Opinion:
appellations as brands
The other day I was standing on a station platform thinking
my usual vague early morning thoughts, and I was struck by the
appearance of a train going in the other direction: all eight
carriages had been painted a
vivid red with the current Côtes du Rhône advertising campaign
on its side – the irritating and rather banal hedgehog drawings
with the slogan ‘think red, think Côtes du Rhône’. I don’t
quite get the connection between hedgehogs and Rhône reds, but
someone has clearly been spending a lot of money trying to boost
the sales of French wine in response to the popularity of the new
world brands. But does such a generic campaign – in effect,
using appellations as brands – work?
I’ll state my position from the outset. I’m not
sure that the marketing of appellations is a great idea. In
principal, the idea of pooling the marketing budgets of all the
producers in an appellation (for one big, visible marketing push,
rather than many tiny initiatives) is supposed to benefit all
members of the appellation equally.
In reality, though, those who gain the most from this
approach are the poorer producers, and the relative losers
are the most conscientious, better-performing domaines. Why?
Because this sort of marketing doesn’t discriminate
against cheats. The vignerons who cut the most corners and
have the lowest costs (usually producing the lowest quality
wines) benefit the most.
Let’s illustrate this concept. Look at the famous
appellations of Champagne and Chablis. Most consumers
aren’t aware that the key to buying French wines is the
producer’s name, not the appellation, yet the wines are
being marketed generically. Thus when a supermarket offers
Champagne at £6.99 or Chablis at £4.99, these wines fly
off the shelves. The producers who have managed to make
wines that they can sell at these prices benefit from the
cachet that Chablis and Champagne have as brands. In
reality, these cut-price classics usually do little to boost
the image of the region. Usually, just the opposite… |
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Appellations
with a cachet |
n |
- Champagne: the ultimate brand. The average consumer
isn't worried by the quality if the price is right.
- Chablis: high consumer awareness, and a neutral
Chablis at under six quid will fly off the shelves
- Châteauneuf du Pape: the name on the bottle
guarantees £9, even if the contents taste no better than an
average Cotes du Rhone
- Sancerre: the ultimate restaurant wine (producer
often unspecified)
- Pouilly Fuissé: Macon's most famous name
guarantees £10 a bottle
- Muscadet: it may be cheap, but it's a name people
recognize, so it sells
- Meursault/Chassagne Montrachet/Puligny Montrachet:
famous white Burgundy appellations that will sell for high
prices simply because of the name
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The principle behind appellations is sound. They preserve the
regional styles that have been officially recognized as being the
best that the region has to offer, and guarantee authenticity of
the product. Crucially, however, they have consistently failed to
guarantee quality. Rules governing grape variety, maximum yield,
and pruning and picking techniques don’t guarantee quality, no
matter how stringent they are. For example, while lower
yields are more or less essential for producing better quality
wines, they are not a guarantee of quality. Many producers prune
for the maximum permitted yield, and then in a high-yielding year
they just leave the excess grapes unpicked. This makes a mockery
of the regulations. If you produce 90 hl/ha grapes and only pick
40 hl/ha, you’ve still got 90 hl/ha quality grapes. Even the
statutory tasting tests (where they are required) don’t work in
practice. No, it’s the dedication, motivation and skill of the
vigneron/winemaker that is the key to quality, and this can’t be
legislated for. Ironically, the appellation-as-a-brand concept
ends up encouraging mediocrity.
French producers are acutely aware of their need to regain
market share lost to the new world brands. On paper, it looks like
a generic marketing attempt based around appellations will be a
solution to their problems. In reality, though, I suspect this
generic approach is proving to be an obstacle to raising the
quality of the average French wine. The typical consumer thinks in
terms of the appellation when buying French wine. I have a
non-geek friend who declares how much he loves Volnay, but isn’t
aware how crucial the grower is in determining the quality of his
favourite wine. In a similar vein, someone recently told me that
they’d had a great Châteauneuf-du-Pape, and seemed a bit
perplexed when I asked them who the producer was. This concept of
the appellation as a brand creates a strong incentive for less
conscientious growers to cut corners; it rewards producers who can
knock out large quantities of inexpensive Chablis, Châteauneuf,
Sancerre, Pouilly Fuissé and Champagne – wines that are
unlikely to do their appellations any favours. Of course, within
each region there are a few superstars with reputations that mean
they can command high prices for their wines, but for the average
producer this system gives them no incentive to raise their
quality threshold, because even if they don’t they will still
benefit from generic marketing campaigns and the cachet their
appellation enjoys.
Agree?
Disagree? Respond to jamie@wineanorak.com
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April 2002 |