All the wine world’s a stage and China keeps getting bigger roles. Some press coverage of that drama. By J. Boyce

Australia has just seen its highest export sales in a decade, reaching 2.1 billion dollars in 2015, and China played a strong role in that rise, reports ABC here:

[Wine Australia] chief executive Andreas Clark said while the United States remained Australia’s largest market, exports to China experienced the greatest growth.

“China was up 66 per cent, for a total value of $370 million of exports,” he said.

“Hong Kong was up 22 per cent, up to $172 million.

ABC also reported that Anne Ruston, Assistant Agriculture Minister, stated the growth came before passing of the recent China-Australia free trade agreement:

“The fact that Australia’s strongest export growth was recorded in to China, and the new ChAFTA effects are not yet reflective in Wine Australia’s figures really does indicate that we are in the midst of yet another boost in market optimism,” she said in a statement.

“Under ChAFTA, the tariff on bulk has already reduced from 20 per cent to 12 per cent, and the tariff on bottled wine has reduced from 14 per cent to 8.4 per cent.”

Not mentioned by ABC, but pointed out by Philip White in this In Daily post called “The truth behind the latest wine export figures”, is how a weak Australian dollar helped. I dug up the last two years of CNY-AUD exchange rates and the visual is striking:

White breaks down the export numbers in more detail, and looks at the role played by premium brands, in a semi-rant that is well worth reading. Check it out here.

Georgia, with thousands of years of wine-making history under its belt, is about to open its newest wine center in China, says Tbilsi-based site Agenda:

Georgia’s Agriculture Ministry announced the wine centre will be opened in February this year in China’s province Jiangxi where about 30 million people live. A Georgian wine centre will cover 4,000 sq.m. territory where will be placed wine-testing and exhibition halls, museum, Georgian restaurant, etc. This will be the fifth Georgian wine centre to be opened in China.

Agenda notes that Georgia has opened venues in Beijing, in Zhejiang province and in the Xinjiang region. Georgia has also been active at recent trade fairs in China.

Kendall-Jackson has turned a new leaf in China by switching importers. One month after ASC Fine Wines announced, in this terse statement, its parting with Jackson Family Wines, competitor Summergate, which seems to have been buoyed after being acquired by Woolworths just over a year ago, announced it has partnered with this well-known California operation. From this Summergate press release:

After several months of discussions and joint planning, Summergate and Jackson Family Wines (JFW) today announced a successful multi-year partnership for the Greater China market for Kendall-Jackson wines. Effective immediately Summergate has been appointed the sole importer and distributor for this iconic American wine producer across the region – Hong Kong, Macau, and Mainland China. Summergate expects to have Kendall-Jackson wines available in all major cities across Mainland China in the Spring of 2016, and even sooner in Hong Kong and Macau.

Summergate also lists the U.S. brands Black Stallion, Brazin, Delicato, Gnarly Head, Ingelnook, Irony, J. Christopher, Kistler, Ridge, Tablas Creek and Woodhaven.

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By Jim Boyce | Saw this ’82 Lafite at Lufthansa Center in Beijing a few days ago. It was in a case with a few dozen other Lafite bottles from different vintages near the fancy packages of sea cucumbers and mushrooms that are priced higher than most people’s monthly rent.

That particular tag seems to date to about three years ago, before the government austerity campaign, when such bottles were far more popular and far easier to move. CNY99,480 translates to USD 15,100 or EUR 13,900, enough money to buy a fleet of scooters or easily pay a year’s rent in most parts of Beijing or enjoy about 1000 delicious lunches at most excellent mid-day spot Migas. (Saturday brunch is tasty there, too.)

When I posted the photo of that ’82 Lafite on social media app weixin, wine trade people cited the current price as between rmb20,000 and rmb40,000. One person, from one of the city’s top hotels, said its bar lists ’82 Lafite at rmb72,000.

Online, wine-searcher turns up a China listing with ’82 Lafite from rmb58,000.

Meanwhile, ASC, a major importer / distributor here, has bottles at rmb48,000:

Not surprisingly, given its duty-free environment and status as a wine hub, Hong Kong has it for far less:

But if you do find yourself in Lufthansa Center, itching for Bordeaux but with much less than rmb100,000 in your pocket, you can always try a less expensive option:

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By Jim Boyce,

One New Year’s resolution for 2016 is to finally, after years of procrastination, put together an online directory of some key players in the China wine scene. This project is just off the ground and includes categories for retailers (here), local producers (here), and importers and distributors (here), with more to come. It will include a mix of listings posted by companies (with that content indicated by quotation marks) and info and links provided by me. Check this work in progress here.

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By Jim Boyce

I’ve spent much of the past three Novembers helping to organize a month-long charity project called Maovember. The idea is for small bars, restaurants and vendors to partner with their customers for good deeds, whether that means furnishing a reading room via The Library Project or, this past year’s goal, funding cataract surgeries for the elderly poor in rural China via Orbis. The “mao” refers to the money of that name — a tenth of one renminbi — and the idea small things lead to big results.

Three of this year’s events had a wine focus. The weather gets chilly about the time Maovember starts and few things are as warming as a hot mug of mulled wine. For the third straight year, wine shop chain CHEERS used this winter drink to support Maovember. In 2013, it served mulled wine from its Sanlitun shop on the campaign’s final day. In 2014, owner Claudia Masueger upped the effort to two stores over several weekends. This year, it went even further with a three-day mulled wine marathon at all 15 Beijing shops. The result: a rmb10,000 donation to Maovember.

Meanwhile, Cafe de la Poste tested wine aficionados’ palates with a blind tasting of French and Chinese wines. Each taster paid rmb100, which went to charity, to try four pairs of wine, each with a French and a Chinese pour. Tristan McQuest and Justin Barthelemy led the tasting and there was plenty of discussion and debate — and general agreement that picking wines with labels unseen is no easy task!

The French wines were provided by Cafe de la Poste while the Chinese wines were donated by East Meets West (Chateau Nine Peaks), Torres / Everwines (Grace Vineyard), 1421 Wines (1421) and Grape Wall of China (Kanaan). The evening, which included numerous rounds of “Office Basket-Bola“ (see here), raised rmb1664.8.

Finally, despite a rare snowfall in Beijing, there was a strong turnout for the ‘Mystery Wine Party‘ at the shop La Cava. The idea? Customers paid rmb100 and picked one of 50 gift-wrapped wines — each retailing from rmb120 to rmb2000 — then tore open the packaging to see what they got. All 50 bottles were snapped up in an hour. Given most people then opened their wines to drink, and share, it wasn’t surprising the event lasted well beyond it’s scheduled three hours.

The more sporting imbibers signed up for the Wine Flights Paper Airplane Race. Eleven contestants each paid rmb50 for a flight ticket, carefully designed their craft, then raced for glory–and a bottle of Charles Ellner Champagne–in the hallway outside La Cava. The Mystery Wine Party, airplane race and donation spittoon raised rmb6000.

The wines were donated by Randy Svendsen of 1421, Nick van Leeuwen and Ross Tan of Australian Natural, Jim Boyce of Grape Wall of China, Mariano Larrain of La Cava, Vicente Muedre of Le Sommelier International, Alberto Pascual of Pasion, Helene Ponty of Ponty, Edouard Simon of Seina and Mike Signorelli of Signature Wine Club.

For more info about Maovember, see the official website here. And if you’d like to get the free Grape Wall of China e-newsletter, sign up below.

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Last year’s lone wine trip outside China was to California in October and it came just after the new edition of The Wine Bible by Karen MacNeil was released. A fellow traveler picked up a copy of this massive tome — it’s almost 1000 pages — and I checked to see if it had any China coverage.

Indeed, it does. There is an overview of the market, short entries on key provinces and regions that produce wine, and sidebars on topics like fake wine. Market watchers will quibble with some parts for being too simple or vague — such as the claim China is split between huge producers doing cheap wines and small ones doing expensive ones, or the list of easily recognizable white grapes planted that only names Chardonnay, Chenin Blanc and Semillon, even though Rieslings are far more prominent than the latter two — but the book nevertheless lets readers know that China has an increasingly important wine industry.

Media coverage of that industry has grown by leaps and bound over the past three to five years although English-language books about it are still relatively rare. Two recent ones are A Decent Bottle of Wine in China by Chris Ruffle, about his trials and tribulations in establishing Treaty Port Vineyard in Shandong, and Thirsty Dragon: China’s Lust for Bordeaux and the Threat to the World’s Best Wines by Suzanne Mustacich — reviews coming soon. Works like The World Atlas of Wine by Hugh Johnson and Jancis Robinson also have sections on China. I’ve created a books page here that includes these, and other wine books I like, and will update it as more become available.

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In April, I wrote that wine importer / wholesaler CHEERS, which has more than a dozen shops in Beijing, would soon expand to Shanghai. The team, led by Claudia Masueger, has been on a role ever since and has now opened shops in six more cities — Chengdu, Dalian, Hangzhou, Lanzhou, Qiqihar and Shenzhen. While Masueger says the dream goal is 888 stores, reaching 50 shops over the next year is her more modest target.

The company has struck a chord, especially with younger drinkers, given the shops offer a colorful and upbeat vibe (the motto is “CHEERS makes you smile” and screens show fun CHEERS TV videos), activities (including free tastings and events like comedy nights) and inexpensive wines (starting at rmb28). CHEERS is working on wine recommendations categorized by mood and occasion and on more food options, such as cheese platters, and continues to sell a small range of spirits as well as beer from Yunan operation Shangri-la Brewing.

CHEERS also recently expanded its office, which includes a demo store, and marked the occasion with a party earlier this month that included giving away a trip to Switzerland, Masueger’s homeland, to the winner of the company’s photo contest. There’s a lot going on with the company, which I wrote about in early 2014 for Wine Business International — more details here — and it will be “one to watch” in 2016.

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Go to enough wine tastings, press conferences, trade fairs and winery tours and you will end up with a closet worth of openers, notebooks, lapel pins, towels, cork-shaped USB keys, T-shirts, bookmarks, baseball caps, grape bunch-shaped fridge magnets, and on and on and on. No doubt, much of this material will be carefully curated and passed through the generations of those who received it. But some is of immediate usefulness. The textbook example is this Sonoma County bag:

I received this bag in the May of 2013 during a visit to Sonoma County. The bags were sourced by Sophie Jump of Jumpstart Solutions when she worked with Sonoma County Vintners to bring a group of wine trade people from Beijing, Shanghai and Macau stateside. I don’t believe any amount of writing I could do would promote Sonoma as much as this bag.

First, it works perfectly as a carry on, able to neatly fit my laptop, a few books, lots of ear plugs, an extra pair of socks, and any other items crucial to a 12-hour flight. It has slots for pens and phones, a clip for keys, pouches that zip up tight, and flexible holders at the end that can fit small water bottles. It is equally useful — when packed with notebooks, an extra battery pack, some snacks and more — while traipsing around vineyards. So, what’s my point?

This bag has visited places like Mendoza, San Jose and Salta in Argentina, Stellenbosch in South Africa, Xinjiang, Ningxia, Shanxi, Hebei and Shandong in China and, earlier this year on a return trip to California, Sonoma, Napa, Lodi and Livermore. It almost always elicits a comment about Sonona that ends up with anecdotes about the wonderful Rockpile Zinfandels or the delicious Sonoma Valley Chardonnays or the incredible diversity of this relatively small county, anecdotes that would not likely have arisen in Capetown, Stellenbosch or Yinchuan if I was not carrying that bag.

It’s equally useful in Beijing, whether stuffed with up to six full bottles of wine en route to a tasting of with six half-full ones post-tasting to be shared with friends at a local bar or restaurant. Nothing makes people organizing tastings of wines from Napa, Barossa, Mendoza or leading regions happier than someone in the front row plunking down a Sonoma County bag in full view. (Did I mention that Sonoma offers to much diversity in contrast to many other well-known regions?)

It can also fit all of the score sheets, pencils, clipboards and the other materials needed for our annual Grape Wall Challenges. And it has made hundreds of shopping trips in Beijing, where it has been stuffed with everything from potatoes and tomatoes and walnuts and bayberries, brought to the city daily by farmers at the local wet market, to rice, beans, crackers, sesame oil, dumplings and anything else I might find at the supermarket.

It’s quite the swag. One that’s been lost and found a half-dozen times, stepped and vomited upon, soaked in wine (spills do happen) and in water (so do rainstorms) and coated in dirt from dozens of wineries. Yet it still functions well about 30 months of nearly daily yes. Did I  mention Sonoma County makes some of the more diverse wines in the world?

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