Virginia: The Commonwealth of Wine
Assessing Virginia's Place in Wine Amid Market Headwinds
The Virginia wine community gathered in Richmond earlier this month for a day-long conference of celebration, introspection and good old fashioned pick-yourself-up-by-the-bootstraps cheerleading. With the unwieldy title “Virginia Wine Trade Intensive,”1 the sessions aimed to remind sommeliers, retailers, distributors and writers that Virginia wine belongs on the dinner table and in the discussion. Panel speakers at various sessions included Joe Czerwinski of Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate, Jason Wilson of Everyday Drinking here on Substack, and Lisa Granik MW, a regular judge at the Virginia Governor’s Cup competition.
The mood was subdued, given the adverse market trend of Americans buying and drinking less alcohol, declining winery tourism (most Virginia wine is sold at the wineries), high costs from inflation and tariffs, and the growing anti-alcohol movement in the media and public health sectors. The devastating freeze of April 21 not only deflated hopes for the 2026 vintage, but also raised existential concerns for some. Custom crush brands, with no investment in vineyards or winery facilities, could be especially at risk, at least to the extent they are products of boom times in sales and grape crops.
And yet there was confidence that despite the current conditions, Virginia wine is strong enough to pull through.
I was on the panel for the opening session, titled “Virginia in Context: A Comparative Grand Tasting.” The session was moderated by Jay Youmans MW, and we were joined on the podium by Winn Roberton, head sommelier at Michael Mina’s Bourbon Steak restaurant in Washington, D.C., and Cheron Cowan of Wine Enthusiast magazine. We tasted 10 wines in five pairs, each pitting a Virginia wine blind against a “benchmark” wine from elsewhere. The audience was asked to guess the variety and which wine from each pair was from Virginia.
This was a “Judgment of Richmond” style tasting, and Jay noted the recent 50th anniversary of the influential Judgment of Paris that saw California wines triumph over French counterparts. He also recalled that Steven Spurrier, who had organized the Paris tasting in 1976, had keynoted a Virginia Wine Summit on the same stage in 2012. That visit ignited Spurrier’s love for Virginia wines, which continued until he passed in 2021.
But in a very real sense this wasn’t a JOP re-enactment. Virginia no longer needs to “beat” France or California. Virginia has demonstrated that it can produce world-class wines, so the question we were asking — implicit in the title “Virginia in Context” — is where does Virginia stand at present in the global wine scene.
The snapshot we got from these five pairings showed Virginia producing wines comparable to its European counterparts in quality. No surprise that Virginia’s wines tasted riper than Europe’s and racier than California’s. As one pairing demonstrated, Virginia also produces wines that have no counterparts elsewhere.
Many people noticed that Virginia also offers value, confounding a common complaint among consumers that “local wine costs too much.” In four of the five pairings, the Virginia wine was significantly less expensive than the other. I’ll append the list of the wines and my more detailed impressions at the end of this article for paid subscribers.
The Commonwealth of Wine
With quality and context established, how to get the message out against the economic and cultural headwinds? In a panel on market trends, moderated by Frank Morgan, author of the Drink What YOU Like blog and manager of the Virginia Governor’s Cup wine competition, discussion turned to the idea of promoting a signature variety. As I’ve written here before, New York is campaigning on “NY Cab Franc Forward,” and Livermore Valley trumpets Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc as its premier varieties. Jason Wilson noted that most wine regions are best known for a single type of wine and argued that a broader approach dilutes the message and confuses consumers.
Virginia tried that approach about a decade ago, briefly declaring Viognier the state grape. That campaign died quickly, and Viognier was the uninvited uncle at this year’s gathering, nowhere to be seen and never mentioned. Virginia makes some fantastic Cab Franc, of course, but its real strength is blends, and that message well, kind of blends in with all the other noise out there.
About 10 minutes after the trends panel ended, I had an idea. (Always, always, always …) I chased down Annette Boyd, who runs the Virginia Wine Board’s marketing office, and proposed “The Commonwealth of Wine.” It would nod to Virginia’s history as well as wine’s ability to bring people together and promote community, or as Lisa Granik put it, provide the “social lubricant” to counter the “loneliness crisis” of a society mesmerized by screens and devices. And the wineries need community and its support now more than ever.
You may never hear of “The Commonwealth of Wine” beyond this newsletter, but as the saying goes, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
The Judgment of Richmond
Here are the wines tasted in the morning plenary session, “Virginia in Context,” along with my impressions of how the Old Dominion’s wines compared with their counterparts. Suffice to say, all the wines were delicious — the winners were those of us privileged to taste them.