The famous bubbly provides some health benefits, plus other news and notes from the world of wine, beer and spirits.
Champagne Is Actually Good For You
Writing in The Telegraph, Guy Kelly lists five health benefits attributed to daily Champagne consumption, from improving your memory to helping your heart. Then there are the less serious, questionable plusses—namely the quick rush of carbonation or the antioxidants that help detox and tone the skin. Finally, Champagne has fewer calories than either beer or still wine, with a handy calculator to help prove the point. Pop fizz, oh what a relief it is!
News from the 2015 Beer Insights Seminar
On November 8–9, New York City hosted the 2015 Beer Insights Seminar, with data galore offered up by management teams from many of the big brands. Among the most interesting statistics, they found that per capita beer consumption is down 20 percent, while competition amongst brewers remains intense with over 4,000 craft breweries in operation, and 1,800 more in the works. Additionally, flavored beers and malt alternatives may help win back so-called “alienated” female consumers.
The big picture over the next decade: sales of super premium/craft beers will double, potentially taking a 50 percent share of the total beer market. Meanwhile, imports will rise to 20 percent, while value/economy brands will fall to 30 percent.
How to Snag a Millennial
Were you born between 1980 and 2004? Congrats—you are now the most desirable wine and booze-drinking demographic, with a lot of corporate suits scratching their balding heads to figure out how to grab your rather transient, self-obsessed attention.
Or so says a piece in The Drinks Business, offering 10 sure-fire tips to help sort through all the bluster. According to the report, “millennials mean big business, with some reports suggesting that they will represent 50 percent of the wine- and spirit-buying population by 2025.”
Among the ideas offered: it’s helpful to be a little David slinging rocks at corporate Goliaths. It means you have a higher purpose. Along with that, you should have all the eco-creds possible and demonstrate that you are also adventurous and worldly. The most telling tip is the last, citing a Microsoft study on human attention spans, which are shrinking dramatically. So you’d better get to your message qui—
Just For Fun
In an entertaining profile, Munchies chats with San Francisco sommelier Maryse Chevriere about her Instagram account, which illustrates goofy wine lingo with fun, and funny, cartoons.
She takes writers’ and sommeliers’ real quotes about specific wines and portrays them in pictures. For example, “of its many different personalities, sometimes Grenache is fat and sweaty, but other times it’s ripped and wears a black leather jacket.”
In the Trade
Red Blends on the Rise
After years in the doldrums, sales of red blends are up significantly, says Nielsen. Calling red blends “the craft beer of the wine category,” the article notes that a combination of trendiness and affordability is driving the gains. In terms of percentage of total sales value, red blends (13.3 percent) trail only Chardonnay (#1 with 19 percent) and Cabernet Sauvignon (#2 with 16.2 percent).
Epic Wines & Spirits Expands
Bill Foley, Chairman and CEO of Epic Wines & Spirits, announced the company’s newly formed sales division, Black Knight Fine Wines & Spirits. The division will be responsible for the business development and sale of luxury wines and spirits within Epic’s portfolio.
The team will consist of certified sommeliers, wine and spirits educators and specialists who will be singularly focused on building brands within key accounts. “This is a very exciting time of growth for Epic Wines & Spirits,” Foley stated in a release. “As we continue to add to our portfolio, it is imperative that we fully support all of our suppliers with the resources needed to reach the goals we have set together. The Black Knight division will play a key role in ensuring this success.”
Fine Wine Outperforms All Major Investment Assets
Vin-X, a British company that specializes in offering advice on investing in fine wines, has published a report that puts such investments at the top of all major assets in the past quarter century. Almost doubling the gain in the Dow Jones and S&P indexes over that time, fine wine also handily beats out real estate and gold. And let’s be honest, it’s the only investment that can be drunk with dinner.
By Paul Gregutt, Winemag