A Last Post and Preview of Coming Wine Coverage

This is my last post here on my way to a new publishing platform. If you choose to follow me to my new publishing platform at Substack, I’ll begin publishing there tomorrow. To read any future posts you’ll need to subscribe: CLICK TO SUBSCRIBE But with this last post, I want to preview a few things I’ll be writing about at the new home of FERMENTATION. A look at the stranger arguments states and opponents of wine shipping are making…

Jan 17, 2022

A New FERMENTATION and a Promise

A New FERMENTATION and a Promise

It’s pretty clear at this point that I’m incapable of looking at something then not saying something about it. This affliction can’t be addressed through medication. It’s something I’ve known for some time now that I just have to give in to the compulsion. And that’s what I’ve done for the past 17 years and through 3,500 posts here at Fermentation. It’s my intent to continue to do this at a new subscription-based newsletter/website version of Fermentation hosted by Substack…

Jan 13, 2022

Transitions in the Wine Media—And For This Writer Too

Transitions in the Wine Media—And For This Writer Too

The wine media is a slow-moving ship. Its turns and transitions come slowly. When changes do come to the wine media, they are notions and innovations at first, then the spigot opens and it seems as though it must have always been this way. Up until the 1960s and into the 1970s, the wine media in the United States consisted primarily of books providing the basics on a select number of regions and wines One occasionally would find newspaper articles…

Jan 12, 2022

Moving Forward on the Question of Race and the Wine Industry

Moving Forward on the Question of Race and the Wine Industry

Stacy Brisco never disappoints. The most recent reminder of this writer’s well-honed chops is an article she wrote for the Wine Industry’s Beverage Industry Enthusiast entitled, “The Wine Industry Pledged Improve Diversity, Equity and Inclusivity. Has anything changed?” One thing that Stacy demonstrated in this review of the wine industry’s DEI efforts is how talking and writing about the issue has changed. As I read through the article I noticed that there was no mention of the wine industry being…

Jan 11, 2022

Where Is Alcohol E-Commerce Going and Where Has It Been?

Where Is Alcohol E-Commerce Going and Where Has It Been?

Rabobank’s latest report on Alcohol e-commerce shows that such transactions reached $6 Billion in 2021, a 131% increase in just two years. Now, this $6 billion figure includes e-com sales of wine, beer, spirits and everything else. But the question that goes unanswered is to what degree do e-com sales of alcohol help increase the total sales of alcohol? In the press release announcing the new Rabobank report (2022 Alcohol E-commerce Playbook) the report’s author, Bourcard Nesin, answers this important…