The philosophy of the Long Island Merlot Alliance starts with “terroir” which is simply defined as “the place” where grapes are grown and wines are produced. Without an ideal place to grow wines, we cannot produce wines of excellence. So firstly, the members of the Long Island Merlot Alliance believe that this place (Long Island) is one of the few in the world that provides the best opportunity for growing and producing great wines substantially comprised of the merlot grape. As is true of great winemaking throughout the world, such as the Bordeaux region of France, the final blend in each vintage is determined by the growing conditions of that vintage. Therefore, since our goal is to produce the best possible wine from every vintage, we often blend our Merlot as we see fit, with small additions of cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc and sometimes malbec and petit verdot. Often, small amounts of these varieties can create more complex and interesting wines. Clearly though, the major component in any red blend, in most vintages, will be Merlot.

It is our belief that in order to achieve our quality goals it is imperative that we cooperate in an effort to constantly ‘raise the bar’ both in the vineyard and in the winery. So secondly, the members of the Long Island Merlot Alliance believe that in order to create a generation of winemaking acumen, the individual talents of the group raise the level of winemaking for our members, and ultimately benefit the region as a whole. We believe that this cooperative effort is essential in order to demonstrate to the wine world our commitment to the advancement of quality Merlot wine on Long Island.

Thirdly, the members of the Long Island Merlot Alliance believe that focusing our attention on the production of excellent Merlot wine does not compromise our ability to produce excellent wines from other varieties. In fact, we believe this cooperative effort will ultimately lead to higher levels of quality in all varieties of wine that we produce.