“The Swirled Cup” Takes Flight! Nota Bene July 2026

July 28, 2026 By in Nota Bene, popular culture, wine 2 Comments

Nota Bene is a periodic Wine Economist column that briefly highlights stories that might otherwise escape attention.

The Swirled Cup Takes to the Air

If you are flying on Delta Airlines now through September, check your seatback entertainment system for three episodes of The Swirled Cup, Andrea Robinson’s documentary series about the rise of wine in the last half century and the people who made it happen. The series was inspired by the 50th anniversary of the Judgement of Paris, but the stories it tells go far beyond that storied event. Click here to view the series trailer.

Andrea writes that

After several years of filming in vineyards, wineries, kitchens, restaurants, and wine regions around the world, I’m so excited to have the first 3 episodes in the in-flight entertainment/DeltaSync system. The series celebrates wine, food, farming, travel, cultural connection, and, especially, the people who give them meaning. In that vein, you’ll see central voices like Danny Meyer, Kevin Zraly, Bobby Stuckey MS, Piero Antinori, and Laura Catena (to name a few!), as well as the architects of the globally transformative Judgment of Paris tasting in their own words from my one-on-one interviews, top culinarians, and many in the industry’s next generations as well.

I’m incredibly grateful that Delta believed these stories deserved a place among the journeys they help people make every day. If you are flying Delta between now and September (thank you!), I’d love for you to search for The Swirled Cup and see the episodes.

Sue and I plan to tune into The Swirled Cup on our next flight. In the meantime we are watching the trailer and imagining where Andrea’s journey will take us next! Andrea Robinson is a wonderful storyteller and the positive story of wine needs telling. Now more than ever.

Did Wine Win the World Cup?

Let’s start with a question. How did Team Wine do at the recent World Cup? Were we even in the game? It depends on how you look at the situation.

Wine-producing countries did very well, as usual. In fact, they dominated the competition.

Spain versus Argentina was an all-wine final match. France and England played for third place in a sparkling (wine) shootout. Wine won the World Cup big time if you look at it this way.

But was the wine industry able to exploit the opportunities that the World Cup created to sell more glasses and bottles or to make strong impressions on global consumers?

The World Cup is a marketing competition as much as a soccer tournament. We all know about the great success of Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing. The producers had a plan and executed perfectly, gaining worldwide attention for their product and apparently creating a headache for TSA as international visitors stuffed their bags with ranch dressing. Gooooooooooooooooal for Hidden Valley Ranch!

Beer had a good World Cup, we are told, at least in some locations. Stories are told about loyal fans of the team from Scotland who drank all the beer in Boston and maybe a bit more.

How did wine do? Was much of an effort made to exploit the opportunity? The only wine-related story I have seen is about David Beckham. He was caught on camera sipping a very large glass of red wine in his luxury box in Miami. The English press called him out for unsportsmanlike conduct. An English soccer legend shouldn’t drink wine at a game! Only a pint of beer will do.

Not exactly an own goal for wine, I guess, but not exactly a hat trick either.

Over a Barrel?

Fast and furious. That’s how the stream of wine business news has been coming this year. Many folks in the industry feel that they are “over a barrel,” victims of forces beyond their control.

Most of the reporting has understandably been focused on vineyards, wineries, distributors, and retail sales. Still, the impacts of market shifts extend much further, affecting all sorts of related products and services. In assessing the situation, it is important to take into account the whole product web.

Barrels are a good example, as the “2026 Barrel Survey Report” (download pdf here) in the July 2026 issue of Wine Business Monthly makes clear. The barrel industry is obviously affected by recent wine market shifts, but in ways that are conditioned by the particular nature of the product and the industry’s institutional structure. Here are some highlights of the WBM report.

  • Wine production has fallen across world markets and winery margins are increasingly squeezed. It is no surprise, therefore, that demand for wine barrels has decreased and wine producers have sought to reduce costs. The WBM survey shows that 35 percent of responding wineries plan to purchase fewer barrels in 2026 compared with 2025, a substantial increase over the previous two years’ data.
  • Less wine production means less need for barrels. Then there is the issue of shrinking margins. How do producers economize on barrel expense? You might expect a shift to cheaper barrels, use of less new oak, and longer use of existing barrels (keeping them in service for four years instead of three, for example).
  • Using a smaller proportion of new barrels both saves money and is in tune with some style shifts seen in the market. And extending the useful life of barrels is happening, too. Interestingly, a movement to cheaper barrels is not a trend seen in the WBM survey. Reports indicate that many wineries are using less oak, but are careful to maintain the quality they desire.
  • WBM reports that the challenges that barrel producers face are exacerbated by the failure of H&A, an important Bordeaux-based barrel-leasing and financial firm that works with both the wine and spirits industry. H&A would purchase new barrels when clients ordered them, leasing them back to the clients. There was also a buyback program that saw H&A sell used barrels to the spirits industry. H&A had more than one million barrels in its system, according to WBM, with 2000 clients worldwide and $432 million in annual revenue. These are all big numbers.
  • The sudden simultaneous decline in wine, Cognac, and Bourbon markets threw a monkey wrench in the system leading to H&A’s bankruptcy. Now there is great uncertainty about who will receive payments and when.
  • Tariffs and the ongoing tariff refund process have also had an impact on the barrel business. Some international firms with domestic cooperages have moved final production of barrels to the U.S. to reduce vulnerability to future levies and increase ability to adapt to local demand.

See the WBM report for more analysis and survey results. There are always useful and informative articles to be found in Wine Business Monthly. The wine industry is fortunate to be served by this fine publication. Required reading.

Resilience! Changing Times Test Oregon Wine

July 21, 2026 By in Oregon wine, wine, wine markets 2 Comments

“Oregon Wine Industry Shows Signs of Contraction” was the headline that caught my eye on the YourOregonNews.com website. The signs were clear enough and familiar to anyone following the wine industry just about anywhere in the world. The surprise was that it was Oregon.

Oregon has seemed like an unstoppable wine force in recent years. The industry rode the general wine boom starting in the 1970s (when Sue and I made our first visits), and accelerated rapidly in the Sideways era, with its focus on Pinot Noir, Oregon’s signature grape variety.

New wineries opened their doors and new vineyards put down roots. Significantly, wine producers in California, Washington, France, Italy, and elsewhere got into the market. Oregon seemed like the right place at the right time with the right wines. What could go wrong?

Changing Times.

But times have changed and Oregon’s winning streak looks to be over for now. The news article reports that

Oregon’s 2025 winegrape production dropped 25% and acreage harvested dipped 12% from the previous year due to declining sales and exports, particularly to Canada.

Signs of contraction were anticipated as the state adjusted from record years of the early 2020s to more sobering market conditions, according to the 2025 Oregon Vineyard and Winery Census Report.

A survey of winegrape growers found: “About 48% of growers sold grapes below the cost of production, 35% cut yield via farming practice changes and 23% removed vines.”

“Fruit was available and high-quality, but buyers were often hard to find. Growers adapted by selling below costs, cutting yields deliberately, dropping fruit on the ground, and in some cases pulling vines or planning to exit,” stated a report supplement.

Declining U.S. domestic sales and rising production costs were the main source of economic distress, but the collapse of export sales to Canada hit hard, too. Provincial boycotts of U.S. beverage alcohol products caused Canadian exports to fall by 83 percent, according to the report.

No Silver Linings?

“Difficult to find any silver linings in the ‘dark cloud’ news about the Oregon wine industry.” That’s what I wrote when I first posted the news story on social media and the situation sure looks bleak.

Pinot Noir seemed like Oregon’s magic pass for a while, but sales have declined along with almost every other wine category (New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc is the exception). Things are so bad (and wine enthusiast budgets so stretched) that the famous International Pinot Noir Celebration was forced to hit the pause button after a successful 35-year run.

So what’s the story? Wine is a risky business and this is the sort of thing that happens when your luck runs out. That’s true enough, but it isn’t why I’ve brought you here today. I want to talk about something that hasn’t changed with the times: Oregon’s strong resilience.

New Directions

No sense sugar-coating the bad news, but it is fair to draw attention to the many efforts that Oregon wine is making to bounce back. White wine sales are holding up better than purchases of reds, for example, and Oregon is best known for its Pinot Noir. What to do? Well, as we learned a couple of years ago when we met with a group of Willamette Valley winemakers, the resilient pivot is obvious: white Pinot Noir. It was delicious. There’s no reason that “blanc de noir” should only apply to sparkling wine. I’ll bet white Pinot sells very well in tasting rooms.

Speaking of sparkling wine, Oregon produces some great examples. Why not draw attention to these wines now? Well, of course, that’s just what resilient Oregon producers of traditional method sparkling wines are doing, banding together under the “Method Oregon” banner. In fact they are hosting an ambitious Method Oregon Grand Tasting Weekend on July 24-26, 2026. More than 50 wineries are working together to connect with thirsty consumers and promote their wines.

Beyond the ABCs

Chardonnay is another Oregon pivot worth noting. Pinot Gris has long been Oregon’s best-known white wine, not Chardonnay as you might expect. Why? Part of the answer is that Oregon Pinot Gris can be really good. Another answer, a wine critic friend suggests, is that the wrong Chardonnay clones were planted in the early days and it has taken a long time to change the vineyards, the wines, and the reputation.

I think the ABC effect is also important. Oregon’s rise overlapped to some extent with the Anything But Chardonnay reaction to a certain buttery style. Many people (Sue and me included) sort of lost interest in Chardonnay.

The current crisis has motivated Oregon producers to focus more intently on their Chardonnay wines and to confront the ABC curse. Sue and I have enjoyed a number of Willamette Valley Chardonnay wines recently and we can see the appeal. The Seven Soils Chardonnay from Rex Hill, for example, was delightful. Sue said that she would be happy to drink it anytime!

We recently received a sample of the Domaine Roy & Fils Iron Filbert Dundee Hills Chardonnay, which forced us to rethink what we thought we knew about Chardonnay in Oregon. This wine, more than most we have sampled, is about place, in this case the Iron Filbert Vineyard. It is a unique expression. Much to think about here. (Domaine Roy & Fils is now owned by Italy’s Frescobaldi family, who seem determined to advance the winery’s vision of Oregon wine.)

Origins of Resilience

The Iron Filbert Vineyard’s name triggered a memory of Oregon resilience. It is possible to argue that the Oregon wine industry owes its early growth in part to a natural disaster. As Benjamin Lewin MW explains in his 2011 book “In Search of Pinot Noir,” Western Oregon was better known for hazelnuts (filberts) than wine grapes until the famous Columbus Day storm of 1962. The storm tore through the fruit and nut orchards, a disaster for the local industry.

Some of the orchards were brought back into production, but many never recovered because the costs were just too high. Some of these distressed orchards were eventually reborn as the early vineyards on which Oregon’s wine industry was built.

A new industry rose out of the wreckage of the old. Oregon wine, it seems is resilient from the ground up.

Simply Irresistable? Sicilia DOC Wines

July 14, 2026 By in Italian wine, wine, wine markets Leave a comment

Sicily isn’t Italy (you can ask anyone), and Sicilian wine isn’t Italian wine either.

Many Sicilian producers have embraced the Sicilia DOC designation as a simple but effective identity. It’s the kind of idea that other wine regions might consider in today’s crowded marketplace. Here is our report.

Einstein’s Law

Everything should be as simple as possible, Albert Einstein said. But no simpler.

I think Einstein was talking about scientific theories, of course, but the idea applies to wine, too. If you make wine too complicated, it is hard to understand (and harder to sell). But make it too simple and it really isn’t wine anymore. It’s just … what? Alcohol, I guess.

I see Einstein’s Law everywhere in wine these days. On one hand, some wine brands push simplification to the point where it is hard to know what’s in the bottle, where it came from, or even who made it. Consumers buy the brand as much as the wine (maybe more).

On the other hand, many wine regions work to needlessly complicate life. Regional indicators (AVAs in the United States, appellations in Europe) are a sort of collective brand that gives the producers in a region an identity. The problem is that, once an AVA brand is established, we often see pressure for sub-AVAs that might benefit particular producers and sub-regions, but risk undermining the whole by diluting the regional brand.

I authored a tongue-in-cheek “Modest Proposal” for U.S. AVA reform a few years ago, but I don’t think anyone got the message. But some regions in Italy have been working to find the right balance between complication and simplicity. Both the Abruzzo DOC (2010)and Sicilia DOC (2011) appellations were established in an attempt to strengthen the broad regional brand, to simplify choice for consumers without going too far.

Simply Sicilia DOC

It is not easy to get producers to invest in a broad regional designation (Sicilia DOC)  when they see their particular interest more closely tied to their own sub-regional brand (Etna DOC, for example). And of course getting consensus on technical and financial issues is harder the larger the group involved.

Maybe this is why the Sicilia DOC took a while to gather speed. My 1999 copy of a Touring Club of Italy wine guide notes that, after several years of negotiation, the much-anticipated Sicilia DOC designation was just about ready. The 2004 edition of the same guide said the same thing. The DOC finally appeared in 2011 and is now an important force.

Sicilia DOC has ridden the ups and downs of the wine market in general, of course, but it benefits now from Sicily’s rising profile, which has spawned a couple of interesting initiatives. Taormina, Sicily, is the recent home of The White Lotus television series, creating what is called The White Lotus Effect for Sicilian wine. Sicilia DOC has worked to take advantage of this association, which has drawn both international visitors and international interest more generally.

Sicily has also benefitted from the post-COVID international travel boom. As a press release explains:

It’s no secret that Sicily has become the “it” destination for American travelers, but that cultural obsession is now officially moving from the suitcase to the wine cellar.

We’re seeing a fascinating “Souvenir Effect” take hold: as Americans return from the island, they aren’t just looking for “Italian wine,” they are hunting for the specific indigenous grapes they discovered on the coast, like Grillo, Lucido, and Nero d’Avola.

Sicily enjoys an embarrassment of riches in terms of regions, grape varieties, and styles of wine. Some producers focus on a particular region or style, but others draw broadly on the resources available. Donnafugata, for example, offers a range of wines ranging  the rich Ben Ryé dessert wine from the wind-blown island of Pantelleria in the south-east to the complex minerality of Sul Vulcano Bianco from the slopes of Mount Etna in the north-east. Completely different. Totally Sicilian.

T is for Tasca

Sue and I learned a lot about the diversity of Sicilian wine during our recent trip by enjoying Sicilia DOC wines from Tasca d’Almerita.

In Palermo we discovered Tasca d’Almerita Fondazione Whitaker Mozia, which is made from Grillo grapes grown in a historic vineyard on the low-lying island of Mozia near Trapani on the island’s west coast. We later visited Mozia and its salt flats and recognized how much the unique terroir is reflected in the wine.

We enjoyed a completely different Tasca d’Almerita wine over dinner in Catania. Tasca d’Almerita Nozze d’Oro is made from Inzolia and Sauvignon grape varieties and commemorates a special wedding anniversary (like the one Sue and I are celebrating this month). Memorable wines.

Back home in the U.S. we were pleased to see that Tasca d’Almerita wines are available here, imported by Heritage Collection, part of Trinchero Family Estates. We are currently sampling several of them, including Tasca d’Almerita Tenuta Regaleali Regaleali Bianco Sicilia DOC 2023, Tasca d’Almerita Tenuta Regaleali Lamuri Sicilia DOC 2022, and Tasca d’Almerita Tenuta Regaleali Rosso del Conte Sicilia Contea di Sclafani DOC 2018.

The bargain-priced Regaleali Bianco really caught our attention. A blend of native grapes from the west coast of Sicily (plus a little Chardonnay), it is both interesting and delicious. A perfect “souvenir” wine? Of course. Simply irresistable.

Lenz Moser’s Mad Mád Mád Mad Wine World

July 7, 2026 By in Flying Winemakers, wine, wine markets 1 Comment

A winemaker from Austria making white Cabernet Sauvignon wines in China. It seemed like a crazy idea. But, as we reported here in The Wine Economist a couple of months ago, it really worked. Crazy, but true.

World Wine Ambitions

The winemaker is Lenz Moser and his Chateau Changyu Moser XV wines made us believers. We had to find out more.

Moser is the 15th generation of his family (hence Moser XV above) to make wines in Austria, but he obviously has world wine ambitions. He spent a decade working for Robert Mondavi, for example, and brought what he learned home in terms of making wines to appeal to international markets. He identifies as a consumer and seeks to craft wines that people will enjoy.

One problem with the Chateau Changyu Moser wines is that they are not currently available in the U.S. market (it’s complicated, but I assume that U.S.-China trade issues are part of the story). So we have been focusing on Moser wines in U.S. distribution.

Gruner Pastures?

It is not surprising that an Austrian winemaker would make wine from Austria’s signature grape variety: Gruner Veltliner. Less probable, I suppose, is that Moser would seek to reimagine the wine as he has done with his New Chapter wines. New Chapter aims to leapfrog evolution, producing “tomorrow’s Gruner today,” by which I think is meant to make Gruner more consumer-friendly without sacrificing its essence.

I admit that I don’t drink Gruner often enough to evaluate the “to the future … and beyond” claim, but I can verify that the wine quickly disappeared over lunch with our friend Mary. A good start to our investigation.

Mád Mad Moser

Our friends Lisa and John recently returned from a trip to Budapest, so they were logical guests to help us get to know Lenz Moser’s line of Hungarian wines, three variations on Furmint from the Tokaj region. How much more Hungarian can you get?

The wines are called Mad Moser (or sometimes Mád Moser) because they are made in partnership with the Mad Wine company located in the city of Mád. Mád Mad Moser for sure.

The first wine we sampled was a dry Furmint (labeled Mád Moser) made in a modern style (think stainless steel). It was distinctive and made us think a bit about where Furmint fits into the Central European wine matrix that includes Gruner and Riesling along with other white wines.

The second wine (labeled Mad Moser) was also a dry Furmint, but quite different from the first, having spent eight months in Hungarian oak casks and barrels. It was more complex, nuanced, drinkable. And it paired really well with our dinner of orecchiette with speck and peas.

The contrast between the two dry Furmint wines was striking and I’d enjoy repeating the experiment. I wish the wine labels provided more information to help consumers know what to expect (not everyone is going to be able to open the two wines side-by-side like we did). I admit that there was a lot of information on the back label, but it was in such tiny print as to be useless even in bright light (I can’t imagine trying to read it in a dimly lit restaurant). I guess I will have to try to remember how Mád differs from Mad and which one we preferred (Mad, I think).

We finished with an elegant Mad Moser Tokaji Aszu 2013, a real treat. It was well balanced and paired perfectly with Sue’s Sicilian almond cookies. A great way to end the meal. John and Lisa commented that the wine was much drier than they expected (a good feature, they said).

Tokaji was once celebrated as the King of Wines and the Wine of Kings, but it is under-appreciated today. Maybe Lenz Moser is a bit mad to try to draw our attention to it and its dry Furmint cousins, but we hope he succeeds.

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The title of today’s column was inspired by Stanley Kramer’s 1963 film, It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.

Flashback: The Judgment of Paris & the Road Not Taken

June 30, 2026 By in wine history 3 Comments

This is a year of celebrations here in the United States. This week, for example, we mark the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Wine enthusiasts have reason to pop a cork, too, because 2026 is the 50th anniversary of the “Judgment of Paris,” the famous wine tasting that drew global attention to the high quality of California wine.

Have you ever wondered how things would be different today if the Declaration had not been agreed upon back in 1776? How would history have unfolded if Britain’s American colonies didn’t break away?  It’s an interesting question. Counter-factuals like this give us a chance to appreciate how the past has shaped the present and how events today might be transforming the future, too. It’s the Back to the Future effect.

Here is a Wine Economist column from 2022 that tries to imagine the present if the Judgment of Paris didn’t happen (or if it happened and didn’t get much attention, as is often the case with wine tasting events). Something to think about over the Independence Day weekend. Cheers!

P.S. Be sure to click on the video below to see what Napa and its wine industry looked like 50 years ago. Amazing!

The Judgment of Paris and Napa Valley’s Road Not Taken

The Wine Economist / September 13, 2022

A journalist recently asked me to comment on the impact of the famous 1976 “Judgment of Paris” tasting of California and French wines. The California wines were very competitive, according to the scores given by the panel of French judges, and wines from the Napa Valley actually topped both the Cabernet and Chardonnay lists. Amazing.

Time magazine reporter George M. Taber was the only journalist in attendance and his exclusive story about the unexpected American victory was a shot heard round the world. His 2005 book, Judgment of Paris is worth reading and even re-reading today.

What if … ?

Would Napa Valley have grown and developed if the Judgment of Paris had not taken place? Well, yes, I answered, there was already a good deal of momentum stimulated by, among other things, the successful opening in 1966 of the Robert Mondavi Winery, the first major new winery in the valley since Prohibition.

In fact, local residents were already concerned about the masses of wine tourists clogging local roads and highways and over-whelming winery facilities back in 1972 when a KPIX Eyewitness News reporter paid a visit to see what was happening. Click here or on the image below to watch the vintage video report.

And there was already international attention, too. Domaine Chandon, the Yountville outpost of the famous French Champagne house Môet Chandon, opened in 1973, three years before the famous Paris tasting.

On the Road Again

So the Napa Valley was already on the road to big things even before the Paris tasting. But just about everyone agrees that the international recognition changed things.

It changed things for Napa and for California, but the impact didn’t stop there. Towards the end of his book, George Taber takes a bit of a global tour, showing us how the world of wine broadened as the result of a number of forces including, of course, the new perspective on New World wine that the 1976 tasting provoked.

Second Thoughts?

Revisiting the Napa Valley years after the Paris tasting, to gather insights for his 2005 book, Taber could see the result of the intense focus that his astute reporting helped create. There was growth, for sure, and lots of new investment, both domestic and by a long list of international wine luminaries including, of course, the Rothschilds who partnered with Robert Mondavi in 1978, just two years after the Judgment, to build Opus One.

Taber was concerned about how the boom was unfolding. Enormous wealth, vanity vineyards, trophy wines. “The Napa Valley unfortunately became another proof of the maxim that nothing succeeds like excess.” And a good indicator of excess, he proposed, was the price of vineyard land. Warren Winiarski paid about $2000 per acre in 1970 for the first Stag’s Leap vineyard, Taber reported.  In 1999 the owner of Far Niente winery paid $100,000 an acre for a 42-acres vineyard, which seemed like a lot. Francis Ford Coppola raised the stakes just a few years later, paying $300,000 an acre, a jaw-dropping price at the time.

Now, of course, $300,000 an acre for Napa Valley vineyards is not noteworthy or exceptional. $300,000 to $500,000 per vineyard acre (adjusting for the value of any production or housing assets) seems to be the norm, with some particular parcels going for even more.  The excess that Taber saw 20 years ago has not diminished.

Money, Taste, and Wine

Naturally this is reflected in the wine. Not all of it, of course, but it is easy to see a pattern. The focus in Napa is increasingly on its signature grape variety, Cabernet Sauvignon. I am sure this is about taste — the best Napa Cabs I’ve tried are really good — but it is also about money, I think.

Cabernet is the grape of Bordeaux, too, and some people are happy to pay much more for Cabernet than they would for Zinfandel, which was once widely grown in the valley but now not-so-much. Sky-high land prices require high grape prices which mean high bottle prices for the wine. King Cabernet is the surest bet, many believe, and so it increasingly carpets the valley floor.

Many of the wines are really distinctive — Sue and I have tasted some real stunners! — but some of them taste the same to my amateur palate. I call them Napa Valley Red Wine. Maybe this is true of all wine regions, even the great ones? In Napa they often sell for more than $100 a bottle and seem to satisfy the thirst of buyers looking for the taste of Napa.

They Think I’m Bragging

I am not the only one who is concerned about how the wines of Napa Valley have changed and how the flood of tourist dollars and investor wealth has led to excess. But whenever I bemoan certain aspects of the Napa wine industry environment to international audiences, they think that I am just bragging. All those tourists and fancy restaurants! All the celebrities and trophy wines! Such economic success and pure opulence!

Napa Valley is a dream to international wine visitors, and for foreign winery owners who long for their own Napa moment, their own Judgment of Paris. Who can blame them?

But what if the Judgment never happened? If you know the story, you can appreciate that it could easily not have taken place (of the results could have turned out differently).  Napa Valley would still have grown the thrived, I think, but it would be different today. What might it look like? Come back next week to see what might have been … and is.

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Thanks to Tony Correia for his help nailing down vineyard valuations. Thanks to Silicon Valley Bank’s Rob McMillan for his help locating the KPIX video, which was originally featured in a very memorable post on Rob’s blog.

Wine Goes to the Opera: Nota Bene June 2026

June 23, 2026 By in Nota Bene 1 Comment

Nota Bene is a periodic Wine Economist column that briefly highlights short stories that might otherwise escape attention.

Wine Goes to the Opera

A recent Wine Economist column examined the relationship between wine and classical music and worried that wine could become like opera, mainly relevant to a shrinking audience of affluent, aging enthusiasts.  Once upon a time wine was for everyone. What happens if it is mainly for elites?

Given these concerns, we were interested to discover that Festival Napa Valley has commissioned an original opera to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Judgment of Paris. Bacchus and Venus are the opera’s main protagonists, supported by characters such as Steven Spurrier, Patricia Gallagher, Mike Grgich, Warren Winiarski, and others.

It’s an ambitious undertaking. Cheers to a successful premiere performance.

Against the Tide: K&L Opens in NYC

There is so much negative news in the wine press these days that signs of growth and optimism are both noteworthy and welcome. So you can imagine the excitement that has greeted the news that California-based K&L Wine Merchants has opened a new shop in New York City.  NYC wine news has been dominated by closings, not openings, in recent years, with the loss of Sherry-Lehmann Wine & Spirits in particular.

What does K&L see in the NYC opportunity that many others do not? K&L CEO Brian Zucker writes that

My father Todd co-founded K&L in California in 1976 on the premise that careful selection and producer relationships could build a sustainable independent retail business. Fifty years later, that’s the model we’re testing in a market where several other independent shops haven’t held up. We built the ecommerce business in the late 90s and early 2000s, and that multi-channel base is part of why we have a thesis about why ours can work.

According to K&L’s press release, “The expansion follows six consecutive quarters of wine sales growth for K&L, even as much of the U.S. wine industry continues to navigate declining consumption, pricing pressure, and shifting demand. With four California stores, a national e-commerce business, the most active wine & spirits auction platform by bids and users, and now a New York location, K&L is betting that the category’s next phase will be driven by more selective consumers seeking value, access, and expert guidance.”

“There’s a lot more demand out there than the headlines suggest. Customers haven’t lost interest in wine, they’ve gotten more deliberate about it, and that’s something retailers can work with,” said Brian Zucker, CEO of K&L Wine Merchants. “Wine’s bigger problem was where prices went leading into COVID and during the consumption spike that followed. That’s working itself out now. We’ve seen significant growth in wine in each of the last six quarters, and it’s accelerating.”

Second Glass Test Update

Regular readers will be familiar with our “Second Glass” test for non-alcoholic wines. The wines have to remind us of the type of wine they represent and be tasty enough that we would happily drink a second glass. We recently met with research assistants Nancy and Michael to apply our test to a few editorial samples we received.

The news is very good. Two wines passed the Second Glass test with flying colors and we are pleased to add them to our “highly recommended” list.

Missing Thorn Sparkling White was simply delicious, with medium body and bright tree fruit flavors. Michael, who was initially disappointed to learn that we would be tasting NA wine, commented that he would not have guessed that the Missing Thorn was missing alcohol. Second glasses all around. Congratulations to the Missing Thorn team.

The Pierre Chavin Signature Zero Sparkling Chardonnay was an even bigger hit with our tasting panel. They appreciated the body and mouthfeel of the wine and the complete flavor profile. The label notes that nine percent of unfermented grape juice is part of the blend and I think this might have had something to do with the positive response. Grape juice is often blended into NA wines to restore some of the sensory elements that the alcohol removal process takes away. Missing Thorn’s blend includes an unspecified proportion of grape juice too.

Pierre Chavin is widely distributed by Kobrand and, at about $20 per bottle, is more affordable than some NA wines we have sampled.

Port Hits the Cocktail Circuit

Prosecco-based Aperol spritz drinks are everywhere these days, proof that cocktails and wine can be a profitable and delicious combination. Port producers have long encouraged enthusiasts to experiment with cocktails as a way of growing their market by introducing new customers to Port’s many pleasures. At one point a famous producer even redesigned some Port bottles and labels so that they would look more at home behind the bar.

Ruud Scholten (a.k.a. The Port*ologist) has written an impressive new book to help cocktail-curious Port lovers and Port-curious cocktail drinkers discover the pleasures of Port cocktails. The book, The Port*ologist: Crafting Port Wine Cocktails, seems at first glance to be a collection of recipes for cocktails featuring all manner of Port wines. On closer inspection, we found a lot more information about Port, Porto, the Douro Valley, and the fundamentals of mixology, too. The book is beautifully illustrated. An impressive package.

It is clear why a Port lover would want to try cocktails, but what’s the appeal for the cocktail set? Well, there is a taste, of course, but more than that there is also the fact that Port wine  has about half the alcohol of many liquors,  so the book’s Port Old Fashioned drink has less “punch” than the traditional drink. This aligns very well with current market trends favoring moderation.

Sue and I love to drink The Portonic, a white Port and tonic spritz, so we are already on board. Next stop is to experiment with other summery white Port cocktails as well as those for the other seasons and occasions based on Ruby, Tawny, and other types of Port. What fun! (Available direct from the publisher or from Amazon.com.)

The Trouble with Gewürztraminer

June 16, 2026 By in Italian wine, wine, wine markets 2 Comments

The trouble with Tribles, as Star Trek fans all know, is that everyone falls in love with them at first sight. The trouble with Gewürztraminer is very different!

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Sue and I were fortunate to attend a big dinner at Cantina Tramin‘s strikingly beautiful winery a few years ago. Although I can’t really remember what we ate or who we sat with, I know for sure which wine we most enjoyed: Gewürztraminer!

The town of Tramin, in Italy’s Alto Adige region, is thought by many to be the birthplace of the Gewürztraminer grape variety, which is Cantina Tramin’s most-planted grape. The Nussbaumer Gewürztraminer is their signature wine and the wine we returned to again and again at dinner that night.

Cooperative Economics

We’ve written about Cantina Tramin before because it makes such a good wine economics story. Cantina Tramin is a cooperative winery and, like every cooperative I know of, it started life as a defensive effort. Faced with a soft market and low grape prices, growers banded together to make and to sell their own wines and share in the profits (if any). The initial focus was on bulk wine production, but about 50 years ago the bold decision was made to shift from quantity to quality, building a strong brand and earning higher margins. There was no guarantee that this would work and some other cooperatives that have tried it have not succeeded.

Cantina Tramin today is a noteworthy success story. Its 160 grower families farm about 280 hectares of grapes, producing 150,000 cases of wine. If you do the math you will quickly realize that the individual vineyards are tiny, so cooperation mobilizes strength in numbers. The small scale of individual holdings is exploited to highlight terroir. Higher quality grapes are rewarded with higher prices. Although it produces both red and white wines, Cantina Tramin is best known for its white wines, especially Gewürztraminer, for which it is famous in Italy.

The White Shift in Action

As most Wine Economist readers know, wine consumers today seem to be shifting from red wines to white wines, much to the  benefit of Alto Adige producers and those in other regions of the Italian northeast such as Friuli and the Veneto. The white shift is especially important to the degree that it compensates somewhat for the general decline in wine consumption. White wines have a larger share of the smaller market pie, so to speak. Smaller share, smaller pie for red wine producers overall.

So this is good news for Cantina Tramin because their Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio, Sauvignon, and white blend wines are all very popular. But the situation is more complicated for Gewürztraminer. Or at least that’s the case here in the U.S. market.

Gewürztraminer is well-known in Italy and nearby Austria, for example, and the Nussbaumer Gewürztraminer has a stellar reputation. But Gewürztraminer seems to be a hard sell here in the U.S., even though excellent Gewürztraminer wines are made here (think Anderson Valley, for example). The story is told that the famous Napa winemaker Andre Tchelistcheff endorsed Washington State’s potential as a quality wine producer upon tasting a glass of excellent local Gewürztraminer.

Gewürztraminer & the Riesling Curse

Gewürztraminer has the qualities that wine drinkers today look for. It is crisp, aromatic, delicious. It might not be the next “boom variety,” but it should be more popular than it is, don’t you think? What’s the problem?

I hate to put it this way, but maybe Gewürztraminer has the Riesling Curse. Like Riesling, Gewürztraminer has a name that some people are afraid of getting wrong (Jancis Robinson has written that some people are uncertain if it is Rice-ling or Rees-ling or something else). Gewürztraminer is kind of a long word (see Mark Twain’s essay “The Awful German Language” in this regard) and cautious people are sometimes afraid to try to sound it out, I guess.

A second problem is that, again like Riesling, Gewürztraminer can be made in different styles and consumers may be afraid to make a mistake. Is it sweet or is it dry? How can I tell? Gewürztraminer can even fool you a bit because a sweet aroma can disguise a dry finish. Gewürztraminer is what is sometimes called an “experience good.” You won’t know if you like it until you try it. But it can be hard to get to that first sip.

Maybe Catina Tramin’s stellar line-up of Alto Adige white wines can be an onramp for Gewürztraminer. All the wines we’ve tried have been great. A glass of the Troy Chardonnay might lead to a bottle of the Stoan white blend, which includes a touch of Gewürztraminer along with Chardonnay and other grape varieties. Then, maybe, who knows? Gewürztraminer isn’t that hard to say once you’ve tasted it!

Message in a Wine Glass: How Does That Wine Make You Feel?

June 9, 2026 By in wine, wine markets 5 Comments

Why do so many people love Champagne (and other sparkling wines, too)? Is it the way they taste? Or is it the way they make you feel? Here are a few thoughts inspired by a message in a wine glass.

Not Necessarily Clear as Glass

As regular Wine Economist readers know, Sue and I have this thing about specialized wine glasses and wine paraphernalia generally. Wine is an everyday drink for us and we try not to take it (and ourselves) too seriously. The purpose of wine is to make life better. Why complicate that?

But it is important to have an open mind, so we experimented for a while with specialized tasting glasses designed by Raj Parr and manufactured by Glasvin. As reported on The Wine Economist, we found them pretty, but a bit awkward. They didn’t really improve our wine experience very much, although, to be fair, they always seemed to delight guests. Maybe it was just us?

Then, a couple of months ago, we started experimenting with a Glasvin product called The Universal , and we surprised ourselves. We really enjoy using it. It’s a drinking glass rather than a tasting glass, of course, which suits our preference. It is super lightweight and pretty to look at. They have become our first-choice glassware for everyday enjoyment (we still rely on our OG INAO tasting glasses for analytical work.)

Hold Me, Touch Me, Taste Me, Feel Me

So here’s the thing. Does the wine taste better in nicer glasses than it does in regular wine glasses? I know that the type and shape of a wine glass is supposed to affect perception, but I have never paid too much attention to that side. I know that the Raj Parr tasting glasses had some effect just because they were designed for you to focus on particular elements rather than just enjoying the wine.

After some thought (and a few more glasses of wine), I’ve decided that it doesn’t matter to me if the glass makes the wine taste better. The point is that using these nicer glasses makes drinking the wine feel better. It elevates our experience (your mileage may vary).

This is not a very important observation on its own, but the idea of tasting versus feeling might be worth considering in a broader context. Wine descriptions often tell consumers how the wine tastes, sometimes in intimidating detail. This is useful information, but is it what buyers want to know? Or would it be better to suggest how the wine might make you feel?

Think about the last time you entered a friend’s home or attended an event where a glass of sparkling wine was quickly put in your hand. How did that make you feel? I’m pretty sure it felt good. How did it taste? You might not be able to remember because the feelings of welcome and relaxation were so strong.

I wonder if the feeling effect explains the success of some celebrity wines? Do you think it just feels good to connect through wine to someone you know, like or admire? Sue and I often remark that we especially enjoy wines with a personal connection, usually to the winemaking family.

Don’t Jump the Shark

If this is true, then I wonder why so many wine producers go out of their way to ignore the feeling effect? Some labels feature tasting notes or technical data suitable for a WSET study guide. Not a lot of feeling there. Now I don’t think you should tell people how they should feel when they drink your wine. But the right language can set an emotional framework that consumers can fill in themselves when they lift the glass.

I think emotion is an obvious part of the wine experience and it seems to me that wine producers don’t always pay enough attention to this in telling their stories. That said, I don’t want to push too hard on this point or some desperate winemaker might start crafting products for specific emotions. Moody Malbec. Silly Sauvignon. Passionate Pinot. Who knows where that might lead?

That’s the message I found in our new wine glasses. I wonder what the corkscrew has to say?

The Battle of Land versus Brand

June 2, 2026 By in wine, wine markets 4 Comments

In the wine market’s continuing battle of land versus brand, brand has several built-in advantages. Brands are often backed by big business marketing and distribution muscle, for example, and brands are scalable in ways that vineyard- and region-specific wines never can be.

My first wine book, Wine Wars, charted the path of several famous brands, including Blue Nun and Two Buck Chuck. Wine Wars II went deeper into brand land, searching for the keys to brand success. We are living in the Age of Identity and brands offer wine companies the opportunity to craft identities to fit specific market segments (think 19 Crimes, for example).

So brand trumps land, right? Not so fast. Here are three brief reports from the battlefront.

Noble Nobile

Sometimes land trumps brand or maybe it is that land reinforces the brand. The point is illustrated by two Italian wines Sue and I had the pleasure to sample.

Avignonesi Poggetto di Sopra is a relatively rare thing: A vineyard-designated Vino Nobile di Montepulciano. The map on the label shows the particular vineyard rows that were used along with the precise latitude and longitude of the block. The goal, we are told, is to let this particular place tell its story through the wine with as little intervention as possible.

The result is a rather elegant wine that changes and shifts in the glass as you drink and consider it. Sue was impressed, saying that it is just the kind of wine she most enjoys drinking. It paired very well with our homemade prosciutto and arugula pizza (the sauce was made with tomatoes from Sue’s garden).

The Avignonesi brand is famous, of course, but the wine is about the land and I think this elevates the brand rather than competing with it.

Vermentino and Not Vermentino

Tenuta Argenteria is a well-known producer in the Bolgheri region, best known for Bordeaux-blend red wines. They produce a white wine called Scenario, which is both a Vermentino and not a Vermentino.

How is this possible? Is it another “American wine” naming trick? No, the answer is that Scenario is made from 100% Vermentino grapes and if you put that on the label, then customers naturally define it in those terms (grape varieties are a sort of brand in this regard) and set expectations accordingly. They will evaluate the wine from the perspective of their Vermentino experience.

Argentiera wants to have the land be the defining factor, so Scenario is identified only as Bolgheri Bianco DOC (no grape variety is listed). I don’t know about you, but we haven’t tasted a ton of Bolgheri Bianco wines, sowe had to take the wine on its own terms. Isn’t that refreshing?

How did it taste? Savory not fruity, with nice minerality. We usually drink white wines warmer than our friends do, but this one wanted a little more chill. Did it remind us of Vermentino wines like the ones we discovered in Sardinia a few years ago? No, not really. But why should it? After all, only the grape variety is the same. Land, climate, people — all different. Do the red Bolgheri wines, blends of Bordeaux varieties, taste like Napa Cab?

What is American Wine?

An interesting example is the current debate about American appellation wines. This very broad designation was created to allow the blending of wines from different geographical designations. Some wines from New Mexico, for example, carry the American appellation for the very good reason that they include grapes from California and Washington State. Not really New Mexico, but not allowed to use California or Washington designations, either, because they are made outside those states. American wine? OK.

The VARA Zero Dosage American sparkling wine, for example, is made in New Mexico with Chardonnay grapes from Lodi and Arroyo Secco AVAs in California. It’s a fine wine and good value.

Now, however, we learn that the American appellation rules permit wineries to include imported wine in the blend. So they are “American” but not entirely American either. It is an obvious cost-saving and margin-protecting strategy because the world is awash in inexpensive bulk wine.

The California Association of Winegrape Growers (CAWG) is working to try to correct this situation. It is obviously in the interest of CAWG members to keep imported grapes and bulk wine out of “American” wine boxes and bottles (just as it is in the interest of big producers to keep the rules as they are). But there are more than competing interests at stake. It is hard to take wine regulations seriously if “American” means “not necessarily” or “not entirely” American. If that’s the case, why have an American appellation at all?

Five Buck Napa Cab? Nota Bene for May 2026

May 27, 2026 By in Nota Bene 5 Comments

This week, we introduce “Nota Bene,” a periodic Wine Economist column that briefly highlights short stories that might otherwise escape attention. Use the Comments section to let us know what you think and to suggest future stories.

Five Buck Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon?

I suppose it was inevitable that we would stumble across Five Buck Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon. After all, there is a lot of surplus Cabernet out there, even in Napa Valley, and at some point, someone is going to decide that getting next to nothing for the bulk wine is better than getting nothing at all. Still, it was enough of a surprise that we took this photo at our local Grocery Outlet store.

Using the “Rule of 100,” a $5 bottle of wine suggests that the grapes were purchased for $500 per ton. That’s unlikely since the average price of Napa Cab grapes has been hovering around $7000 per ton for a while. Someone suffered a big loss somewhere along the supply chain that produced this wine. No, we didn’t buy any of it. Made me sad to see it on the shelf.

(See Blake Gray’s Wine-Searcher column for more on discount wine today.)

Rediscovering Rex Hill

I guess we sort of lost track of Rex Hill Winery. Rex Hill was one of the pioneers in Oregon wine and it was also one of the first wineries we visited when we started visiting the Willamette Valley in the 1980s. Significantly, Rex Hill was built around its vineyards, specializing in vineyard-designated bottlings and the strong reputation those wines earned.

Eventually, however, Rex Hill was acquired by A to Z Winery when it found itself in sudden need of production facilities. And then A to Z (and Rex Hill) joined Erath Winery as part of Ste Michelle Wine Estates and its Sycamore Partners, which acquired SMWE in 2021. Sycamore Partners sold the Washington assets of SMWE in 2025, but retains the trio of Oregon wineries.

Recently we had the opportunity to taste Rex Hill Willamette Valley Pinot Noir and the Rex Hill Seven Soils Chardonnay. They were both delicious (the heart of Rex Hill is still beating), but the Chardonnay was especially impressive. Sue and I agreed that we’d be very happy to drink it on any occasion.

Diving into Vinho Verde

The folks at Quinta da Aveleda contacted us a few weeks ago in response to a Wine Economist article about Vinho Verde. There’s more to Vinho Verde than the simple, delicious summer wine we all know and love, we wrote. You are right, the Aveleda folks said, let us show you more. So we accepted the offer of editorial samples and have enjoyed discovering that they are right.

We started with two single grape variety Vinho Verde wines, an Alvarinho and a Loureiro. Both are Vinho Verde, but so very different. The varieties and the corresponding blend possibilities make for many potential styles of Vinho Verde wine.

But that’s not all. A second pair of wines, Solos de Granito and Solos de Xisto, highlighted the different of soil types for a single grape variety. Interesting! They were so intense and so different, too, both from each other and from our expectations regarding Vinho Verde and Alvarinho wines, too. The Granito was full of tree fruit flavors, golden apple evolving into pear. The Xisto was all about structure and minerality. What a difference soil type can make! A really memorable experience.

And a final pair of wines, which we hope to taste soon, promise to take our explorations to the next level. Parcela do Convento Loureiro and Parcela de Roseiral Alvarinho are single-vineyard expressions of Vinho Verde featuring the Loureiro and Alvarinho grape varieties. Can’t wait to see (and taste) what’s next.

Wow! There is more to Vinho Verde than we thought. That’s a rabbit hole we’d be glad to dive into!

Canadian Boycott Bites

We started today’s Nota Bene with a story about bargain Napa Cab and we end with a story about bargain Napa Chardonnay. This photo shows the bargain board outside our local Metropolitan Market that recently caught my eye. That’s a pretty big discount on a name-brand Napa Valley Chardonnay from a recent vintage. What’s the story?

The explanation became clear with a quick peek at the back label. It was in English and French with the required Surgeon General’s warning pasted on a separate label. No question in my mind: This wine was bottled for the Canadian market, which is a market that doesn’t really exist in the way it used to because of regional boycotts of U.S. wine and spirits.

First time we’ve seen this situation on store shelves, but I understand ex-Canada market wine is available on discount re-seller websites. Have you seen it? No, we didn’t buy any. Made me sad to see it on the shelf.