Breaking Resolutions

Oh, New Year’s Resolutions! We never make them because we can never keep them. Dear Audience and loyal readers will remember our last post where we resolved to be better about maintaining this blog. It is sad; we started that post in early January and only managed to put it online on 22 January.

And now we are starting the second post of the same day. But with the holidays receding in the rear-view mirror, and therefore, with many meals to describe, we must get on with it! We also want to address something else before it slips out of our mind - a comment from you, dear Audience, from great friends. We don’t receive many comments; actually, officially, we receive no comments.

Unofficially, we did hear the Girlfriend make a verbal comment the other day, a positive one touting the blog which was appreciated but did not surprise; loyal readers will remember that her encouragement is partially ‘to blame’ for this exciting blog. We also know that another close friend has Eating/Drinking/Traveling registered on her personal page at www.netvibes.com. Aside from tracking changes in this blog, we are not sure what it can do for you. Maybe the Country Lady will comment (officially) and let us all know why netvibes.com is worthwhile.

But, back to the comment on which we wish to comment. Our great friends, Mr. Sausage and Spouse (Her Grottiness), generously took the time to read posting after posting on the blog between Christmas and New Years. Their reaction was that they found it interesting but hard to follow unless you know the specific wines involved, and continued with the comment that “they’re impossible to find here [New York City] so it’s not like you can follow along as a reader by trying the same wines.”

At first read that seems correct, but in reality many of the wines we drink and discuss are available when they are younger in New York, at least the appellations are if not the specific domains. When they are older, and are ready to drink in our humble opinion, these wines remain available but in more limited quantities and often at very high prices in the US. However, dear Audience, thanks to our sometimes enviable position straddling the Atlantic Ocean, we occasionally have some ideas where one can find certain of these wines at more interesting prices. So as not to bore with mundane details, interested parties are welcome to email us at alawrence@victory-partners.com.

It is completely understandable that great imported wine ‘of a certain age’ is not readily available (even if the 'ladies' who drink it are so!) at reasonable prices in the US unlike in the country of origin. First of all, America has a byzantine system of alcohol importation based on regulation by both the Feds and individual states. In NY, there are licensed importers and distributors servicing the retail alcohol sellers – stores, bars and restaurants. NY is also a state where only one importer is allowed to import a brand. ‘Anti-competitive’ is not the correct legal term; perhaps someone, dear Audience, can write in with the phrase I am seeking.

These licensed importers buy wine when it is released from the vineyards, in other words, ‘very young.’ Now there are some French producers we know who keep a majority of their production at the vineyard to age, but they tend to be smaller producers using very specialized importers to distribute their wine if they export at all. More typically, the importers ship the wines stateside in large quantities and sell it immediately to distributors who resell to retailers with NY State Liquor Licenses. Few, if any, of the importers or the distributors have temperature and humidity controlled warehouses suitable for ageing wine. Living as many of us do in dry, overheated NYC apartments, we certainly understand how difficult it can be to create the conditions needed to age ‘gracefully.’

Additional to the space and technical requirements, there are the economic requirements of ageing wine. The cost of real estate is obvious and not to be forgotten is the cost of electricity, construction and maintenance, but the largest cost may be that of inventory. Decent young vintages can be purchased in volume for $15 – 20 per bottle total cost into the harbor. When we purchase a case for $240 it makes sense to put it down for a few years, but when an importer is buying a thousand cases of one wine for $240,000, a thousand cases of another and two thousand of a third, the cost of inventory becomes overwhelming, especially when the business model is importation.

Luckily for those of us, dear Audience, living in Manhattan apartments so filled with chic bibelots that even a small version of the increasingly available wine refrigerators (they now sell them at Target!) cannot be shoehorned into the space, there does exist condition-controlled wine storage for a reasonable-ish price – think in the neighborhood of one dollar a bottle per month or less. A well-known such storage is located under the Chelsea Markets; another in Long Island City.

A quick summary of tidbits shared here: keep up with blog posts as you best can; wine is always available and often at reasonable prices; keep our email handy; and storage can be costly – drink faster!