Have you ever had a bottle of [ yellow tail ]? Come on, admit it. Everyone has. We all know that little kangaroo when we see it, and certainly know
friends and family who have a bottle or two hanging around their kitchen. I myself am guilty of it as well. I even went so far as to share a bottle of
Yellow Tail Reserve once in my life,
and though it wasn’t an altogether awful experience, I must say that for $45 with
corkage, I expected something a little more.
Yellow Tail, for those who have been under a rock for the
last ten years, is an Australian wine brand, notable for its eye-catching label
of a yellow-footed rock wallaby. A quick
history: the brand was first developed in
2000 by the Casella family, originally of Sicily,
who had relocated to New South Wales
in the 1950s to start a new life for themselves. By 2003, the brand had become a behemoth - the
number one imported wine to the US
- and in that same time the original winery was forced to expand to nearly ten
times its original size. Supply could
barely keep up with demand. After only selling
112,000 cases in its first year, sales of Yellow Tail jumped to 7.5 million in
2005, helped in large part through distribution by low-cost retailers such as Costco. Also in that year, Yellow Tail became the
first variety wine to move one million cases in a single month. At present, Yellowtail facilities have the
capacity to store approximately 300 million liters (about 80 million gallons)
on site with more wine produced and stored elsewhere.
Specializing in blended wine in the $8-10 range, Yellow Tail
at first glance sounds like a dream: its
quick to find, it sells well, and best of all, it’s cheap. From a marketing standpoint, Yellowtail hit
the nail on the head. But they had the
means to do so, with a large-scale distributor in Costco, financial backing
through investors, and the hot Australian climate to load up its vines and
churn out record crops each and every year. By mass-producing and mass-marketing Shiraz (same as Syrah, different
name) and Chardonnay, Yellow Tail appealed to many casual wine drinkers
worldwide who were desperate to try an entry red or an alternative to
California chards, but who had neither the wine wherewithal nor the cash to
pony up $15-20 a bottle for everyday dinner wine.
Today, Yellow Tail is one of the most recognized labels in
the world. Its annual revenues for the US alone are in the hundreds of millions of
dollars, and it comprises over 40% of all imports from Australia by volume (2006
data). To put things in perspective,
Australian wines claim a volume market share of 9 percent worldwide; if Yellow
Tail were to be excluded, this figure would drop to 5 percent. The success story apparent, Yellow Tail markets
premium blended wine at basement prices, while concurrently targeting younger
drinkers by through its instantly recognizable wine labels. With so many wines struggling to sell in the
late 90’s, combined with beer being the beverage of choice for most of
America’s youth and college students, this was a great way to recruit younger
oenophiles as the traditional base got older and stopped buying wine. With all the good things that the Yellow Tail
“phenomenon” spawned, why do I object so much to buying it?
The answer, and the reason for my lengthy discussion on this
topic, becomes clear – or rather unclear - in the glass (no pun intended). A bottle of Yellow Tail, in general, has such
a plethora of different grapes blended together that it might in fact not
legally be called wine, at least according to contemporary Australian wine laws.
Shiraz makes for an easy blend with other classic grapes such as Grenache and
Mourvedre, or Cabernet and Merlot, among many others. A few examples include Shiraz-Cabernet, Cabernet-Shiraz-Merlot,
Grenache-Cab-Merlot, and Grenache-Shiraz-Mourvedre. Though the latter blend is an exception and
can certainly make for some delicious wines coming from down under, at the end
of the day there really is no way to recognize true varietal in Yellow Tail’s
overly blended mess. Most contemporary
blends contain a maximum of 4 grapes in a Syrah-based blend, or 5 for a
Cabernet-based blend, but some of Yellow Tail’s contain six or more different
varietals, many of which may not even be grown in Australia! For all you know, you might be drinking
fermented grape juice made from grapes that were grown in Africa, India,
or elsewhere in the South Pacific! I’d
love to tell you that I’m making this stuff up, but I’m not.
As a result, Yellowtail by and large lacks a product that
has a distinction of place. The truth is apparent on the label. Australian wine-labeling law stipulates the
following:
“A minimum of 85 percent of the grape
variety stated on the label must be used [to make the wine]; if two different
types of grapes are used in a blended wine and neither grape represents 85
percent of the blend, both grapes must be mentioned on the label in order of
importance (e.g., a wine labeled Cabernet/Shiraz has more Cabernet than Shiraz).”
Source:
Kolpan, Smith, Weiss, et al. Culinary Institute of America's Complete Guide to Wines
of the World.
So by designating ‘Shiraz-Cabernet-Merlot’ on the label, the
folks at Yellowtail are telling you that 85% of the grapes in the bottle come
from those three varieties. The proportions are unknown, though Shiraz appears in slightly
higher percentage than the other two. What’s more troubling is that the remaining 15% is also unknown. There are likely a handful of similar grapes
thrown in for good measure, though what they are, and more importantly, where
they come from, remains a mystery.
So what am I suggesting as an alternative? California Syrah, for one. California produced 110,000 tons of Syrah grapes statewide in 2007, a large percentage of
which could be characterized as ‘cool climate’. These are grapes that come from the cool
coastal regions of Sonoma, Monterey, and Carneros, and without a doubt many
will produce fabulous wines. Though an
entirely different beast than Shiraz,
cool-climate Syrah, as it has come to be known, is largely underrated in the United States. The slower ripening process, longer growing
season, and lower yields lead to a wine grape that is highly sought after by
many wineries looking either for a single varietal wine or for a Rhone-style
blend. Cline Cellars makes a fabulous
100% Cool-climate Syrah from the Sonoma
Coast appellation that is
only $12.
The resulting product has proven in recent years to be very
good, and an incredible value at that. Many
growers from Paso Robles have come to Monterey in recent years looking for cool-climate Syrah either to bottle alone or to
balance out their hot Cabernets and Merlots from San Luis Obispo county. Not surprisingly, many of these growers have
been loathe to plant Syrah simply because of the lack of water availability in
this region. It has been shown that
Syrah is very susceptible to “burn” when conditions are such that water demands
are high and its availability is low, particularly in the summer months when
temperatures push well into the 100s. Syrah
is an incredibly water-demanding creature, and even under stress its stomata
tend to stay open (called anisohydric
in viticulture jargon) and they continue to use water despite the fact that
they are killing their own tissue in the process. Conversely, varietals such as Grenache close down
their stomates when water becomes scarce (they are isohydric), and they essentially shut down photosynthesis in an
effort to save water. This innate need
to conserve is why Grenache does so well in the hot and dry climates of central
Spain, in the Rhone Valley
of France, and in Australia
for that matter!
So why haven’t the Aussies taken the hint that continuing to
plant Shiraz isn’t the best idea in these hot and arid climates? Probably because they can’t afford not
to. Yellow Tail is a multi-billion
dollar behemoth, and for the last near decade the stuff has flown off the shelves
at record pace. Yet in the process,
Yellowtail has effectively murdered the image of Australian Shiraz as a unique
and quality grape from down under, mass-producing it to the point of retail
over-saturation. And Yellow Tail has not
only lowered its own standard in the process, but lowered the world’s standard
for what is to be expected of the varietal it champions. But that’s all about to change.
Australia is at present
experiencing a 100-year drought, and over the last several years some growers
have lost as much as half of their crop due to yield limitations from water
scarcity. This will certainly have an
effect on the quality of wines coming out of Australia in the near future, but
it will also have a supply effect on the industry as a whole down the road.
We’ll start to see the 2007 Australian reds hit the shelves
in the next 18 months, so I’ll be keeping a close eye on things when they
do. In the meantime, my advice would be
to stop picking up the Kangaroo simply because it’s eye-catching and because it’s
a no brainer. Put some thought into your
decision-making at the wine store and dare to be different. There’s better stuff on the shelves from our
own country to be had, and for comparable prices. And even if we don’t have a cooky marsupial
on the label, it’s the substance in the bottle that really matters.
