Do Wine Lovers Improve
with Age?
Courtesy of
30 Second Wine Advisor
By
Robin GarrA pair of recent news stories about fine wine
and marketing have me shaking my head and wondering whether they
could both be right.
First came the not-so-surprising news that members of the Baby
Boom generation are virtually supporting the wine industry. "Aging
like fine wine," the Los Angeles Daily News headlined this story.
"Baby boomers are turning their interests and wallets to the fruits
of the vine."
The Baby Boom generation - the huge cohort of children of World
War II veterans, born between 1946 and 1964 - accounts for "the bulk
of serious wine drinkers in the United States," Associated Press
reporter Lisa Singhania wrote from New York on March 31, attributing
this statistic to "industry and research groups."
Fair enough.
But then the wire services transmitted a surprisingly similar
story by Washington Post reporter Kimberly Edds. Headlined "Young
wine drinkers could revive industry," this report finds great wine
enthusiasm among "the millennial generation," which Edds defines as
the 21- to 26-year-old set. These 20-somethings, Edds announces,
"are trading their beer and liquor shots for Zinfandel and Pinot
Noir at startling rates when they hit the town, or even the living
room couch. And that has wine industry players buzzing."
The Baby Boomers story marshals statistics to suggest that wine
enthusiasm increases with maturity, prompting analogies with fine
ageworthy wines. Americans in their 50s consumed an average of 16
bottles of wine in the year 2000, closely trailed by 60-somethings
drinking an average of 15 bottles and people in their 40s drinking
an average of 14 bottles of wine that year. The 30s cohort, in
contrast, trailed badly with an average of only 10 bottles,
according to the wine-industry research firm MFK. (Careful observers
will note that those of us who enjoy good wine and drink it
regularly are far above average in any case.)
"Baby boomers tend to have a taste for handcrafted products, for
premium products. They're willing to spend," said Vic Motto,
founding partner of MKF Research.
A lack of interest in wine among younger adults could spell a
long- term problem for the wine business, but the Washington Post
report suggests that a growing cohort of younger wine enthusiasts
could be good news for the industry.
"The rapidly increasing influx of new wine drinkers, coupled with
a recovering national economy and a dwindling of the vast oversupply
of grapes in recent years, could turn around the $14 billion
California wine market, which accounts for more than 90 percent of
the wine produced in the United States," reporter Edds wrote.
John Gillespie, president of the non-profit trade group Wine
Market Council, was quoted in both articles. "Boomers came to wine
as much as a reaction against the three-martini lunch of their
parents as to create a statement of their own," he said in the first
story. "Virtually every taste and lifestyle choice made by the
boomers in the 1970s was something to set them apart from their
parents ... whether it was bell-bottoms, flower power or wine."
Commenting on the growing interest by young adults in wine,
Gillespie said, "If we're just seeing the leading edge, the tip of
the iceberg, then we are in for a tremendous upsurge."
I don't know about averages, but from my vantage point, based on
E- mail from readers and participation in online and real-world wine
communities, I see plenty of graying-haired contemporaries and lots
of young adults who don't take second place to their elders in
enthusiasm, knowledge or passion about wine.
But I suspect that wine-industry professionals, fully conscious
of criticism of the tobacco industry for allegedly targeting
youngsters in their marketing, will bend over backward to avoid
similar charges. Don't look for a "Joe Chardonnay" cartoon character
in wine advertising any time soon. |
