Is October 2024 the month you finally try non-alcoholic (NA) wine? Maybe you’ve never sampled NA wine before or perhaps you have and were disappointed. In either case, this might be a good time to see what’s going on.
The Case for NA Wine
The NA wine market in the U.S. is growing, which is worth noting since the overall wine market continues to struggle. NA wine sales have grown by more than 25 percent over the last year, albeit from a relatively small base. On an anecdotal level, we have watched as the NA part of the wine wall at our local upscale supermarket has grown from one lonely bottom shelf to two shelves and now three. Given the competition for shelf space, that says a lot.
Sue and I got interested in non-alcoholic wine a few years ago when a good friend of ours was in a severe cycling accident. Recovery from the concussion she suffered was slow and the doctors said no alcohol, not even wine. But a glass of wine in the evening lifts the spirits, so the search was on for an alternative with the taste and feel of wine, but without the alcoholic kick.
Our initial research was a bit disappointing because NA wines were not always easy to find and the selection was generally limited. This was especially true in on-premise situations. There was almost always NA beer available, but NA wine? Not so much.
Since then the NA category has exploded, especially for NA beer and NA spirits. At one point, for example, U.S.-made Athletic NA beer was the best-selling brand of beer at Whole Foods stores. NA brews from Europe are popular, which makes sense because the combination of active anti-alcohol movements in Europe and strict drink-driving laws pushed up the demand for these products early on.
A recent shopping trip revealed three or four varieties of a single inexpensive California NA wine brand at the local Safeway store. But the Metropolitan Market across the street offered nearly 20 different NA wine SKUs ranging from about $10 to nearly $30. The wines came from the U.S. (Washington and California), Germany, New Zealand, and South Africa.
The Second Glass Test
Writing in The Wine Economist in December 2023, I proposed “The Second Glass” test for NA products. NA beer and wine ought to remind you of the regular product and not be, like the sparkling apple cider we used to serve non-drinkers at our parties, a liquid placeholder for wine. And it should be tasty enough that you’d want a second glass and not just nurse the first one until it is time to go home.
Good NA beers satisfy the Second Glass test, but so far we have not found many wines that do. Either they don’t remind us of the equivalent wine (a NA New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, for example, ought to remind you of a NZ Sauvignon Blanc) or they just don’t make you ask for that second glass. The growing interest in NA wines is such that the Second Glass test article is by far the most-read single article on Wine Economist so far this year!
The NA wine section at your local upscale supermarket probably isn’t as large as the equivalent NA beer space, but at least it exists (I still haven’t seen NA wine on a by-the-glass on-trade list), so maybe it is time you checked it out. October is just around the corner. Maybe that’s the time.
Why October?
October has sort of evolved into a month to think about how wine fits into your lifestyle. It started, I think, with the advent of something called Sober October, which is sort of an echo of Dry January. Why October? Because it rhymes with Sober, I suppose. Sober October provoked the creation of a movement called Come Over October (which only rhymes if you have a pretty bad head cold), which stresses the sort of social gatherings that are wine’s natural environment.
Water keeps us apart, I like to say, but wine brings us together. That’s the spirit of Come Over October to me and the program is receiving lots of support from wineries and retailers that are happy to remind consumers that wine is about people and sharing, not alcoholic content.
Since Come Over October is about bringing people together, alcohol is neither necessary nor sufficient to participate and it seems to me that this is your opportunity to give NA wine a test run if you haven’t tried it or a second chance if you have. I know some readers will object to bringing NA wine into the conversation, but if consumers are interested in NA products and if wineries can profitably make good ones, then it seems like we should embrace the opportunity. Imagine if cola makers rejected the idea of sugar-free colas or if coffee producers turned their backs on caffeine-free coffee. You’d think they were nuts.
Meet ZERONIMO and Dr. LO
Our most recent NA wine experiments have involved brands from ZERONIMO and Dr. LO. The ZERONIMO wines are imported from Austria. Although they are produced in relatively small quantities, they have found markets in both Europe and America. Production has expanded from 3000 bottles to 60,000 bottles of four different wines.
White wines and sparkling wines are the types of NA wines we most often see on store shelves, so we were interested to try the ZERONIMO Sparkling Select ($39.30), a blend of Pinot Blanc, Chardonnay, and Sauvignon Blanc. It was very dry and refreshing. It passed the second glass test for me, but Sue said it was on the edge for her because of the acidity.
We have not seen or tried many red NA wines. The highly-rated (98 points!) ZERONIMO Leonis Red Blend ($69.40) is a blend of Blaufränkisch, Zweigelt, and Cabernet Sauvignon that spends two years in oak. It is light-bodied, as you might expect from an Austrian red, and showed oak influence without tasting woody. It is the first red NA wine we’ve tried to pass the second glass test, but I wish I had been more successful in teasing out the fruit.
Dr. LO is a line of NA wines from Loosen Bros., the well-known producer of Mosel wines. There is both an alcohol-removed Riesling and an NA carbonated Riesling in the portfolio. Sue and I are predisposed to like Mosel Riesling wines in general and we admire Loosen wines in particular. And it seems like they might be a particularly good base for NA treatment since the regular wines start out with relatively low alcohol levels. The alcohol is removed using the vacuum distillation method which, Loosen argues, creates a more balanced NA wine, when combined with the low initial alcohol level.
We really wanted to like still Dr. L Riesling (and we did) but it didn’t fully pass our second glass test. It was tasty and refreshing, giving us the fruit we missed in the earlier tastings, so we’d happily have another glass, but to be honest it didn’t remind us of Riesling wine. That’s a subjective assessment, of course, but that’s our finding. Your mileage may vary.
Come on Over
If October is the month when we make a point to invite friends and family over to share wine, food, and fun, then it is not a bad time to try out some of these non-alcoholic wine products. There will be some folks who want to avoid or limit alcohol consumption for health or religious reasons or who have volunteered for the role of designated driver.
They are going to be looking for something tasty to drink while avoiding alcohol. Why shouldn’t it be wine?
