In the most broad sense, a winery’s location determines the wine laws it may choose to follow. The question basically comes down to how a winery label their wines. Or how do they choose to label their wines? Why is this so important? A label can express a level of quality or the basic amount of production element done to that wine to achieve that level of quality. If done well, the customer can have a legitimate amount of confidence in what is purchased, be it a high-end bottle or an every day table wine. The level of quality expressed, like many other parts of economics, will translate to the amount of money a customer would be willing to pay.

There are grapes in the world that are planted in a wide range of environments. This is an absolute understatement. Of this vastness is a small number of varieties that have easily traveled from their homelands and have been planted around the world. Why? Because they are proven grapes that can produce high-quality wines and are not too fussy about where they are planted.

Last week, we presented wines from Italy to pair with the food on your Thanksgiving table. This week, we are travelling to Eastern Europe in order to bring some new and interesting options to your holiday feast. A visit to Eastern Europe must include wines made from grapes local to the region. Off we go.

The winery’s location will determine under what wine laws it may choose to participate. Wine laws are meant to strengthen the branding relationship between winery and consumer, by informing the customer what level of quality, approved varietal used, and production methods were imposed to produce a bottle of wine. Austria imposed a three-tiered quality level system: