To me, overrated and overpriced are two totally different things. This asks about overrated.
Châteauneuf-du-Pape - Some people would put this up with Bordeaux but for me too many of them are just too high in alcohol and have no elegance whatsoever. Not to say there are no good ones, but too many are not.
Chianti - Again there are good ones, but they exist in an ocean of swill.
California Pinot Noir - Yet again there are good ones, but too many are high in alcohol and low in elegance. If a Pinot Noir is not elegant, what is the point.
More than any other region, I feel that the hype for New Zealand is often not backed up by what’s in my glass. Not saying the wine’s inferior, but the marketing is slick and pervasive
Yes, overpriced and overrated are different things. But the reason this thread is doomed to confusion is because nobody will ever agree on who is doing the rating or what the ratings are. So everything becomes an idiosyncratic list of wines they don’t like because whatever people happen to be in their ear are more positive than they are about the wines.
I never hear anyone rating CdP, Chianti or CA Pinot Noir highly.
The producers that post here are certainly the exception (and a handful of others as well), but something would bug me when I lived in Oregon is how homogenous soooo many Pinots would be.
Now, they were usually well made and clearly good to very good wines, but too often it felt like the only real connection with many was the personal story or experience you have a place. Rarely did I have a bad WV Pinot, but also as rarely did I have one that I felt was truly special. Factor in that more and more single vineyards are pushing $70-100 and it makes it easy to go back to Burgundy (it also doesn’t hurt that Wasserman is as well represented in PDX as it is).
Just my feelings and experiences. Again, I can’t recall that many bad wines so the base level is quite good.
Good points. I was very lucky in that Vinopolis introduced me to Goodfellow wines as probably my second or third OR PN ever. I then asked Marcus what producers he liked. You can guess who they were!
In addition to the problems you mentioned, I see two others. Almost every producers focuses on some combination of PN or Chardonnay. There are many other very interesting grapes grown there, but they are miniscule in quantity. And many of acres of these have been ripped out to plant the big two. I find that a bit boring. Secondly, there are now 1000 producers in the Willamette Valley alone. I have been to the Valley a dozen times and I am amazed at all the names I see. I doubt I could name more than 50 producers. Who is buying all these wines??? As has been mentioned in the “Current State of the Wine Market” thready, Oregon too is in need of some consolidation.
[quote=“ChrisJames, post:67, topic:337630, full:true”] Secondly, there are now 1000 producers in the Willamette Valley alone. I have been to the Valley a dozen times and I am amazed at all the names I see. I doubt I could name more than 50 producers. Who is buying all these wines???
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Many of them are garage projects. Some are cool and interesting. Many fall into the problem I said where they are technically solid wines, but little past that. I don’t really think I took many notes the two times I went to the indie wine mixer. Why? Because so little moved me and I didn’t want to spend the time typing in a sea of 88 point wines into CT.
And I completely agree with your point irt Chard and Pinot. There’s an ocean of it and basically everyone has the same story.
I’d put Chianti i the same basket. There are very, very few distinguished wines, but I rarely run into one that is not at least drinkable. One of the major problems with the category is that people assume because of its pricing that it should be an early drinking wine, and I find even the cheapest labels routinely benefit from aging.
I think Chris that you and Keith are touching on something important and as you say is a part of the “Current State of the Wine Market”. It would be interesting to see a thread about ‘what wine regions folks feel like operate in a concise manner, sharing their wines/messages in way that is conveyed best to consumers’ especially in the realm of the new world. It is hard when say Burgundy has a 2,000 year head start on Oregon. They have been able to delineate on such a scale that it feels like an amazing discovery the deeper you go (as long as you have the money/interest to play). There are a number of folks in the W.V. who are presenting things in a clear manner for customers that I can think of and of course there are more (Walter Scott - Eola-Amity, Morgen Long - Chardonnay, Goodfellow - Whistling Ridge, Violin - Eola-Amity, Cameron - Dundee - Evesham Wood - Le Puits Sec - Thomas - Dundee - Sivilli - Sparkling) These are simply the things I would be able to easily connect to each of these producers though clearly they are up to other things.
And again probably best for another thread, but Chris I think consolidation is coming for a lot of regions, and I can’t say that I see that as a good thing especially when applied to a place like the W.V. where farming is harder than say Washington State. There are a number of wineries in the W.V. that can count 1-3 people as their winemaker. You can find a number of labels around the country from Oregon and when you look them up you find they are linked back to a single large custom crush space. Folks that don’t live in the state have wineries here, brands here, etc… Folks also living here with wineries where they aren’t here toiling day in day out. For me, this creates more of a problem. Too many labels which read artisanal and yet they are mass produced side by side to spec. Some will say too many small artisan producers are making ok wine - no doubt. Cream will rise to the top, and buyers will need to hunt the best down from wine shops, etc… In time, perhaps Oregon will feel more detailed and concise for consumers. But if the big groups gain too much control over vineyards and resources, that homogeny will be wildly detrimental for the region. This is only continuing to grow here as a problem. I don’t see the problem being two varieties, I see it more as a cumulation of things: lack of concise of information, too many vineyards, the natural wine bump, irrigation and on and on. I will also say for how hard wineries need to work on marketing, vineyards really need to do the same and some do. Too many vineyards are planted in hopes to sell fruit and mow.
To not lose sight of the thread, I agree with what someone else said, overrated only seems to apple to what you care about. And I will go out on a limb and say I think Chianti is underrated when it comes to price for me (Felsina.)
Thanks, Keith and Chris. I enjoy this thought exercise as many of us in the W.V. try to absorb info to keep getting better and carry on in a way to make terroir wines with plenty of toil.
Sorry this was so hodgepodge, I am trying to entertain my 3 year old, and now back to the real work. Happy Sunday all!
Thanks for your thoughts (and sorry that this is becoming about OR)! When I said consolidation, perhaps that was the wrong word. I didn’t mean all the little wineries getting gobbled up by a few big ones. I more feel that there are too many wineries and perhaps too many vineyards with a sort of goldrush mentality (and it is not my wish for wine businesses to fail). I am not ITB, so I wonder how they all possibly stay afloat. I can think of three OR wineries that use to participate on this board that have gone under in the last couple of years. There must be dozens more that I don’t know about. If you look on Winebid this week, there are dozens and dozens of OR PN offerings for $25 or less. I have not heard of most of them. So I asked “who are supporting all of these wineries?”
You are absolutely right that OR is still finding it’s identity and may need decades more to fully do that. Meanwhile, for your list above, Goodfellow - SPARKLING!
I don’t understand why WV producers should be producing wines other than PN and Chardonnay, if producers think that these are the best grapes for their vineyards. The world is full of great wines from all types of grapes. Unless for some reason you are restricting your purchases to WV wines (in which case the lack of diversity is really your choice), I don’t see how you are lacking for alternatives. Is there some really outstanding grape variety that you believe should be grown in the WV where it could make a unique contribution to the world of wine. I don’t see Pinot Noir being grown in Bordeaux or Cabernet being grown in Burgundy, so I have to ask what you feel you are missing.
These are obviously the native grapes to those regions. You don’t see Italian varieties in France either, but you do see French in Italy. Why? Because they are the best grapes for their vineyards? No, because it is an economic calculation. Oregon has no native wine grapes and could plant anything. I don’t know that Oregon producers are planting the best grapes for their vineyards so much as the best grapes for their pocketbooks. If that is what the market seems to want, good for them. I simply find that a bit boring as I am very happy to buy domestic cool climate wines if they are available. If I never bought another bottle of Oregon PN in my lifetime, I still have enough. Additionally, I have bought excellent Oregon versions of Pinot Blanc, Pinot Gris, Albariño, Riesling, Gewürztraminer, Grüner Veltliner, Cab Franc, Syrah, Blaufränkisch, and Tempranillo. As a consumer of domestically produced wines of the PNW, I would love to have more options of these. But I am just the consumer. I don’t pay the rent for winemakers and vineyard owners - not directly anyway. But the ones that produce wines with grapes other than PN and Chardonnay are very happy to be able to source those grapes.
Why would they lose money if they are selling a good product that people are willing to pay for?
Have you visited Oregon wine country? Visited a bunch of wineries and met producers? Do you drink Oregon wine at least a couple of times a week? I would guess not since I don’t recall you ever participating in any of the Oregon threads. Or are you just looking to argue for fun?
Goodfellow are amongst the least elegant and most bitter of OR in my opinion. But it’s just an opinion and others like Chris may disagree. Horses for courses and it’s good we not all appreciate the same things which I respect.
Those grape varieties are not ‘native’ to those regions. The plant isn’t even native to that part of Europe.
Over the centuries those varieties have become the de facto choices for wineries in those regions for many reasons. Then government was employed to create protectionist policies in order to make labeling wines by those regions tied to the historic varieties of choice there.
Whatever growers choose for WV is going to be for different reasons than historic Europe. The choices made in the New World are clearly more deliberate conscious choices of the business owners given they can literally buy nearly any variety they want to plant there. If farmers in Europe 1500 years ago were making any choices about what to plant for wine it was likely more about whatever their neighbors would allow them to sample.
I’m guessing the current popularity of Burgundy varieties is more about fashion than particular economic choices. Or even more likely the fashion is driving the economics. Remember when Oregon was mostly known for Pinot Gris?
Agree if the condition “think that’s best for their vineyards” actually holds. But I’m sure there’s plenty of WV acreage dedicated to Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris, and Chardonnay that is in the ground because that’s what you can sell, as opposed to what the grower thinks is the best match for the site.
Edit: drafted this, got distracted, and posted only later. Now see others made the same point.