California Dreaming...
26th May 2017
We just received a smart and expensive brochure of the "California Collection 2017". It's a selection of the best 50 wines (from a tasting of 150, all in the UK market with large or specialist importers) selected by a panel of independent wine merchants as suitable to be sold by independents. The gushing introduction, written by a good man who should know better, closes: "..right now it seems to me that California has never been better placed to serve the UK's independent trade". Well, I looked at this selection: the average recommended retail bottle price is £29.56.
What planet are these people on? Some of these wines might work at the long-term £:$ exchange rate, which is 1.60, but at 1.25-1.30? ...forget it. I know one should not compare apples with oranges: we buy very little wine from UK wholesalers and source and ship our own wine whenever we can, but around that price (remember, the average for the Collection), you can buy Cote Rotie, Pomerol or Savigny 1er Cru, Barolo or Brunello, and for a lot less some really great wines from the Cape, Chile or Argentina. Whoever financed this exercise must be sitting on a lot of stock....
