My landlord and new friend, Robin, works for M.A. Silva Corks. She let me run around with her this morning.
My education started today.
M.A. Silva Corks is a relatively new company. But, Harlan is one of Robin's clients (had to throw that in there). They are dedicated to extremely high-quality, high-standard cork production.
So many things I never think about when I pop those corks. Obvious and not so obvious. Like the fact that corks are coated with paraffin wax or silicon. Without one these coatings you would not be able to pull the cork out.
Other notable things to consider.
Density of the cork is tested. That's to make sure the cork doesn't push into the bottle. Like when you are pressing your corkscrew into it.
Branding, with food-grade ink or fire-branding the logo. Food-grade. The corks are treated like a food product since they are touching the wine.
Adolfo, the quality supervisor, showed me around. Any corks we touched did not go back in those bins.
Length of cork in milimeters. That Caymus Special Selection is a big 60mm. That's unusual. That's expensive. Costs seem to run from 20 cents or so up to and probably over $2 per cork.
That can probably add up quickly on a 100,000 case winery.
There is an in-house artist to help with all the different winery logos, fonts, coloring, etc. Rombauer seems to be a huge client as well as Rodney Strong.
M.A. Silva also puts their own little brand on the cork so it can be tracked back if a winery is using multiple cork suppliers. Don't want to be blamed for another producer's faults.
They are a boutique supplier. Others are bigger but they are all about the quality.
