We don’t have a lot of discussion here of Rioja. Tim Atkins’ article is rather sad to read, though it appears that it’s producers of cheap supermarket wines that are suffering, and not the top-tier producers like La Rioja Alta, Lopez de Heredia, CVNE, et al.
Earlier this summer, the regional governments of La Rioja and the Basque Country committed to funding the distillation of 30 million litres of surplus wine to try to balance supply and demand. A further 150 million litres are sitting in cellars, which is way more than the market wants to buy…
Rioja’s fundamental problem is that it makes too much wine. Its area under vine has grown from 38,817ha in 1985 to its current 66,798ha – an increase of 72% in less than 40 years. Many of these additional hectares have been planted in the wrong places, with the wrong grapes, or rather grape, as Tempranillo now accounts for 88% of Rioja’s plantings.
… The resulting retail prices – Top Cash in Logroño sells a wine called Campo Aldea at €1.69, a Crianza at €2.29 and a Reserva at €3.95 – have depressed grape prices further.
A lot of that is probably coming from the lower areas of Rioja in Rioja Baja/Oriental and those areas should be more planted out to Grenache than Tempranillo. Just my guess, but that is also where most of the Cooperatives exists
Great article John. I thought some of this is rooted in their governance? IIRC the Consejo Regulador grants voting power based on liters produced rather than market value of said output, which gives a bias toward the bulk outfits agenda, even if it may be at the expense of the overall regional long term prosperity.
It seems difficult to solve, within that governance structure, which explains why Artadi (and Remelluri) and others are choosing to sell more under their own name, than some official tagging like Gran Reserva etc. I wonder how long elite producers will even keep the Rioja regional name on their bottlings, if these 2 EUR bodegas are tarnishing their work.
It feels like they are going through the same kind of issues Tuscany had in the 70’s and 80’s.
If every bit of the wine was of the quality of CVNE, La Rioja Alta, Lopez de Heredia etc, they could sell it all in a microsecond. This sounds like a quality problem.
The overproduction issue is not unique to Rioja, obviously. There was a story recently about the dire situation of minor Bordeaux producers.
From what I’ve read, part of the issue in Tuscany was lots of poor variants of sangiovese. The Chianti consortium did a vast amount of research starting in the 90s to pick better strains, which were then widely propogated. I’d guess that Tuscan produces at least as much wine now (think of all the planting in the Maremma, and the expansion of the Brunello and Chianti Classico vineyards). But better grapes have made the industry sustainable.
That was the article to which I was referring. And France has been distilling large quantities of wine for decades. (Cheap source of hand sanitizer!)
EU agricultural subsidies were a big factor in overproduction, as I recall. I know the EU has cut back on those over the past 20 years (it was breaking the EU budget), but I don’t know big he cuts have been.
I am a huge, huge fan of Rioja from circa 2001 and older, but aside from LdH (which is still great in its own inimitable style), I haven’t had almost any wines from there that really have quicken the pulse like the pre-02 older stuff did and still does. Even my favorite producers from of old like CVNE, Muga, Riojanas, Rioja Alta, I just don’t get excited about anymore (but again, I still find their older stuff thrilling).
Is it just me? Or did great, traditional Rioja kinda of have a mass die off in the 21st Century?
Agree, it’s a commodity wine here in the UK. Just ubiquitous to low end grocery stores. When my wine-curious friends that have grown up here on that plonk get to try one of those three producers, they are always so excited to see what Rioja is capable of.
Honestly, it’s probably you and where your palate has gone in that time. I recently opened a 15 CVNE Imperial GR and it was absolutely gorgeous, albeit on the young side. You wouldn’t confuse it with Roda or one of the new wave producers like Olivier Riveriere or Arizcuren.
What has happened is that there is a lot more available on the market these days than the classic standard bearers of Traditional Rioja. This is a good thing and I find Rioja on the whole way more interesting because of it.
In the US market – luckily for the Spanish – it hasn’t played that generic plonk role, so I don’t think the reputation is so tarnished. We have our own plonk, Yellow Tail and various industrial-quantity Italians to fill that need.
