The Price of Wine: Is good wine becoming too expensive?

00:00:00: [Music]

00:00:15: Welcome to Just Another Wine podcast. It's me, Jenny Good. Me, Doug Reg. And me, Emily Harman.

00:00:22: What's the topic today guys? I think the price is right or the price is wrong.

00:00:28: Let's have a discussion on the price of wine. Oh, that's a nice ring to it. So,

00:00:35: you know, when I first started buying wine, this is maybe the mid-90s. So I remember my first,

00:00:42: when I first started buying wine, it was probably about 1992-93. And the first multiple bottle

00:00:50: purchase I made was three bottles of the Brokenwood Graveyard Hermitage 1991.

00:00:58: And that was £13.49 a bottle. I remember that Penfold's Bin 389 was, I think, £11.99 a bottle.

00:01:07: And Penfold's Grange was £35 a bottle. And I thought that was too expensive. I went by any of that.

00:01:13: And then Lindemann's Bin 65 Chardonnay was £4.99 a bottle. And fast forward to today.

00:01:23: There's just a few examples. I was kind of started off drinking Australian wine.

00:01:27: And today, you know that the Brokenwood were probably about £85 a bottle. The

00:01:33: Grange is what, £600 a bottle. And the Bin 389 is £50 something a bottle. And the Lindemann's Bin

00:01:42: 65 Chardonnay is £5.99 a bottle. So it's kind of gone up a pound. Everything else has gone up a lot.

00:01:47: But generally speaking... Kind of scary that it's only gone up a pound since the 90s.

00:01:51: Because of what the hell? So we're seeing... Actually, I remember the Montana Sauvignon Blanc

00:01:58: when I buy that £5.99 a bottle. Now it's probably, you can probably buy the equivalent

00:02:03: Sauvions from Marlborough for £8.50, £9. Because they kind of promote them regularly.

00:02:10: So some wines have got really expensive. Some wines haven't really moved with inflation.

00:02:15: So cheap wine is cheap and unsustainably cheap perhaps. But a lot of wines are kind of like

00:02:22: to the point where I can't buy them anymore. This is the... I mean, we did a podcast on

00:02:30: cult wines and icon wines. And I was a som at a restaurant in South Kent. And we had a vertical

00:02:38: of penfolds. Three vintage anyway. Grange 80, 80, 182. £60 a bottle. We had Margo 50,

00:02:49: £5 I think. £120 a bottle. I don't even think what these wines would cost now. And I would,

00:02:56: you know, I would discount the wines as a sommelier and try them to see whether they were in

00:03:02: adequate condition. And they were phenomenal wines, you know. And I'm not sure the wine making

00:03:08: has improved or the wines are any greater now, but they're more in demand than they've ever been.

00:03:14: And then I think command these ridiculous prices that you pay. I say ridiculous because, you know,

00:03:20: maybe they are wonderful and worthy, but if they're out of the beyond the pocket of so many ordinary

00:03:26: people, we'll never try them in their whole lives. Because why would you commit to something like that?

00:03:32: What is the point of wine if it's going to be like a bag of tell like that? Just something that

00:03:39: you sort of like look at from a distance and, you know, you hear about, you read about, but you

00:03:46: never, never get to try. And that's disregarding something that we should probably come to you,

00:03:54: Emily, about is markups and restaurants having changed since I was in restaurants that the

00:04:00: average markup was two and a half times those days. And now I open a wine list and nothing is

00:04:09: under three figures practically. And the average markup is probably four times in most places.

00:04:16: And it's unremitting as well. There's no sort of like gradation for more expensive wines, which to

00:04:21: bring them, you know, into the remitter of the customer. It's just relentless gross profit margin

00:04:29: applied across the whole wine list, making wine much more expensive to buy, perhaps making people

00:04:37: drink less because they can't afford to drink more. What would you say about that as someone who works

00:04:42: with restaurants? Yeah, I think there's a number of factors. I think the like the GP, the gross profit

00:04:48: margin is crazy, like particularly in London, and it is a minimum of four times, like you said,

00:04:52: to get to that 70% gross profit margin. Four times what the restaurant pays for the wine.

00:04:57: Yeah, minimum. And then if you're dealing with anybody who's a hotel, it's much higher than that.

00:05:02: It can be five times. And you're right, like it's not staggered. I think there are exceptions,

00:05:06: like I mean, Noble Rotts still, they do maintain good pricing where there is a sliding scale that

00:05:12: you can still drink, let's say premium, fine or rare wines at good prices. Because that's their

00:05:18: business model and their priority. And it's one of the few places where I actually really want to

00:05:23: spend my money on wine because I know I'm getting a reasonable price. I definitely feel that the

00:05:29: price of wine impacts me personally. I love drinking great wine. But if I feel I'm being ripped off,

00:05:34: I'm like, I'll just drink the cheapest wine on the list then, because you're just flogging me for it.

00:05:40: And I think that's one thing. Then there's also regions or producers that have had a lot of attention

00:05:48: that have then escalated demand. I mean, the euro is an amazing example of that. I mean,

00:05:55: all three of us love that region and the wines from there. I remember when I was buying wine

00:06:00: at Bichera Bruno Loubet in 2012, 13, I think a bit of 14. I was pouring Kuvay Florine from

00:06:09: Ganeva by the Glass for almost 24 months. I was the only person pouring that wine by the glass in

00:06:14: London, maybe with the exception of Teowar's at the time. But there was no challenge in supply

00:06:21: and we could pour it for £10 a glass consistently. Right? Yeah. And now it's like,

00:06:28: that's just not even feasible. Look, double that. It's not even feasible. And maybe I get three

00:06:33: bottles of it. Right? So there's like, one there's that. I mean, the same things happen with Burgundy.

00:06:38: So we're seeing one increases, many factors. We can all talk about what they are, of why that's

00:06:43: caused that. But there's like, I don't know, there's a lot of a lot of things that are unraveling

00:06:49: with that. I mean, the UK, I think this conversation cannot go without the government imposing these

00:06:56: crazy increases on beverage tax that's just happening every year, like the like the most

00:07:01: recent increase that's just making it even more complicated. Well, I think the Royal Court, I mean,

00:07:06: there's so many things to factor in the Royal costs of wine have increased labour increase.

00:07:12: Climate chaos impact. Climate climate chaos. I mean, you talk about your wine. Yeah, we used to

00:07:17: get like, I remember, we used to get a pallet of Truceaux from Ganevart. Now we get like 24 bottles

00:07:23: in a good year. You know, so it's a so supply and demand. Remember, the UK was primary market

00:07:31: in the early days for so many of these producers. So there was like more, more wine. But as soon as

00:07:37: like other powerful markets like the Far East, particularly in America, came on board, that

00:07:43: drove the price of wine up. It became like an auction. Meanwhile, the factors on restaurants,

00:07:49: rent, rates, wage, wage costs, and just all other costs and general tax on alcohol and

00:07:57: a general tax on that so much so that let's see if we can do a little equation, maybe Jamie,

00:08:04: a bottle of wine which costs, let's say five euros would be on a restaurant list for,

00:08:10: I reckon, around £55 to £60. But you're only getting five euros of wine. But you're the middle,

00:08:17: you know, the wine merchants buying it, putting their margin on, and then the restaurants putting

00:08:21: their whatever 80% GP on top of that. It's still a five euro wine and five euros doesn't buy you

00:08:29: a heck of a lot. I'm afraid. You see, I'm a geek, right? And what I've noticed is that

00:08:34: sometimes if you're a geek, you like certain wines. And I remember one example, because I've

00:08:42: had it in a restaurant last Thursday, I think it was, went to the Draper's Arms,

00:08:46: and I found this wine on the restaurant list. And this is a wine that I bought before for like

00:08:49: £30. What was it? The Vina Tondonia Rose. I mean, that's, I mean, that's an amazing example

00:08:56: of a wine becoming so suddenly so sought after and it made in relatively small amounts. I bought

00:09:02: it in the past. And I bought it once I had to buy six of the Red Reserver to get one bottle of the

00:09:07: Rose. And so I'm in Draper's Arms and it's a fantastic wine list. And well priced. And I see

00:09:15: the Tondonia Rose and, yeah, quite 110. That's okay, actually. That's a fair price considering

00:09:23: how much he's paying for it. If it's retail, if you get it for retail, so like in,

00:09:27: hedonism had some, it was like £90. So it's just really hard to find. And it's a,

00:09:32: it's a, I think it's a brilliant wine. It's a complicated wine, but it's brilliant. And funny

00:09:37: enough, I had one the week before I found it on the list and the Wynn Palace and Macau in one of

00:09:42: the bars. And there was a thing, £140 equipment. So I bought one there to share with the people I

00:09:47: was with. But you don't really, you rarely see these wines now. So it's almost like a wine you

00:09:51: have to give up on. Because it's like, do you know what, everyone's so interested in getting

00:09:56: hold of these wines. You just can't get them. And if you can, they're kind of, the price just creeps

00:10:00: up to the place of pain. Tondonia White used to buy for grain store when it opened and it was

00:10:05: around £19 a bottle. So we had it on, I think for £78 a bottle. Brilliant. I'd buy that.

00:10:12: I saw that. And there were, like honestly, it was like, there was no limitation on buying it. It was

00:10:17: like, buy as much as you want. Like there was, it was on the wireless for a year and a half. Again,

00:10:21: like a period of time, because this was like, that's a wine that style that's like irreplicable.

00:10:26: Right. Like, because it's such an individual wine, but it is, it's crazy now that they've done, maybe

00:10:32: they were always underpriced that we can also challenge that. Like maybe that some of these wines

00:10:36: were too cheap, like as well. Or a medio pepe, another example. That's gone up a bit, hasn't it?

00:10:43: Doubled. Yeah. So this is, this is what we get to the point where actually this is where you

00:10:49: have to use your geekiness and find things that are really delicious and fantastic, but haven't

00:10:58: yet been discovered. So they're still selling at a reasonable price. And I think there's lots of

00:11:03: wines like this. It's just you've got to have the confidence in your palate to know that you can

00:11:07: really enjoy it. And I think some people they need to have the wine needs to be sought after for them

00:11:12: to really enjoy it. They need the reassurance that everyone else thinks is amazing. But I think

00:11:16: you get to a stage in your drinking where your palate is at the point where you can be satisfied

00:11:22: that it's wine you're drinking is fantastic. It doesn't matter if you've never heard, you know,

00:11:27: anywhere any press about it, or you don't know it's in demand. And that's when you can find other

00:11:32: things, I think that can replace the super expensive stuff. But don't you think that wine

00:11:37: should be democratized as well? I mean, I want to be able to try some of these like wines you're

00:11:42: talking about, and we'll never have the opportunity to. So I think wine lists are really strangely

00:11:48: structured. If when they apply one margin fits all, so whether it's the cheapest wine or the more

00:11:54: expensive wine, it's unrelenting. Whereas, yeah, should a restaurant make 300 pounds of a bottle

00:12:01: of wine just because the cost price is X amount, for example, is it reasonable? That's a question.

00:12:06: Restaurants bank cash, you know, like at some point having a wine which is so far beyond everyone's

00:12:11: pocket, that that it just sits on the list. So you can sell that wine, an expensive wine or a

00:12:17: premium wine, much more quickly by bringing it down to much more reasonable price with a cash

00:12:23: margin. And everyone will perceive that wine list is really good value, whether it is or not,

00:12:28: you made a statement, you can make your margin, your gross profit margin, if you like on the

00:12:33: cheap wines to incentivize people to drink up the list and more interesting. But at the moment,

00:12:38: speaking as a wine merchant, we are seeing more and more of our trade customers defaulting to the

00:12:44: cheapest wines they can possibly buy. So you can make the biggest gross profit to satisfy the bean

00:12:51: counters who are basically giving them the targets. Yeah, I'm so glad that you said this, because I

00:12:56: 100% share the same point of view in terms of the ideal pricing structure model. And then secondary

00:13:02: to that is this idea now that everybody goes, Oh, well, guests are not spending that much. And it's

00:13:07: like, well, rather than like, nobody does the reflection work of like, maybe I need to look

00:13:12: at my margins to make it more appetizing. Instead, it's just like, Oh, the same price, people only

00:13:18: spend wines under 50. Okay, so then you're offering a worse product at the same price because of

00:13:23: inflation, because of the tax rate. Like, what's your point of view? And what's your perspective

00:13:28: on your whinest? Because I really think it's important to not drop quality. Like, where can

00:13:34: you actually allow some flexibility with pricing so that you still bring great wine to people? And

00:13:40: maybe it means sometimes, okay, the profit margin needs to look a little bit different.

00:13:46: And I think there are still wines you can make amazing profit on, like you've said. But equally,

00:13:51: like, what do we do? Do we just keep moving a lot of these other wines into the pockets of just

00:13:56: private collectors? Like, how do we actually make those wines? And I think we're the kind of movers

00:14:01: and shakers of this as buyers and as sellers of like, how do we actually inspire people to be

00:14:07: able to still access these wines? And I think you're right, that piece around emerging regions,

00:14:13: indigenous varietals, lesser known places, the local stories of those people is really important

00:14:20: now more than ever, for a number of reasons, not just from an economic point of view, but also

00:14:25: the restaurants that communicate on wine are the ones that sell it best as well. You know,

00:14:30: they are the ones that can discover the new producers for their customers. The restaurants

00:14:35: that treat their customers as basically, you know, feeding them money back are the ones who are

00:14:42: taking like a cynical view that wine is just a commodity. And it's, you know, it's to make margin

00:14:48: on. Whereas, I think we know that from our experience, restaurants that we go to, they're

00:14:53: really busy and people are drinking really good wines in them because they're not being treated as

00:14:59: cattle. And I think people have a sense of whether this wine list is something they want to spend

00:15:04: their money on. And I know that very quickly, you go to a restaurant and look at the wine list and say,

00:15:08: I'm not buying wine here. This is like, this is ridiculous list. It's not interesting. The producers

00:15:14: are boring and the pricing is insane. But like what the draper's arms last week, I spent 100 and

00:15:22: I'm not a rich person, but I spent 190 pounds on wine because we had the Tondonia and then they

00:15:29: had the silver and pate ale goatee. And so it's like, wow, so a bit greedy, but it was like,

00:15:37: it was like, it was kind of like special evening. And it was just beautiful.

00:15:41: But also if you get a bargain, I think you tell me about Le Van. I think you did. You have a

00:15:45: Auvernoir. Yes. Yeah. Poussin or something like that. Yeah. It was incredibly well priced.

00:15:49: That was with Christina. Yeah, we went there and they got, it's like...

00:15:52: 10 cases, another place. There's a number of places that are like,

00:15:55: we can make it reasonable. And we tell other people in the trade who tell other people,

00:16:02: and it becomes this viral thing about go to so and so if you want to drink the most amazing wines and

00:16:06: uncynical price. And I think this is why these places churn through wines because they've got

00:16:14: the right philosophy. The funniest was Brilliant Corners though. They had a 10th anniversary

00:16:19: wine list for a while. And basically all their rears, I didn't think they realized what they'd

00:16:23: got were put on a basically below retail price on a little short list. And so I went in there.

00:16:30: I always wanted to buy that. No, I went in there. It was like, it happened to be my birthday to

00:16:34: coincide as we went and basically raided this list. I think we all need to go there together.

00:16:39: I remember the best one was a whole group of us. It was a Beaujolais event.

00:16:43: I don't know were you there? I don't know. It was a Beaujolais event. It was with a reasonable size

00:16:49: group. I think it was the and basically we got hold of the Terroir's sort of like friends and

00:16:56: family list of all the rears on it. And this is before the pricing had been adjusted to reflect

00:17:02: the increased demand for these wines. And we just tucked in. But that's naughty behavior, I think.

00:17:08: But it shows that people get excited if you've got something that's good and your pricing is

00:17:13: is fair. I think people will make use of that. I also think that, you know, now everyone spends

00:17:20: most of their time googling pricing, which is crazy. But but but it's something that didn't happen

00:17:26: when we started working as songs. But I think, you know, like, I know someone very well who said,

00:17:33: Oh, my wine is, I've got this wine, 30 pounds or 40 pounds cheaper than this place. And I

00:17:39: thought this place was supposed to be good value. Should I put the prices up? And I said,

00:17:44: No, I mean, like, you know, like, make a like advertise the fact. It may annoy other accounts.

00:17:50: But you have your own model, your own business model of what you want to make a wine. If you're

00:17:55: just making a cash margin, then just do it. And maybe hopefully other accounts will take notice

00:18:03: of it, because no one wants to be perceived as super expensive. So it just needs, you know,

00:18:09: first person to stick their head above the parapet and saying, I'm not like doing these

00:18:13: crazy margins anymore. I just want to sell wine, you know, I'd like to add a point on this, because

00:18:18: I think there's the one thing of like, the business model idea, right? And we can all go, I'll be

00:18:23: amazing. Everybody just does that like, sliding margin. So like the percentage goes down as the

00:18:29: cost of the wine goes up. Perfect ideal. But then there's those people that also have those business

00:18:34: models, but then they get that rare wine, we talked about this on the MIWA episode, right?

00:18:38: Like when we did talked about icons and cult wines. And then there's that person that gets that bottle

00:18:43: of wine that pays like normal trade price from you, for example, Doug, let's just use the MIWA

00:18:48: example. And then they put it on their wine list. And then they mark it up to like 3,400.

00:18:53: And that irritates the shit out of me because it's like, and I'm sorry to swear, but like,

00:18:58: it really does because it's like, you haven't paid an escalated price. Why are you

00:19:03: contributing to escalating that price? And that I think is not cool. And I think that is where

00:19:08: I would really like there to be like, there should be kind of almost like wine trade ethics of like,

00:19:14: for me, it's just like, that's an unspoken agreement that if I purchase that wine,

00:19:19: I'm not going to, to participate in that system of escalating the price for others.

00:19:25: That's where these indexes like, you know, Bordeaux index, I'm not talking about the company,

00:19:29: I'm just talking about the, I'm just talking about the idea that all there's a, there's a price out

00:19:34: there, an auction price for a whole bunch of wines, but Bordeaux, Rhone, Tuscan, whatever.

00:19:39: I think when we, when we talk about MIWA, it comes back to, I think the, when we were just about

00:19:46: to close Terroir, that we gave them a little MIWA to sell. And I said, like, specifically,

00:19:52: I want you to sell it by the glass, you know, 15 pounds of glass or whatever it is. I want as

00:19:57: many people to try this wine as possible. You're not going to make money out of it. It's, you know,

00:20:01: make a little bit of money, but that's not really the point is what a great opportunity. And they

00:20:05: did. And the people just came, the restaurant, which had not been that busy, was suddenly really

00:20:09: busy with, with wine nerds and other people, really enjoying this opportunity. Because if you're

00:20:15: going to buy a bottle of that, are you just going to drink it by yourself with no friends?

00:20:19: Or are you going to like share it? Of course you want to share it. So I think,

00:20:23: increasingly, with the sort of rare wines, they are going to be rationed. But we hope that restaurants,

00:20:31: particularly are creative in the way that they bring that wine to as many people as possible.

00:20:36: I think there'll be a really generous gesture. And you're not going to sell a wine for like

00:20:39: 100 pounds of glass either. I hope not. I think it's really good that some places have a policy,

00:20:46: which is that you, you can only, you have to drink in, because this wine has to be drunk in.

00:20:51: So people don't come in, see a rare and then just walk out with it. Yeah.

00:20:56: You told us, did you tell us about Farm Yard? Was it Farm Yard? You went to?

00:21:00: Yes. That was really cool. So what happened there is, they just got their allocation of

00:21:07: Ganava. And it was on the top shelf somewhere. And I spotted it and I said, oh, is that for sale?

00:21:13: Any of those bottles for sale? And the guy said, oh, I've got to phone my wife to find out.

00:21:18: And the news was that, yes, you can buy one bottle, but you must drink it in here.

00:21:23: And I said, yeah, well, so I chose the one I wanted, which one we chose. But it was like,

00:21:28: um, felt really special. And I was waiting for the shock of the price. Because I think,

00:21:34: I know it's like at some places this would be 250, you know, and it was like 100 pounds.

00:21:39: It's like, that's really very reasonable. That's cash margin. And so that was a nice experience.

00:21:46: Good people, you know, I love that restaurant. So good. Right. So now we're basically, um,

00:21:55: having talked about like expensive wines again, because we always end up talking about expensive

00:21:58: let's talk about like discoveries, yeah, things that could command a reasonable price. But, you know,

00:22:04: we enjoy, yeah, yeah. It's not about like whether you enjoy a fifth of the amount or a tenth of the

00:22:10: amount or half the amount. It's just like we enjoy and they intrigue us and we like talking about them.

00:22:16: And yeah, I wanted to bring this because I haven't tried it myself yet. And we just received it last

00:22:24: week. So for the benefit of the tape, um, this is Thierry Navar, 2023 lineares from Saint-Chinillon.

00:22:33: So it's in Vendor, France, but it comes from Saint-Chinillon. So in the longer dock.

00:22:35: And it's 13% alcohol. Doug, what else can you tell us about this? So Thierry Navar has engaged in

00:22:42: reviving grape varieties that were extant in the 18th and 19th centuries in the longer dock.

00:22:51: They pretty well died out, but there was like a small nursery that had some

00:22:54: grape varieties that he took cuttings from. And he noticed before it's red, he worked with a grape

00:23:01: variety called Eard, which is a relation of Saint-Sauce and also Ribbon and Noir, which is very rare.

00:23:08: And his contention is that this is what normal people drank in the long dock, you know,

00:23:14: they didn't drink Shiraz or Grenache. These grape varieties weren't around and they didn't drink

00:23:18: alcoholic wines. They drank wines which are sort of 10, 11, 11, 1/2%. And the wine that we're trying

00:23:25: now is a white. It's a white made from two grape varieties you'll know and one grape variety you

00:23:31: may not know. So the grape varieties you might know is Grenache Gris and that gives, Grenache Gris

00:23:37: has got some real body and punch. It's quite a punchy grape variety. Clérette Blanche. Okay,

00:23:42: I thought it was Clérette because there's a acidity line in there. Yeah, and that provides

00:23:46: some acidity and Ribbon Inc. Blanc. Ribbon Inc. Blanc. And I didn't know this existed because

00:23:53: you can probably Wikipedia and there might be like a half a line on it. But again, it's one of

00:23:58: these incredibly rare grape varieties. There's a Ribbon Inc. Noir Blanc and I think there's a

00:24:03: gris as well. But only someone like Thierry would like stick it in. And what price would this be?

00:24:09: So this would be retail around 23, 20 fish, I guess. So this is the thing. This is about finding

00:24:17: these wines. So this is quite profound. I love this. And the longer docks especially, there's,

00:24:21: even if you're making amazing stuff in the longer docks, pricing, unless you're one of the three

00:24:25: most famous producers there, the pricing is still quite reasonable. Some things have kind of, again,

00:24:31: done this out of sight thing like Grands de Paire. Used to be able to buy that relatively affordably

00:24:37: from La Vigneron, Elizabeth Mike Berry in the early 90s. I remember. But now, and now it's

00:24:44: fancy collectors wine. But there's a lot of stuff there that's really very interesting. I love this

00:24:51: wine. It's also like, if you think about it, white wines are not so fashionable in the longer

00:24:55: docks. But it's intriguing because we love Burgundy, we love Churro, we love cool climate wines.

00:25:02: What about in warm climates now, global climate catastrophe? Green, white grapes is actually

00:25:08: quite an interesting proposition. Well, yeah, we're seeing this in the Rhône. So in the

00:25:11: nicer appellation to the Rhône, in the southern Rhône, white wines are just taking off.

00:25:20: I think it's also drinking trends as well. Because I mean, every person that I speak to that's

00:25:24: selling wine is like the demand for white wine is significantly higher than red wine at the moment.

00:25:29: And I think though, in a warm climate, often, whites seem to not suffer as much,

00:25:36: paradoxically, you know, that reds can really sour. White sometimes seems to get away with it,

00:25:42: especially certain varieties you mentioned, Claret. There's like a, sort of, brings a

00:25:46: bubble of length, they bring freshness. They can be more redacted sometimes.

00:25:49: Cagniant Blanc, it's a really interesting grape variety.

00:25:52: But also looking at Greece, like for example, like there's a lot of places like for example,

00:25:56: even Cypress, like you've tried a few of the wines I'll show you, show you writing up about.

00:26:00: Yeah, Maracunus is it. Maracunus and also another, there's another producer that's doing some

00:26:04: interesting stuff there, but they work with a variety called Zinisteria. And it's like,

00:26:08: Cypress is one of the hottest parts of Greece. If you consider it as Greece, because I know it's

00:26:12: got its own identity, but I mean, the fact that it's still 30 degrees in late October in Cypress,

00:26:18: but you can produce natural levels of alcohol in a white variety called Zinisteria,

00:26:25: like 11 and a half, 12 degrees. That's kind of cool, which is adapted to the climate.

00:26:28: But that's a great variety, it should be planted in more places, you know.

00:26:31: I mean, so yeah. Might need to be in the future.

00:26:34: Doug, this is a really lovely wine. It's got depth and real depth of flavour. It's not like

00:26:42: It's not just pick early, get to 13% alcohol, pick early, and end up with a complete

00:26:46: pressed wine without flavour. This has got an expansive sort of broad flavour.

00:26:50: It smells a bit like a sake, a bit like a diamond joe shakit sake, this green apple

00:26:55: laces and white florals and peachy pear kind of note to it.

00:26:59: Well, I always think the wines from this region are a bit, yeah, they're quite aromatic, like

00:27:04: vermouth, you know, they had that sort of noir d'epère sort of like, and a textural sort

00:27:10: of fennelly, there's a lot of garig sort of elements in it. But what I like about wines

00:27:16: like this, I love texture and wines and I like the fact that this is a blend of three grapes

00:27:21: and each of them are putting their weight, you know, you can, you say you've got the

00:27:24: acidity from the claret and you've got the lightness and brightness from the ribber

00:27:28: ink and you've got the, not that I would know, not that I would know.

00:27:30: A little bit of waxyness from the Green Ash.

00:27:32: Yeah, the Green Ash spying, so what's the typical ribber ink like, Doug?

00:27:36: Yeah, exactly. Nobody knows, so I can say anything and people will believe me.

00:27:41: Well, called Tire in a Vile and it comes up on the Who Wants to Be a Millionaire question.

00:27:45: It's 50/50 or 33/35.

00:27:48: Phone a friend, phone a friend.

00:27:50: Tire in, Tire in mate, we've tried your wine, I don't know what ribber ink tastes like mate,

00:27:54: you know, what's it taste like, you know.

00:27:57: The, yeah, beautiful wine and this is what we have to look for now, for wines that we

00:28:05: can drink, wines that we can sell. It's, you know, people who are making these wines that

00:28:11: become newly famous, we're still making a living before the wines went to crazy prices.

00:28:17: So, you know, it's like these people, you know, it's looking out for the less fashionable

00:28:23: regions is a really important thing.

00:28:25: Yeah, well let's reframe it almost as like emerging regions and also like for me, what's

00:28:30: really interesting about this, not just a price point, it's like, I mean, because I,

00:28:33: I mean, my import business focuses on lesser known regions, which makes it quite difficult

00:28:38: to sell the wine sometimes, but I think the storytelling is way more interesting, like

00:28:44: these great varieties that you haven't tasted, these flavors you haven't experienced before,

00:28:49: like the, the history of that place is really intriguing that you actually get like a 360

00:28:55: degrees experience of something new.

00:28:58: I like the idea, there's no reference point, so you have to find your own reference points.

00:29:03: Yeah, I mean, similar in certain respects and perhaps it does make us feel that the longer

00:29:07: dock, you know, sunshine, rock and garrie, and like San Julian and whatever have we been

00:29:12: there, but that's not really the point.

00:29:14: The point is like it really delivers flavor, you know, in the glass and you know, it's

00:29:19: like to wine you just like, you know, come back to, I have to say some more famous growers

00:29:24: are also like, they're conscious that they have some, they make trophy wines and they try

00:29:29: to also for their sense of honor almost trying to make wines that are much lower price level.

00:29:36: Yeah, so you'll see a lot of tears of wine and the wines at a lower price level are not

00:29:41: inconsiderable, you know, in comparison.

00:29:43: It's not that they're just cheaper and they're worse.

00:29:46: It's they're really interesting because it comes from the same place, the same person.

00:29:50: Ultimately, maybe it's younger vines or maybe it's, you know, in tank rather than in 100%

00:29:56: new wood, who knows, but yeah, there's, there are ways of finding inexpensive wines out there.

00:30:02: But also I do think the world does need good cheap wine.

00:30:05: I think once, so maybe some of the problems the wine, the world's experiencing at the moment

00:30:10: are because there's not some of the stuff at the bottom end of the market.

00:30:14: It's not really a good advert for wine.

00:30:16: No.

00:30:17: And I would love if I was making wine, I would love to be able to, you know, through getting

00:30:22: decent yields because yields are money.

00:30:24: So to get decent yields, farming well, farming in a, you know, really nice sort of like sensitive

00:30:31: regenerative way, but getting decent yields of grapes from varieties that crop well, but

00:30:37: also then making lighter wines that are honest and natural and pure, but selling them at decent prices.

00:30:44: I think it would be the absolute goal.

00:30:46: Yeah.

00:30:47: I mean, the tricky thing is like that's not wines that can be made everywhere, right?

00:30:50: Like because of, because of the right or because of the weather conditions you need in order to do that.

00:30:54: You need to go somewhere sunny.

00:30:55: Yeah.

00:30:56: Like South America, maybe Sicily at the moment.

00:30:59: Like, I mean, you have, but it's a, you know, it's, it's a, I think it's a really good goal to make wines that people can afford.

00:31:07: The other thing I think is that when you get to a region like the Longa Doc is people that are making wines and they can get these.

00:31:12: This is a good price for a Longa Doc wine.

00:31:14: You know, this is, you know, most Longa Doc wines are sold very cheaply.

00:31:18: I think maybe the fact that some people have become very expensive has created some, some, you know, that it's created a bit of space for other people to make a little bit more money out of their wines.

00:31:28: And I think that's a, you know, a positive trajectory.

00:31:32: So they're making affordable wine.

00:31:34: They're making affordable wine profitably because the fancy things have got so expensive.

00:31:39: It's changed people's expectations about how much they'll pay for a bottle from, from that region.

00:31:43: So you look at, you know, the fact that red burgundy or burgony, as we should call it, has got so expensive.

00:31:50: Maybe that's opened the door for Pinot Noir's from other places.

00:31:55: Which is very convenient considering the bottle of wine you're about to pop open down.

00:31:59: What are you doing Jamie there?

00:32:01: I don't know. What have you got under the table?

00:32:03: This wine, I think, is a good example of, of what I would call a fine wine, but at a price that I can afford on a normal professional salary.

00:32:11: And the wine in question is Hanny Storm's Pinot Noir 2018 Ignis from Upper Hemelnard Valley.

00:32:19: It's 2018 vintage, so it's got a few years on it.

00:32:22: But these are wines I can afford to buy. And I think, you know, in terms of Pinot Noir, I think there's a few people,

00:32:29: a few, few regions now making some fantastic Pinot Noir's that are still within reach of normal people.

00:32:35: I think that's fantastic.

00:32:37: I mean, also from South Africa, Kristalln and Peter Max, for example.

00:32:40: Kristalln, I think, is an excellent wine.

00:32:42: Peter Allen Finneson is making some astonishingly beautiful wines.

00:32:48: This is the perception of the region because, I mean, look at Oregon.

00:32:53: Bless Oregon, we love it. I love the Pinot's. But those are, those are surprises because their target market is California, domestic market,

00:33:04: and people will pay any money because they equate Pinot Noir as like, you know, the noble grape of sideways.

00:33:11: Yes, so, so, Oregon Pinot Noir's pretty much all of them have got punchy.

00:33:15: By the time they're in the UK, you can't really sell them because they're too expensive.

00:33:19: I mean, there's no discount there on red burgundy. You know, they're priced at the line priced with the village level above red burgundy.

00:33:27: Yeah, they compete already with an established image that already exists at that price point.

00:33:31: So then it's hard sometimes challenging in the UK to get people to step into an Oregon wine over a French, French Pinot.

00:33:39: But I think South Africa is quite interesting in that because there's a lot of wine.

00:33:44: There's a lot of really good fine wine that's affordable, especially in South Africa.

00:33:48: Yeah, but it's £1,600 on a wine list, like really good wine that you can find.

00:33:52: So this is not cheap wine, but I think it's a wine that offers real value.

00:33:56: It's upper-heeled and arid valleys and that so often has a distinct savouriness, I think, to the wine,

00:34:02: especially that's going to be exaggerated by the fact that this is now seven years old.

00:34:08: Seven years old, yeah. Yeah, sort of smoky, slightly pruney.

00:34:13: Almost autumnal. Yes, like it makes me think of like... Yeah, exactly.

00:34:18: But then there's smoke tea.

00:34:22: And the palate is not just about sweet fruit. There is some sweet fruit, but then there's this savoury, almost bloody iodine sort of quality.

00:34:30: I think that often I find in the upper-heeled and arid valley in those wines, it can be quite grainy and angular, but in a nice way.

00:34:41: It's nice because there's still quite a bit of structure there, like the tannin structure's there.

00:34:46: The acid line is very nicely integrated, but then this interplay between sort of sweet and savoury fruit, it's in a really nice drinking spot.

00:34:55: Yeah, I think I'd drink it now. I'm not going to sell it this for a while, obviously, I opened it now.

00:34:59: Yeah, it's quite developed, I think, on the palate, and it's not my particular style of peanut, but I actually really like it because it reminds me of other things.

00:35:07: It's got a bit of smoky bacon-sirah quality to it, and I love sirah, so comparing peanut to sirah doesn't sort of worry me too much.

00:35:16: Yeah, because cool climate, South Africa is still quite warm by, say for instance, cool climate, France standards.

00:35:26: There's plenty of sunshine.

00:35:28: But I mean, Burgundy's getting pretty warm too, eh? There's been quite a lot of vintages where the wines are like 14, 14.5, 15, some of the...

00:35:35: It's the problem, this idea of ripeness, you know, picking the idea with the red wines, do you have to pick at a certain level of ripeness, otherwise they're considered green, or I'm pleasant with the white wines, this is not a problem.

00:35:46: You can play around.

00:35:48: I think that's the pursuit of flavour ripeness on the part of the wine grower that leads to trouble when you're in a warm climate with red wines, as you were suggesting.

00:35:59: So it's like, people are scared of green, and so they're kind of waiting for the flavours in the grapes to kind of like, to be more resolved.

00:36:11: They want the tannins more resolved.

00:36:13: The problem with that is if you're tasting the grapes, this is my own particular personal view, and you're looking for the flavour ripeness in the grapes, you've missed your pick, and the wines end up high alcohol, and just...

00:36:27: But don't you think this also comes down to overall business model decisions, because you can pick somebody making a choice on physiological ripeness, which is what we're talking about right now.

00:36:39: That can look very different in terms of the overall structure, and let's say analysis of the wine, depending on the decision that somebody's made on their method of farming, their method of training, their varietals that they've planted based on that soil, and all those other things.

00:36:56: Because, for example, South-Eastern Sicily is a really good example of that.

00:37:01: You're on the parallel Tunisia. It's extremely hot.

00:37:04: There are producers like Kos, Ariana Ocopinti, AgriCola VnB, Marabino.

00:37:10: So I can say for sure with Marabino and also AgriCola VnB, they don't pick early.

00:37:16: They're picking in mid to late September, all the way through to October.

00:37:23: But because they farm biodynamically, they work with bush mines.

00:37:27: They train the fruit, really low to the ground.

00:37:30: They have limestone soils there.

00:37:32: This combination means that there's a really slow ripening period.

00:37:37: But they're also working with varietals like Nerodavilla that have high natural acidity.

00:37:43: So when they're picking still in late September and they're not cropping high, you get actually winds still at natural acidity levels between 11 and 13 degrees alcohol.

00:37:55: But you get acid levels that are similar to Mosul-Riesling.

00:37:59: But you're basically in Africa, like in terms of climate.

00:38:03: But they pick on physiological ripeness. So I really think that really sometimes comes down to the farming decisions that can shape that final wine.

00:38:13: Because maybe sometimes picking on physiological ripeness now with certain varietals in certain regions doesn't make sense anymore.

00:38:22: So I just want to throw that into the conversation.

00:38:24: I think if you want to pick early, because obviously the trend has been to start picking more early and you taste some wines where people have picked early.

00:38:32: The wines taste very compressed and just not really in the right place.

00:38:39: And I think that the thing is if you want to pick early, you've got to farm to pick early.

00:38:44: I think Evan Sadi, that's one of his phrases.

00:38:46: If you want to pick early, farm to pick early.

00:38:48: Get your farming right.

00:38:50: If you want to have a wine with freshness, it's all in the farming.

00:38:54: And I think that's the... you can't just go in there and just pick while the acidity is still high.

00:39:01: Because you've got to have those flavour components right.

00:39:04: I think where I was getting before is just some people's idea of flavour ripeness or physiological ripeness.

00:39:09: It's different.

00:39:10: It's actually over ripeness.

00:39:12: So this is a stylistic goal maybe.

00:39:14: Because some people do like jammy rich red wines.

00:39:18: I think a lot of consumers do.

00:39:20: But also I think if you measure...

00:39:22: If you measure sugar, ripeness and alcohol, it's very different too.

00:39:26: If you measure it on your tongue, if you buy into a grape, you think, oh that's really refreshing.

00:39:31: That's me.

00:39:32: There's a very tactile way of looking at a wine.

00:39:35: But if you just wait for ripeness, it's often too late when you do that.

00:39:40: I think also the way you profile your own taste as a vineyard.

00:39:44: Like Craig Hawkins for example. He picks on taste.

00:39:49: But he's also notoriously picking early.

00:39:51: Like he says I pick before everybody else.

00:39:53: Yeah because he likes acid line in his wine.

00:39:57: Having said that, the way he makes the wine is a mellowed the wine out a bit.

00:40:01: But still, like some people, I like wines which are al dente, which I can buy into, which are crunchy,

00:40:10: which are red fruits as well.

00:40:12: Teri Jama and the Loire, red fruit all the way.

00:40:16: So many Cabernet Francs are now, you know, verging on black fruit.

00:40:20: And he said like I associate black with death.

00:40:22: You know, it's gone too far.

00:40:24: Whereas I like the idea of the sap still in the wine as you're trying it.

00:40:29: And so you get that gush of red fruits with Pina Loire as well.

00:40:32: You know, I like the gush of red fruit.

00:40:34: I like the sort of floral aspect of it.

00:40:37: And it's a very fine line and comes back, comes all down to balance.

00:40:41: And an idea that the grower has in the vineyard, what they're looking for in the final wine.

00:40:47: And as the final sort of sort of coda to this little tangent, we work with a grower in Minervois.

00:40:54: Minervois is an incredibly hot, dry region.

00:40:57: Yeah, which one?

00:40:58: I mean, it's really, really suffering.

00:41:00: And this is Jean-Baptiste Senna.

00:41:03: And they're getting rid of like things like syrup because it's becoming Shiraz like and whatever.

00:41:11: And they're growing things like Poul Noir because it ripens at 10, 10 and a half percent.

00:41:17: And it's really good in blends.

00:41:19: And they're looking for cooler climate nor facing sites planting young vines, not aging them as well.

00:41:27: The profile is like drinkability, freshness, youthfulness, exuberance.

00:41:31: And there are no barrels now in the cellar.

00:41:34: It's all cement.

00:41:35: And the wines are changing for me for the better because they're much more delicious.

00:41:40: But I think so many people went through that sort of spell going back to the longer dock of it's got to be berries, you know.

00:41:48: But I feel that's a trend globally of like warmer climate producers moving away from oak,

00:41:54: realizing that there's already enough concentration and moving more towards cement or stainless steel or maybe...

00:42:00: It may be cheaper as well to bring it back.

00:42:03: I think one of the problems is that if you're just fitting out your barrel room with barrels, that's expensive.

00:42:10: And the wine needs time to digest the oak.

00:42:12: So you need an extra year or two or three to mature it.

00:42:17: Whereas if you're just working with cement or tanks or whatever, you can release it early and it's fine.

00:42:23: It's not as expensive because you haven't put so much investment in the winery then.

00:42:29: And we do need these nourishing drinkable wines.

00:42:32: One of the things I'm fascinated by in Portugal is the resurgence of the paliata style of wine, which is the sort of wine that the workers would have drunk.

00:42:45: The wine of the Contadino.

00:42:48: So it's a field blend with lots of white grapes and red grapes all fermented together.

00:42:53: And it makes lighter red wines than a nourishing at low alcohol levels.

00:43:00: And these are fantastic. This is really good.

00:43:03: That's like the Palme do wines, right?

00:43:06: The Contadino wines of "Yeah, yeah, all those guys."

00:43:11: We really do need these. And these wines are delicious and they go to market quickly.

00:43:15: And it's bringing cash to the producers.

00:43:19: It means they can be a bit cheaper.

00:43:22: Yes, and so they can reach a bigger market.

00:43:24: Because better wine is all about, though, doesn't it? It should be there to be drunk.

00:43:28: We love our fancy wines, but we also love sharing wines at table that are good and interesting and hold our...

00:43:35: We can drink them unconsciously, but we can also pause and give them some attention and they repay that attention because there's something good and interesting going on with them.

00:43:45: Yeah, and maybe it's also worth just adding that experience for somebody who's in a restaurant and then you get talked into a wine that's beyond your budget.

00:43:55: And how uncomfortable that feeling is to feel stressed about how much you're spending.

00:43:59: And I think that is something that, especially this year, people are feeling more and more.

00:44:05: Like, no one wants to be in that situation where you're like, "I've spent more than I can afford."

00:44:10: And then you don't really relate to the wine, right? Like, how nice is it when you can share wine and you feel comfortable with how much you're spending on it,

00:44:18: that it doesn't feel like a complete stretch or that you've been moved so far out of your comfort zone that you can't even then appreciate the wine and share it because you're stressed about the money.

00:44:28: Yeah, because I think wine should be for everyone.

00:44:31: I remember when I first started getting interested in wine, we just talked to the boys.

00:44:36: We're not just a bit late, we've talked to the boys, but financially we were a little precarious and that's why I planted an allotment with vines.

00:44:44: So I thought, well, if we can't afford to buy wine, at least I can make some wine.

00:44:48: It was like, maybe it's a scarcity mindset.

00:44:52: I was thinking, well, if we can't afford to buy wine, maybe if we can make some, we can still drink.

00:44:56: It's a helpful scarcity mindset in that sense.

00:44:58: I really enjoyed drinking wines and there was a nice part of the evening is to have a glass of wine.

00:45:03: And I thought, maybe if we can't afford the wine, because the budget was a little stretched on one sort of salary and with two mouths to feed and the attendant expenses, then I thought, well, yeah, we could maybe make some.

00:45:20: But I planted these vines on this allotment and then we got so busy that they kind of just grew and they just formed this forest of vines where they'd kind of grown into each other.

00:45:30: It's quite a fertile site as well. And I got a warning from the allotment committee and they stole my allotment from me.

00:45:36: So it was like too bad.

00:45:38: But fortunately, this is a divine joke is like, if you look now, there's so much wine in this place.

00:45:45: It's going to be wine.

00:45:46: It's not going to run out.

00:45:47: Yes.

00:45:48: But I do think that having making a wine offering at the bottom end that's not just ultra processed wines is really interesting because we talk about ultra processed food.

00:45:58: And the long talk about ultra processed wines.

00:46:00: And then there was this move towards the zero alcohol wines.

00:46:03: I kind of like, yeah, I think this is kind of good, but these wines are totally ultra processed.

00:46:08: These are the most processed wines in the world.

00:46:10: And wines that you go to the ship to there, you do all these stuff.

00:46:14: And then you do some processing.

00:46:15: And then you move it somewhere else and then you add some sugar.

00:46:17: And then you sell it.

00:46:18: And it's like, and you sell it for like quite a lot of money, even though there's no alcohol in it.

00:46:22: It's like, I'm kind of feeling maybe we can do better than this.

00:46:25: Yeah.

00:46:26: We make a nice drink that we can drink that's not got alcohol in it.

00:46:30: Yes.

00:46:31: That doesn't involve ultra processed.

00:46:32: Yeah.

00:46:33: Moctails.

00:46:34: Shrubs.

00:46:35: Shrubs are amazing.

00:46:36: Fermentation that aren't alcoholic fermentations.

00:46:39: Herbs.

00:46:40: Yeah.

00:46:41: So I make kombucha every two weeks at home.

00:46:43: Yeah.

00:46:44: It's delicious.

00:46:45: Yeah.

00:46:46: Because you have your own fermentation.

00:46:47: It's not alcoholic.

00:46:48: And then like you, it's really fun.

00:46:50: And of course everybody can be like, it's not that good for you, but it's way better for you than alcohol.

00:46:54: And also if you, you make it, then you bottle it and then you can add different fruits to it.

00:46:59: Why is it not supposed to be good for you?

00:47:01: It's been told as something that has probiotic benefit, but then it's questioned of it.

00:47:06: Does it have that much probiotic benefit because of also there's quite a bit of natural sugar in it.

00:47:11: But again, it depends on how far you ferment it.

00:47:14: So I ferment it till it's dry or close to dry.

00:47:17: And then I add, I add fruit syrups, but I add fruit syrups, but sometimes I add like bitters

00:47:23: and different things like rose water.

00:47:25: And you can make like, I made this one and I did like lavender bitters.

00:47:29: I did a little bit of rose water and then I added like a blueberry syrup.

00:47:33: It was next level.

00:47:34: Like I did another one like a passion fruit syrup that I made, like the next one, or like next round I'm going to do you too.

00:47:39: Like you can actually have a lot of fun with this stuff.

00:47:42: And also like you can make a lot of these things yourself as well.

00:47:46: So it's very, I don't know.

00:47:48: For me, I'm very interested in fermentation in general, but

00:47:51: these can be like very refreshing drinks, but to get back to wine, like we want wine which is maybe not so alcoholic, which is digestible.

00:47:59: It's good with a lot of different food.

00:48:01: Which goes back to indigenous varietals.

00:48:03: Yeah, we often want the kick of alcohol, you know, like a mild kick, you know, but not too much.

00:48:09: I'm going to throw this in.

00:48:12: Is red wine trying to be, are too many producers trying to make too impressive red wines when they should be dialing it down

00:48:19: and making something more drinkable and better value at the bottom end of the list.

00:48:26: It's something I've always thought about.

00:48:28: I went to a very famous two-star Michelin restaurant and it's a Mellier.

00:48:31: He said, "Would you like to drink?"

00:48:33: And Eric, my business partner, said, "Oh, well, you know our palettes, you know, we like sort of freshness, purity and sort of deliciousness."

00:48:41: And she bought us like a 14.5% Collior.

00:48:44: And then he said, "Oh, we can't..."

00:48:46: She got the briefing then.

00:48:47: "Can we go the other way?"

00:48:50: You know, sort of like, you know, sort of like, we don't want to be impressed by the wine we went into drinking.

00:48:54: The next wine was 15%.

00:48:56: And then she could not, she was so respectful of like our palettes wanting the greatest wine she could possibly provide.

00:49:04: She went right up the list and the wines got bigger and bigger and blacker and blacker and bolder and bolder.

00:49:09: And when Eric said, "I think we should just have a beer."

00:49:13: No!

00:49:14: Yeah, and it was like, he said like, "No, look, we'll pay for the wine and no disrespect to you, you're just trying to do your job."

00:49:20: But maybe you didn't...

00:49:21: Oh, then she'd serve the wine for you already.

00:49:23: Yeah, she poured it out and we tried it because she would give us the briefing on the wine and say, "It's from this small producer in the so-and-so."

00:49:31: But obviously the wines on that list were built to impress.

00:49:35: And sometimes you don't, you know, in company, you just want to be there for the food and the company.

00:49:41: And you don't want the wine to be the foreground and the be all and end all.

00:49:45: And you don't want to pay £150 for a bottle of something that you're not really going to enjoy so much.

00:49:50: So I sort of agreed with him and it's happened to me on numerous occasions where I said, "Less, less, less, okay.

00:49:59: Now my palette is ruined because I've got all this tan in my mouth.

00:50:04: This is why I tend to drink white wines or orange wines because, you know, I find I can find the right thing.

00:50:11: Whereas red wines, for me, it comes down to balance.

00:50:15: If it's beautiful, fine, but it's so difficult to find the wine that totally aligns with my mood that some Somali isn't trying to push me towards,

00:50:23: either because it's more expensive or because it's more impressive.

00:50:27: It's so interesting.

00:50:28: I mean, I remember the first time when Eric came to Berlin in, I think it's 2019 when we did the first wine fair and he came to the restaurant where I was consulting and I sort of served him.

00:50:38: I was like, "Oh, what wine would you like?"

00:50:40: And I was so nervous because I was like, I hold this man in such esteem that I was like, "Fuck it.

00:50:46: Also, like he's tasted so much wine."

00:50:48: And then he's like, "Oh, you just picked something for me."

00:50:50: That makes it even more difficult.

00:50:52: No, no, that's like the worst thing you can do.

00:50:54: And I was just like, "Oh, does he not import what he likes?"

00:50:59: And then I'm like, "Could you try to ask questions?"

00:51:01: And he's just like, "Oh, yeah, whatever."

00:51:03: And he's just like, "No, don't do that thing of being really nice."

00:51:06: And actually, I picked the Korab wines from Czechia, from Maravia.

00:51:11: I picked the Saint Laurent from him, which is at like 11.5%.

00:51:14: And I was like, "This isn't a perfect wine, but I love that about it."

00:51:18: And I think they're really pure and they're very authentic.

00:51:20: And I was like, "Maybe he doesn't know it." And he did this.

00:51:23: I was like, "Yes." And it was like, but you know, then he was like,

00:51:26: "And something else." And I was like, "Oh, no, I'm going to go with all the roses again."

00:51:29: But that's the trouble, Eric.

00:51:31: Even if it's by himself, there'll be about eight bottles of wine.

00:51:36: On that note, I think we should draw this conversation to a close.

00:51:41: It's been a really interesting sort of like journey through looking at the issues of pricing of wine.

00:51:49: And the different levels at which we can address this one is the cost of which, you know, it's expensive to make wine.

00:51:59: So making wine has become progressively more expensive.

00:52:02: We've got then the channels through which wine gets through to consumers,

00:52:06: where the costs have racked up, especially when it comes to restaurants.

00:52:10: Recently, we've got higher staff costs.

00:52:13: We've got higher tax rates.

00:52:15: Higher energy costs.

00:52:16: Higher restaurant costs.

00:52:17: So we've got this perfect stone for wine, where wine naturally is being pushed into a more expensive place.

00:52:24: And then the thing is people generally will drink less wine if it's more expensive.

00:52:29: So this is problematic.

00:52:30: But then the other side, we go to the geek end where some of the kind of like the wines that we've really cherished have become famous and sought after.

00:52:40: And so they're too expensive now.

00:52:41: So we have to look elsewhere to find that same sort of geeky Venus hit.

00:52:47: But fortunately, there's no shortage of really interesting wine out there.

00:52:52: I think this is a very exciting time to be a wine drinker.

00:52:54: You just got to have an open mind and a willingness to explore the unknown.

00:53:01: Explore the unknown, yes.

00:53:03: Very well said.

00:53:04: Thank you for tuning in and you can find us on Instagram.

00:53:07: If you're not already following us on Instagram, I'm Emily Harmon.

00:53:12: I'm Jamie Good.

00:53:13: I'm Doug Rake.

00:53:14: Cheers.

00:53:15: Cheers.

00:53:16: Cheers.

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