In the current economic climate, supermarkets are battling for market share. Despite their efforts to help curb binge-drinking, in practice they will continue to implement very aggressive promotional programmes which will have a far greater impact on consumption.
In essence, this is a volume-led strategy. But if we are to tackle alcohol-related issues, we need to accept that price is the biggest lever we have. Until the industry adopts a quality-led strategy, increasing average item price, the Government will do the job for us by increasing duty.
Increasing duty is self-defeating. The higher duty goes, the more it squeezes profit margins through the supply chain which means people have to sell more volume to stay still.
If we are to tackle alcohol-related issues we must accept price is the biggest lever
So what would a quality-led strategy look like? One where revenue increases through value growth; where gondola-ends of discounts are replaced by quality indicators such as medals, press mentions and seasonal selections; and where the story of a product is told and drinks are sold on their attributes, not just their price.
A quality-led approach could be win-win, bringing with it savings in transport and distribution costs, packaging waste and carbon emissions. I'm sure most wine buyers would much prefer it, but their number one priority now is to deliver against targets over which they may have little influence.
Susan McCraith MW is managing director of www.ethicalwine.com
I like Susan's thinku=ing, Unfortunately., it is a mite naive. We have allowed a culture of cheap wine to develop within the UK, to te extent that the supermarkets are driving ex-cellars prices down. Wines which were previously of acceptable quality are now made to fit a price category determined by meesrs. Tesco, Asda, et al. The result is that these wines are no longer of an acceptable quality.
Joe Public buys on price and on the appearance of the pretty label. Ask Joe, or Josephine Public what they drank last night and they will tell you that they cannot remember, but that "it had a pretty label." I am afraid that the vast bulk of the wine buying public fits into that category.
I would love it, were the public to pay attention to education about yields, micro-climates and clonal selection, but, for 85% of them, such things are far beyond what they want to know about in a bottle of wine.
I agree that increasing duty is self-defeating, look at the experiences of the Scandinavian countries, where Norway has increased duty levels and seen its alcohol problems increase in line with the cost of the product, or where Sweden has lowered duty levels and is seeing a reduction in its alcohol problems.
The cost of a bottle of wine in our near neighbours in France, Spain and Italy is far below the cost within the UK and yet they do not experience the problems that we do. This is solely down to the difference in culture. In southern Europe, they enjoy wines and spirits for their flavours; drunk with food and accompanied by water. In the UK, our drinkers drink to get drunk.
If we are to tackle alcohol-related issues we must accept price is the biggest lever
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