Rise of the Chinese wine market
Contributed by Julia Zhu
Subbed by Jacinta Freeman
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Hilton Beijing’s new sommelier Julia Zhu has fine-tuned her craft at the Canadian Association of Professional Sommeliers in Toronto, Canada, and spent the last three years working as a Sommelier at Hilton Toronto before moving on to Beijing. Julia gives her take on the wine market in China now.
Ten months ago when I came to work as a sommelier in Mainland China, there was rarely a sight of wines in a Chinese commercial, TV programme or movie. Now, wines are getting more exposure through the media, whether it is to promote a specific wine label or just as an accessory in a movie or a serial. In the recent hit TV drama Fen Dou, the director had many scenes |
with wines to help position the different character’s social status and stages of development.
These frequent images of wines have left people with a certain impression about the drink, strengthened by the phenomenal increase in wine themed bars and lounges opening in China over the last couple of years. Two years ago when I visited Beijing, there were less than five popular wine bars in town. Now, I would have to decide among options of close to two dozen. Even the event pages of local magazines are filled with advertisements for wine events and dinners, as opposed to next to nothing years ago.
Even the smaller cities have jumped onto the bandwagon. Last summer, I travelled to Wenzhou to visit a friend. Along one of the main streets in the city that had no wine shops just three years ago, there were then at least five. Now, there are about 10 wine shops spread out on that main street.
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The hospitality sector, too, has done their part in promoting this industry. For example, soon after I joined Hilton Beijing, the hotel hosted its annual Food and Wine Experience Exposition, an event it had been organising for 11 consecutive years. During this one-day event in 2008, we had 200 booths of food and wine display, which attracted thousands of locals and expatriates.
This year, the event scheduled for early November, would have |
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another platform for the importers and distributors to showcase their products. Despite the global economic slowdown, we are expecting at least five new wine companies to participate, above the 20 that were present last year. Many of our current wine suppliers have indicated their interest to continue participating in the event to reinforce their position and promote their products since their budget for promotion and advertising has been affected.
Wine is still perceived and categorised as a luxury commodity; but it has become a more popular accessory and even a necessity in Chinese households. Many people in China are storing wines as a hobby.
On national TV, a spokesman from Dragon Seal Company, one of the more famous regional wine producers in China, even suggested using his company’s wine sales as a forecast of when China’s economy would turn around. Interestingly, he revealed that the sale of the company’s wines had suffered a 15–20 per cent drop year-to-date.
The past can be a good, though not the only, indicator for predicting the future. However, one thing is certain. As soon as China comes out of the economic gloom, we can expect a much more prosperous wine industry in China in the years ahead in terms of production, distribution and consumption.