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Food & Wine Magazine, May 2001

MATTERS OF IMPORT: These wine importers travel to Italy, France or Argentina to find great bottles so you don't have to.

Ed Lehrman discovered Argentina’s finest wines in May 1999, when San Francisco-based wine distributor Nick Ramkowsky invited him along on what was to be a "recreational" visit, shortly after Argentina’s 1999 harvest.

Lehrman, then 34, was a wine retailer at the time, with a business degree from UCLA (he created the Passport Wine Club, later purchased by Geerlings & Wade); Ramkowsky, now 36, was one of his favorite distributors. On that trip, the two tasted so many great 1999 wines (most straight from the tank) that they decided to become partners in Vine Connections, focusing on quality artisanal wines from Argentina.

When they formed their partnership in January 2000, their timing was particularly auspicious: Not only was 1999 a spectacular vintage for Argentina, but it was also a remarkable rebound from the dismal vintage of the year before. The Vine Connections portfolio currently features some of the most critically acclaimed wines made in Argentina, including BenMarco, mapema, Tikal and Luca as well as bottles from Susana Balbo, Argentina’s leading female winemaker. None of these wines are household names here yet but with the attention they’ve garnered, it’s unlikely that will be true for long.

However, as Ramkowsky notes, both he and his partner realize that their job goes beyond selling a handful of wines from star producers. It also requires that they help enlighten Americans about Argentine wines in general, especially those from the Mendoza region. Or, as Ramkowsky says, "People need to be educated to the fact that Argentina makes more than just good, inexpensive, supermarket wine."

They also need to educate American wine drinkers to Argentina’s premier grapes, Malbec and Bonarda, whose names are likely to be unfamiliar to most fans of Chardonnay and Cabernet (although those grapes are grown in Argentina too).

This may seem like a lot to take on, but it’s clear that Vine Connections is more than up to the challenge.

-Dave Marglin

 

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