July 10 2007
God is in the details
I read the July issue of Decanter magazine on my plane trip out to Napa for some work this week. In a curious choice, perhaps inspired even, based on the U.K./Int’l focus of the magazine, is the selection of Al Gore at #48 on the Decanter Top 50 Power List. Undoubtedly, without Linda Murphy’s influence, Gore would have never been chosen. The magazine cites Gore’s influence in bringing global warming to the table as a topic of discussion and its long-term impact on the wine industry. Decanter says,
We were tempted to include God as the arbiter of global warming, but man is responsible for much of the climate change now affecting the world’s winemakers. No winery is immune from its effect, though they can temper it. Even so, the long-term impact will be substantial, meaning the likes of Gore, whose Democrat party may well be back in power in 2008, will need to continue to drive home the message in order for action to be taken. His book,An Inconvenient Truth, has replaced the bible in one Napa Valley hotel-room bedside table, so maybe we were right saying God’s influence is on the wane.
Actually, the hotel that I stay at, Gaia, an eco-hotel that attained LEED certification, is the hotel in question, because I’ve had a copy of An Inconvenient Truth in my hotel room before. Not every room, but several. It’s also incorrect that there’s no bible in the room--a trusty copy of the expected Gideon bible is resident in the nightstand. Interestingly enough, though, in my room this stay the bible is nestled next to a copy of The Teaching of Buddha. I’m not sure where the Dalai Lama comes down on wine within global warming, but Buddha might have it right when he says on page 42 of my handy copy that,
Blossoms come about because of a series of conditions that lead up to their blossoming. Leaves are blown away because a series of conditions lead up to it. Blossoms do not appear independently, nor does a leaf fall of itself, out of its season. So everything has its coming forth and passing away; nothing can be independent without change.
It is the everlasting and unchanging rule of this world that everything is created by a series of causes and conditions and everything disappears by the same rule; everything changes, nothing remains constant.
Rośe: One Notch Up, One Notch Down
Every summer I try iced tea. Every year I come away disappointed that I’m just not a tea guy. But, it seems like I’m on the outside looking in because everybody else drinks iced tea in the summer. I can’t even be cool and order an “Arnold Palmer” when out to lunch. It’s still too tea-y for me.
I’m kind of the same way with Rośe. Man, I’m trying. Everybody is drinking the pink this summer. Rośe wine is, without question, hot. I’ve tried a Syrah Rose, a Merlot Rose and Pinot Rose. I’m just not into it. I hear people say how great it is, what a nice deck wine it is, how it’s a great summer sipper. Maybe I’m not trying the right stuff, but to me it’s a notch less sweet than White Zin with a notch more acid. I’m not a White Zin guy, and sadly, I’m not a Rośe guy, either.
For my money, I’m on the next trend in town, Lambrusco and Moscato d’Asti. If I’m looking for a summer sipper when the thermometer breaks 90 degrees, I’m pulling the cork on a nice demi-sec Lambrusco or Moscato and I think Dr. Vino is with me.
But, in regards to Rose, maybe I’m simply not drinking the right wine. Somebody help give me a pointer to a decent bottle or three that has wide availability (i.e. available in Indianapolis).
The culture of snippetry
If you haven’t taken the current survey at Fermentation, head on over and spend the two minutes it takes to complete. Personally, I’m curious to see the results. Tom is asking a number of questions around the meaning of wine blogs, and it drives at questions of reading habits as well as how readers use the information, touching on blogger wine reviews and more. As an adjunct to this survey, Tom also has a post about the “culture of snippetry” a term he uses to refer to skimming content, the act of reading offline and online content (like blogs) by headline and glance. Here’s where I’m fearful for the results because while most bloggers blog technically correct, for a culture of snippetry, I’ve stuck to the columnist model, in long form, with a beginning, a middle and an end, and occasionally a point. What do you think—short form or long form in blogs—newsy analysis or pot-stirring opinion?
To me, this is a most important question because while our print media articles are getting shorter and shorter, our televised news is moving towards more contextual backstory. Blogging sits somewhere in the middle of this. If you made it to the end of this post (all 860 + words of it) Leave a comment here or at Tom’s post with your thoughts on information consumption.
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February 15 2007
Friday evening is your last chance to vote for the American Wine Blog Awards. If you haven’t done so already, I encourage you to vote here.
And, some other errata and miscellaneous from the week so far … I wrote a post on the Inertia Beverage Group blog yesterday … you can check it out here. Normally I wouldn’t write about the professional blog here on my site, but I wrote about Spot Runner, an Internet advertising agency that lets virtually anybody buy inexpensive ad space in television markets nationally. Quickly, you realize that Stormhoek with their quirky YouTube videos and Gary Vay-Ner-Chuk at Winelibrary.tv could be in a living room near you before too long. Frankly, I think it would be pretty cool. They could cozy up to Jennifer The Watson’s Spa Girl and Don from Don’s Gun’s for local Indianapolis infamy.
I decided to take the bait with the press release/email I received yesterday. QPRwines renamed themselves The WineBlueBook. According to the release,
“WineBlueBook’s new name (formerly QPRwines) plays off the “blue book” metaphor and works with the company’s strategy to best serve wine consumers with an easy to read guide to purchasing wines and understanding scores versus price. Neil Monnens adds, “blue books are one step research books for most industries – why shouldn’t a crowded market like wine not have its own resource.”
Hmm … I don’t have enough information to pass sound judgment on this one, but my instincts tell me that forsaking the unique equity built up with QPR and trading that for “Blue Book” which is associated most predominantly with used cars is not a good branding decision. I’m sending Neil an email to see if I can find out … check out the new site here.
At Winecast.net, Tim posted the round-up from Wine Blogging Wednesday (WBW) on Monday. A lot of wine and food bloggers are taking part in this fun little monthly exercise in group wine drinking and blogging. Dare I say a critical mass has been met. Rumor has it that Lenn is developing some organization around the event. ’07 could see WBW graduate to high school.
Over at Pinotblogger.com, Josh recounts the first part of what will be two parts in how he met his wife, Candace. It doesn’t get much better than combining the words “diddling” and “banging” within two sentences of each other within the context of talking about a reality television show on MTV. Nice.
Speaking of banging, or diddling, or something like that ... the Winespectator.com site, unfortunately the password protected portion, has a blurb about Dr. Ruth Westheimer doing an appearance at Bottlerocket Wine & Spirit in New York to promote the recently published 3rd Edition of her book Sex for Dummies. In the short article blurb she says,
“Well, I do tell people, especially in today’s world where everybody has a hectic schedule, if you’re going to have a romantic encounter, make sure you drink a glass of red wine, or maybe two, but not more!” said Westheimer. “Men, if they drink too much, will fall asleep, or not be able to function, and women might say things that they’ll regret.”
My wife is Dr. Ruth’s editor for the aforementioned Sex for Dummies. And, yes, it’s true--it’s as fun of a job as it sounds. Dr. Ruth, according to my wife, is a peach of a lady, too. As soon as somebody in the marketing department at Wiley Publishing can get their act together, I’ll post a link for the Sex for Dummies podcast that hostess, Lindsay Lefevere, conducted with Dr. Ruth, too.
For Valentine’s Day Lindsay and I agreed that we wouldn’t do any gifts or even spend money on a card, we would simply go out to a very nice dinner.
I was excited to go to one of the best restaurants in the city, a place that won Wine Spectator Awards of Excellence five years in a row ’01 – ’05 and best restaurant of the year, critic’s choice by Indianapolis Monthly in 2005. We decided to not go to our favorite restaurant and try something new.
Not necessarily a mistake, but the restaurant didn’t live up to the hype. The prices on the web site were a little off from the prices on the Valentine’s dinner menu, wringing a couple of extra bucks out of patrons here and there including on my appetizer and my entrée. Our service was casual, casual to an extent that you don’t expect to experience while enjoying fine dining. No 2nd tier of support for our waiter who had casualness you would expect at a chain restaurant. I half expected him to crouch down with suspender buttons twinkling and ask what he could get for us. The ’03 Patz & Hall Pinot Noir I ordered was in fact a ’05, delicious just the same and to top it all of they had a mandatory 18% gratuity included on the bill—for a two person party. I know a lot of people that don’t go out on New Year’s and Valentine’s Day because it is amateur hour, but a mandatory included gratuity for a two person party is an insult. It’s even more ridiculous that I didn’t get a choice on the gratuity as they hit me full-on for the wine, too. I don’t mind tipping for wine service, but unfortunately I didn’t get wine service. I got a bottle opened for me and that’s about it. It’s too bad for the waiter because I usually tip 20% because the math is easier, especially after drinking 2/3’s of a bottle in an hour or so.
Despite some of the shortcomings, the Patz & Hall wine made it worthwhile—an absolute beauty of a wine to complement the beauty of my wife and best friend, Lindsay! Despite Dr. Ruth’s warnings, though, I did have more than two glasses.
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February 13 2007
A couple of quick notes … voting is still taking place on the American Wine Blog Awards—you can cast your vote in the democratic process at the following link. Voting takes place through Friday.
No politicking by yours truly, but I do encourage you to spend some time on a couple of the categories to potentially look at some sites that may be out of your reading or listening or watching “jetstream.” There is some good work—aside from the winery blog category that I mentioned in an earlier post, another stacked category is the “Best Wine Podcast or Video Blog.”
My frequent collaborator, one of the most technically astute wine bloggers that I know of, Tim at Winecast.net, should receive an emeritus award even if he didn’t make the final nominations. And, the other contenders are all exceptionally strong, as well. Winelibrary.tv is an Internet juggernaut that will be hard to beat, but I’m looking forward to seeing the final results.
Another blog, nominated in the best winery category, Stormhoek, has a really fun post that can be found here. A pack of baboons had to be shooed out of the Chenin Blanc vineyard after they were found enjoying breakfast. Classic. What a great little snippet. I’m guessing that no wine lover that has picked up a South African Pinotage recently (including me) gave a moments notice to baboons being an indigenous animal to the terrain.
Elsewhere, Tyler Colman, better known to online wine denizens as Dr. Vino, references the friendly wager that he and I made over the Super Bowl on his site. Living in Indianapolis with the victorious Colts is sweet indeed—as will the bottle of Tulocay Zinfandel that I’ll pick up as a part of the win. As a courtesy to his good nature, I did return the favor and send him two relatively inexpensive, found only in Indiana wines. A Shiraz/Cab blend and a quirky semi-sweet white made from a vitis aestivalis grape called Norton. I have a hunch that these are not going to tickle his palate and invite intrigue with the skill of Indiana winemakers—but, hopefully, they can act as a through the week quaff and as a novelty.
Finally, in wacky medical research, researchers have found a potential link to smell and a shortened life. Those that are sniffing their way through increased wine drinking to get the resveratrol might be doing more harm than good. From this news account based on this research news release:
Studies in worms, flies, mice and monkeys have shown that aging can be slowed by cutting way back on calories consumed.
But is it food itself that shortens life? Or might it be the mere perception of food—the biochemical stimulation that occurs when food odors tickle olfactory nerves?
Scott Pletcher, a geneticist at the Huffington Center on Aging at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, knew that the mere scent of food could block some of the life-extending effects of caloric restriction in tiny, soil-dwelling worms. So he and his colleagues conducted similar tests in flies.
Sure enough, when calorie-restricted flies—which tend to live about 50 percent longer than normal—were housed in containers with the smell of fresh yeast (a favorite food of flies) wafting in, the life-extending benefits of their diet were reduced by about 20 percent.
Hmmm … I wonder if the dieting masses, eating sensibly, but not forsaking their scent laden wine knew that their lifespan could be shorter as a result? I’m not exactly calorie restricted, but I’ll take my chances …
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December 28 2006
You never know who you’ll bump into on the Internet.
A couple of weeks ago I was on the forum at the Wine Lovers Page (.com) and responded to several posts from a guy named Bob Ross and another gentleman named Thomas Pellechia.
Thomas Pellechia? Where have I heard that name? Then I looked to my right, adjacent to my desk, on the floor in a neat pile and saw the book that I had set aside to review over the holidays—Wine: The 8,000 Year-Old Story of the Wine Trade “>Wine: The 8,000 Year-Old Story of the Wine Trade by Thomas Pellechia.
Pellechia and I have since communicated via email and he demonstrates a tremendous understanding of the wine world based on his experience in every link of the value chain.
More notable than that brief aside is his newly launched blog called VinoFictions, launched this month.
Thomas strikes me as the kind of guy that calls a spade a spade and his mission statement backs up the intention of his blog:
Our Mission Statement: to bring truth to wine.
You know the game called telephone: a comment starts at one end of a group and is whispered to members of the group, one person at a time. By the time it makes it to the last person in the group, the comment bears little resemblance to the original. A lot of information about wine is passed along like this. Plus, a lot of marketing manipulation is passed along as information.
The aim of this blog is to set the record straight.
I have little doubt that Thomas will set the record straight. And, if he doesn’t, perhaps his compadre, Bob Ross, will. Bob is going to contribute to the blog in the form of a peer review, like academics that vet each others work. This is Siskel and Ebert approach, I suspect, is a good blog idea whose time has come.
I’m going to like reading Thomas as he’s already taking people to task …
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Over at Winecast.net, Tim is taking the lead as organizer for the Wine 2.0 movement—which is sorely necessary. I’m not sure I would want to call the online movement in the wine community Wine 2.0 because that begs to become passé, but the rush of new businesses online cannot be confused with anything but opportunity. I firmly believe that wine on the Internet today is the equivalent of books on the Internet in 1996. Green pastures and blue skies in terms of online sales, but who will become the Amazon?
Though I attended the Wine 2.0 event in San Francisco in November, that event struck me as not being nearly geeky enough to be interesting. While Tim isn’t a geek, he does bring the right mix of skills to being an online ringleader—notably he’s a marketer with technical chops—two characteristics that are sometimes in conflict with each other.
Tim has written a Wine 2.0 “Mini Manifesto” after taking his inspirational cue from Hugh at Gapingvoid.com. Hugh’s blog, while not in my everyday reading line-up, dances on the edge of being brilliant. In my book, “genius” is reserved for a very select group of people—Frank Sinatra, and Michael Jordan come to mind. The next notch down is being regarded as “brilliant” and Hugh continues to write stuff that gives me pause.
Since it’s the holiday season, I am reminded that I once asked for and received a book by Matt Drudge of the Drudge Report, so I should more carefully choose my words about relative brilliance, but live by the sword, die by the sword, I guess.
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Speaking of choosing our words carefully, I have openly fawned about Don Sebastiani and Sons—their wines are good values at their price point and their marketing is clever, but no longer do I take in everything at face value.
There’s an article in the December issue of Wine Business Monthly called: The Sebastiani Perspective on Global Sourcing that floats out a couple of dunder head quotes. The one that gets me is a quote attributed to August, the youngest son of Don. He says, in response to the question of “How are Young People Different Today?”
“A lot of it started with Two Buck Chuck. Instead of going down with $20 and picking up a 12-pack of beer, my college friends were buying a 12-pack of wine instead. Then you get out of college, get a job, have a little more money, and figure, if I spend $4 or $5 on a bottle of wine instead of $2, look at how much better the wine is. That was the evolution within my circle of friends. I spoiled them plenty, and would go home for weekends and bring stuff back. But I really think Two-Buck Chuck is to thank for a lot of it.”
Out of the mouths of babes … way too simple to say that Two-Buck Chuck started the tsunami of wine consumption amongst Generation Y. Having a Trader Joe’s in his college town may be his reality, but that’s just simply not so for the rest of the country. Atlanta, GA just got their first T-J’s this year. It may play like that in the Pac 10, but I guarantee you it doesn’t hold water in Big Ten, SEC, ACC, or Big East country.
Equally simple, I think the cocktail culture has as much to do with it—not everybody drinks liquor and if you’re a student and you want something in a glass what else are you going to drink? It’s probably not a beer, more likely a glass of wine and sometimes trends can’t be summed up and defined ... they just happen ... that’s what the Internet is all about anyways ...
One under-reported aspect of Sebastiani’ future plans, despite the article’s headline in Wine Business Monthly, is the fact that they are joining Alice White wines in turning to global sourcing; that may turn out to be more nefarious than a naïve answer in response to how people in their twenties are approaching wine.
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I ran across a new music-oriented service that could have cross-over business model implications for small wineries.
With viral markets, the wisdom of crowds and other user-owned models, Sellaband.com is brokering the opportunity for fans to pay a $10 ante and buy a share in an unsigned band. When a band signs up 5000 fans and has $50,000 they record a CD which every shareholder receives for free. Additional profits can be paid out to the fan base via album sales, ad revenue, et al
The wine industry has cooperative arrangements with a bunch of winemakers as in the A-Z Wineworks in Oregon, but I don’t think there’s truly a concept where the winery is owned by the people. It might be an interesting concept. I’m good for $100.
Part III of News, Notes and Dusty Bottle Items coming in the next day or so …
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December 27 2006
There ought to be a law … one of the “rip and read” style wire stories that got a lot of mention during the holiday newspaper dead period of the past week was a “mocktail” for wine called “Cranbernet Sauvignon”
Cute name. Your eye almost misses the change in the name and it’s not a typo.
This non-alcoholic drink is a recipe from a forthcoming book called, Sober Celebrations by Liz Scott.
I’m reprinting the recipe here for curiosity sake and you can find the wire blurb/recipe here. If anybody tries it, please let me know if it’s worth a darn … I’m down with a nice balsamic on my salad, drizzled over fresh fruit even, but I’m not so sure about it being combined in a drink …
1 cup black currant juice or nectar
½ cup unsweetened pure cranberry juice
½ cup no-sugar-added red grape juice
½ cup plain seltzer
1 ½ tablespoons balsamic vinegar, preferably a lighter, non-syrupy variety
Combine the ingredients in a glass pitcher and let stand for 15 minutes at room temperature. Divide between two 10- or 12-ounce wineglasses and serve.
Hmmm … like I said, it won’t be a part of my New Year’s program, but let me know if anybody decides to try it.
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In my estimation, one of the biggest trends in ’07 will be commercial wine preservation systems that take a turn towards the consumer. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire and the increasing growth in consumption and the off-the-charts demonstration of Gen. Y to be red wine drinkers has to be followed, at some point, by the mechanism to sample.
Enomatic is capitalizing on this with tasting bar technology that is in use from California to Florida and places in between. In Indiana, for example, you can sample wine, if you are a restaurant permit holder, many other states have similar laws. So, with a profit opportunity with on premise wines, why not allow folks to try something or a lot of things. Sampling = Selling in many industries, wine included. Ask a tasting room manager. I read an article that once said that tasting rooms have a 95% + close ratio on samplers to purchase. I have to believe that sampling in a restaurant or store increases purchasing quantity on an already captive audience by at least 25%
Players in this space include the aforementioned Enomatic, Cruvinet and Le Verre de Vin. I would expect that Cruvinet and Le Verre de Vin re-position or release more consumer-oriented offerings, as well.
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Speaking of trends, Biodynamic wines continue to be one of the re-current topics of conversation in the industry—some believe in it, many call it complete hocus-pocus magic without scientific benefit. Noted blogger and anonymous wine industry insider, St. Vini, is crystal clear on which side he of the fence he lives. Personally speaking, I am not source credible to have an opinion since I’m far away from viticulture practices, but I’ve made it a goal to have a well-grounded opinion based on research in ‘07.
Usually, though, in these politicized and polarizing debates in between right and wrong emerges a moderate to bridge the divided. With organic wines having their own niche in the market, I’m wondering if Oregon’s LIVE (Low Input Viticulture & Enology) isn’t the moderate that can bridge the seer’s and the naysayer. LIVE acts as sort of a “don’t throw the baby out with the bath water” middle-ground in between bioD and organic and the need to not lose a crop based on dogmatic belief. Their principles seem reasonable and understandable. You can find their site here.
LIVE program objectives for a sustainable viticulture
• To see the vineyard as a whole system
• To create and maintain a high level quality fruit production
• To implement practices that reduce reliance on synthetic chemicals and fertilizers with the goal of protecting the farmer, the environment, and communities at large
• To encourage responsible stewardship of the land, maintain natural fertility and ecosystem stability
• To promote sustainable farming practices that maintain biological diversity in the whole farm
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At Good Grape, we occasionally post excerpts from public domain related wine books—in particular, a book from wines’ founding father in the U.S.—John James Dufour, who grew and bottled the first successful vintages from a U.S. winery around 1807 in Vevay, Indiana. The book is called The American Vine-Dresser’s Guide and I excerpt from it because it’s notable for its historical implications for any wine enthusiast.
I’ve often thought, as I frustratingly try and track down an out of print book that is usually very expensive, that doing a small, custom wine-related book publishing house publishing just books that are in the public domain would be an interesting and meritorious project.
It still might be, but as a lover of books I get mad at scurrilous and overly opportunistic profit whores on the Internet. There’s a special place in hell reserved for spammers, cyber-squatters and e-book publishers.
Now, Business 2.0, a tech-savvy business magazine, reports in the December issue that some guys are taking public domain books (generally speaking, books published before 1923), having them digitized, updating the content to be more contemporary and are then selling them online in specialized niches. The article (not yet online) reports that “gentleman” who updated a 1925 book called Closing the Sale by J.C. Aspley into an updated niche title for real estate agents is making close to $25K a month. The site provided in the Business 2.0 article now forwards to a web site with a domain of, http://www.stealingthelegalway.com which promises to teach you how to steal as well.
I hate this. I hate this. I hate this. Amway salespeople are virtuous and bright by comparison.
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Back in September, I wrote a post about fantasy football and its application towards the world of wine (Post can be found here). Wine enthusiasts could draft cult bottlings or first growths by varietal and then duke it out for points and wins based on roving tastings with consumers. It’s a simple enough idea and would be easy to monetize.
Lest you think this is a crazy idea, be warned that this concept is now up and running for movies. Launched in October, Fantasymoguls.com lets players assemble a roster of films and play based on box office dollar take, weeks in the Top 5, reviews, per screen dollars and other metrics.
Man, with people signing up for affinity cellar/wine recommendation sites, you would think something like this for wine might be a hit …
News, Notes & Dusty Bottle Items Pt. II coming up next ... all the quick hitters that are worth an opinion ...
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