Bogus Gold

So I'm trawling through the local paper for something interesting, when I came across this article: Winemakers pitch macho merlot for manly men

So. Many. Things. Wrong.

But let's give it a chance. It begins innocuosly enough.

Hot on the stiletto heels of last year's wines-for-women trend, new releases from Ray's Station Vineyards in Sonoma County are being pitched to the Y-chromosome set as "Hearty Red Wines for Men."

The bottling of the sexes seems to be part of a wider industry trend that includes cute labels and easier-to-use packaging. Vintners want to break from the pack by making wines more consumer friendly.

"You face this challenge: How do you even get people to know you're alive?" said Robert Smiley, a management professor at the University of California, Davis, who follows the wine industry. Considering the fierce competition to get noticed among the hundreds of brands lining store shelves, gender vending is "not a bad strategy to try," he said.

Okay, so far so good. It's a "pay attention to me" marketing strategy, which isn't a bad idea at all in a nation where wine drinking still carries baggage as a snobby and/or effette beverage compared to beer. And it's obviously just the flip side of the chick-oriented marketing of last year. Still...

The wines are packaged simply with a label bearing the outline of a galloping stallion. The accompanying tongue-in-stubbled-cheek ad campaign features the winery's namesake, Sonoma County pioneer John G. Ray, and such masculine pursuits as fishing and hunting.

One ad shows a hunter at sunset, dog by his side, with the copy "John G. Ray did not serve pinot noir," a sly dig at the varietal adored by wine sophisticates.

I'm sorry, but the non-wine drinkers the previous exerpt suggested as the target here are not likely to be able to identify what Pinot Noir is, let alone appreciate an inside joke about it.

And that doesn't begin to get into the problem that our Sonoma County pioneer friend almost certainly didn't drink Merlot either. Until the late 1980's it was a freakin' blending grape, outside of one or two ridiculously priced chateaus in France.

And this gets to my central problem with this whole effort. Merlot?!

Seriously, if we're going to go wine geek here, and by the "sly dig" at Pinot Noir above it's hard to pretend otherwise, why market Merlot to men at all? It's not one of the "manlier" varietals, truth be told. It's regularly described as having a "soft" character. "Berry notes" are characteristic.

Compare that to Syrah - a varietal becoming increasingly popular among California wine growers. Here we have notes like "leather," and "pepper, and "tobacco." Syrah would kick Merlot's ass in any bar any pioneer would consider calling his own. So what's the deal?

The deal is that California wine growers pulled up acres of superior grapes like Petit Sirah and Zinfandel to plant more of the mushy blending grape Merlot when it was all the rage. And now they're looking for somewhere to dump the stuff.

Don't be fooled. If you want a "manly" wine, be a man who isn't easily lead by cheap marketing schemes. Explore Aussie Shiraz if you want some "manly" red wines on the cheap.