Winebits 682: Big Wine, wine writing, on-line wine

This week’s wine news: The Winestream Media discovers Big Wine, plus a wine writer discovers conflicts of interest and wine drinkers grapple with on-line shopping

• Big Wine, indeed: This post did not come from the Wine Curmudgeon or one of the few independent voices in wine writing who pays attention to these things. Rather, this harsh look at Big Wine came from the trade site for the Wine Enthusiast, one of the gatekeepers of traditional wine writing. It laments the “corporatization” of the U.S. wine business and even uses the M word – monopoly. This news is not new, of course, and regular visitors here have been reading it for years. But that we’re seeing it on a site that is one of the pillars of the current system may speak to a growing sense of unease with the status quo. And a note to the writer: E&J Gallo accounts for almost one out of every four bottles of wine made in the U.S., which should have been at the top of your story.

• Conflicts of interest: Spanish wine writer Miguel Hudin asks the “massive” question that we don’t ask enough in this business: “How objective can you actually be when you’ve been flown somewhere and put up on someone else’s dime who is expecting coverage which should in theory be positive coverage?” His descriptions of the way the wine writing world works these days is past depressing, including the admonition he got for complaining about food he paid for. It’s good to see the subject brought up by someone who isn’t a cranky ex-newspaperman, and that Hudin understands the uphill road he travels in writing about this: “Oh Miquel, relax and enjoy the freebies! You’re being too critical and difficult!” No, Miquel, you’re not.

• Going on-line: We’ve had several mentions on the blog recently of wine drinkers’ reluctance to shop on-line. But, apparently, the wine drinking demographic isn’t worried about buying other stuff over the Internet, reports the Washington Post: “… one of the most significant and unexpected shifts, experts say, was the almost immediate embrace of online shopping by people in their 60s, 70s and 80s.” Which, of course, is the same age group that still dominates U.S. wine purchases. The next question: How soon until this group feel as comfortable buying wine over the Internet as it does toilet paper?