In 2021, more wineries, including luxury wine giants, will promote new “ethical wine” initiatives such as the certified regenerative farming program, started by eco-warrioring clothier Patagonia Inc. In 2020, California’s Tablas Creek winery became the first winery to adopt its principles and get certified. International Wineries for Climate Action, which was founded last year by Spain’s Torres Family and California’s Jackson Family Wines, will also continue its mission.
Streaming live experiences will be the new oenotourism
Oenotourism, now shut down, won’t be back for a while. Count on being transported to wine regions virtually, as new wine experiences vie with Netflix.
Silicon Valley entrepreneur Michael Baum created an innovative tourism hub in Burgundy after buying his wine estate Château de Pommard. Now he’s launching Vivant, a platform streaming live wine experiences from wine regions around the world, with professional production values and a community of organic wine producers.
Expect master-classes, music and wine pairing, and interactive “visits” to 12 new wine regions in 2021.
The rise of the Champagne robot sommelier
With restaurants closing and the Court of Master Sommeliers organization rocked by #MeToo scandals, the somm community has had a bad year.
And now: robots. This month, in cooperation with Veuve Clicquot and Dom Perignon, two M group restaurants in London unleashed Bailey and Sage, which ferry bottles and glasses of bubbly to customers. Hotel Trio in Healdsburg, Calif., sends out Rosé the Robot butler (not as cute as Bailey) to deliver room service wines. “She” is sanitized after each delivery.
Yet, I still have plenty of questions. Which NBA stars will debut wines next year? What bottles should wine lovers pour with lab-grown meat? Where are all those airline wines from planes no longer flying? And last: President-elect Biden is a teetotaler, but Vice President-elect Kamala Harris is not. What wines will she be drinking in 2021?
I’ll be covering those stories, and many more, in the year ahead.
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.