The wizards of small lot wines are back in their garages by
now but the flavors linger on. Even a trained professional, such as myself, can
be overwhelmed (some over served) by the variety of options served at the
popular Garagiste Festival. And the word continues to spread. While a more
local event when starting six years ago, I spoke with many who'd travelled from
San Diego, the Sacramento area and from up north. They had good things to say
about the lodging and dining options available in Paso Robles as well as their
experience at the event. Many had learned of the Fest from word of mouth and
were first timers but many indicated being repeats. And it was a knowledgeable
crowd, who expressed being pleased with the ability to engage the winemakers directly. It made
for a nice end of season boost for the local restaurants and hotels too.
If not familiar
with this group, there are a variety of things to do aside from the tasting and
a mix of ticket options. First off is a Friday dinner and continues through
Sunday's passport to some of the participating wineries, generally not open for
public tastings. The main event is Saturday, beginning with a pair of seminars
if you chose that level of attendance, and that includes lunch and early entry
into the tasting. The day ends with a chance to wind down at an after party.
The seminars are
a focus for me as they provide fodder for this blog. Much of what I post is
information on trends, newly popular varietals, current ideas on winemaking,
growth in various wine growing areas. Garagiste types are great for sourcing
information on that as they are often on the first wave in such areas.
First up was
Adam Lazarre with, "A Peek Behind the Curtain" presentation. We are
from a similar generation in the business and he took me back to my wholesale
days with brands he was involved with, such as Jekel, Sonoma-Cutrer and Hahn.
He is a brand building winemaker who does large production labels for Bev Mo,
Whole Foods etc. and has grown 25,000 case wineries to over 100K. He discussed
the differences between that experience and his own miniature production label.
I have discussed
some of this in prior writing as I believe bringing people into the wine
culture is good for the industry. You don't do that with $65 bottles of Cab,
you need a mass market appeal and approachable wines. That is what the big boys
(and increasingly women) provide. Adam pointed out the value in economy of
scale and its effect on final price when entering the national distribution
arena . The top selling (mostly multi label) thirty producers in the country
sell 90% of the wine. None do less than 600,000 cases with #1Gallo putting 75M
into the market. Over233M cases are made by the six top producers. After that,
the double digits fall off but the next
thirteen on the list still are in the millions of cases with the last ten
producing merely hundreds of thousands.
Compared to the
Garagiste maker, the savings in cost of labels, closures, capsules and bottles
is enormous. Often 50% or better in cost variance. And the ability to operate
with all the new tech toys that artisan makers have no hope of capitalizing is
also an advantage. Thus we get lots of reasonably priced everyday wines that
are blended to a house style and dressed up with some back of the curtain
techniques from made to order effects of available yeasts, oak alternatives and
even powdered lees. This is not the little old winemaker image but it provides
a product that allows people to become fans of wine, usually moving up the
ladder. And that is good for the wine business.
To Be
Continued
Never too early
to start planning for 2017 events. Early announcements, some including early
ticket promo pricing are out from the following events.
Santa Barbara
Vintners (sbcountywines.com) will celebrate New Spring Releases Weekend over April 20-23. Discounts are available for
tickets through the end of the year. If you need your wine event fix sooner
than that, World of Pinot Noir (worldofpinotnoir.com) also in Santa
Barbara, will be held March 3-4. For those who really can't wait, Rhone Rangers
to the rescue! The Paso Robles branch (rhonerangers.org) holds a now annual
gathering at Broken Earth winery on Sunday March19. Known as the Experience
it offers a complete day of panel discussions, lunch, silent auction and grand
tasting. Tickets for the entire event or just the tasting portion are
available. Full details and tickets are available via the indicated web sites.
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