On Wine Report

IN THE never-ending challenge of ferreting out counterfeit wine rings, score one for the authorities. A Russian man has been fined and jailed for his part in selling counterfeit Domaine de la Romanée-Conti and Domaine Leroy. In May, Aleksandr Iugov appeared in court in Dijon and was sentenced to four... Read More

A WORD of advice to anyone seeking to register a product with a name bearing the slightest similarity to “Champagne”: think twice. Champagne producers take that very seriously. Most recently, Moet Hennessy, citing its high-end Dom Perignon brand, moved to block a Florida man from registering “Dog Perignon”. Fort Myers-based... Read More

THERE’S BEEN a lot of innocent wine destroyed in France of late as tensions have reached a boiling point over cheap Spanish imports.  Over the last year militant winemaker group CAV – or CRAV as it is sometimes known – has attacked lorries carrying Spanish wines and set fire to... Read More

MOTHER NATURE has been particularly cruel this year as spring storms and frosts have caused devastating damage to much of France’s wine regions as well as several other countries including Germany, Italy and England. Champagne vineyard managers were among the first to raise the alarm over frost but it was... Read More

For better or for worse, blue seems to have become a trend in wine production.  First there was Gik, the blue wine from Spain made by mixing red and white wines together along with a blue plant-based dye.  After being told it could not label its product as “wine” the... Read More

For a bunch of thieves they certainly have good taste.  In what’s being considered one of the biggest “wine and cheese busts” in recent Italian history, a group of ten people have been arrested by police for stealing more than $25O,OOO in fine wines and gourmet cheeses.  They were apprehended... Read More

PROSECCO IS STAYING ahead of the growing issue of pesticide use in vineyards. Grape growers for the Prosecco DOC are set to be prohibited from using three chemical sprays, including one that was only recently judged safe by the European Union’s watchdog. Stefano Zanette, President of the Prosecco DOC council,... Read More

IF YOU’VE EVER poured a bottle of wine you’ve likely experienced the dreaded bottle drip: wine (almost always red) dripping from the bottle neck onto a tablecloth as you pour it.  Leave it to a scientist to come up with a solution! Daniel Perlman, a researcher at Brandeis University in... Read More

BUBBLY HAD ANOTHER sparkling year in 2O16. Sales of Champagne last year hit their second-highest level in value terms, although currency fluctuations related to Brexit hampered the year for the segment’s biggest market. Figures from the Comité Interprofessionnel du Vin de Champagne show sales of Champagne last year totaled $5.O6... Read More

HOW MANY stressed-out stinkbugs does it take to spoil a batch of wine? While one might logically assume that one stinkbug would be one too many, it’s actually more than three per grape cluster, new research says. Stinkbugs are a pest among vintners because of the bugs’ taste for wine... Read More