I can't see a limit to honey being very easy to reach, there's always more flowers out there, and if there's the demand then people will start more and more hives (I would think).
Why isn't mead more mainstream?
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I'll throw in my $.02.
From a fermentable sugar point of view, here in FL I can purchase OB honey for $1.25/gal if I buy large qty's based upon 55gal drums. In other parts of the country, I'd have to add transportation costs to that. So compared to beer, the fermentable sugars may a bit more expensive, but that's looking through a soda straw at a larger picture.
Another way to look at it would be raw material costs vs alcohol by volume (ABV) of the finished product. In this case, mead probably can be commercial manufactured for the same or even lower costs than beer. Keep in mind, most beers utilize (expensive) hops in their creation, along with other ingredients that add to the raw costs.
As for wine material comparisons, it seems to me that the commercial wine industry (at least in the US if not around the world) has so moved this to a science as to commoditize grape juice to where actual cost variances are minimized, and probably comparable to honey must. That's not to say that some wines/wineries don't incur greater material costs, I'm just commenting in general.
The BIGGEST difference (in production) to me seems to be in the aging, and the associated costs. If a decent (not blow your socks off nor horrible) wine can be bottled and shipped in just a few months after grape pressing, that is a HUGE advantage over mead where to achieve the same "goodness" level needs at least a year of aging, if not more. Keep in mind, those gallons of aging of mead need somewhere to live during that time, and that costs money that has to be included in the final bottle price.
Of course, culture, availability of high volume, quality product obviously comes into play here as well, but we are a LONG way away from having a Gallo, or Woodbridge equivalent in the mead industry. (No, I don't necessarily hold these up as the quality standard to shoot for, but simply their approach to production, marketing, distribution, etc.)
Eric
From a fermentable sugar point of view, here in FL I can purchase OB honey for $1.25/gal if I buy large qty's based upon 55gal drums. In other parts of the country, I'd have to add transportation costs to that. So compared to beer, the fermentable sugars may a bit more expensive, but that's looking through a soda straw at a larger picture.
Another way to look at it would be raw material costs vs alcohol by volume (ABV) of the finished product. In this case, mead probably can be commercial manufactured for the same or even lower costs than beer. Keep in mind, most beers utilize (expensive) hops in their creation, along with other ingredients that add to the raw costs.
As for wine material comparisons, it seems to me that the commercial wine industry (at least in the US if not around the world) has so moved this to a science as to commoditize grape juice to where actual cost variances are minimized, and probably comparable to honey must. That's not to say that some wines/wineries don't incur greater material costs, I'm just commenting in general.
The BIGGEST difference (in production) to me seems to be in the aging, and the associated costs. If a decent (not blow your socks off nor horrible) wine can be bottled and shipped in just a few months after grape pressing, that is a HUGE advantage over mead where to achieve the same "goodness" level needs at least a year of aging, if not more. Keep in mind, those gallons of aging of mead need somewhere to live during that time, and that costs money that has to be included in the final bottle price.
Of course, culture, availability of high volume, quality product obviously comes into play here as well, but we are a LONG way away from having a Gallo, or Woodbridge equivalent in the mead industry. (No, I don't necessarily hold these up as the quality standard to shoot for, but simply their approach to production, marketing, distribution, etc.)
Eric
1st I suspect that you meant $1.25 a pound not $1.25 a gallon. That is still a very good price, but if you could get it at 11 cents a pound I would drive down there and bring back a tanker truck full.
I agree that the cost of sugar in mead is more expensive than for beer and that beer helps to make up that difference with hops and such. At the same time the cost of sugar for mead is very competitive with the cost in wine. In addition the aging of mead and wine is very similar.
I have visited commercial meaderies in this country that have told me that they produce their standard meads in as little as a month or so. And this was a large (by our standards) craft meaderie that we would all consider producing good mead.
Bottom line, on a price basis we could compete with wine very easily. The trouble is getting people to buy it.
It is going to take a change in the publics conception of mead, this is the reason I so enjoy getting groups of people together that have never even considered mead and turning them "onto" mead.
I do think this is coming, how fast, though is anyones guess.
I agree that the cost of sugar in mead is more expensive than for beer and that beer helps to make up that difference with hops and such. At the same time the cost of sugar for mead is very competitive with the cost in wine. In addition the aging of mead and wine is very similar.
I have visited commercial meaderies in this country that have told me that they produce their standard meads in as little as a month or so. And this was a large (by our standards) craft meaderie that we would all consider producing good mead.
Bottom line, on a price basis we could compete with wine very easily. The trouble is getting people to buy it.
It is going to take a change in the publics conception of mead, this is the reason I so enjoy getting groups of people together that have never even considered mead and turning them "onto" mead.
I do think this is coming, how fast, though is anyones guess.
15 years ago we'd be having the same conversation about non-macro-lagers and microbrews. The momentum is on the upswing, time is on the side of mead. The question we should be asking: how do I get in on the ground floor? The time to do the experiments, test the boundaries, and go nuts is now.
absolutely.
i recently had two locally made meads and frankly i will NEVER buy mead again.
its just simply crap products thats the problem. its no different from a cafe or restaurant serving up crap food.
the catch is one bad meadery stuffs it up for all of them. with wine a person will just not buy that brand again but with mead they will not buy ANY mead again.
It's not just mead. I know folks who tried one beer once and won't try any beer ever again (beer is quite a large universe). Some people swear off all red, or white, or pink wines after one bad taste. A bad night with tequila turns into a lifelong aversion. Heck, even sushi, tofu, and Chinese takeout suffer from the same tendency of people to generalize.
Where mead suffers in this regard, I think, is that to the average person "mead" is all one thing (just like "beer" is all one thing to some people, but not as many). More people realize that there are at least red, white, and pink wines from different places in the world. Fewer understand that mead can be even more diverse.
even i didn't know you could get so many different varieties. i've only seen traditional for sale. the most people know is mead = honey.
i think mead is worse for it because it tends to be treated as such a niche product.
i think mead is worse for it because it tends to be treated as such a niche product.
My dad keeps saying he doesn't like mead, which always makes me laugh - traditional mead sure, but "mead"? That's as wide a category as all the rest of alcohol combined - but people don't know/understand that.
One of my biggest fans is the owner of a local Tapa bar. He has a fair selection of beers on tap. He hates sweet wines, and it took me almost a year before you would finally taste one of my meads. I brought him two bottles one of a dry traditional mead and one of my petite sirah pyments. Now he wants more and says he would carry them if I would make them form him.
While he had tasted meads as a kid in Argentina, he thought of them with sickeningly sweet honey drinks.
For now I trade mead for food, pretty good deal for both of us, and in case you are curious, it is just for his own consumption.
While he had tasted meads as a kid in Argentina, he thought of them with sickeningly sweet honey drinks.
For now I trade mead for food, pretty good deal for both of us, and in case you are curious, it is just for his own consumption.
Well I like some commercial Meads that I have tryed. But I am a person that likes sweet wine and a sweet mead tast a little like some of your white wines.
Roger
I believe that mead is at a nexus point; given the recent mass public exposure in popular entertainment media (movies, primarily), more people have at least heard the term, and they associate it with an alcoholic beverage, than ever before. However, most of the stereotypical portrayals of mead do not present it in a favorable light, so in this case the uptick in exposure may be a two-edged sword. However, many of the successful established commercial meaderies in North America (those that have been around a while) have been successful not because they are trying to turn out a stellar product; rather they have been expert at controlling production and storage costs, so their product can compete successfully with commercial wines, despite a very (until now) limited niche market. Many of their meads have historically been what we might regard as little more than sweet swill.
However, as the re-emergence of real beer (aka the craft brewing industry) in the US demonstrates, the public will eventually come to accept and then demand, the best-of-the-best in any beverage product, if that product is presented to enough of them such that interest is piqued in a critical mass of individuals. I was around at the re-inception of home brewing, which spawned the renaissance of the craft brew industry in the US (my first batches of beer were brewed even earlier than my first mead - back in the late 70's), and back then only a very small percentage of the public - only those that I like to call the "intelligencia elitists," along with those "hippies" who were into the all things natural movement - were interested. But with the dedication and perseverance of at first only a few crazy brewers who found loopholes in existing law that allowed them to open brew-pubs and later, microbreweries, a market was created and that market is growing and thriving today.
Further, the brewing industry's success demonstrates that once word spreads from the intelligencia elite to a more generic upscale crowd, demand escalates dramatically. Mead can, and hopefully will, undergo a similar growth in market potential (albeit not likely to be as dramatic or as widespread as the beer market, since beer still attracts a wider demographic than meads ever likely will). But what it will take are both dedicated attempts at public enlightenment (which is one big reason that Gotmead sponsors the Mazer Cup - we want this fledgling industry to grow and we know that events that attract the public will spread the word), and the availability of stellar commercial product. The stellar product is now out there, and slowly becoming more widely available, although most of the "good stuff" being made commercially these days is still distributed over very limited regional areas. What is needed, IMO, are more "micro-meaderies" dedicated to producing the best meads on the planet (which will open up more market by providing more net product volume) , along with more public mead awareness. The path forward is not guaranteed. There is much risk inherent in starting a meadery and a huge amount of work, business skill, patience and an insane amount of dedication to the craft is required to be successful while still producing top shelf product.
I applaud the new generation of commercial meadmakers, some of whom frequent this site, for taking on the risk and defying the odds; because of people like them, the prospects for more widespread public acceptance of mead are better now than ever before. We need more of 'em, and to all you guys now in the process of starting your own micro-meaderies, I applaud you even more! (And as soon as you can sell inter-state, I'll buy your products!!)
Now it is incumbent on all of us, who know what truly good mead is either from personal meadmaking experience or from exposure to the existing stellar commercial meads now out there, to spread the word, and the mead, far and wide. Word of mouth will be necessary to build initial demand, because we're nowhere near that critical mass point that I mentioned previously.
So, get out there and serve your best, folks! Host more mead tastings, invite your most influential friends and acquaintances. Do all you can to help these brave, insane, new commercial guys succeed... only then will you start to see more widespread availability of truly good commercial meads.
However, as the re-emergence of real beer (aka the craft brewing industry) in the US demonstrates, the public will eventually come to accept and then demand, the best-of-the-best in any beverage product, if that product is presented to enough of them such that interest is piqued in a critical mass of individuals. I was around at the re-inception of home brewing, which spawned the renaissance of the craft brew industry in the US (my first batches of beer were brewed even earlier than my first mead - back in the late 70's), and back then only a very small percentage of the public - only those that I like to call the "intelligencia elitists," along with those "hippies" who were into the all things natural movement - were interested. But with the dedication and perseverance of at first only a few crazy brewers who found loopholes in existing law that allowed them to open brew-pubs and later, microbreweries, a market was created and that market is growing and thriving today.
Further, the brewing industry's success demonstrates that once word spreads from the intelligencia elite to a more generic upscale crowd, demand escalates dramatically. Mead can, and hopefully will, undergo a similar growth in market potential (albeit not likely to be as dramatic or as widespread as the beer market, since beer still attracts a wider demographic than meads ever likely will). But what it will take are both dedicated attempts at public enlightenment (which is one big reason that Gotmead sponsors the Mazer Cup - we want this fledgling industry to grow and we know that events that attract the public will spread the word), and the availability of stellar commercial product. The stellar product is now out there, and slowly becoming more widely available, although most of the "good stuff" being made commercially these days is still distributed over very limited regional areas. What is needed, IMO, are more "micro-meaderies" dedicated to producing the best meads on the planet (which will open up more market by providing more net product volume) , along with more public mead awareness. The path forward is not guaranteed. There is much risk inherent in starting a meadery and a huge amount of work, business skill, patience and an insane amount of dedication to the craft is required to be successful while still producing top shelf product.
I applaud the new generation of commercial meadmakers, some of whom frequent this site, for taking on the risk and defying the odds; because of people like them, the prospects for more widespread public acceptance of mead are better now than ever before. We need more of 'em, and to all you guys now in the process of starting your own micro-meaderies, I applaud you even more! (And as soon as you can sell inter-state, I'll buy your products!!)
Now it is incumbent on all of us, who know what truly good mead is either from personal meadmaking experience or from exposure to the existing stellar commercial meads now out there, to spread the word, and the mead, far and wide. Word of mouth will be necessary to build initial demand, because we're nowhere near that critical mass point that I mentioned previously.
So, get out there and serve your best, folks! Host more mead tastings, invite your most influential friends and acquaintances. Do all you can to help these brave, insane, new commercial guys succeed... only then will you start to see more widespread availability of truly good commercial meads.
I think that while cultural/historical/taste/marketing/etc factors are important limits to the spread of mead, cost is the most important issue. As people has already said here, honey is expensive. That sets the minimum price mead can be sold for. Grapejuice is very cheap by comparison. So, in the cheaper wine segments (say, up to 5-6 US dollars per 75 cl bottle or tetrabrik 1 liter box), mead is not competitive. That segment is a very important segment both by volume and by value for the industry. The upper segment, say from 40 dollars upwards per bottle (e.g. a burgundy premier cru or 3rd growth Bordeaux, a good rivera del duero, amarone della valpolicella, etc) is also probably out of reach of mead due to the strong "luxury good" component of those wines.
Therefore, mead could probably be competitive within those brackets. It is in those segments, where I think mead has more possibilities. Of course, when you can get excellent wine, with 12 months of new (or second use) oak cask aging for US$ 11 retail, as is the case here where I live, I think it is rather challenging to sell mead, even if people knew how good mead can be.
Therefore, mead could probably be competitive within those brackets. It is in those segments, where I think mead has more possibilities. Of course, when you can get excellent wine, with 12 months of new (or second use) oak cask aging for US$ 11 retail, as is the case here where I live, I think it is rather challenging to sell mead, even if people knew how good mead can be.
I'm also a fan of sweeter wines and I love Moniack mead, although I was quite happy with the only North American commercial mead I've tried (Munro's) and it wasn't the least bit syrupy. I had a dry "honey wine" once, long before I started making my own, but it was just like a white wine, inoffensive but nothing special. <shrug>
The homemade meads I used to barter for at an annual gathering I used to attend were better than the "honey wine" but they definitely needed a couple of months to age, I generally left them on the shelf about 9 months before I'd bother.
I suspect that nothing short of a vibrant, growing religious movement that spreads across the globe and which regards mead as its sacred drink will ever allow mead to regain its former place from wine.
The problem with comparisons to to the beer industry before the rise of craft brewing is that in the beer industry there were a few huge beer companies all producing the same, weak-kneed, watered-down, so-called "pilsner" and nothing else. The craft beers gave people something different to taste. With wine, yes there are a few huge wineries producing "galloesque" jugs, but there are also thousands of small wineries here and abroad producing an array of different grapes, and flavors, and levels of sweetness. You can try something new and different twice-a-day every day of the year and not cover it all. That doesn't leave a lot of room for a novel "wine" (mead in this case) to make an impact.
That's not to say that making a great product won't eventually encourage more people to taste mead, and once tasted, folks may appreciate it (I know I did). But I expect it to be a long slow climb out of obscurity. The fact that mead can be so many different things - sweet, dry, fruity, high ABV, sparkling, etc. just mean that it is tougher to focus marketing. The fact that consumers expect it to be sweet probably accounts for the fact that most of the widely available products are. The fact that people can easily experiment with flavors using distilled products - see the lastest vodka flavors, and the current martini craze - just means it is that much tougher for novel fruity/sweet beverages to find an opening.
I don't mean to sound negative, but if we are waiting for critical mass, I think it might be faster to start a different kind of mass. A mass for Sainted Mother Vicky of the bees. In the name of Oskaar, and Schramm, and Hightest (while making the sign of the bee)....
The Apostle Medsen of Fey
The problem with comparisons to to the beer industry before the rise of craft brewing is that in the beer industry there were a few huge beer companies all producing the same, weak-kneed, watered-down, so-called "pilsner" and nothing else. The craft beers gave people something different to taste. With wine, yes there are a few huge wineries producing "galloesque" jugs, but there are also thousands of small wineries here and abroad producing an array of different grapes, and flavors, and levels of sweetness. You can try something new and different twice-a-day every day of the year and not cover it all. That doesn't leave a lot of room for a novel "wine" (mead in this case) to make an impact.
That's not to say that making a great product won't eventually encourage more people to taste mead, and once tasted, folks may appreciate it (I know I did). But I expect it to be a long slow climb out of obscurity. The fact that mead can be so many different things - sweet, dry, fruity, high ABV, sparkling, etc. just mean that it is tougher to focus marketing. The fact that consumers expect it to be sweet probably accounts for the fact that most of the widely available products are. The fact that people can easily experiment with flavors using distilled products - see the lastest vodka flavors, and the current martini craze - just means it is that much tougher for novel fruity/sweet beverages to find an opening.
I don't mean to sound negative, but if we are waiting for critical mass, I think it might be faster to start a different kind of mass. A mass for Sainted Mother Vicky of the bees. In the name of Oskaar, and Schramm, and Hightest (while making the sign of the bee)....
The Apostle Medsen of Fey
And with all due respect to Medsen, I prefer to remain more optimistic. ;D
The points that he raises are all valid, and it does mean that mead will have a longer climb out of the depths of alcohol obscurity than craft beer ever did, but I think that a similar emergence of the American craft wine industry (which started before the craft beer emergence, but took longer overall to catch hold) demonstrates that it is possible for any alcoholic beverage to pique the general public's interest.
Thinking back to the mid 1960's or so, a few hardy fools out in the vicinity of Napa, California, decided to try to make wines that were more than jug-swill quality, despite the fact that there was no extant market in this country for such a home grown product. Back then wine drinkers were pretty much bimodally distributed. The intelligencia elitists in the US were all drinking French wines (except those on budgets, who stooped to having to content themselves with German and/or Italian "second class" products). The only other major market segment purchasing wine in the US back then were going for Gallo jugs, or Thunderbird, or the like....
What happened to ignite the interest of a much wider segment of the American public in wines from their own backyard? The same kind of almost maniacal fanatic drive on the part of some smaller winemakers in turning out great product - despite the predominantly held belief at the time that it couldn't be done outside western Europe, coupled somewhat later, with aggressive marketing campaigns that started about the time of the Judgement of Paris. Americans like nothing better than to be told that their home-grown product is superior to that from other parts of the world (in case you hadn't noticed)
and when commercial advertising employing icons of stage and screen (Remember Orson Welles declaring that Paul Masson would sell no wine before its time?) start to reinforce the idea that the local product is worth trying, the public are motivated to try. Masson wasn't even selling particularly good product back in the late 70's, but when Orson spoke, Masson sales skyrocketed. And the stuff that Masson was producing was so much better than the Gallo and T'Bird swill that Americans had come to think of as "wine," that interest in a critical mass of individuals was kindled - and California wine sales rocketed up in volume almost exponentially for the next two decades after that.
All I'm saying is that the same can happen with mead. Will it likely take longer than beer or wine did? Sure. Mead has even less general public recognition than wine did in the latter half of the last century, so of course the development of critical mass interest will take longer. Plus, precisely because wine has been so successful in establishing its broad market appeal, that mead has more competition out of the gate. But those are difficulties to be overcome from my perspective, rather than forever limiting roadblocks.
Maybe I'm just one of those crazy, hardcore, believers in the potential success of commercial mead. If that's true, then I'm at least a kindred spirit of some fine folks out in the commercial mead production industry.
The points that he raises are all valid, and it does mean that mead will have a longer climb out of the depths of alcohol obscurity than craft beer ever did, but I think that a similar emergence of the American craft wine industry (which started before the craft beer emergence, but took longer overall to catch hold) demonstrates that it is possible for any alcoholic beverage to pique the general public's interest.
Thinking back to the mid 1960's or so, a few hardy fools out in the vicinity of Napa, California, decided to try to make wines that were more than jug-swill quality, despite the fact that there was no extant market in this country for such a home grown product. Back then wine drinkers were pretty much bimodally distributed. The intelligencia elitists in the US were all drinking French wines (except those on budgets, who stooped to having to content themselves with German and/or Italian "second class" products). The only other major market segment purchasing wine in the US back then were going for Gallo jugs, or Thunderbird, or the like....
What happened to ignite the interest of a much wider segment of the American public in wines from their own backyard? The same kind of almost maniacal fanatic drive on the part of some smaller winemakers in turning out great product - despite the predominantly held belief at the time that it couldn't be done outside western Europe, coupled somewhat later, with aggressive marketing campaigns that started about the time of the Judgement of Paris. Americans like nothing better than to be told that their home-grown product is superior to that from other parts of the world (in case you hadn't noticed)
and when commercial advertising employing icons of stage and screen (Remember Orson Welles declaring that Paul Masson would sell no wine before its time?) start to reinforce the idea that the local product is worth trying, the public are motivated to try. Masson wasn't even selling particularly good product back in the late 70's, but when Orson spoke, Masson sales skyrocketed. And the stuff that Masson was producing was so much better than the Gallo and T'Bird swill that Americans had come to think of as "wine," that interest in a critical mass of individuals was kindled - and California wine sales rocketed up in volume almost exponentially for the next two decades after that.All I'm saying is that the same can happen with mead. Will it likely take longer than beer or wine did? Sure. Mead has even less general public recognition than wine did in the latter half of the last century, so of course the development of critical mass interest will take longer. Plus, precisely because wine has been so successful in establishing its broad market appeal, that mead has more competition out of the gate. But those are difficulties to be overcome from my perspective, rather than forever limiting roadblocks.
Maybe I'm just one of those crazy, hardcore, believers in the potential success of commercial mead. If that's true, then I'm at least a kindred spirit of some fine folks out in the commercial mead production industry.
We need an association with a national platform from which a recognisable spokesperson can take the message to the people. Yes?
And here's a problem--a coworker asked me for some of my mead, and I brought him two bottles, a dry traditional that's 2 years old and a sweeter big berry Mel that's about a year and a half old. He can't wait to try them, and if he really likes them and wants to try more, he can't just go to our local BevMo here in Elk Grove and pick a bottle of good mead. They have Chaucer's and Bunratty "mead," (white wine sweetened with honey), and some BevMos have Rabbit's Foot, but for the most part, if he wants good mead he needs to either get it from me or order it online--which is a huge hassle when you can get reasonably priced decent tasting mass-produced wine at the local grocery. Why would he bother?
Hallelujah!!
BTW, I did have an error in OB honey price, it should have stated $2.25/gal, ($125/55gallon drum).
That's a good point for sure wildoates, there needs to be a slow climb to having decent mead readily available before it can ever become popular, or else people will try it, like it, forget it.
I have one question, off topic with the OP but on topic with the pricing discussion in this thread - if grape wine costs so much more to produce the must, why is it than in the 15$ "golden" price range a person can get wines aged for at least a year, often a couple/few, but with meads in that price range they've got to be out the door in months?
Is it because those wines are being produced by massive companies? Thanks to Ian I've seen at least one meadery's numbers, and he's right, it's simply not affordable to age longer than a few months for meads anywhere near that price point - so what are wine companies doing differently?
I'm guessing it's company size, wineries that are similar sizes to these meaderies are putting out much higher priced products, and most/all of the 15$ range stuff is being done by bigger players who can get costs down even lower?
I have one question, off topic with the OP but on topic with the pricing discussion in this thread - if grape wine costs so much more to produce the must, why is it than in the 15$ "golden" price range a person can get wines aged for at least a year, often a couple/few, but with meads in that price range they've got to be out the door in months?
Is it because those wines are being produced by massive companies? Thanks to Ian I've seen at least one meadery's numbers, and he's right, it's simply not affordable to age longer than a few months for meads anywhere near that price point - so what are wine companies doing differently?
I'm guessing it's company size, wineries that are similar sizes to these meaderies are putting out much higher priced products, and most/all of the 15$ range stuff is being done by bigger players who can get costs down even lower?
