Yakima Wine Producers Oughta Love Millenials

The conservative kind of common sense served up and toasted by so many people in the Yakima Valley may be at odds with one of our prime product’s consumer groups.. Those children of the Baby Boom and Gen-X, those “oh-so-different-from-me” millennials don't always see things or do things like their parents,  but you gotta give them this--they are lovers of wine!

USA Today reports on research from the nonprofit Wine Market Council showing Millennials (ages 21 to 38 in this study) drank 42 percent of all wine in the U.S. last year. That might not align with your thoughts on the microbrew sipping hipster generation.  It sure surprised me!  That 42% is more than any other generation, and equates to almost 160 million cases of wine - for an average of two cases per person.  Wow!

The study also found that thirty percent of those who drink several times per week, were millennials and they drank a little more than 3.1 glasses of wine per sitting which too is more than any other generation.

But from the wine producer's perspective, the big question is price.  Were the Millennials drinking bargain basement Beaujolais and box wine or were they willing to drop a Hamilton on a premium Yakima Valley vintage?   Survey says - they aren't cheap!  17 percent had shelled out over $20 for a bottle of wine in the past month.  By comparison among all other age groups, only about 10% of them spent $20 or more on a bottle.

No surprise here- over half of wine-drinking millennials confessed to posting about their wine experience on Facebook.