ADVERTISING: Advertorial — GEORGE BALLING: Updates
It is that time of year when much is happening and changes are rapidly occurring in the wine industry. The growing year is in full swing, restaurants in many parts of the country and some here at home are still closed or are reclosing, and wine supplies are still facing challenges. With so much up in the air it seemed a good time to bring wine consumers up to date on all that is going on.
The 2020 wine grape vintage is off and running across the Northern Hemisphere. In the appellations of the Western US it is a bit of a mixed bag so far. California is largely experiencing a good start to the year. Weather has been moderate, there is ample water in the reservoirs from timely and mostly normal winter precipitation and there have been no big storms or late frosts. The crop is right on time as of this writing on the third of July.
In the appellations of the Northwest though, things are a bit more challenging. The cold, wet spring and start of summer has the crop well behind where it should be. Some of the heavier rains also caused some “shatter” during bud break that will cause much unevenness in the vineyard. The best news for Washington, Oregon and Idaho is that the crop still has time to make up some ground, assuming the rains and cool weather stops now; and I do mean NOW.
Similar to California, Europe has had a good start with moderate temperatures and near-normal conditions.
As the coronavirus has shuttered restaurants across the country, and in some areas where they are going through a second round of closing, we have seen increased allocations of the hardest to get wines at the retail level. While many of these bottlings are priced at levels none of us would buy for our regular consumption, the increased availability is making for some very happy collectors.
For instance, we have seen for the first time an allocation of Sloan from the heart of Napa Valley. We have also seen an increase in our allocation of Domaine de la Romanee Conti, DRC for short. DRC is not only the hardest wine to get on the planet, but it is also the most expensive and we have received three bottles this year, when normally we get one. Similarly, our allocation of Spottswoode, one of the premier old-line vineyards from Napa, was larger than normal. Again, all good news for the wine collectors among us.
On the flip side of having access to wine, the supply chain issues we encountered early in the virus outbreak persist. Both with European and domestic bottlings of all budgetary price points, we continue to struggle to get regular access to many of our customer favorites. We are learning as we go along what is causing some of these constraints. Because of restaurants and bars being closed in Spokane and now with some reclosing in North Idaho, distributors have reduced the number of trucks they are sending from Seattle and the other westside distributions hubs. The remaining trucks are many times full and some of our products will go a week or more before it makes it onto a shipment. A similar scenario is playing out with our shipments from California; as trucking capacity is being reduced, we are left to wait in the cue until our turn comes up.
For international shipments, the bottleneck affecting our supplies is in the ports. COVID restrictions on workers in the ports are slowing the receiving of wine and the time it takes the product to clear customs. Regardless of the cause, the effect is the same across the board; we are waiting for many of our best sellers. While we planned much of this column to be an update of what is affecting your ability to get wine, it really can be simplified to more of the same, sadly.
We can finally add that the 2019 Skylark Pink Belly has now arrived and is in the shop! Originally the wine was delayed in bottling. We finally got word that it would arrive last week at the end of June when we ran into the trucking issues described above. Our number finally came up and we now have the wine, which is great news for all our wine consumer friends here in North Idaho, as it is our most popular every year. We hope to see you in the shop soon before our limited supply runs out.
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George Balling is co-owner with his wife, Mary Lancaster, of the dinner party, a wine and gift shop in Coeur d’Alene by Costco. The dinner party has won the award for best wine shop in North Idaho twice, including for 2018. George is also published in several other publications around the country.
After working in wineries in California and judging many wine competitions, he moved to Coeur d’Alene with Mary more than 10 years ago to open the shop. You can also follow us on Facebook at facebook.com/#!/dinnerpartyshop.