Books, Arts & Manners: Wines, With and Without

This season’s hot wine news: Champagne is all the rage now and sales are up and up; we can look forward to better versions of Italy’s most famous wine, Chianti; and a wine without alcohol—but a real fermented wine nonetheless—is being test-marketed in California and other Western states by the Seagram wine company.

In the last few years an oversupply of wine and grapes, in Europe and here at home, has made it imperative to find something to spark additional sales. So the wine and grapes are put to use in making champagne, which in turn is being heavily promoted to the public as an all-year festive drink rather than as something for special occasions only. In the United States, sales of sparkling wine have gone up around 13 per cent since 1980, while sales of table wine languished—proving that the American public is ready to spend money on the pricier potion. Imports now account for 25 per cent of American bubbly sales, up from 16 per cent in 1980. The old established California producers are Korbel and Schramsberg, known for very fine wines; and now well-known wine producers like Sebastiani and Robert Mondavi are also getting themselves into the profitable sparkling-wine business.

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Nika Hazelton

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This season’s hot wine news: Champagne is all the rage now and sales are up and up; we can look forward to better versions of Italy’s most famous wine, Chianti; and a wine without alcohol—but a real fermented wine nonetheless—is being test-marketed in California and other Western states by the Seagram wine company.

In the last few years an oversupply of wine and grapes, in Europe and here at home, has made it imperative to find something to spark additional sales. So the wine and grapes are put to use in making champagne, which in turn is being heavily promoted to the public as an all-year festive drink rather than as something for special occasions only. In the United States, sales of sparkling wine have gone up around 13 per cent since 1980, while sales of table wine languished—proving that the American public is ready to spend money on the pricier potion. Imports now account for 25 per cent of American bubbly sales, up from 16 per cent in 1980. The old established California producers are Korbel and Schramsberg, known for very fine wines; and now well-known wine producers like Sebastiani and Robert Mondavi are also getting themselves into the profitable sparkling-wine business.