All Media Winery Solutions

DAVE MCINTYRE MAY BE GONE FROM WaPo BUT HE’LL WRITE ON

No Heavy Bottles and Honest Wine Reportage Will Prevail

By ALAN GOLDFARB

January 20, 2025

Dave McIntyre, the longtime wine columnist might be gone from the Washington Post, but his words and thoughts as a living, breathing thing – as with wine itself – will continue to be written.

I spoke to Dave recently. I thought it would be a rare opportunity – in light of the raison d’être in this space, which is to try and explain media relations – to find out what it was(is) like to be the recipient of PR pitches from the world of flackery. That’s because we publicist-types work in a vacuum, without much guidance or collegial interaction. In all these years, I’ve never really known if what I’m attempting to do to serve my clients well, if I’m going about it with certitude.

McIntyre’s responses gave me the insight to realize I’m probably doing things the right way.

He’s a self-effacing guy, who belies his position as one of the most important wine writers of his generation. When I ask, what drives him crazy when he’s pitched by a PR rep? he says the ones that proclaim their client is “’The best winemaker since Jesus at the wedding at Cana (you know, when he turned water into …). I try to respond and say thank you,” but no thanks.

What drives me crazy from the other side of the aisle is a non-response. Crickets. Although I’ve never sent such a hyperbolic pitch on behalf of one of my clients, spouting, “You’ve got to write about this winemaker because she or he is the second coming.” Not yet, anyway.

Or this from the 65-year-old scribe, who will continue his columns, which will live on Substack, when I query, what he looks for in a possible story? He hesitates for what seems like at least 10 seconds and answers, “To be honest, I really haven’t asked myself before. I think when I read an email (pitch), and I get a whole bunch of them, including the ones that do get lost in the inbox, names that I know (get my attention). Or, I don’t know why a subject might catch my eye. I lot of it might just be, what my mood is that day.”

He then actually opens his current email. “Here’s one about whisky. I don’t write about whisky. That’s one to ignore,” he relates. But then quips, “I don’t have that many today; maybe they’ve already crossed me off their list.

“(But) if I recognize the name of the person sending and who I’ve been interactive with and respect, or it’s from a region or type of wine I like,” that will catch his attention. It used to be easy to say, 'I’d like to try those wines.' I try to be more selective now.” He plans to be more circumspect about what wines he’ll write about now on his new “WineLine” Substack newsletter. He wants to focus on the wines surrounding the Washington D.C. area, which include the on-the-come wines from nearby Virginia and Maryland. But he tells me that of course he’ll also write about wine from California. Whew! But not so much about those wines that reach “triple digits”. (But not so good for me or my clients whose wines often play in that stratosphere.)

“One of things that will get my eyes rolling is when a pitch is for a wine that is in triple digits or when a pitch says “affordable and accessible’ when it’s $50 a bottle,” he says. “That’s part of wine being tone-deaf to reality. That reinforces wine as an elite luxury drink. Maybe it is Substack. (But) that’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot as a senior wine writer. I would dismiss those wines for the Washington Post, but I wouldn’t for WineLine.”

I tell him I have a client with a great story (truly) in a very cool (read: hot) AVA with equally wonderful wines (not all my clients’ wines are wonderful; and I wouldn’t take on a winery whose wines I didn’t like), and are priced from $50-$65 and whose quality warrants a price increase. He listens carefully and responds in-kind:

“I assume he (the vintner) doesn’t make lot of it. He doesn’t make enough for everybody to afford a bottle. But it’s capitalism. There’s a difference; I’m not aiming for the same audience (now). If anybody signs up (for WineLine) they’re going to be reading about wine. But at the Post, they’ve probably just been leafing through the food section. It’s a different reader.”

I really didn’t mean to pitch him during this conversation (not consciously, at least; but OK, maybe) but McIntyre tells me that the region in which the above winery resides, has gotten his attention; and he intimates that the prices are not a turn off. Yowza!

But what is and will continue to be a turnoff to him in the pages of the new WineLine, will be the marketing ploy of grossly heavy bottles. McIntyre has been railing against those monstrosities for years and he just may be responsible for the industry (which he quaintly refers to as “the community”), beginning to reach critical mass apropos reducing its carbon footprint.

In fact, someone is doing a documentary on that very subject and apparently Dave McIntrye will be a part. “I’ll probably keep beating that drum,” he tells me of his aversion to barbell bottles.

“Even Laura Catena mentioned me,” he says without a hint of conceit. “Hopefully wineries can stop with this silliness of ‘consumers want heavy bottles.’ The wine community is not killing the planet but don’t let them (continue to use heavy bottles).”

And when I tell him I’ve warned by clients about Dave McIntyre’s stance on those bottles; and even have a comment in a spreadsheet– bolded – on McIntyre’s line: “NO HEAVY BOTTLES”, he chuckles.

Dave McIntyre’s reasons for leaving WaPo are certainly pragmatic, to hear him tell it, rather than polemic (see: Bezos). But his retirement, which coincided with his leaving his “day job” as a public affairs officer with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, also in an amazing concurrence, came on the same day that WaPo political cartoonist Ann Telnaes resigned after her depiction of Bezos bending the knee for the President-elect.

“It had nothing to do with politics. It was time. I thought of taking a break but with the Surgeon General’s report (alcohol kills), it seemed like a good time to jump in,” to get into the next chapter. “I want to establish a rhythm (before I decide) whether or not to keep doing it.”

And as if it just dawns on him, “I have un-fined, unfiltered, and unfettered total freedom (now).”

That, for a writer and journalist, is a rare commodity – autonomy -- to have at one’s disposal. It just may be enough to keep Dave McIntyre in the ever-decreasing circle of wine scribes.

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