Radio-Coteau: 2004 vintage allocation and luck of the draw
Radio-Coteau is probably my favorite wine that I have yet to try. Their Web site describes their background; the 2004 vintage is their third release to date, and the reviews of their wines from 2002 and 2003 have been quite good. I love the premise: unfiltered, unfined wines made from grapes culled from a number of sites around California. The name itself, “Radio Coteau,” means either “word of mouth” or “broadcasting from the hillside,” according to their Web site. I love the idea of a winery whose reputation spreads largely through word of mouth advertising and reputation rather than, say, massive RVs with advertising on the side.
Anyway, I signed up for the Radio-Coteau e-mail newsletter because I got sick of trying to remember to visit their site to see when their new vintage would be released. Ultimately, I was quite glad that I signed up because, starting with their 2004 release, they chose to move to an allocation-based sales system…and they decided to offer their wines to newsletter subscribers first. Nice.
Allocations are based on past patronage. In my case, my past patronage was zero, so I was offered 2 bottles of the La Neblina Pinot Noir release. However, I also put a few other bottles on my wish list. I wound up getting 3 other bottles through this process: the Savoy Anderson Valley Pinot Noir, the Timbervine Russian River Valley Syrah, and the Cherry Camp Sonoma Coast Syrah. We’ll see which ones I drink and which ones I attempt to resell on winecommune.com to cover the slightly unexpected cost of snagging 5 bottles total. Of course, this is one reason why wine makes a great hobby: I can just drink my collection to make room for new items!
So, we’ll see how these wines taste soon enough. As I’ve said before, though, since my fiancé can’t drink too much I may need to wait for a dinner party before I crack open a Radio-Coteau. In the meantime, I will continue to content myself with the El Tesoro Platinum tequila I bought yesterday….