Inside the Fredrick Wildman and Sons new Greek wine portfolio

Fredrick Wildman and Sons, an old-line New York fine wine importer, has worked with @elloinos, an Athens-based Greek wine promoter, to develop a portfolio of Greek wines for the US market.  Fredrick Wildman introduced these wines to the market in a tasting held at the Landmarc restaurant in New York City on February 1, 2012.  According to Wildman, the producers around whose wines the portfolio is built "... provide eight distinct new voices in the world of Greek wine: from organic boutique upstarts, venerated houses, and vin natural producers, these vintners share common goal(s) in the quality and care they put forth." I have summarized the offerings in the table below.

(i) CS = Cabernet Sauvignon; (ii) Floara di Munti Brut is the sparkling offering

As the list shows, the portfolio consists of 26 wines from nine producers (the Rossiu di Munte Collection is a label from Katogi Averoff).  There are no distinct patterns in the list in terms of the age of the wineries.  The oldest is Koutsoyiannopoulos which was founded in the late 19th century while two of the wineries (Zafeirakis and Nerantzi) were founded within the past decade.  Of the remaining, three were founded in the 1990s, one in the 1980s, and one in the 1950s.  The average size of the vineyards for which data are available is 10.6 hectares.  As can be seen in the figure below, the estates are fairly widely distributed across the Greek wine regions.

Katogi Averoff contributes the highest percentage (30.7%) of the wines to the portfolio while Koutsoyiannopoulos and Troupis both contribute a single wine (3.8%) each.  Seventy-three percent of the portfolio is red wine, 23% is white, and there is a single sparkling wine.  Of the 19 reds, five are blends and the most important varietal, blend or standalone, is Agiorgitiko.  The international varietals Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah are represented in the portfolio both as monovarietals and as components in a blend.  With the exception of one case, the white wines are monovarietal and disparate.

Overall, the quality of the portfolio is very high.  I was particularly impressed with the saline citrus minerality of the Assyrtiko, the story and storied wines of Domaine Economou, the surpringly balanced Syrah of Domaine Nerantzi, the complexity of the Katogi Averoff Red blend, and the expressiveness of the Christos Kokkalis wines.  I found the sparkling wine from the Rossiu di Munte Collection wanting (whack-a-mole bubbles, limited persistence) and cannot see a clear path to success in the US market for this offering.

With the exception of three of the offerings, the wines were all poured by the estate owners/winemakers and they were all pleased and excited to be representing their estates and Greek wine on this stage.  I had extended conversations with Yiannis Economou (Domaine Economou), the brother of Christos Zafeirakis (Domaine Zafeirakis), and Eva Nerantzi (Domaine Nerantzi) and they were all highly enthusiastic about their products as well as the opportunity.  Yiannis particularly impressed me with his dedication to his principles of production and the aging of his wines and his wines reflect those principles.  Eva has an Oenology degree from the University of Dijon in France but utilizes her learnings within the guiding principles of the estate that her father built.

Kudos to @elloinos for putting together a great portfolio and to Fredrick Wildman for choosing the right man for the job.

Genesis of the Fredrick Wildman and Sons Greek wine portfolio

Having arrived at the conclusion that @elloinos is one of the most passionate and informed of the Greek-wine-focused bloggers -- as well as being similarly interested in, and concerned about, the impacts of the current financial crisis on the broader Greece, and, more narrowly, its wine industry -- it was a no-brainer for me to respond affirmatively when he announced that he was going to be in the US in the January-February timeframe and would be interested in meeting some of his twitter friends at that time.  After some DMing and emailing, I came to understand that @elloinos had put together a portfolio of Greek wines for Fredrick Wildman and was coming to the US for the public introduction of same.  I was subsequently invited by @elloinos to attend the New York event.

@elloinos is the Twitter handle of Markus Stolz, a German native currently residing in Athens and working on connecting Greek wine producers with importers from other markets.  A key tool in his arsenal is elloinos.com "... a hub for producers, merchants, and consumers ..." which provides insight into Greek wines and Greek wine production.

@elloinos expounding on his favorite topic at the Landmarc

In a January 2012 post on his blog, Markus expressed his excitement at being chosen by Wildman to assist them in their Greek-wine-importing initiative (This project hits the sweet spot of the elloinos mission which is to get Greek wines into the hands of international consumers through linkups with importers.).

Fredrick Wildman and Sons had its beginning shortly after the end of Prohibition when the namesake owner bought a wine and fine food importer called Bellows and Company. Shortly after the purchase, Mr. Wildman travelled to Europe and signed up a number of leading wine estates to have their products distributed in the US through his company. The name Fredrick Wildman and Sons came into being in 1952 when Mr. Wildman formed a company of that name to fill the void created when National Distillers left the fine wine business.  Wildman became a subsidiary of Hiram Walker in 1989 but was sold in 1993 to an investment group comprised of the Wildman CEO (Richard Cacciato) and six of its leading suppliers.

In my conversation with him, Markus indicated that he had been approached by Wildman to assist them in assembling a new Greek wine portfolio.  He put together samples and shipped them off to New York and within two weeks of the samples' arrival in NY, Wildman staffers were in Greece to meet the winemakers, taste the wines in-country, and explore the opportunities for business relationships.  The tasting at the Landmarc signaled the end of the selection/portfolio-building stage and the launch of the marketing/selling phase of the initiative.

I will explore the portfolio in a subsequent post.