Just as we are mentally ready to declare that the Covid pandemic is over and return to a life similar to before… there are now other existential threats surfacing in Eastern Europe which affect the rest of the world. I must admit I find it extremely difficult to focus on such relatively ‘minor’ subjects such as offering wine for sale. Judi’s father is from Eastern Germany where he, his parents and siblings lived through WWII and its aftermath. His father was an engineer, and they were fearful of being ‘taken’ by the Russians vs. the Americans who were both scooping up technically trained people in Germany after Hitler’s demise. Fortunately for our family, the Americans got there first, and they left their home with what they could carry and were taken west before the country was divided between east and west. History repeats itself so regularly and it’s an important reminder that this happens to real people, not just distant ones on the media.
The Rolling Stones were young people at the time they wrote the title song, living a day at a time. All the founding members were born in the years during WWII and grew up during the aftermath and recovery in Great Britain. It is remarkable how much wisdom it communicates about the human condition. The message of this song seems quite apt today for reasons beyond the initial thrust of the song. Here is my amateurish version taken from a Zoom interview early in 2020.
The supply chain is truly as difficult as you’ve been hearing, wineries included. Availability of wine bottles at this point has been particularly fickle. Bottles ordered months ago suddenly became unavailable. The green colored claret bottles we use for the Zin and Cabs are now nearly impossible to get and what is available is so much more expensive. We’re having to make adjustments to what we are able to bottle and actually ship. At one point I seriously considered using burgundy bottles for our Zins (and even Cabs) just to be able to bottle the wines at all. We used up what we had in stock and have a mixed bag with some brown colored bottles moving forward. We can’t always get the bottles we want but can at least still get what we need to get the wine to you. The cost of these bottles, shipping of incoming materials as well as outgoing wine has skyrocketed. We are no longer able to absorb this and so we are going to start to take a measured approach to increase prices in order to remain in business. We have kept prices at the same under-market level for quite some time and just can’t continue.
As it was last year, and more so with the worldwide conflict, it has been very therapeutic to be outside working in the vineyard. Knowing how it all affects the quality of wines and that will help the vines remain in play for decades more to come.
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