I think my wine drinking progression went something like Red Blush ($3bottle, or box wine)->White Wine->Merlot->Cabernet->Pinot Noir.
Not sure what I would recommend to new wine drinkers at this point, maybe dry Riesling. Lots of decent slightly sweet wines that are good chilled for the summer ;)
Riesling is probably as good a recommendation as any. If you expose a group of wine novices to lots of random varietals, Riesling tends to be the plurality favorite. (At least going by the data from the Cornell intro wines class, which has about 1500 students per year.)
Not sure what I would recommend to new wine drinkers at this point, maybe dry Riesling. Lots of decent slightly sweet wines that are good chilled for the summer ;)