Mark's Wine Blog

I couldn’t be a Southern California Blogger without mentioning the passing of John Wooden this past weekend. Many people are familiar with Wooden’s life and legacy, but he is certainly someone whom I admire both for his professionally accomplishments as well for how he handled his personal life and especially how he treated everyone who came into contact with him.

Some classics from the best college basketball coach ever:

“If you’re not making mistakes, then you’re not doing anything. I’m positive that a doer makes mistakes.”

“It’s not so important who starts the game but who finishes it.”

“Never mistake activity for achievement.”

“Talent is God given. Be humble. Fame is man-given. Be grateful. Conceit is self-given. Be careful.”

“You can’t live a perfect day without doing something for someone who will never be able to repay you.”

“The main ingredient of stardom is the rest of the team.”
“Be quick, but don’t hurry.”
“Sports do not build character. They reveal it.”

Professionally his accomplishments stand by themselves. I can’t even imagine another college basketball program having another run of 10 titles in 12 years. That level of success is unprecedented in any sport, let alone college basketball which has a true tournament system to crown a national champion.

Personally, Wooden not only always showed how much he loved for and cared for his wife (even after her unfortunate passing some time ago) but he also showed a level of class not found often in the sports world. He was consistently supportive of each and every head coach who came after him, you never heard him talking about who should be fired or hired. Although there were times the University would have loved to bring him back, he was steadfast in his insistence that he was only part of the program to help the current coach reach their full potential.

Lastly Wooden treated everyone who he met with respect. He was well known to sit in his same seat at each home game and graciously signed autographs during both time outs and half time. You’d often see a line around the entire court before the game of people of all ages waiting for autographs. Wooden always obliged.

We’ll all miss him both for what he did on the court, but more so for what he did off of it. As much as there has been talk during the past week or two about Midwestern values, he was truly an iconic figure in Southern California and made UCLA the type of household name that it is today.

Pride Mountain Vineyards

During our last trip to Napa, we were able to identify at least 3 new wineries that we’re interested in partnering with in the upcoming months. While we’ll wait until after shipping those wines to talk about them I did get a chance to taste and take a tour at Pride Mountain Vineyards during my time in Napa. Pride’s probably not a fit for any of our clubs, not because of quality but because they are already extremely well known.

Having not personally spent a lot of time on Spring Mountain it was good to get a chance to explore in person, I have enjoyed Pride’s wine on quite a few occasions because my business partner/brother in law has been a club member for some time.

The trip up Spring Mountain starts easily enough. Turn off Highway 29 in St. Helena (one of the cutest small towns you’ll encounter anywhere) and make a right on Spring Mountain Drive. It’s a windy mountain road without services (yes we had gas this time, unlike here or especially here) and the drive up to Pride which sits atop the mountain took the better part of 15 minutes and included a few fun moments like being tailgated by a VW Bug and having a semi truck decide that it needed 3 feet of our lane on a curve. It seemed appropriate to be there on a rainy, foggy day because the GPS had put us into white space well before we found the winery itself.

The tour at Pride is reservation only, although I hear telling them that you have a reservation can sometimes be as good as actually having one and takes about an hour while costing $10 per person. I do believe they will credit that $10 towards one of your wine purchases however.

We started in the tasting room with another couple (from Pennsylvania and Toronto respectively) and were able to taste their Chardonnay which is a solid selection grown in Carneros. It shows hints of lemon, orange and nuts (almond, walnut?) while having a basic sense of acidity. Retailing for $37 I can see a lot of people liking the wine, personally I tend to look for more acidic whites in that range.

After that we were taken to a map of the vineyards at the side of the tasting room which also included a picture of the Pride family. Theirs is, in many ways a quintessential Napa story having moved to Spring Mountain to grow some grapes and retire in relative anonymity. It hasn’t quite worked out that way, in large part because Parker gave their first Merlot a 94 point score. After the short and enjoyable history lesson, we moved outside.

I expect our time outside was shortened quite a bit due to the weather, but our host whose name and business card currently escape me after traveling (currently attending Sonoma State in their Wine MBA program which is very cool I might add) showed us that they have a small example vineyard planted in the front of the tasting room. They plan to let visitors pick a grape off the vine and taste how different it is from grapes you find at the grocery store. I think this is a great idea and should give visitors an even bigger connection to the wine that they find in their glasses.

We then walked toward the caves and learned the most interesting part about the winery…..more tomorrow!

Last marked the first Meet Up that Uncorked Ventures has participated in. Both Matt and I enjoyed ourselves thoroughly and learned quite a bit about how we want to handle our next event. We’re starting to get some feedback from our MeetUp group, aptly named the Peninsula Wine Enthusiasts. A few brief pictures from the event which was hosted at Alana’s in Redwood City, a restaurant that is normally open for breakfast and lunch only so we had this converted Victorian house to ourselves for the event.

Every month or two it comes time for me to make my way up to wine country once again. This month that happens on Thursday morning bright and early. It’s an exciting trip for a couple of reasons. Thursday night brings our first Peninsula Wine MeetUp followed by a Saturday charity tasting event. We’ll also be spending Monday and perhaps part of Tuesday morning of next week visiting wineries.

Saw an interesting short note this morning that Southern Wine and Spirits, the largest liquor distributor in the United States is seeking a 2 Billion dollar loan to get it through these tough times and allow it to restructure it’s current obligations.

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2010/05/07/1177597/southern-wine-seeks-loans-of-2.html

It brings up a couple of interesting, if divergent thoughts for me. To start I think it is in many ways a sign of the times that many companies (and individuals) are carrying more debt then the have in the past. Secondly and perhaps most importantly it doesn’t sound like getting the loan and line of credit is going to be a problem, so perhaps this just presents as a way to both encourage the passage of HR 5034(look we need you to pass this so we stay in business!) while taking advantage of historically low interest rates.

I hope that these type of debt restructuring, which are incredibly common for a company the size of Southern (about 20% of total wine distribution in the United States) doesn’t effect any one’s vote when it comes to HR 5034…..too big to fail is an interesting and debatable concept, but one I do not believe applies here.

As a reminder, I think Southern Wine and other large distributors serve a valid purpose in our alcohol distribution model and they have a ton of quality people working for them. That being said, I do believe that the government should allow other businesses, yes like my own, to compete with them without needing to pay them for the privilege.

Most of my friends and family have noted that I’ve been on my best behavior on this blog, not talking too much about baseball and the first place Padres….well I couldn’t pass this one up.

I’m 100% sure that running on the field isn’t worth the 15 seconds of fame, especially when it includes being tasered, spending a night in jail and a $1500+ fine. Pretty funny though and no, I really don’t feel sorry for the guy since he decided to run on the field.

San Diego Wine Meet Up

I’ve talked about the general lack of good wine bars, wine stores and wineries in the greater San Diego area in the past few months since starting Uncorked Ventures.

Given that situation and a number of friends and family encouraging me to start making a larger push to get our wine into the hands of consumers, we will be taking part in a San Diego MeetUp group in the very near future.

Tentatively titled the San Diego Wine Lovers MeetUp, we’re looking forward to our first first event within the next 30 days or so.

Depending on the response we’ll run them either monthly or bi-monthly and will look toward finding a nice dependable restaurant to host and pour the wine.

Any suggestions? We have a few ideas already, but any helpful suggestions are always appreciated.

Over the past weeks I’ve talked some in this space about HR 5034 and the negative affects it could have both on my business as well as on the wine industry in general.  I know that although this law would in fact cripple the only growth area of the wine industry in the United States (small family owned wineries dependent on shipping directly to consumers) I have to be concerned when I hear Tom Wark who is not only one of the three most influential wine bloggers on the planet, but also the President of the Specialty Wine Retailers Association say that he gives this bill a 30% chance of passing.

To me, although I’m interested in politics, being a registered independent means that I feel like politicians from both sides should be not only willing to hear my cares and concerns, but even court my vote.  My local representative in the House of Representatives is Duncan Hunter, who fits largely with the image of San Diego politics 30+ years ago, being intensely pro military (a very good thing) as well as being extremely conservative socially (personally, I like moderates best).

I wrote him an email explaining my side of the story which can be summed up in the following points:

-Wine already faces more strict shipping regulations then guns or ammunition.

-Does it logically make sense that an under-age drinker wants to wait 2 days to obtain their alcohol, even if we discount the fact that all common carriers (Fedex, UPS, etc) require a person 21 years of age to sign for the shipment?  Wouldn’t it be easier to pay that same 21 year old person to buy the alcohol from the local grocery store?

-The national wholesalers behind the bill have not been able to show a single study to show that direct shipments of wine lead to underage drinking.

-Although the stated intent of this lawsuit is to stop lawsuits fighting state specific shipping regulations, the same sponsors of this bill are currently challenging California’s shipping law in court in this state.  If lawsuits shouldn’t be used by consumers fighting for the freedom to choose their own wine, why can the industry use them?

Please don’t misunderstand my points, I am not asking for the rights to ship to any consumer anywhere without regulation.  I’m simply asking for the right to apply for a permit, pay taxes and deal with consumers interested in my wine and wine clubs.  I believe that freedom of choice should extend to as many states as possible.  If Utah’s consumers do not want to approve direct shipment of alcohol, I can understand that completely, but New York State should not be allowed to violate the commerce clause by allowing their in state wineries to ship to consumer in the state, while not allowing out of state wineries to do the same.

I’m not even saying that I think distributors should go away completely.  We deal with some of these folks on a daily basis and some of them provide an incredible service and the widely distributed wines offer people an entry into the market and help to create a market of consumers that my company, Uncorked Ventures focuses on servicing as their wants and needs change over time.  To be even more clear, there are distributors that do an outstanding job including some of the people at Monterrey Bay, TGIC and even Southern Wine and Spirits.  The employees that we deal with in those companies don’t see my company as a threat, one of the wineries we represent makes 650 cases of wine a year.  Many distributors can’t represent anyone who makes under 10,000 because of their wide distribution channels.

Although I was quite impressed to have received a response from Mr. Hunter I was somewhat disappointed at the content, simply because it seems to include a number of talking points taken directly from the wholesalers.

Response from Duncan Hunter

The bold is my addition to bring your attention to a part which sounds pretty familiar:

According the Wine and Spirits Wholesalers of America:

It is important that states retain their constitutional power to regulate the distribution of beverage alcohol and are able to fend off litigation, which serves to destabilize or destroy that authority. Although we may oppose direct shipping and self-distribution as a matter of policy, our goal is not to overturn existing state laws. We simply believe the proper forum for resolving legitimate differences over these issues is in the state legislatures – not the courts.”

I will additionally point out that aside from the obvious inconsistencies which come up in the Wholesalers statement (how do you have adequate choice when there are 5 national distributors and 6,000 wineries in the United States?) I also wonder why using the courts would be used for such things like integrating schools, the death penalty and literally every social issue of our time, but somehow alcohol distributors and certain states should be exempt from those same challenges.

My overall frustration comes mostly from the fact that the Supreme Court just decided this exact issue in 2005 in GRANHOLM V. HEALD in which the court decided that State or territorial regulations may not facially discriminate, without justification, against out-of-state producers of alcoholic beverages in favor of in-state producers.”

I don’t think it’s asking too much to have a state prove why they need to break the commerce clause before they are allowed to do it.  If they can break it with impunity, what does that say not only for the judicial branch of our government, but the Constitution itself?

Mr Hunter, all we’re asking for is a fair playing field, one which is already accorded to our competitors which are based outside of California.

Enjoyed the most recent video in regard to the direct shipping of wine, yes it’s a bit over the top, but pretty funny none the less.

Enjoy!

At Uncorked Ventures we’re happy to announce that we’ve partnered with both Alana’s Restaurant, the Redwood City location and our favorite South African wine importer Smith Wines to bring another wine tasting Meet Up to the Bay Area.

Wine Tasting Flyer copy [Converted]

Alana’s will be hosting our initial meeting on Thursday May 13th at 7pm.  The cost is $20 per person to attend, which will allow you to try some outstanding value wines from producers both near and far.

Hope to see some of you there!