A glass act
WINE IS NO longer the domain of the bourgeois middle class. It's a massive global industry and for some, particularly collectors of rare fine wines, it's big business. But cork taint - the undesirable smells or tastes that can be detected in a bottle only after it's been opened - is literally spoiling the industry, and has spawned a multimillion-dollar 'alternative closures' sector. Metal screw-caps - long associated with only the cheapest of wines - is leading the pack, but in the past couple of years a sleeker contender has emerged: the glass stopper.
Since cork taint - or, more technically, the chemical compound trichloroanisole (TCA) - was linked to corks in the 1980s, a raft of plastic and metal stoppers has hit the market. There are gimmicky products such as Zork, a plastic-looking capsule that gives almost the same 'pop' as a cork, and the more utilitarian screw-caps, synthetic corks and crown caps, the small metal caps used on beer bottles. Broadly, they all offer the same thing: an alternative to cork and the promise of a lower incidence of cork taint; the mouldy, hessian-sack smell that's estimated to affect about 3-5 per cent of all bottles sealed with cork.
What's interesting about glass stoppers is how quickly wine producers are adopting them. After just two years in production, an estimated 14 million are being used by 600 European wineries. The stoppers are also being taken up in New World markets such as Australia and the US. Alcoa, a German-based US company that makes and sells the stoppers, attributes the popularity to a reduction in cork taint.
'This is the first alternative to high-quality cork - it's a big breakthrough,' says Alcoa's business development manager, Thomas Strieder. 'The trend to screw-caps is unstoppable, so alternative wine closures are in and consumers' acceptance is growing rapidly.'
Alcoa, which also produces screw-caps, expects its stopper sales to almost double again next year to 24 million. Strieder estimates that by 2010, there will be four billion alternative closures (screw-caps or glass stoppers) on the market.
Piggy-backing on the success of the screw-cap is a clever strategy. It's taken decades for wineries to convince themselves and consumers that an alternative closure can deliver a more consistent product. The push for screw-caps was driven by Australian and New Zealand wineries, which were often supplied with inferior cork. Now, according to the New Zealand Screw-cap Initiative, 80 per cent of all wine bottled in New Zealand is under screw-cap.
But corks still dominate the market and not everyone is willing to bet that the alternatives will end their use. Portuguese Cork Association Apcor estimates that cork accounts for 80 per cent of the global closures market, with the remainder split between synthetics (15 per cent) and screw-caps (5 per cent). 'We foresee a market share increase for both natural cork closures and screw-caps in the short- and medium-term as the quota for oil-derived [synthetic] closures diminishes,' Apcor director Joaquim Lima says.
Lima says that cork is the only natural fibre available and the only stopper available across all price points.
Perhaps one of the most significant measures of the industry's concern with cork is that the most prestigious and traditional wineries are looking at alternatives. And they're not ruling out testing glass stoppers further down the track.
Chateau Margaux in Bordeaux, one of the world's most traditional wine regions, began experimenting with screw-caps two years ago. Director Paul Pontallier says it will be another 20 years or more before the chateau considers changing closures. Based on his tasting experience, just 1 per cent of Margaux's wines are 'corked' although he says it's impossible to accurately measure the problem. He says 'maybe one day' the first growth will experiment with glass stoppers, but adds that the long-term testing for the products is far from complete. 'The main problem is making sure that whatever we use will still work well during the life of the wine. Not just in five years but in our case it is over 25, 30, 35 years,' Pontallier says.
The chateau is experimenting with different types of cork and Pontallier says the cork industry is reducing the incidence of taint.
In the New World, it's a slightly different story. Top wineries have been keen to try the new glass stopper, even partnering with universities to study the effects of new closures over time. South Australian wine producer Henschke has been one of the most enthusiastic early adopters, first testing the glass stopper last October with the Australian Wine Research Institute. The winery has released a trial quantity of 200 dozen of its 2004 Henry Seven Shiraz Grenache Viognier. All of the company's whites are under screw-cap and 80 per cent of the reds. Winemaker Stephen Henschke says the final 20 per cent under cork could be replaced with glass stoppers.
'I expect the percentage under glass stoppers to increase over time,' he says. 'It's the perfect replacement for cork as it has zero cork taint, or off flavours [it's 100 per cent neutral], has zero leakage and zero random oxidation.'
Glass stoppers hit the US this year, with a slightly different design than for the European market. The company says the take-up from high-end wineries such as Napa Valley's Whitehall Lane has been outstanding.
But although some wine producers are enthusiastic about the product, retailers and consultants are holding judgment. British-based retailers have declined to comment on the new closure, saying it's too early to be sure. Richard Halstead, the operations director at market research and consultant Wine Intelligence, agrees that it would be hasty to make a meaningful comment about glass stoppers. He says it's still uncertain how the trend away from cork will pan out.
'The picture isn't clear as far as we're concerned. Some wine producers will no doubt abandon cork over the next few years, either for production reasons or because their retail channel partners are demanding it,' he says. Halstead says consumers are still suspicious of any non-cork closures because 'cultural attitudes are very slow to change'. Retailers such as British supermarket giant Tesco have thrown their support behind the screw-cap, in part to eliminate the cost and hassle of dealing with returned wine due to cork taint.
The consumer perception that screw-caps are a cheap alternative to cork is gaining momentum. An Apcor study of the US wine trade, as measured by a 2006 opinion poll of restaurateurs and wine buyers, found 71 per cent still preferred to open wine bottles with cork closures above screw-caps (26 per cent) and synthetic closures (3 per cent). These figures vary from country to country. In New Zealand, 80 per cent of wine bottled in the country is sealed with a screw-cap, according to New Zealand Screw-cap Initiative's Dave Williams. 'Research into the ageing of red wines sealed with a screw-cap is also ongoing, and is currently showing good results with a slower, more even ageing process and far less variance due to oxidisation.'
Yet proponents of glass stoppers are hoping it will find a more upmarket image. Even in the ultra-conservative world of Bordeaux winemaking, it's finding a niche. Lionel Raymond, who owns Chateau de Lagarde, a 150-hectare organic winery in the Entre-deux-Mer, has been using the stopper since March last year. The winery uses glass stoppers for its easy-drinking wines such as rose and summer whites - about 10 per cent of production, with plans to increase that amount.
'When I first began, the retailers weren't very sure of the product,' he says. 'But after the operation we sold 97 per cent of the product in the shop. It means it was a good operation.'
