Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/744999
2 6 V I N E YA R D & W I N E RY M A N A G E M E N T | N o v - D e c 2 016 w w w. v w m m e d i a . c o m w w w. v w m m e d i a . c o m speaking, the cheapest wine wins. Over the past five years, Aussie Shi- raz has been supplanted by Argen- tines making tasty, cheap Malbec. Soon it will be the Chinese, plant- ing hundreds of thousands of acres of vines intended to provide the world with more serviceable wine. If I were writing a business plan today, I wouldn't want it based upon serviceable wine but instead upon something special. I'd want some- thing unique to who I am and where I live. In that way, people who live around me would value what it brought to my community and to my region. Others far away might want to taste my wine because it's unique to my place, and perhaps I'd grow a market for what I made, a market the Chinese (not to pick on them, but you get the point) wouldn't be able to imitate and supplant at lower and lower prices. Today, there's some dissembling about all of this. It seems unfair to pick on a winery in these pages, so let's consider the travails of one distillery: Templeton in Iowa. For years, it insisted it was making its own amazing rye whiskey, and it's inarguable that its rye whiskey was damned delicious. But the truth comes out in our social media era; it turns out that Templeton was buy- ing rye whiskey from MGP in Indi- ana, like many smart rye whiskey producers. Some haven't forgiven the company for this lack of candor. DOING WHAT'S RIGHT There should be truth in labeling. We often look to our government to protect names of specific regions, as other governments often do. But there are many who'd rather keep the government's nose out of their business. The TTB is cur- rently promising to take a closer look at veracity in wine labeling; wines sold only within a state's bor- ders have been labeled in ways that would never pass muster if sub- mitted for COLA approval. Some companies might prefer the gov- ernment to go sniffing someplace else. And with the TTB still reeling from the "sequester" cuts of 2014, it doesn't have the manpower to police these matters adequately. So it falls to wineries to do what's right. And while every win- ery has the right to conduct busi- ness in its own best interests, its long-term prospects are ruled by one imperative: What is your unique proposition? Instead of being just another winery, shopping from the same California broker, why not reflect your own place and community? Instead of pretend- ing to be from Kansas and selling them California, why not just be from Kansas? I live in that state, so I know it can be embarrassing at times to admit you're a Kansan, but how else will we create change? A wine label is a marketing tool. The most powerful marketing mes- sage your label can employ is to tell people who you are and where you come from. We're in an era in which transparency is rewarded and any semblance of duplicity is likely to be ripped apart by the pack of angry vultures collectively known as social media. How much are you willing to offer them your red meat? Doug Frost is a Kansas City author who's one of only four people in the world to have achieved the remark- able distinctions of Master Sommeli- er and Master of Wine. He's written three books, is the global wine and spirits consultant for United Airlines and writes about wine and spirits for many publications. Frost is the direc- tor of the Jefferson Cup Invitational Wine Competition, the Mid-Amer- ican Wine Competition, the Wash- ington Cup Spirits Competition, the host of the Emmy Award winning PBS-TV show FermentNation and is a founding partner of Beverage Alco- hol Resource, an educational and consulting company. Comments? Please e-mail us at feedback@vwmmedia.com. 707~293~6212 KCVINEYARDS.NET SERVING SONOMA, MENDOCINO AND LAKE COUNTIES Vineyard Management • Development • Custom Har vesting A Sonoma County Agricultural Family Since 1853. MIDWEST WATCH DOUG FROST