderous to me, but endemic of the need for a new type of understanding.
Understanding the dirt in Alsace is great, but credibility is likewise mired in the dirt absent a broader understanding.
In the future, primary wine knowledge won’t be centered on food and wine pairings, or which glass to use for which wine, it will be based on understanding the issues and dynamics that is happening in the wine scene. Issues like natural wine versus wine technology, wine points, negociant models, mainstream media versus online media, high alcohol in wine, the difference between a boutique producer and a large producer, issues of the three-tier system and dozens of others topics that provide color commentary to what’s in the glass, creating a sense of understanding and belonging.
It’s these issues, once understood, that will give a budding wine enthusiast a comfort-level in engaging around these topics online, further perpetuating their interest in and knowledge of the wine world.
In sum, the what’s what, and who’s who is quickly going to outpace the whys and wherefores. In wine, if knowledge is everything and content is king, context is going to make a move to ascending to the throne.
May 3 2010
In a speech last fall at a gathering of online wine writers, Editor Jim Gordon from Wines & Vines magazine encouraged those in the audience to dig deep into expanding their viti and vinicultural knowledge. Only when understanding how grapes are grown in the vineyard and turned into wine in the winery would a writer have enough breadth of knowledge to render valid context and criticism of a wine, went his line of thinking.
It’s good advice for all wine writers as well as experienced enthusiasts that make up what the industry call, “Core” wine drinkers. And, of course, industry trade magazines like Wines & Vines and Wine Business Monthly along with any number of other educational supplements are valuable tools for understanding the production side of the business in order to accrue enough knowledge for what can sometimes by murky territory.
Elsewhere, and in a separate rejoinder, writer Matt Kramer calls for a heightened level of transparency about the making of a given wine in the current issue of Wine Spectator – things like acidifying, watering back, de-alcoholization and the use of additives like Mega Purple (Kramer did not specify Mega Purple by name) that can enhance mouth feel, color and taste.
Kramer’s piece wasn’t a call-to-arms as much as it was a call to lay down the arms, or indicate weapons of choice.
What’s unfortunate however in these twin calls to understand and to explain is the manifest reality that in the business of making wine there’s a certain level of forthrightness from winemakers that may never come.
Simply, the stakes are too high.
The dollars involved are too high not to use the technological advances that are available, and the stakes are too high around the romance of wine from the consumer side to talk about how the wine is made, lest the imperfection of reality manifest itself like a slovenly and sullen cast member at the Magic Kingdom.
Coming back full circle to Gordon’s statement, one thing I would encourage anybody with more than a passing interest in wine to do is begin to monitor the oak alternative companies. Not necessarily in a “watchdog” way, but definitely in a “trying to understand” way. It’s less shrouded in mystery and slightly more interesting than understanding a winemaker’s preferred choice of yeast.
A read through of the current issues of Wines & Vines and Wine Business Monthly, both focused on oak, indicates that a significant amount of innovation is happening in this niche of the industry and, secondarily, one of the significant hard costs for a winery is the acquisition of barrels – French, American or other. Thus, the use of oak alternatives is rising.
I read one futures prediction recently that indicated that in the not-too-distant future any wine under $15 would use an oak alternative.
An example of the innovation in oak is a recent ad for StaVin in Wine Business Monthly (bolded emphasis is mine). The copy in the ad says:
“Two years ago, we told the world we could replicate the flavors of a French oak barrel by alternative means. Experts balked, then proved our point in blind tastings, actually choosing our flavors over those of prestigious French barrels. We didn’t stop there. Today we’re offering the tools to recreate flavor profiles of a whole range of different barrels. Whether they come from France or Kentucky, Hungary or Spain. Never before have winemakers had such a wide array of flavor controls at their command.”
In the visual for the ad (which is far more interesting than the copy), the photography indicates something of a board of dials for different flavors. Represented in that ad, either by design, or lack of thought, are flavors for grapefruit, lemon, pear, violet, raspberry, blackberry, plum and many other components typically associated with grapes.
Oak doesn’t impart an apple or peach nuance? Or does it?
With the growing divide in between natural wines and wines of construction (using technological advances) there is much more left unsaid then is said. It’s the iceberg theory in action – 20% seen, 80% unseen.
Shrouded in mystery, the winemaker’s art won’t always tell us how a wine is constructed, but by following areas of the industry, like the barrel companies and oak alternatives, we’ll all start to have a better understanding of what goes into wine. Your meaty Syrah with notes of bacon? Comes from the grape, right? Yeah, it might have come from a tea bag of oak dust tuned to deliver that flavor.
May 1 2010
For the intellectually curious, far along the curve of consumer wine enthusiasm, beyond the run-of-the-mill kibitzing about varietals, regions and appellations, an investigation into vineyard sources and, notably, the different styles of wine that can come from the same place happens.
It’s a wonky conversation for sure, but also integral to teasing out the nuances of understanding the New World terroir vs. winemaking debate.
Indeed, wine is made in the vineyard, but like a chef working with the best raw ingredients, a deft touch in the process is significant, as well.
In January, Wines & Vines magazine (a must read companion to Wine Business Monthly for anybody interested in a fuller, 360 degree understanding of U.S. wine), had an interesting feature on the different expressions of Pinot Noir from Julia’s Vineyard (south of Paso Robles in the Santa Maria Valley) and its “Artisan Vineyard” program.
Started in the mid-1990’s, the idea behind the artisan program was to provide grapes to small vintners so long as they used the fruit as a vineyard designate bottling. It was a win-win. The Julia’s Vineyard owners (the inimitable Jess Jackson and wife Barbara Banke), received slow burn branding for their vineyard and the small vintners received guaranteed and consistent access to high-quality fruit. And, of course, a natural by-product of sourcing to small vintners from the same vineyard was/is an examination of the influence that winemaking style can have on the end wine.
The Wines & Vines article noticed significant stylistic differences in between Pinots produced by Lane Tanner, Cambria and Foxen. Terroir apologists might not want to hear that it’s not just the fabric that makes the fashion; it’s the designer, as well—each winemaker providing their own recipe for a high-quality, low-production product. Brix level at harvest, grape handling, yeast type and use of oak all play a significant part in the style of wine that ultimately goes into the bottle, after starting with good source material.
In the same vein as Wines & Vines, I took a look at Bacigalupi Vineyard in the Russian River Valley in Sonoma County.
Some in the Russian River Valley have taken to calling Westside Road, an area noted for being a viticultural slice of nirvana, the “Miracle Mile.” It’s a stretch of winding road running a meandering parallel to the Russian River. The vineyards along that stretch of road turn out some of the finest Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Zinfandel in the country.
With history dating to 1954, Bacigalupi Vineyard has long been a source of grapes to third-party vintners including Chateau Montelena and the Chardonnay grapes that went into the 1976 Judgment of Paris winner.
Flash forward to modern day and second-generation Vineyard Manager John Bacigalupi tends over 150 acres of vines at the eponymous vineyard including Petite Sirah, Chardonnay and more notably, Zinfandel and Pinot Noir.
Grapes from Bacigalupi Vineyard go to Rudd, Williams Selyem and a cadre of small vintners as well – up and coming names like Chronicle, Gracianna and the Bacigalupi’s own label, John Tyler wines. Each have a Bacigalupi Vineyard designate bottling.
I tasted through several Zins and Pinots sourced from Bacigalupi and the results were interesting – widely varying styles, all high-quality, and each enjoyable – an underlying quality from the viticulture, all marked by the signature of the respective winemaker.
2006 Chronicle Russian River Valley Bacigalupi Vineyard Zinfandel
ABV: 14.5%
SRP: $36
Production: 165 cases
Tasting Note: Lighter-styled, and translucent garnet in the glass. This wine forsakes the syrup that marks so much Zinfandel these days. A fruit forward, balanced, and restrained expression of Zinfandel – what I like to call a “Nü California” style – good with food, good alone. Notes of blackberry, raspberry, vanilla, with a hint of tar on the edges and an underlying earthy, nuttiness. Palate offers an extra dimension with spice, herbal notes and a streaky cranberry. Finishes complex with black olive juice, cola, spice and touches of leather.
I’m of the notion that Zinfandel isn’t capable of much beyond the “very good,” never breaking through to exceptional. This one pushes that edge. 93/100
2007 Gracianna Russian River Valley Bacigalupi Vineyard Zinfandel
ABV: 14.4%
SRP: $42
Production: 52 cases
Tasting Note: Candied nose of blackberry with vanilla, cola syrup, wet stone and a briary component. Palate offers blackberry and a beguiling minerality, but lacks significant stuffing. Overall style is feminine and approachable; the kind of glass you want to have after dinner as the conversation continues with good friends. The 5% Petite Sirah was an inspiration as a blending component, adds rich depth. 89/90
2007 Gracianna Russian River Valley Bacigalupi Vineyard Pinot Noir
ABV: 14.3%
SRP: $48
Production: 58 cases
Tasting Note: Brick tinted garnet in the glass and made in a vexing style that needs some time to open up in the glass, yet is extremely soft. Bright, pure strawberry juice, cherry, plum and cotton candy on the nose. Palate is soft, round and rich with strawberry and cherry with added complexity from notes of violet, mushroom and a hint of orange peel on the edges. Finishes long, and balanced.
This wine is like Target store designed products – a cut above in quality; trustworthy, well-designed, and accessible. Winemaker Trini Amador is cutting his own style. 91/100
2006 John Tyler Russian River Valley Bacigalupi Vineyard Pinot Noir
ABV: 14.7
SRP: $42
Production: 589 cases
Tasting Note: Brick tinted cranberry. Nose is reasonably muted, but offers a delicious and complex stew of macerated strawberry, cherry, blackberry, and earthy spice, with beet juice on the edges. Palate offers more earthy complexity, cola, spice, cranberry on the edges and a healthy dollop of oak. Typical to many Pinot’s, this is a brooding, complex mysterious wine. On the one hand it lacks a third dimension that would truly separate it as exceptional. However, it is, unmistakably, a food wine, that would allow an entrée to fill in that 3rd dimension into a harmonious whole. Finishes with a touch of heat. I wish I had a second bottle and roasted lamb with rosemary, perhaps the biggest and most positive endorsement I can make for it. 89/100
Note: Lady Bug photo credit: John Tyler Wines
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