Out of the Tariff Woods, into the Barbera
Friends,
It was a surprise and a pleasure to see so many of you at the warehouse this past Saturday. The 15 hours on airplanes to see old friends was clearly worth it!
The pleasure part was obvious--pouring wine for friendly faces, loading up boxes with delicious stuff to take home, talking about travel plans, restaurants--all that jazz. The surprise part, though, was that not once, but twice, I looked up from the tasting bar to see 15-20 people captured in my monologue about tariffs. It isn't a sexy conversation, you know? Yet I was touched by the genuine interest and curiosity that most of you showed. And all of it was couched in the same overriding question:
What the hell is going on?
Here's the truth: No one knows what's going on. Wednesday, April 2nd is a big day, though. We'll know more about who, what, when, and where these possible tariffs will apply. Currently, it's sort of like dealing with a snow forecast that is predicted to be either 4 inches or 200 inches. No one can plan for that. But let's just say this--we'll get out our shovels and deal with 4 inches, maybe even 20 inches. But 200? That will be a non-starter. We'd have to wait for it all to melt, which it might never do. Heck, we couldn't even step outside to have a snowball fight or go sledding!
We got our ducks in a row over the winter, knowing that something might be coming. We bought a lot of wine, and all of it is now safely in our warehouse, landing here under the current tariff schedule. We're good. For the moment. But consider this--the wine below, with a 50% tariff would cost $28. At 100% it would be $38. At 200%? $57. This is a bottle that you can grab while you're in Italy for 12 euros. That we currently sell it for $19 actually makes sense considering freight, transport, and exchange rate costs.
At $28, $38, or $57 it makes NO sense.
Okay, so let's get out of the tariff woods shall we? Let's instead talk about a truly delightful young winemaking couple and their wine, the thing we prefer to do, and that we're best at doing.
In Italian, bosco means woods or forest. (see what I did there?) This is the welcome mat wine provided to us by the team of Paolo and Cristina Baudana, from the small frazione(hamlet) of Sorano, in the heart of Barolo country, near Serralunga. Many of you know their wines and their work as they have been a mainstay of our importing work over the past six years. Sébastien and I are possibly more proud of having their wines in our portfolio than almost any other. We buy nearly 1/3 of their entire production every year, and since 2019 we've built our own little cult following for all their wines.
Everything in their story says something about why we do what we do!
Contrada di Sorano Barbera 'Bosco' 2023
100% Barbera from Serralunga, planted in 1999, and just below a parcel of woodland on the hill that rises to the village
Fresh, bright, and easy drinking--like really very much so!
A red fruit salad with a crack of white pepper
The wine you'll see on local restaurant tables, drunk with impunity while washing down plates of tagliatelle with mushrooms or some kind of ragú.
Frankly, I think it would be sad not to have the pleasure of wines like this on our tables, even considering what it takes to transport them a quarter of the way around the world. There's just nothing else like it for a price like this. Wine is meant to complement great food and conversation, isn't it? It shouldn't have a high-priced barrier to entry and shouldn't be thought of as a luxury. Plus, it's like inviting Paolo and Cristina to join us at the table for a meal. How would we replace that?
We all appreciate and need little pleasures like these in our lives, don't we?