Ronnie Scissorhands
July 5th 2008, by Gavin
Our new rogneuse arrived this week, complete with numerous spinning blades. New to us, that is, after one careful owner and just twelve months on the road, allegedly. It is immediately being put to good use, trimming the rows of vines after a team of mostly seasonal workers, or saisonniers, have lifted all the vines up through the training wires. Our old machine could just about cope but it’s seen better days, not least during our first full season in 2000 when we bought it brand new. (It should have lasted longer but the both the manufacturer and the distributor have closed down, so it’s tricky to get it fixed each time it goes wrong.) We still have the really old, lethal one that we inherited but we can’t show it here because the inspecteurs de travail would close us down if they knew we still had it. Even visitors to the vineyard exclaim ‘oh my god, what’s that?’ when they peer inside the tractor shed (all part of the longer, more exciting tour), but head boy Daniel is quite attached to it and, besides, he never throws anything away. I should get him on to eBay.
Using the rogneuse (pronounced ron-years, in case you wanted to point one out on your next vineyard tour in France) is a highly skilled job, carried out this week by Hafid while Daniel works on one of the other tractors. By far and away the most labour-intensive aspect though is the work by the saisonniers, lifting the branches of the vines up through the training wires, taking care not to damage the newly formed bunches at knee level.
New AOC Rules: Forgive me for yawning
June 17th 2008, by Gavin
There are significant changes afoot with new rules surrounding the Appellation Contrôlée system. From the 1st July it’s all change: previous controls about guaranteeing the authenticity of a wine from Bordeaux are being replaced by, er, a brand new set of controls. The changes are for the good, just like stopping drink-driving is for the good, but we’ll have to wait and see just how well the whole scheme is implemented and policed.
I was invited to what I thought was going to be a routine meeting this afternoon, between a few fellow vignerons and a Directeur from the Syndicat de Bordeaux. I realised when I walked in to the Salle André Lurton in Grézillac that the session might go on for a bit longer than I had anticipated, as there were 200 people in the room and more arriving. There was a choice of standing room only at the back, or a seat in the front row, and I realised my mistake in opting for the latter when the main presenter gave everyone a peep at just how many Powerpoint slides he was about to share with us all as he set up his laptop with the overhead projector. There was to be no escape.
Darling Goes over the Top
June 7th 2008, by Gavin
By our man in the trenches
Times are tough for the UK wine trade. The pound has slumped against the euro, the cost of wine at source and fuel prices have shot up, and consumers face the credit crunch.
If that wasn’t enough, the anti-alcohol lobby is winning the media battle, with middle-class binge-drinkers being portrayed as a drain on the nation’s resources. So the same government that brought in 24-hour drinking (for health reasons?) softened the way for the assault on responsible wine lovers.
Britain now boasts the highest rate of duty on wine in Europe. The Chancellor of the Exchequer slapped a record 14p on a bottle of wine in the Spring budget and pledged to increase duty above the rate of inflation over the next four years.
Duty on a bottle of wine is now nearly £1.50, plus VAT on the duty as well as the wine, while there is no duty at all in Italy, Spain, Portugal, Austria and Germany, while France fleeces its citoyens for all of 2p a bottle. And yet we manage to remain sober – well, most of the time.
Captain Darling even claimed that wine drinkers are better off under this Government: ”Alchohol has become more affordable. In 1997, the average bottle of wine bought in a supermarket was £4.45 in today’s prices. If you go into a supermarket today, the average bottle of wine will cost about £4.00.”
Perhaps, but what he didn’t say was that the government has trousered 37p more per bottle in duty in that time, before the new rate came into being. Producers have been forced to cut costs, and two thirds of wine sold in Britain today is on ‘special offer’.
50% tax on an average bottle
On a £4.20 bottle on sale in the UK, which is the average price paid for a bottle of wine, £2.10 goes on duty and VAT, then there’s shipping, storage and distribution, plus the agent and the retailer’s margin. After the bottle, cork, capsule, label and packaging (we spend 50p on all these) that leaves rod all for the wine inside the bottle.