Mike Veseth's Blog, page 38

Unlocking the Market Potential of Languedoc, Roussillon, & the Loire Valley

[image error]What do you think of when you think of French wine? If you are like most people, your thoughts probably stray to the iconic regions of Burgundy, Bordeaux, and Champagne. These regions and their wines are fundamental to the way we understand U.S. French wine and wine generally.

The Rhone and Alsace are probably on your radar, too, as they should be given their wonderful wines. Languedoc, Roussillon, and the Loire Valley likely show up further down the list. Important wine regions, but not quit...

Outlaw Wine? 19 Crimes Succeeds by Breaking All the Wine Marketing Rules

[image error]19 Crimes, the popular brand from Treasury Wine Estates, does everything wrong. It breaks all the “conventional wisdom” rules. It is everything that shouldn’t sell in the U.S. market. And yet it flies off the shelves. What’s going on?

19 Crimes is an Australian wine brand, which is the first problem. Sales of Aussie wines have been in decline here in the U.S. for years. The Australian section of my local upscale supermarket’s wine wall has shrunk to a shadow of its former self.

Sad and Doubly...

Wine in America: Surprising Idaho and its Diverse Wine Scene

[image error]There is a big world of American wine out there, full of surprises. Wine is made in all 50 states, so “Support your local wine industry” is practical advice. Sometimes this requires you to head off the the vineyards, but sometimes they can come to you. Case in point … the booming Boise, Idaho wine scene.

There is an urban winery trail of sorts developing in Boise and our friend Jim Thomssen spirited us away for a quick survey of the scene between sessions of the Idaho Wine Commission meetings...

The Changing Face of Wine in America: The Cooper’s Hawk Phenomenon

As I noted last week, wine is everywhere in America, or nearly so, and while it is common knowledge that the U.S. is the world’s largest wine market and that wine is produced in all 50 states, the diversity of the wine experience here sometimes comes as a surprise. Case in point …

What if I told you that one of the largest wineries in the U.S., home to what is probably the largest direct-to-consumer winery club program in the world, is based in Illinois, not California?

Illinois? (I can hear...

Scratching the Surface of Wine in America

[image error]I was busy this winter speaking at national and regional wine industry gatherings here in the United States: the Unified Wine & Grape Symposium in Sacramento (the western hemisphere’s largest wine industry meeting) and smaller but equally ambitious wine business meetings in Colorado, Idaho, and Washington State.

It’s been inspiring to meet so many hard-working and talented wine people and to talk with them about their challenges and achievements. I’d like to give a sense of what I learned in...

Review of “Our Blood is Wine”: A Film about Georgia Qvevri Wine

 

Our Blood is Wine, directed by Emily Railsback, released by Music Box Films, 2018. Available as video-on-demand via iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, etc.

Our Blood is Wine is a fascinating look at traditional wine-making in Georgia (the republic, not the U.S. state) and how it survived the traumatic Soviet era to be widely celebrated today as a natural wine icon. This documentary has been made with the same restraint and respect for tradition that the Georgians use in making their qvevri wines....

Războaiele Vinului: Romanian Wine Wars

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Romania has a long wine history and a more significant contemporary wine market presence than many observers appreciate. Its fine wines seem to fly under the radar here in the United States.

Romania produces more wine than New Zealand, according to OIV statistics. So why are Kiwi wines much  better known on the international scene?

Strategy is one answer. New Zealand is highly export-driven, powered by international and multinational investment, while Romanians drink much more of their own w...

Book Review: Intriguing Variations on a Wine Globalization Theme

[image error]Wine Globalization: A New Comparative History edited by Kym Anderson and Vicente Pinilla, Cambridge University Press, 2018. (See also The World’s Wine Markets: Globalization at Work edited by Kym Anderson, Edward Elgar, 2004.)

The fact that wine is such a global business was one of factors that motivated me to study it seriously in the first place. My 2005 book Globaloney (named a Best Business Book of that year by Library Journal) included a chapter that examined the evolution of global wine...

Book Review: James Conaway on the Napa Valley Wine Wars

[image error]James Conaway, Napa at Last Light: America’s Eden in an Age of Calamity (Simon & Schuster, March 2018).

Hegel wrote that the Owl of Minerva only takes flight at dusk, suggesting that wisdom (the owl) finally awakes when the day is nearly done and the opportunity to benefit from insight has almost passed. It is a sad thought — I hope that Hegel is wrong — but it captures pretty well the gist of this new book by James Conaway, who has been writing about the Napa Valley for many years.

Conaway’s...

Beyond Wine Boom & Bust: Taking a Closer Look at the SVB Report

[image error]Silicon Valley Bank recently released their 2018 State of the Industry report on the U.S. wine market and if you haven’t read it you should. It is well researched, written, and argued. Most important, it will challenge your ideas about the U.S. wine industry and make you think.

Most of the media reaction to the report has focused on two “boom and bust” elements: the predictions that (1) the 20-year wine market expansion is coming to an end and (2) that the relentless rise in grape prices and...