I’m 28 and started about 4 years ago. I think $$ is the largest factor. Wine is expensive and a lot of under 30 year olds are in a different lifestyle place (financially, family-wise, etc.) than those of us youngsters around here.
College and law school aren’t that far in the past for me. Back then if I had any wine at all it was likely an inexpensive Malbec from Argentina bought at the local liquor store. But more often, it was cheap beer or mixed drinks (“cocktails” would be too generous a term).
Now, more and more of my college and law school friends are into wine. They aren’t buying Ganevat and Overnoy just yet, but one has to start somewhere.
My generation (I just rolled over 30) has a lot more economic uncertainty than previous ones have had at the same age. We also live in a time of glorious access to alcoholic drinks, and can have our pick of the lot at Trader Joe’s. And, given the prices involved for any sort of serious connoisseur, the choice is stark. For $5 a glass, you can drink the finest beer in the world. There are plenty of excellent bottles of wine out there that come out to $5/glass, but none of them can be called “the best in the world.” Thus: lots of young beer snobs, not so many young wine snobs.
I’ve got a cellar full of really interesting (to me, anyway) long-term prospects, and I can’t give them away to friends. Developing a taste for something that isn’t a CA fruit bomb takes time and money, and most people my age that I know aren’t willing or able to devote the resources to it, so my offer to pop one of Bedrock’s SVDs gets a response like, “Hey, yeah, this is pretty good… have you ever tried Seven Deadly Zins? You’re a wine guy, I bet you’d love it!”
The OP’s assertion that young people shy away from wine isn’t supported by the facts. There’s lots of data that suggests wine is seeing a resurgence with young people - they’re gravitating towards it, not shying away.
Not sure 2,027 people is a good sampling to state such facts with high confidence. But I’m not a stat type of person so maybe someone a little more up on these things can say with more certainty.
Survey Methods
Results for this Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted July 10-14, 2013, with a random sample of 2,027 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.
(edit: and since you have to be 21 to legally drink in the USA, not sure how that may skew the stats)
Hey, I like these monickers on our young uns with great palates.
Also, try to picture Salil “the rajah of rhone-and-riesling” Benegal doing the same.
Completely agree. I’ve found myself in this situation a few too many times.
It’s weird that the 18-20 age group is a part of that study…regardless, even with the increase in the 18-29 bracket, you still have ~75% of adults in their 20s preferring liquor or beer. I think this sampling absolutely confirms that young people still shy away from wine.
Plenty of places by me where the cheapest wine on the BTG list is $9 and it comes from a bottle that retails for $7. Meanwhile you can get a good craft beer for $5 or $6. Definitely doesn’t encourage people to experiment.
Andy, you really need to search the QPR threads here if you think you need to spend $35-65 for a “decent middle end bottle of wine”…
But that is fairly easy for those of us in the “know” about wine. We’re talking about those young people just starting out. They aren’t likely to get on a wine board and spend lots of time searching out the odd bottle that is a great deal for not too much money that they have to have mailed to them from some far off store. Most are walking into their local grocery store, maybe liquor store, or even some small not so great corner wine shop and buying wine. In that realm most wine under that amount isn’t all that good. It’s the mass produced, over priced, not very good stuff…generally what we would consider poor QPR.
Yes, that is what I call the “impenetrability” problem. You can buy La Crema for $20, or you can buy something really interesting for $20. But the really interesting wine will be hard to find, not advertised, and most likely not known by the store personnel. You have to really do your homework, and put in some leg work, to find the small-production artisinal wines that are often cited in the QPR threads. In addition, it is extremely challenging to find interesting wines at even the best wine stores in Houston, which is of course a major city. Once you get outside of NY/CHI/LA/SF, it becomes pretty hard to find the QPRs that people talk about. In fact, it’s a huge frustration for people. I will open Pepiere Briords or Lauer Barrel X or Vissoux or Clos Roche Blanche and tell people that they can be found for less than $20, but with some exceptions the only way to get wines like those here is to order them from out-of-state retailers. Or for domestic wines, most of the interesting bottles out there you have to order direct from the winery; you can’t just walk down to your local store and find Bedrock or Rhys or Dirty & Rowdy. But ordering wine and awaiting shipment is not something most people are willing to do, and of course shipping charges eat into the QPR factor pretty quickly.
This thread is kinda opening my eyes to how many young wine enthusiasts we have on this very board.
to the OP’s question, I can only answer based on my own experience, and the experiences of friends and family that I have witnessed:
Wine is intimidating; it is confusing and expensive, and it is very easy to spend any amount of money and get a bad bottle of wine. Not to mention the somewhat Snobby image that many folks still have of wine enthusiasm. That said, I do get the sense that fine wine is more popular with “young” folks now than it used to be; as our country’s culinary culture continues to evolve and become more refined, so does our country’s appreciation for fine wine. Even the craft beer culture in our country, which is by all accounts thriving, will ultimately contribute to an uptick in wine appreciation, if it hasn’t already — as many folks get into craft beer, they start to explore beer/food pairings; the natural progression from that point, it would seem, would be wine/food pairing.
The “wine is expensive” argument certainly holds some merit, but as a 34-year-old I can say that I spent my early 20s drinking $7 aussie shiraz and spanish grenache with great zeal, and a lot of those wines have barely budged in price. (Columbia Crest Grand Estates Cab Sav was for special occasions–$10, y’all!)
Those wines tasted good, too!
I think you can always find gateway wines. But certainly I agree that wine can be hard. I still tiptoe around the German section at my local shops, and I’m into this stuff.
There is a virtual sea of perfectly drinkable and enjoyable wine to be had inexpensively these days. Everyone has to start somewhere.
Sorry, I should have been clearer in my point. Lots of data out there (beyond just Gallup) which suggests there is a significant trend upwards of young people moving towards wine. I certainly agree that more young people drink beer and spirits than wine (count me as one of them when I was in my twenties).
hey charlie - we should see if todd can open a “wine drinkers in their 30s” subgroup!
Tons of people under 35 drinking wine - actually more than ever before…
Number of those people interested in points, cult wines, collectibles etc. - VERY small %
Scott – there are whole college classes devoted to Marketing to Millennials in the Sonoma State wine program, with a professor there that seems to be making a name for herself with the subject. There are plenty of numbers out there that show Millennials to be the next great wine drinking generation, however while the desire to drink wine may be there, the personal wealth just isn’t. Millennials are WAY far behind where previous generations were at the same stage – too much debt and not making enough money yet.
Millennials have been painted as the wine industry savior – and that may be the case in 15-20 years – however that really hasn’t happened yet, unless you are moving <$10 bottles.
Just spend a weekend in Santa Barbara’s Funk Zone, and you’ll see how many young people are out drinking wine.