The last time I saw Miles Mossop was at the SAA wine list awards in October and so bumping into him at the penthouse party of Karl Lambour on Saturday night, reminded me that airlines are perfect customers for wine producers. They pay on time and not on final demand, like many restaurateurs. And with Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner made from carbon fibre now whispering its way among the clouds, one of the less obvious advantages are that cabin pressures will be higher (1800m altitude equivalent instead of 2400m) and more fresh air provides an environment closer to a terrestrial tasting room. And what a view!

Airlines have a seemingly unquenchable thirst and as Lars Maack, owner of Buitenverwachting can confirm, you never know who will drink your product. Phoned by a first class passenger on Lufthansa impressed with the 2005 vintage Bordeaux-style Christine that was served, when told it was out of stock, the frequent flyer offered to buy the farm. With cash, not air miles.

So no wonder SA Airways was offered a tsunami of over 1000 brands by 167 producers for their annual wine selection process. For SAA serves only local with the exception of French fizz, served at the pointy end of the plane. Although with méthode cap classique quality increasing all the time, how long before that final bastion of cultural cringe, crumbles?

In premium class, the wine list is more diverse than many terrestrial restaurants with 48 brands rotated four at as time on a monthly basis, while in economy eight different whites and six reds are available in 187ml bottles from producers you’ve likely never heard of.

Like Driehoek in the Cederberg, whose Sauvignon Blanc 2011 won the trophy for best white. Best red was a 2009 Plaisir de Merle Cabernet which is two years older than the Bellingham Sauvignon Blanc, which dates back to 2007.

A brave decision this, by SAA’s impressively diverse panel of judges, who ignore the common wisdom that SA Sauvignon is best drunk in the year of the vintage. The bottle aged Bellingham was no fluke as Domaine des Dieux (another producer new to me) and Uva Mira will both offer 2009 vintage Sauvignon Blanc in the skies next year. Long after supermarkets have removed them from their shelves as being past their notional sell-by date.

Airline wine sales are big business and a welcome outlet for SA producers with exports down 25% so far this year or 50 million litres. SAA spend R30 million a year in the local cellar and international carriers are also keen. Tokara sold 31 000 bottles of their zingy Sauvignon Blanc to British Airways in December 2010 and 6000 bottles of their toothsome Director’s Reserve red to Lufthansa – wine that is showcased by those airlines on hundreds of flights around the world. Can there be a better marketing vehicle with passengers captive for the twelve hours of a flight to Europe? And with Reuben Riffel creating African signature dishes in the galley, the opportunities for creative wine and food matching are endless.

The fact that Tokara moves as much wine through its tasting room by value as it sells to the rest of the country is surely not unrelated to its presence on board the wide body jets that bring tourists to SA. And when a producer like Creation in the Hemel en Aarde Valley does 40% of its turnover through the cellar door in spite of being at the end of one of the worst dirt roads in the Cape, a listing on the airline is more bad news for the road but glad tidings for the bottom line.

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