Wine is one of the great success stories of the late twentieth century. World-wide sales are booming, wines from many new countries are on the shelves, prices for wine are as low in real terms as they have ever been, choice is enormous and availability is excellent. Supermarkets and high street chains have revolutionised the way we think about and purchase wine. A bottle of wine with dinner at the weekend is now the norm for many “ordinary” people.

Twenty or thirty years ago in Britain it would have been unthinkable, but nowadays many of us are as likely to pick up a bottle of wine with our weekly shop, as we are a loaf of bread. As well as developing our knowledge so that we can choose wines with confidence, our enjoyment of wine can be enhanced by understanding the basic rules for correct storage and serving so that the wine can be experienced at its best.

Buying wine - understanding the label
The world of wine labelling is confusing. It’s not that there isn’t enough information on labels, it’s just that each country - and often each wine region within a country - has its own system for presenting important information on the label. Let’s look at a few examples from around the world of wine: This label is a typical French label. with all the information you need to establish the quality level and origins of the wine:

Cru Bourgeois is an official classification for Bordeaux.
Château Lamothe Bergeron is the name of the wine.
1988 is the vintage date (the year of production).
12% is the alcohol level of the wine, and opposite, the bottle volume

The Appellation Contrôlée of this wine. “AC” is the sign of highest quality in France. Each wine area his its own controlling body which ensures standards. Below AC comes “VDQS” or Vin Délimité de Qualité Supérieure. Below that is the designation “Vin de Pays”. These “Country Wines” include much average wine, but due to complex regional laws, also some real gems where the producer chooses to grow certain grapes at the expense of gaining a higher quality designation.
Mis en Bouteille en Château means the wine was made and bottled by the proprietor, not blended by a third party. Usually a good sign.
The label below comes from the Rioja region of Spain:

La Rioja Alta is the producer.
Vina Ardanza is the name of the wine and below, the equivalent of Mis en Bouteille au Château: bottled by the proprietor.
Reserva is the quality classification of the wine - there are strict rules for what is plain Rioja, Rioja Reserva, and Rioja Gran Reserva.
Denominación de Origen Calificada - the official stamp of quality in Rioja.

German wine labels are notoriously difficult to read. Apart from the problems Germany brought upon itself during the 1970s and 80s by bottling huge amounts of over sweetened, cheap wines for the UK market, it has always had another problem with the consumer: its obscure and complicated labelling.

Wine pricing
There are obviously many factors that affect the amount any of us will pay for a bottle of wine. Apart from the differences in how much each of us can afford to spend on a luxury item like wine, we are likely to pay a lot less for our “everyday” wine than for a bottle to celebrate a special occasion. Supermarkets have increased their share of the wine retailing market dramatically over the past decade or so. With their relentless pursuit of price-cutting to out-do the competition, wines are now as cheap in relative terms as they have ever been. The average supermarket stocks wines in the rough price range of £3.00 to £12.00. A detailed look at the proportion of each and every bottle that is made up of non-wine costs might be quite surprising:

1. HM Customs & Excise Duty £1.16
2. Shipping £0.20
3. Bottle, Cork, Capsule & Label £0.40
4. Wine Merchant’s Margin £0.55
Sub Total £2.31
VAT @ 17.5% £0.40
Total £2.71

With every bottle costing over £2.70 before a drop of wine is put in it, it stands to reason that paying £2.99 for a bottle means you are actually buying only 30 pence worth of wine! In the past year or so the great psychological consumer barrier of £3.00 has been exceeded: few of us expect to pay less than £3.00 for a bottle, and the only £2.99 wines left on the shelves are either discounted stock, or “loss-leaders” used as promotional gimmicks.

There is still a great pressure on “mass” wine retailers (supermarkets and chains) to offer sub £3.50 wines however - the next psychological barrier. I firmly believe that the wise wine lover really benefits if they can up their basic spending level by a pound or so. At around £4.99 a whole new range of possibilities opens up, with wines made by producers who are not so constrained by impossibly low margins, and have a chance to add real character to their wines. As a general rule, I would always spend my money on three genuinely interesting £4.99 bottles, than four easy-drinking, but probably dull, £3.49 bottles.

The price of fine wines - particularly those from Bordeaux and Burgundy - is like a runaway train at the moment, fuelled by speculators and far-eastern buyers who are willing to spend fortunes in auctions at Sotheby’s and Christie’s to secure the great names. These wines are now out of the reach of many ordinary wine lovers: top Bordeaux of the 1996 vintage fetched £2,000 per case, or £160.00 per bottle.

Superb though these wines are, there are plenty of alternatives in purely value-for-money terms: extremely well made, complex, delicious wines in the £5-£10 price bracket that are also of the quality necessary to merit longer term cellaring. From the “lesser” regions of France, Italy and Spain, and from new world countries such as Australia, Chile, South Africa and the USA, come a host of individual and profound wines - many of which can rival “prestige” bottles at twice the price. As your interest in wine grows, you may become tempted to visit some specialist wine retailers rather than supermarkets.

If buying older wines (say reds with vintage dates more than 4 years old, whites more than 2 years old), it pays to check the condition of the bottle: some retailers do not look after wines on their shelves adequately, keeping them standing upright in hot, dry conditions where the wine can maderise (in other words, “cook”). Tell-tale signs of this include seepage from beneath the capsule, running down the side of the bottle, corks pushed out so that they strain against the capsule, and low fill-levels where some wine has evaporated. Avoid such bottles, or if you risk one, keep the receipt and don’t be scared to return it if it proves unacceptable.

Storing Wine
Your wine “cellar” might be anything from a proper, underground cellar filled with expensive rarities, to a few bottles kept on a rack in the kitchen. In either case, there are certain requirements for maintaining wine in good condition that you should know. In modern, centrally heated, well insulated houses, some of these conditions are hard to find, though this is only really a problem if you have wines you intend to keep for the mid to long term - say 3 to 10 years or more.

What to cellar?
First of all, not all wines are suitable for longer term storage. If stored correctly almost all red wines will stay in good condition for 2 or 3 years after release, whereas most white wines are best drunk within a year or so. Beyond that, only certain wines are considered worth “laying down”. With such wines, we hope that not only will they keep for 10 years, but that they will evolve positively in that time, gaining complexity and subtlety as they mature.

Red wines suitable for mid to long term storage:
Only those red wines with sufficient tannins and acidity will last longer than a couple of years. This rules out lighter wines (like Beaujolais or most wines from the Côtes du Rhône, for example) and most of the cheaper red wines, such as those from Central Europe. As a rough guide, wines costing under £6.00 or £7.00 are unlikely to stand up to longer storage. Among the best bets for red wines suitable for laying down are:

Vintage port
(but not LBV or “ordinary” ruby or tawny ports)

Red Bordeaux
(perhaps only those costing more than £10 from this expensive area)

Other Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot based wines
(from the USA, Australia, Chile, etc.)

Red Burgundy
(but only the finest, of Premier Cru level or above)

Wines of the Northern Rhône
such as Hermitage, Côte-Rotie and Cornas

From Spain, better Riojas and from Italy, better Chiantis, Barolos and Barbarescos.

White wines suitable for mid to long term storage:
The vast majority of white wine is made for short term drinking - within a year or two of vintage date. A few whites can reward patience, and those include:

Fully sweet white wines
(particularly botrytis wines of Sauternes in France, and German wines of Auslese, Beerenauslese and Trockenbeerenauslese quality)

Better chardonnays
(again, maybe only those costing over £10.00 as a general rule of thumb)

Vintage champagne
will cellar for several years, but it is usually best to buy this as you need it.