With the spiral of financial pressures currently bearing down on the trade, it’s no surprise that some companies are becoming more creative when it comes to sourcing grapes.
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With the upmarket, wine-focused Argentinian Gaucho Group and its offshoot Cau under administration, and the on-trade landscape littered with recent casualties including Prezzo, Carluccio’s, Jamie’s Italian and Byron Burger (to name just a few), it’s looking tough out there in the restaurant world.
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As Kermit the Frog famously noted in song, it’s not easy being green. For the wine trade the sentiment translates into the problem of how to be environmentally friendly in a business that involves moving vast quantities of product around the globe. In the UK off-trade, where the New World has the upper hand, for example, around 60% of all the wine consumed comes from the deep-sea shipping sources of Australia, the US, Chile, South Africa, Argentina and New Zealand.
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Borough Wines is backing refillable technology for its green credentials as well as its contribution to quality. Lisa Riley reports on a system that’s gaining new ground
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Celebrated by critics but crippled by drought and low returns, South Africa rarely has an easy ride.
Few in the trade could have missed the ongoing challenges facing South Africa’s wine producers as the worst drought in 100 years continues to afflict the Cape. With the 2018 crop predicted to be down by 15% after two years of water shortage that almost saw Cape Town meet “day zero” and turn off its domestic supply, the harvest has been described by Bibendum’s South Africa buyer, Paul Meihuizen, as “the most challenging I have ever known”.
With so much attention to detail going into what’s inside the bottle, marketing and packaging innovation can sometimes be seen as an afterthought in the wine industry. But as new and more inventive technologies appear on the horizon, companies are now showing that smart packaging can be a vital tool in the ongoing battle of engaging consumers and decoding shopping habits.
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Angela Mount investigates how distributors and producers are shaping up to meet buyer demands as routes to market narrow.
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Countries such as Greece, Turkey, Hungary and Romania are no longer considered off-piste when it comes to winemaking. Justin Keay looks at what’s on offer
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With a winemaking culture stretching back multiple millennia, Georgia claims to be the birthplace of wine.
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Jo Gilbert connects with the businesses aiming to bring the convenience, value and focus of online shopping to bricks-and-mortar stores
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The Climate Change Leadership Porto Summit gave compelling reasons for the drinks trade to take a lead on tackling global warming, as Andrew Catchpole reports.
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Some of the most enjoyable games of the football World Cup so far have been match-ups featuring lesser-known nations – countries that you know play good football but are not up there with the likes of Brazil, Spain and Germany in the pantheon of soccer greatness.
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Far from suffering from its mass appeal, Argentina’s flagship grape is heading for the next level. Andrew Catchpole reports
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For Cava connoisseurs, Prosecco and Champagne can’t compete when it comes to quality and value for money. Jo Gilbert looks at how businesses are converting
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Computer vision has been used for years for facial recognition software and this this type of technology will become instrumental in decoding drinking trends, says Jo Gilbert.
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Vodka may have been eclipsed in recent years by the gin boom. But Britain’s bartenders are rediscovering its charms.
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Mousiness is on the rise, and there’s confusion over the problem.
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Own-label is on the rise, adding the lion’s share of value growth to the wine category in the UK. Jo Gilbert reports
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In our latest poll, Harpers gave independent merchants a chance to identify those wines that always get consumers coming back for more. We looked at how these bottles stacked up
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Alison Jane Reid asks if wine is the next culinary frontier to undergo a squeaky green, clean, organic and biodynamic makeover
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