What Is a Wine Vintage?

A wine’s vintage can be a great indicator of the taste and quality of th bottle contents. This is because the weather of a wine region can change throughout the growing season from year to year.

Wine is both simple and complex.

Wine is simple because very little is needed to make wine, as ut can be created by the natural process that occurs all around us everyday. Wine is also very complex because a winemaker can influence this process in many different ways. Allowing for the production of many different styles of wine, even from a single varietal.

Dictionary Definition:

Vin·tage
/ˈvin(t)ij/
.noun

1. the year or place in which wine, especially wine of high quality, was produced.

Vintage Variation Definition

Vintage variation is simply the difference in how a wine tastes from year to year.

Wine regions throughout the world with higher variable climates tend to have more extreme vintage variation. Poorly timed bad weather can have devastating effects on a wine vintage. Vintage charts can serve as a general guide, to help you remember where had good weather on what years.

Wine Vintage Charts:

• Robert Parker
• Wine Spectator
• WineMag

The Origin of the term “Vintage”

The term vintage comes from: “Vint” stands for “Winemaking” and “age” implies the year it was made.

When you see a vintage year listed on the label, it’s the year the grapes were picked and made into wine. The wine grape harvest in the Northern Hemisphere is August to September, while in the Southern Hemisphere it's from February to April each year.

What is Non-Vintage?

TNon-Vintage wines are frequently created from a blend of different vintages, aiming to create a consistent style for thier brand.

Fortified & Sparkling wines (including Champagne), tend to be non-vintage. The exception to this rule, is that in an outstanding year, a Vintage may be declaired for Champagne and Port. When this happens, the grapes from that harvest will be made wine & not blended, but instead bottled on their own to highlight that specific year.