Italian wine sector recovering through high-end products

Rome, Italy | Xinhua | As Italy’s wine sector slowly recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic and the conflict in Ukraine, higher-end wines are out-performing the rest of the sector, industry experts say.

While France remains the world leader in terms of the overall value of wine production, last year Italy was the global winner based on the volume of wine produced, according to Italian wine analyst Giampietro Comolli. This was despite overall production remaining flat compared to a year before.

Nevertheless, the Observatory of the Italian Wine Union (UIV) reported this week that exports of Italian wine are on the rise. Sales to distributors in the United States, Britain, Canada, and France all grew by double digits last year compared to 2021, UIV said.

According to wine sector data and commentary from expert analysts, a rise in sales of premium wines is driving this trend.

Alessandro Leoni, head of Leoni Wine Consulting, told Xinhua that the shift began during the pandemic, when consumers who were no longer able to eat out or travel due to health restrictions began indulging in higher-end wines.

“During the pandemic we started to see consumer spending either maintain or increase in economic terms,” said Leoni.

The limited availability of the prestigious wines of Tuscany and Piedmont, which can sell for hundreds of euros per bottle, has a trickle-down effect on the popularity of lower-priced wines, Leoni said.

“The tastes of consumers change over time, and there is a new generation of wine drinkers who want wines that are more modern, more complex,” he explained.

Names like Amarone, Barolo, Barbaresco, Brunello, and Chianti Classico are now more familiar to wine drinkers.

While the definition of “premium wine” is that sold to distributors at more than 9 euros (9.76 U.S. dollars) per liter, higher price and quality ranges are now seeing more growth.

“We see situations where a producer increases production over time by, say, 10 percent, but the producer also increases the value of each bottle by 35 percent,” Leoni said. While the average price for Italian wine still lags behind that of French wine, this gap is shrinking over time.

Italy is also the world’s second-largest wine exporter, behind only France, with an increase of 12 percent last year compared to 2021.

The United States, Germany, Britain, and Canada are the largest markets for Italian wine exports. Meanwhile, demand in China, which was the fastest-growing Italian wine export market before 2020, is increasing once again.

Italian wine exports to the Chinese market will likely recover to pre-pandemic levels this year, and could double in size by 2026, Leoni said.