Wine sales up 6%

Wine sales experienced further growth in 2007, up six per cent to 8.7 million cases in total from a figure of 8.2 million cases in 2006 according to the latest figures from the Wine Board of Ireland.

Table Wine accounts for nearly all wine sales at 93.7 per cent with Sparkling Wines increasing their share of the market from 2.7 per cent to 2.9 per cent by volume. Red wine still has the edge over white wine at 51 per cent, unchanged from 2006. Similarly females dominate the wine consumption market being responsible for 57 per cent by volume.

At €7 billion, consumer spend on alcohol as a proportion of total consumer spend dropped slightly in 2007 to 8.0 per cent from 8.5 per cent (€6.9 billion) the previous year. In 2005 spend on alcohol represented 9.2 per cent of total consumer spend.

In terms of alcohol retail sales values, wine consumption grew continued to grow share in 2007 from 16.6 per cent of the market to 17.9 per cent.

Beer¡¯s retail share of the alcoholic beverage market declined from 53.9 per cent to 50.6 per cent in 2007 while spirits increased share to 24.2 per cent from 22.2 per cent.

Pubs again lost share of wine sales last year falling from 10 per cent to nine per cent by volume while off-licences took up the slack going from 71 per cent to 72 per cent.

Within the off-trade, the Wine Board puts the multiples¡¯ and symbol groups¡¯ share of wine sales up one per cent to 45 per cent and 17 per cent respectively at the expense of the independent sector which lost share from 34 per cent to 32 per cent in 2007. Discounters took six per cent of the off-trade market.

At 2.16 million cases, Australian wines continue to be top dingo in the wine market here, having increased their share from 25 per cent to 26.4 per cent in 2007. With 1.72 million case sales, Chile too increased its presence from 20.8 per cent in 2006 to 21.1 per cent as did the US which grew share to 11.3 per cent from 10.9 per cent in 2006 with 922,000 cases sold in 2007.

France, in third place, continued to experience a diminishing market share of just 13.5 per cent on sales of 1.1 million cases, down from 14 per cent in 2006 and with sales of 672,000 cases South Africa lost share from 9.5 per cent to 8.2 per cent.

Spain grew its share slightly from 5.8 per cent to 5.9 per cent (484,000 cases) but Italy¡¯s share shrunk to 5.6 per cent from 5.8 per cent on a case sales figure of 455,000.

While German wines held fast to their 2.8 per cent share or 232,000 cases, New Zealand grew share to 2.5 per cent (204,000 cases) from 1.9 per cent.

At 107,000 cases, Argentinean wines suffered a decline to 1.3 per cent from 2.0 per cent.