• WINE’S CHINA SYNDROME

    par | Jan 13, 2017

    By ROBERT JOSEPH
    From Meininger’s WINE BUSINESS INTERNATIONAL News – January 13 2017

    Robert JosephWe are living at the tail end of the American century. 

    Whatever President-elect Trump might like to claim, the mantle is passing to China. 

    A century ago, the US’s population and greater wealth gave it two key advantages, which it used to influence the way citizens of other countries lived their lives – from production-line manufacturing to supermarket shopping, fast-food consumption, to advertising and popular culture. 

    It was not a French or British wine critic whose 100-point scale became the international default, for example.

    But the US is like an ageing monarch seeing its power slip.  Even if China’s economic growth stalls, America will, over the longer term, continue to lose ground. China’s influence is already palpable. Hollywood producers now think about how their movies will play in Pudong as well as Peoria, and Facebook freely admits that it wants to offer a retail service that’s as sophisticated as its Chinese rival WeChat.

    Of course the influencing process works both ways. Chinese diners will adopt Western cutlery before Americans and Britons switch to chopsticks, and there will be a greater readiness to learn English in China than the reverse. But just as British parents have watched their offspring adopt Halloween and the school prom, the Western wine industry will soon be learning some lessons from China. (suite…)

  • CHINESE OVERTAKE FRENCH AS WORLD’S TOP RED WINE DRINKERS

    par | Jan 30, 2014

    From WINE SEARCHER – AFP | 29-Jan-2014

    China tops world league of red wine drinkers dethroning France as the world’s largest consumer, according to a market survey issued by Vinexpo.  155 milion cases (12 bottles, 9 litres) i-e 1.86 billion bottles of red wine were consumed in China in 2013 – an increase of 136 % compared with 2008.  France’s total was 150 million cases, followed by Italy (141 million), the US (134 million) and Germany (112 million).  These figures show the ever-growing thirst in China for red wine, due to its perceived health benefits and to the highly symbolic importance of the color red.

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  • THE WORLD’S MOST-PLANTED VARIETIES: WINNERS AND LOSERS

    par | Jan 8, 2014

    By | WINE SEARCHER | Posted Tuesday, 07-Jan-2014

    A new database of grape plantings documents a rapidly changing wine world.
    Airen, grenache and rkatsiteli were the world’s most widely planted grape varieties 20 years ago, but mighty cabernet sauvignon and merlot have since knocked them from their top slots.
    That’s just one of the findings released by the University of Adelaide, Australia, which has published what they’re calling the     first database of the world’s wine grapes and regions. Compiled over the past year using statistics from more than 500 regions in 44 countries, with information on 1,271 varieties, the database covers 99% of global wine production, its authors claim.

    Former front-runner airen « was a pretty forgettable grape in Spain that went out of popularity, » Professor Kym Anderson told Wine-Searcher. «  People just ripped it out, especially when there were subsidies for vine pull, and replaced them, mostly with reds. »  While airen remains the most-planted grape variety in Spain, covering nearly a quarter of the country’s vineyards in 2010, its share has fallen by 8% — nearly 140,000 hectares — in the last decade. (suite…)

  • CLICK AND CLINK: AMAZON SELLING WINE IN CHINA

    par | Oct 30, 2013

    By YU WEI — China Daily USA in San Francisco — 2013-10-30 07:21

    After launching its first shipment of directly imported US wines into China, Amazon China, Amazon.com’s branch there, said the wines have received a very good response in the country, especially in Shanghai. “The direct-sales model gives our wines quality assurance and more cost-effectiveness,” said Niu Yinghua, vice-president of Amazon China. “Consumers can easily have fine wines from thousands of miles away by just clicking Amazon.cn.”

    According to Amazon China, sales of its wines in Shanghai account for nearly half of its total sales, making Shanghai the hottest selling city in China.

    Barbara Insel, president of Stonebridge Research Group, a leading research firm for the wine industry, said the news from Amazon China is good news for all California wines, as it shows that there is interest in and demand for fine wines from California’s family producers. (suite…)

  • FRENCH WINEMAKERS SEEK ELUSIVE CHINESE BLENDS

    par | Oct 25, 2013

    AFP-JIJI — PENGLAI, CHINA — Oct 20, 2013

    The world’s fine winemakers have exacting standards for soil, climate and cultivation to produce the perfect grape. And they are looking to re-create that unlikely blend in China, which is better known for cheap mass production. The potential harvest will be more drinkers in the world’s most populous country, where wine consumption more than doubled in the four years to 2011 and is set to rise another 40% by 2016 (*).

    France’s Domaines Barons de Rothschild (DBR), maker of the renowned Château Lafite red wines, is planting roots in China with an initial 15 hectares in Penglai.

    The estate is situated on a hilly green peninsula dotted with vineyards on the east coast of Shandong province with a century-long history of winemaking.

    DBR is associated with CITIC, the first Chinese State Investment Bank.

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