The Kiwi wine buyer is more likely to be a woman and to try pinot gris and pinot noir these days.
The Kiwi wine buyer is more likely to be a woman and to try pinot gris and pinot noir these days.
More New Zealand wine buyers are also drinking beer and the Kiwi wine buyer profile has shifted more towards women, new research shows.
New Zealand Winegrowers (NZW), the national organisation for the grape and wine sector, said its latest brand health research also showed that, since 2022, the Kiwi winebuyer profile had skewed more towards consumers aged 55 and older, from 39 per cent to 46 per cent.
Charlotte Read, NZW’s general manager of brand, said the wine buyer profile had shifted towards women, from 48 per cent to 53 per cent.
The proportion of New Zealand wine buyers also drinking beer had “significantly” increased from 60 per cent to 65 per cent, Read said.
Wine buyers were also including more pinot gris in their shop, up from 48 per cent to 53 per cent, and pinot noir choice had lifted to 53 per cent from 46 per cent.
More people bought their wine in supermarkets than through supermarket websites, Read said.
In country of origin imagery research, New Zealand wine owned “environmental” and “naturally refreshing” image associations versus other New World wine competitors.
Charlotte Read of New Zealand Winegrowers says the proportion of Kiwi wine buyers also drinking beer has increased significantly.
The research concluded the New Zealand wine brand remained healthy, with no signs of any deterioration compared with 2022 results.
On export performance, Read said volumes were tracking down to date as global supply chains stabilised and retailers reduced their stocks, resulting in lower replenishment orders.
NZW chief executive Philip Gregan, commenting in NZW’s latest magazine, said the destocking of supply chains had a major impact on global wine exporters in the second half of last year, and had resulted in New Zealand exports declining by more than 20 per cent in July-December, compared with 2022.
The positive consumer perceptions of New Zealand wine identified in the latest research were backed up by the latest sales data, Gregan said.
“In the US, UK, Canada and China, our in-market sales continue to grow and outperform the wider wine market while, in Australia and New Zealand, our market share is solid, even if New Zealand wine is performing slightly behind the market.”
This formed a very solid base on which to build New Zealand’s wine reputation in the year ahead, he said.
Last year, New Zealand harvested 501,000 tonnes of grapes with exports earning more than $2 billion. Ninety per cent of New Zealand wine is exported. The three biggest markets are the US, UK and Australia.
This year’s grape harvest, which runs from February to May, is expected to be good in quality but lower in volume, NZW said.
Meanwhile, New Zealand was ranked No 1 in a white wine production category in a major report by the “United Nations” of wine, the International Organisation of Vine and Wine (OIV).
New Zealand had the world’s highest percentage of white wine in national wine production in 2021, said the France-based OIV, which is headed by Kiwi John Barker.
At 89.6 per cent, it topped five European countries: the UK (85.5 per cent), Hungary (71.8 per cent), Austria (70.3 per cent), Greece (67.7 per cent) and Germany (64.7 per cent).
The top 10 countries in this category were completed by South Africa (61 per cent), Italy (58 per cent), the US (56 per cent) and Bulgaria (53 per cent).
Kiwi lawyer John Barker is the first director-general of the International Organisation of Vine and Wine from outside Europe in 100 years.
However, New Zealand didn’t make the report’s top 10 major white wine producers in 2021, which was headed by Italy. But it did record “very positive trends” along with South Africa and Chile, said the OIV. Australia was ranked sixth on this list with growth of 8.8 per cent between 2000 and 2021.
(New Zealand is the world’s sixth-largest exporter of wine by value, despite producing under 2 per cent of global supply, according to NZW.)
The main findings of the OIV report included global red wine supply and demand declining significantly between 2000 and 2021.
By 2021, red wine production had declined by 25 per cent since its peak in 2004. In 2000, red wines accounted on average for 48 per cent of total wine production. In recent years that share had dropped to 43 per cent. Negative growth rates over the 20 years were seen across all major European red-wine-producing countries, notably France and Italy.
Red wine consumption had fallen mainly in large European markets, notably Germany, France, Italy and Spain, said OIV.
Globally, white wine demand and supply had expanded since 2000.
Production in 2021 had increased by 13 per cent since its lowest level in 2002, overtaking red wine production in 2013.
White wine’s share of world production was 49 per cent, compared to 46 per cent in 2000. OIV said the increase in demand for white wine was mostly driven by a boom in three important sparkling wine markets: the US, Germany and the UK.
The US was the world’s largest consumer of wine in 2021, accounting for 14.1 per cent of total consumption, said the report. The US is New Zealand wine’s main market, earning $870.5 million last year, up from $694m in 2022.
Italy was the world’s second-biggest wine consumer, with France third and followed in order by Germany, the UK, China (mostly red), Russia, Spain, Argentina and Australia.
Andrea Fox joined the Herald as a senior business journalist in 2018 and specialises in writing about the dairy industry, agribusiness, exporting and the logistics sector and supply chains.
