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62 p r a c t i c a l w i n e r y & v i n e ya r d d e c e M B e r 2 0 1 4 A ll the world is a stage, and we are all players — that is what I told my audience when I spoke at the Southern Oregon Wine Cluster Industry Conference in August 2013. We were gathered near Ashland, Ore., home to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, which perhaps explains why I invoked the Bard to this group of winegrowers and producers. "The world is a stage, and all the men and women merely players." This famous line from Shakespeare is true in general and particularly apt for those of us in the wine business. Wine is certainly local—the product of a particular time and place— but the business of wine is clearly global, with many complicated international im- pacts and influences. You might not think of yourself as a global market participant, I told my audi- ence, but consumers are keenly aware of the global stage, because they encounter it—with its hundreds and thousands of players—every time they choose a wine. So long as consumers can entertain choices from around the world, we all are players on the global stage—whether we want to be or not! Importance of regional reputation It can be difficult to get attention in this global arena. Having a distinctive national or regional wine identity is an advantage, although it is obviously not the only im- portant factor. Oregon has worked hard to develop its market identity and has ben- efited from these labors. Oregon stands for quality to many wine enthusiasts, and the glow of this image obviously benefits all producers throughout the state. But many consumers see Oregon more narrowly, as Willamette Valley Pinot Noir. This is problematic because, while the image certainly helps sell Pinot Noir, it can present something of a barrier to other regions—especially Southern Oregon and the Columbia Gorge—and to the many other wine varieties that Oregon produces so well. What can Southern Oregon do to forge its own identity to compete more successfully in the marketplace? One answer is to gather together the "usual suspects" who have succeeded in es- tablishing an identity in recent decades and try to learn the lesson of their success. Ar- gentina, New Zealand and Australia have all experienced tremendous U.S. market growth in the past 20 years based, at least in part, upon a strong wine identity. It is important to learn the right lessons from these cases, however. The conventional wisdom is that having a signature variety is the key to each of these success stories. Australian Shiraz, New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc and Ar- gentinean Malbec. These are three wines that led the successful market charge, so it is natural to suppose that grape variety is the key to success. Signature variety: wrong lesson? This explanation is flawed in several ways. First, while Shiraz, Sauvignon Blanc and Malbec did open doors for the three associated countries, they did not open them as far as you might sup- pose. Argentinean Malbec opened the door for more Argentinean Malbec. Sales of the many other excellent Argentinean wines have not increased as much as you might expect. Argentina is experiencing a Moscato export surge just now, but that is obviously not driven by Malbec. The same is true of New Zealand Sau- vignon Blanc, at least now that the "Side- ways" interest in Kiwi Pinot Noir seems to have faded a bit. Although exports of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc continue to grow at a breakneck pace (it is now the best-selling white wine in Australia, even outpacing Aussie white wine!), the good news has not spread very far to other va- rieties. This fact makes many Kiwi pro- ducers a bit nervous as they ponder the possibility that the boom might someday turn to bust. Australia is the worst-case scenario in the sense that it became so identified with Shiraz (and a particular style of Shiraz) that when consumer sentiment turned Mike Veseth, author of Wine Wars, Extreme Wine and editor of The Wine Economist BY A global perspective on regional wine identity W I N E M A R K E T I N G 64 Key drivers in shelf life of wine: Closure trials demonstrate volatile sulfur compound formation by Neil Scrimgeour and Eric Wilkes 70 Overcoming 10 objections from beverage retailers by Zach Milne-Haverly T E C H N I C A L R E S O U R C E F O R G R O W E R S & W I N E R I E S Don Neel, Editor practicalwinerylibrary.com Access Practical Winery & Vineyard article archives online. THINK GLOBAL DRINK LOCAL