Red wine consumption sharp decline per SF Chronicle

[lemniscate]

The times, they are a-changin'

 

https://www.sfchronicle.com/food/wine/article/red-wine-restaurants-19930284.php

[TdeV]

You'd never know it by my red wine consumption. 😁

[mgaretz]

I think it comes down to pricing.  When we go out I used to almost always order a glass of wine (red). Now with restaurants charging $15-$18 for a 5-6 oz pour of a wine that retails for $7-9 a bottle, I'm passing.

[TdeV]

15 hours ago, TdeV said:

You'd never know it by my red wine consumption. 😁

 

I meant to write that "You'd never know it by the percentage of red in my wine consumption" but it's much funnier in the original post. 🙄

[Margaret Pilgrim]

I wonder if it has to do with younger people's tending toward craft beers over wine, and older people finding white wines more easily tolerated than reds.    Many of our friends have veered to more white consumption than in our earlier decades.  

[gulfporter]

This NY Times article from a few days ago on the decline in Craft Brewers.  

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/27/dining/drinks/craft-beer.html

 

I agree with @mgaretz.  It's the overcharging by restaurants that's causing the fewer glasses sold at this SF restaurant.  While the article indicates this restauranteur reports their sales of reds are down 27%, whites are also down 13%   Why the disparity?  I looked at this restaurant's website and while it only shows samples of its offerings, many of its mains showcase wagyu beef, duck, oxtail; items that most would order with a red wine.  Yes it sells meals that are vegetarian or fish/lobster, IMO it's the sort of place you go for a splurge meal and you may want The Big Meal.  

 

Personally when we are in the US I limit myself to 1 glass of wine when eating out since even in the Tucson area they average $12 and up.  When we are in Mexico I don't always, but won't hesitate to order 2 glasses as they average 60 to 90 pesos ($3.90 to $4.30 USD equivalent).

 

 

[TdeV]

I read that the popularity of smoking pot was reducing wine consumption in general.

 

I can possibly find the source of such info if folks want me to look.

[lindag]

I'm doing my part to shore up the market.  😁

[weinoo]

23 hours ago, Margaret Pilgrim said:

I wonder if it has to do with younger people's tending toward craft beers over wine, and older people finding white wines more easily tolerated than reds.    Many of our friends have veered to more white consumption than in our earlier decades.  

 

I think what's actually happening is "younger people" (old Gen Zs and young Gen Ys) are trending to cocktails, especially Martinis (or, god forbid, espresso martinis). One or two of those, with an order of fries, becomes dinner. Or as a restaurant owner recently told me:  Four kids come in, order Martinis and share an order of fries. No need for wine.

 

Look at this "Happy Meal" from the restaurant Cecchi's:

 

NEW YORK HAPPY MEAL 

MARTINI & FRIES | $25

Every day 5-6pm & one hour before close

 

 

And then there's this, from Grub Street:

 

Quote

 

Historically, martinis are a drink of gravitas for me, conjuring images of tailored suits, men with money clips and thick stacks of cash, or my dad after work at the bar of a Chinese restaurant waiting for our family’s takeout order. But the martini culture I’ve been observing recently looks nothing like this. I’m talking about tables of friends around burgers and French fries, sloshing back martinis in front of the flash of phone cameras. Twenty-somethings ordering another round at happy hour (a death wish, if you ask me). Massive batched martinis at spring kickbacks (another death wish). “Ordering a martini” has become an activity, something that someone does as much as something that someone drinks.

 

“You are not wrong about this martini thing,” Toby Cecchini, the owner of Brooklyn’s Long Island Bar says. “It caught everybody unaware. In the same way that years ago all these 20-year-olds were ordering old-fashioneds all of a sudden. We went from making four or five of those for older customers a year to every kid across the bar ordering old-fashioneds without any idea of what they were. I was like ‘What the hell is going on?’ and everyone was like ‘Oh, it’s this show Mad Men.’ But where is the martini coming from? Complete blowback from the pandemic.”

 

Every day, Cecchini gets a printout of the numbers the bar did the night before. For years, it was a battle between the Long Island Gimlet (a light lime drink) and the Dolores Del Rio (a play on a spicy margarita). “Suddenly, six months ago, the martini was wiping everything out. I was like, ‘Oh my God, we did 71 martinis last night? And 36 gimlets?’ I recently turned to my business partner and was like, ‘I guess we’re just a martini bar now.’ I watch these kids hammering martinis and I’m like, good Lord.”

 

 

 

Edited 8 hours ago by weinoo (log)

[lemniscate]

I think craft beer consumption is also declining.   Hard seltzers are replacing beers on tap at local places.

[rotuts]

I drink less red wine.

 

W/O food , these days , it causes more acid secretion then in the past .

 

but Im hardly the Index for wine trends these days .