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48 WINES&VINES July 2016 OAK BARRELS & ALTERNATIVES Configuring his warehouse to best achieve that goal also proved slightly more efficient. With 11 rows of seven barrel stacks at six bar- rels high, Blom said his room can fit 1,848 barrels, which is 10% more than what he could fit with 14 rows of 10 stacks at six high. He said such a stacking arrangement is well suited to four-barrel racks, which are seismically more stable. If a winery is considering changing to four-barrel racks, Blom noted they may also need a bigger forklift to handle the extra weight. Most of the barrels at Blom's warehouse are still on two-barrel racks because those are what his clients use. In the aftermath of the earthquake, however, only about 10% of the toppled barrels were a loss, while there was a 20% loss of racks. "As strong as the racks are, they're going to be a casualty as well," he said. He said one of his clients has a winery in the Mt. Veeder AVA of Napa Valley and decided to use new, "seismic-safe" racks after the earth- quake wrecked his barrel room. The racks are produced by Barrel Safe, and the four corners of each rack rest on the posts of the rack below it rather than on the barrels. Such racks provide far more stability, but a winemaker needs to make sure they will work with how the winery is set up for barrel wash- ing, topping and other jobs. Blom said they do reduce some available space for barrel storage. "However you're gaining more stability with your racks and insuring your investment in a better way," he said. Discussing what he expects to see in the barrel room of the future, Blom said "smart bungs" will be more prevalent. These are bungs equipped with sensors that monitor and wire- lessly transmit wine chemistry data, fill level, wine temperature and other information. He also expects sensors to be located throughout warehouses and on barrels to provide constant, real-time tracking of barrels. Water recycling will also become more wide- spread because of the rising cost of fresh water or treating wastewater. Blom made note of the Napa wine kegging company Free Flow Wines that installed an elaborate water recycling pro- gram that reuses rinse water for the company's thousands of kegs. A large winery with an ex- tensive barrel program could find large savings by just reusing the last rinse water from barrel washing as the first rinse for the next barrel. And, he added, one can "always count on more regulations," and winemakers should expect more inspections, monitoring and pa- perwork from state and federal agencies. Questioning the coopers Winemaker Jeff Cohn, who founded Jeff Cohn Cellars in 1997 while he was working at Rosen- blum Cellars, is known for having conducted extensive barrel trials during his career. He has written about those trials and his experiences with oak for Wines & Vines and Wine Business Monthly. Cohn moderated a panel discussion of coopers to provide attendees with a better sense of the factors that influence the price of barrels and advancements in the cooperage trade. Joining Cohn on the stage were Phil Burton, owner of Barrel Builders and importer of Ton- nellerie Marchive; Vincent Bouchard, owner of barrel importer Bouchard Cooperages, and Guillaume Maugeais, production manager at Tonnellerie Radoux USA. Cohn's first question touched on what he described as the enemy of every winemaker: the prices of new oak barrels. Burton said winemakers should just expect prices to continue increasing, especially with French oak, but he reminded the audience that they can pick when they get invoiced for their barrel order. Depending on where the dollar is in relation to the euro, a winery could save some money if it invoices at delivery rather than at ordering and vice versa. "If Britain opts out of the EU, the euro could drop consider- ably," he added. Bouchard noted that American oak is also getting more expensive, and he explained that