Ross Brown, Executive Director, was presented with the latest Wine Intelligence 10 for 10 Business Award, in Melbourne, Australia, during the Wine Industry Outlook Conference yesterday.

Mr. Brown (pictured above with Lulie Halstead, Wine Intelligence’s CEO and 10 for 10 Business Award Judge Stephen Strachan, Director of Gaetjens Langley) is the 9th recipient of the award.

The award itself is an original piece of art conceived by Polish artist Anna Kus Park, who has created 10 distinctive paintings, one for each award winner.

Click here to read the full press release

Nordic countries represent main European opportunities for sales and profit growth

Wine businesses searching for growth opportunities in Europe should be thinking primarily about Finland, Norway and Sweden for the next few years, according to a new report from Wine Intelligence, published this week.

Almost 9 in 10 adults drink wine, representing around 13 million adults across the 3 countries, and between a 1/3 and 1/2 of these claim to have a “strong interest” in the category, according to the Nordics Landscapes report. The combined market for wine last year was approximately 33 million cases, all of it imported, putting the Nordics as a bloc ahead of Japan in the league table of wine drinking.

While the wine markets in the 3 countries share many characteristics, there are marked differences between wine consumer behaviour in Finland, Norway and Sweden, according to the report. Beer remains the most popular beverage in Finland and Norway, while wine is top dog in Sweden. Within the wine category, nearly 6 in 10 Swedes say they drink rosé wine, compared to just a third in Finland.

One of the main shared traits between markets is the adherence to a system of state-controlled retail monopolies, which prevents discounting and other price based promotions, and encourages involvement and education in the category through well trained staff and well-maintained merchandising.

Maria Troein, Nordics Landscapes project manager at Wine Intelligence, said: “I think it’s fair to regard Sweden, Norway and Finland as three rare good news stories in a European wine market that has been suffering for several years as a result of tax increases and economic uncertainties.”

She added: “The monopoly retail system can take some getting used to, and barriers to entry can be high. However the ultimate consumer is highly involved, willing to pay for quality, and quite brand oriented, which are characteristics that are increasingly tough to find elsewhere in Europe right now.”

The Nordics Landscapes report is published by Wine Intelligence and available from the Wine Intelligence Reports Shop: GBP 2,500 / USD 4,000 / EUR 3,200 / AUD 4,000 or 5 Report Credits.

Click here to download this press release

Report details:

Further details about the report can be found here.

Requests for purchase should be directed to reports-shop@wineintelligence.com

How the data was collected:

Principal data sources for these reports were Wine Intelligence’s Vinitrac® surveys in each of the three markets in January 2012, plus data from Wine Intelligence market calibration studies, the IWSR and various government statistical bodies. For full details on the methodologies used in Wine Intelligence research, please contact stefanie@wineintelligence.com

About Wine Intelligence Ltd:

Wine Intelligence is the leading research-led strategy consultancy serving the global wine industry. It conducts client-specific research projects to aid companies to gain greater insights into wine markets and wine consumers, and helps business leaders develop business strategy and marketing plans. The company also assists businesses in developing new brands, and in formulating and communicating marketing messages within the industry.

Contacts:

Richard Halstead, Wine Intelligence Ltd., +44 (0) 20 7378 1277 or richard@wineintelligence.com

Stefanie Forster, Wine Intelligence Ltd., +44 (0) 20 7378 1277 or stefanie@wineintelligence.com

Pour tout complément d’information sur ce sujet, veuillez contacter Jean-Philippe Perrouty (Directeur, Wine Intelligence France) par email jean-philippe@wineintelligence.com

Para recibir más información en castellano, pónganse en contacto con Natasha Rastegar: natasha@wineintelligence.com

For more information in Chinese, please contact Rui Su: rui@wineintelligence.com

The long term health of the Chinese wine market rests on its ability to engage more consumers who buy wines for social or domestic use rather than for a business obligation, according to new research published by Wine Intelligence today.

China Portraits is the first published study that establishes a consumer segmentation of Chinese wine drinkers, and is the culmination of 2 years of quantitative and qualitative research by Wine Intelligence in the Chinese market.

The segmentation shows that the Chinese market remains highly reliant on a segment of wine consumers who are buying very expensive wines as part of a business obligation. These “Prestige-seeking Traditionalists” make up 22% of the wine drinking population but over 40% of spend. These individuals are typically purchasing top end Bordeaux and Burgundy for business dinners and gifts, but are unlikely to venture beyond prestige wines to buy more everyday brands for their own consumption.

By contrast, the two segments of consumers who drink wine for pleasure – middle aged couples and younger social drinkers – account for nearly half of the current wine drinking population but only a third of sales by value. These two segments, dubbed “Social Newbies” and “Casual-at-Homers” in the China wine consumer segmentation, tend to dominate wine sales in more mature markets.

Maria Troein, Wine Intelligence Country Manager for China and the report’s author, said the Chinese wine market was still at an early stage of development, and it would take a number of years before the wine culture of mature consumption markets such as the USA and northern Europe took hold.

“I think the China Portraits segmentation has really brought home the fact that wine as an everyday social drink is still a relatively small part of this market.”

She added: “Nonetheless, there are encouraging signs that there are sections of the market who find wine interesting and appealing for reasons that go beyond social prestige. As the market evolves, the big question for us will be to see whether this remains a niche group of enthusiasts, or whether we begin to see a larger segment of consumers picking up a bottle of wine as a natural, everyday choice.”

China Portraits is published by Wine Intelligence and available from the Wine Intelligence Reports Shop, priced at GBP 2500 / USD 4000 / EUR 3200 / AUD 4000 or 5 Report Credits.

Click here to download this press release

Report details: Further details about the report can be found here.

Requests for purchase should be directed to reports-shop@wineintelligence.com

How the data was collected:

Quantitative: Collected in July 2011, November 2011 and May 2012 via Wine Intelligence’s Vinitrac® online survey with 3,020 Chinese upper middle class drinkers of imported wine in Beijing and Shanghai, Guangzhou, Wuhan, Chengdu and Shenyang.
Qualitative: Collected primarily through a programme of 40 face-to-face in-depth interviews with Chinese consumers of imported wine, conducted between April and May 2012 in Beijing and Shanghai.

Contacts:

Richard Halstead, Wine Intelligence Ltd., +44 (0) 20 7378 1277 or richard@wineintelligence.com

Stefanie Forster, Wine Intelligence Ltd., +44 (0) 20 7378 1277 or stefanie@wineintelligence.com

Pour tout complément d’information sur ce sujet, veuillez contacter Jean-Philippe Perrouty (Directeur, Wine Intelligence France) par email jean-philippe@wineintelligence.com

Para recibir más información en castellano, pónganse en contacto con Natasha Rastegar: natasha@wineintelligence.com

For more information in Chinese, please contact Jenny Li: jenny@wineintelligence.com

Consumers in the UK are drinking less wine and continuing to shun the on-trade, according to new research published today by Wine Intelligence.

(more…)

UK wine consumers are surprisingly adventurous in their choices of wine packaging, which could eventually mean the traditional 75cl bottle may lose its stranglehold on the market.

(more…)