You can live in your basement if you want — we’re drinking $500 wine.
The blog’s eighth annual do-it-yourself wine review — because, premiumization. Do we need any other reason?
The Wine Curmudgeon has been tasting roses costing $20 and up this year — not necessarily because I want to, but because more marketers than ever want to send me $20 rose samples. Which leads to the first question: Don’t they know who I am?
Which leads to the second question: Is it any wonder I worry about the future of the wine business?
So, for the eighth annual do-it-yourself wine review, four reviews for wine that costs much more than it’s worth, the kind of wine that only a winery CFO and its marketing team could love. (As always, thanks to Al Yellon, since I stole the idea from him all those years ago.)
Again this year, you’ll need to go to the old website to enjoy the post, since Substack doesn’t allow the necessary coding. So follow this link, and then click the drop-down menu and choose your favorite line.
“I’m not sure how I’m supposed to pass out on a bottle of wine a month, either.”
This week’s wine news: World wine consumption statistics, plus the New Yorker offers wine buying tips, and a 50th anniversary celebration for some of California’s top wineries
• Not nearly as much: The Europeans still drink the most wine in the world, per capita, but their consumption has declined dramatically, reports Decanter. In France, In France, consumption has fallen by about half, per capita, in the last 50 years, as it has in Italy. The Portuguese are the biggest wine drinkers in the world, with about 69 bottles a year per person. Per capita consumption in the U.S. remains a little more than one bottle a month, though we’re still the biggest wine drinking country in the world by total volume. Neo-Prohibitionists: Explain how we’re all getting drunk every night on a bottle of wine a month, would you?
• Gen Z, baby! Nate Odenkirk, writing in The New Yorker, has figured out wine buying, an offers this advice: “What font do you see? Helvetica? Loopy cursive? Tasteful balloon letters? Yes, please! The wine inside may be aged, but the label screams Gen Z.” His take – which includes three other tips — is appropriately humorous and and playful, as we would expect from the magazine that published James Thurber and S. J. Perelman. “Farewell, My Lovely Appetizer,” anyone?
• Happy birthday: Dave McIntyre, writing in the Washington Post, demonstrates why he is one of the top writers in country with this take on the 50th anniversary of some of California’s most important wineries. They include Caymus, Silver Oak, Dry Creek, and Smith-Madoren. Dave tells the story with perspective and intelligence, never once lapsing into winespeak. Perhaps most importantly, he writes for an audience that may be interested in wine, but doesn’t want to geek out over it. Would that more U.S. wine writing did that.
First, there’s the tremendous look — the long hair, shades, and dark outfit. Then, there’s the swirling, followed by splashing wine on the face. Finally, that wonderful glance at the bottle at the end of the video.
Frankly, I wish I had thought of it. Can you see the WC, hat on head, rain fogging up glasses, doing the same thing?
“My aunt shared an article on Facebook about wine, so you know it’s legit”
The WC, in his never ending quest to bring young people to wine, has explored back alleys, ventured to three continents, slithered through the Internet, and even looked on YouTube. That’s where I found this, from CollegeHumor.
Yes, it ends predictably, but what comes before says everything that needs to be said. I can’t decide if my favorite part is “aerating the wine,” where the wine ends up spilled on the table, or the faux tasting notes, which had to be borrowed from various Winestream Media reviews. Or, of course, the spit bucket.
The funny thing about this “Schitt’s Creek” parody is not so much that it’s funny, but that it makes fun of almost every stupid wine ad ever
At first glance, this “Schitt’s Creek” wine commercial parody is funny because it’s “Schitt’s Creek” and it features the great Catherine O’Hara. But watch it again (and maybe again), and you’ll see there’s a lot more going on:
• It’s for fruit wine. Which, given the status fruit wine has in the wine world, is a joke unto itself.
• “In the lee of a picturesque ridge, lies a small, unpretentious winery.” Which, of course, is snotty and pretentious and speaks to almost every bad wine ad the blog has ever dissected.
• An almost dazzling amount of wine geek slang silliness. Some is obvious, “the muskmelon goodness of his oaked chardonnay” and calling a wine a riesling Rioja, which is actually impossible. And some is very geeky, like the term “good fruit.” I can’t tell you how many times I’ve tasted wine, nodded, and used the phrase — and I know better. So you can imagine how common it must be.
“Maybe wine wouldn’t be so bougie if more people listened to the WC.”
The Wine Curmudgeon’s ninth annual Do-it-yourself New Year’s wine resolutions. Welcome to 2022, wine drinkers!
Just click on the drop-down menus and select your wine resolutions for the new year. And, as always, thanks to Al Yellon, since I stole the idea from him — and he has never once complained.
“Sure, you can drop my wine — and then you can distribute even more wine that tastes exactly alike, sweet and smoooth. It might make you even richer, which is all you apparently care about.”
In which the WC parodies yet another Christmas classic – because who else who writes about wine would do that?
“Now, George, do you really want to jump?”
George Bailey, standing on the edge of the bridge, looked next to him. A small, bald man was sitting on the bridge railing. He ignored the man, moved to climb on to the railing.
“Now, George. …”
George stopped, turned. “Who are you?” he asked.
“I’m your guardian angel.”
“And I need one because?
“Because you’re going to jump – because you don’t think there’s any reason to keep going. Three of your distributors are going to drop you. Your sales manager is quitting. And it doesn’t seem like anyone wants to buy your quality, inexpensive wine.”
“I don’t know about the guardian angel thing, but you’re right about the rest. I’d be better off jumping. Then my wife can sell the winery and the vineyards, cash in on the value of the land, and everyone will be better off.”
“Your wife? The one who looks like Donna Reed?”
“Terrific. I have a guardian angel with a sense of humor.”
“I have more than that, George. I can make you see what the world would have been like without you.”
“What do you mean?” asked George, and then he didn’t remember anything else.
•
“This is my winery. Or it should be my winery. Why does it look so strange?”
“Because, George, you were never born. So this can’t be your winery.”
They were standing outside a building that looked like it should be on the cover of Architectural Digest – all glass and ceilings and reflections.
A young man, who looked like he lived in a building that should be on the cover of Architectural Digest, walked up to them. “Can I help you?”
“Yes,” said George. “This is my winery. I need to get in it. I have a Zoom sales meeting.”
The young man looked at him. “Your winery? I think not. This is Mt. Holy, a subscription-only winery where we only make reds, each scores 100 points, and none cost less than $150 a bottle. And, since we only make 35 cases a year, we’d certainly never let anyone like you buy one.”
“But this is my winery. I own this land. My kids’ stuffed animals are in my office.”
The angel took his arm, led him off. “It can’t be your winery, George. You were never born.”
•
They were standing outside what looked like a wine shop. “I know this place,” said George. “It’s the terrific little store in the Bay Area, the one owned by the smart, funny guy who has always, always liked my wines.”
“Look again, George.”
He did, and then wished he hadn’t. The store was called TotAlcBevCostKrogTarg, and there wasn’t an employee in sight – just rows and rows and rows of rows of merchandise, each row looking exactly the same.
“Where’s my wine?” said George. “I need to find my wine.” He ran to the front of the store, practically tackled someone who seemed to be an employee.
“Where’s my wine?” He was close to screaming.
“Wine? Who buys wine anymore?” said the employee. “Now, if you want to buy hard seltzer or craft beer or canned cocktails or strawberry gin or kombucha, we’ve got that. I think the wine is in the back of the store, aisle 176.”
“No, no, no,” said George. “It can’t be. …”
The angel took his arm, led him off. “It can be, George. You were never born.”
•
“What am I going to do?” said George. He was near tears.
“Just realize that jumping wasn’t going to solve anything.”
“You’re right, you’re right,” said George, and then he wasn’t on the bridge. He was in his office in the winery, stuffed animals exactly where they should be. The angel was gone.
His sales manager walked into the room. “I’ve changed my mind, George,” she said. “I don’t want to quit after all. I’d rather work for you. What’s the point of flogging wine where the only selling point is that it’s smoooth?”
“Thank you, thank you,” said George. “But what are going to do about the distributors dropping us?”
“You know, that’s a funny thing,” said the sales manager. “Did you see this, written by that guy with the beard and glasses, the one who wears the hats?”
She handed him her phone. It was a glowing review of the winery’s $12 red blend: “Just the kind of wine California needs to make more of … highly recommended … certain to enter the Hall of Fame next year … candidate for Cheap Wine of the Year.”
“And I always thought he was weird,” said George.
“I think I can use this review to find new distributors, ones who will give us a better shake than the old ones did,” said the sales manager. “We’ve at least got a shot now, which we didn’t have much of before.”
“You’re right,” said George. “I wonder how that little guy on the bridge knew that.”
And then George thought he heard a screwcap untwist and someone pour a glass of wine. “Of course I knew that, George. That’s what guardian angels are for.”
