Success Quote by Robert Mondavi

Moderation, in Robert Mondavi's mouth, isn’t a meek moral virtue; it’s a business strategy dressed as common sense. As the winemaker who helped turn California wine into a global lifestyle product, Mondavi understood that alcohol is always selling two things at once: pleasure and permission. “This is what I think is very essential” sets up a sermon-like cadence, but the sermon is calibrated. He’s not preaching abstinence or indulgence. He’s carving out a socially acceptable middle where wine can be framed as civilized, even health-adjacent, rather than risky or reckless.

The subtext is regulatory as much as it is personal. Mid-to-late 20th-century America oscillated between temperance instincts and postwar consumer freedom; wine producers had to thread that needle, especially as public health messaging about drinking grew louder. “Moderation can be good for you” doesn’t argue with critics so much as it preempts them. It borrows the language of wellness and restraint, repositioning wine from vice to habit, from “drinking” to “dining.” It’s also a quiet attempt to normalize daily consumption without naming it.

What makes the line work is its soft authority. “I think” feigns humility, yet it lands like guidance from an elder statesman of taste. The vagueness is the point: moderation is elastic enough to let listeners hear what they want - one glass, two, a generous pour. Mondavi isn’t just selling Cabernet; he’s selling the idea that responsibility and pleasure can share the same glass.