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The Wine Collector
Practical wine collecting advice from Steve Bachmann, Vinfolio's CEO
 
22
Nov
2006
Female wine collectors – where are they?

A post in James Laube’s Unfined blog yesterday titled “That’s right, women are smarter” inspired me to consider why female wine collectors seem to be scarce. The general demographic profile of a wine collector is 90+% male, 40’s or older, and with some disposable income to support their “habit.” When I checked Vinfolio’s list of top 100 customers based on wine spending, only 5% were women. The big question is does this reflect the market or are we just bad marketers?

Here are some possible explanations (without any supporting facts):

  • Women tend to have a broader range of collecting-related interests from shoes and handbags to clothing and jewelry where they prioritize their spending. Wine just does not bring as much pleasure per dollar as those other categories. (Note: this is an observation from a female staff member).
  • Married women allow their husbands to take the lead on wine collecting to generate leverage to justify spending on what they want (see prior point).
  • Many men treat wine collecting as another arena of competition and a method of signaling to others they have “made it.” Women tend to choose other means to compete or to signal success.
  • Women are more disciplined drinkers and physically smaller. This in turn leads to less consumption and a lesser need to collect.

What’s your theory?

6 comments:

Another theory?
'Collecting' is a male pastime, whether it's baseball cards, stamps or wine. Women buy wine to share with friends and family, so storing it away seems wasteful when you can enjoy it.

Posted by anonymous at Tuesday February 20, 2007

although how does that fit into the ancient theory of men being hunters and women being gatherers?

Posted by italian wine guy at Tuesday February 20, 2007

Thoughts:
I think it's tied into culture,money and age. We in America don't have a history of wine as part of our socio-cultural norm. It would be intersting to see statistics on female collectors in countries that have had wine as a part of eveyday life. Wine is still considered a luxury in the U.S.. Women still don't make as much money as men, therefore have less disposable income.Lastly,by your own information, the age range for collecting is "male, 40>. Women of previous generation historically have not had financial control. As younger women are increasingly learning more about wine and attaining financial independence, I think we will see more women entering the realm of wine collecting.

Posted by anonymous at Tuesday February 20, 2007

Being a female collector under 40, I can attest to the lack of other women wine collectors. It appears to be jointly related to prestige/wealth and to a lesser degree lack of role models. As one blogger noted, women tend (still) to make less then men of comparable age therefore, disposable income is less available. Also noted was how women also prefer to display their wealth in other ways: jewelry, designer clothes/accessories, plastic surgery. Both these points have been made above.
However, one missed point is that women have fewer role models in the oenophile world. Perhaps similar to the historically male culinary arena, women are only beginning to be seen in numbers in wine circles...not as drinkers but as serious players, competitors and influences. The very few female Master Sommeliers is a testament to this. Yet, as more women see other women chose the field, not as a dalliance but as a serious occupation and interest, they will follow in each others' footsteps.

Posted by anonymous at Tuesday February 20, 2007

Woman with the means to collect wine would be too busy spending time organizing their closet full of shoes and dresses. Their closet is their wine cellar. I.E. their first love (refering to a hobby)

Posted by anonymous at Tuesday February 20, 2007

I started a wine group in Boston a few years ago for women and it grew to 40+ members since. We were mentioned in food and wine mag as well. this month i started my second group Salem MA wine women and run both I also this week launched my website bostonwinewomen.com I am looking for women to talk about their wine experiences on the forum on this site and their collecting experience since I just started my wine cellar.

Posted by Colleen White at Sunday January 20, 2008






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