I went down to the crossroads…

posted by Robert in Snooth, Wine, Guest Bloggers

There is a lot of rumination on “wine quality” as an absolute measure in this country. I have used the idea of a measurable quality level myself often in conjunction with price to confer value (quality<price) or pretentious (price>quality) status on a particular bottle. Over time I have come to realize that this system of determining a wine’s quality vis-a-vis its price to determine a value proposition is a fun concept, mostly academic and one that bears little resemblance to how we enjoy wine. It is what I refer to as an information based methodology of selecting which wines to drink.

But this Quality determination – if it even exists on the absolute plane – requires a fairly well developed system of critics and opinion givers to support the notion and disseminate the information. In mature markets where each consumer is a palate to be fought over wine quality and the quality vs. value proposition should be paramount. In a brand new market these notions are not yet established across the population of consumers and other considerations are more critical.

Take the US, our wine market is one of the only developed wine markets that is showing significant increases in sales volume at all price points but specifically at the higher end of the market. That the whole market is increasing is a bit of a surprise, but the increase in the high-end sector does not surprise anyone who follows US trends and understands that we have always been a major consumer of vintage Champagne, first growth Bordeaux and vintage Port­­ ­- pricey tipples all. Marketers often refer to this segment as the aspirational end of the market and the allure can be explained at various different sociological or psychological angles; see the report on this study for a prime example of how your friend the mind can mess with you.

Taken as a whole, and when faced with limitless options at our local wine shops, we fall back on price as the sole determiner of purchase decisions. I posit that this is exactly what you would expect from a nascent community of drinkers. Now, to be fair, the US is not a homogenous market and the level of transition from price based to information based wine selection is very different across the country and, more to the point, as a market the US is well on its way to making this transition at every level of knowledge and across categories. Too, the level of information available to even the average consumer is a quantum measure more advanced in today’s environment than even 10 years past and that aids in the speed in which a market can make this transition.

This is going to be important because the world’s wine producers find themselves on the edge of huge expansion in the size of demand for their product. Call it the China syndrome or more as I have painted it, a devil’s bargain. And you may unwittingly be a part of that bargain as these new markets may be driven top to bottom by price and not by information and this will affect the type and style of wines available in all locales across the globe.

Before we deal with the shift in worldwide supply my question to the community is have you felt the shift in your own purchasing habits and to what extent do you feel that you are, if you are, broadening your information base to make better purchasing decisions?

Robert Scibelli is a lecturer and administrator at New York’s premier wine school, International Wine Center.

New Feature: Share This Wine

posted by Chris in Snooth

Thanks to a little graphic design work, and a lot of code monkey love, you may have noticed some new links under the images on the wine detail pages.

The top link will add/remove wine images, as usual. But what about those new links below? Looks like there’s a discussion going on about this wine. If I check it out by clicking the green link, I go to the official Snooth Talk post about the Razor’s Edge Shiraz vint. 2005. If a discussion hasn’t been started, the link is grey, and you can be the one to kick off the party.

Right between those links is another button, “share this wine.” I think HondaJohn might like this one, so I can send him a Snooth message with the wine as an attachment!

The wine attachment in a message has a special style that looks like this:

You can click on these sharable objects to go to the pages they reference. We will use this style to allow you to share other things in the future. As we say here, the Snoothabilities are endless!

Chris Carpita is a software engineer at Snooth, Inc. He makes sure the trains run on time, whilst building new tracks and improving the cleanliness and service features of existing lines. He also likes K2’s, DP’s, Coney Island, and Indy films.

I has a sad

posted by philip in Snooth

Like the kitteh says…

…”I has a sad” every time i see a user with this on their profile page:

If you see these people, just go and friend them. They’ll immediately be enveloped into the warm soothing fold of snooth, they’ll see your reviews and forum posts trickling through their grapevine and it will help them get comfortable with the site.

Thanks, and just so ya know, I’m counting on you!

Ode to Broken Bottle of Canadian Wine

posted by Annie in Guest Bloggers

As if stained clothing, a dripping suitcase, and money down the drain isn’t enough, a broken bottle of souvenir/gift wine is never cool.

Bringing home wine presents is a common thing - we go to a foreign land (say Canada for example), we purchase wine for drinking at home upon returning from the foreign land, and we try our darnedest to pack the wine in such a way that checking the bag (since a wine bottle is way more than 3oz and the duty free selection is never any good) won’t break the bottle. Sadly, its never a sure thing.

My previous mentioned boyfriend, one with good knowledge of my palate, brought me back wine presents in a similar fashion from a foreign land. (Canada) He returned with a Cabernet Franc and a Canadian Bordeaux-style blend from British Columbia packed in clothing, paperbags, and a cardboard bottle separator. He was so excited to give me the wine, but when he opened the bag to get them out, the telltale scent of Cabernet Franc wafted out, and some newly pinked undershirts were there. Disaster. Wine everywhere. Gift destroyed. Boyfriend depressed.

I said it to cheer him up, but it was really true. At least I got to smell it. The thought was there, and I saw the bottle’s label so I knew it really was an un-exported British Columbian wine. A pity though really. It was thoughtful and smelled like it would have been tasty.

I think its now clear that the number 1 rule of packing wine in a suitcase is plastic bags. In the event of bottle breakage, at least there is a barrier between liquid and your white boating outfit from Berdorfs. Rule number 2 is padding. Clothes are nice, but so is packing material, bubble wrap, and/or poofy jackets.

Has this ever happened to you? Are you still cursing the ever-so careful luggage handlers at American Airlines?

Whats up with Burgundy?

posted by Callie in Wine, Guest Bloggers

[I’m very pleased to welcome our latest guest blogger. Callie Exas, newish to the world of wine, recently began work at NY Wine Co and will focus on some Wine 101 posts for us all.]

So with this being my first blog, I should introduce myself a little bit. I’m Callie…as in “Cali”. I’m pretty sure I came out of the womb liking wine, but didn’t really get a chance to fully develop that passion into a love until I studied in Rome. I started out in the advertising business doing some media planning and hap-hazardly acquired a part-time job at New York Wine Co because I was really interested in wine and wanted to learn. The head guys at NY Wine Co. have since taken me under their wing and slowly but surely I’m starting (and when I say starting I mean infantile steps) to wrap my head around the wine world.

Working in this industry has definitely been a great experience; however it can be extremely overwhelming at times. The world of wine is big and complex. There are laws, rules, science, tradition and history to know in order to fully get a grasp on the business and products. When the guest blog spot was brought up to me, I thought this would be a great opportunity for me to learn more and connect with people like me who are just getting into wine. That being said, I’ll be addressing some wine 101 issues all of us beginners might come across in day to day life.

As of my first day working at New York Wine Company, I had no idea what made a Burgundy, other than the fact that the wine was made there and it tasted good. I remember this being my first little lesson. Now that I’ve invested some time into getting a better understanding of the region, I really love Burgundy wines. I learned that this region actually makes some of the most collected wine in the world and the wine itself must satisfy a number of different factors before it’s considered a Burgundy. So, what is a Burgundy?

Typically, to be a Burgundy wine, it must be made of Pinot Noir or Chardonnay. There are a couple of other grape types that are allowed by law to be grown there but these are the major two. The wine must go through a certain fermentation period and then samples of the wine must be passed along to the INAO, (which makes me think of old men in white wigs sipping and spitting wine all day with their pinkies up, but don’t mind me) where it is then determined a Burgundy. Ta Da! Sounds so simple, right? You may be asking yourself how all of this got started. In my research I found that in the 14th century, Duke Philip the Bold declared the Gamey grape to be inferior to Burgundian practices and ordered that all vines be destroyed and only Pinot Noir be produced. Seriously. So that practice continues today as we drink our bottles of the lovely pinot noir. Thanks Phil.

There’s your little lesson for today. Laws, rules, history, and tradition in approximately one paragraph. I hope you enjoyed. If there’s anything anyone would like to touch upon in the future, feel free to give me a shout and I’ll be happy to investigate properly. In the mean time, happy sipping!

Callie Exas has just launched her wine career at New York Wine Co. in Manhattan. So far so good!

Wine Words: It’s All In The Name

posted by Scott in Snooth, Wine, Guest Bloggers

Let’s face it: names matter. They do. Sure, they are subject to fashion, but because words possess meaning, they carry a weight more permanent than the latest trend. It’s the reason that “Fart” isn’t a popular last name. Go ahead; check your phone book. Anyway, this “weight,” if you will, is a word’s denotation, its definition. As such names have semantic histories, or etymologies, just as any other words might. Philip, for instance, is derived from Greek and means “friend of horses.” I might be mistaken, but I don’t imagine that many parents have this meaning in mind when they name their child Philip. Still that doesn’t change the significance of the word.

Grapes have names, too, and with each its own story. Here are but a few:

Uva di Troia

Zinfandel

Aglianico

Shiraz

And last, but not least, here’s a list of funny ones.

There are literally thousands of etymologies like these. Some are true and some are just fun to tell. Feel free to post your own or tell me your parents named you Philip because they really do love horses.

Scott Rosenbaum is director of operations for the International Wine Center and wine buyer for the retailer DrinkUpNY.

Self promotion

posted by philip in Snooth, Wine Industry

Tom Wark, over at Fermentation posted today over how people, usually wineries in his case, sometimes misuse the comments on his blog post to either get his attention or to sneakily collect a few back links to their own site. I’m still not sure if this is better or worse than real spam (of the cialis/viagra kind, although somehow snooth gets a lot of golf and scuba diving spam) as its done deliberately, by hand, whereas the average piece of spam is done via software code and the spammer realistically has no idea which sites they are posting comments to.

We see this on Snooth occasionally, a winery may create an account, then rush out and rate 5 or 10 of their own wines 5 snooth glasses.

In the short term these tactics probably work. Tom even, in a sardonic fashion, gave his spam commenter major exposure today by talking about them, and even posting their bottle label image (complete with naked woman), but over a longer term I think they are a bad idea:

1) the cost of being called out is greater than the benefit of gaming the system. To be totally accurate you need to factor in probabilities of each action, but even so I think its unwise.

2) in the same way that the captcha (type the words you see in this box to prove you are a human) trims out a lot of spam, we’re looking at ways to strip out bogus ratings. We already allow people to vote on reviews, and we’re getting closer to having a karma-esque rating for each user, which will help expose gamers.

I’m not saying wineries shouldnt comment on blogs, or review wines on Snooth, but making an effort to join in the online conversations that we are all having will be more rewarded than trying to hitch a free ride on everyone else’s work.

Two perfect examples:

> HondaJohn works in the tasting room of Loxton Vineyards, and reviewed one of their wines very favorably, however, he discloses that he knows the winemaker.

> Jeff Stai of Twisted Oak Winery, through his total immersion in blogging and the online wine community has generated an enviable amount of goodwill and press.

I cant wait to try wines from either of the se two wineries, when in other circumstances I’d probably have never even have heard of them.

$18,518.52 per bottle

posted by Dan in Snooth, Wine, Guest Bloggers

A couple of weeks back I wrote in my What I’ve Learned post that, “consumers will always be price sensitive, but the goal is to create a conversation, sometimes about the wine itself, but more importantly with the people who are enjoying it. And if we are fortunate, a memory will be made not on the price paid, but the stories themselves.”

Well, a whale sized story hit the wine world this week. On Saturday, April 19, an anonymous “Beijing-based billionaire [had] splashed out a record $500,000 on 27 bottles of red wine, London-based Antique Wine Company said.” That’s an average of $18,518.52 per bottle. The 27 bottle lot consisted of Domaine de la Romanee Conti wines from 1961 to 2002. No one will argue the sought after power of these wines; honestly, I had the good fortune of drinking a 2001 DRC Grands Echezeaux last week while dining in New York City. It was my first experience with DRC and even from a challenging vintage year this wine hit all the Elysian highs a wine drinker can hope for - seductive aromatics, silky mouth-feel and a mouth watering finish. I was angered to have to share this wine with my table mates. I knew the wine was credit card bending expensive but 180x more expensive than I am comfortable spending?!?

Flabbergasted when I read the auction results article this weekend, I did what any good wine geek does to feel the pulse of the people, I logged on to Mark Squire’s bulletin board to see what the eBobber’s were saying. With over 2,500 page views on the post regarding the sale, the 52 comments dissected the Reuters press release language (”moronic”) and the buyer’s motives (”more money than brains;” “more money than taste”).

For the majority of us, we will rely on product cues (price, promotions, packaging, ease of consumption and consumption occasion) to choose our wine. When there is a limited knowledge of a region or producer at the tip of our tongue, price becomes a proxy for quality and strength of brand. Although “buying up” may excite some folks in the wine world, without proper appreciation we can easily be turned off and regret spending $10 or $20 more than what we could have spent on an acceptable bottle of wine.

Educated or less educated; to the individual consumer in either category, taste is subjective. Everyone has an opinion and a reason for their purchase. It is difficult to argue that one is right or wrong because taste means different things to different people. This happens to be a buying influencer that exists outside the appreciation of wine or shopping for clothes or a car. Some consumers will buy as a means to project an image about themselves, while others will make a purchase based solely on consumption occasion. Unfortunately, (part-time and/or legitimate) connoisseurship creates demand that drives prices.

So we ask, is a bottle of DRC more worthy of an accompanying libretto when someone writes a New York City sized mortgage check per bottle, than a bottle of Charles Shaw - “Two Buck Chuck” - which claims, a good wine for a great deal? According to an economist, a limited supply of a (quality) product will result in a subsequent price demand. But a 925,000% variance is only explainable by the self-imposed statement it makes about the purchaser. Is it true that DRC will be a vastly different wine than Two Buck Chuck? Yes, but 925,000 points different, no.

A few points of differentiation can be attributed to the wine’s taste, but beyond a few distinct characteristics, as we established, taste is subjective in the mouth of the beholder. And in most cases, when tasting a wine that reaches astronomical price points, even to the educated consumer, there is an invisible bar that exists that carries a sign, “any who pay the price beyond this barrier, will probably not be able to tell the difference.” Is it as simple as saying a $300 bottle of 1997 Antinori Solaia is exactly the same as a $30 bottle of E. Guigal Chateauneuf-du-Pape from 1999? Both wines received Wine Spectator’s #1 spot in the annual Top 100 in the last few years. The Wine Spectator uses criteria such as quality, value, availability and the excitement the wine creates in the consumer, i.e. the “X-factor.”

So, if your subjective taste delivers excitement (social status aside), it is safe to say that no price can be put on your enjoyment. Enjoyment is defined as the pleasure one receives while experiencing something. Wine has that unique ability to take on its environment, from production to enjoyment.

And therefore, wine is a complicated, and, at times, an expensive pursuit. But, wine in all its variety encapsulates a story in every sip. And with a little education we can descend on our neighborhood wine store or restaurant, and feel a connection to the wine shop owners who help our selection process, we will even be less intimidated by the restaurant’s sommelier in all his sartorial splendor, who protects the leather bound wine list as if it were the Gutenberg Bible. As consumers, we “will always be price sensitive, but the goal is to create a conversation, sometimes about the wine itself, but more importantly with the people who are enjoying it. And if we are fortunate, a memory will be made not on the price paid, but the stories themselves.”

Dan Petroski is Assistant Winemaker at Larkmead Vineyards in Napa Valley. Dan has an MBA from New York University and worked as an Ad Exec in New York for several years, before switching it up and trading his suit for a move out west.

Progress

posted by mark in Snooth, Wine Industry

When I started building Snooth I had an unclear picture of the wine industry. If I can recall properly, from the outside I always assumed it was well structured, well defined, and well planned. None of these assumptions ended up being the case, but wine’s mystique holds up for the industry as well as its product.

Now when I look at the wine industry, I see problems. Many of the problems are only resolved by fighting in our courtrooms. I have no interest in going there (although I do support the efforts of those who do). What I am interested in is the use of technology to fulfill a need for the industry. We have found very specifically that technology has yet to penetrate the industry as far as it has elsewhere. It’s a temporary condition. We’re very happy and fortunate to have interacted with many of the technological innovators in the space, some of whom we will meet in person later this week. For better or worse, the high-touch way of doing business is coughing and spluttering and being replaced by a business supported by computers. We notice the difference. Our partners who have embraced technology are better able to serve their customers.

The opportunity that Snooth provides is twofold. First, it helps the brick and mortar stores to connect up to the web — they can reach customers they couldn’t before, and serve those around them better. This is true especially as we begin to serve recommendations for stores in your area where others have enjoyed shopping and recommendations for wines you should try that are sold at those stores. That’s a real need, and it’s coming.

Secondly, it infuses the whole buying process with the social aspect that is so special about wine. We want you to connect with us, and with other folks, about wine. We’re all passionate here — and all of us can learn something. I know I love learning and sharing knowledge. What’s coming up here? We’re soon adding the ability to share wines directly with your friends via Grapevine message or even in Talk if you want to hear everyone’s thoughts. Talk will be doubly helpful when you can search it and find discussions about that which you are curious. As it grows, Talk essentially becomes a knowledge base with interesting information for the novice or the expert.

This opportunity to have a global conversation about our passion while simultaneously shopping smarter and better is what we’re about. It won’t work without the stores, and it won’t work without you. So join on in — we’re happy to have you all and your involvement encourages us to work even harder!

Differentiating yourself

posted by philip in Wine Industry

Every site, company and business is constantly trying to differentiate itself, to stand out from the crowd and to build sufficient credibility with you, the consumer, so that they hold your attention. Then, over time, they hope to earn the right to build trust and credibility with you. If they manage to do that it becomes easy (well easier). In many businesses the cost of bringing you to the point of making that first sale is so great that companies lose money on the initial transaction. The company then hopes to make it up over time, via subscriptions, add ons and other optional extras, or just through plain old repeat purchases.

This isn’t about Snooth, but about wine retailers. Every day a store or winery asks me how they can build their online presence (I’ll actually address this in a future post), but I’m equally impressed when a store builds it the old fashioned way - offline.

Which brings me to NY Wine Co. I was invited to one of their wine tasting dinners last week. It was a night of Spanish food and wine (witness table crowded with wine glasses below).

The food was excellent and the wine’s original and artfully paired, but what really caught my attention was the relationship with the store’s staff and the guests; the atmosphere of the whole event. Everyone was so at ease, relaxed and comfortable, it was as if the people were having a dinner party in their own homes. Clearly, to many of the people, this was not their first time here.

In the heart of Manhattan, they’d somehow managed to create a micro neighborhood community. And thats something I’ve never seen before in this city. To the guests that night, NY Wine Co had done more than differentiate themselves, they had made themselves unique. And that might be the most powerful marketing message of all.