I hate to break it to you, but the days of good cheap wine are numbered. Very drinkable wine under $10 was a holy grail of wine drinkers and wine writers for years. Alas, those days are fading in the rearview mirror of our lives.
Ten dollars retail no longer covers cost of production—of growing, of bottles, of corks or screwtops or even bags in a cardboard box. Vineyard workers deserve a living wage. Transportation and storage costs—up. Cost of bricks and mortar stores or of shipping and handling for online buyers—up. Taxes—every government entity wants to suck on the alcohol teat. The greed and inefficiency of the three-tier system.
The days of good cheap wine are fading away and we have to adjust.
Mother nature’s climate change agenda is not helping. The Riverland, a vast region of South Australia alongside the Murray River, once was an agricultural powerhouse. Wine, citrus fruits, stone fruits, almonds. The region once produced almost one-third of Australia’s wine crush—19 Crimes is the wine you most likely recognize from there. Today it is imploding thanks to drought and floods. Nowadays those are not mutually exclusive. Aussie grape growers and wineries are simply walking away, no longer able to keep the lights on or the the Riverland wine presses pressing.
The new sweet spot is wine in the $15-25 range. There is margin in that to give all the hogs of wine production a place at the trough. The code word is “premiumization.”
Lower-end grape growers and wine makers worldwide are not in a happy place. The table plonk that sustained their grandparent’s operation now is lost to time out of memory. Mommy and daddy’s white-knuckle operation is doomed. It is time to upgrade vineyards. Governments long fattened on wine success should help in this. Time to improve product and expand to wine tourism and other income streams. Or die.
The days of rushing into a convenience store and scoring a couple of $9.99 bottles of drinkable wine for your haphazardly organized soirée are going, going, gone. Life has evolved for billions of years. Why should now be any different?
Tasting notes
• Daou Vineyards Soul of a Lion Cabernet Sauvignon, Paso Robles Adelaida District 2020 continues the winery’s record of excellence. It delivers conclusive evidence Paso Robles produces wine to compete with the world. $150 Link to my review
Last round: Kid to teacher: “You only teach useless crap.” Teacher to kid: “Don’t be so hard on yourself.” Wine time.