Hong Kong and Global Wine Market

A new study, albeit based on 2010 data, was just released by Vinexpo awarding Hong Kong residents top spot on the Asian continent for per capita wine consumption.  The Wall Street Journal, reporting on the study last week, said the average Hong Kong consumer drank 6.3 bottles in 2010, about twice as much volume as Japan [...]

2011 Wine Highlights Part 2- Wine Community

When I launched WineZag in 2009, I did it under a founding motto of “wine is a lubricant for human connection that holds no bias.”  The essence of my wine appreciation has always transcended the juice, gravitating to the center of human bonding and relationships that are accelerated by shared wine experiences; either during dinner [...]

Ignoring California Wines: Is Anybody Listening?

Last week Steve Heimoff published a post called “California Needs To Be Careful It Doesn’t Price Itself Out Of The Market.”  I become confused when I read things like this because the fact of the matter is California violated my personal quality to price ratio (QPR) tolerance more than a decade ago.  For me, California [...]

What’s Going on With the Price of Wine

I finally caught up with a replay of Rob McMillan’s Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) webinar presentation of their own 2011-2012 State of the Wine Industry report. Rob is founder of SVB’s Wine division.  His presentation was not really a state of the wine industry report since the bank and its research are only concerned with the U.S., west [...]

Cork Drive Features Sustainability Beyond the Vineyard

There are plenty campaigns and initiatives advocating sustainability in the vineyard.  What about at the other end of the wine chain?  We recycle glass bottles, but what about cork?  Wine closures make up 70% of the entire cork market, so a focus by wine drinkers on recycling and replanting cork trees could have a significant [...]

NJ Wine Consumers and Growers Facing Direct Shipment Legislation

Current New Jersey wine law affords its in state, small, fledgling wine producing industry the right to sell direct to consumers from their own showrooms. That’s a good thing because wholesalers will not handle these small production wines and 90% of the state’s local winery sales occur just this way. Practically all New Jersey wineries, [...]

Costco Wine: Neither 90 Points Nor $15 and Under

90 Points of Costco Wine, written on June 9, 2009, turned out to be the most popular WineZag post yet. Untold sums of people search multiple forms of a “Costco Wine” phrase every day and the post drives a high volume of “wine aware” organic search traffic to this blog. Some of those vistors poke around [...]

US Wine Labels and Hong Kong Wine Auctions: Tale of Two Wine Worlds

While the US domestic wine industry continues its painful recessionary adjustments in response to the $50-plus wine category implosion and the consolidation of its distribution channels, the picture looks very different in Asia where this year’s Sotheby’s and Christie’s Hong Kong wine auction sales will outstrip their own combined New York and London volumes.  As [...]

No Comment on Wine Freedom in H.R. 5034 Response From Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown

H.R. 5034, the Comprehensive Alcohol Regulatory Effectiveness Act of 2010, is simmering in the House of Representatives and waiting to make its way out the House to a Senate vote.  So,  I contacted my State Senator, Scott P. Brown, with an appeal to consider the scary aspects of this legislation which would allow Massachusetts, and all other states, [...]

Wine Industry, Consumers, and Social Media: A Brand Loyalty Conundrum

I am annoyed and conflicted sorting through the efficacy of social media deployment for wineries intending to build brand loyalty.   My visceral understanding of the raw marketing power unleashed by well deployed social media programs and a personal conviction that wine consumers ought to embrace brand/winery/vineyard/house styles and reject brand loyalty fuels my sloppy moral [...]

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