The Great Reaveal

By Gary Hewitt, DipWSET, CWE, FWS, Sommelier

Do you ever wonder what is in your wine and turn to the back label only to find … no further information? Many people are challenged by the lack of meaningful information on wine labels. But times are changing—and these changes could influence how we choose our wines.

As of December 8, 2023, all wines released in the European Union (EU), domestic or imported, require a label showing ingredients and nutritional information. This legislation— more than 10 years in the making—is the greatest modification of wine labelling since France’s 1919 laws protecting regional names on labels. While there is no similar legislation in Canada (yet!), we will soon begin to see the new EU labelling in our market.

Since early discussions in the 1970s, wine producers have resisted nutritional labelling on the grounds that wine is a “natural product” with a long history of safe production and a traditional place at the table. Besides, wine bottles are beautiful, and all that extra information would be ugly. However, the modern consumer has legitimate demands that wine follow the same legally mandated dietary labelling available on its other food and beverages. As for wine being a “natural product,” many consumers (rightly) suspect that some wines result not from some simple natural process but from sophisticated technology. The new regulations consider both points of view, providing convenient access to ingredient and nutritional information while minimizing the scarification of labels with “ugly” details.

New labels will offer four key pieces of information: energy value (caloric content), intolerances or allergies, a nutritional declaration, and a list of ingredients (see a sample on page 35). The nutritional declaration may be of little interest because wine does not include salt, protein, or fat, whereas the caloric content may attract a lot of attention. Spanish winemaker Esther Pinuaga of Bodegas Pinuaga thinks that consumers will begrudgingly acknowledge that wine, unlike water, is calorie-rich and may alter their buying habits.

Alternatively, the list of ingredients has terrific potential to reveal differences among wines. Ingredients, additives, and adjuncts with a health-related attribute (allergens) must be listed on the bottle. A short list of ingredients will generally indicate a more natural wine, whereas a longer list will indicate greater intervention. Rainer Lingenfelder of Lingenfelder Estate in Pfalz, Germany, is “especially happy to comply as it’ll help us to communicate our minimally invasive approach. Consumers will then be able to decide if they want to buy and drink pure wine or a well-made alcoholic beverage.”

To further accommodate producers’ concerns, mandatory information can be augmented by additional information accessible electronically—for example, using a QR code on the back label. The linked information must be specific to the wine and must not contain additional advertising. This will allow full disclosure without information overload on the physical package.

Undoubtedly, the new legislation will have consequences. Increased label design costs will be passed on to consumers (this will have a greater impact on small producers). Consumers will almost certainly favour wines with fewer additives. As a result, producers will alter their production methods, minimizing the number of additives listed by using physical methods that achieve the same outcome. For example, clarification using an adjunct (like casein, a milk protein) could be replaced by filtration.

Lingenfelder suggests that for many consumers, the label details “need to be interpreted, explained, and put into context. A highly educated expert or team of experts at a serious wine store doesn’t become obsolete with more information on a QR code on the Internet. I am convinced the opposite is true.” As a serious wine store, that’s music to our ears.

Clearly, the simple, clean design of one-word labels such as “Chablis” or “Chianti” is a thing of the past. As consumers, we have embraced wine-industry changes such as screwcaps, wine in bags and cans, and orange wine, so why not nutritional labelling? Change is in the air—there is no doubt that nutritional labelling and more (e.g., health warnings) will come to Canada. We will adapt to nutritional labelling, and in time, it will seem normal.