The Art of Making Milk

Huge Johnson and Tom at Fermentations already took some swipes at this article, so here's my two cents. For the record, I was going to pipe off on this one last night but chose to wait, gather my thoughts, and then drop the hammer. Further proof that this sphere o' blog is the place to come for 'real time' commentary and review.

The world according to Gallo

Let me say from the get-go that I afford the house of Gallo a great deal of respect. This is not because I am necessarily a fan of any of their wines, I am not. But one cannot think of wine in America without including the brothers Gallo, Mondavi, and Kendall-Jackson. Without these three, it simply would never have happened. Okay then, enough with the accollades. Let us move on to everything that is wrong with this company:

"French wine is the gold standard," says Gallo, noting that his research shows that American consumers consider it the best wine in the world. But they're drinking less and less of it because it's too hard to understand, Gallo says. It is a pattern of declining consumption that holds true with French wine drinkers in France as well, according to Gallo."

The first statement is absolutely true. While there are good wines being made in every corner of the globe, the is no one country that produces so many grape varietals with attention and repect to terroir at such quality levels. Not one. Secondly, how ironic is it that the wine country presumed to be the best in the world is also the most misunderstood? Why is this? I can only assume that it is two-fold:

1. Somebody, somewhere, told somebody else that the French are the best and the recipient of this information took it blindly as fact.

2. The average American consumer doesn't speak French, probably has some disposition against them (for non-wine related reasons), more than likely couldn't pick out France on a map, and is perfectly content living their entire life this way.

Okay, so that's more like five-fold, but I hope I made my point. I will grant that some of the names used on French labels can be difficult to pronounce but how many of you reading this are fluent in Chinese? And even if you speak Chinese (Mandarin), how many other dailects can you speak? When it comes to confusion, the French don't hold a candle to the Far East. And speaking of east, let's see what Old Man Gallo has to say about France's neighbor, Italy:

"With Italian wine, says Gallo, there's a similar paradox. "Americans love Chianti. They just don't like the way it tastes." The romantic image in consumers' imaginations doesn't fit with the dry, acidic wines they've had to drink. So, again, they are buying less and less of it, says Gallo's market research."

Seriously, I am about to pull my eyes from my skull. What the hell does this mean?!?! My take is that people think they like Chianti. This is because it is a word that is relatively easy to pronounce. It is a word that they have heard before, one that they are comfortable with, and it was in that movie with that dude and the fava beans. (An aside, Hannible Lector should have been imprisoned simply for the gross mis-pronunciation of the word.) But alas, when you get the wine in the glass, 'what the hell is this?...it don't taste like no Mare-low I ever had!' You know why, because it isn't. And why should it be? This is precisely why California and Australia pump out billions of gallons of 'fruit bombs' for the monkeys every year. In this way of thinking, I suppose the vast numbers of Taco Bell's popping up all across the fruited plain should be proof that 'American's love Mexican Food'? My ass! Put a plate of molé and nopales in front of John Q. Jackass and watch him lose his shit.

"As it did with its first Italian wines — Ecco Domani and Bella Sera are the alpha and beta tests of this international strategy — Gallo chose not to put its name on the imported bottles or the marketing materials. They're Gallo wines, but they don't say Gallo."

This is both brilliant and scary at the same time. On the one hand, if people see the word Gallo, the automatically (and somewhat rightly) assume the bottle to be crap. But slap an 'inticing' name in a foreign language on the label and sit back and count the cash. Maybe the French need to hire some PR firm here in the states and start cranking out radio commercials. Maybe instead of the old "It's going to be a beautiful night, or as they say in Italy, a 'Bella Sera'", it could go something like this:(set to the tune of the Stealer's Wheel classic)'Seas of marginal wine to the left of me, rivers of poo to the right, here I am, drinking Entre-Deux-Mers with you'. Just an idea...

"Importing an initial 250,000 cases of Red Bicyclette at the end of 2004, Gallo single-handedly stopped an eight-year-long slide in the sales of French wine in the United States, says Fredrickson."

This is again impressive and scary. Imagine what could happen if Gallo (or any of the 'big boys') took it upon themselves to set about educating the 'general public' instead of dumbing it down for them? How cool would it be if Gallo would sponsor French and Italian classes across the U.S.? Of course, if Coca-Cola and Pepsi took half the money they spend on advertising and simply gave to the victims and countries that suffered the recent tsunami, South East Asia would be re-built in about a week and a half.

"Why shouldn't we?" responds Gerry Glasgow, Gallo's head of marketing for 23 years. "If we can make wine more appealing by removing the things that some people find objectionable — acids and tannins — then that's what needs to be done."

With all due respect Mr. Glasgow, here's why: Because it is counter to all things wine. Of course, that is assuming that you are in the business of making wine. And after reading this article, it is obvious that 'making wine' is probably the last thing on your mind. No, this is about the dollar. And while I am a 100% red blooded American and damned proud of it, it is actions like this that promote the 'Ugly American' image that gets thrown about all too often.

All right Glasgow, bring it on home:

"Too many Americans have been humiliated when they were ordering a bottle of French wine in a restaurant," continues Glasgow. The difficult-to-pronounce names, the confusing labels — both remind Americans of their preconceived notion that the French are condescending and arrogant, he says."

Thanks. First, any person working in a restaurant that cops some sort of attitude when serving a bottle of French wine should be drawn and quartered. Secondly, I know it's kind of hard to imagine but some one from France trying to get to 'The Motor City' would have one hell of a time getting directions to 'Day-twa'. How's that for confusing. And lastly, the French (at least the ones that I have met) aren't condescending or arrogant at all. No more so than your average American who can't wrap his brain around anything more than a bottle of Bud and some grotesquely large piece of beef on a crappy bun.

Damnit!!