Wednesday 21 April, 2004

'IF IT AIN'T BROKE, DON'T FIX IT'

The recent announcement that INAO's President Rene Renou is advocating a change to France's long establish AOC system for control of wine production has provoked a furious backlash from wine producers and others in the industry.

The proposed changes, which include labelling and the method of qualifying new vintages for the standards, were suggested as a means of countering falling sales of French wine in the face of growing consumption of new world wines.

Vignerons are reluctant to make public statements for fear of victimisation in the close-knit wine producing communities, but one anonymous source from the south of Burgundy commented: "The whole system of the AOC is fine. The cost of re-tooling for new labels is something these bureaucratic morons have no concept of. We pay a small fortune to keep these people employed and for what? Just to keep them doing nothing.

"All that is required is to get one organisation to cover all the admin of the AOC and viticulture, one decent marketing strategy for the whole of France and PR companies that know what they are doing in every country of the world".

His view was shared by Maurice Carroll who runs the France office of wine and travel website, winedrive.com. "We have been saying for years that the decline in sales of French wine is down to a lack of cohesive marketing strategy in a fragmented industry. By contrast, the new world producers marketing and promotion is planned, targeted and effective, so it is little wonder their market share is growing."

He added that it was UK consumers who were partly responsible for setting up the AOC system which guarantees that unlike some products, French wine does exactly what it says on the bottle. In the late 1930's and until the end of the 1940's, many French wine labels owed little to the contents of the bottle. Unscrupulous producers resorted to all kinds of ruses and fiddles including blending wines from Algeria and elsewhere, then labelling them as local, quality products.

To build credibility, British wine merchants imported their wine in barrels from known and reliable vineyards and bottled it themselves. Shrewd buyers knew the best way to ensure quality was to look for the phrase 'Bottled in London' on the label, placing more trust in the British shipper and bottler than the French producer.

By the early 1950's, the French industry had taken control of the situation and introduced stringent rules under the AOC system.

Added Mr Carroll: "This is one of major strengths of French wine. Changing it just ignores the real problem. The industry should capitalise on it unique strengths which have been held in such high regard for so long and get their marketing act in order. As the old saying goes, 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it'".

Ends

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