Cork or screwcap? Synthetic or crown cap? While many producers decide to make the switch based on how it will affect the wine in the bottle, one Bordeaux producer is asking their customers what they want.
Strange as it may seem to some traditional producers, wine is ultimately about the consumer and Gavin Quinney at Chateau Bauduc seems to have cottoned on to that. Involve your customers in a major decision and it can only serve to make them more loyal to the brand.
I received an email from Gavin asking me to vote on corks vs screwcaps for their whites, reds and roses. On Baudoc’s blog,
they’ve put the main arguments up for and against both closure types so those who are not au fait with the geeky closures debate can make an informed decision.
I placed my vote, saying screwcaps for whites and rose and, corks for reds if they’re going to be laid down for a while. I admit it’s a little bit hypocritical to put your whites and pinks under one closure and then put your reds under another. It could look like a lack of faith in screwcaps. However, Bordeaux is such a traditional winemaking region, a red under screwcap is still poo-poohed.
It’s important for Bauduc to alter their bottling preparation if they are going to switch from corks to screwcaps to avoid problems of rotten egg/smelly drain syndrome a.k.a reduction. Plus consumers in different markets should be considered. Screwcaps do have a high level of acceptance in the UK but head to the US or Japan and it’s another story. One size does not fit all.
Voting takes place until 24 January and there’s no complicated proportional representation voting system, it’s simply first past the post. Very British.
I’ll keep you updated on the big decision when it’s announced.
I hope you had a good Christmas and new year break tolerating your extended family admirably? There was plenty of food and wine consumed over the festive period and I am now nursing a rather large belly for it.
At the out-laws’ house, I was rifling through the book selection over Christmas, and came across Grumpy Old Wit by Rosemarie Jarski. I’m sure it’s not meant to appeal to the under 30s but I loved it.
However, in the food and drink section, I came across a rather sad but true assessment of wine presenters by British satirist Victor Lewis-Smith.
He said: ‘I recently disovered the appropriate work for the modern brand of telly wine bores. You know, the ones who insist on telling us that “I can smell wet nappies in there and burned toast and newly mown grass and creosote and Sunday newspapers.” What better name for such a pretentious group of plonk experts than plonkers?’
Harsh but fair. Are we really this boring and out of touch with the common man? Er, yes. I guess the old cat’s pee on a gooseberry bush is a load of bollocks to most normal people. And tasting notes on twitter…please can you save me from them? There is one individual who shall remain nameless that tastes wine regularly for a New Zealand retailer and I have had to unfollow them for their boastful, boring tasting notes. Who wants to read them? Certainly not the consumer. And this is the problem…social media has opened great opportunities for the wine world but it has also uncovered yet more of Lewis-Smith’s plonkers.
John Buchanan, who founded Mt Riley in 1992, has some great stories of his life in the wine industry, many of which I have promised not to put into print. In his early days, he worked at London wine merchant Rutherford, Osborne, Perkins before it was sold to Martini Rossi in the 1960’s. At that time Serena Sutcliffe MW, the head of Sotheby’s wine department was the company’s typist. How she has climbed up the ranks…
At that time Louis Roederer was the company’s house wine and cost £3 a bottle on account. “It was an everyday plonk,” he says.
Since his days of drinking cheap Roederer, he has held a number of roles in the industry including CFO at Corbans.
Now 18 years-old, Mt Riley has 103 hectares under vine and exports 70% of its production. Buchanan’s mother was a Marlborough girl so he does have family connections to the region unlike many newcomers. However, this has its drawbacks. She was one of nine and ‘all of the relatives came out of the woodwork’ when they heard there was wine up for grabs.
His daughter, Amy, heads up marketing and her now-husband, Matt Murphy, is the winemaker. And he’s foolishly agreed to do a Christmas Unfiltered. Thanks for being a good sport, Matt…
Winefuture 2009 - where were the future wine leaders?
Winefuture moves to Hong Kong in November 2011
I sincerely hope the second edition of this conference is better than the first, as I would have been seriously pissed off if I had spent more than 700 euro on a ticket to Winefuture in Rioja.
I also hope that the conference addresses the future rather than having allowing speakers to unabashedly promote their company – Xavier Pages, CEO at Codorniu told us about his grandfather and the history of the company for the first ten minutes before he actually got to something interesting. And while I like Stephen Spurrier his speech on the future of wine writing was a Decanter advertorial. Nevertheless he has been invited to speak again.
Similarly Mel Dick of Southern Wine and Spirits stood up and told us about a wine event in Florida experiencing great weather. Strike me down, he’s been invited back to speak too.
If Winefuture is to be a success this time, it must run on time, those speaking should have their speeches checked before they start doing a personal PR campaign, there should be some speakers who represent the future of the wine industry, and wi-fi access must be available. It’s not much to ask. Let’s hope they can get it right second time around.
Drinker of the world unite! We are on the eve of a rosé revolution. As you can see, I have started early.
Ok, it just so happens I’m writing a piece for this week’s Herald on Sunday on rosé but I’m all for becoming a member of the pink proletariat, rising up against the red classes.
The rosé effort has been half-hearted for far too long. Many producers only started making pink as a by-product in a bid to make their reds more concentrated. By ‘bleeding off’ a proportion of the juice from the tank, this leaves a greater proportion of skins to juice. As skins are responsible for the colour and tannin, this meant great tannin and colour of the juice remaining in tank. The stuff that is bled off, ends up fermenting without any skins and thus remains pale.
Producers in Provence are a little more passionate about their pink growing grapes and vinifying them specifically for rosé. In fact, 80% of production in Provence is rosé and their pinks are the envy of the world.
There are already more than 800 people signed up to the revolution’s facebook page. There are ‘meet-ups’ planned from Adelaide to Santiago. The live tweet up takes place tomorrow at 1900 AEST – so if you’re in the UK it’ll be an early start on the bottle. If you want to join in the pink uprising, go to the Rose Wine Revolution site
I’m still not sure about these tweet-ups: people drinking wine and then discussing their tasting on the live-feed doesn’t excite me, perhaps because I find reading tasting notes as interesting as watching paint dry. However, getting people to think about rosé, attend a rosé event and view it as a category in its own right can only be a good thing. Producers should also take full opportunity to use it to raise the profile of their rosés, particularly with summer coming. So well done to Leanne de Bortoli and Steve Webber of De Bortoli wines for standing up for the pink proletariat. We have nothing to lose but our chains…or should that be livers?
