It's safe to say that wine is a little bit of an obsession in my life; I study it, I taste and evaluate, and I even wax lyrical. But, that being said, a few days ago as I slumped heavily into my couch on a hot and slightly sweaty Sunday afternoon' I dug my index finger into the tab of an Amstel Lager can and then took a few deep, drawn out sips of the frothy liquid that once seduced the inner walls of the can (a lamza so good that I dented the can a little): En ek sê vir jou, woh!
Wine, the way I think about it, and the way I write about it, has always been romantic (some would say I've turned to smut in the mechanism of my penmanship, but I'm not here to split hairs). The point is, wine is best sold on stories; whether the story comes from the farm on which the wine is grown, the winemaker her/himself, or (these days) the AI "assisted" marketing blurbs that fill our mailboxes on a daily basis. These are often laden with ruthless hyperbole and wording that wouldn’t be amiss in a Stephen Fry lecture on French words commandeered by the English.
Beer identity
Despite (or maybe in-spite of) the fact that beer sales completely eclipse wine sales with beer swallowing almost 75% of national alcohol sales while wine sips quietly at around 10%, there seems to be a classist objection to beer drinkers in the wine community. There have been several occurrences when I am unleashed in the streets of Joburg, and a customer of mine would find me sneaking a smooch from a moisture beaded glass of bitter at the corner of the bar. The reaction is always the same, and spat out with the same amount of black bile that plagued Queen Elizabeth I: "You drink beer?!"
But frankly, my beer consumption shouldn't be a surprise. The nation's beer consumption shouldn't be a surprise either. Carling Black Label, as a brand, moves more booze (in terms of revenue), than the entire wine industry does. While that is a colossal brand, it is only one brand. Now why is that? I fear I'm going to sound like a broken record if I bring up culture again, but IT IS culture. There are other things that I think contribute to the monstrous discrepancy between beer and wine sales (which I'll get to), but once again, culture is playing an enormously important role in why people choose drink so much more beer.
The hoity-toity of wine
Wine is definitely not a classless affair. You just have to look at how wine farms and big distributors structure their offerings to see that even at the highest ranks of the industry, there are tiers of wines available. From "lifestyle" ranges to super-premium, allocation-only wines; brands make a clear distinction in quality and price point for what they put into the market. Now this makes sense. Not everyone can afford to drop avocado money on wine (me included), so lifestyle and mid-tier ranges are important to access the consumer base that thinks twice about buying yet another Woollies bag for their groceries. The super-premium loud mouth soup then becomes aspirational products, but this fosters a class divide within circles of wine drinkers, even if the quality of the wine doesn’t differ. People want to be seen drinking "the good stuff", better yet, god help you if order a glass of Merlot no matter how premium.
This type of eggshell culture makes it difficult to navigate the world of wine, even if you are buying at the highest level. I myself have been guilty of shaming people for buying a certain producer's Grenache over another, and maybe I am becoming part of the problem... But, when in Rome.
A bit of bitter
What I love about beer, and what I think makes it so successful, is that it is classless. There aren't many quality differentiating tiers, and no one is sitting around the table discussing the tasting notes, nor the consistency of the foam. We just enjoy it. We gulp it down like we've got a case to go through, which we normally do. The conversation is not revolving around beer, there is just a whisper of satisfaction that happens after each sip. No one feels intimidated by picking a beer off a menu, and that's if you even look at the menu. Food pairing? Whatever is in front of you. Beer, in this regard, feels like a far greater human experience. It's more honest, it's not laden with expectations of the producer, vintage, nor grape variety. It's just a cool glass of bitter that you pair with thirst, and not much else. Not that you can't pair beer, but why would you want to? It is beautiful in its crisp simplicity.
Even though there are wines that fit into this class of consumption, the good ones still get categorised as "quaffable" or "poolside wine". But even then, those terms come with a certain altitude in nose positioning, because they aren't cognitive experiences *eye roll*.
Given this perspective
Do I think South Africa, as a wine country, will ever shift the scales in terms of market share between beer and wine? Do I even think that the wine industry will steal some market share from beer? No I do not. Because while South Africa is a wine country, we actually live in beer drinking communities; where there is a brewery in your city (in most major cities) and a pub spilling frothy bitter wherever you look.
Customer-focused experiences are also largely different between beer and wine. I have attended, organised and made an excuse to not join several dozen wine tastings in the last year. Bar a few remarkable instances, wine tastings always follow the same formula: Someone introduces a wine to you, they speak a jargon that is only recognisable if you spent your childhood summers chasing the rats out of a family-owned cellar in Burgundy (mes excuses, Bourgogne), and then you spend the rest of time trying to justify to your friends, and to yourself, that you know what the word "petrichor" refers to.
On the other hand: I spent an evening at The Forum in Hyde Park a few weeks back where Heineken was hosting an event. Now I know what Heineken tastes like (like 2 more Heinekens), and I know that beer is consistent in its flavour profiles, so I wasn't going to taste anything new, but I wasn't there for the beer, I was there for the event. Heineken was airing 18 Uefa Champions League Games all at once, in one venue, at the same time. The event was called: Fans Have More Friends. All they served was Heineken in its various guises, and all we did was drink beer, talk smack, and watch football on a gigantic space-age screen that managed to bring us all the action at once.
Now I'm not saying Boekenhoutskloof needs to start sponsoring sporting events, but I do think that learning from the people-friendly and social-forward approach that Heineken has used here could be beneficial to an industry that is seeing declining sales due to a population that is choosing experiences over inebriation, and enjoys novelty over routine.
Novelty
Whenever I read or listen to someone broaching the subject of what's new in wine, I find I'm confronted with information that either requires a degree in viticulture, or recently with the introduction of Methode Ancestrale into the South African market, we're rediscovering old methods of making wine (so not very new at all). What's in it for the ordinary consumer? Very little, if anything.
What's new with beer? Not much, but Heineken hosted one hell of a Champions League fan park. See what I'm trying to say here?
Beer just feels more honest, like I don't need to be anything more than thirsty to enjoy it. Like I don't need to train my palate to truly appreciate it. Maybe the wine economy is built on this kind of exclusivity and "skill"-masked snobbery. But Millennials don't have the money, nor the time, Gen-Z's aren't drinking as general rule, and those with the space to store it, the money to buy it and an interest in wine are sadly a dying breed. We need to get creative as an industry. Tales of
terroir simply won't cut it anymore.