Exchange Rates and French Barrel Pricing
While barrels made with American oak are typically sold throughout the year, barrels made with French oak are typically ordered between March and June. These barrels are usually priced in euros, and it typically takes two or three months for an order to arrive. Vendors usually convert the euros to dollars on the day that they invoice, but that can pose a dilemma when currency conversion rates change.
This spring, for instance, after the federal government unveiled a 3.6-trillion-dollar budget proposal, the price of a French oak barrel rose by $70 in one week.
Last year, the price of French oak barrels peaked, reaching nearly $1,000 and scaring many buyers, yet prices then fell by nearly $100 due to exchange rates when barrels arrived.
Some large wineries buy euros when they're planning a large purchase. In late March the exchange rate was $1.25 per euro, but a year ago it was $1.65.
Cork Supply Opens New U.S. Barrel Cooperage
Cork Supply USA, which, as its name suggests, sells corks (and synthetic closures and even screw caps), is in the process of building a cooperage in Benicia, California for its Tonnellerie O barrels. The cooperage will make high end barrels from French oak. Cork Supply already has a division selling barrel alternatives, everything from staves to chips, and its VinOak subsidiary has been active in Australia for a decade. Coopering French barrels in California will help the company control the process and reduce transportation costs. As noted by the company, one differentiator is that the company will operate an in-house lab equipped with the latest technology for working with winemakers on flavor-profiling.
Five French cooperages already assemble barrels in the U.S., including: Demptos Cooperage, Nadalie, Seguin Moreau and Tonnellerie Radoux in California. Additionally, French cooperage Taransaud owns Canton Cooperage in Kentucky. A number of U.S. cooperages also offer barrels they make with French oak, the most well known being World Cooperage.
Tonnellerie Radoux Develops Infrared Technology to Measure Oak Tannin Potential
Tonnellerie Radoux, a leading cooperage in the global market with facilities in France and California, has developed an infrared system that instantly analyzes the amount of extractable tannins within oak barrel staves.
Radoux OakScan™ will make its debut this June with 50,000 plus French oak barrels in 2009 having been analyzed through the process in their France facility. "It's the greatest evolution in the cooperage industry in the last 20 years," claims Nicolas Mähler-Besse, vice president of sales and marketing for Radoux. OakScan™ was developed by Nicolas Mourey, an engineer for the company, and was five years in the making.
Development was a three-step process. First was analyzing the infrared samples and comparing them to ones that had been evaluated chemically for tannin levels to ensure the readings were accurate. The second step was to put the scanning equipment in the cooperage to see how it would adapt to the atmosphere. "We needed to make sure that it was resilient in our facility where it would be constantly exposed to dust," stated Mähler-Besse. "Having to be concerned that it possibly would not function properly under everyday conditions was not an option." The final phase was assessing the oak staves over the course of a year followed by trials that involved three different European wineries aging red wine within the barrels made with scanned staves.
Major positives of OakScan™ are its efficiency and time-saving factors. Although scientists and laboratories have been able to measure extractible oak tannins for decades, it's a lengthy process shuttling staves back and forth to an off-site location and then waiting for results. Also, standard random sampling is not always an accurate representation of the staves that may be used in a specific barrel.
The process works by moving the oak staves along a conveyor that analyzes the wood by a near infrared spectroscope that measures their extractable tannins. The tannin strength of each stave is then recorded. Each is bar coded and grouped together according to their tannin level and then assembled into barrels with accurate tannic potential.
There is one other benefit to OakScan™. With many premier French oak forests diminishing, sourcing quality trees has become an issue and the challenge to find alternative locations has become real. Because of this, coopers, who in the past viewed a specific forest to gauge quality, are now turning toward grain width to deduce the possible tannin levels. The problem is that tighter grains sometimes but not always produce higher tannins. The wood aging process is also not an exact science and can give mixed results. Mähler-Besse suggests that Radoux's new invention alleviates that. "OakScan™ corroborates the effectiveness of oak grain-selection and drying regimes. Because we measure tannic potential just before the barrels are assembled, we consequently eliminate the risk of variation due to grain size and drying time," Mähler-Besse said.
There is no additional cost added to the French barrels that go through the scan, according to Mähler-Besse, and the company is already looking to develop other uses for OakScan™. "The next process we are working on is to accurately analyze the staves' aroma potential as well."
--Peg San Fellipo
An Ecological Barrel in a Kit
Tonnellerie Renaissance has designed an ecological and easy-to-assemble barrel dubbed Barrikit. The patented concept reduces by half the use of noble oak in the fabrication of a barrel. To this end, fine grain staves are employed to create the inside, and regular oak staves are placed on the outside. The different layers are stuck together and thermo-shaped using a high frequency press. All of the staves are derived from the same tree; however, the outside ones use parts of the trunk generally discarded by cooperage firms.
"As wine penetrates a barrel by up to 3 mm at the most, thick fine-grained solid oak is not required for the entire container," said Tonnellerie Renaissance CEO Patrick Lalande. "Barrikit offers the same taste as a traditional barrel and, as a result, can be used to mature premium wines," he added.
Available in different shapes and sizes, these easy-to-assemble barrels are shipped in kit form. With a starting price of approximately $470, Barrikit is about 40 percent cheaper than a traditional barrel as it is less expensive to make and transport. A local agent or cooper assembles the exported barrels upon arrival at their final destination.
Staves and Chips Offering a Regional Style
Several cooperage firms now offer the possibility of imitating the ageing style of French wine production regions, such as Bordeaux, Burgundy, Rhône or even the Languedoc, thanks to a new selection of staves or wood chips. Latitude 44° Bordeaux, 45° Rhône and 46° Burgundy by Oak Solutions come in the form of tank staves designed for specific grape varieties and for a four- to six-month wine maturing period to add extra complexity.
The concept launched by Boisé France is slightly different. The Classique Région twosome offers the possibility of using a combination of chips, with different degrees of toasting, to bring about regional characteristics. The Languedoc version is said to offer sucrosity and roundness whereas the Bordeaux blend reproduces the region's maturing style, without offering too much oak.
Controlling New Barrels for TCA and TBA Contamination
According to Excell laboratory, there has been an increase over the past two years in the number of wines contaminated by TCA and TBA originating from new oak. To help eradicate this problem, the company has developed a test to control new barrels called Check List Barrique.
The procedure is based upon the analysis of water samples of new barrels. It generally entails a first analysis of the samples of up to 10 barrels mixed together for a price of $160. If a contamination is detected, the water samples of the barrels are then analyzed one by one to identify the source of the problem for the same price per individual sample. This method offers the advantage of analyzing the entire surface area within a barrel.
ETS Laboratories of California has provided testing services for TCA and TBA in barrels for a few years and currently uses two testing methods: One involves taking shavings or chips from barrels and conducting a soak test while the other entails directly extracting wood from barrels in a powder form. Dr. Eric Herve of ETS told WBM he has been seeing increased interest in these tests among winemakers. However, he questioned whether there, in fact, have been more occurrences of TCA and/or TBA contamination in new oak barrels and suggested that the increased interest in testing likely reflects a growing awareness of the problem. Herve said that, in the past, the chemical preservatives used in the wood floors of shipping containers have occasionally been a source of contamination but said cooperages are aware of this issue and also test their barrels.
New Brett Test for Red Wine
California biotechnology company, Z-Wine Co., has announced the availability of a new test to detect Brett in barrels. The Z-Brett Assay™ is billed as "the world's first immunoassay-based biochip for the early detection of Brett in wine." According to the company, it is also the fastest on the market today, easy-to-use and the least expensive.
Brettanomyces is a wild yeast that can post significant problems with barrel fermentation and red wine.
According to Dr. Anil Shrikhande, vice president, research & development, Constellation Wines U.S., the largest wine company in the world, the Z-Brett Assay™ for rapid detection of Brett is a revolutionary concept for the wine industry.
Half the barrels used for red wine could be contaminated with Brett, according to one wine industry expert. This microorganism can penetrate the oak barrel and remain there ready to infect the next batch of wine. Brett produces volatile phenols, which impart a distinct odor that winemakers describe as "sweaty" and like a "wet-dog-in-a-phone-booth." The test is offered through Z-Wine; see www.unitechscientific.com.
Canada Lifts Tariff on Imported Oak Barrels, Eliminating America's Free-trade Advantage
Canadian vintners are finding it less expensive to import European oak barrels after the removal of a 3 percent tariff.
"We're very pleased the government agreed that removing the tariff wouldn't hurt the few cooperages operating on a very small scale in Canada," said Dan Paszkowski, the Canadian Vintners Association's president and chief operating officer.
The removal translates into a saving of about $23 (CAN$30) per barrel.
"While that might not seem like much, it adds up when you're changing barrels every three years or buying oak for a new winery," Paszkowski said.
Canadian vintners currently import about 70 percent of their oak casks from the United States. The U.S. exported $13.9 million (CAN$17.2 million) worth of wood barrels and barrel parts to Canada last year. The 1989 Free-Trade Agreement exempted the U.S. from the long-standing tariff designed to protect Canada's once-booming cooperage industry.
Sweeney Cooperage of Vancouver, which began as a small backyard operation in 1889, became one of the world's largest barrel producers by the 1950s with plants in Montreal and Seattle, but it shut down in 1981. Canada had no domestic cooperages for the next 18 years.
The tariff's elimination last Dec. 12 might prompt Canadian vintners to add more French or Hungarian oak to their cellars. French imports of barrels and barrel parts totalled $4.8 million (CAN$5.9 million) in 2008 or about 25 percent of the imported market.
"Any time a tariff is removed, it reduces our production costs and allows us to reinvest in our wineries to make them more competitive," Paszkowski said. "New oak and better quality oak will help our industry in pursuing its premium quality."
The Canadian wine industry also hopes the tariff's elimination will lead to other countries reconsidering their own trade restrictions.
"It does provide for a more equitable basis of trade and encourages the removal of other barriers," said Anthony Bristow, chief operating officer at Andrew Peller Ltd.
Paszkowski said there's definitely interest in Canada and the European Union in terms of entering into a free-trade agreement. "What'll be on the table during those negotiations hasn't been made public, but it's our hope that tariffs will be removed so that we can get our products into select European markets at a lower cost," he said.
Sparkling wines carry a 32 euro per hectolitre tariff while the rate on bottled wine ranges from 13.1 to 15.4 euros, depending on its alcohol percentage.
Negotiations to reduce and ultimately remove tariffs also look promising in South Korea. While the U.S. still leads the world in terms of buying Canadian ice wine, Paszkowski said that South Korea has the potential to become the No. 1 market.
"Tariff reductions would definitely make our products more competitive there," he said.
Not everyone is pleased with the removal of the tariff on oak barrels at home. Cal Craik revived the cooperage business in Canada a decade ago when he started Okanagan Barrel Works. The company imports oak staves duty-free from the U.S. and France to assemble its barrels in Oliver, British Columbia.
"I kind of liked having that 3 percent advantage over my competitors from other countries," he said.
Craik was particularly miffed at not being consulted given that International Trade Minister Stockwell Day represents his region in Canada's Parliament. "Why didn't the government contact someone from the Canadian barrel-making industry--namely me--before removing the tariff?" he asked. wbm
--Julie Gedeon
