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Corks pop as the spring collections get a tasting
Supermarkets offer cheap wines by the barrel, but can they beat the quality of smaller shops?
SPRING is in the air and there are wine tastings everywhere. Morrisons, the supermarket chain with stores in Chalk Farm and Holloway, is the latest to show off its bottles. Last week in the Imagination Gallery, off Tottenham Court Road, they uncorked their spring collection.
Four years ago, in an audacious move, Morrisons, a regional chain, bought up the much larger south of England-based Safeway group, defeating Tesco and Asda – who also wanted the company – in the process.
One man, Sir Ken Morrison, had masterminded the company’s rise from a handful of market stalls to the fourth-largest supermarket brand. He spurned many modern business method. Expensive consultants were definitely out – “I’d rather use the money to employ some extra check-out girls,” he is reputed to have said.
Wine tasting and wine writers were also not high on his agenda. It was good quality produce coupled to low prices that enticed an army of northern workers to file past his check-outs each week.
Safeway, on the other hand, had built a reputation by regularly introducing interesting, often innovative wines, the kind that inspire wine writers to wax lyrical.
While wine had played no part in the growth of Morrisons, in the south of England the situation was different. Supermarkets wishing to attract custom and enhance their image often turn to wine.
Sir Ken may have surmised that one possible way to gain access to the bank accounts of the south’s middle classes is through the contents of a wine bottle. Or perhaps the company decided press tastings are what national retailers are supposed to do. Whatever the case, this was the company’s third attempt to impress London’s wine writing fraternity.
Last year’s affair was a bit of a disaster. The Observer’s Tim Atkins lambasted the range: “There were too many cheap, badly blended wines on offer,” he wrote.
However, this did not stop him and several other national wine writers from regularly recommending individual Morrisons wines throughout the past year.
Atkins’s criticisms may have hit home though for Stuart Purdie, who guided us through the wines at last year’s tasting, is no more. He’s taken early retirement, announced master of wine Arabella Woodrow who, along with three others, has replaced him on the wine-buying front. It should be noted that Sir Ken, 76, has also recently taken to pruning rose bushes.
It soon became clear that the new team have not had time to make their mark – most of the wines on show at this tasting were chosen by the old regime.
So are Morrisons’ wines a problem? Not really. They have a comprehensive range that includes all the major brands, international wine varietals are well represented and there are lots of bottles from all the major European regions. True, many are cheap – under £6 – yet the range includes the wines that the vast majority of wine drinkers buy.
Morrisons also introduce new, sometimes exclusive, wines regularly and for those who don’t fancy run-of-the-mill, there are some upmarket, more expensive bottles. The real problem with Morrisons is supply: it is often difficult to obtain their best wines this far south.
Some years ago, supermarkets were in the vanguard when it came to introducing genuinely new and exciting wines; those days are long gone. These days, the really interesting wines are to be found in the growing number of small shops that line the main roads and back streets of London and towns across the country.
We no longer need a wine guru to know where the best wines are. A pair of sturdy shoes is more useful then a national wine guide. |
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