Organically Inclined

By Courtney Thompson
 

ORGANIC, CHEMICAL-FREE PRODUCTS have long been popular in the United States. "It's like recycling, you just feel good about it," says Steve Dorfman, chief winery officer of Brown-Forman Wines, which owns the certified-organic Bonterra Vineyards.

Fetzer Vineyards began producing organic wine grapes in 1986 and when Brown-Forman purchased the winery in 1992, it supported the effort. Today, Bonterra is Brown-Forman's only certified organic label, while Fetzer has a certification goal of 2010. "Fetzer believed that better tasting fruit through organic farming would yield better tasting wines," says Dorfman. "Today, we believe we are more true to the varietal flavor coming from our organically grown fruit."

According to the Organic Trade Association (OTA), the organic market has grown an average of 20- to 24-percent a year throughout die 1990s and consumers spent $7.8 billion on organic products in 2000 alone. Recently, the trend has also been building steam in the wine industry.

While some may associate organic products with meat, dairy and even Cheetos, the wine industry is no stranger to pesticide-free practices. According to the California Department of Food and Agriculture, there were 7,940 acres of certified organic wine grapes in California in 2003. Although organic winemaking remains a niche, due to the category's growing popularity, it could be headed for the mainstream.

Brown-Forman's Dorfman believes that by focusing on producing a superior product, organic wine can be appreciated for its quality rather than just the fact that it's organic. "We have found via consumer research that people want wine to be good. 1 hen [they] feel good about the added benefit that they have helped to be good stewards of the earth," says Dorfman. "We want our wines to compete with all other wines, not just other organic wines." Dorfman adds that Brown-Forman has taken a grass roots approach to marketing its organic wines by employing p-o-s materials for retail outlets, on-premise specialty programs and print advertising in lifestyle magazines.
 
And Katherine DiMatteo, executive director of the OTA, reinforces the need to market the quality of organic wine. "Consumers today have   more choices [among organic wines) than they did 10 years ago," she says. "Organically grown wines are showing up mo e often in taste tests. They are beginning to be rated by top critics [along side] other wines."

New York City's Counter Vegetarian Restaurant and Wine Bar co-owner, Donna Binder, found so many tasty Organic labels to put on the wine menu, that she decided to change the scope of her restaurant all together. "When we started tasting organic wines] there were so ma y good ones that we decided to become a wine bar as well as a restaurant," Binder says.

Counters constantly evolving wine menu consists of 80 organic wines and wines made with organic grapes ranging in price from $24 to $52 a 750-ml. bottle, with bestseller the 1998 Rotllan Torra Priorat Amadis for $32. Counter has 14 wine- by the glass, priced from $6 to $12.

In response to demand: for organic products, federal regulations were created in 1990 with the Organic Food Production Act that established national standards for labeling. In 2002, after 12 years of ongoing public commentary, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) launched the National Organic Program (NOP) to implement label standards and to oversee the production, processing and certification of all organic producers in the United States. Currently, there are 90 domestic and foreign NOP-approved certifying agencies.

Yet, as the popularity of the organic wine category continues to climb, consumers struggle to understand the organic classification system.

New label standards differentiating "organic wine" from "wine made with organic grapes" can be perplexing. In the United States, wines labeled with the word "organic" are made without added sulfites, while wines labeled with the phrase "made with organic grapes" can add sulfites to the wine. Sulfites function as a preservative in wines. These rules are generated by recommendations made from the National Organic Standards Board, which is a 15-member group consisting of growers, processors, retailers, consumers and other members.

Many in the industry agree that some organic wines made in years past weren't regarded as top notch. It's a stigma that today's organic wine producers are trying to shed.

RIQHT: Wine growers must farm organically for three years before becoming certified    organic and receiving the USDA ORGANIC label on their bottles.

"Nowadays, it's possible to make a great wine without added sulfites," says John Frey vice president of Frey Vineyards in Mendocino County, California. Frey, whose family-owned vineyard produces 50,000 cases of organic wine each year, says that the demand for organic wine is ever-present. " I here are many people who appreciate not having those added sulfites," he says.

Jeff Cox, wine merchandiser for PCC Natural Markets, a seven-location natural food market in Seattle, carries only three lines of wine that have no added sulfites, current vintages from Badger Mountain ($8 to $15 a 750-ml. bottle), Frey Vineyards ($6 to $15 a 750-ml. bottle) And Nevada County Wine Guild ($7 to $15 a 750-ml. bottle) -- because he believes the quality in these three lines are consistent and that 'mainstream' consumers tend to view organic wines suspiciously. PCC offers more than 450 wines at each location, 15- to 20-percent of which are wines made with organic grapes. "There is a perception that organic wines aren't as good as conventional wines," says Cox. "My first criteria is to put good wine on die shelf and if it happens to b" organic, it's a bonus."

According to NOP regulations, in order to become certified organic, a grower must abandon all chemicals and farm organically for three years. This, in addition to creating an organic farm plan, maintaining conversion records and paying initial transition costs has some producers eschewing the certification process altogether.

Catherine Green, an agricultural economic Research Service, with the USDA, says the red tape scares off many small-time wine pro-farmers who are growing there products organically have opted not to get certified because of the paperwork," she says.

Some in the industry also believe that non-certified farmers have "philosophical   differences" with the USDA, regarding the organization's lack of support for the organic industry in the past.

According to Dorfman, Brown-Forman's organically farmed Jekel Vineyards has avoided becoming certified due 'o the vineyards challenging weather aid its proximity to neighbors who farm conventionally. "Jekel has not certified at this point based on our desire to make sure we can stick to the program through thick and thin," says Dorfman. "If they had an issue where they needed to use a non-organic product, they would lose their [NOP-sanctioned) certification."

Despite the regulatory hassles, many producers still choose to become certified. "Environmental [concerns] were a powerful motivator for me," says Bonterra Vineyard's winemaker and general manager Bob Blue. "I live out here. And not having those sprays is pretty nice." To maintain a biodynamic environment-a farming process guided by natural cycles that relies upon both plants and animals for success-Blue releases chickens and sheep to loosen soil, introduces cover crops to enhance fertilizer and plants fruit trees and Echinacia to attract predators that keep the pest population down. Bonterra became certified organic in 1990 and produced 150,000 cases of nine varietals in 2003.

At Frey Vineyards, organic techniques include not tilling, maintaining cover crops and constantly staying abreast of organic research throughout the world. "Organic is a very modern, science-based system trying to address productivity without hurting natural systems," says Frey.

In her book, Growing Organic Wine grapes, Ann Thrup, manager of organic development at Fetzer Vineyards, estimates that the initial organic conversion costs can increase overall production costs 5- to 10-percent in the first three years. This is attributed to investing in new weed management machinery. After the first three years, most producers agree, organic growing costs become equal or less than conventional growing costs, as money is no longer being spent on synthetic chemicals.

Just as organic regulations are constantly changing, so is the role of die farmer. Both Bonterra's Blue and John Frey are in agreement that today's organic producer must work in accordance with nature's elements and must rely upon prevention, not chemicals, to solve typical farming problems.

"You're more focused on the vineyard when farming organically.," says Blue. "You become closely engaged in the crops."

Frey concurs, "Every [organic] farmer has to wear many different hats, from scientist to CPA."

What it boils down to for Counter's Donna Binder it simply "drinking great wine without all die pesticides."

Printed with permission from Market Watch