Schrader caution

WINE TALK
21

What action will Schrader take if someone ISN’T on their list and DOESN’T offer any of their wine for sale? [stirthepothal.gif]

Bruce

22

OK guys, just send me your Schrader and I’ll sell it for you. :wink:

23

You will be added to the list as soon as someone gets kicked off!
(Waiting… [truce.gif]

24

Hmmm. Could be a reasonable argument for not using true names in CC.

25

26

I’ve purchased 35 bottles since 2007, with 27 remaining. Notes on the other 8 are on CT. Looks like I’ve accounted for everything. [berserker.gif]

27

He obviously doesn’t want you diluting the auction market. It brings the price down when he auctions off part of their production.

28

Um, yes, EXACTLY! But don’t speak ill of ol’ Fred…he gives some of his auction windfall to charity. Of course, he could make one or two competent wines, sell his wines through normal distribution channels, make whatever he could make doing so and then give whatever money he chooses to give to charity privately and anonymously. He could also let all reviewers taste his wines instead of limiting tastings to the whores who are guaranteed to lay 100s on his overwrought plonk. This is gamesmanship all around, not serious winemaking, and surely not appreciation of fine wine by Schrader buyers. The uniquely American phenomenon of mailing lists is such a crock and a fraud. It creates artificial demand and a culture of haves and have-nots for wines that are not ever remotely among the world’s best…

29

where does it say Fred reached out to him directly?

30

Is it really artificial demand? What’s the difference between such wines and something like Pappy that’s distributed the regular way? If all CA wines had the normal distribution model I expect we’d have the Pappy case with some of them. Then it’s just a different set of haves and have nots, plus some distributors and retailers taking the profits. Same with a number of Old World wines now.

31

“I’m Robert Parker, some guy from rural Maryland. I give this here Screaming Eagle, made by former real estate agent Jean Phillips in her guest bathroom, 100 points. Here is the contact information for the winery. Get on the mailing list as soon as you can!”=artificial demand, and that is exactly what has happened, again and again. Also, one might make quality distinctions between Pappy and most, if not all, highly allocated CA wines, but then again, maybe not…it could be that Pappy is just the next SQN. Craig, maybe your fundamental point is that mailing-list distribution is more democratic and cuts out more middlemen. Could be, at least until the Shah of Schrader sees what Dan was doing and declares, “Off with his allocation!”, or decides to cut the greediest middlemen of all, auction houses, in on the action. You may be right about similar net impact. I just find all of the whining, gnashing of teeth, gloating and waste of wine-board threads and words over mailing lists to be worse than useless. I also find demand for DRC, first-growth Bordeaux and Monfortino in the open market to have far more rational underpinning, but that perspective ultimately comes down to questions of taste…

32

I think the main thing is that the “original” price is well below the market price, due to high demand for a scarce resource. Critics certainly contribute to creating that demand. The mailing list may play a part, but if SQN or SE switched to normal distribution tomorrow (at mailing list prices) I think the dynamics would be very similar to Pappy and I don’t think the market values would change that much. “How many SQN calls did you get today?”

33

TODAY that is likely true, but only after reviewers created mailing-list Monopoly and turned it into the national pastime in the first place. (This from a former winner of mailing-list Monopoly, by the way.) Otherwise, there would have been little to no chance of that happening, and also little chance of Pappy becoming the phenomenon that it has. (That was Parker’s doing as well, you may recall.)

Americans are rarely driven by a legitimate, objective or quasi-objective concept of “the best”. They are too often driven by accessing something that other Americans do not have, and then boasting about it. Do the name “excessibe ballah” mean anything to ya? That, by the way, underlies Galloni’s selfish, cynical approach to wine reviewing. He conned a very few people into thinking that he knows what he is doing, and now treats his readership to his impressions of DRC Montrachet verticals and 100 years of La Romanee instead of publishing what they want from him, which is, frankly, only Barolo, Barbaresco and Brunello scores. He wrongly believes that his assholy tweets saying things like, “Look at me! Look at me! La Tache and Romanee-Conti are my LUNCH wines!” are somehow going to give him experience and credibility that he lacks, rather than just pissing people off. When his readers tell him, as they have, that they are not interested in subsidizing Tony Gallons’s Excellent Adventures, a defensive Galloni quotes an anonymous reader as saying that he (the reader) LOVES reading about Galloni tasting all of those DRCs, all the while sure that he will never taste one himself. Really? I am going to enjoy watching THAT strategy falling flat on its face. America has been there and done that with Parker, and Galloni is no Parker (talk about insults!). But I digress…

There is not a lot of interest in CA trophy wines outside of the U.S., while there is enormous interest in the world’s finest wines in the U.S., as well as around the world. (And for much of Europe, “Pappy” or “Papy” is a stock character in French porn movies, rather than a spirit! :slight_smile: ) All of this is the end result of incestuous and cynical relationships between reviewers and wineries and reviewers and retailers, reciprocal back-scratching until all backs are bloodied, and yet, so many folks simply do not want to own up to that. Talk about your willing suspension of disbelief! The loyalty that one sees around here respecting up and coming winemakers is a different phenomenon, by the way. In many of those cases, personal relationships with the winemakers are forged, buyers truly enjoy the wines and many are rationally priced. That has to be CA’s wine future. Eventually, I think that there will be only so many people who, presented with a check for $2,000 and told to buy wine with it, will seek out a magnum of Old Sparky or a bottle of Screagle…

34

Bruce- yes that should be the case.


35

My thoughts exactly! And perhaps this answers part of the question from another poster about how WB and social media play a part in a winery’s operation? hitsfan

36

And yet, you are guilty of this as well, bragging about your life as well…

37

While this describes me and I believe many others that post here, I doubt that we represent a changing trend in the way CA wine is valued by the larger populous of wine drinkers. My wife has been making jewelry now for over a decade and that has forced me to look at it with a much more critical eye. It’s disheartening once you understand that most consumers have no concept of quality and value and really can’t connect it to price. They trust that if its in a “respected” store that it must be of good quality and will pay more for it as it relieves them from the burden of independent thought. The truth is much of it is flimsy and made on the cheap in Bali and the stones are often of lower quality. Relying on the store to vet the jewelry is no different than relying on critic scores to “know” what’s good or auction houses to “ensure” that the bottle is legitimate. So I doubt that there will ever be a shortage of people chasing those 100 point bottles.

38

In taking a look at the low ratings/reviews on CT, looks like the 2011 speaks for itself.

39

I applaud him for doing this and wish more wineries would have done this years ago. In my opinion, letting purchasers flip wines on purchases they have made in the short term has helped fuel the inflation bubble in the wine industry over the past twenty years. A little sanity is great, along with competition for discretionary purchases of alcohol coming from the craft beer and spirits industry.

40

What an ass! Set the price at whatever you want but if I decide to buy it then it is mine to do with whatever I want. If I want to sell it, use it for an enema, dump the juice down the sink, whatever…just don’t tell me what to do with my wine.

I’m not on the list and I don’t drink his wines…just opining in general.