Interesting Blog Post by Kevin McKenna (Louis/Dressner)

[Markus_S]

Okayyy, so has anybody here actually tried La Singulière? This could be a tempest in a wine if it is indeed, crappy wine.

[Alan_Rath]

@Vincent Fritzsche

But anyone who wants to wax about the good old days, please, stop. Franchise alcohol laws, for example, aren’t a modern invention. They’re old school, they’re bs, and they hold producers by the nuts and it’s been that way for a long time. This was a dirty business, not some bullshit gentleman’s game. Let’s not get into the wholesalers vs. direct shipping, etc. The business now is way more wide open, hence these battles increase, and it’s only going more in that direction. Good luck sorting through it all.

Yep.

[Chris_Freemott]

Okayyy, so has anybody here actually tried La Singulière?

Not yet. I keep waiting for Louis to bring it in…

[TomHill]

@Roberto Rogness

The ones who DO know about importers almost always got that info from Parker OR a merchant. Parker once likened it to record labels in that you could buy a Blue Note, Sub Pop or Arhoolie album with NO other info and pretty much be guaranteed you’d like it if you had liked others on the same label.

Hmmmmm, Roberto. I’m not so sure I’d agree w/ that. I, and many other folks I knew, were paying attention to the names on the importer labels
long/long ago. Be it RobertHaas/FrankSchoonmaker/FredrickWildman/KermitLynch/etc. Parker has very minimal to zero influence on my buying habits.
And I don’t recall any retailers pointing out an importer label when recing a wine to me. But, then, maybe I’m, sorta weird.
Tom

[Roberto_Rogness]

Tom, I said “almost always”, leaving room for the “sorta weird” folks like you who buy crazy shit from “sorta weird” folks like me. But no one even mentioned Kermit or Terry Thiese? Those guys have freaking CULTS.

Got Frizzante Organic Ortrugo? I can guarantee you that one is not in the US because of any writer…

[Ken_V]

@Tim Heaton

4. L/D’s statement on their blog that Fass Selections misspelled the cuvée name is simply a lie.

I wasn’t aware FS was named in the blog post. Or maybe it wasn’t.

It was named multiple times in this thread starting with Post #36:

http://www.wineberserkers.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1488231#p1488231

[TomHill]

@Roberto Rogness

Tom, I said “almost always”, leaving room for the “sorta weird” folks like you who buy crazy shit from “sorta weird” folks like me. But no one even mentioned Kermit or Terry Thiese? Those guys have freaking CULTS.

Got Frizzante Organic Ortrugo? I can guarantee you that one is not in the US because of any writer…

I’ll often get a mention from a retailer that their TT shipment will be coming in next week.
But that’s about it. When I’m looking at a btl of import wine, I almost always turn it around
and look at who the importer is. There are certain importers I’ll jump on nearly everything.
But Kermit is not one of them.
Tom

[Dale_Williams]

At a wine tasting at my home last night we were discussing this thread. I mentioned I wasn’t on FS mailing list, someone forwarded me the offer (name incorrect in subject line, though correct in text). As Matt noted above, "Today, I am offering a wine never offered in America (it’s thought to be too expensive through the 3 tier system). " So the wine is $42, $40 on 4 pack.

Does anyone know ex-cellar pricing vs the Picasses? Looking at WS Pro, the few places internationally that have both seem to offer the Singuliere at 25-30% over the Picasses, which sells for $19-25 in US. I’m struggling to see the savings via the skipping of the 3-tier system in this particular case.

[M_A_T_T_H_A_R_T_L_E_Y]

@Chris Freemott

Roberto,
One point (S.M.P.G.) does not refute what I wrote above. While valid, it is an outlier, not a model.

My post ignores no such thing. None. My point is simply this: L/D, like other established 3-tier folks see Lyle (and Rimmerman and Lot 18 and Last bottle and, and, and) as challenges to an ever flattening world they happen to live in (and built). No one likes competition so the first thing you do is attempt to defame it. And, after you hit send you have a choice; Consider “Hope” a business plan, or get busy reinventing yourself.

Lyle is ultimately assisting the winemaker in selling more wine. And, how do you know Lyle’s cost-basis? Maybe the winemaker is making more money. Is that bad? So the winemaker be subordinate to the whims of a L/D? Haven’t you hammered on the poor revenue sharing models of streaming music? or am I mis-remembering? For all we know Lyle has said “I can kill a tier in the US - let’s split the margin.” Why assume otherwise and why assume that ‘the work of thousands’ specifically chooses to NOT import (read: support) the winemaker?

Chris - there is no such thing as cutting out a tier. Last bottle is owned by a very reputable wine store based out of CA for instance…

It is all marketing… You can’t “kill a tier”…

[Roberto_Rogness]

Hunh? Kermit Lynch and Martine Sauneir (SP?) are importers with a retail outlet. WineBow and several others are their own distributors on NY/NJ. Multiple small Italo-centric importers in San Francisco area are their own distributors.

[GregT]

Roberto - CA is more consumer-friendly than NY and NJ.

In NY and NJ, if you’re a store, you have an importer and if he has his own warehouse and distribution, you’re good, otherwise you need another layer to store and deliver the wine. Sometimes the importer is lucky and can pre-sell the wine to a retailer - we’ve done that many times. You gotta charge for your admin costs but it’s a lot cheaper than investing your money in inventory that you’ll have in the warehouse for a few weeks or months. And you still need to get it and clear it through customs for the retailer.

In CA, as far as I understand it, they’re a little more rational and guys like Kermit can import and sell. That’s just not an option out east. The three tier system exists only because each individual state where it lives has decided to keep it. If a state decides that it will allow retailers to also import, the customer gets a break.

That is not to say there’s anything wrong with the service importers provide. It costs money to run a store, sell the wine, and also fly to Europe, taste wine, arrange for importing, etc. And there are costs involved so it’s not like anyone is cutting out a tier and avoiding all the responsibilities of that tier - they might save some money, but then again they might not because someone who does that all the time will have it down to a system and they’ll likely get better prices on shipping and storage.

I’m not sure where the argument about importer/writer ended up but both Parker and Spectator have said that they taste wines that are brought in by importers because that’s what their audience, which is primarily US-based, will be able to buy. At the WA, they taste by sitting down with the importer and going thru the portfolio non-blind. At WS, the importer submits the wine for tasting and someone puts it into a blind line-up for the taster. Both will send writers to the winery, but they’re introduced to the wines by the importers.

The importers however, do not move wine through the customer filters. The writers do that. Pick any importer who’s had a good write up in the NYT and ask if they noticed a difference. They absolutely have - people carry around the NYT article when they go shopping. Same with a top pick from the WS. So the importer decides what the writer is going to taste, but the writer decides what the consumer is going to buy. That’s a little crass and simplistic, but it’s essentially the way it was. It also seems to be changing. Instead of a writer, there’s increasingly the Yelp, CT, Facebook effect.

There’s a very very small percentage of people who shop by importer. Every so often, some writer in the WS or some newspaper will suggest that shoppers look for certain importers. But Joe Average goes to the store to buy something for tonight and has no clue who writes what for whom and who imported what when. However, if you’re small, and if you get a few thousand people to follow you on Twitter and act on your selections, you can do OK financially.

[Oliver_McCrum]

@Roberto Rogness

Oliver, I am not referring to second labels in the Bordeaux sense (a different, inferior wine), but EXACTLY the same wine with a DIFFERENT label. We have even had producers tell us “We signed with Empson for national distribution (or WineBow or Paterno) but don’t worry, we’ll get you your five pallets on a different label with the same wine.”

The economic situation in Italy is so dire now that they need to sell EVERY bottle they can.

Roberto,

I have always understood wines like Pavillon Rouge to be called second wines, not second labels. A second label is, as you say, the same wine under a different label; I have two of them in my book; but I don’t think there were any such wines in the original rant. Were there?

[Roberto_Rogness]

No, but I brought that up to show that both importers and producers are not at all above playing a shell game with names and labels to sell more wine and that there is nothing deceitful about it.

[jbray23]

I think there is too much emphasis and sympathy for importers.
There are a handful of thoughtful hard working importers whom have spent blood sweat and tears building brands and fighting Larger distributors/wholesalers for market share. Then… There are a lot of importers whom were started by hardworking honest people that have now devolved into big business and squeezing out the exact people that their business models were based on.

In my mind importers (in general) are more concerned about how much of the wineries wine they can sell vs. how the winery is functioning on a family level and conversely wineries are pretty savvy not to trust anyone, it is business no matter what the importer tells you about their family ties and how long they have been doing business. I’ve seen this more than a number of times where I’ve been tasting with an importer and winemaker in the cellar and the whole conversation comes down to business.

People forget that importers hold a ton of influence in wineries, creating their own cuvee’s, picking and choosing through one’s wines, ultimately holding power over how much of the wineries wines make it to our shores. Consumers dismiss this all the time and ask ‘why doesn’t the winery find a different importer’, not that easy, and when you’re a farmer generally speaking you don’t have time, energy or often times money to go out and have a stopgap in importation.

I don’t feel sorry for LDM, they’re big boys with big boy pants, they are a relatively large, mid tier importer whom has a niche that they built, this blog post shows publicly the chinks in the armor. Throwing Lyle under the bus didn’t really make sense as it seemed like the writer was just trying to come up with more justifications for their rant, it came off as another ‘we’re a small business and being targeted’, which is just not the case.

On the allegiance of consumers to importers: I think the importer stripe is a generational thing, generally speaking people who purchased wine pre 90’s have a bit more focus on the importer as it was a bit more important at least relationship wise for the consumer. Years ago publications weren’t as pervasive as they are now and consumers swore an allegiance to their wine shops and imports more than they do now. Unfortunately I think some importers have abused that and added wineries that would cushion their bottom line not for qualitative reasons, but for financial ones and unsuspecting buyers have blind faith in that importer to buy whatever they bring in.

[M_A_T_T_H_A_R_T_L_E_Y]

@Roberto Rogness

Hunh? Kermit Lynch and Martine Sauneir (SP?) are importers with a retail outlet. WineBow and several others are their own distributors on NY/NJ. Multiple small Italo-centric importers in San Francisco area are their own distributors.

As far as I know cutting out the importer is the 4th tier

• winery
• importer
• distributor
• retail

So when I combine the importer with one of the other 3 I still get a three tier system.

CA does have the 17/20 combo as well as the license I would guess Fass operates under (85 I think) but as far as I can tell there are still 3 touches occurring…

[Jay_Miller]

@Mike Evans

@Chris Freemott

The fact that those wines are THERE to purchase when a consumer goes to buy a wine he read about AFTER that writer “discovered” one of Kermit’s or Oliver’s wines at a trade event or by being sent a sample BY Kermit or Oliver is not caused by the writer.

Okay. Point taken. But who reached the consumer to buy the damn stuff? The writer - or an appropriately educated shop owner with a loyal following. But, for every guy like you how many people read a Parker (or other) note and don’t think a single thing about the importer? Pretty much all of them. But, in Illinois I’m stuck with whatever my protected-class importer wishes to bring in and he faces no competition.

This entire fracas is about L/D rallying the wagons around his empire. Cracks are showing. Consumers win. Winemakers should win.

Chris, I think you have the wrong target here. LDM is hardly an empire, but to the extent that it is, it is because Joe, Denyse, and Kevin and David Lillie at Garnet and then Chambers Street created the U.S. market for a host of wines, and regions, that are now well known on boards like this, in close collaboration with their growers. They tirelessly worked to bring attention to their growers, many of whom have been engaged in a quixotic battle to preserve artisanal wines and traditional varieties and styles from the forces of industrial mediocrity.

While I don’t know that the blog post was the best way to handle some of their concerns, I understand where it comes from. It took tremendous passion and perseverance to establish the position that LDM’s producers now have in the market, and that kind of passion can lead to statements that aren’t always as temperate as they could be.

I’m a harsh critic of the three tier system, but you could hardly pick a worse example to represent the problems with that system.

Thank you Mike. I started typing a reply but you summarized all my points far better than what I was writing.

@Chris Freemott

Okayyy, so has anybody here actually tried La Singulière?

Not yet. I keep waiting for Louis to bring it in…

Um, are you talking about Denyse Louis (the Louis in Louis/Dressner)?

[Chris_Freemott]

I was using Louis to reference Louis/Dressner

[Ian_Dorin]

@Chris Freemott

Mike,
I’m sympathetic to the risk-takers and market-makers. I’ve spent far longer in my career signing the front of checks than the back of them. And, the points of those with far better knowledge of wine industry history (you appear to be among them) have standing I don’t. My role is that of a consumer in this case. A semi-educated one at best. But, not a dumb one.

Yes, the passion, work, effort, travel and expenditure of the LDM’s is something I think all of us can ‘tip the cap’ to and I am okay with their desire to circle their wagons around the world they built. But, this doesn’t mean they should have an insulated lock on consumer access to wine and then use their bully pulpit to hammer competitors. They can do exactly what Rimmerman et al can do - it’s a question of if they wish to engage in creative destruction of their model or not. And, as a significantly established business which looks around at infrastructure and staff and storage and capital outlays - seeing upstarts has to scare the hell out of them. But, in the end, they have to decide what they want to be when they grow up.

Take Thivin for example. Explain to me why we aren’t drinking Cuveé Zachcharie or La Chapelle here? It’s not like the Brouilly or Château Thivin or Brouilly aren’t well-received. Should the winemaker NOT sell their product here because their 900# gorilla US importer doesn’t view the production quantities to be worthy of their attention?

Chris, I’m not going to pretend I know what you do for a living, but if people were coat tailing or poaching business that you worked long and hard on, you’d be signing a very, very different song here. I think people think this only pertains to the wine business and it’s that easy to just go out and get new producer after you lose one. There is only one Pepiere. How are you replacing that? Overlay that against anything you do. You’re a lawyer and Donald Sterling or Donald Trump is your client, and they present a good chunk of your annual income. Someone poaches them, what do you do then? (maybe there is some binding contract I don’t know about between lawyer and client, but I’m sure those expire, and have loopholes to get out of them)

Kermit works differently too. I know the reasons that he doesn’t sell those cuvees, and that’s his business choice. However, is any one else bringing in those cuvees for the country on a broad scale? Any particular reason you think they aren’t??? Price? Quality? Has to be something along those wines, and I’m sure it has nothing to do with Kermit.

[Chris_Freemott]

Chris, I’m not going to pretend I know what you do for a living, but if people were coat tailing or poaching business that you worked long and hard on, you’d be signing a very, very different song here.

Residential mortgage lending. An immensely competitive industry where a few hundred dollars on total costs can take a loyal client and make them vanish. So, not ‘unsympathetic’.

I think people think this only pertains to the wine business and it’s that easy to just go out and get new producer after you lose one

Maybe my read of the blog is different, but who lost a producer?

Any particular reason you think they aren’t??? Price? Quality? Has to be something along those wines, and I’m sure it has nothing to do with Kermit.

Take the Thivin example. I live in Illinois. If that importer doesn’t bring wines in from that producer it’s challenging (an understatement) to get those wines. So, as I think many have alluded to, the gray market steps in and fills a void.

I’m not challenging Kermit’s model - i’m pointing out something that shouldn’t surprise them as opportunities that others may exploit.

[Ian_Dorin]

I’m not saying they lost a producer, but just making a point that it’s where this stuff can lead to. It’s not that easy to pick up a new one (and who’s to say that one will be loyal too?)

With regards to Thivin, the wines are on the table for another importer to pick up, and Kermit (from what I understand) has no issues with that. Beaujolais has been super hot over the last 3-4 years, yet no one has still not picked those up for the US market? There is a reason for everything in the wine business. Just like LMD not picking up the cuvee that Lyle sold.

BTW, I’m not sour on Lyle buying this wine and selling it, it’s the HOW part that creates deception. If someone pumped up cuvee Zacharie from Thivin that the importer “passed on this spectacular Cuvee and it’s his loss, your gain” is just nonsense, but the consuming public who reads that won’t know that it’s not the case. I’m all for capitalism, but maybe I’m too much of a boy scout to say there’s a right way and a wrong way to promote wine. FWIW, if Lyle was REALLY that good of a salesman, should he need to allude to Dressener at all to sell the wine? Kind of like banking off a rating, no?