Has Bordeaux Got the Bottle to Reclaim Market? New World Wines and Archaic Systems Pushed France Out of the Market. Now They're Fighting Back, Finds Tom Bruce Gardyne
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Summary
IN the cult film Sideways the tormented, wine-loving hero, Miles Raymond, reveals that the most treasured bottle in his cellar is a Cheval Blanc 1961 - a great year from one of the grandest of the Grands Crus. At that level, Bordeaux still reigns supreme. Despite prices puffed up by speculation and the annual scorings of the American wine guru, Robert Parker, demand for the top chateaux continues to outstrip supply.
The trouble is that below this pinnacle, at the base of the Bordeaux pyramid, it's a very different story. Among the mass of generic AOC wines that accounts for 90-per cent of Bordeaux production, the region's wine producers are having to fight for survival. Of the major European export markets, only Belgium held its own in 2004, while the value of shipments to the UK crashed by 32-per cent. In the US, where French wine suffered a consumer backlash because of the Iraq war, the fall was 52-per cent.See the full content of this document
Extract
Has Bordeaux Got the Bottle to Reclaim Market? New World Wines and Archaic Systems Pushed France Out of the Market. Now They're Fighting Back, Finds Tom Bruce Gardyne
The Brits still spend more on Bordeaux than any other nation, excluding the French, though market share is being eroded by ferocious competition, particularly from Australia.
"The UK is by far the most critical and most difficult market in the world, " says Jean-Francois Mau, a leading Bordeaux negociant who supplies wines f...See the full content of this document
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