Comments on: Bringing closure? A screwcap-cork showdown

By: Fabius

Fabius — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 15:22:53 +0000

Hi,
This is a very complex and interestng topic - both for the consumer and the producer of wine. (I am both!)
For me, the technical aspects of the type of closure (cork, plastic or screwtop) are not that important to me. Number one is the quality of the wine. Number two is the presentation / experience / cultural dimension of drinking a bottle of wine. ie if you just want to get blotto then ‘cheap and convenient’ is the way to go for you. But if you like to appreciate wine with good food or as an apperitivo or just drinking and enjoying it for its own sake, then a proper cork is obvoiusly part of the routine.
I’ve read widely conflicting data on the % of cork taint in the wine industry, and the only thing I can rely on is my own experience: I’m 45 years old, have been drinking wine for 20 years (as a discriminating wine-loving adult) and since I was about 7 casually at the table. And the number of corked wines that I’ve experienced in that time I can count on the fingers of one hand!
I think the whole closure debate is really about economics and profitability, because they are so CHEAP compared to the price of a natural cork. All the technical debate is really froth and marketing.
The world of wine is immense and wide-ranging and all types of people drink diffent types of wine on different occasions and circumstances. I think that screwtops will be associated with cheap and nasty wine while natural corks will be used for quality wines. Plastic tops are somewhere inbetween as usually you cant see the cork when you buy a bottle of wine as its covered by the capsule. Personally, I am always disappointed when I uncover a plastic cork and will try to remember not to buy that wine again.
I always use natural corks for the wines that I produce even if they are more expensive for me.
This debate has been going on for years, and it’s really started to bore me, … perhaps I’m just getting cynical in my old age! … but I really believe it’s just a cost issue for wineries, and all the technical blah blah blah is just a justification for a nice cost-cutting excercise.

By: larry schaffer

larry schaffer — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 05:16:16 +0000

I can understand why people might want to hold on to the ‘traditions’ of cork, but I cannot understand how consumers can live with the variability that is inherent with the closure, in addition to potential TCA effects . . . Just don’t get it. Oh well . . .

By: Teresa

Teresa — Mon, 31 Dec 2007 05:23:33 +0000

I think wine should have a real cork. I think people like the tradition. Part of enjoying the wine is opening the bottle.
I do think screwcaps should stay on beer bottles.

By: George Vare

George Vare — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 23:20:55 +0000

My concern about corks is that the TCA compound is often present in subliminal levels, so that the consumer is not aware that the wine is “corked” but finds the wine lacking in freshness, fruit and, otherwise, unpleasant, or not up to expectations.
I would use screw caps in a second, because I only make white wines that I want fresh. Also I produce a variety that few people in the US know about (Ribolla Gialla) and I do not want TCA to make a poor impression for this new wine or me being a new producer.
Unfortunately for me, I only use 500 ML and 1.5 L bottle sizes where the selection of bottles for screw tops is extremely limited. As a result I use the synthetic Nomacork (my tests indicate it is the best coming out of the bottle) with good results so far.

By: Paul Sharp

Paul Sharp — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 00:11:33 +0000

The one thing the consumer needs to come back too, is the wines quality, not all the gimmickry and marketing. The closure is irrelevant as is the color of the label. If you start with a poor quality and faulty wine a screw top is not going to improve it. A lot of the debate seems to be from the stand point that all wines are good before they are bottled. It’s a nice idea but it’s not correct. If a wine smells and tastes terrible you should take it back regardless of how they closed the bottle. I want to see good quality, interesting wines, I don’t really care how they are closed.

On the subject of reduction. This is a really tricky issue thats not necsercerily connected to the screw tops but can be exacerbated by the reduced oxygen transfer rate, although new waddings are seeking to improve this. Also wine makers need to make slight adjustments in their procedures when changing from cork to screw top as the wine will mature in a different environment. Cork closed wine can suffer the same problem but at very low levels of reduction it is very hard to detect and only mutes the aromas.

The bottom line is that if the wine is rubbish, take it back and demand a refund. It helps lend weight to your argument if you don’t drink the whole bottle!

By: Dr Vino’s wine blog » Blog Archive » Reduce, reuse…recork?

Dr Vino’s wine blog » Blog Archive » Reduce, reuse…recork? — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 16:15:36 +0000

[...] screwcap posting from a couple of days ago generated an interesting discussion on The Consumerist about the pros and [...]

By: Dr. Vino

Dr. Vino — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 12:04:47 +0000

Mike -

I personally am not a fan of the plastic corks (or corq as one company calls it). They have SO much elasticity that the grip firmly on to the corkscrew and can be hard to remove!

There may be some period of acclimatization to screwcaps. But with so many more wineries bottling en screw, it’s no doubt something we’ll be seeing more of for even finer wines. Btw, this posting got picked up on Consumerist and a wide rage of comments have been posted over there, mostly in favor of screwcaps…

By: Dr. Vino

Dr. Vino — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 12:01:14 +0000

Paul,

True, a screw cap closure could still have TCA if the winery itself were tainted…The scale at Laroche does give him the ability to do both bottlings. It was difficult to find the same wine bottled two different ways!

On that note, a wine geek friend of mine was telling me that in his experience some screwcap wines have to be given a moment after opening for the sulfites to blow off since they would normally diminish gradually with the cork closure.

By: mike

mike — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 01:10:39 +0000

Why not just use a plastic cork? We just enjoyed a marvelous bottle of Layer Cake Shiraz that was a screw cap. Although it was a truly deep and delicate wine, I still couldn’t get over the opening process. I felt as if I was opening a bottle of soda. A $20 bottle of soda. I would assume that the plastic cork that many are using these days solves both problems, preserving the wine and keeping with traditional opening methods (as silly as that sounds).

By: Chateau Scroutop FTW « asocial studies

Chateau Scroutop FTW « asocial studies — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 19:02:08 +0000

[...] 27 Mar 2007 Chateau Scroutop FTW Posted by asocialstudies under Uncategorized http://drvino.com/2007/03/26/bringing-closure-a-screwcap-cork-showdown/ [...]

By: The wacky world of wines « The Gleaners

The wacky world of wines « The Gleaners — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 18:57:58 +0000

[...] comes news of another taste test (presumably blind), this time comparing wines bottled with screwcaps and those with cork. Since [...]

By: Screw-Caps Better Than Corks for Wine at Dethroner

Screw-Caps Better Than Corks for Wine at Dethroner — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 15:04:26 +0000

[...] Bringing closure? A screwcap-cork showdown [DrVino.com] [...]

By: Paul Sharp

Paul Sharp — Mon, 26 Mar 2007 21:05:43 +0000

The only trouble I find is that there seems to be a perception in some quarters that screw tops will make a wine better somehow. Screw tops will remove the possibility of the closure tainting the wine with TCA (which is great). There still remains the possibility that the wine has been tainted in production although this is very rare.
What a screw top won’t do is turn a low quality wine producer into a great one. Consumers need to separate the marketing from the actual advantages that screw tops offer.
I think Laroche’s approach is a healthy way to deal with what can be a difficult issue for wine producers. Their scale does give them this option, which would be more difficult for a small boutique producer to implement.