Best Practice for Wine by the Glass Programs: An Investigation of the Interaction Between Storage Methods and Temperature

Wine by the glass programs are strong sources of income for restaurants and bars, and are also enjoyed by customers as it allows for the tasting of many wines over the course of a meal. Once a wine has been opened though, oxidation begins to occur which causes the deterioration of the aromas and flavors of the wine. Oxidation can cause a wine to become unfit for sale to a customer within days of opening the bottle. By storing the wine at cool temperatures or reducing the amount of oxygen that can interact with the wine, the process of oxidation can be diminished. In this study, the effectiveness of temperature control and bottle closure to diminish oxidation in an opened bottle of wine was observed. The storage temperatures of 72°F, 60°F, and 50°F were paired with the bottle closure methods of recorking, vacuum sealing, and inert gas preservation. This led to nine combinations of storage temperature and bottle closure which were used to preserve wine for sixteen days. In order to measure the effectiveness of the preservation methods at slowing oxidation, sensory analysis was performed. The preserved wines were compared to fresh wine in duo-trio testing, and results of the testing were analyzed using ANCOVA methods with a covariate of the taster’s years of wine industry experience. The effects of storage temperature and closure method were both found to be significant with no interaction effect between the two. The combination of storage temperature and closure method that was found to be the most effective at reducing the discernable signs of oxidation was vacuum closure at 50°F storage temperature.