Antidote for selfish wines

Love..is..an action?

How many times have you heard your spouse or loved one say these words,”Love is an Action”!? But isn’t it true? When words don’t match the actions, it is certainly a conflict you’ll ‘need’ to pay very close attention to, isn’t it?

We make decisions in our lives based on ‘contradictions’. If pepper doesn't compliment our ice cream as a ‘topping’, we choose chocolate syrup. If our skills at playing baseball ‘contradict’ the necessary skill-set of a ball player, then we make a decision to choose a different vocation. If you have a potential suitor who says “I love you and would do anything for you.” but never sacrifices time for you or can’t tell you the color your eyes, then you might want to reassess that relationship (FAST!).

Expressing love comes in many forms…….and this is my love language to you.

Would allowing that ‘impatient’ person into your lane soften a possible tense moment on the road? Well, would it!?

“The Antidote”
’Sharing tender thoughts with others;
’Willingness to withhold our own pain to comfort another;
’Waiting a moment to allow another car into our lane;
’Sending a gift anonymously;
’Passing a mirror without a glance.”

— The Narcissist by Nicholas Karavidas

Shock factor: Growing up with Lucille ball

‘Shock factor’ and other Lucille Ball Hollywood stunts have the ability to draw our attention fast but if dwelling too long on the ‘attention grabber’, we can easily be offended.

Some of my favorite memories were in the Hollywood Studios where my grandfather worked. A vivid memory is watching the filming of shows with Lucille Ball and my grandfather talking about having coffee with her when she was ‘on set’.

Lucille was famous for doing something “shocking” to get our attention…..and then the story would end with emotional relief as she reconciled with Ricky or her neighbors, Fred and Ethel.

In the 1960’s book, “The Psychology of Color”, an example of bright fuchsia fur coats in a retail storefront draws fast the consumer eye. Looking past the window decor into the store should meet us with warm inviting earth tones, otherwise our split-second psychology tends to offend our senses (say if all the others coats were bright primary colors like ‘canary yellow’).

Fleshing out this idea with ‘branding to raise awareness’ is a sensitivity exercise for a brand marketer.

When we combine ‘reason’ behind our brands and with it serious quality, it aligns our brand stories and helps to ensure that our businesses aren’t based on ‘gimmicks’ or simply capitalistic greed. The result: Enhancement of our capability to give ‘voice’ and social power to our products.

So, unless you live in a vacuum or an unchartered island in the South Pacific, your life is impacted by serious mental issues (whether directly in your family or personal life or daily news channel changing).

THE NARCISSIST ATTEMPTS TO RID THE WORLD OF SELFISH WINES!

“There’s nothing wrong with being anthropomorphic. That’s how we understand the world.”

— Natalie Jeremijenko ~ Associate Professor of Visual Arts, New York University

From Bugs Bunny, to Donald Duck, to Wile E. Cayote, anthropomorphism drives the way we think in modern culture.

The message

We can all relate to the topic of the brand, “The Narcissist”. The likelihood that each of your lives is impacted by an ‘over self-focused’ individual is very high. Sometimes we have a tendency to translate continuous selfish acts as ‘narcissism’ but the topic of this brand, true narcissistic personality disorder, has its roots in cultural philosophy that focuses much more on ‘self satisfaction’, ‘self-fulfillment’ and YouTube’s “Promote Yourself” mentality than in a self-sacrificing mode of life.

It wasn’t all that complicated to promote awareness of narcissism through whimsical descriptions of human character through anthropomorphic language. It was almost as though the challenges were greater in using common descriptions ‘translating’ the exact character attributes of this particular psychological disorder.

How to rid the world of “selfish wines”

The reason beyond the reason….beyond the reason.

I’m a winemaker, second to being a human being….one that would like to make a slight difference in the world…but a winemaker nonetheless.

My daily functions as a winemaker are to create character traits in the wines I produce by agonizing over details such as:

• Vineyard sourcing;

• Developing fluid relationships with the vineyard personnel;

• Balancing environment in the field to insure phenolic development and perfect timing for harvest;

• Insuring that the fruit grown in the Vineyards of Élever consider the balance of environment and health of the workers who labor daily to deliver great fruit;

• Using only the finest of natural fermentation products holding to Vegan, Non-GMO, and Gluten Free to include consumers with sensitivities and convictions;

• Managing the production of wine from pick to delivery to processing to finishing with the least intervention to ‘guide’ the fruit to a beautiful bottle of wine.

These are the goals of any conscientious winemaker. These should be the goals of any conscientious wine supplier…..period.

The Narcissist is sourced from 3 different vineyard regions in Paso Robles. Willow Creek, El Pomar, and San Miguel America Viticultural Areas are specifically the sub-AVA’s my fruit is grown in. I’ve been either overseeing, reviewing, and/or judging wines from Paso Robles for 30 years now and have discovered what I love about each of these areas. Acidic and overall phenolic concentration from Willow Creek Petit Verdot. Concentration and boldness in Cabernet Sauvignon from the El Pomar vineyard, and aromatic enrichment and ‘integrity’ in the Cabernet Franc from San Miguel.

The fruit is hand-harvested at varying ripeness between 24.8 to 25.5 brix and small open top 2-5 ton stainless and 1/2 ton macro-bins with hand-punch downs. No sulfur dioxide is used in the processing until fermentation and Malo-lactic fermentations are complete.

The wine is aged for 20-24 months in mostly French Oak barrels of mixed coopers with a few new American Oak barrels enhancing the berry and sweet aromatic fruit notes in the resultant wine.

This wine is filtered one time at the very end of processing in preparation for bottling with no fining or clarification agents used to clarify the wine for finishing. This allows for minimal filtration in the final prep for bottling and allows the wine to be very ‘giving’ as it ages, enhancing the overall aromatic and textural qualities. This wine qualifies as vegan.

“For evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing.”

— Edmond burke

“Storytelling” is the most powerful way to share an emotional thought or topic.

DRIVING the ‘Point’ home

If the idea of “The Narcissist” helps to encourage one person to ‘allow another car to move into your lane’ without throwing a fit (a suggestion on “The Antidote” back label description of The Narcissist), then one person will have reduced societal stress by ‘giving up their personal (and legal) right to be in that lane’.

The impact of writing this back label was fascinating to me. Every time someone tried to move into my lane with a bit of ‘narcissistic aggression’, all I could see were the words on that blasted back label! Every time I thought about sending my wife a note to tell her how much I loved her, there was another distraction of something “I” wanted to do to keep me from that action.

a “giving” Wine

“The Narcissist” is a product to be sold for profit. Profit, not being a dirty 4-letter word, is what drives economies. Healthy economies are more commonly ‘giving’ economies, and giving economies more often come to the aid of others when the need arises.

The Narcissist has ‘ingredients’. A recipe, if you will. One such ‘ingredient’ of “The Antidote” back label description is “Passing a mirror without a glance”. It raises awareness of our own desire to promote ourselves above all else. Loving ‘ourselves’ is a very good thing, but when we become the center of attention rather than servant leaders, sacrificing for those around us (especially those placed under our care) then our caring becomes more like a thin veil.

If you have ever had a family member or spouse or friend lose their lives young or suddenly, and you never took the opportunity to share with them how much they meant to you (even though they were living their lives in opposition to your desire), then you can relate to The Narcissist. Not just a gimmick to cash in on, but a way to say, ‘yes, I could have done better, I could have given or communicated with more sensitivity, and I’m resolved not to beat myself up over my mistakes but to grow in my efforts to strengthen relationships around me’.

“In the end, I created The Narcissist to combat my own selfishness and to help others combat theirs that there might be a more giving attitude around me, my family members, my children, my business partners, my community and yes, even my country.”

Could you imagine if Zipper manufacturers were taxed $1.25 per Foot of Zipper………how much shorter Zippers would be…..and how many more button manufacturers there would be!!

Zippers, taxes, & Modern Prohibition

Zippers. Would you be surprised if the US & individual state governments placed a new ‘sin tax’ on zippers? Let’s say the tax imposed was $1.25/lineal foot of zipper…., why not?

Why does this question seem so outrageous? Because it is, and so far, we have not had a suggestion of the sort….at least…..yet. I mean, really!? Should every area of life be regulated by government under the single condition that it has a potential to be used irresponsibly, irreverently or illegally? Or maybe the only reason for taxation should be ‘whatever possesses the highest potential revenue for taxation’, that’s what we should tax.

Yeah, there’s a lot of zippers out there….in fact, does a human being alive in the U.S. not posses multiple zippers? Wow! That’s a lot of potential tax revenue…..isn’t it?

For sure, zippers would be shorter and button manufacturing would be a much larger trade (probably heavily unionized).

With Alcohol tax revenue at $70 billion/year, a “zipper tax” could created an additional $10+ billion dollars of tax revenue (considering the U.S. fetish for jeans(!)

Ok, where’s the jump between zippers and the wine trade?

The US and State controls over the production, distribution and sales of alcohol are as antiquated as the thought of taxing a zipper because of the frequency of use and the tendency to use ‘what’s inside’ inappropriately (however that is defined).

Of course, irresponsible consumption of alcohol is not the question. Driving a vehicle under the influence of alcohol and the required regulation to make such behavior illegal is not a question. Producing products with ZERO regulation where the product consumed might be harmful to the consumer is not in question.

The same answer regarding the responsibility to manage what’s inside a ‘zipper’ is the same human responsibility to consume and control behavior consuming alcohol. Drink and drive: go to jail. Assault someone sexually: go to jail (of course, in CA, the law is now changing to suggest ‘rape’ isn’t a violent crime).

Oh, yes. There’s this little reference to ‘products and industries which have higher than normal tendencies for fraud’ as a criteria for greater regulation (such as the gambling industry).

Last but certainly not least, there’s this little thing called “taxes”: $69,000,000,000 (that’s billion) per year of alcohol tax revenue (Federal, state and Local).

The image of handcuffs automatically strikes fear into the viewer. Are modern wine producers handcuffed by regulation or are they free to manufacture and sell products to persons over the age of 21 in America or abroad according their own laws of consumption?

Granholm: Modern decisions to free the modern wine trader

Granholm v. Heald was a Supreme Court decision to override the state controls that were granted with the 21st amendment to the Constitution of the United States. Of course, the alcohol trade previously being made illegal by the 18th Amendment, was ‘freed’ and no longer were alcohol manufacturers held as slaves to the US government….at least in part.

So long as the U.S. and state governments could control (meaning control the means of taxation for the manufacturing of alcohol), then the manufacturing and distribution of alcohol could resume in the United States of America.

Not limited to the 21st amendment, barriers to trade cause spoilage and dumping of countless volumes of wine in the U.S.

“Granholm” was specific to the ‘unfair’ trade controls by state wineries to have a monopoly on the sales of alcohol to consumers within their own state. That a ‘state’ citizen should have the right to purchase wine or other alcoholic products from any producer of wine or alcohol they wish as a ‘direct’ purchase (no different than that of a, yes, you guessed it, a zipper!).

The Granholm decision didn’t ‘fix’ the regulatory issues stifling the U.S. producer/supplier but was simply a stop-gap resolution to hold back even greater controls by government or monopolization of ‘certain’ producers.

The ‘freeing’ of the US wine trader has many tentacles of entanglement to unwind. From barriers of producers and sellers to freely sell their wares as easily as, yes…..say a ‘zipper’, to the trade barriers between U.S. and foreign producers and sellers, there is a crazy amount of regulation involved.

With many regulations seeming reasonable (such as the requirement of a ‘particular’ percentage of grape varietal being required for the resultant wine to be named that grape varietal [i.e.: Cabernet Sauvignon]), there are a myriad of regulations that only encourage greater monopoly by major U.S. & foreign entities.

“There’d never been a more advantageous time to be a criminal in America than during the 13 years of Prohibition. At a stroke, the American government closed down the fifth largest industry in the United States - alcohol production - and just handed it to criminals - a pretty remarkable thing to do.
”

— B. Bryson

When a people cannot control themselves…..we give excuse to our Civil Authorities to regulate us more. Is it time we end the antiquation of modern prohibition?

Wine is legal….or is it?

The recent ‘trade war’ between the U.S. and China directly effected many California producers selling wine into the country of China. When asked what I thought about the challenge of U.S. trade policies that were being inflicted by our executive branch on some foreign wines, the response is simple:

“For the better part of my 40 vintage career, the ‘walls’ of taxes, tariffs, value added taxes, fees and the ‘accumulated costs of exporting U.S. wines to foreign nations’ has be completely upside down compared to the cost of foreign wine products importing into the United States. Before the ‘trade war’ of 2018-2019, it cost 47% to import a wine into the country of China from America. Ask me how much it costs for foreign wine products to import into the U.S. I don’t know how y’all define ‘free and fair’ trade policies, but it’s high time we evaluate the imbalance that is decimating the U.S. wine supplier trade (remembering that the only producers that can benefit from foreign trade barriers are the top 1%).

There are times a tradesman might question whether or not it matters that something is legal or illegal concerning their trade. The ability or inability to freely trade within the systems of that trade are the point to reconcile: Can I as a producer freely and fairly trade the wine I craft into any consumer who desires to purchase my product, either foreign or domestic?

The Great Wall of China: Figurative to the imbalance of trade barriers to import wine into the Country of China. Open boarder for trade into the U.S. vs. Highly restrictive (tax & fees) Exporting of wine OUT of the U.S.

what is free and fair?

It might be an immature or overly juvenile thought to suggest that ‘trading’ in business should have equal regulations concerning the movement of particular products from one geographic area to another.

What does this mean?

If government and the regulation of particular products is to serve and protect the consumer then do the current set of U.S. and state regulations serve, protect, and provide opportunity to the American consumer? If they do not, then should they be restructured to do so?

Rhetoric! Man, don’t you hate it sometimes! What is ‘free and fair’? Is it Something that orange haired politicians use as election jargon?

Or how about a set of policies to support and nurture the businesses and consumers (ALIKE) within the jurisdiction of local and national boundaries?

The simplicity of trade is that the mechanisms of ‘equality’ must encourage the sustaining of local producers. Without this, a weak supplier industry becomes a poor trade partner.

Ok, maybe it’s oversimplified to state that if it costs 20% of the invoiced export to enter into a particular country that ‘fair’ might be that it would cost that country 20% to enter ‘like kind’ consumer or industry goods into the United States (in total accumulated importing costs of taxes, tariffs, duties, fees, value added taxes, etc.).

Shouldn’t trade policies balance and consider the producer and tradespeople within the jurisdiction of the trade before considering the producers from outside the jurisdiction?

Hmmm….if the answer is ‘yes’, then Granholm becomes a bit more challenging. Yup, that’s why it was a 5-4 Supreme Court Decision. Maybe, brilliant minds could concur that there might be localized protections to insure local economies of business development and local employment without ‘locking out’ the consumer of a local state to make decisions to purchase products they prefer outside of their locale? Sound reasonable?

You see, whether we’re talking about local trade or international trade, if a policy weakens the local producer or supplier while strengthening either another related local industry or a foreign industry, then ultimately the local trade will founder.

The foundations of trade policies necessarily focus on whether or not the local supplier trade is strong. Without this, it is impossible for the producer/supplier trade sector to remain a strong international trade partner.

A weak or decimated supplier industry can never become a strong foreign trade partner.

If there is a financial barrier, of any kind whatsoever, upon entry for trading, it is called a ‘trade barrier’.

Who wins when a state or foreign government limits trade?

Good question. Not so easy to answer. Of course, the wine trade is no stranger to trade barriers within its own country.

Try shipping wine from California to a consumer in Utah and you’ll soon discover the challenges to trade.

Try shipping wine from California to India and soon you will discover how big of a trade wall there is for wine entering that country (upwards of 300%).

You see, whether foreign or domestic, U.S. trade policies for wine producers seem almost, well, criminal. OUCH! How can we say this? Because the system of laws encourages greater freedom of trade from outside of the United States than inside.

So why is it that I can sell and ship a pencil or trash bag or flower arrangement, etc. from California to Vermont but I can’t do the same with the bottle of wine I produce?

The license to direct ship wine from California into Vermont is roughly $1,000/year. That means that if I make $5 on selling a bottle of wine I would need to build a business of selling at least 200 bottles directly to consumers in that state just to pay the direct shipping license. This license does not allow me to sell wine to other retailers as that would be a wholesalers license. If I don’t want to go through the difficulties to license a wholesale company in Vermont to wholesale my own product to retailers, then I have to have another license to sell to wholesalers directly in that state.

How much does a license to do the same for a pencil manufacturer or a garbage bag manufacturer, etc. into Vermont. Nothing. You simply make your pencil and ship it to a buyer, whether directly to a consumer or a retailer who wishes to buy your pencil.

Sound complicated? Well, welcome to the United States of oppressive alcohol related regulation.

How Trade Policies have created U.S. infighting

A not so civil war…..just beginning

Over the last 20+ years, trade policies encouraging imports of wine into the U.S. and discouraging exporting of wine products to foreign countries are topics rarely discussed. Why?

Another great question. For whatever reason(s), what has resulted is what some call ‘the decimation of the U.S. producer shelf space by either direct or indirect subsidized foreign products’. OUCH….again!

The consumer is the absolute winner in the scenario of providing very reasonable priced wines on the U.S. shelf from foreign producers giving the U.S. consumer a vast variety of wine choices.

During this 20+ years, the import dollar share of wine purchased from U.S. retailers has grown from less than 10% to over 35% with over $1 of every $3 spent on wine in the U.S. is spent on an imported product. Much of the wine being imported into the U.S. has been either directly or indirectly subsidized by the foreign governments importing wine (i.e.: Australia does not directly subsidize its wine products to the U.S. but with water subsidies by the Australian government [to water the vineyards], the U.S. market would not have been so lucrative for Aussie producers [such as Yellow Tail]).

Not that California wine growers are looking for this kind of support, but it they did have these ‘indirect’ subsidies (not small contributions) there might not be a need to discuss this here on “Purple Happy”!

The US consumer of wine has been the overall winner of international trade policies on wine, some say at the expense of the U.S. wine supplier.

During this last 20+ years, U.S. retailer and Importer business have built into quite a strong voice in this one category: The importation, distribution, and sales of imported wine products.

In fact, this voice has some of the strongest literary voices in the U.S. wine media singing the song of ‘free and open trade’ regarding the recent tariffs placed on French Wine, even organizing a very strong and effective regulatory voice, the “National Association of Wine Retailers”.

It should go without saying that a collective voice for the wine retailers of America is going to produce positive fruit for the both the retailers and consumers. There is no doubt that with such a large membership (I believe over 8,000 members (almost overnight since the threat of foreign tariffs on wine became reality under the Trump administration).

Regarding the impact of imported wine on U.S. grower and wine suppliers, the reality has hit hard over the last several years (if not decade).

One such example is that over the last year, California wine growers have been asked to clear out over 30,000 acres of wine grapes as the supply of California grapes is higher than the demand of California wine.

U.S. Wine Oversupply…..maybe not

In the same year that California wine grape growers were asked to pull out 30,000 acres of vineyards (and another the following year), the imported wine costs dropped 27%. Many believe that this created not only a flood of imported wines, cheaper than U.S. growers and suppliers can produce, but also a wider door for imported products to place a foothold on domestic retailer shelves, further exacerbating the weakness of the U.S. grower and winery supplier.

“If the population of America is growing and the per-capita consumption of wine continues to increase (albeit slowing with millennial age group low consumption), then how do the shipments of California and U.S. wine suppliers decrease?”

1. In the last 30 years, wine consumption in the U.S. has increased every year with the exception of maybe 3 years. Wine consumption in the U.S. is higher today than ever before in history.

2. Vineyard plantings in the U.S. have leveled off and large percentages of aging vineyards have leveled off or dropped in their productivity resulting in a lower supply to demand ratio.

3. The population of the U.S. continues to grow at a pace of adding 1.6 million more people per year.

4. Since 1990, the U.S. per-capita consumption of wine (per adult ‘of-age’ consumer) has grown by almost 1 gallon per person.

   So why does this translate into California growers having to pull out grape because of an ‘oversupply’?

   The answer: simple. Increase of inexpensive imports + High trade barrier expenses of U.S. wine into foreign countries.

   The problem (or at least a significant hurdle to overcome):

   “Internal conflict between the retailers who have built extensive businesses from imported wines over the last 20+ years and the U.S. vineyard/winery suppliers who have increasing costs to produce while foreign competitors have been able to garner support for in various ways, including direct or indirect subsidies to aid their survival.”

   Does the U.S. vineyard & wine supplier have to suffer for the U.S. consumer to win?

Balance. Now there’s a new word. NOT!

It is estimated that the growth of imported wine dollar share of sales in the U.S. has grown from 7% to nearly 37% in the last 25 years.

It is also estimated that if the U.S. vineyard/wine industry could regain only 5% of the import dollar value it has lost to imports, it would have to begin planting vineyards again to keep up with population growth and per-capita consumption increases (assuming they both remain a constant).

One of the great lessons that the U.S. wine trade may need to learn (before this ships rights itself) is that they may need to lose more vineyards and wineries before it realizes that a shortage of wine grapes will ultimately cost the consumer much more for the resultant wine from California. Of course, imports may always be there to fill in the blank but the consumer of California wine certainly will not the winner with rising labor, land, and materials costs for the California and U.S. growers.

I would hate to think that the National Association of Wine Retailers wouldn’t be concerned for this particular potential imbalance, nor would they desire the decimation of the existing California or U.S. wine supplier trade. Much has to come into balance in communications, inclusion of supplier side representatives on the board to insure a trade balance, and reasonable efforts to right the import/export trades to allow the suppliers to get back on their feet.

Lessons from the sandbox: Can U.S. retailers share the wealth with the U.S. & California vineyard and wine supplier industry?

It should be stated that issues such as this do not hinder the top 1% of the wine supplier market (i.e.: the “Big Boys”) but that 1% only represents less than 100 wineries of the 9,000+ in the U.S. What’s more is that 80% of the U.S. wine shelf is controlled (80% of U.S. retailer wine sales) by less than 10 of those U.S. Wineries!

Folks, that leaves 8,990 wineries battling over the last 20% of the U.S. retailer wine shelf.

So, does the consumer have to suffer for the U.S. domestic vineyard/winery supplier wine trade to regain it’s composure?

No. It simply needs to ‘consider’ that there is more than one side to the U.S. wine trade.

Hopefully, a little sandbox lesson will open the eyes of those who wish to keep them closed.

Nicholas Karavidas, Consulting Wine, Intl.

Nicholas Karavidas is owner and winemaker of Élever Vineyards & OneMaker Wines, Principal Consultant for Consulting Wine, Intl. and the Designer of Wine & Food Pairing tool “Flavor Shapes”. 2020 marks 40 vintages of wine production as a winemaker with the majority of his time designing and managing winery designs as well as vineyard and wine family business strategies. If you can’t find Nick analyzing wine, you will certainly find him analyzing his market, reading more on technical topics of wine & wine marketing, the impact of international trade on his craft and last but certainly not least, how to be a better father and husband to his wife Heather, his 6 children and 8 grandchildren.

Old Vine Zinfandel generally promotes mental images of ‘free standing’ vines with no trellis system. Not so in this OVZ example in St. Helena, Napa Valley

“They’re gnarly. Crotchety. Less vigorous. Challenging to prune and harvest. And a little stingy with their production of grapes....”

— Cathy Huyghe, Wine Writer

So ‘older is better’?

What is it about Old Vine Zinfandel that garners attention of both aficionado and average consumer alike?

Could it be that there is still an appreciation for “old” (meaning ‘items of historic importance’ or ‘aged products connoting experience or refinement)?

It it that ‘technically speaking’, old vines (in general, not varietal specific) are ‘self-regulating’ in specific reference to both the reduced quantity of grapes produced as well as the quality, concentration or ‘nuance’ of the grapes they produce?

Finally, could it be that ‘old vines’ simple produce better or more flavorful or characteristic grapes resulting in the same or similar characters of wine?

Answer: Of course, a little of all and yes…yes….and YES!!

Nostalgia dovetailing with historic ranches in wine country California.

In my old ‘Cucamonga days’, the Zinfandels being produced out of California were either thin and light in color (‘white Zin’ had not come into play quite yet) or they were highly alcoholic and lacked balance, expressive fruit, judicious oak aging or a consistency of quality with relatively few producers in the ‘Zin’ game.

Rombauer was launched in that first vintage of mine (harvest 1980) and, although there were obviously producers of Zinfandel from vineyards of up to 80 years old at the time, the main crux of Zin production was more generic red wine blending and still a tremendous volume of ‘jug’ Zinfandel dominating the varietal’s shelf exposure.

It’s funny, but we must remember that it was very common to see Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon selling for less than $10 on the shelf (in fact, our winery tasting room sold Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon in 1983 for $2.95/bottle!).

Cucamonga Peak in the background, this Southern California history bastion of Zinfandel (40,000 acres) is not home to less than 100 acres of total grapevines. This particular vineyard, ‘Lopez Ranch’, is home to the grapes for Carol Shelton’s ‘Monga Zin’.

But Zinfandel, I mean the really great Zin of our current era were not known but in very small circles.

In 1980, wines from Turley (founded 1993), Ravenswood (4 years old in 1980), Rombauer (who had not had a first vintage yet), and so many of the other greats like Peachy Canyon in Paso Robles, didn’t open their doors until 1988. Other standouts must be referenced before moving on as one can NOT engage in a California Zinfandel conversation without speaking of Ridge Vineyards, Seghesio, Chateau Montellena, Renwood, Heitz, Dutton Goldfield, Cline, Chappelet, Pedroncelli, Dry Creek, and Jessie’s Grove (who presents a marvelous representation of what 130 year old vines can produce from Lodi).

The reality is that “Old Vine Zinfandel” is a recent phenom, becoming an industry and consumer ‘sweetheart’ only over the last 35 years……..that’s young….in Old Vine Zin standards!

So is older better? Yes if the vines are cared for with great tenderness and detail. Yes if the vintner pays close attention to natures balance in the vineyard as ‘old vines’ have a tendency to be more susceptible to disease, draught, harsh environmental conditions such as heat waves, etc. Yes, if the grapes are grown in such a manner as to ‘ripen’ the fruit rather than simply ‘dehydrate’ the grape in a desire to gain high grape sugars for higher alcohol wines (still a challenge for some growers and inexperienced winemakers).

Caveat: Saying that ‘older is better’ should read more like, ‘older has a greater possibility of being better only considering the fact that older is self-regulating so ‘older’ vines are as vigorous where younger vines tend to be vigorous and produce larger quantities of lower quality……IF they are not managed is such a way to not over-produce.

Without the color in the photograph, it is impossible to know whether this is 2020 or 1921!

This simply means that instead of the vine regulating itself, the farmer must be the one ‘regulating’ what the young Zinfandel vine produces (involving cluster thinning, more aggressive management of irrigation [assuming not ‘dry-farmed’, another topic for later], and the time period of berry sizing between flowering and Veraison, is managed extremely well so as to not allow the berries to become large, producing lower phenolic concentration [i.e.: color, tannins, and other flavor and aromatic compounds]).

Some might even say that old vine Zinfandel is the ‘lazy winemaker’s’ route to successful Zinfandel production….the vines do the majority of the work with much less management than young vines demand (yup, just like our children).

What ‘old vine is….and is not’

Northern California, from Sonoma to Napa, Lodi to the Sierra Foothills, is the playground of the most sought after Old Vine Zin vineyards on earth.

In the early 1980’s, the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (BATF, now the TTB or Tax and Trade Bureau) began to review the term “Old Vine Zinfandel” as it became a ‘category’ of fine wine label marketing.

I remember my own though process that if I wanted to use that term I could expect either delays on my government label approval or a rejection of my application to get a new wine label approved for use (as all wine label terminology is highly regulated).

After what seemed to be years of debate, the issue slid into the background of the regulatory battles of ‘label law’ as there was not enough historic evidence to determine what exactly “old vine” meant. As an industry, we could not agree or determine what constituted “Old Vines”.

Although it was generally agreed that vines of greater than 25 years would be ‘softly’ considered old (in “grapevine years”) but that it would be up to the integrity of the producer themselves to determine what they would label as ‘old vine’.

Perfectly balanced, perfectly aged: the call to bring Old Vine Zinfandel into the modern age of winemaking

Many years later, in the early 2000’s, the issue came up again as Joel Peterson, known as the “Godfather of Zinfandel” helped to lead an attempt to better define what ‘old vine’ meant in regards to label regulations…..but that attempt fell by the wayside once more.

Most of us agreed (those of us in the ‘Old Vine Business’) that vines became ‘old’ after 25-50 years’ and that vineyards were more ‘ancient’ between 50-100. Rarely are there surviving vines older than 100 but there are several highly sought after small vineyard blocks in California touting over 100 (a few listed below at the end of this article).

One last mention; Old Vine is a term that is generally reserved for very specific vine age that should be no less than 25 years of grapevine age but in reality most expect vines of 50-75 years to consider it ‘truly’ old vine. Again, it does not mean that great Zinfandel cannot be produced from much younger vines but certainly we have witnessed an intense passion of flavor from the respect winemakers have for these ‘old trees’.

Is it the producer…or the vineyard?

Old Vine Zinfandel comes in a myriad of shapes and sizes, such as this Old Vine Zinfandel in the heart of the Lodi AVA on Peltier Ave.

Both……but….it is really the vineyard that makes this category of winemaking so seductive, so alluring, so mysterious and imaginative.

Vineyards such as Lodi’s Kirschenmann Vineyard (owned by Turley winemaker Tegan Passalacqua), Oakly, CA Evenghelo Vineyard produced by Morgan Twain-Peterson (Bedrock Wine Company), or 115 year-old Lytton Springs Vineyard by Ridge become ‘weather patterns unto themselves’ with an magnetic attraction rivaled by few vineyards in California, much less the world.

The gems from California’s ‘vineyard’ based productions of Old Vine Zinfandel lead the topic of wine excellence away from the producers, per se, into the specific vineyards established in history. Families such as the Saini’s of Dry Creek, Russian River McFadden Family Old Vine Zin planted in 1971 (just hitting the 50 year mark), or the Mauritson’s of Sonoma with over 150 years of passion (I’ve read Cameron Mauritson’s Thesis, ‘The Fruiting and Berry Chemistry Responses of Zinfandel Grapes to Cluster Thinning as a testament to the continuing passion of farming excellence in Old Vine Zinfandel).

There is something quite strikingly different about the Old Vine Zinfandel farmers and producers as they have a tendency to be, well, a little different. They tend to not be directed by whims of modern thought (regarding winemaking or farming other than they do hold fast to a technical desire to farm a vine into antiquity). They tend to be a little more reclusive (as growers), and definitely live lives of greater humility, not desiring as much notoriety in a broad sense.

Sunset walks in Northern California Old Vine Zin Country

My friend David Divine (who farmed one of the vineyards in my photographs of the Clements Hill/Dogtown area of Lodi for over 40 years), simply farmed the old vines planted in 1962 (I was 1 year old) without anyone but a few local coffee shop pals knowing who he was or the magnificent work he crafted each year in the head-trained old vine Zin he managed until 2018. This particular vineyard, now owned by Michael-David Winery of Lodi (of the famed ‘7-Deadly Zins’ acclaim), is one of the most meticulously farmed old vine Zinfandel vineyards in the state of California. A prize among prizes.

There is something about Old Vines…..yes, even mysterious and magical, as though ‘stars-align’ when vines (specifically Zinfandel) reach an age where the ‘bark’ of their trunk and arms splinter out phalanges of gnarled protrusions……there’s a chemistry that adjusts when the vine draws liquid through the xylem tissue of its inner workings that creates an intensity, triggering greater berry intentsity in the resultant wines…softer and more voluminous tannins in the finish…..a greater integration of oak barrel chemistry with the grapes phenolic composition.

Yes, mysterious and magical because many of the attributes associated with Old Vine Zinfandel production are unexplainable, that is, that no person scientifically has identified exactly the influences associated with wine produced from these ‘witnesses of the past’.

One of the most striking Old Vine Zinfandel vineyards I have photographed is in the Dogtown, Clements Hills area of the Lodi AVA. This vineyard, now owned by Michael-David Vineyards, is 160+ acres of pure nostalgic bliss!

What i really think about old vine zin

Looking back the 40 vintages of winemaking, my old Cucamonga roots shaped my ideas and gave me a deep appreciation for the challenges and rewards of growing and producing Old Vine Zinfandel.

20 years ago I moved to Northern California and all the while learned a deeper and greater love for the craft of Old Vine Zin…to the extent it became a major focus on my career.

In 2004, I drew on a napkin back a shape that would become a popular wine brand in the US. The 3 letters I drew on that shape, OVZ, I would later attempt to trademark for the company that managed only to find that I had missed the trademark by only 6 months for the acronym to ‘Old Vine Zinfandel’.

Fast forward, a little over a year ago, historic winery operator and Old Vine Zinfandel producer Erich Russel from Russel Family Vineyards (the owner of the trademark I lost the OVZ trademark to), reached out to ask if I would consider collaborating on an Old Vine Zinfandel with him.

Of course, my answer was ‘Hell Yeah!’ and the new design I reworked for Rabbit Ridge Zinfandel O.V.Z is the testament to the history of 2 California Old Vine Zin makers.

The first vintage of this work is represented in our prototype ‘micro’ production that can be found on the onemakerwins.com website and pictured here below.

It’s not Ridge Lytton Springs but for the $28 price tag, we’re very pleased to be dedicating a ‘new effort’ to an ‘old category’.

Listed below are a few of my favorite Old Vine Zinfandels from California…..for what it’s worth!

Unique and visually distinctive is the contrast between uniform rows and the gnarled, non-trellised arms of an Old Vine Zinfandel Vineyards

Nicholas Karavidas is owner and winemaker of Élever Vineyards & OneMaker Wines, Principal Consultant for Consulting Wine, Intl. and the Designer of Wine & Food Pairing tool “Flavor Shapes”. 2022 marks 41 vintages of wine production as a winemaker with the majority of his time designing and managing winery designs as well as vineyard and wine family business strategies. If you can’t find Nick analyzing wine, you will certainly find him analyzing his market, reading more on technical topics of wine & wine marketing, researching the impact of international trade on his craft, wandering around hard to access vineyard sites, and last but certainly not least, how to be a better father and husband to his wife Heather, his 6 children and 8 grandchildren.

Nick’s Picks

Green & Red - Napa Valley

Macchia - Lodi

Turley

Mauritson - Sonoma

Russel Family - Paso Robles