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Large Wineries Dominate
Courtesy of
30 Second Wine Advisor
By
Robin GarrFor those of us who admire the work of
small-farm wineries and artisanal producers and enjoy nothing more
than discovering a tiny one-person winery housed in a barn or garage
and producing a few barrels of wine every year, here's a cold splash
of reality: These hand-made wines that we love represent only a drop
in the world's ocean of wine.
Virtually all the wine made in the world every year comes from
major, industrial producers. Considering large-scale wineries in the
United States alone, an extensive recent study by the trade
publication Wine Business Monthly is instructive. It was published
earlier this year, but I just ran across it recently and thought it
was worth sharing with you today. (A link to the full article online
appears below.)
Wine Business Monthly compiled a list of the 30 largest U.S. wine
producers, published them in order, and featured interviews with
principals of each, including their opinions about the state and
future of the wine industry.
The top three producers alone sold well over two-thirds of all
the wine sold in the U.S. the previous year: Giant E&J Gallo led all
the rest with 75 million 12-bottle cases, with nearly-as-gigantic
conglomerate Constellation Brands catching up with 66 million cases,
and San Francisco's The Wine Group following with a "mere" 25
million cases.
Wine Business Monthly reports that the top 30 producers make
fully 90 percent of all the wine sold in the U.S. In fact, by my
calculations, the magazine's totals for these producers alone add up
to 240 million cases a year, which is actually a bit more than the
U.S. Treasury Department's report of 237 million cases produced in
the U.S. in 2001. This discrepancy is apparently explained by the
presence of some imported brands within the U.S. producers'
portfolios, like Gallo's big-selling Ecco Domani brand (from Italy),
Brown-Forman's Bolla (Italy) and the wine feature in today's tasting
report below, Kendall-Jackson's Calina from Chile.
If you're at all interested in wine industry facts and figures, I
think you'll enjoy browsing the full Wine Business Monthly report on
the "Top 30," which is
online here.
For your information, here's the magazine's listing of top
producers, in order by cases sold during 2003:
1. E&J Gallo (75 million total cases)
2. Constellation Brands (66 million)
3. The Wine Group (25 million)
4. Beringer Blass Wine Estates (11 million)
5. Bronco Wine Company (10 million)
6. Robert Mondavi Winery (9.7 million)
7. Trinchero Family Estates (8.3 million)
8. Brown-Forman (6 million)
9. Kendall-Jackson (5 million)
10. Diageo Chateau & Estates (3.25 million)
11. Stimson Lane (3.2 million)
12. Allied Domecq Wines USA (2.5 million)
13. Heck Estates (2.1 million)
14. Delicato Vineyards (1.5 million)
15. Golden State Vintners (1.3 million)
16. Phillips-Hogue (1.2 million)
17. C. Mondavi & Sons (1 million)
18. Peak Wines International (700,000)
19. Ironstone Vineyards (700,000)
20. J. Lohr Winery (700,000)
21. Chalone Wine Group (670,000)
22. Don Sebastiani & Sons (640,000)
23. Bogle Vineyards (600,000)
24. Rodney Strong (500,000)
25. Barefoot Cellars (500,000)
26. San Antonio Winery (500,000)
27. Hess Collection (450,000)
28. Round Hill (350,000)
29. Domaine Chandon (320,000)
30. Wente Vineyards (300,000)
For today's tasting report, let's turn to the ninth-largest
producer - Kendall-Jackson Wine Estates - for this modest but
quaffable red wine from Calina, one of the California conglomerate's
Chilean properties. Carmenere, as you may recall from our Wine
Tasting 101 feature this past March, is an ancient grape variety of
Bordeaux, no longer produced there but recently rediscovered in
Chile, where it had been mistakenly identified as Merlot for
generations. It's Merlot-like, but boasts a character all its own. |
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CALINA 2001 MAULE VALLEY (CHILE) CARMENERE RESERVE ($7.99)
This wine is inky dark-purple in color, almost black in the
glass. Warm, plummy fruit aromas are surrounded with smoky, toasty
scents of oak. Fresh black plums and blueberries rise up with
swirling and carry over intact on the palate, where ripe, juicy
fruit is joined by lemon-squirt acidity, with spicy oak as an
accent. Warm and fruity, it's an approachable wine, frankly made
more in the style of an international-style "glass of red" than a
wine that speaks of its land or grape of origin. But it's nicely
structured and balanced, enjoyable to drink, and it's hard to
quibble with that for $7.99. U.S. importer: Kendall-Jackson Wine
Estates Ltd., Santa Rosa, Calif. (June 6, 2004)
FOOD MATCH: Fine with a turkey thigh long and gently
grilled in warm hickory smoke, Texas barbecue-style.
VALUE: As noted, it's more a "glass of red" than a wine of
varietal or territorial interest, but shows excellent balance and
structure that raises it well above its low-end price.
WHEN TO DRINK: May not evolve in the cellar but should
keep for another year or two.
WEB LINK: The Calina Website, operated by Kendall-Jackson,
is online in English:
http://www.calina.com
FIND THIS WINE ONLINE: Very widely distributed in the
U.S., Calina should be easy to find in local retail shops. See also
the Website (linked above) or check prices on
Wine-Searcher.com.
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