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JWE Volume 16 | 2021 | No. 2

Journal of Wine Economics Volume 16 | 2021 | No. 2

Introduction to the Issue

Karl Storchmann
Pages: 115–116
Full Text PDF
Introduction

This issue of the Journal of Wine Economics opens with two COVID-related papers.

First, Glyn Wittwer and Kym Anderson analyze “COVID-19 and Global Beverage Markets: Implications for Wine” (Wittwer and Anderson, 2021). The authors employ a model of global beverage markets to simulate the respective effects of the COVID-19 pandemic (Wittwer and Anderson, 2020). They find that both international trade and domestic sales have been adversely affected by temporary shifts away from on-premise sales. These losses have partially been offset by gains in off-premise and direct e-commerce sales. “Further recent disruption to the global wine trade has been the imposition by China in late 2020 of prohibitive tariffs on its imports of bottled wine from Australia. Its diversionary and trade-reducing effects are compared with those due to COVID-19” (Wittwer and Anderson, 2021, p. 117).

Magalie Dubois and collaborators shed light on the question, “Did Wine Consumption Change during the COVID-19 Lockdown in France, Italy, Spain, and Portugal?” (Dubois et al. 2021). Drawing on an online survey of more than 7,300 individuals conducted during the first lockdown phase, the authors analyze purchasing and consumption patterns. They find that more people reduced their wine consumption frequency than maintained or increased it. Further analyses highlight various aspects of heterogeneity among countries and individuals and their determinants.

In “Reputation and Advertising of Collective Brand Members in the Wine Industry: The Moderating Role of Market Share,” Ricardo Sellers-Rubio, Francisco Mas-Ruiz, and Franco Sancho-Esper analyze the nonlinear relationship between advertising investments and reputation of collective brand members (Sellers-Rubio, Mas-Ruiz, and Sancho-Esper, 2021). They draw on a sample of 176 Spanish wineries and show that the quality reputation of collective brand members has a positive effect on their advertising investment until a reputation threshold is reached. In addition, scale economies of advertising mean that the market share of collective brand members negatively moderates the curvilinear relationship between quality reputation and advertising investments.

In their paper entitled “On Fine Wine Pricing across Different Trading Venues,” Paweł Oleksy, Marcin Czupryna, and Michał Jakubczyk shed light on how selected attributes of fine Bordeaux wines affect prices in three types of trading venues:

auctions, electronic exchanges, and over-the-counter markets (Oleksy, Czupryna, and Jakubczyk, 2021). Their findings suggest that the price-impact of various char- acteristics varies across trading venues. For instance, while auctions pay a substantial premium for a wine’s age, the marginal price effects of age are lower at electronic exchanges and over-the-counter markets. Similarly, the (positive) bottle size effect is strongest in electronic exchange markets and weakest at auctions.

The last paper of this issue, entitled “Consumer Stigma and the Reputation Trap Hypothesis: An In-Store Experiment with Colorado Wines,” is by Marco Costanigro and Becca B.R. Jablonski. The authors conduct an in-store experiment to test the hypothesis that Colorado wines may be in a “bad reputation trap.” Based on a 2×2 design where they varied the production region (Colorado vs. California) and grape variety (familiar vs. unfamiliar), they revealed the origin of production to only half of the participants (Costanigro and Jablonski, 2021). The authors measure taste perceptions on Likert scales and elicit valuations via a multi- ple price listing. “Our results are consistent with the presence of stigma against wines produced in Colorado. In the discussion, we draw from the literature on stigmatized markets to suggest plausible strategies to remove or avoid stigma” (p. 210).

Karl Storchmann
New York University
karl.storchmann@nyu.edu

COVID-19 and Global Beverage Markets: Implications for Wine

Glyn Wittwer & Kym Anderson
Pages: 117–130
Full Text PDF
Abstract

This article provides an empirical case study of the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on global beverage markets, particularly the wine sector. Both international trade and domestic sales have been adversely affected by temporary shifts away from on-premise sales by social distancing measures and self-isolation that led to the closure of restaurants, bars, and clubs, plus declines in international travel and tourism. Partly offsetting this has been a boost to off-premise and direct e-commerce sales. We first estimate those impacts in 2020 and their expected partial recovery in 2021 using a new model of global beverage markets. Further recent disruption to the global wine trade has been the imposition by China in late 2020 of prohibitive tariffs on its imports of bottled wine from Australia. Its diversionary and trade- reducing effects are compared with those due to COVID-19.

Did Wine Consumption Change During the COVID-19 Lockdown in France, Italy, Spain, and Portugal?

Magalie Dubois, Lara Agnoli, Jean-Marie Cardebat, Raúl Compés, Benoit Faye, Bernd Frick, Davide Gaeta, Eric Giraud-Héraud, Eric Le Fur, Florine Livat, Giulio Malorgio, Philippe Masset, Giulia Meloni, Vicente Pinilla, João Rebelo, Luca Rossetto, Günter Schamel & Katrin Simon-Elorz
Pages: 131–168
Full Text PDF
Abstract

This article documents how the COVID-19 crisis has affected the drinking behavior of Latin European wine consumers. Using a large online survey conducted during the first lockdown in France, Italy, Portugal, and Spain (n = 7,324 individuals), we reconstruct the purchasing and consumption patterns of the respondents. The number of people who maintained their wine consumption frequency is significantly higher than those who increased or decreased their con- sumption. Wine consumption frequency held up better than other types of alcohol (beer and spirits). We analyze heterogeneities among countries and individuals by employing the Marascuilo procedure and an ordered logit model. The latter identifies the impact of demo- graphic, commercial, and psychosocial factors on wine consumption frequency. The results shed light on changes in wine consumer behavior during the first lockdown and consider pos- sible post-lockdown trends that could be useful to industry players.

Reputation and Advertising of Collective Brand Members in the Wine Industry: The Moderating Role of Market Share

Ricardo Sellers-Rubio, Francisco Mas-Ruiz & Franco Sancho-Esper
Pages: 169–188
Abstract

This paper analyzes the nonlinear relationship between the advertising investment and repu- tation of collective brand members in an experience goods industry, as well as the moderating role of their market share within the collective brand. The central assumption is that the quality reputation of collective brand members has a positive effect on their advertising invest- ment until a reputation threshold is reached, after which the effect on advertising investment becomes negative. This change in the slope is explained by the information sets (firm reputa- tion and collective reputation) used by consumers to reduce uncertainty, which leads to a weaker motivation for the firm to invest in advertising. In addition, scale economies of adver- tising mean that the market share of collective brand members negatively moderates the cur- vilinear relationship between quality reputation and advertising investment. The results for a sample of 176 companies in a Spanish experience goods industry (i.e., winemaking) between 2004 and 2014 show an inverted U-shaped relationship between the advertising investment and reputation of collective brand members. The results also show that market share nega- tively moderates this curvilinear relationship.

On Fine Wine Pricing across Different Trading Venues

Paweł Oleksy, Marcin Czupryna & Michał Jakubczyk
Pages: 189–209
Abstract

This article examines how selected attributes of Bordeaux fine wines (producer, vintage, quality, bottle size, case, flaws, and transaction volume) affect prices in three types of trading venues: auc- tions, electronic exchange, and the over-the-counter (OTC) market. The findings indicate a price differentiation across the venues. Wine aging leads to relatively higher prices at auctions than on the electronic exchange or the OTC. There is a nearly linear relationship between prices and wine ratings, the strongest of which is found in the case of auctions. The bottle size effect is mostly positive for supersized formats and is the strongest on an electronic exchange and the weakest at auctions. The transaction volume negatively affects wine prices in all the trading venues. The simulation results facilitate the construction of more realistic trading models and may help traders make more informed decisions on the choice of a trading venue, depending on the wine characteristics.

Consumer Stigma and the Reputation Trap Hypothesis: An In-Store Experiment with Colorado Wines

Marco Costanigro & Becca B.R. Jablonski
Pages: 210–230
Abstract

We conducted an in-store experiment to test the hypothesis that Colorado wines may suffer from reputational stigma. The context relates to marketing challenges faced by novel wine regions entering the competitive retail environment, even in a local context, and the possibility of being stuck in a “bad reputation trap.” Adopting a 2×2 design where we varied region of production (Colorado vs. California) and grape variety (familiar vs. unfamiliar), we adminis- tered a between-subject information treatment that revealed the origin of production to only half of the participants. We measured taste perceptions using Likert scales, and we elicited val- uation via a multiple price listing. Our results are consistent with the presence of stigma against wines produced in Colorado. In the discussion, we draw from the literature on stigmatized markets to suggest plausible strategies to remove or avoid stigma.L1, L15, Q1, Q13

Book & Film Reviews

The Blood of the Colony: Wine and the Rise and Fall of French Algeria

By: Owen White
Reviewer: Paul Nugent
Pages: 231-233
Full Text PDF
Book Review

As colonies go, Algeria was singular. It lay just across the Mediterranean Sea from France, and it came to focus on the one commodity that the metropole produced in abundance, namely wine. None of this was supposed to happen. White observes that the initial emphasis lay squarely upon promoting complementarity in which Algeria would deliver up its bounties in the shape of commodities that France needed—like grain, tobacco, and cotton. But efforts to develop alternatives stalled, and Algeria ended up producing prodigious quantities of wine that threatened to compound France’s systemic problem of overproduction. This is a book that handily brings together a history of wine—from unpromising beginnings, through phylloxera and the subsequent surge in production, to the travails of the interwar years and the eventual demise of viniculture—with a history of settler colonialism and all its contradictions.

The book shuttles between two running themes. The first is the relationship between Algeria and France, as it played out in relation to wine. The second is the impact of the wine industry upon Algerians, who provided cheap labor but never a market for the fruit of the vine. As with South America, it was Catholic mission- aries who provided the initial impetus, in the shape of the Trappists and Cardinal Lavigerie’s White Fathers. Their success with the vine close to Algiers led to growing numbers of settlers planting their own vineyards—notably in the western

department of Oran and the Mitidja plain south of the capital, but to some extent

also in the department of Constantine in the east.

In the interwar years, Algeria became famous (or notorious) for its large wineries, owned both by wealthy individuals and co-operative cellars, which typically concen- trated on volume rather than quality. Because Algeria belonged to a customs union with France from 1884, the bulk of this wine was shipped to France through the port of Rouen. Producers and politicians in the Midi, who initially shared common con- cerns, blamed overproduction on the Algerian colonists and demanded quotas on imports in the troubled 1930s. White demonstrates, however, that Algerian produc- ers had their supporters in France, including those who supplied the colony with manufactured goods, wine merchants, and consumers in parts of the north. Hence, various plans to clip their wings came to nought.

Turning to the second theme, White demonstrates that the vine only found its feet on Algerian soil after a brutal campaign of conquest, followed by the expropriation of lands. The industry initially depended upon migrant workers from across the Mediterranean, but over time it was Algerians who provided the labor—with migrants from Morocco providing additional seasonal workers. Some of the most compelling parts of the book deal with labor struggles in the 1930s in which urban workers (including barrel makers) in and around Algiers, and their counterparts in France, joined forces to combat the efforts of French importers to ship wine in tankers.

These urban labor struggles were separate from those of farmworkers, although efforts to organize rural labor gained traction as well. White indicates that wide- spread sabotage, which involved the destruction of vines under cover of darkness, was a sign of the growing restiveness of vineyard workers during the mid-1930s. He judges that these actions were driven more by economic grievances rather than anti-colonial nationalism. However, following the acute hardships of the war years, the struggle for the countryside assumed a more overtly political form during the 1950s. Algerians who sought to advance the cause of independence tar- geted wine estates, which included physical attacks on their owners. As the latter retreated to the safety of the cities, the vine—once the symbol of conquest— seemed to symbolize colonialism in retreat.

White covers the end of colonialism relatively briefly and avoids repeating a story that has already been told in detail. His primary focus is on what happened to the enterprises that were abandoned and what became of the “Euro-Algerians”—his term for a community that was composed of immigrants from across the Mediterranean—who left for France. In a fascinating account, which leaves one wanting more, White notes that abandoned enterprises were turned over to workers in an avowedly socialist experiment with autogestion. Other enterprises were nationalized. Given that the vine had such a close association with French colo- nialism, it is hardly surprising that the newly independent government should be less than enthusiastic about continuing along the same path. But White notes that most vineyards were already very old by the 1960s and would have required reinvestment.

With the loss of the protected market in France itself, replanting vineyards in a thor- oughly Muslim country did not make a lot of sense. Indeed, the demise of wine solved a problem both for the French and the Algerians. White notes that even before inde- pendence was on the cards, some had already begun shifting their assets to France. Subsequently, some of the wealthiest families acquired prime wine estates in France, such as Chateau Giscours in Bordeaux. The less prosperous ones sought to make a go of production in the south of France and on Corsica. Here they became distinctly unpopular, and in the latter case, bore the brunt of another form of nationalism that drives them from the island. White closes with a brief account of the ambivalence with which the golden age of the vine is viewed in Algeria today.

One strength of the book is the focus on particular families and estates and how they rode the various storms over more than half a century—a story both of bank- ruptcies and technical innovation. The text is also enlivened by a good number of photographs and illustrations. White avoids the temptation to delve deeply into the technicalities of viniculture and winemaking and does not bombard the reader with statistical details—although an appendix would have been helpful. There are passing references to particular cultivars, and again, it might have been a good idea to have presented whatever data exists in a tabular form. Despite the fact that Algeria was once the world’s fourth-largest producer and the largest exporter (Meloni and Swinnen, 2014), it is remarkable that nobody has attempted to write such a book before. White has performed an admirable job and has served up a monograph that is scholarly in the best sense but also a real pleasure to read.

 

Paul Nugent
University of Edinburgh
Paul.Nugent@ed.ac.uk
doi:10.1017/jwe.2021.16

From Vines to Wines in Classical Rome: A Handbook of Viticulture and Oenology in Rome and the Roman West

By: David L. Thurmond
Reviewer: Paul Nugent
Pages: 233-235
Full Text PDF
Book Review

The esteemed French oenologist Emile Peynaud wrote that before Louis Pasteur’s work on fermentation, “good wine was merely the result of a succession of lucky acci- dents.” The reality is more complex. While it is customary to credit the ancient Romans and those they colonized for the wider dissemination of the vine and

wine itself, skepticism abounds about the quality of what was produced, given the absence of fundamental scientific knowledge. Thurmond’s treatise is refreshing because it eschews the condescension of the present and seeks to credit ancient knowledge about all the stages of the wine-making process. This is less a history of wine in the ancient world than a dialogue between what ancient commentators wrote and the author’s distillation of what we know now. The bottom line is that those who planted/tended vines and made wine actively experimented were keen observers of cause and effect and actively shared their accumulated wisdom. Lucky accidents happened, to be sure, but Thurmond also reveals that there was a great deal of design and active learning.

The book begins with an overview of the early origins of viticulture and winemak- ing based on the current archaeological and botanical evidence. This covers some familiar ground about the domestication of vitis vinifera vinifera in trans-Caucasia and its subsequent dissemination southwards and westwards along both shores of the Mediterranean. The overview covers the dissemination of wine under Roman rule, typically along the contours of the principal river systems in western Europe. As the vine entered more northerly climes, the author suggests that the vines were deliberately crossed with those that could cope better with the climatic conditions. At this point, Thurmond turns to a detailed discussion of viticulture, which was evi- dently a subject very close to the heart of the ancient Romans. He engages in a back- and-forth dialogue with Roman authors—notably Columella, Cato, Pliny the Elder, Virgil, and Varro. The bottom line is that while the advice was occasionally mis- placed, imperial Romans understood the foibles of the vine very well, and much of the distilled wisdom remains with us today. Thurmond indicates that while the ancients may have lacked the basic science, they were close observers of what we would now call terroir. Columella was, for example, clear about the need to match particular vines to soil types. Thurmond notes that the Romans had names for around 200 cultivars, although the same vine evidently bore more than one name. For historians of wine, the challenge has been to link these to the varietals we know today. Although he leaves the door open in terms of the ancient origins of Cabernet franc, DNA evidence would seem to suggest a large gap between what was planted and the cultivars we are familiar with. Thurmond provides a detailed account of approaches to the planting of vineyards, typically through digging trenches or holes; the propagation of planting material through the selection of cut- tings or “layering” in the vineyard; the training of vines to trees and stakes; the art of grafting; the practice of seasonal pruning; the use of cover crops and manure; and careful water management. Many of these practices persist to this day. This discus- sion establishes without any doubt that Roman viticulture was highly sophisticated.

One might anticipate a greater gap between vinification and storage practices of ancient times and those of the present, given that the winemakers had no knowledge of the microbes that can turn wine into vinegar. Again, Thurmond holds ancient prac- tices up to the light of modern wine science and finds that, by and large, it was based on sound knowledge. There is a detailed discussion (among other things) of wine

presses, yeasts, racking, fining, and storage. Ancient winemakers understood that while oxygen was often their friend, it could also lead to spoilage. Although they did not use bottles—though they did use glass for drinking vessels—the various earth- enware vessels were effectively sealed. The ancients also distinguished between wine that was made for immediate consumption and that which could be cellared.

The concluding chapter of the book deals with how wine was marketed and con- sumed. Much of the discussion concerns the receptacles that were perfected to store, age, transport, and dispense the wine. Thurmond is alert to the range of practices that distinguished the wine-drinking experience of the masses from those of the elite. At the top end, he notes that close attention was paid to vintage and provenance. Many of the details were inscribed on the necks of the amphorae. He also indicates that something like a ranking of regions (and associated varietals) emerged, linked to some conception of varying quality. There is also evidence that both resinated and appassimento wines were highly prized. The adding of wine to hot water might strike the modern consumer as odd, but some of the methods used to chill wine do not strike the contemporary wine drinker as unusual. Ancient Rome no doubt has its fair share of wine snobs, but what we do not have is a clear sense of whether there was anything like arbiters of taste, whose opinion might have influenced the choices made by others—except, of course, through ostentation and emulation.

For anybody interested in wine today, this book provides an invaluable service. It reveals how modern viticulture has built on millennia of active experimentation and good old-fashioned trial and error. It also demonstrates that while tastes certainly change, and wine drinkers look out for different things when they raise a drinking vessel to their lips, there are some constants in terms of practices that have been con- sidered conducive to quality. On Thurmond’s reading, the ancients were much closer to us than much conventional wisdom would have us believe. At a more basic level, the book underlines how integral wine has been to the shaping of western European and Mediterranean culture and society. The only shame is that the cost of this book will set the reader back to the cost of a third-growth Bordeaux.

Paul Nugent
University of Edinburgh
paul.nugent@ed.ac.uk
doi:10.1017/jwe.2021.17

Wine and the White House: A History

By: Frederick J. Ryan, Jr.
Reviewer: Knut Bergmann
Pages: 236-238
Full Text PDF
Book Review

It starts with the good old days: In a cartoon from 1953, the Republican elephant and the Democratic donkey are peacefully toasting each other. The next illustration

does not impress politically, but personally: a bottle of Mouton Rothschild 1955 with a handwritten dedication by Ronald Reagan. He gave it to the author for his birth- day. Of course, the bottle is from the year of Frederick J. Ryan’s birth—and the cartoon mentioned is from the Washington Post, of which he is now publisher and CEO. Before going into media, Ryan served in the immediate entourage of the 40th U.S. President for 13 years—first in various capacities in the White House and from 1989 to 1995 as Chief of Staff to former President Ronald Reagan. On the one hand, this guarantees a wealth of first-hand insights. On the other hand, such proximity can be problematic if it comes at the expense of critical distance— especially since Ryan has held leading positions at the White House Historical Association for almost two decades. The organization is also the publisher of this visually impressive book. Imposing in its format (24×29×4 cm), weight (2.6 kg), and page count (456).

The book opens with an 80-page chapter on “The Presidents and their Wines,” preferences as well as abstinences ranging from George Washington (sub headline: “A Madeira Man”) to Diet Coke drinker Donald Trump. Most presidencies are covered in two pages, with many pertinent pictures and rather scant text devoted pri- marily to the tastes of the officeholder. The cultural imprint of some of these heads of state on the oenophile inclinations of their compatriots is little discussed. Under champagne lover James Madison, for example, Champagne began to rise to become the drink of the American upper class—even before French red wine. As a result, the United States became the sparkling wine’s most important export market after Great Britain. Champagne could become a problem—Martin van Buren, the eighth president, was criticized by his opponents for his allegedly lavish lifestyle. A caricature of him was titled: “A beautiful goblet of White House Champagne.”

A few decades later, the temperance movement cast its shadow. In 1881, a news- paper article discussed whether wine should be banned from the White House. After all, the United States at the time was an “Alcoholic Republic” (Rorabaugh, 1981), with an annual per capita consumption of nearly 30 liters of pure alcohol, three times that of the present. The drinking habits of the three presidents during Prohibition are covered on only a single page. Here the reader would have liked to learn more about the relationship between the head of state and everyday culture. Also interesting would have been a deeper dive into Woodrow Wilson’s unique per- spective as the last pre-Prohibition president. His veto of the Volstead Act was rejected by Congress, which did not have much of an impact on him personally. When Wilson moved out of the White House, he was able to move “a substantial wine collection” (p. 59) into his post-presidential residence. Since transporting alcohol was a crime, he needed a special permit from the Prohibition commissioner. This opening chapter mainly reports anecdotes, many of which may already be known to the interested reader: That Richard Nixon (sub-headline: “High taste for fine wine”) sometimes secretly had his favorite top-class Bordeaux poured for him, while regular attendees were served simpler wines—this practice became

known as “Pulling a Nixon” (p. 77). On the other hand, he still officially offered high-

class German Rieslings, premier crus from Bordeaux, and vintage champagnes.

Exclusively domestic wines have only been offered in the White House since the tenure of Nixon’s successor, Gerald Ford. This appears in the 100-page sixth chapter, which contains pictures of presidential menus from 1877 to the present day. The few exceptions can be interpreted as a respectful gesture to the guest; the Obamas, for example, had a Shaoxing Wine served to Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2015 as an accompaniment to the soup. Stocks of older French wines were otherwise occasionally served for smaller private dinners, as evidenced by some Reagan-era menu cards.

Despite his preference for these wines, Nixon (“his own counsel in many ways,” p. 103) did much to promote American state wine culture. Schramsberg Blanc de Blancs owes its worldwide fame to Nixon’s “toast to peace” with Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai in 1972, and it has been served at the White House to the present day, as can be easily determined from the extensive statistical appendix. Speaking of toasts, there is a richly illustrated fifth chapter with “Presidential Toasts.” In the photos with European state guests, a transatlantic difference in etiquette becomes visible, the cultural-historical explanation of which is missing: In Europe, the wine glass is (mostly) touched by the stem, in the United States by the bowl.

A short chapter in which the influence of other wine-producing countries is explained is informative. Three officeholders stand out: the still legendary wine collector and winery owner Thomas Jefferson, who as ambassador to France had made extensive trips through European wine regions; John F. Kennedy, who had been accustomed to the life of the upper class since his childhood; and Richard Nixon. All three shared a preference for prestigious French wines. Together with Ronald Reagan, who recognizably had the same taste, they rightly occupy a large space in the book.

The statements of various top vintners whose wines were served in the White House come across more as thinly veiled advertisements. Far more insightful is the introduc- tion of a number of the staff responsible for the wine there. A true gem in the book is the four pages contributed by longtime “First Food and Beverage Usher” Daniel Shanks. Here the reader learns about the motivations behind the selection of the wines and details, for example, that the White House always pays for its wines. Another highlight is the very beautiful 60 pages of the fourth chapter, on which chronologically “The White House Collection” of wine glasses and decanters are illustrated.

The fact that wine can be a means of state representation becomes clear on almost every page. In wine-loving France, the philosopher Roland Barthes even counted it as a “raison d’état” (Barthes, 1957). When state guests in Washington are served bottles from wineries founded by immigrants from their country of origin, this is more than just courtesy. Rather, it is an oenophile proof of identity.

During the 45th presidency, only state banquets seemed to involve traditional diplo- macy. To the first of his few official state visitors—French President Emmanuel

Macron—Trump had Chardonnay and Pinot Noir served following the concept “French soul – Oregon soil.” The wines were chosen “to embody the historic friendship between the United States and France,” according to a White House statement. However, a picture of the two presidents shows them toasting each other with different glasses and different contents—one of the details where some diplomatic background would have been desirable. In general, how does protocol deal with presidents who do not drink alcohol? How to deal with abstemious guests, such as observant Muslims?

The concrete influence of the respective incumbents is largely omitted. An excep- tion is a document from 1961: With a stroke of a pen, JFK ignores the written advice of White House Social Secretary Letitia Baldrige to have under all circumstances a red wine served with the cheese. The president insisted on a single wine, a California Pinot Blanc—if not culinarily, this wine was at least patriotically correct.

Many books already exist on various aspects of state representation around the White House, its architecture and garden, interior design, art. There have also been some on gastrosophical issues, on menus and recipes, but not specifically on wine. This void is now filled, though Ryan’s book extends beyond wine; the drinks serve more as the common thread. However, the reader is in danger of getting lost in the multitude of chronologically presented individual cases. Because of this abun- dance of detail, which remains mostly on the surface, the book misses a broader view. A large historical arc is spanned but remains without the political depth of focus. Still, the many pictures offer further access, which is not so much a criticism of the work as a complement to photo editing. Ryan has delivered a great coffee table book—or rather: a wine cellar book—that makes you want to consume more than a single bottle with it.

Knut Bergmann
German Economic Institute
bergmann@iwkoeln.de
doi:10.1017/jwe.2021.18

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