Wine quality is a contentious and controversial subject as every wine maker tends to think that his (or her) wine is the best, and will rarely accept a dissenting voice on the matter.
Nevertheless, we know that all wines are not created equal and that the quality (and price) of wines vary enormously. The question is: what is the intrinsic quality of Indian wines, and how is this quality perceived by consumers? Two, can consumers understand these differences, and do differences in wine quality affect consumer choices and preferences?
It has been said that “80 per cent of wine quality depends upon the grapes”; in other words, one can make indifferent (or poor quality) wine out of good grapes, but there is no way anyone can make good wine out of indifferent (or poor quality) grapes.
In India, grape vines are subjected to two prunings, and wine grapes are harvested at the beginning of summer. In contrast, the practice in other wine producing countries is to prune only once and harvest in autumn (September/October in the northern hemisphere). Quite clearly, Indian wine grapes are different in quality from those produced elsewhere — different, not inferior. So wines produced from Indian grapes will also be different from imported wines — different, not inferior.
Blind tastings have proved that most well-made Indian wines are as good as well-made wines from anywhere, with the best Indian wines holding their own against good international wines from most countries. Of course we have miles to go before being able to produce wines equal to the best international wines, but who knows? Indian wines have yet to develop a ‘signature grape’, in the sense that German wines have the Riesling grape, or that Argentina has Malbec or South Africa the Pinotage. However, India is a sub-continent with a range of terroirs, and the wine story here is really just 20 years old; so let’s give it time to develop its potential — who knows, we may yet show an ‘Incredible India’ in this field too!
Unfortunately, most consumers in India as yet know little about wine, so there is a large element of subjectivity in how wines are perceived. Many think that quality improves with price and that an expensive wine is better than a less-costly bottle, quite forgetting that high customs duties on imported wines means that many entry-level imported wines end up being higher-priced than better quality Indian wines. Even among Indian wines consumers will tend to go for a known brand rather than a new or unknown brand, again forgetting that a new brand is often priced lower than an established label just to get trials.
Can consumers differentiate wine quality? Yes, of course, but they rarely get an opportunity to do so. If you were to get ordinary consumers together for a blind tasting, many would give preferences matching scores given by the experts. But few get the chance as we rarely open more than one or two bottles at a time, and almost never actually sit down to compare quality (and price).
To summarise: the quality of Indian wines is as good as that of wines anywhere, but they are perceived to be of lower quality (than international wines) as they are lower priced. The quality of wines made in India will improve further over time, and so will perceptions — who knows, sometime in the future we may talk of ‘Incredible Wines from India’!
Alok Chandra is a Bangalore-based wine consultant
