New winery in KS. Looking for better price structure understanding

[Bartman]

I think a lot of small wineries do sweet wine for a couple reasons: a) women (mostly, but not exclusively) prefer sweet wines (and wine coolers) to dry wines for socializing (my observations), for various reasons; and b) you can cover a lot of defects and shortcomings by sweetening a so-so wine and they are quicker to produce and sell. So you have 'strong' demand from non-wine-drinkers and relatively cheap supply costs/turnaround time from a production standpoint.

A few years ago, I stopped in at a little winery with a 5-acre vineyard off a local rural highway and they were bragging about their cab. sauv. I had heard cab. sauv. did/could not grow very well in north central Texas b/c of high heat, high humidity (little cool-down overnight), and clay-ey soils that retain too much moisture, so I wanted to try it. Well, it was locally grown cab.sauv. that had been back-sweetened to the point you couldn't tell it was cab.sauv. - it might as well have been Welch's (no offense to Welch's lovers, but we all know Welch's juice is a lot cheaper than good cab. sauv. juice). It was horrible, but they thought it was their prize 'dessert wine'. Wanted $24-25 per bottle - I couldn't finish the tasting she gave me.

 

[GreginND]

b) you can cover a lot of defects and shortcomings by sweetening a so-so wine and they are quicker to produce and sell.

Certainly that happens. But I think more often than not it is about balance. Many of the hybrid grapes and midwest climates tends toward more acidic wines that almost demand some balancing with sugar. Now, I can't comment on the sickly sweet cab you tasted. But, for me, I will make my wines the best they can be.