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We had started the evening with Moet & Chandon
to celebrate the inauguration of the new Bangalore facilities
of National Instruments, a billion dollar Texas based
IT company. The nine wines selected for tasting were
Azure Bay, Kendall Jackson and Fontanelle Banfi Chardonnays,
Beaujolais Villages from Louis Jadot, Sula Satori Merlot,
Kendall Jackson Pinot Noir, Oxford Landing Cab-Shiraz
and as the grand finale, Gaja Promis, all purchased
locally from Metro Cash & Carry.
A pretty decent selection that, for an august gathering
that varied from novices to not- so- novices who were
there to enjoy the tasting experience. One hoped that
after the end of the evening there would be a few converts
to the wine religion. At the very least, they would
feel more confident in the company of wine drinkers
and relish wine better in future.
The guests were enjoying the unidentifiable aromas,
the incessant fizz of the tiny bubbles and the fresh,
crisp flavour of the champagne. While we were still
at the rudimentary stage of wine tasting discussion,
the efficient waiters from the Taj catering had opened
the next wine in line, Azure Bay Chardonnay, getting
a hint from the corner of my eye. While the interaction
on the beauty of champagne was on, I saw some people
already engaging their palates with the chard, ‘ahead
of the class’.
Looking at the dark golden colour of the wine from
a distance, my instinct warned me something was amiss.
When the glass was brought to me, the aroma was …yuk,
so off-putting, almost putrid. The colour was unappetising
and so was the flavour which was not that of acetic
acid but certainly not of apples or peaches it promises
on the label. The wine was flat, dull and simply off.
It was a case (two bottles, actually) of bad storage
or simply the wine dying out on us because of old age.
The question is: who should bear the cost of these
two bottles of wine in the purgatory state waiting to
attain the only possible state of nirvana- poor quality
vinegar. After the purchase, the bottles had been stored
properly in the client’s fridge under my instructions
from Italy from where I had gone to attend this important
event in Bangalore with a few hours’ layover in
Delhi. So the customer is not at fault
Is Metro at fault? Or the distributor? Or the importer,
or should one blame the producer? The producer could
be faulted for churning out this cheap quality wine,
of course, but that fact is known to the importer and
he prices it accordingly. He might even have negotiated
an umbrella rebate for wine to be defective or corked,
a universal occurrence of 2-5%.
There is no doubt in my mind that the customer should
be given an immediate replacement or refund immediately.
The matter can be sorted out between various other links
of the chain. In any consumer product, the law protects
the customer from a defective product and the retailer
is the agent who is accountable to him for any defects.
For defective products one can also approach the producer
directly. This may not be practical for imported wines,
anyway.
IT laws have been formulated only recently in India,
IT being a new phenomenon. In wines too, this area of
satisfactory quality is still nebulous and will need
to be handled with care and prudence.
With so many wines in the market, of past vintages
that have become ‘defective’ by losing out
their original characteristics, the issue will gain
more significance as retail sale opens up. I was checking
out a popular retail store in South Delhi recently when
a customer walked in with a bottle that had exactly
the same problem as the Azure Bay and the store manager
was tizzy trying to ward off the complainent and creating
a lot of unpleasantness. Such situations are bound to
increase.
It would be a tricky situation to handle too, obviously
because who is to tell whether the wine is off or not
- certainly not the man behind the counter, whose knowledge
is limited to the colour and perhaps the race of the
wine. In this instance, all other wines served were
purchased from the same vendor and were ok. In fact,
like on other occasions, the guests polished off the
last, Gaja Promis as I was giving them the background
of the wine. I did not even get time to tell them that
the Super Tuscan was a blend of Merlot, Syrah and a
minor portion of Sangiovese but the bottles were polished
off with every red wine lover rating it the best.
What nags me always is also the fact that a person
drinking out an off wine may also be turned off completely
forever by wine, a white wine, a Chardonnay, or Azure
Bay. Despite it being a low end wine, its brand name
can be sullied, for no fault of the winery. Since the
off wine does not physically harm the system, the taster
may perceive this to be the normal taste, with no excitement
that we find in the beverage.
Fortunately the next two labels of Chardonnay we served
saved the day for the varietal and possibly the wine,
as the next two were quite quaffable, especially the
Banfi from Tuscany. Same was true for the reds- they
were all in good physical shape.
Coming back to the basic question, the common business
sense would also dictate that the front end retailer
take the bottle back immediately and give it back to
the importer. The history of the customer would guide
him if the complaint is genuine or not.
One hopes that there will not be many cases coming
up in the consumer courts in future. With retail opening
up in a big way, this problem is likely to be accentuated
unless the cool chain is maintained and the importers
and distributors clear out the stocks of young wines
before they die out. To this extent, a possible law
insisting on ‘Best before…’ on the
label would be a good idea. Incidentally, hotels may
be accused of fleecing the customers with their high
prices but are generally amenable to appeasing the customer
in such cases as they have trained service oriented
personnel.
If we do not handle the case of bad wine bottle, we
risk the growth in wine consumption even at the current
rate.
Subhash Arora
June 15, 2007
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