Rolling update: Festive wine sales up in supermarkets

Published: 04 January, 2012

Despite the gloomy economic times, wine sales in supermarkets were up during the festive season - with Sainsbury's proclaiming it their "most successful Christmas ever".

This rolling update will highlight sales across the on and off-trades, pinpointing strong performances in December.

In summary, the major multiples did well:

Sainsbury's had its "most successful Christmas ever" in BWS, outgrowing the category as a whole. Spearheading the growth were wines from sparkling, France, Spain and New Zealand, while Taste the Difference wines grew 40% in December.

Waitrose's Champagne and sparkling wine sales were up 26% year on year in the last 13 weeks of 2011.

Asda's Champagne sales were up 7% year on year, and the overall sparkling category up 40%. It sold a quarter of a million bottles of Champagne in the week before New Year's Eve

The details:
An Asda spokeswoman said its BWS department had a "good Christmas", with Champagne sales up 7% year on year, and the overall sparkling category up 40%.

She added: "In the week before New Year's Eve we sold nearly a quarter of a million bottles of Champagne as people prepared for their New Year's Eve parties. Pierre Darcy is our biggest seller and that is no surprise as it's super value at £10. We have sold nearly half a million bottles of this since we rolled back the price at the end of November and have sold over 50% more Pierre Darcy than we did last year.

"£5 Extra Special Cava is also selling well, so despite toughh times, people still want their fizz and are looking for high quality at the best price. They still want to treat themselves."

Waitrose buyer Andrew Shaw said sales of Champagne and sparkling wine were up 26% year-on-year in the last 13 weeks of 2011. "This performance has been driven across the whole spectrum of fizz available at Waitrose, with Prosecco/Cava proving particularly popular this festive season.

"Exclusive Champagnes to Waitrose and sparkling wines performed strongly, as did branded Champagnes in seasonal packaging.

"What is most exciting, however, is that customers are keen to try different regions and styles of Champagne and sparkling wine, in particular English sparkling wine."

Sainsbury's senior wine buyer Julian Dyer said: "We had our most successful Christmas ever, with Christmas trade week breaking all records due to a full week's trading up to Christmas Eve on Saturday. For the beers, wines and spirits category as a whole, we outgrew the market over the golden quarter (the three months to Christmas), including the Christmas trade week, in which the total market was very buoyant.

"Our most successful wine categories in terms of year on year growth were sparkling, France, Spain and New Zealand, indicative of both a resurgence of classic wines, and also the health of premium wine categories. Our best selling wine in December was our Taste the Difference Prosecco, which we promoted on Save 1/3. This reflects the amazing popularity now of Prosecco, but also the strength of and trust in our supermarket own label. The Taste the Difference Prosecco outsold our similarly priced Taste the Difference Cava by three to one."

Dyer added that overall Taste the Difference wine sales grew by over 40% in December.

"The Champagne market was as competitive as ever, and we made sure we were very competitive across own brand and brands. It certainly looked like a battleground, but pleasingly we drove most of our exponential growth in other categories.

"I am bullish about 2012. Beers, wines and spirits are mature categories with a good consumer base. We just need to make sure we offer great service and value, and keep our focus on relevant innovation, across all product and store formats."

Please email gemma.mckenna@wrbm.com to let us know how your business fared over Christmas, and we will add it to our festive update.

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