New Year, Best You ’25! Try The Wines Of Garda DOC
By Maureen Martin | January 8, 2025 | The Soft Life
In 2025, we’re all about rediscovering comfort foods and delicious red wines. My favorite way to discover a new Italian wine is over dinner. Our friend Susannah invited us to a tasting of Garda DOC appellation wines over lunch at Osteria San Carlo in New York City. This little gem is the brainchild and passion project of six childhood friends from the Piedmont region. The restaurant serves delicious authentic Piedmontese cuisine and wines.
Here is some intel about the region: “The Garda DOC appellation encompasses 10 historically prominent wine designations—including Lugana, Valpolicella, Bardolino, and Soave. Formed in 1996, the appellation is now guided by the Garda DOC consortium (consorzio) founded in 2016. This consortium includes 250 members that produce wines from almost 77,000 acres [31,100 hectares] of vineyards, or an aggregate area similar in size to the city of Orlando, Florida, or somewhat larger than the Italian city of Genoa.”
Eight main grape varieties dominate Garda DOC wines. For whites, these are Garganega, Trebbiano (two types—di Soave and di Lugana), Chardonnay, and Pinot Grigio, while for reds, they are Corvina, Marzemino, Merlot, and Cabernet Sauvignon. Other local grapes include Erbamat (white) and Groppello (red). Although Garda DOC consists of a hefty quantity of international grape varieties such as Chardonnay and Merlot, the highest percentage of the variety grown (43% in 2023) is the white Garganega.
Most wines in the appellation (80%) are entry-level, priced at less than three Euros a bottle, whereas premium and super-premium wines priced at six Euros a bottle and upward constitute 7.9% of sales. About half of all wine sales are international (including to Germany, the U.S., the U.K., and Belgium), and half are in Italy.
Within the Garda DOC, patterns of wine production have dramatically shifted over the past seven years. The number of grape producers increased by 20%, while the number of grapes produced increased by 46%. More wine is also now being bottled within the appellation—having increased by 246% in the last six years to a total of 18.6 million bottles annually.
This sudden burgeoning output was associated with eye-opening shifts in the types of wine produced. Since 2016, sparkling wines decreased by half—from 34% to about 13.5% of production, while reds are less than a quarter of what they were, having slipped from 32% to 7%. Meanwhile, the production of white wines has more than doubled.
Amid such rapid changes, questions loom regarding which direction wine production and marketing should aim for. To help address uncertainties, the Garda DOC consortium engaged universities from Verona, Milan and Padua to study market patterns—including strengths, weaknesses and opportunities.
Paolo Firini is the President of the Garda DOC Consortium. He is a tall, enthusiastic and affable man who recently spoke at the shoreline town of Lazise along Lake Garda’s southeastern shore. Consortium members had gathered there to meet researchers who had recently surveyed the appellation.
“This appellation is extraordinary, with a great spirit of collaboration and sharing among producers. We know our strengths include heterogeneity; we need to learn our weaknesses, not focus on inadequacies.”
Photo credit: Consorzio Garda DOC
