I have been musing on this topic. Burgundy has a classification system tied to the land or terroir. Certain vineyard sites have historically produced the best wine. There are some quarrels that a few plots are over-ranked or that a few should be promoted. For the most part though, it seems people agree the system has some validity.
Bordeaux has the classification of 1855, which I believe was set up to help promote their wines and to help people understand which were held in highest esteem. Other areas have added classifications thereafter in the area. These are assigned to wineries, but the system is based upon a hierarchy - some wineries are historically better than others. They seem to fight over some of these rankings every few years and there are cries for revisions of the 1855 rankings.
I have found these classifications helpful in learning about the wines (in the sense of getting me to buy and drink them) from these areas and in buying wines. I understand we have AVAs, but this really seems more like a wine zip code than a qualitative measure. Would it help if there was an American classification for say, Napa cabernet sauvignon, California pinot noir or Oregon pinot noir? Would it help promote our wines? Do we have enough history to determine the signature of certain vineyards (while our viticulture is much younger than Europe’s, I would think so)? Is this something you would like to see?
If there were to be a classification system, it would be applied to consulting winemakers. I guess you wouldn’t have any monopoles since a Grand Cru Classe flying winemaker doesn’t get there by focusing on a single brand (or terroir). But otherwise this is really what drives critical acclaim and demand for US wine.
iirc the 1855 classification was based mostly on price, as the assumption was that the market had already determined which wines were better.
If you are willing to accept that approach (which I’m not) then it is pretty easy to set up the hierarchy.
You can also follow Parker’s hierarchy from his “Buyers Guide” (but again that is not necessarily the best idea.)
We’re currently seeing so much change, exploration, experimentation, discovery. Locking in what might effectively be a protectionist measure could stifle California’s pursuit of greatness. If you tell the market that “these are the best California can do” and they aren’t, for whatever reason, you’re hurting the state’s image relative to other regions.
Part of it is the general intractability of the problem and the American mindset. Naming the best vineyards when the situation is generally very fluid would be difficult. And there would be a lot of opposition I’m sure from producers and growers who might be left out making it a political nightmare. Americans being individualist by nature would lend itself more to naming people as GC and PC winemakers. I do suggest this not 100% seriously, but it does often seem that winemaker drives perception much more than vineyard in the US.
SQN derived almost all of its acclaim not from vineyard designates, but through the Krankl and SQN brand. Early on the SQN fruit was sourced from a variety of vineyards, but cuvees were differentiated by fanciful names. Even now that SQN has its own vineyards in SRH and Ventura, the wines still derive popularity not from vineyard designation but by the creative wine labels and SQN/Krankl brand. Incidentally, I guess I would classify Krankl as a Grand Cru classe monopole winemaker given he only works on his brand.
Does Screaming Eagle come from a vineyard with a long history? Probably, but it derives its status from the brand equity and its initial winemaker Heidi Peterson. There seems to be almost a cult around Thomas Rivers Brown–any wine ‘made’ by TRB automatically is noticed. Same for winemakers like Turley, Hobbs, Rolland, Aubert, Melka and others. Any project they are involved in automatically is considered from the get-go by the wine press and collectors.
This is not to say there are vineyards with a history of excellence. But it seems that in critics and collectors’ minds no name fruit made by someone like TRB or Turley will trump Bien Nacido or Hudson fruit made by a non-famous winemaker.
There are two other issues that would complicate any effort to classify US wines according to a Burgundy-like hierarchy:
First, Americans are driven by grape variety. Look at the popularity of Merlot until Sideways came out… then Merlot went into decline and Pinot became popular. The industry has trained people to like varieties, not vineyards - people will walk into restaurants and ask for a cChardonnay or a Cab or a Zin. Not for a region. Trying to retrain them to look for certain regions because those regions produce significantly better wine probably won’t work and certainly won’t be easy.
Second, we don’t have enough history and thus enough knowledge. The US wine industry is, at best, a century old and in some areas much less than that (The earliest Washington label I’ve ever seen is 1968). Most vineyards are far younger than that and, since people will replant vineyards because of sales issues, we don’t have a lot of vineyards with decades of history in producing the same grape variety. Put simply, we don’t have the knowledgebase to work from in declaring certain vineyards as the best, second-best, etc. Before anyone starts typing out counterexamples, ask yourselves this - were those vineyards producing at a world class level 20 years ago? 50? If not, then all we have a re fashionable vineyards that show promise.
We’re currently seeing so much change, exploration, experimentation, discovery. Locking in what might effectively be a protectionist measure could stifle California’s pursuit of greatness. If you tell the market that “these are the best California can do” and they aren’t, for whatever reason, you’re hurting the state’s image relative to other regions.
Wes, I beg to differ.
Politics will not be involved. Politics is never involved with wine issues. All of the European designations were made based on terroir, with absolutely no political influence ever. If there had been political considerations in 1855 for example, some liberté, égalité, fraternité freaks might have rated things differently, but because it was all about real terroir, the more expensive wines were properly rated more highly than the others.
I’m sure that in the US, things will be much the same.
Moreover, to ensure a proper wine profile, the Europeans prohibit certain grape varieties in their designated regions and we should probably do that as well. The people with many acres of some rejected grape variety will surely be happy to rip out their grapes to comply with the rules.
Seems crazy that the US wine industry was allowed to develop on its own, without proper regulation and oversight. That’s why it hasn’t gotten anywhere in 50 years. People investing their own money and time can’t be as productive as trained bureaucrats. And now that they’ve established the vineyards, well, it’s time for the bureaucrats to step in and make sure that the status quo is enshrined in law. Sans politics of course.
I would be against a classification system like that of Bordeaux since I think theirs is quite flawed and why would we want to imitate a flawed system? I think the Burgundian system where soils, typicity and microclimate are combined to break off areas into sub-sections, is a far better (and truer) method, although I would not call something a Grand Cru per se. I just think that the style of the appellation due to climate and soil should be how things are broken up, and within that, people can make up their own mind about quality and what a wine should sell for and who makes better wine.
I can think of more than one great Cab that is great because of the sheer determination of the owner to make a great wine no matter what the cost, more than because the vineyard is worthy of a certain classified growth status. And I know some so-so wines that come of terroir that is ridiculously good, but is under-made. To label the first as a first-growth and the other as a 4th-growth would mean that the owner and winemaker are the determining factor for classification and not the soil and microclimate. And if that is the case, then why not assign First Growth status to the winemaker, instead?
In Napa, most good winemakers know where the good sub-zones are and act accordingly. It is no co-incidence that the best winemakers work with the best soils. The relationship is causal… from the side of terroir! We even use different names for some of these sections that have no official designation (Pritchard Hill, Oakville East, Rutherford Bench, etc) when discussing terroir. I think we should start by obliterating the AVA system as is, and re-write them in a way that makes sense. We do have enough knowledge of the soils and micro-climates to make these distinctions right now, imo.
So, using a 150-something year old gov’t system that has basically set prices in France is something we should do? No thanks.
No, the AVA system doesn’t tell you if a particular PN will be to your liking or not. The AVA system isn’t great, but more control isn’t the answer. Who do you want deciding where the best wines come from?
I can think of more than one great Cab that is great because of the sheer determination of the owner to make a great wine no matter what the cost, more than because the vineyard is worthy of a certain classified growth status.
Yup. And BTW, not only in CA. Unless I’m mistaken, under EU rules, you can’t put new vineyard land into production unless you can show that it was historically vineyard land and you take out something else. And even so, we can see the difference that passion and investment make in “under-performing” chateaux and wineries and regions. Even a place like St. Emillon wasn’t really all that respected years ago until they put in a railroad in 1870 and then those guys were able to, and in fact had to, compete with the other growers.
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(Assuming there is a heavy dose of tongue in cheek in this statement!)