Francis Coppola Diamond Collection Merlot Red Wine, California, 750 mL

By August 12, 2026, 36 shoppers had rated this Merlot. Their scores average 4.83 out of five. What they were rating deserves a short explanation, because Merlot has a particular job in red wine. Our grape research describes a grape that works two ways: bottled on its own it makes a complete wine, and blended into Cabernet Sauvignon it can soften the result. It generally ripens earlier than Cabernet, and the wines often come out rounder. When regional guides describe the category, they talk about plum and other red and dark fruit, with tannin that sits more gently than Cabernet's in many examples. This wine is sold under Merlot's own name, not as the softening part of a Cabernet blend.

In the September 2026 checks, it ran $15.99 to $22.99 at the stores we price. It names California as its origin, an origin our research has verified, and it belongs to the brand's Diamond Collection. The one fact we have verified from the producer concerns its home estate: Francis Ford Coppola Winery's own history says the Coppola family purchased its Geyserville, California property, formerly Chateau Souverain, in 2006.

The producer's page for this exact wine adds a critic score and the winemaking behind it: a Wine Enthusiast rating of 92 points for the 2022 vintage, and portions of the blend aged up to 12 months in French and American oak. The producer's tasting profile lists cherry, raspberry and vanilla in the aroma with caramel, mocha and ripe red fruit in the glass, and the winemaker credits a warm summer after a cold, dry start for concentrating the fruit. Alcohol content is 14.5 percent.

Our call: this one suits the Merlot buyer who wants a well-tested shopper rating and a critic's second opinion behind it; the shopper average runs above the middle of the rated wines we cover, one of the larger pools we track, and the producer's own page cites a 92-point Wine Enthusiast score for the 2022 vintage. Pass if you want an origin named more narrowly than California at large; the evidence available to us does not narrow it further.

The Grocery Store Wine Desk · written Sep 16, 2026 from our research file for this wine. Numbers reflect our latest checks.