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WINE TALK "Value" value (val' yoo) n.
1. A principle, standard, or quality considered worthwhile or desirable. 2. An assigned or calculated numerical quantity. Wine merchants are always dropping the value card on the unsuspecting public. This brings forward a few questions. Are all inexpensive wines a value? For that matter, can a wine that costs say $550 per bottle be value. How about bad values (like the ones exhibited in the red states)? And what's this value-driven term that I'm hearing regularly? The wine press seems to like to assign the value tag quite often. Sometimes, not only do they name a particular wine a value, but they also claim that a particular importer or winery is the finest importer (or producer) of value wines in the world. Really? Every wine that they touch is a value? Is that like a reverse Midas touch? And while I'm on the wine press, do all value wines get between 85 and 89 points? Is there some sort of law stating that a 95-point wine is no longer a value? Or is the wine press really using the value tag to subtlety convey that a particular wine just isn't very good? (I can envision the conversation - "give it 88 points, it only costs 10 bucks") I tend to think that value is far more of a personal,subjective statement. The bus stops at my front door and drops me off a block from work for only $1.60! Now that's a value to me! I get to read or doze, I don't worry about parking, or the cost of gas. But to others, the bus option is a lousy value, no matter what the cost. Their idea of a value is a Lexus. It's dependable, comfortable, attractive and cheaper than a Mercedes - value indeed! By that standard, I've got to believe that the high-scoring wine must be a value. I mean, if its good enough to get 98 points or something, it must be great, right? And if its great, isn't it worth the price tag? And if it's not worth the price tag, should it get 98 points? Doesn't the price of the wine impact the score? Shouldn't it? All these questions! Let's make it simple... henceforth: a value wine is wine that you really like that cost less than you think it should. We'll dispense with the points because no one really knows what they mean anyway - especially the people handing them out. Value is as value does. - Peter Wood
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