Estimating the complete global wine market impact from an increasing pace of China wine investment activity has grown unsettling. For context, think of it in these drastic terms. A couple of years ago I was driving around Zimbabwe and noticed Asian workers entering an energy facility. My driver explained that Chinese investors were acquiring mining resources and […]
Hong Kong and Global Wine Market
A new study, albeit based on 2010 data, was just released by Vinexpo awarding Hong Kong residents top spot on the Asian continent for per capita wine consumption. The Wall Street Journal, reporting on the study last week, said the average Hong Kong consumer drank 6.3 bottles in 2010, about twice as much volume as Japan […]
US Wine Labels and Hong Kong Wine Auctions: Tale of Two Wine Worlds
While the US domestic wine industry continues its painful recessionary adjustments in response to the $50-plus wine category implosion and the consolidation of its distribution channels, the picture looks very different in Asia where this year’s Sotheby’s and Christie’s Hong Kong wine auction sales will outstrip their own combined New York and London volumes. As […]
When Lafite Meets Jiaozi
In case your catalogue never arrived, you can rest assured that the first fine wine auction ever held on mainland Chinese soil went off without a hitch this weekend in Beijing. A case of 1989 Petrus and 1982 Chateau Lafite Rothschild sold for 320,000 yuan each ($US 47,000) and an imperiale of 1979 Chateau Latour sold for 32,000 […]