Editorial: Wine’s problem isn’t storytelling – it’s relevance

The South African wine industry is deep in introspection, as it no doubt should be. At both the recent Wine Summit organised by industry body South Africa Wine and the Wine Talk conference as hosted by education hotshop winelab.Africa, discussion repeatedly returned to a common concern: how does wine remain relevant in a world that increasingly seems indifferent, if not hostile, to it?

The instinctive answer from many quarters is “storytelling”. Tell consumers about old vines, remarkable terroirs and family histories. Tell them about sustainability and holistic land management practices. Tell them about authenticity and inclusivity.

There is merit in all of this. The problem is that every premium category now tells stories. Coffee tells stories. Craft beer tells stories. Whisky tells stories. Even insurance companies and banks tell stories. The challenge facing wine is not that it lacks stories but that it increasingly struggles to command attention. Indeed, it may be that the industry’s greatest challenge is not communication but relevance.

The South African wine sector often assumes that consumers are simply waiting to be educated. Yet this assumption deserves scrutiny. Most consumers are not waking up in the morning wondering about decomposed granite soils, heritage vineyards or spontaneous fermentation. They are thinking about enjoyment, identity, value and social connection.

This disconnect is particularly significant in South Africa, where wine continues to carry considerable cultural baggage. For many consumers, especially black consumers, it remains associated with a world that feels distant, exclusive and not entirely welcoming.

At Wine Talk, many POC attendees spoke of still feeling disregarded by the industry. That’s a sentiment it’s easy to dismiss, given that many now derive an income from wine, directly or indirectly. But to do so would be to ignore their lived experience, which, you know, isn’t cool.

History plays a role. So do pricing, representation, language and social context. The industry’s tendency to frame the challenge as one of perception rather than structure risks misreading what the problem actually is.

Wine possesses several characteristics that can easily be mistaken for – and sometimes genuinely become – status signalling. Unlike most consumer products, wine demands a considerable amount of knowledge. To participate fully, one is expected to understand grape varieties, regions, producers, vintages, production methods and tasting vocabulary. This creates a barrier to entry that enthusiasts often underestimate.

The situation is compounded by wine’s historical association with wealth, education and social class. Although wine consumption has broadened considerably over recent decades, these associations persist. Meanwhile, wine culture often drifts into flexing. Knowing an obscure Swartland producer, a cult Loire Cab Franc appellation, or a rare grape variety (Maccabeau, anyone?) can confer status within the community. The line between genuine enthusiasm and one-upmanship can become perilously thin.

Wine communication has not always helped matters. Descriptions featuring “graphite”, “oyster shell” and “sweaty saddle” (don’t get me started on “minerality”) may delight fellow enthusiasts but can sound absurd to someone simply trying to determine whether a wine will be enjoyable to drink. What insiders regard as useful precision can easily be interpreted by outsiders as performance.

How to fix things

At the same time, broader cultural forces are at work. Contemporary culture increasingly values accessibility and relatability while displaying growing scepticism towards traditional gatekeepers. Critics, journalists, academics and experts of all kinds command less automatic deference than they once did. Wine inevitably inherits some of this distrust.

The irony is that most serious wine lovers are not attempting to signal superiority. They are fascinated by complexity in much the same way birdwatchers, music obsessives or test cricket fans are fascinated by their chosen subjects. The difference is that wine carries social and economic connotations that those pursuits generally do not.

This has important implications for how the industry thinks about growth. If wine is perceived as a club, marketing campaigns are unlikely to solve the problem. Inclusion is not created by invitation alone. It emerges when consumers repeatedly encounter wine in environments where they feel comfortable, represented and unjudged.

That means moving beyond the idea of audience development towards participation and ownership. It means greater visibility for black winemakers, viticulturists, educators, retailers and commentators. It means reducing unnecessary jargon and focusing more on taste, occasion and enjoyment. It means meeting consumers in their own cultural spaces rather than expecting them to enter wine’s.

Most importantly, it means changing the tone of expertise. Wine’s challenge is not to become less knowledgeable but to become more generous with its knowledge. Too often communication adopts an implicit hierarchy in which experts explain and consumers learn. A more effective model may be one of shared discovery. Curiosity tends to be more attractive than authority. Humility generally gets you further than rigid certainty.

None of this represents a repudiation of wine’s traditions. Nor does it require abandoning the stories that make wine compelling. But the industry’s current moment calls for something more than better storytelling. What is required is a complete rethink of where wine fits in people’s lives.

The future of wine will not be secured by persuading consumers that they should care about wine. It will be secured by ensuring that wine matters in the contexts that consumers already care about. Only then do the stories have an audience. Until that happens, the industry’s challenge is not finding better ways to tell its stories. It is finding more people willing to listen.