Six of the United Kingdom’s top independent wine merchants (in alphabetic order: Corney & Barrow, Haynes Hanson & Clark, Lea & Sandeman, Private Cellar, Tanners, and Yapp) united in a collaborative effort back in 1993, and it is safe they have never looked back. What was a great idea at the time is still very much a great idea today. Sharing core values, the association allows these wine merchants to pool knowledge, discuss, analyze and have insight on wine consumption, sales trends, and trade issues that concern them and all of us too.

As very acutely stated by The Bunch Chair Siobhan Astbury, “… The Bunch’s value and purpose have equal relevance today as when the group was established…”. In a world increasingly and progressively dominated by big industry (in wine too) there is now more than ever the need for independent voices, no matter how big or small, in an effort to broadcast and celebrate uniqueness, a thinking out-of-the-box mentality, and the willingness to offer products that are not carbon copies of all those made everywhere else, with exactly the same grape varieties and winemaking methods used. Does the world really need more cookie-cutter, oh-so-boring neutral and insipid, or hopelessly over-oaked Chardonnay wines? (Or for that matter, well-made but equally boring Chardonnay wines expressing all the same aromas and flavours?) Is what the world really needs today more overripe, sweet-tasting Merlot or overly-tannic Cabernet Sauvignon wines with little sense of place?  Humbly, I think not.

The selection of wines presented at The Bunch Press Tasting held this past September in London highlighted the individual merchant buying visions, hunches, insights, and talents: clearly, not all the wines will be equally loved by all those attending. But therein lies the beauty of wine, a drink that, chameleon-like, will change depending on the vintage, the soil, the wind, the rain, the temperature, the grape variety, and the viticulture and winemaking employed. Wine should not be identical to itself year after year and from place to place, even very distant ones. Wine is not a soft drink made in a formulaic manner: soft drinks are absolutely meant to replicate the same taste sensation year after year and from place to place. But that is not wine, and despite what many might like, it shouldn’t be. Wine really does live in a much different realm. If you allow me, a far more interesting one.