Remembering best selling wines of the past would help Wine Australia atone for its dismal record in promoting the country’s industry.
The list of the best selling wines of 40 years ago provides all the clues needed. The bottles people liked opening back then had little to do with poncey tasting notes and “expert’s” scores out of a hundred.
They were unashamedly easy to drink and tended to be on the sweeter side – precisely the kind of tastes that introduced most Australians to wine. And still the kind of tastes that younger drinkers find in their assorted flavoured forms of spirits.
So instead of bemoaning youth’s growing lack of interest in wine, Wine Australia should stop pretending that its calling is simply to promote what it would describe as fine wine.
There is no such thing as the “one sector” it continues to plan for. Without beginners the whole wine industry will continue to decline. So there is still a need for the kind of wines that people like me grew up with and which dominated the list of best sellers that my brother David compiled for The Financial Review back in 1983.
