Michael Pinkus found some unexpectedly vocal critics after he criticized the organizers of Fiesta Buckhorn over their wine and beer selections:
For once I wasn’t trying to stir up controversy, honest . . . but somehow it found me. A little over two weeks ago I wrote about Fiesta Buckhorn in my On the Road with the Grape Guy blog; amongst the wine picks and new winery news was a paragraph entitled, “Shame on Buckhorn” where I chastised them for, once again, allowing Cellared in Canada wines to be poured at an “All Ontario” wine event. There was also an aside, 2-lines within that heading, about a Mexican beer being there amongst all the Ontario craft breweries — but my main focus was the wine, the beer issue had just been pointed out to me in passing during a discussion with another attendee; I hate to say it but I hadn’t noticed them. Well, let me tell you, the mess really hit the fan, so to speak; I received letters from past organizers, current organizers, wine writers and others, weighing in on the controversy.
[. . .]
Two comments made to me (one by past the other by present organizers) concerned me, and encapsulated what is truly wrong with the Ontario wine market and consumer: “. . . quite frankly, there isn’t anyone on the committee knowledgeable enough who can identify non-Ontario wine to us.” In my opinion, this should be rectified immediately and should have been identified as a problem years ago. But it is the next comment that shows a total lack of understanding with regards to the sensitivity of this issue these days when there are websites and petitions against Cellared wines: “How were we to know that this was the case with [the wine in question]? How are we to know what any content of any wine is? Are we to conduct a privately funded research program to do so? We are a NOT FOR PROFIT ORGANIZATION raising funds for a community center.” My comment to that was quite simply: “LEARN” (capitalization begets capitalization), after all, there are plenty of sources out there, use the resources available to you. Crying ignorance is no defense.
The problem stems from the belief that I was accusing Fiesta organizers of willfully deceiving the public, which I am not. Let me state again: I am not accusing Fiesta Buckhorn organizers of deception; I have and will continue to accuse the winemakers of “cellared” wine (who shall go un-named here because this article is not about their product — this time) of deceiving the public, until such time as labeling practices change. What I am saying is that Buckhorn was merely an accomplice or, more to the point, the facilitator. “We intend to offer wine lovers a chance to taste wines from Ontario Vintors [sic]. We do not intend to deceive anyone. We also don’t hire the RCMP to forensically verify every wine served.” I was angrily informed. “And yet,” I retorted, “you offend the Vintners who pour 100% Ontario product by allowing one company to bring in the fake stuff.” And saying nothing.
It’s absolutely inexcusable for the organizers of a Canadian wine event to be unaware of the differences between VQA and “Cellared in Canada” wines . . . in simple terms, VQA is guaranteed to be Canadian wine, CiC is guaranteed to be up to 70% foreign. The wineries that do their level best to disguise foreign wine as domestic deserve to have their deceitful practices exposed and shamed. One particular no-longer-Canadian-owned wine conglomerate is quite noteworthy for this kind of deceptive marketing.
