Might Be Too Much To Ask

“This is the last time, I brought full bottles this time and if you still don’t like them I won’t bring them back” a nervous sales rep that had made an appointment with me for early Wednesday morning but somehow failed to mention that he was also bringing his company’s import specialist/bully and a line of wines that he has been desperately trying to get placed at The Wine Country from like the second they landed the Fancy In The Pants brand, a line of wines I kicked out years ago…for a couple reasons. I grabbed my notebook, gave him a head-cocked grin and a shake of my smiling head as I made my way to the tasting room. Had to give it to the cat, that or feel for him as my guess was that he was getting some serious heat and pressure, big deep thumbs drilling his shoulders as to why this famed estate had no placement at The Wine Country….determination is a weakness of mine. You got it, I’ll at the very least listen and admire you for your RAWR.  

The last time I met with, oh let’s just call him Eric, he was freaking giddy as all get out, frothing at the mouth and such bubbling over with what I’m sure he thought were visions of dollar plums dancing in his head as he proudly, (poor fucker) sat across from me with those wretched half bottles of Billecart-Salmon Brut Reserve and the famed Grande Dame as it were, the Billecart-Salmon Brut Rose. Big stoner-ish looking wide grin, little sweaty bottles puddling on the table before me, almost accusatory in their weird little curly-q shirts and just-missing-it hipster packaging. I let him talk, felt guilty as he rattled off comments like, “As I’m sure you know” in a tone that was as oily and confident as I’d ever heard from him before. I closed my eyes, took deep and frantically seeking sniffs of the limp wine in my glass. Spun it, spun it again and again, my nose open wide and pulling and aside from a creepy little dried cheese aroma I was left flat and still seeking….anything even remotely pleasing. “Going to have to take a pass” I told him with an unusually sheepish tone, “Pass on which one?” he asked assuming that there was only one wine that I didn’t quite have room for…”On all of them” I said with a scrunched face. Ever stabbed a stoner in the heart? Sort of sucks. 

We parted that afternoon and I did my best to console him, “Maybe it was the half bottles” I tossed his direction as he shoved the water beaded little cheesy bastards in his bag. “I think half bottles are the worst, the absolute worst for Champagne” I offered as he made his way out the door. It’s true, that tiny bottle is far from a proper venue for wines as serious, profound and sexy as Champagne. Oh sure, put your shitty Prosecco and Cava in them, hell might as well put Laurent Perrier and whatever mass produced bubbly in there too, kind of like a juice pouch anyway. Serious Champagne lovers, the real ones not the “I like bubbles in my wine” dorks, they would never even consider a half bottle of gloriously effervescent, palate staining, sensual and mischievous wine, be it bubbly or not.  Those tight quarters prematurely age the wines, plain and simple and if the quality isn’t already there, well how well is it going to hold up really? I mean, when was the last time you saw a bottle of DRC, Comte Lafon, Mount Eden, Lopez de Heredia, Bruno Giacosa or  Camille Saves Brut Rose in half bottle? Yup…long freaking time, if ever. Just too little of the world’s great wines to bother with the smidgen bottles and as a first class wine dork I can tell you, our people are in no mood for droplets of greatness, we want mouthfuls. That and as I mentioned, the wines show advancement in those wee bottles, and with the larger Champagne houses aging the wines in regular sized bottles then re-bottling in those little bottles, (not to mention we never know how long the wines have been sitting around)? Well the wines have been forced and exposed more than the 750’s, and it way too often it is evident in the aromatics and on the danky, tired palate. I have a handful of half bottles of Champagne in the shop, they are tiny production wines that are in fact aged in bottle rather than being aged and re-bottled and, at least to me, it shows. If you insist on a not enough bottle, well I can proudly say it is as good as the full bottle…those Billecart-Salmon halves….eek.

“I fell in love with Champagne because of this house” I told the woman that was gently in my grill Wednesday. “My world quite literally changed over a bottle of 1989 Billecart-Salmon Nicolas Francois. Those thick, toasty, baked stone fruit aromas, the weight that pried my mouth and heart wide open…I would not be here and in any kind of charge if it weren’t for that squatty bottle of Champagne. I don’t take lightly the importance of this house. That being said I won’t give it a pass any more than I would a lover or partner that promised unconditional love and slapped me in the face over and over again with conditions.” My whole heart out and open as I ran through the wines, notes honest and open minded…the wines are not worth what they are asking, period and it breaks my heart. Better than they have been in years seeing as the gray market issue is being resolved so the wines are far more consistent but…

“I don’t think I’d be asking for your to sell your soul to bring the wines in. You are the only store of this caliber that isn’t stocking the wines and you, with your Champagne knowledge…we really want to see the wines here” her voice firm but hopeful, my eyes darting and not ready to land upon her. Not asking for my soul? Have to tell you…really sort of feels like it. I’ve spent years, over a decade actually, selling, teaching, opening bottles, minds and palates, spreading myself wide open and exposing one of the only real things I own, my pride, to opposition and “why don’t you have?”….showed people that Champagne, the real Champagne is wine and I won’t settle in my bubbly wine department any more than I would or do in the others I manage. Sell my soul? Sell my soul to a house that carries with it perceived prestige or value…can I stand there and take $75.00 dollars for a bottle of Brut Rose Champagne that I wouldn’t pay half that for? Suppose I could but….might be just a bit too much to ask.

My soul, not for sale just yet…