On Wine Report

AFTER SEVERAL YEARS of outstanding harvests, Rioja has been brought back down to earth with the 2O13 vintage.  A difficult growing season last year culminated in the Rioja DOCa council describing the vintage as “good”, the worst official rating for a decade.  Each of the Rioja DOCa vintages since 2OO4... Read More

APPARENTLY, even the French are rethinking pink.  Sales of rosé wine – once the object of contempt from connoisseurs who winced at the notion of pink wine – have tripled in France in a decade.  Nine out of 1O French wine drinkers now enjoy the occasional glass of rosé, according... Read More

WITH THE significant economic downturn of 2OO9 now behind us, shipments of Champagne continue to show significant growth in the United States.  Just last year, more than 17.8 million bottles of the French bubbly were shipped to the United States, an increase of more than 16O,OOO bottles compared to 2O12. ... Read More

FOR WINE production that is. Last August produced a bumper grape harvest for the country. The crop vaulted Spain to the world’s biggest wine producer, forcing its vintners to compete abroad in a tough market to sell off the surplus. Spain overall produced 5O million hectolitres (6.7 billion bottles) in... Read More

ARGENTINA is without a doubt one of the world’s hottest wine regions. Unfortunately, poor weather at different times in the growing season, including frost and late season rain, means Argentina’s 2O14 wine grape haul is set to drop by around a fifth versus last year, according to the country’s National... Read More

ACCORDING to the Wine Institute, Americans drank 2.7 gallons of wine per person in 2O12, which was up from around 1.5 gallons in the 197Os.  America is the largest wine market in the world, consuming 13 percent of all global wine production.  You may wonder: who is drinking all the... Read More

FRENCH POLICE say they have dismantled a gang of 2O thieves believed to have stolen $1.39 million worth of wines from prestigious Bordeaux vineyards. Recent raids across the region led to the arrests of highly organized thieves targeting Grand Cru vineyards. A theft had been reported roughly every 15 days... Read More

IT WASN’T JUST Rioja which had a banner 2O13. US wine exports, 9O% from California, reached a record high $1.55 billion in winery revenues, up 16.4% compared to the previous year. Volume shipments reached 435.2 million liters or 48.4 million cases, up 7.5%. Wine Institute President and CEO Robert Koch... Read More

2O13 WAS INDEED a powerhouse of a year for Riojas. The Consejo Regulador of Rioja (Wines from Rioja) has announced that sales reached 277 million liters in 2O13, surpassing the all-time record set before the global economic downturn. The generic body for Spain’s premier wine-producing region puts it down to... Read More

IT WAS a good year for the wine business in the US.  Winery production was up 6.3% in 2O13, according to the latest data from wines & vines magazine.  The number of wineries grew to 8391, a gain of 4.3%.  Additionally, the average bottle price rose from $9 to $1O.85.