Did you know that for the first time ever in history British wine drinkers, those notorious Francophiles, are buying more American Wine than the French!! The implications of this are quite staggering when you think about it. What this really means is that California wine (95% of US exports) outsold French wine in the UK for the first time in recorded history. Commentators chalk this up to "television advertising, big brands and cheap rosé" a claim that makes me wonder as I'm not entirely sure what TV and cheap rosé have to do with it. Rather, I think we've probably been aided more by the falling strength of the dollar and perhaps France's own difficulties in the wine department. Speaking of which, I also heard that, Italy is poised to become the number one producer of wine, knocking France out of a position it has held for the last decade. Of course, judging success by purely the volume of wine produced is a tricky business as the French can tell you. But we have no reason to believe that this development results purely from growth in Italy's lowest quality wines. In fact, if statistics are to be believed, the number of Italian wines that receive some level of certified quality designation continues to rise at a greater rate than production. Which means Italy is not only making more wine, it's making more higher quality wine than ever. Wondering what your thoughts are on Italian Wine available here in the U.S. and what is available in Italy and Europe.... My experience tells me that the majority of the quality wine stays in the country, as is the case in South America, according to many clients of ours visitiing those countries. |
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