Sales of budget "British" wines have soared more than 50% in value over the past year following price hikes at the low end of the import wine market.
Unlike English wine, British wine is made from imported grape juice rather than home-grown grapes. However, it is fermented and bottled in Britain and, as such, has not been hit as hard by currency fluctuations as traditional imported wines have.
This, coupled with the industrial scale on which it is made, means it can retail for as little as £2.99 a bottle or two-for-£5 undercutting the foreign wines that used to dominate the lower end of the price spectrum.
Although, when combined with sales of low alcohol wine, British still only accounts for 1.6% of the off-trade market, value sales have rocketed 53% in the off-trade over the past year to £23m, [Nielsen 52w/e 14 May], while volumes have jumped 39%.
CWF, which produces British wine brand Silver Bay Point, said promotional activity had helped push the brand's volume sales up 657% year-on-year to take a 33% share of the off-trade British wine market [Nielsen 52w/e 16 April 2011]. "The three-for-£10 mechanic on traditional imported wines from Australia and Chile is drying up because of the duty escalation and very few categories can offer the two-for-£5 mechanic we can," said group marketing controller Vicky Hall.
With few imported wines available for £3 or less, retailers risked losing the price-sensitive wine consumers to other drink categories, said Paul Shelton, category insights manager at importer PLB. "The introduction of British-made wine has directly substituted the sub-£3 wine category with what appears to the consumer as a generic new world wine," he said.
However, Julia Trustram Eve, marketing manager for English Wine Producers, warned that some consumers were not clear about what they were buying.
"I have seen instances where a consumer wanting to be patriotic has picked up British wine but didn't understand the difference between it and English and was disappointed. This is something we have to continue to address."
Unlike English wine, British wine is made from imported grape juice rather than home-grown grapes. However, it is fermented and bottled in Britain and, as such, has not been hit as hard by currency fluctuations as traditional imported wines have.
This, coupled with the industrial scale on which it is made, means it can retail for as little as £2.99 a bottle or two-for-£5 undercutting the foreign wines that used to dominate the lower end of the price spectrum.
Although, when combined with sales of low alcohol wine, British still only accounts for 1.6% of the off-trade market, value sales have rocketed 53% in the off-trade over the past year to £23m, [Nielsen 52w/e 14 May], while volumes have jumped 39%.
CWF, which produces British wine brand Silver Bay Point, said promotional activity had helped push the brand's volume sales up 657% year-on-year to take a 33% share of the off-trade British wine market [Nielsen 52w/e 16 April 2011]. "The three-for-£10 mechanic on traditional imported wines from Australia and Chile is drying up because of the duty escalation and very few categories can offer the two-for-£5 mechanic we can," said group marketing controller Vicky Hall.
With few imported wines available for £3 or less, retailers risked losing the price-sensitive wine consumers to other drink categories, said Paul Shelton, category insights manager at importer PLB. "The introduction of British-made wine has directly substituted the sub-£3 wine category with what appears to the consumer as a generic new world wine," he said.
However, Julia Trustram Eve, marketing manager for English Wine Producers, warned that some consumers were not clear about what they were buying.
"I have seen instances where a consumer wanting to be patriotic has picked up British wine but didn't understand the difference between it and English and was disappointed. This is something we have to continue to address."
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