I have noticed that the membership here (myself included!!!) is getting older and older : )
Should we try to attract a younger audience? I know I personally get the greatest enjoyment from helping younger people get involved in wine?
I would also note I included a reference to one of my posts here on instagram and I immediately noticed a few people who are active on instagram become more active here.
Love it here and what I learn and this is definitely not a critique or negative it is much more in the spirit of how can we include more people in wine!
I think there’s a lot of younger people on here that lurk or don’t post as often as the more established posters. A lot of people are intimidated to post here.
I find the same as you that younger generations are not interested in wine but with just a little encouragement and education this changes fast. I see it over and over with my events where I use music to attract a younger crowd.
I don’t think many people really get into wine in their 20s? Of course some do.
I got into wine owing to the particular circumstance of my dad being a wine lover, writer and critic (my eye opening moment was my first glass of champagne at age 16, on a holiday in Paris). He often played the role of wine educator at the table, and eventually at wine events that I was curious enough to attend with him. I eventually started exploring things on my own and that’s how I ended up here.
I come from a Southern European culture of regular wine consumption, but that’s different from wine appreciation the way we understand it on a board like this. Most people won’t know or won’t care to treat wine with the particular care we believe it deserves (things like stemware, service temperature, food pairings, etc), and their notions of wine are likely still informed by the odd uncle or grandfather who makes it at home, etc. They can definitely perceive fine wine appreciation as half eccentric, half pedantic, as well as unreasonably expensive (I’ve seen people on different wine groups who unironically believe 10€ bottles of wine to be for special occasions. There’s no question that 10€ goes a very long way in Portugal, but still).
I got into wine starting at 22, and really into wine by 27.
The same barriers were in place back when I started, and the pool of resources was smaller.
The one thing we should all do is to try to avoid telling people “you’re doing it wrong.” Someone told me that in no uncertain terms on the WLDG many years ago, and it nearly put me off.
I’m 30 and also very much into wine. I got serious about it in my late 20s after a family trip to Bordeaux. It is an experience that I love sharing with my dad. I hardly post right now, as I really enjoy reading the different threads to learn about other people’s experiences. Maybe that will change as I get older and more comfortable sharing my experiences.
Card-carrying young WBer here. Got into wine by accident, found this site and subsequently an amazing wine community. Agree some of the younger WBers I know are reading more than posting. As helpful as it is to hear from seasoned WBers, the bickering is equally if not more discouraging.
I know Reddit has a relatively active wine subreddit. I imagine the demographic is younger there. This is a pretty “serious” forum, Reddit a bit less so. Similar to golf at the local muni course vs country club.
Also, gen z and millennials don’t like being told by boomers how they’re drinking their wine wrong.
There’s also some level of judgment from older posters especially regarding burgundy about how people are spending their money due to rising prices. Most of the relatively younger posters like myself, Andrew k, and Ryan c (among others) just tend to not care or stay out of it.
I generally don’t care that much about what other people think and have no problem getting into it with ppl over various things (obviously) but this forum can be a pretty unfriendly place for people just getting into wine, especially compared to Reddit and discord where if you post a trophy bottle you’ll just get hundreds of likes.
This is true for me at least. I’ve read forum pretty voraciously since getting into wine, long before actually making an account (many years of wisdom here), but don’t have much to contribute and feel the stuff I’m drinking is not worth discussing amongst people routinely pulling corks on aged GC Burgundy and cult cab. A splurge wine for me is $75+ since I really don’t feel justified in putting down hundreds of dollars yet for wines from appellations I’m still learning about.
As someone in his early 30s, this captures it perfectly. Some threads, Burgundy ones in particular, seem to often into bickering more often than not. Happy to learn and be educated and WB has been phenomenal for that, but if it starts to feel like you’re getting talked down to or just someone pontificating, then it becomes a turn off.
I’d add, this is a forum that is more affluent than most, so while plenty of threads exist for affordable wine–wine is a much, much harder hobby to get into than before, especially at the highest levels. It can get annoying to hear people talk about only drinking the most expensive wines all the time. People mean well here, so it’s easy to get over after I’ve read people for while, but if you don’t spend some time browsing threads, it can feel like just bragging and not actually contributing. From a practical perspective, for those of us who are living in major metro areas, housing is more expensive than ever, so it’s harder than ever before to build a decent-sized cellar of your own (and off-site storage costs isn’t exactly cheap). Combine that with the fact with price increases for the most collectible wines–it’s just becoming a daunting hobby for a lot of people my generation to get into.
@MChang interesting comment about Reddit and a great point. I remember browsing the r/churning subreddit and someone replied to comment that FlyerTalk would have reacted a lot more vehemently and the OP was surprised that the subreddit was where the nice guys were. The more intense of a community you get into something, the more daunting it can be for newbies to join.
I can understand how you feel. But just one example please check out my Spatburgunder thread where the average bottle price is around $50 or the Riesling thread. At this point in my life I can drink any wine I want but get much more enjoyment out of exploring new wines from up and coming producers or regions. And as I said above helping to get people into wine.
This is turning out to be a great thread and it was a wonderful way to kill some time on my flight back from the Mosel.
Lurkers keep the comments coming and lets all keep it civil in 2025! Will check back in when I am on the ground and have collected my two cases of Mosel Pinot Noir
