The new wine drinkers
They’re savvy, adventurous and don’t blink at spending $30 a bottle. A new generation is shaking up the old wine ways.
Saturday afternoon and there’s just room to pull up a stool at the bar, a position that suits me fine. The place is typical of a new breed of wine bar you’ll find in London, New York, Melbourne, Perth… intimate, wine-focused, staffed by engaged bartenders, a somm or two. There’s simple but delicious bar fare, maybe from a chef who’s worked the pans in places chasing stars and glory. The patrons are discerning but chatty young drinkers; wine is just part of their social lives. There’s an ease to it all, a fluidity that is, shall we say, very millennial.
To my side at the bar, two friends in their mid-20s talk about that constant theme of young adulthood, tortured romance. Just days after turning 40, I’m feeling my age acutely; googling the current meaning of “woke” is a new low. In between putting the world to rights, the friends study the one-page wine list. Will it be a glass of a funky orange wine from New Zealand, or something closer to home? They contemplate style, variety and how far the bottle has travelled. Price doesn’t seem to be a deciding factor.
When I was their age, living in London, sophistication meant knowing your red from your white, perhaps a few new-world hotspots, a varietal or two; at a push, even a region. If you were drinking something pink or orange, it was likely to be some vicious pre-mixed concoction. How things have changed. And far from mocking Millennials — a sport for some — I’m a little in awe of what they’ve got at their fingertips and tastebuds.
Across the wine-loving western world, this generation is shaking up the old ways. It’s no different in East London, where I’m observing Millennials in a bar run by Australians, or East Sydney, where 28-year-old Alexandra Payne typifies the new wine drinker: engaged, more interested in discovery than habit, and into personal connections with — and over — wine. The MTV producer says that on a night out with friends, “we’ll find a place that’s BYO — Chiosco by Ormeggio at The Spit or Vacanza Pizzeria in Surry Hills — and we’ll each bring a bottle that we’ve been saving; something special, and share it.
“I’m bringing a Glaetzer-Dixon 2014 Reveur Pinot,” Payne says of an upcoming outing. “We were at the cellar door in Hobart and bought a couple of bottles; one to drink now and another to cellar, so it’s something that you can come back to in years to come.”
It is, says Dan Sims, “the golden age of wine”. The awarded sommelier is founder and CEO of Revel Global, the Melbourne-based team behind a growing roster of wine events that are firmly focused on Millennials. Sims, who talks with rapid, fervent passion about wine, has visited seven cities across Australia and Asia in a matter of weeks and while at 42 he’s not quite Millennial, he’s firmly in their corner.
“The old guard has probably in many ways done itself a disservice by not fully appreciating or recognising a quantitative shift in how wine is perceived and consumed,” says Sims. For the average 20-something it’s no longer about finding your favourite wine, buying a case and making it a habit. At bars, in restaurants and at events, wine experiences are being integrated into the social lives of people who value peer-to-peer recommendation and education more than a label plastered with medallions from a wine show you’ve never heard of.
A case in point is David Cosford, 29, a Perth-based doctor who is training to be a specialist. “My family were never really interested in wine,” he says, but then he discovered “a couple of wines in quick succession. Patrick Sullivan did a pinot blend a few years back called Jumping Juice, which was one of the first I tried and it was amazing. Then a couple of mates showed me an orange wine which was on pour at Shadow Wine Bar [in Northbridge, Perth] for a time.” Cosford sought out more than just a good drop. “I tried a wine from [WA-based label] Old Mate, and got in touch with the winemaker and have been talking to him about these wines since, going out to see how he does things. It all just happened in succession and sparked that interest.”
Cosford shares his love of low-intervention and natural wines through his Instagram page @lo_fi_wine, where he showcases only wines he likes. He’s not interested in critiquing the ones that don’t quite live up to the hype: “Why affect someone’s livelihood?” His interest falls mainly on these types of wines because “they are all relatively small producers making an artisanal product with young families and doing it out of passion, as opposed to just for a buck and making sure your bottom line is supported”.
Talk with young drinkers and the industry players working to connect with them, and narrative is something that comes up again and again. Eddie Schweitzer, head of merchandising at online wine retailer Vinomofo, says appreciation is so often centred on story; the consumer might be “this guy who was passionate about this style of wine because he travelled to Italy where he had it”.
Schweitzer, whose job involves understanding shifts in the market so the retailer can edit its playbook accordingly, says that where once there was a real division between the people who knew and understood wine and those who didn’t, now “there’s a real democratisation and everybody wants to engage a little bit in wine”.
Learning about wine is part of the fun for the social-network generation, says Sims. “Wine by default is social and this is where a lot of the, dare I say, old white men have got it wrong; socially they [Millennials] don’t want to sit listening to a bunch of old men tell them what they don’t know.”
He points out that more than 4000 people recently visited Pinot Palooza at the Royal Exhibition Building in Melbourne — “not only a wine event but an event on a single grape variety. That’s potent, and 60 per cent of that audience were under the age of 35; they spent money and they wanted to meet the winemakers.”
Lest you think this is all leading to a national hangover among young wine-lovers, it’s most certainly about quality, not quantity. Winemakers and retailers will tell you younger drinkers aren’t that interested in buying full cases, and that they’re not drinking the same quantity as their parents’ generation. Global researcher Wine Intelligence says that the younger the consumer the less often they drink wine, and that among Australian wine drinkers those most likely to drink wine less than once a month are aged 18 to 24. Some attribute this to concerns over health and others to a different approach to alcohol. And Millennials don’t put themselves in the box of “wine drinker” or a “beer drinker”. In an age of quality and choice across the spectrum of booze, they’re drinking to suit the occasion and often from multiple categories in the same day.
“Variety is really important to this group,” says Schweitzer, 30. “They want to try new things more often… [they’re] a generation who read constantly about new things and new trends and want to try these things. So, you know, maybe a French rosé one week and then a pinot grigio from Italy the next.”
Could this simply be a case of Generation Wine’s habits not yet being fully formed? Lou Dowling, a co-owner of edgy bottleshop P&V Merchants in Sydney’s Newtown, says: “They’re still trying to figure out what they like, whereas the older generation, they already know what they like, they’ve been drinking it for years.” And it’s not just wine. “There’s a lot of younger people drinking gin and soda, or gin and tonic now because there’s also really good gin available… So people are a little bit more adventurous. There’s so much more to choose from, and there’s so much good stuff.”
The effect of this experimentation is being noticed by larger retailers such as Vinomofo. “We sell a lot more mixed packs to those customers,” says Schweitzer, “and I would say that even though they consume through us less volume, the average bottle price is higher.” Dowling agrees: “They’re spending within their means but they’re not in the habit of buying $15 Oyster Bay [just] because that’s what they’ve been doing and they think that’s what wine costs.”
Alexandra Payne says her average spend on a bottle is $20 to $30; David Cosford hovers around the same price point and can count on one hand the number of times he’s ordered a case. “I won’t really cellar many wines as my whole thing is to try and drink as much different stuff as possible,” he says. “If it it’s really good I’ll maybe try to get a half case or put a few away, but more often than not it’s just about getting individual bottles and trying something different, seeing what it’s like.”
Will members of this generation drink more, and differently, as they get older? Their preference for premium wines might wane as mortgages and school fees take hold, but good habits formed in young adulthood have a powerful hold, and once you have the taste for the good stuff, does it ever go away? Wine Australia says there are some general truths about Millennials: they want experiences, an emotional connection is the key driver to sales, and they are looking for social responsibility in the brands they are considering.
It would be easy to pigeonhole Millennials as rebels, champions of natural wines and new discoveries, but they’re not closed to tradition. Payne, for example, is not averse to the staples of the Australian wine industry — a chardonnay or shiraz, a drop from Coonawarra — but is equally happy to “throw the net wide on varietals, like viognier, gamay and producers from other countries”. While she can appreciate natural wines for what they are, she also likes “the heritage winemakers or newer producers that are focused towards heritage techniques, without being in the natural bracket”.
Women, in particular, are carving out a very distinct market. “The future isn’t female, female is now,” says Sims. Since his first event in 2012, he has tracked the trends and says that 60 per cent of Revel Global’s audience is under 35 and in that demographic, 65 per cent are women.
While older men are spending more money, they tend to be entrenched in their habits, with a set idea on price, variety, region and often producer. Schweitzer, who produces video interviews with makers, does so partly in recognition that young female customers like context with their wines. “We recently started with a new rosé called Betty’s Game, which is like an orange-style rosé from Heathcote,” he says. “We did a video, photography, we even did a launch party, which generally wouldn’t sell to an older demographic.”
Sims emphasises that reaching the female market isn’t about, “ ‘Oh, we’re going to make this wine in particular for women’. They don’t want to be marketed to, they want to have an experience — their bullshit radar is off the charts.”
Australian wine has never been more diverse or high quality, and as an industry it is perhaps the most vibrant and poised it has ever been. Generational friction, meanwhile, is as old as time. One looks at the other and slowly shakes their head. Sims paraphrases his friend, award-winning Australian wine writer Andrea Frost, a columnist for JancisRobinson.com, when he says: “We’re at this moment standing on the shoulders of giants. This current wine industry is because of the incredible work that winemakers and people like James Halliday have done. Because if you look at the quality of Australian wine it’s never been better, and that is a result of a very analytical approach to wine.”
So while we embrace new trends, we do so with the rigour of previous generations at our backs. Frost has more words of wisdom, perhaps the perfect catchcry of this generation: “We’ve got the map, now let’s explore the territory.”
GLASS OF 2018: Bars for the 21st century
In Melbourne, choice abounds — from Fitzroy’s Bar Liberty, part owned by super somm Banjo Harris Plane, to Bar Di Stasio in St Kilda, via Longsong, City Wine Shop and Embla in the city. In Sydney head to Wyno, Poly, The Dolphin, Tapavino and Love Tilly Devine, or progress from cocktail in a can to eclectic wine choice at Continental. In Hobart, Institut Polaire is well worth a stop, as is the thimble-sized Drinks & Co. Canberra’s Bar Rochford is the place to be and in Adelaide, Africola co-owner Nikki Friedli tips La Buvette, Hellbound and Proof. Perth’s vibrant wine scene includes Harvey Leigh’s, Wines of While, Tiny’s and Wise Child Wine Store. In Brisbane, make a beeline for 1889 Enoteca and Bar OTTO. And in the regions, a growing legion of bars and restaurants is giving its city counterparts a run for their money in the wine stakes, from Fleet in Brunswick Heads, NSW to Liberté in Albany, WA.
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