GuytheGrape

Things are changing in the world of volume wine trading which makes my job quite interesting at the moment. A series of factors have come into play that mean that wine as a whole is going to become a bit more of a luxury item for most people rather than the first thing that they thoughtlessly reach for from the fridge after a hard day at the office. This is not just down to high taxation although this plays a part. What used to happen was that if the price of something like Chilean Cabernet went up because a poor harvest or more likely foreign exchange movement, then buyers would just drop it and move onto whatever else was cheap which could be Spanish Tempranillo or California Merlot, it didn't matter.   For years there has been over supply particularly from the European powerhouses of France, Italy and Spain. Growers have been desperate to get anybody to buy their grapes but also with the full knowledge that if nobody did then a friendly EU official would com...

Solutions to what exactly?  I rarely feel the urge to rant on a blog. Actually, I rarely feel the urge to rant full stop.In a nice gentle way I have vines, winemaking and cider to write about . If people are interested then that's lovely but I suppose that I write the stuff mostly as my way of recording what changes on the farm.As a middle aged Englishman I obviously have an inbuilt genetic hatred of people who throw litter out of car windows and of people that queue jump but that's unavoidble. In my day job I get to write quite a lot of copy for products whether it's for back labels, websites or press releases. I enjoy it but there are those lazy lazy words and phrases that you could so easily slip in to save having to use a single brain cell, it's so tempting but you know that you would feel ashamed and unclean afterwards. Authentic - as in, Authentic Italian Pizza produced in Germany/Ireland Edgy -   any product aimed at middle aged people trying to believe...