SPLASH DECANT 07/12/21

Fast Natural

3 minute read

File Under: History

Fast Natural* is booming in the New York marketplace. Every few blocks you will find a shop selling fast natural wine and likely not knowing the difference between the private label they are selling and a farmer-grown, soulful wine. This isn’t the first time we have seen this dynamic (or the last); it is the natural wine version of “this Napa cabernet should be higher-priced and we can’t tell you which vineyard or star winemaker it came from.” Brands hide the ball all the time to sell juice.
Today, we have the beauty of a revitalized, young market thirsty for Natural and horrific misunderstanding of Natural due to lost history.

Joe Dressner (the late founder of Louis/Dressner Selections) was one of the people that made the natural wine tribe what it is today. In an excerpt below from his blog, Captain Tumor Man, he gave vital context to the Natural Wine Movement and clues to the future of Natural Wine the NY market today.

The manifesto doesn’t “define” natural wine, and it certainly doesn’t give you all the perfect answers so you can pass a test. However, it is filled with his humor, concepts, and references that give texture to where we are today and why Fast Natural wines exist. It was written in 2010.

The Official Fourteen Point Manifesto on Natural Wine by Joe Dressner*

1. Hold your wallet tight when someone tells you they love “Natural Wine.” All of a sudden it is popular to say you are making natural wines, that you are drinking natural wines, that you just love natural wines. Wines come in bottles, not slogans, and unless you are talking about actual growers, vintages or vineyards, you are blowing hot air. The Natural Wine Movement hates all sloganeering and please leave us out of your exhortations.

2. Years ago I asked a clerk at Brooks Brothers how to tie a bow-tie. She patiently answered that a Gentleman either knew how to tie a bow-tie or did not know how to tie a bow-tie. The same applies to Natural Wine. If you have to ask what Natural Wine is then please reintroduce yourself to the flavors, smells and textures of nature. The Natural Wine Movement can help you, but you must do most of this work yourself.

3. The Natural Wine Movement is not a movement with a leader, credo and principles. If you think there is a Natural Wine Movement sweeping the world, triumphantly slaying industrial wineries and taking no hostages, then you are one delusional wine drinker. The Natural Wine Movement thinks that you might want to lessen your alcohol consumption for a few months.

4. But wouldn’t life be simpler if we had just one big category of natural wine to direct the poor consumer who is faced with so many baffling options? The Natural Wine Movement believes that wine is complicated and turning wine into neat categories is what made America and Madison Avenue great, but not what makes one Romorantin taste better than another Poulsard. And that doesn’t even leave room for Counoise and Pinot Fin. Broad categories are great for soda, juice, low carbon footprint beverages, eating and drinking locally and romance novels. Leave Natural Wine alone.

5. The poor consumers facing so many baffling choices are not really so confused. They need to learn how to trust and explore their tastes. If they like crappy industrial wine, why slap them around? Let them learn and go with their instincts, eventually they will come around. The pointists and tasting notes crowd are obscurantists who wants them to believe it takes the training of a brain surgeon to appreciate wine. The Natural Wine Movement believes everyone has the right to drink and eat badly, to watch horrible movies, read crappy books and watch CSI Las Vegas, CSI Miami or CSI New York. Forensic evidence tells us that wine drinkers can mature and blossom and find nuance more charming than the world of Awesome and Mind Blowing!

6. Jules Chauvet used to say being determines consciousness. The Natural Wine Movement doe not expect the Wine Industrial Complex to be won over to natural fermentation, low sulphur and what-have-you. Even if it were, it would still be making unfathomable, undrinkable stuff. Stop condemning the Parkers, Rollands, Eisenmeyers, Wine Spectators, Cult Wineries with 16 Degree swill, Southern Wine & Spirits and the Andre Tamers of the world (actually, Andre Tamer is a very good importer of Spanish wine but I have a grudge against him, with good reason, and threw his name in here for no other particular reason). Honestly, they live in another world than we do.

7. Please leave us alone. Great natural wine is made in small quantities and there will never be enough to go around. Industrial Wine can satisfy thirst, I suppose, as can water, diet Sprite, Tomato Juice from local farmers and Gatorade. If everyone jumps on the natural wine bandwagon there will be a tendency to get bigger to satisfy demand and quality will be compromised. We will be overwhelmed by corporate types who want to cash in on the next big thing. We’ll have to form a new movement and find a new vague concept that hipsters all over the world will embrace (like Real Wine). The Natural Wine Movement likes to drink in peace and doesn’t want to become a marketing scheme for bloggers, wineries, retailers, distributors, importers with brain cancer, journalists and virtual reality television shows. We like being marginal.

8. The Natural Wine Movement abhors earnestness. Please don’t tell us your stories about leading a sulphur-free life and how wild yeast fermentation made you kinder to your loved ones and pets. Humorless activism to promote wine is an oxymoron. Getting smashed, eating well, and laughing with good friends are key to our movement. We actively campaign for the drinking age to be lowered to sixteen-year-old, like in good old France. We also enjoy being contemptuous of other people around us, somewhat randomly, particularly when we are on the second or third bottle.

9. Another thing we dislike is self-importance. The wine milieu is saturated with so many very important people it makes the mind dizzy. The Wine Spectator even organizes events for the very important to meet their very important peers from all around the world. The Natural Wine Movement does not attend these conferences. We don’t go to the Miami, Aspen, Boston, Denver, Houston, Phoenix, Elmira or Washington Wine Week Celebration. We’re not important enough to attend and don’t want to become that important.

10. Sure, there are big shots even in our marginal milieu. Certain vignerons, certain importers, certain restaurateurs and certain major private drinkers. We do our best to rotate big shots, searching as far as the former Czechoslovakia for media darlings. We’re a democratic group based on the French principles of Liberté, Fraternité et Copinage! The Natural Wine Movement knows no lider maximo and is dedicated to the notion that we can all be René Mosse for one day! By the way, I’m not sure what Copinage means, but it sounds good.

11. Is there really a difference between Natural, Biodynamic, Real and Organic wines? There sure is, but is it really productive to blab about the differences? We like mystery and suspense and so do you or you wouldn’t be glued to your television sets watching CSI New York. The Natural Wine Movement hates precision, detail and facts. For instance, when someone asks a member of The Natural Wine Movement for the exact variety composition of a blend, we just make up some percentages. Often they don’t add up to 100% because no one really cares. We don’t care and you don’t care. If the terroir is expressive then the grape varieties are transparent. We are not in California.

12. So, can you make natural wine in the New World? Maybe and we’d love to try some examples. No doubt there are great sites and we’re confident that our colleagues in the New World will find their way over the next few decades and centuries. Planting the right variety on the right root stock and not having all those unsightly clones would be a good start. The Natural Wine Movement salutes the courage and audacity of our New World brethren.

13. Doesn’t this make us a bunch of fascists who want to dictate taste to everyone else? Not really, The Natural Wine Movement doesn’t look for converts. If you want to hang around with us, that’s wonderful, but we’re just nice people looking for a nice buzz. Ever meet Olivier Lemasson – I can’t imagine a softer-spoken, nicer guy. He has two young kids to feed and buying a case of Olivier’s wine would be of great assistance to him.

14. Who appointed me to speak for The Natural Wine Movement, you ask? I seized control three years ago in an epic battle with François Ecco and Arnaud Erhart. Since then, I have been the official public spokesman for me, myself and I.

*Fast Natural is my term for the co-opted brands and large farm sourced wines with natural placed on the label that are capitalizing on the natural wine movement. Natural Wines are wines of nature from farmers, while Fast Natural Wines are wines of business and scaleability.

*originally posted by the late Joe Dressner of Louis/Dressner Selections on captaintumorman.com, bolds are inserted by me.

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SPLASH DECANT 06/01/21

Preconceptions

Preconceived Notions

3 minute read

File under: Marketplace

We hold onto our preconceptions for comfort. For nailing that blind. For feeling good about what we are doing. For feeling right.

We dissect all of the whimsy and surprise out of the fruit from a magical piece of land by peppering the producer who shepherded it from fruit to juice and into bottle with questions like – stems? How long in barrel exactly? What’s was the PH? What was the temperature? How often do you rack the wines?
I have asked these questions, feeding my own ego with “I knew it” and “maybe the wines would be better if…” – but the inconvenient truth is that as experienced as one might be, you can probably never fully decifer the mosaic that is in an artisan bottle of wine. The pieces are just too many and too shape-shifting to really and truly know it all. So we lean towards preconceived notions, partially writing the script of a wine before the wine is poured.

Why are we doing that again?

I wonder if we as an industry have gone too far towards the tenured professor as the ideal. Where having all the answers is the goal. Would you truly follow an Academic Wine Prophet?

There is no doubt that science is present – geology, too. That wonderful interaction called fermentation is in itself a lifetime of study.
And yet, I still wonder what we are promoting – what it’s all for.

What we are saying to young sommeliers and beverage directors when the interview includes the first la-la vintages, what’s the ideal cost for btg, and what was your stage at Dujac like? And not, what does the art of table-side collaboration look like for you? How do you want to lead? What’s the wine you are into that isn’t everywhere? What is the narrative of a great wine program?

We will have to throw out our preconceptions to build the industry in a better way. Don’t focus so much on the brushstrokes of academic study and miss the whole painting.

“

SPLASH DECANT 05/15/21

Rosé, Uninterrupted

3 Minute read

File Under: Tradecraft

Rosé is clearly not dead, on pause, or challenged by the orange wave – no matter what some hackneyed publication will tempt you to click sometime soon.

Rosé as a broad category is so expanded compared to more than a decade ago that it is truly shocking to consider how varied and wonderful it is now. Real Rosé is much easier to find by the day.

However, the Rosé season is the nut that the industry has been trying to crack for more than a decade and I am not sure we ever will. In early 2019, I wrote about the explosion of Rosé as a category and that we as an industry have a Rosé situation. We still have meaningful work to do to prove that we think of Rosé as an all year wine.

Exactly like ten years ago, some Rosés will sell through and echo into the marketplace and some won’t this year. Some will get famous and others will fade quietly away into the next season. Does that mean that the Rosé that doesn’t fly is going to be DOA next season? Nope. Famously, López de Heredia Rosé (Rosado) hardly sold at all on first release in the US and had to be closed out.

The current market drivers today are still allocation (scarcity), seasonality (warmer days, higher sales), name recognition (fame), same as it ever was (habitually bought), color (light pink for the big sales), and price (sub $14.99 is the high volume).

We still have a ways to go to get to where we want to be as an industry with Rosé, but any news of the death of Rosé will be greatly exaggerated. This will be (and in many ways, already is) a raucous Rosé season.

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SPLASH DECANT 04/15/21

Orange Crush – The Arc of the Orange Wine Craze

5 minute read

File under: History

Genesis

It started like a whisper. Orange Wines began getting real play in the small, energetic restaurants in the city. The first wave #sommelebrity set saw an opportunity in the wines of De Conciliis, Gravner, Radikon and Vodopivec for the young elites coming in for that new new.

Sommeliers began headlining prominent digital publication upstarts with the Orange Wine story and including it as the trendy, pro recommendation – saying ‘white wine made like a red’ in a thousand different ways. ‘Macerated on the skins’ was thrown about table side like tik tok dance routines.

Nouveau-Niche

Orange Wine became the nouveau-niche category of the wine world; gaining immense traction and providing a new conversation. “Do you have orange wine?” became a question that importer/distributors would expect to get.

Just when it seemed like Orange Wine would become the yin to the mic-drop sales of Rosé’s yang, like it would be the other color-curious question that would be asked by the customers at wine stores, these articles went viral and gave Orange Wine a gut punch: Why Tecate is Greater than Orange Wine, quickly followed by Orange Wine Already Over, Say Two Wine Writers.

Take a moment and read these articles beyond the titles. That was 2013.

The Dark Times

Immediately following these articles, Orange Wine went through a brutal period where it fell starkly out of favor. It was put on the end of the wine bench – unlikely to be called and asked to play. On the street we talked about how fast it had died. How many of the wines weren’t even orange and how wacky the prices were.

Were they actually too expensive? Was Rosé just that dominant? Was the explanation of the wine process of orange wine just too difficult to take in for the general public? Did they obscure terroir via process?

I doubt there is an answer, but it was around this time that I had a realization.

In the above articles, Jon Bonné and Richard Betts (both of whom I admire) clarified one of the most vital elements of the new wine business for me: trends often don’t care about the industry, they feed on something outside us insiders.

In 2017, I started to notice a sliver of daylight and emerging possibilities for Orange Wine via a raucously fun Ribolla Gialla Tasting in California and more tangibly, some street-level sales action I wrote about here.

Guess who’s back?

The slow time for Orange Wine came to an end with bright flashes of resurgence in the press. Orange Wine started showing up again in headlines in numerous wine publications, paired with clickbait headlines like ‘What is Natural Wine?’ and ‘Is Rosé Over?’

Do you have Orange Wine? is again an opener question in retail stores and restaurants accompanied by a new crop of factory-fabricated orange wine entering the sub-$15 retail space. And producers are regularly convinced by their importers to make an orange to acquire some perceived relevance.

Today you can join an Orange Wine Club or grab Simon Woolf’s book available on Amazon, Amber Revolution.

The Future

We aren’t approaching the peak of Orange Wine, yet. The answer to this trend’s possible velocity lies in a few simplistic concepts:

It’s easy to remember and ask for, fast to say, loosely defined, and widely available.

Now go try a few and see if you like them. And buckle up, because more is on the way.

“

SPLASH DECANT 01/01/21

Predictions for 2021

If 2020 was an earthquake, 2021 is about rebuilding. Below are my predictions for 2021 – hang tight, it’s going to be a wild one that will ultimately reshape the whole beverage business in surprising ways.

Silicon Valley and Wine?

Can the wine world handle the new tech bro entrance? Will we accept hoodies and all birds? I am currently wearing both…DOH.
Tech is going to more strongly enter the wine world. Whether it’s a platform or marketplace like Sevenfifty, AI to learn consumer’s taste, another new product or app trying to “democratize” the wine world, or a platform to make ordering easy. Wine Tech is coming, and I don’t mean the “we want to be the Amazon of wine” people, that’s hogwash. I mean a tech perspective on wine problems.

What’s certain is that a tech hat put on a scalable product works, but it doesn’t match up with the artisan/farmer wine model. In other words, it’s hard to go tech with artisan products coming from the old world where faxes and 80’s pop music are still a thing.

Someone is going to solve the right wine world problem with tech and it will be the beginning of a massive shift in the beverage ecosystem.

Subscriptions Galore

As consumption at home and delivery to those at home solidifies as a bigger part of the game, we are going to see a sizeable amount of subscription wine clubs formed – both through existing brick and mortar retail and independent operations. Anyone who wants to scale their subscription into something real is going to realize that it’s hard to move wine around the country. Those who have it grooved and/or figure it out will win big.

The New Retail

If the experience of buying wine and spirits is like going to the gas station, then prepare to watch the retailers offering this experience squirm and struggle. The new retail is going to focus on the digital shopping experience, in-store operations, service, and delivery. From the first interaction to checking out, the experience will be the focus for those that want to win. Quibble with Total Wine or the like all you want, but try shopping online, in-store, and/or taking delivery from them. It’s brilliant. That’s where it is all going in retail.

A Great Reorganization

We are going to see rebirth and reorganization across the board in the beverage distribution and import ecosystem. If the import/distribution game was a chessboard, imagine an empty board that will be reset in a new combination we have never seen before.

There will be new players, consolidation, and a staggering amount of producers up for grabs. Along with this shift, importers with means will go more direct to have more control over their own destiny. It’s not the sort of switch you can just turn on or off and is harder than it looks – but direct is the new direction.

The gangster move is a consolidation of a few mid-size players – who will that be?

Private Labelism Hits New Heights

There is going to be a TON of juice available at a discount. The exhale of inventory of all of this available juice will be through current private labels and a startling number of new private label projects.

New Size Formats

Holy shit, this is huge, especially in the spirits space. New size formats of 700ml, 720ml, 900ml, and 1.8L for spirits will extend the lines of many known spirits brands and even more newcomers. It’s a huge advantage for those working with distilleries in the EU and Japan. This will be a gamechanger in Q3/Q4 and lead to record spirits sales.

Tariff Madness

On his way out, the Orange Monster is attempting to burn everything down and hand the next guy and his administration, not just a shit sandwich, but a full tasting menu of shit. For the cheese course, we in the wine and spirits business get this: there are more tariffs in play. This new round represents a financial and emotional migraine for the business that is going to take quite a bit to get rid of and is going to cause some casualties. We have to hope for get a new deal with the new administration.

Low and Soft – the Low Alcohol Trend Accelerates

Low alcohol is going to get a lot more attention this year. Brands like Ghia and Seedlip are going to see more competition and more play. Look for well-known distillers to jump into this space with line extensions of low to no alcohol that mimics beer brands that produce low alcohol products.

Big Box Natural

This year we are going to see the solidification of the Big Box Natural phenomenon. Wines that would have never fit into the burgeoning category five years ago because of the size of the producer or their mission will be publicly accepted and will hit more shelves than ever. This is directly related to the ascending demand and price of the en vogue wines and the business sense of the Natural Wine Tribe.

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SPLASH DECANT 12/01/20

The Birth of Big Box Natural

A few months ago the Valentina Passalacqua drama* was the go-to conversation in the wine streets of NYC, and I couldn’t help but be reminded of the Bressan issue of a few years ago.

As shocking as this is, there is no doubt Valentina Passalacqua will have US representation again. And like Bressan, the drama will be placed into a dark and unsuspecting corner of the mind of the market and the wines will find their way onto lists and shelves.

But below the surface of the Passalacqua drama was a significant development – a new iteration of the natural wine movement I am calling Big Box Natural.

Filling a Need

In February, my wife and I went to a wonderful restaurant with a voluminous natural wine list in Montréal and I asked the talented and well-traveled sommelier about the current craze for the V. Passalacqua and his response was startling:

“She is rich and has 80ha of vines. Her wines fill a need.”

Which need is that? Between the lines of this statement is a powerful cultural shift in the shape of the natural wine tribe movement.

Valentina Passalacqua didn’t just expose worker rights and issues, Passalacqua cemented the new business model – Big Box Natural.

And with it, comes a whole new iteration of the natural wine movement that has a far-reaching impact. What was unthinkable a few years ago has happened. Natural now has a proven, scalable, and repeatable business model and will get the full profit-driven treatment.

The Fundamentals of Big Box Natural

A decade ago, the early-adopting ambassadors of Natural laughed when you called a family estate of 15ha “a small estate.” Now, that definition no longer applies.

We are a long way from the barely-attended Dive Bouteille held outside in the rain.

The market driving forces of the Natural Wine Movement have been scarcity, fear of missing out on the new producer, approachable prices, and most importantly, being a part of a fun, kinetic tribe that is going against the grain. This is a movement that thrives on being David versus the commercial wine Goliath.

But, because demand firmly outstrips supply and pricing is now elevated, the producers of the Natural Wine Tribe have encountered a conundrum that will drive this new business narrative: not enough wine and less affordability.

The fundamental change in the Natural Wine Movement is that large production is no longer off the table. Big estates that would be laughed at as a member of the tribe will now be considered natural. It’s done, and Valentina Passalacqua proved it.

According to the facings in stores today, even a large farm where a portion of the vineyards are farmed sustainably, another portion organic, and the third portion biodynamic, can produce natural wine. These wines are bought by the truckload and portrayed as natural on shelves and lists.

Going forward, having a larger quantity available at a moveable price tier is where the action will be. Wines that hit that magic fire price point below $19.99 will become much more prevalent.

For the above reasons, you will see many more private labels masquerading as Natural. Veiled collaborations that make it sound like a well-known producer made the wines or they were made to certain specifications. Even wines where the source is more than dubious will be passed off as natural.

In concert with this phenomenon, many natural wine producers will start sourcing from outside their appellation, expanding their holdings, and borrowing/trading fruit to supplement production and profit.

Large retailers will buy these labels from private-labelist importer/distributors until they decide to jump past the importer/distributor and source their own next best thing at the lowest possible price, expanding this space even further.

Big Box Natural is the new fire category where the growth is going to be dramatic, mind-bending, and turn this David into more of a Goliath player.

Will this snake eat its own tail? Will this ruin the artisan, wabi-sabi model, or will all boats rise? We are going to find out in 2021.

*For a quick take on the V. Passalacqua drama, Eric Asimov of the New York Times wrote an eloquent piece you can read here.

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SPLASH DECANT 11/01/20

Reality Show Wines

Have you had Snookie’s Silvaner, Flava Flav’s Furmint, or the New Bachelorette’s Beaujolais?

Not yet, but with the way things are going they will soon be at your neighborhood shop with a proper label from a high-powered marketing team.

They may come with a large, cartoonish clock, or be as simple as a new sexy wine marketing term like clean wine. Minimalist labels will have the celebrity’s name front and center with typography that is SO perfectly on-brand. Bonus: they will almost always have a winemaker from a notable winery “making” the wine to add a sliver of market viability (or a questionable veneer of substance).

Celebrities are crossing the rubicon in droves to not just drink on Instagram live, but lend their names to wines and build brands to add to their expanding portfolios. It’s easy to picture the marketing meeting that led to most of these celebrified wine projects.

Just a few months ago, I read that a certain celebrity wants to “create the defining brand of rosé Champagne,” and I laughed out loud. Then I looked into who is involved and it just made me sad.

I will always give any wine a fair shake, but I can’t look out into a multi-layered, under pressure beverage marketplace during this pandemic and not shiver at the reality show wines appearing on shelves in large quantities. I get the allure – these wines bring easy sales or there may be some new customers that call. But I ask you, what has happened to your conviction? What are you left with?

The moment Nate Ready makes a Napa Cabernet for Elon Musk (Flamethrower Cabernet?), I will concede. There might even be short term positives to the celebrification of wine, but there will no doubt be a hefty price to pay.

Sadly, I believe these reality show wines are in large part another symptom of a segment of the wine world that wants reality show wines of low substance, high celebrity, and barely-there soul.

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