The Top 5 Wine News Stories of 2023

Some shocking and not so shocking stories developments defined 2023

I’ve always liked doing year-end re-cap stories. It’s a selfish thing. The effort it takes to review the wine news for the past 12 months helps me focus on where my industry is at the moment. Readers tend to like these year-end, recap stories too. So, there’s a bonus.

What’s notable about looking back on 2023 is the lack of really good news for the American wine industry. This isn’t unusual. The local news saying that “if it bleeds it leads” can be applied to much of journalism. Bad news tends to strike us as more sensational than good news and so it gets more attention. But in the case of 2023, I don’t think I’m afflicted by the tendency to see bad news as a brighter, shinier object than the good news and therefore blinded to the good.

1. The Slow Retreat From Wine and Embrace of Other Drinks.
This wasn’t so much a “story” in 2023 as it was a well-observed trend. The Silicon Valley State of the Industry Report early in the year established this storyline. After that, the pile on of stories indicating how wine was losing market share and share of mind among the younger crowd in particular just kept on coming.

This chart suffices to demonstrate the trend. This trend toward drinking less wine is not inherently bad unless you sell wine or work in the wine industry, which I do.