The Other “Emperor’s Clothes”   
also Revealed to be Invisible

Everyone who has walked up to a bar and ordered a “glass of Chardonnay, please” is aware of the explosion of interest in wine in the last decade. As interest has increased, the interest in varietals also increased and we then learned about Cabernet, Pinot Noir, Sauvignon Blanc, Zinfandel, Merlot, Viognier and more.

It no longer became acceptable to show up at a house party with a bottle of now “Dreaded” Sutter Home White Zinfandel. In fact in areas like Westlake Village and North Ranch, it became low rent to arrive with anything that didn’t carry a 90 or above Wine Spectator rating. In many cases, table talk centered around who had the best cellar of Opus verticals. One began to wonder from where all those great palates came that could only drink $100 bottles of wine.  I must admit that for awhile, I was an active player of the game.

But then reality started to set in and it became clear that for all practical purposes, production of Napa Cabs such as Screaming Eagle, Bryant Family and others were so tightly controlled that they really were as invisible as the Emperors clothes; and as much of a figment of one’s imagination. The prices then were a factor more of this limited supply and  “grape expectations” than levels of real sensual satisfaction.     

Globalization of wine also then set in. The majority of the sophisticated and aware middle and upper middle class consumers learned about wines from Australia, Chile, Italy, the Rhone Valley  along with  domestic reality vintners such as Columbia Crest and Castle Rock. These wines were on sale for $12 or less and measured up to $30-$50 and up bottles of French or Napa wines. It was then that it was clear that these Emperors  of wine were wearing little or no clothes.

This vision was recently reinforced by a survey in the Wall Street Journal that provided total retail sales and winery production of California wines for 2003. When you do the quick math, you come up with the fact that the average price of 750 ml of our wine is……… under $5. When you knock out $2 Chuck, Jugs and White Zinfandel, you conclude that the real wine industry is actually in the $10-20 category…… max.

Blind tastings over the recent years continually validate that most higher prices are hard to justify. $10 to $20 is all that most palates can recognize and need to spend. Where have you heard that before?

Now what is the Conspicuous Consumer to do? Well, Reidel of Austria  quickly offered to solve  his dilemma with specially made wine glasses for each varietal. They claimed and the CCs bought the fact that each type of wine required special nuances. If you do more quick math on this for a set of 8 glasses per varietal at $20-50 per, you come up with the ability to spend about $3,000-5000 on these fragile glasses. Speigelau offers a similar selection of Austrian glasses for about $8 per glass. Still a bundle.

We don’t deny that a nice large concave bowl aerates red wines while holding the aroma, that a smaller glass seems fitting for most white wines and a flute is crucial to observe the bubbles of champagne. But that’s about it.

Reidel, to justify their high price, claims that their glasses guide the wine to the portions of the tongue that are most sensitive to the individual sensory pleasures. I cannot deny that there is some sense of super luxury in drinking wine out of these large attractive glasses. But tongue guidance? Give me a break!!!.

We’ll make this short.  Gourmet Magazine was also skeptical. They conducted a rather scientific blind taste testing using Reidel glasses and any other glass with a similar wall thickness. They also interviewed tongue medical people. It’s true.

Quickly… the blind tastings concluded that the wine tasted the same in Austrian Reidel glasses as a glass from Cost Plus from Taiwan… if you could not see the glass. The tongue doctors stated that tongue compartmentalization was pure fiction. Under pressure, Reidel himself,  admitted that maybe he had embellished the truth a bit.

Punchline:  As with wine known to be expensive, drinking out of glasses known to be expensive, produces those same “GRAPE EXPECTATIONS”.  And perhaps as with many other exotic things in life, these expectations are as important as the actual final experience. So to some, the price makes no difference.

But for the other 99% of us there is the same sensual satisfaction opportunity at perhaps 1/10^th the total price. Costco, the world’s largest wine retailer is now importing Austrian wine glasses in the key thin wall shapes that make sense.  Each glass is $3.95. Just pour in some California Castle Rock Pinot Noir or Guigal Cotes du Rhone or Rosemount Cabernet or Volpaia Chianti Classico Reserva from recent and readily available superior vintages; you too can be an Emperor,  but you will still have your shirt on.