I was ready to be impressed with Stormhoek, the South African company that has hired Hugh “Gaping Void” McLeod to flog its vines.
I like Hugh’s cartoons and his irreverance, but it turns out he is in some danger of hurting his personal brand by taking Stormhoek on and flogging it. I mean, what if the wine doesn’t have as much personality as he does (and how could it?). Let’s try and make this about the wine though, rather than the exceedingly nice personalised packaging, and Hugh’s personal blog network.
Talking of packaging, the first thing you notice is the screw top. I can live without a cork, I am not a bigot on that score.
I first tried Stormhoek’s Sauvignon Blanc on a Thursday night. It was very well chilled (perhaps too much so).
I poured the wine into a nice wide glass, swished and swished, and tried the “nose”.
Not as fruity as expected, was my first thought. Gooseberrys? Grass? Anything…
So i took a taste.
The dryness whacked me upside the head, a good sign in my book. Unlike a French Burgundy, which tends to hit you on the side of the tongue with acid high notes, this was in the middle of the tongue. I savoured the dryness, and waited for the flavours to come through.
and I waited. The fact is, as far as my uneducated palate is concerned, Stormhoek is not a classic Sauvignon. Its not bad but there just wasn’t enough fruit there. Not enough of the aforementioned gooseberry.
I drank the wine with a home-made chili Tufu and noodles. That was a good move, the wine was a nice cold dry fresh taste to sit alongside the heat of the chili. But i am sure you would agree-not an ideal tasting companion food.
Next day i decided to try again, and brought the wine into the office, made sure it wasn’t so cold this time, and shared it with the boys from YellowPark.
It was not so cold this time, and we poured it into tumblers for a Friday afternoon taster.
This time the fruit came though more strongly. Quite peachy in fact. Nice alcohol levels, and still suitably dry.
But not one of the three of us was all that impressed.
A good product at a good price sure, but that’s not enough in a market this crowded.
You would drink this stuff happily if it was offered to you, but if it takes off, that’ll be down to the marketing rather than the product. Many wine buyers are very subsceptible to effective marketing so good luck.
Frankly the notion that Freshness Matters, the winemaker’s schtick, may well be true of average white table wines. We have all had awful experiences with French table wine. But it was a beer advertising slogan first– from Budweiser no less. And I dont think its true of many decent wines.
So is Stormhoek a decent 7 quid bottle of wine? I suppose so. But if I was in Tesco and could buy a Sancerre for nine, instead, I would do so. The ignorance premium perhaps. Or maybe Stormhoek needs to work on the bouquet.
It will be interesting to see what other bloggers say about the wine in this experiment. I decided not to read other reviews first.
Where did i get the title of this blog? Well you’re supposed to spit it out, right? But really i was thinking about marketing, drinking the coolaid, passion, and ahem – spitting it out.
http://37signals.com/svn/archives2/drink_it_in_or_spit_it_out.php#comments
Cote' says:
August 15, 2005 at 11:44 pm
Pffft! That’s what you get for drinking wine.
I recommend a good “table” bourbon.
Dennis Howlett says:
August 16, 2005 at 4:17 am
Hugh’s flogging method looks interesting – but will he get the customer feedback he can realistically use in merchandising pitches? And if they do go mad for it then what about the supply chain implications? Most important of all, will he share his experiences?
hugh macleod says:
August 16, 2005 at 10:29 am
Hey, thanks for your feedback =)
OK, so Stormhoek wasn’t for you. I’ll pass your feedback along…
Thanks again!
Robin Wilton says:
August 16, 2005 at 1:18 pm
I’m not even going to start on the ‘spit or swallow’ theme.
I do find the Budweiser ‘Freshness Matters’ strap-line obnoxious, though. I toured their St Louis brewery once and they tried to make a big deal of it, by inviting us to taste some newly-poured beer and then some which had been left in a cup long enough to oxidise. I don’t know about you, but it’s a long, long time since I considered the dog-ends of last night’s cans even vaguely worth investigating!
Their next ploy (without a hint of paradox…) was to make a big deal out of the fact that their beer is all pasteurised before it’s shipped… so presumably anything which could still contribute to whatever they might mean by ‘freshness’ is killed off.
ho hum
Robin Wilton says:
August 16, 2005 at 1:20 pm
PS – if you’re after a dry white at 9 quid or less, what about a decent Macon Villages?
James Governor says:
August 16, 2005 at 1:48 pm
very good suggestion robin. i tend to think of Macon Villages as a good 6 quid option, rather than a “premium” seven to ten… i was also trying to map to sauvignon blanc, rather than chardonnay.
i love the marketing beer pasteurisation story – there is a lesson there for all of us.
James Governor says:
August 16, 2005 at 1:49 pm
and cote- a lot of bourbon is awful imho, sweet and nasty. i prefer uisge in the main.
Cote' says:
August 17, 2005 at 1:34 am
“Sweet and nasty.” I can understand where you’re coming from. I think it took me a good year before I got over it. It’s all in the training, you see.
Robin Wilton says:
September 25, 2005 at 4:40 pm
By a strange co-incidence, I happen to be a bourbon fan too ;^). If you generally find it too sweet, try going for a small-batch bourbon with a higher octane. Bookers, Bakers, the stonking Basil Hayden. That said, if you’re a uisgephile you’re probably as unlikely to convert to bourbon as I am to migrate in the opposite direction!
Ludovic says:
March 10, 2006 at 2:09 pm
SEVEN QUID?
Wow mate, you’re paying a lot of marketing money.
At least with French wine, you know it goes to the French Tax Office…
Try a Saumur instead:
<a href=”http://www.ocado.com/webshop/getProductDetails.do?sku=12411011
jason says:
February 1, 2007 at 11:59 pm
Hi James:
Was it the 05 or 06?
Jason