Burgeoning Trend - Wine For Women

The Florida Sun Sentinel is the latest media outlet to pick up on the recent trend of wines being produced and marketed for women. The article notes that women buy 77% and consume 60% of all wine sold in the United States. Several savvy marketers have picked up on this trend and are producing wines aimed at the better half of the country.

Just how aimed at women the wines are varies. Some are just cleverly packed. Others go a long way to create a wine with a taste, color, alcohol content and package designed to appeal to women. Overwhelmingly, however, the wines are aimed at the low end, daily consumption end of the market.

Anyone who has visited a Barnes & Noble recently will have seen this phenomenon in the literature/fiction section. Half the books now have pastel colored covers featuring drawings of women shopping or communing together and titles like "She Shopped on Sundays." A glance at the first paragraphs shows quality control stopped at the cover.

I fear the same is occurring in these "women focused" wines. I would suggest there is a reason women drink far more wine than men - generally, women have better palates and are more likely to appreciate the complexity of wine. Some of the greatest winery owners (Dalla Valle, Screaming Eagle) and wine makers (Helen Turley) are women. That is not accident.

Maybe this is a mixed blessing. Invariably, some of the people enjoying the low end of the market will move up to better quality wines. I believe, however, that these savvy marketers are missing the real opportunity - creating a quality wine aimed at women.

I will punt on the question of whether women who take up wine seriously will develop the collecting and score chasing neuroses that men do. I have certainly met women with collections that put most men's to shame, but it seems the exception rather than the rule in women who seriously enjoy wine.