Bottles of wine open to more scrutiny online
Print Edition
TECHNOLOGY has influenced the wine industry for millennia. From the first use of new materials like pottery and glass to the advent of the Industrial Revolution and the age of machines, new technologies of the day profoundly influenced how wine was made and consumed. Our new digital age is now impacting this beloved beverage in China and around the world.
Internet sales
There’s no shortage of websites selling wine in China. Specialty wine websites like Yesmywine, Winekee, Winenice, Jiuxian, Vinehoo and Wangjiu are now competing with traditional importers who have launched their own websites in order to cash in on this important trend. By anyone’s estimate, the sales of wines online is growing. The Internet’s market share of total wine sales in China is between 19 and 30 percent, depending on who’s statistics you believe.
While many domestic wine websites are guilty exaggerating sales and traffic figures, they nevertheless are profoundly changing the industry in positive ways.
Some websites are decidedly better than others in terms of product offering and content, and overall they offer domestic consumers a mixed bag of wines and advice.
But they tend toward the cheap end, as the majority of sales are inexpensive wines priced well under 100 yuan (US$16.3) per bottle.
Most Chinese wine websites offer a combination of domestic and international content.
The local content has more direct value to domestic consumers, but is still limited in terms of quality and depth.
The international educational content can be high-quality, but it’s seldom exclusive to the websites and can be easily accessed elsewhere. Wine notes written by international critics who actually taste most of the wines outside China are helpful but not terribly reliable, as these tastings can’t take into account the effects of international and domestic shipping and storage.
The ratings game
The rating of wines long predates our digital age, with some of the oldest recorded wine ratings dating back to the 17th century. The most famous rating was during the “Exposition Universelle de Paris” in 1855 when Emperor Napoleon III asked a group of wine connoisseurs to rate the top Bordeaux wines.
The result was a classification system from fifth to first growths that remains remarkably influential if not totally reliable today.
But the methodology and fairness of wine ratings and competitions in the past were quite opaque and mysterious.
Sometimes referred to as the emperor of wine, Maryland lawyer Robert Parker launched “The Wine Advocate” newsletter in 1978 with the goal of providing consumers with some clarity on the quality of wines. At the time, the elitist world of rating and judging wines was unintelligible to most consumers.
Parker, with his easy-to-understand 100-point rating system, made everything more consumer-friendly.
His contributions to the industry are undeniable, but not everyone is a fan.
Many questioned his technical tasting abilities and clear preference for big, highly extracted red wines.
Along with Parker, publications like Wine Spectator, Decanter and others played important roles in demystifying the world of wine and making wine knowledge and appreciation much more accessible and friendly. While these players remain influential, the digital age has further empowered the consumer and provided a much-needed diversity of voices and opinions. However, the salient question is: Can you trust online ratings?
Closed vs open systems
Who should the consumer trust, the established sages of tasting or the hoards of wine aficionados freely sharing their opinions online? The benefit of internationally renowned closed systems like Parker and Wine Spectator is that most tasters are highly qualified and experienced. They are however, subjective and have been accused of bias and favoritism.
As previously noted, they taste most wines outside of China and therefore their wine comments don’t take into account the special transportation, logistical and environmental factors of China. Put simply, a wine tasted in France or Italy quite often will taste different here.
The more open and democratic ratings found on the Internet comprise many more opinions and comments and are clearly less subjective. Naturally, notes from drinkers in China also take into account the special environmental factors that influence the performance of a wine. But there’s little quality control and some of websites that provide ratings also sell wines, leading to conflicts of interest.
Despite this, online ratings and recommendations by domestic drinkers are helpful and a useful counterbalance to the opinions of experts. One additional positive force for the industry is the growing number of Chinese wine experts who are gaining notoriety by rating wines and expressing their opinions.
Shepherds and their sheep
Ardent followers of the Wine Advocate have been derogatorily called Parker sheep who blindly follow whatever the master says and have no regard for their own tastes. In the wine world, this desire to conform happens at many levels from beginners agreeing with more experienced drinkers to professionals tasting together.
Has the digital age given freedom of choice and expression to wine consumers? One would certainly think so, but this may not be entirely the case.
In the 1950s Polish-born US psychologist Solomon Asch carried out extensive research on the desire of humans to conform. His pioneering studies indicate that more than 70 percent of the time people will conform to the advice of others, especially if they are numerically greater or deemed more knowledgeable.
A few recent studies in the US indicate that this also is the case with online wine comments by consumers who would rather agree and follow than truly express their own opinions.
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