I am technically a millennial (although towards the beginning of the loosely defined millennial window), and the component I struggle with the most is just how few other millenials there are to share wine with. All of my wine friends are getting on for at least 10 years older than me and in many cases 30 years older.
I do not buy that spirits have a greater popularity over beer as that article asserts, spirit consumption is increasingly down among my group of friends, and craft beer has gone up. The availability of craft beer increasing dramatically over the last 10 years would agree with that too - I don’t think we’re seeing generation X sitting in a bar much these days, vs their millennial counterpart.
As for the cost of wine…Napa has been out of reach for millennials for years and that’s nothing new. I don’t buy Napa unless I get lucky and come across a deal, and despite living in CA, travelling there does not appeal to me in the way that say Paso Robles or the Willamette Valley does. There is a swathe of local and foreign wine that is not only significantly cheaper, but at least equivalent in quality.
The idea of having an average bottle cost exceeding $100 in a region is bonkers to me (this is an assumption on my part, but I rarely read a positive report on a Napa wine that is sub $100). Somehow, and I realise how silly this statement sounds but it is absolutely the truth, Burgundy is more accessible to me than Napa.
The tasting experience criticism is in my view, a bit of a churlish diversion of the problem. The most valuable tasting experiences for me are those that are real. I want to speak to the winemaker, I want to see the barrel rooms and I want to learn about what goes on behind the scenes - the activity that makes the bottle possible. I would argue that anyone who is entirely satisfied merely by being treated like a king in a fancy room with a rep that’s internally gagging over the thought of selling 3 bottles of $500 wine to them, is the problem. There’s no interest in authenticity or understanding - just a recognition of a massive bill and how impressive that is to their guests.
But, all that being said, I am buying wine, probably significant amounts for someone in my age range that would put me in the very top percentiles. You don’t catch me buying Rousseau or Maybach though, and that’s for good reason.
I do find the blame game on millennials quite tiresome - I’m not sure how key markets of wine being inaccessible and uninteresting means we are ruining it.