Afternoon Brief, June 17th

Winery Owners, Guests Flee as Point Fire Erupts in Sonoma County Wine Region: Guests enjoying an afternoon of wine tasting at Capo Creek Winery on West Dry Creek Road were forced to flee after the wind-driven Point Fire broke out Sunday afternoon in the heart of one of Sonoma County’s most iconic wine regions...

Afternoon Brief, May 22nd

O’Neill Vintners & Distillers Acquires Ram’s Gate Winery and Creates New Luxury Wine Division: O’Neill Vintners & Distillers Founder and CEO Jeff O’Neill has been a co-owner of the brand since 2011, and now takes complete ownership of the brand and property, creating a new luxury wine division...

By Roberto Pavesi, Fermentis Sales Manager for South Europe Just 15 years ago, Prosecco was almost entirely sold in Italy. Now, it is the world’s best-selling sparkling wine, with 600 million bottles produced in 2020. This phenomenon has evidently to do with a strong wine identity and a rich history, but also to the producers determination that built Prosecco into a billion-dollar brand. Let's see how they worked and what significant challenges they will face in the decade ahead. Roberto Pavesi A SIMPLE STYLE BUT A SHARP STRATEGY The success of Prosecco is global and it has lifted dozens of families from an economic crisis and a lack of outlets for the wine produced. But tensions exist on the exhaustion of the land linked to monoculture, and on the position to be adopted: should Prosecco remain a simple wine or become “the new champagne,” as the English already say? The history of Prosecco resembles a fairy tale. In the Treviso countryside, we always used to drink

Afternoon Brief, May 22nd

East Coast Wineries Assessing Losses After Late Frost Turns May Morning into a ‘Bad Dream’: Last week provided another reminder of the risks of farming overall and growing grapevines specifically...

Afternoon Brief, April 28th

Traditional Method and Charmat Do Not Produce Different Sparkling Wines: Researchers from the University of Rio Grande in Brazil claim that secondary fermentation produces the same wines, irrespective of whether they are produced using the traditional method, in bottles, or in closed tanks, using the Charmat technique...

The global bulk wine market continued to be slow through March into early April, as the ongoing economic uncertainty around the world compounds a longer-term structural weakness specific to the wine industry – namely, the multi-year slide in wine sales in key markets: according to International Wine & Spirits Research, Brazil is currently the only country in the top 20 wine markets that is drinking more wine now than it did in 2017.  How the industry goes about arresting this consumption drift is a well-worn topic. It is a tough ask: younger demographics can choose from a far larger spectrum of alcoholic beverages than their parents, while alcohol abstention – or at least a preference for lower alcohol options – is far higher among these cohorts. Hence the new ‘World of Zero’ area at ProWein, and we have seen an uptick in enquiries into lower-alcohol wines – both in recognition of this consumer trend and because taxes on such wines can be lo

The Southern Hemisphere harvests have passed their midway point and Argentina (-40%), Chile (-15-30%) and Australia (-30-40%) are all expected to produce tonnages some way short of their respective averages this year. South Africa’s crop, too, is projected to be on the lighter side, while Cyclone Gabrielle’s impact on the Gisborne and Hawke’s Bay growing regions of New Zealand is still being assessed.  The prospect of shorter harvests has not stimulated a great deal of extra interest from international buyers of bulk and, like their counterparts in the Northern Hemisphere, the bulk wine markets are slow, especially on reds. (Domestic business is active, especially in Argentina, Chile and South Africa, pushing up the price of generic red and white wines.) Consumer confidence in the UK and parts of the Eurozone is patchy, and grocery price inflation high, reducing European demand for Southern Hemisphere bulk wines and – of course – Europe’s own. S

Afternoon Brief, March 7th

French Politicians Wining on the Job: News publications across France went to town last week over reports of drunken and booze-based antics in the country's National Assembly...