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Striking a Balance
Diversity and unity – both are useful concepts for the industry, suggests Angela Lloyd, musing on some elements of the recent Cape Wine 2006 event
I have to admit to an unfashionable admiration for parts of the French appellation system. How much easier it must be to get to grips with a single variety or even 13, when your whole region is tackling the same specific and, in many cases, has done so for hundreds of years. Far from boring sameness, the wines reflect differences of both site and vintage, while remaining tied by a vital identifying thread. Neither is there any standing still; each generation introduces new ideas and quality improvements.
No need to elaborate on how the French fail to capitalise on marketing the pluses of the AOC system (nor sorting out the negatives) but the system has interesting possibilities of beneficially combining diversity with unity.
Diversity has been a hot topic in South African wine circles since the establishment of the much-touted Biodiversity and Wine Initiative. It was also the headline subject of the Conference held as a run-in to the recent Cape Wine 2006 expo, where diversity across the whole industry was explored. It provided food for thought about where we would benefit from more diversity and where it could usefully be combined with unity.
Achieving distinction
It might be called transformation rather than diversity, but involving the whole spectrum of South Africans in the leading parts of the industry, whether as owners, winemakers or marketers, amounts to the same thing. This is a well-aired cry but will still be necessary before South Africans as a unified group will offer their wholehearted support. Merely establishing a local counterpart to WOSA to market Cape (South African?) wines to South Africans doesn’t fully address fundamental issues.
Diversity could benefit the Cape’s vineyards. There is a lesson to be learned from the increased interest, both among producers and winelovers, in indigenous varieties (some nearly forgotten) in countries such as Italy and Spain. While the big five (cabernet sauvignon, merlot, shiraz, chardonnay and sauvignon blanc) are unlikely to fade in popularity, they hardly give us a distinctive edge over other countries.
The first phase of pioneering work on natural terroir units carried out by Dr Victoria Carey and her associates has identified 82 top sites for cabernet and 235 for sauvignon blanc in the Stellenbosch region. They have laid the groundwork to more accurately match variety to site, leading to wines with that desirable thumbprint of ‘somewhereness’. Can we afford not to diversify when this research is coupled with the view of top viticulturist Professor Eben Archer that `South Africa is a one-stop shop for any wine style desired’?
Success stories already exist in the semillon/sauvignon blanc blends of Constantia and the cooler parts of Stellenbosch, as well as the many combinations of viognier, chardonnay, chenin spiced with unknowns such as grenache blanc and clairette blanche in the warmer Swartland.
If there are gaps to be filled in the vineyard, the marketing department could be called a blank space. A frequent cry at Cape Wine was simultaneously one of amazement at how good the wines are but how poorly they’re marketed.
’Making good wine is easy; selling it is getting more and more difficult,’ was the stark warning from UK wine writer Tim Atkin MW at the Diversity Conference’s most interesting session, before he and four colleagues outlined major challenges facing today’s wine producer and proffered some stimulating ideas on how promoting diversity in a global world could help overcome them.
Standing together
Having learned how to diversify and stand out from the crowd, the next lesson is how to ‘Be different together’, something the Australians have long espoused.
I hope the small band of producers in Elim realise what a success they made of doing just this as they showed off their wines and unspoilt coastal region to a large international contingent and a few local journalists as part of Cape Wine. How refreshing to visit an area that isn’t covered by a vine monoculture and where the natural beauty is not gilded by the ‘big white gate’ syndrome. The impact their signature sauvignon blancs, their regional seafood delicacies, caught and prepared by the winemakers and their wives, was as exhilarating as the fresh Elim air. May the region never lose its beguiling naturalness. Stellenbosch take note!
A similar strategy but on a different level worked just as well at the Cape WIne expo itself. Grape Minds (… they Drink Alike, of course), the brainchild of The Winery’s Alex Dale, comprised Flagstone, De Toren, Raats Family Wines, Sagila Wines, Sequillo Cellars and The Winery, smaller producers who share a common philosophy. By sharing a stand and marketing themselves as a complementary group, they created a buzz, attracting a lot of attention and, apparently, sales.
Perhaps the message to producers like the one who complained that all the visitors rushed past his stand to the big guys, should hark to that old saying ‘adapt or die’ – but in this case, ‘diversify and unify or die.’
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