Dr Vino's wine blog

…The biggest collector in Asia is probably Hong Kong’s financial secretary, Henry Tang. His personal cellar is reputed to stand at around 12,000 blue chip cases, which he keeps in Hong Kong, the UK and the US. The wine and cigar merchant Thomas Bohrer once described Tang as being “in a category all by himself. He doesn’t have to visit chateaux or go to wine merchants. They come to him.”

Tang may be able to have merchants come to him personally, but the top French houses are making more visits to Asia in general. In a fascinating story in the Financial Times “How to Spend It” magazine (love that name), John Stimpfig reveals these factoids about the Asian market for wine:

* Asia’s wine consumption is expected to grow at twice the world average for the next two years with sales rising to $5 billion. China alone is expected to rise to $1.76 billion.

* French wines have a 40 percent market share. (Funny, I would have thought that it would be more, but then again, the Chinese have been getting a lot of wine from Australia)

* Exclusive wine clubs are all the rage in Hong Kong and Singapore. Ditto for wine dinners, wine schools, and wine magazines.

* There’s a new wine museum outside Beijing.

* Japan has 200 wineries and several thousand accredited sommeliers.

* South Korea has increased wine consumption 150 percent over the past five years.

* The 96-page wine list at Robuchon a Galera at the Lisboa Hotel & Casino in Macau has verticals of top names such as Latour, Yquem and “more ’61 Palmer than possibly anywhere else in the world.” (Indeed, representatives from Palmer went to the Hotel for a recorking of the 1961 wines on the premises.)

But why are so many Asian wine drinkers/collectors driven to the top wines? Serena Sutcliffe offers two explanations. The first is that “they tend to stick to brands they can pronounce.” Um, OK. So all the first growths of Bordeaux are easier to pronounce than the unclassed chateaus?

“The second is to do with the time-honored custom of ‘face.’ This means that if they serve anything other than one of the world’s greatest bottles, their guest will not be honored and might be offended.”

Wow, “face” sounds like a concept that all luxury goods producers might want to try to implement on a broader scale!

Check it out:
http://www.ft.com/howtospendit

tags: wine | wine collecting | wine in Asia | hedonistic fruit bombs

If you can’t buy wine in your local supermarket, do you think you should be allowed? Massachusetts residents will be asked essentially that question on a statewide ballot initiative this November. If I were a resident of the Commonwealth, I would vote yes.

As crazy as it may sound to residents of California, Illinois or Florida, many states in the northeast still have laws that prohibit the sale of wine in supermarkets. Wine and spirits must be sold at spearate (but equal?) stores. Chains are prohibited in New York where licensees can only have one license in the entire state. Massachusetts is somewhat better with a maximum of three locations per licensee.

Here’s why I would vote yes on “question 1” on November 7:

1. Convenience. If you are going to have wine with dinner, you can’t get more convenient than buying wine where you are also buying the ingredients for dinner.

2. Price. The prices of high volume wines would come down. The Massachusetts Food Association, a trade group that is pushing the initiative, estimates that the reform would save wine consumers between $26 – $36 million. While it’s hard to say exactly how much it would save, it’s easy to tell which wines would benefit. If a consumer wants a branded commodity wine, then they should be able to get that at rock bottom prices. The large purchases of supermarkets and big box retailers would give them the clout to deliver those low prices.

3. End the stigma of wine as “different.” Wine has made significant inroads into American life in the past decade. For that to continue, it has to be easy to buy and at a good price. Selling wine next to cheese and not in a different store will continue this positive trend.

4. The big retailers will have increased clout in the market to offset the clout that the distributors crurrently wield.

5. Sales to minors will not increase as a group against the initiative suggests. It’s funny to see shopkeepers using this rhetoric since it is usually employed by the distributors. Many supermarket chains require any alcohol purchase to be done with an ID. Some even enter the ID number into the computer system.

6. Lest you think I am being too cruel on the “mom and pop” package stores, it will actually improve the small shops that survive. Instead of selling branded commodity wines with thin margins, they will be able to move more upmarket and sell premium wines with fatter margins. They will be forced to provide a better selection, better service, and better wine events than the supermarkets. And that will be a boon for the both the curious and the enthusiast wine drinker.

* * * * *

Question 1: Sale of Wine by Food Stores
This proposed law would allow local licensing authorities to issue licenses for food stores to sell wine. The proposed law defines a ““food store” as a retail vendor, such as a grocery store, supermarket, shop, club, outlet, or warehouse-type seller, that sells food to consumers to be eaten elsewhere (which must include meat, poultry, dairy products, eggs, fresh fruit and produce, and other specified items), and that may sell other items usually found in grocery stores. Holders of licenses to sell wine at food stores could sell wine either on its own or together with any other items they sell.

Related:
Study hits wine sales ‘monopoly’ [Boston Globe]
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I spoke with a cult producer last week who told me that he will release a new wine this fall: a blend of merlot and grenache. Unusual, eh? But thinking about it, the smooth of merlot blended with the sweet of grenache and I’m surprised there isn’t more of this already.

More details in the new wine to follow. But in the meantime, which two regions will the grapes come from? Post your guess in the comments below. The winner will get a link back to his or her blog/site or, if blogless, some form of glorious mention here that trumpets their wine savvy.

UPDATE 9/7: Thanks to all for guessing in the comments and to Whit for guessing the hardest. The answer lies here with Jean-Luc Thunevin of Valandraud.

tags: wine | wine blends

“France is the crossroads of Europe.” This used to be a common refrain in France before Europe shifted east. Nonetheless, the Medoc might become a pit stop between Paris and Madrid.

The Ministry of Transportation in conjunction with the regional planning authority wants to build a new road axis running from Spain to Northern Europe. Three of the five proposals in the Bordeaux region would run over or around Margaux and other growing areas of Bordeaux. They would connect to a new bridge spanning the Gironde estuary.

Since planning for the new highway is still in the early stages, the growers syndicate of Margaux has put up an online petition to collect signatures against the proposal. I was signature 5,414.

Although prime vineyards can survive when surrounded by the city, as a satellite image of Chateau Haut Brion in Pessac-Leognan shows, and Bordeaux has a surplus of wine anyway, I signed for two reasons. First, why there? These vineyards are an international treasure and if it’s possible to re-route the autoroute, so much the better.

Second, making information available on the internet in France has been excruciatingly slow. In fact the wine trade in general has confronted the internet with unease and confusion. This sort of activism is a perfect fit to harness the power of the internet. I applaud that effort.

If you want to sign, click here
See the regional authority’s site for the proposal
And a close-up of proposed routes in Margaux (pdf)

tags: wine | Bordeaux | development | internet activism

June 6, 2006

Bordeaux exports are rallying and distillation should be liberalized the executive director of CIVB, the Bordeaux wine trade group said today.

Commenting by phone from his office in Bordeaux, Roland Feredj spoke of an about-face for Bordeaux wine exports. “I just attended a meeting of our economic committee and some of the leading Bordeaux exporters said that exports have been strong for the past six to eight months,” he said.

Recent accounts from France have focused on the crisis among wine makers so this is surprising news that must come as a relief in the region.

The statistics confirm the trend with all exports of Bordeaux wine up eight percent in volume over the last six months. Exports to the United States were up 21 percent, Canada 20 percent, and Hong Kong 15 percent.

Prices have gone down while the quality of the 2005 vintage is up, two factors that have spurred demand. Feredj also pointed to the return to popularity of “traditional” wines in important markets such as the UK. “We were in fashion and then out of fashion. Now people are rediscovering our wines,” he said.

The market for Bordeaux wine falls into three categories: the grands crus, where demand regularly outstrips supply; the middle tier, which has seen the reversal in exports; and bulk wine sold in huge containers.

On the market for bulk wine, Feredj agreed with the direction of European Union reform proposals.

Where supply outstrips demand, a surplus popularly known as a wine lake, producers are eligible to receive “crisis distillation” funds from the European Union that the member states can match. The wine is then distilled into a fuel additive or industrial alcohol.

Mariann Fischer Boel, EU Agriculture Commissioner, floated the idea of removing EU subsidies for distillation at a meeting of EU farm ministers last month as part of a “bold reform.” Her proposals will be formally announced on June 22. Bulk wine producers in France and Italy are bracing for potentially tough new reforms from the European Union regarding distillation. But not Feredj.

“Rather than pay for distillation, offer a premium for ripping up vines,” Feredj said. “If a winemaker takes a premium for ripping up vines and then can’t sell his wine–too bad. You have to make people responsible. On an open and liberal market, you need to find your niche in the market.”

The current EU premium for uprooting vines is €6,300 per hectare (2.47 acres). The current distillation premium from the European Union is 3.35 euros per degree of alcohol per 100 liters. About 1.8 million liters of wine was distilled in Bordeaux last year.

-Tyler Colman

“Whitehead would market his red strangler by taking it and a dozen bikini-clad women to clubs via his band’s tour bus.” Sure wine needs marketing but would this be a winning approach? Michael Whitehead, rocker, hopes his approach will get him cast in the new PBS reality wine show set to start filming this September in Paso Robles. [Bloomberg]

The Economist discovers the joys of Walla Walla wines: “Yet they are also elegant; unlike California’s wines, they do not overwhelm. Mr [Serge] Laville smiles. ‘“We all try to put the French touch in our wine,’” he says, ‘but not too much! Because we make wine for the American market.’ [Economist]

Helicoptere volant? Randall Grahm scopes out vineyard land from above–in England! [Decanter]

“No bottle of wine is worth more than $10, in my opinion.” Which California wine maker said this–and more!–at a press conference last week? Click to find out [SF Gate]

Georgian wine banned in Russia–except in the Kremlin cafeteria! [Daily Telegraph; background]

Hungarian monkeys drink almost 14 gallons of red wine a year–more than the per capita consumption rate in the US! Heck, it rivals France! I’ll have to add that to my cross-national tables…[CNN]

Moore Brothers opens in New York City! My full report soon…33 East 20th Street near Gramercy Park. See it on the nyc wine shop map.

tags: wine | wine news | monkeys

George Bush will take a 13 hour plane trip to New Delhi today to spend three days in the world’s largest democracy. If the Teetotaler-in-Chief stopped to look at the Indian wine industry, what would he find?

Most importantly, that the industry has friends in high places. The Minister of Agriculture, Sharad Pawar (photo right), is a grape grower who even has a the Sharad seedless grape named after him. He is a champion of the view that wine is a drink of moderation and recently tried to get wine classified as food and be as easy to sell as soft drinks. His efforts were rebuffed. However, his home state of Maharashtra has doubled tariffs on imported wine (states with the ability to add tariffs!), making local grape sources more attractive and more difficult for wineries to pass off Chilean wine as their own.

Viv Menon recently won a Geoffrey Roberts Award to travel to India to examine the wine industry. In his comments on jancisrobinson.com, Menon calls Grover‘s wines “quite incredible.” Michel Rolland is a consultant. Indage has opened a wine bar on the premises with no beer or spirits available and she is surprised to find some people there have traveled over an hour for a glass of wine. He describes Sula as “the slickest of all in terms of marketing” and that they have good viticultural practices to boot. The most promising sign for consumers he writes is that the Oberoi hotel in New Delhi now has an enoteca.

While wine gets frequent mention in the Bible promoters of wine in India can find support even in the Bhagwat Gita: “Yea! those who learn The threefold Vedas, who drink the Soma-wine, Purge sins, pay sacrifice — from Me they earn Passage to Swarga.”

tags: wine | India | Indian wine | Sharad Pawar

Shipping wine to Florida has been classified as a felony (yes, really). But that is about to change. On Thursday, the second largest wine market in the country opened up for wine shipments directly from wineries. As Florida cracks open, the biggest wine distributor, Southern Wine and Spirits, announced their entry into Mississippi, another protected market since the state prohibits direct shipping. (Thanks, Jon)

Arizona might be the next state to open up.

Constellation Brands, the biggest wine producer with brands such as Woodbridge and Almaden, has issued stock options amounting to 2% of shares outstanding–and simultaneously announced a share buyback of $100 million. Cui bono?

Diageo’s profits were up 21% in the last quarter as beer sales growth outstripped wine in North America–while the Irish are drinking less Guinness.

To sell more French wine, maybe shops need to play more accordion music?

tags: wine | wine news