Champagne production to be cut by 32%

[Peter Creasey]

Apologies if this has already been discussed!

WSJ reports that Champagne growers have agreed to reduce production by 32% this year, which will result in dramatically lower grape picking and wine making. The overall wine production may be down as much as 44%, the article says.

The slump in sales has exposed a fault line in the industry. Until now, growers of premium grapes have been able to charge top euro for their harvests, and the houses paid. The big houses have demanded cuts in industry wine production, which would reduce the sales of the independent grape growers to the same houses. The growers had expanded production to satisfy the lofty sales production targets for the big houses. At the same time, the government is continuing its initiative to expand the land area from which "Champagne" grapes may be picked.

Global Champagne sales are expected to plunge to as low as 260 million bottles this year from a high of 339 million bottles in 2007. Sales dipped in 2008 as the recession set in, to 322 million bottles, for the first time since 2000.

As a result, producers such as LVMH Mot Hennessy Louis Vuitton -- the world's biggest Champagne maker -- have been lobbying to lower global volumes of Champagne rather than having to empty their full cellars of unsold bottles at bargain prices. The Champagne industry's governing body, the Comit Interprofessionnel du Vin de Champagne, estimates there are more than 1.2 billion spare bottles sitting in warehouses.

But the move is controversial. The French government as recently as last year had planned to expand the farmable land in Champagne -- the only region in the world where the name can be used -- because demand was expected to grow, especially from consumers in the U.S. and U.K.

Independent growers in the Champagne region supply 90% of the fruit needed for bottlers. The harvest is set to begin in the next two weeks.

Now, hundreds of Champagne farmers in the region are going to bear the brunt of the forced cut in supply.
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To view the whole article --> http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125192460913580955.html

. . . . . . Pete

 

[Rahsaan]

originally posted by Peter Creasey:
Champagne production to be cut by 32%
Apologies if this has already been discussed!

Not really very much:

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