Unlike other parts of the world, understanding wine labels for Chilean wines is not difficult. In France for example, there are winemaking requirements for the appellation and classification. Hence, you have to know what the classification rankings mean and what grapes are allowed in that appellation. There are also a plethora of single vineyards and lieux dits (or geographical area) within the appellation that distinguish a wine from another.
In Chile, similar to California, you mainly have the vintage, grape variety and valley it comes from. Sometimes they specify sub-regions or single vineyards, but they are not as important as in France. Legally, the only requirement is that 75% of the wine come from the region, variety and vintage listed on the label, but most keep it at least 85% to also follow European requirements. Being in the southern hemisphere, vintages actually indicate the year it was harvested since Fall starts in March. Therefore, a 2016 vintage of Chilean wine means the grapes were grown in last half of 2015 and early 2016.
Names of producers often start with the word “Viña,” or “Viñedos” (vineyard). You might also see “Bodega,” (cellars), “Hacienda” (estate), and “Casa” (house). Some higher end cuvees of producers also have another name, sometimes from the indigenous Mapuche language, to distinguish it from their regular winery labeled bottles. For example, there’s Santa Rita’s Pehuen or Perez Cruz’s Quelen. Check out our Chilean Wine Glossary to help understand any Spanish on the label.
Many Chilean wines will also have a label of reserva, gran reserva, and premium. Unlike Spain, these are not as rigorous of rules in terms of the amount of aging required. For the western consumer most gran reservas for a winery are still cheaper than most other countries’ non-reservas while some reservas are practically cheaper than water. Even the premium label, which is a step above gran reserva can cost under 20 dollars for some producers. Therefore, such a label is not always that indicative of the quality. It depends more on the producer and your palate. A more famous producer’s premium wine might cost 100 dollars and it’s made to try to compete internationally with the best wines, but they can also be too modern, oaky and over-extracted for some palates. Other cheaper premium or gran reservas are much more humble and accessible younger. There are also a ton of bargains that taste like 30-100 dollar wines elsewhere in the world but for much less. That’s why I often like the gran reserva wine better than the premium wine. Logically moving up from premium, there are some labeled “super-premium,” but there are no particular requirements to be called that. Much of it is just marketing.
Lastly, there are wines that producers self-label “icono” (iconic) wines. It’s not usually on the front of the label, but it will be in the website or label description. This is considered a step up over the premium label. It essentially means, this is what the winery considers absolutely their best wine, but the reasons for it could be numerous: the best plots and vines, the best lots of grapes and barrels, or the best oak aging. However, I find it strange that a winery will call their own wine an icon. That seems like something critics and consumers should do.
Anyway, icono and many premium wines tend to be too expensive for the average consumer in Chile and most are exported at much cheaper prices than in Chile for richer consumers who can afford them abroad. Therefore, if you’d like to explore the very top Chilean wines while visiting Chile, they are actually cheaper to buy in the US, Europe and China than in Chile. For example, the recent vintage of Sena can be had for less than 100 dollars in the US, but in Chile it costs around 160-210 dollars depending on the current exchange rate.
Vintage differences are more distinct in other countries like France than in Chile, so you also don’t have to know which vintage is better or worse and which is better to drink young or age. Chilean wines, even premium ones, don’t need much age if any to drink. As far as vintages, there are of course differences in the weather that affect the vintage style to a certain extent, but there is enough constant sunlight and wine-making techniques to keep the quality fairly even across vintages. Often the weather differences are more indicative of how much wine is produced than quality. Some vintages can be fresher and lighter than others as opposed to slightly darker and richer vintages, but I find much bigger differences in style depending on the producer rather than vintage.
Basically, the most important thing to know from the label is the variety and region. In addition to that, the style and quality also depends on the producer and price to a certain extent (see varieties, regions and wine tourism to know more). As a generalization, all the big name massive and established wineries (Concha y Toro, Errazuriz, Cousino-Macul, Carmen, Santa Rita, Casa Silva, San Pedro, Undurraga) tend to be more international in style with some Chilean characteristics while small independent producers (some labeled MOVI, an association of independent producers) don’t really use any of the typical labels of reserva, etc. and produce more terroir driven wines with less oak. Plus, all the old rich wineries have other labels, some of which are more independent in style or mass-produced bottom shelf wines.
There are a few other Chilean label idiosyncrasies. VIGNO signifies wineries that are a part of an association of old-vine Maule Carignan. Similarly, Almaule is a new association of rebranding the variety Pais in Maule. Finally, there are traditional Chilean wine types that may be on a label. You can learn more about them by following the link of each type: Chicha, Pipeño, Chacoli, Asoleado, Pajerete and Pintatani.
The main labels of the big producers also tend to be more traditional French like labels with a black and white picture of the estate while independent wines have more colorful, creative but sometimes cheesy labels.
