Cork vs. Screwcap

[Randy Caparoso]

Okay, Curm, but it would still have to be "fancy" screwcap (with a little twist?). Otherwise, I don't see producers embracing them.

And think about this: in the restaurant business, we've been hard at work "upgrading" people into varietals and premium wines -- slowly but surely weaning folks away from boxes and jugs -- over the past two decades. Do you really think most of us would welcome a "return" to screwcaps? Presenting such wines at the table would be, well, a tough thing to swallow, to say the least.

Now I realize that you're talking about grocery store stacks. Traditionally, there have always been products (coolers, Riunite, Thunderbird, White Grenache etc.) which do not cross from retail to on-premise sales. Screw'em, I say. But we're still left with the problem of corkiness with the bulk of the market's wines. And what I'm trying to say is that in our line of business (and restaurant sales ARE important!), we still like the mystery, or "integrity" as I put it earlier, of products with an unusual closure. If true corks aren't doing the job, we need something else!

[This message has been edited by Randy Caparoso (edited 05-30-99).]