The 2020s: The Real Charles Shaw’s Gamay Clairvoyance Will Create A Wine Renaissance

PROLOGUE

There once was a farmer named Chuck

Who got himself mired in the muck,

Foolishly, he planted Gamay

Which landed him in disarray,

And now he’s Two Buck Chuck

That misguided farmer – Charles Shaw – turned out to be the poor schnook, who sold his “Charles Shaw” brand to the astute and cunning Fred Franzia, who turned it into Two Buck Chuck. It was one of the craftiest and lucrative wine grabs in American history. As for poor Shaw, about 15 years ago he told me that he unloaded his label for $18,000. Living in near obscurity in Chicago I last heard, Shaw hasn’t made another dime off of the Two Buck phenomenon.

However, Shaw may have been a man of prescience. In the 1970s he planted the grape variety Gamay. In Napa Valley. In what is America’s most important wine region, it is awash and thriving not on Gamay, but Cabernet Sauvignon. But beginning at about the turn of this decade, Napa Cab – what with its exorbitant prices and showy wines – may have begun to lose some of its luster. That’s also about the time that the Gamay grape’s best-known home – Beaujolais in east-central France – tanked. If you were smart, unlike Chuck Shaw but like Freddie Franzia, you could’ve bought vineyard land in Beaujolais for the price of a couple of cases of Two Buck Chuck.

Ironically, with the recent death of Georges Duboeuf — Gamay Beaulolais’ champion — and even the proposed potential strangulation of Trump’s 100% tariffs on imported wine (which Trump I predict, like most of his outlandish proposals, will back away from) Beaujolais is crawling out from under the image of the cheap/sweet novelty Nouveau Beaujolais, that has defined the region for decades. And as a subsequence, rendered Beaujolais’s better wines to the remainder bin. In spite of it all, quality wines of Beaujolais will at last gain a foothold; as they are the best bargains on the planet.

Beaujolais – Cru Beaujolais – with its incredibly intoxicating fruit, its moderately soft tannins, and its relatively low price, especially as compared to much loftier Burgundy immediately to its south flank, I’m predicting will become the Wine of the 2020s.

And why not? Beaujolais – from one of the 10 Cru (or villages) that comprise the quality appellations of the region (Brouilly, Chénas, Côte de Brouilly, Chiroubles, Fleurie, Juliénas, Morgon, Moulin-à-Vent, Régnie Reviews and St-Amour) – are made from Gamay. And they possess every quality that I believe American consumers want in their wine: Wonderful light, but substantially fresh black cherry-like fruit, and balancing tannins that do not impart perceived bitterness.  Tangentially, but no less important, Beaujolais can be consumed in the near-term, or if you’re inclined to start a wine cellar, can be “put down” for 5-15 years and improve with age.

And therein lies the clairvoyance if you will, of Charles Shaw. He knew the efficacy of Gamay. What he didn’t know, was that his Gamay would get swallowed up by the juggernaut of the Napa Valley marketing machine in his midst; which relegated Gamay into near submission. I don’t know how many acres of the grape were planted in the ‘70s when Shaw planted his, northeast of St. Helena. But in 2010, there were a mere 215 acres of the stuff in the ground in California. Near the end of this decade, that number will have increased by about 35% in the new year. (By comparison, 10 years ago there were 72,000 acres of Cabernet in California. In ‘20, Cab vines will have grown by about 25%).

Planted in California now, mostly in the Sierra Foothills and in Santa Barbara County, Gamay has gained traction in the Willamette Valley of Oregon, in upstate New York, and in Ontario, Canada on the Niagara Peninsula.

I don’t know what the hell is in Two Buck Chuck (which by now should be redubbed Three Buck Chuck) but don’t you think, at 76 years old, the original Chuck Shaw should come out from wherever he is, and plant again, his beloved Gamay? Because I think – almost two decades later – the world is finally ready for Gamay and certainly for the beautiful Cru Beaujolais of France. (Even if Trump’s Terrible Tariffs go through, the price of real Beaujolais will be such that it will still remain a steal.) Figuratively speaking, a steal is precisely what Franzia’s Bronco wine company pulled on Chuck Shaw and his Gamay.

Free Charles Shaw! Free Gamay! And all hail Georges Duboeuf!