Mike

Joe

Having spent 35 years in the wine trade, I’m afraid I must take issue with your claims on the Stelvin closure. Particularly your claim that, “the cost for the winery to use screw tops is less than for corks.” when discussing “bargain wines”.

The quality of cork used in low to medium priced wines is, in general, much lower than that used for wines that retail for $20+, these cheap corks cost a good deal less than using the Stelvin closure.

In my experience the rate of “corked wines” in the under $10 category is in excess of 1 per case, which makes for much less of a bargain.

I worked primarily at the wholesale level and saw first hand the number of customer returns at, quite literally, hundreds of retailers. If wine producers weren’t insulated from the actual spoilage rate by a distribution network designed to only flow in one direction, I believe most of them would switch to Stelvin, as they should. Not so much for the return rate, but for the unreturned TCA affected bottles and the customers that bought them.

Many casual wine drinkers don’t realize the flaw that they are tasting is from the cork and assume that the wine is bad, and cross that producer off their list for future purchases. That might seem unfair, but to go through the effort needed to produce a good quality wine and, whether through ignorance or indifference, allow 10%+ of your customers to have a bad tasting experience, simply for cost concerns, is a bad business practice.

Anyone truly concerned with helping people find ” Good Cheap Vino” should be pushing the industry to convert to Stelvin for any wines under $20. When factoring in pouring out a bad bottle or the hassle and cost of returning one for replacement, that bargain, you thought you just gotten, really isn’t much of one.

For those worried about the “sustainable” cork industry, the current rate of usage is the major reason that cork quality has been deteriorating for the last two decades, a major factor in the current high spoilage rate. Producing in smaller quantities with higher quality, and thus higher prices, is the way back to sustainability and economic viability for the producers of cork.

When choosing between the aesthetic value of the sound of a cork popping or not having to smell a bad bottle, rewash glasses, choose another wine for the occasion and then hassle with returning the bottle, I’d choose a Stelvin closure every time.