California Winemakers and Grape Producers to Hold First Online Grape Auction

Food & Drink Weekly, March 26, 2001

California winemakers and grape growers are planning to trade 2,000 tons of grapes March 27, in what some believe. could be the first of many online auctions. The California- based WineryExchange is conducting the auction and believes it to be the first of its kind. Online grape trading is a departure from the norm in California, where vintners typically have multiyear buying contracts with growers, participants said.

"The wine industry is tradition-bound; it is hundreds of years old; the relationships are solid. The adoption of the Internet is slow, but there is a fascination there," said WineryExchange spokeswoman Kristen Fairchild, who thinks the auction will help participants find the "true market price" as they buy and sell grapes from their office computer terminals.

"In the past, most of the deals have been cut on the tailgate of a truck ... If this is the way of the future, then we want to be part of that," said Doug Wilson, director of grower relations at Hopland, Calif.-based Fetzer Vineyards. Fetzer, owned by liquor, wine and giftware producer Brown-Forman Corporation, will be one of the companies producing $10 to $50 bottles of wine from the "super premium" grapes to be offered by three dozen of the Golden State's coastal growers at the auction.

"I think we always pay the market price," said Wilson, who added that the supply and demand equation now ruling the wine industry will continue to dominate, even on the Internet.