Better by halves?
Restaurant customers like half-bottles of wine because they increase their choice. A couple can share a white and a red at the same meal without going over the top. They can drink a white with the first course, a red with the main course and a sweet wine with dessert.
Half-bottles of dessert wines are invariably popular because they are ideal for sharing between two people at the end of a meal when a bottle would be too much.
Rarer, more expensive wine in half-bottles allow customers the chance to experiment and broaden the range of their experience.
But, by and large, it is with customers that the popularity of half-bottles begins and ends. Wine producers don't like halves because they require an extra slot on the bottling line and a different size of label. They can be difficult to sell unless the subject of guaranteed special orders from a merchant.
On top of that there is the question of quality as wine tends to mature more quickly in half-bottles than in bottles or magnums. That does not mean that the most exalted names among wine producers do not bottle halves. Some of the Grand Cru châteaux put a little of their best wines in half-bottles. And though Baron Philippe de Rothschild does not sell Château Mouton and its other château wines in halves, it has had some success with halves of its red and white generic Bordeaux, Mouton Cadet.
Though many have special listings of halves, merchants do not, on the whole, like them for similar reasons to growers. They find them proportionately more expensive and difficult to shift and list only those they can easily get hold of through their normal suppliers.
An exception to the rule is Tim Jackson who runs a wine merchant in Ludlow, Shropshire, explicitly called Halves (0584 877866). Jackson knows what hard work it is for a restaurateur to put together a satisfactory list of halves, so he decided to supply the service himself.
He launched the company in 1990 at the outset of the recession. The fact that he managed to survive may have something to do with restaurant customers wanting to spend less or generally drinking less and therefore preferring halves during the recession.
But now, as things are getting better, Halves' business is improving and its list and customer base is expanding. It has demonstrated that there are enough restaurateurs around to appreciate the sort of service which Halves is offering, and that there are more who are ready to come into the fold.
Its latest move is to take a share in a retail outlet in London's Fulham Road. This is done by special arrangement with the Wine Treasury, founded by restaurateur Neville Blech.
Halves' list is extensive and gratifying at both ends of the price scale and includes wines from the New World as well France and the rest of Europe. You can, for example, find a Chinon 1990, Caves de Rabelais at a minimum 24-bottle order trade price of £3 a half-bottle. Strongly recommended in the Beaujolais department is a Brouilly Veilles Vignes 1992 from Domaine Gisäle et Alain Michaud at £4.49. A William Fävres Chablis 1er Cru Fourchaume 1989 works out at £6.54 and a Domaine Leflaive Puligny Montrachet 1989 at £13.
A 1985 Gruaud-Larose, which would adorn any wine list and is drinking well, would set you back a maximum of £13. To help restaurants that want to keep their stocks low, mixed cases of 24 are available from Halves.
Another merchant at the opposite end of the scale from the small and specialist Halves, and which is setting out to boost the sales of half-bottles, is Griersons.
It recommends the use of half as well as whole bottles in its current promotion of Frescobaldi white and red wines, Gazebo Galestro and Chianti Remole. Packs are supplied consisting of tent cards, a map of Tuscany, a book on Italian wines and the offer of a free Parker Roller Ball to bar or restaurant customers who buy two half-bottles of the featured wines. (For details call 081-459 8011.)
As for restaurateurs' attitudes to halves, many would rather sell bottles because it is more convenient and buying and listing half-bottles of the wine of their choice can be hard work.
The popularity of wine by the glass and the availability of systems, such as Verre de Vin, which keep wine fresh once opened are seen as further deterrents to offering half-bottles.
Sergio Rebecchi, food and beverage manager at London's Grosvenor House hotel, now sells wine by the glass in the hotel's Pavilion restaurant, where, not so long ago, the fixed-price luncheon menu won acclaim for its inclusion of a half-bottle of red or white wine in the price.
More profitable systems
The Café Royal in London sees no special advantage in half-bottles outside its banqueting and formal Grill restaurant. Instead it makes a feature of wine by the glass in its Daniels bar, Green Room cabaret and Brasserie operations.
In common with other high-turnover city centre businesses, it finds wine by the glass a more flexible and profitable system. Allowing for five glasses to the bottle and a percentage increase on the glass price over the bottle price, it is also highly profitable. This is especially so when customers who start with a glass, uncertain of their intentions, go on to a second or a third glass.
That does not mean that formal restaurants do not require half-bottles. More sensitive restaurateurs see the potential to sell more wine by a generous listing of halves as well as to give a more satisfactory service to customers. For them it is worth the slog involved in building a good list of halves. Sometimes the slog even involves a visit to the supermarket.
Ruth Watson of the Fox & Goose in Fressingfield, Suffolk, is an enthusiast for half-bottles. She lists a Muscat de Saint-Jean Minervois, which she buys from Sainsbury's. She has four pages devoted to halves on her list.
There could be few better instances of a restaurant making a special feature of halves than the 30-seat Cross in Kingussie, Highland (featured in Chef, 8 September).
Proprietors Tony and Ruth Hadley list no fewer than 80 halves on their outstanding wine list. Typical listings are a Les Setilles Olivier Leflaive '86 at the remarkable price of £8.50 and an '82 La Tour de Mons Cru Bourgeois at £13.60.
Not so typical, but for the gods when they visit, a 1976 Trockenbeerenauslese Zeltingerhimmelreich Riesling at £65. It is rare opportunity to taste nectar at a bargain price. "I can only describe this wine as orgasmic," says Hadley.
