Musings on the Horrific Social Habit of Wine Producer Name Dropping

A quickie, food for thought post today.

Because it's the holiday season, I've been out and about a ton lately. And when people find out that I'm in the wine business they often want to talk wine (or if they are a teetotaler, run away from my devil spirit...I do live in the South). If they drink wine and stick around to speak with me, 90% of the time it's a great conversation. But the other 10%...oy vey. PAINFUL at best. Why? It's a little thing I like to call 'obsessive name dropping.'

If you read my blog regularly, you know that I'm much less concerned with producers and much more interested in regions, grapes, and history of wine. Producers are important because they are the people out there creating the good stuff, but I find that most of the confusion in the wine world and most of the snobbery that goes on revolves around conversations like this:

Wine snob: "Oh, you like wine?"

Me: "Yep, love it. Drink it every night"

Wine snob: "Then you must have had [put obscure wine producer here]. I mean they got 98 points from Robert Parker. I bought a case last time I was in Sonoma. And you must also know [insert other obscure producer here]...etc., etc., etc.

Me: "Nope. But I'm sure they're great."

Wine snob: "Did you say that you're a Certified Sommelier?"

Gimme a break.

There are thousands of producers out there and I can't have tried them all. I drink adventurously and try new things all the time, but I hate when people get "Producer-y" on me. It makes me feel bad, frankly. And it leads to a confrontational situation where the person who has knowledge of a producer then tries to quiz me on everything I DO know to prove that my not knowing about their "guy" doesn't make me a wine novice or complete and utter moron, as they make it seem. Although I've passed lots of exams, taught people about wine on the blog and in the wine classes I teach, worked for large wineries, and traveled around the world to wine regions, it has no bearing once I haven't heard of this specific producer.

Maybe I'm more Burgundian in my approach. I think the land is king and that it's the producer's job to seek out the best areas and then not botch what Mother Nature gave them. It's one thing to share an exciting wine experience that you had with someone, another entirely to make people feel bad because they aren't familiar with a boutique producer from a region.

So with the holiday parties in full gear and New Year's approaching, when you strike up wine conversations please remember that all wine lovers have had different experiences. We should applaud the information we DO have and try to share our love of wine and experiences with good producers with a generous spirit, rather than participating in some ridiculous name dropping pissing match.

This is a journey through a topic that none of us will ever know everything about (that's why most of us love it so much -- constant change and learning with a great backbone of history! Who could ask for more?). Instead of trying to upstage each other, let's just try to constructively share the wealth and stop thinking someone is a moron just because they don't know or share your love of certain winemakers.

If you're feeling combative, talk politics or religion instead...at least there you won't turn anyone off of wine!