John Szabo’s Buyer’s Guide to Vintages August 2nd Release

Canada (Wine) Turns 50, Winery of the Year Announced, and Are People Really Buying Local?

By John Szabo MS and David Lawrason, with notes from David Lawrason, Michael Godel and Megha Jandhyala

Canada takes center stage again this week in the Vintages August 2 release, hot on the heels of the final announcements of all platinum award winners, as well as the Best Performing Small Winery and the Winery of the Year at the 25^th annual WineAlign National Awards of Canada. Catch up on all of the news if you missed it. The WineAlign Crü picks their favorite Canadian wines from the release out of an admittedly strong selection, which includes some lesser-known names and intriguing styles, what I’d call a fashionable assortment. We’re told that there’s never been a better time to drink local. Front page on LCBO.com is the “Eh List” touting over 3,000 Ontario- and Canadian-made products, with “90+ new additions.” But are people actually buying more Canadian wine? Anecdotally, I’ve heard from winemakers about the surge in LCBO and licensee sales over the past half year, filling the gap left by American products. So, I decided to investigate the cold hard sales statistics. In other news, David made the pilgrimage this week to Niagara to join the celebration of Inniskillin’s 50^th birthday. Incorporated on July 31, 1975, it is Canada’s first estate winery of modern times. He draws some conclusions about the future by looking at the past.

Money Where Your Mouth is: Are Canadian Wines Sales Up or Down?

There has been a vocal upwelling of support for Canadian grown or made products in the past six months in the wake of the Trump administration’s threat to Canadian sovereignty and attack on the Canadian economy. Most provinces responded, somewhat symbolically by pulling American wine and spirits from government monopoly shelves and often filling the gaps with Canadian products. Historically, I’d say Canadians haven’t generally been too bothered about waving the flag, rather more quietly proud than bombastically so, and also especially circumspect in their views on, and purchases of, Canadian wines.

But what I’ve seen and heard of late is a pretty much unprecedented, at least in my lifetime, galvanizing of national sentiment. In recent conversations, winemakers have been very upbeat about the opportunity that Trump’s foolhardiness has presented for their wines and anecdotally report an increase in sales through all channels, including the LCBO. One small Niagara winery owner told me that sales to the LCBO had grown from about 200 cases last year to more than 1500 cases in just the first half of this year. And while US wines will be back sooner or later, many industry watchers are confident that Canadian wines will have permanently carved out more retail territory by then, winning over former skeptics by their quality, and that some significant percentage of consumers won’t go back to the same old same old US products they purchased before.

Do LCBO statistics support this view? It turns out that they do. And it seems that momentum is gathering, not tapering off.

Sales of Ontario red wines on the General List (just under 200 wines) are up 96.6% over the past six months compared to the same period last year up to July 20 and are up 148.5% in the past month compared to the same month last year.

For the just under 250 white wines on the General List, sales are up 82.8% and 140.3% respectively over the same periods compared to last year. And in Vintages, the story is even more compelling: Reds: +164.3% and +285.3%. And whites: +105% and +152.2%. Those are impressive numbers.

Sales for BC red wines in Vintages are equally remarkable, even if from a much smaller base, up 192.5% over six months, and +345.1% in the last month. Only BC white wines show a decline in sales over the same periods, though this can be explained by the short crop in 2024 which has yet to be reflected in generally later-released red wines.

So, Ontarians, glad you’ve discovered just how far the Canadian wine industry has come in barely half a century. There really has never been a better time to buy local, waving a flag or not.

Inniskillin Turns 50, And So Does the Canadian Wine Industry
By David Lawrason

It struck me as not only poignant moment, but an important one for Canadian wine. Magdalena Kaiser was at the podium in the outdoor piazza in front on Inniskillin’s iconic Barn on the Niagara Parkway.
It was filled with friends of Inniskillin — employees past and present, grape growers, suppliers, regulators, educators and many of us who wrote about the winery from the early days. There were elegant food and wine pouring stations and umbrellas all around. Magdalena had just finished recalling her childhood at “the winery” that her father Karl Kaiser had co-founded with Donald Ziraldo. Canada’s first estate winery of modern times had been incorporated on exactly this date — July 31 — in 1975.

Here is what she said: “As I stand here today, 50 years later, I’m struck by something powerful. What we are living now — this moment, this industry, this community — is exactly the vision that Karl and Donald believed in for Niagara. They saw potential where others didn’t. They believed that Niagara could produce wines of quality and character, wines that could stand with the best in the world — and they set out to prove it. And they did. But they weren’t just building a winery — they were starting a movement. I recently wrote in Decanter magazine that Ontario wine is at the dawn of a golden age. And I truly believe that.”

So do I. As a very close observer and writer about the Canadian wine industry — and especially as co-founder of the National Wine Awards of Canada — that has just announced its winning wines from 1,700 entries from more than 200 wineries across the country — I understood the magnitude of what has been created from this spot and moment in time, in only 50 years. And that, in many ways, as one of the world’s youngest and smallest wine industries, it still feels like something of a beginning for Canada. Not a new age, but indeed a golden age.

Buyer’s Guide Vintages August 2: Canada Coast to Coast White

Benjamin Bridge Wild Rock White 2024, Nova Scotia, Canada
$22.95, Lifford Wine & Spirits (Select Wine Merchants)
John Szabo – Last report we highlighted the lovely Tidal Bay from Blomidon in Nova Scotia, and this week we’re presented with another delightful maritime wine, a lightly spritzy, zesty affair with a sauvignon blanc-like profile minus the green, just the passion fruit and guava portions. (The blend is described as “Sauvignon Blanc-inspired.”) An ideal accompaniment to a seafood tower, ocean-side, al fresco, well chilled, with warm friends.
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