Analysis & Insights - Harpers Wine & Spirit Trade News

The great Rías Baixas experiment

Published: 27 October, 2025

In a region primarily known for Albariño, plenty of winemakers are uncovering the potential in blends and lesser-known grapes, finds Andrew Catchpole.

Spanish wine importers chart the path ahead

Published: 24 October, 2025

Harpers invited some of the bigger producers and importers of Spanish wine to comment on what they are focused on in terms of both sales and marketing and where they see any openings or challenges for Spanish wine in the UK. Many said that Spain is a region with a strong position and a lot of potential, which presents both opportunities and difficulties for those in Spanish wine – one of the most-emphasised points was the necessity of consumer education, as a lack of knowledge may be holding Spain back.

Why communicating Spanish wine’s identity boasts opportunities and challenges

Published: 22 October, 2025

Fuelled in no small part by its ongoing holiday romance with Spain, the UK is the Mediterranean country’s third most successful wine export market behind France and Italy. Ever since the term ‘Costa Blanca’ was coined to promote Spanish tourism in the late 1950s, Brits have been soaking up the culture, food and drink along with the sun.

Futureproofing Malbec: How can consumer fatigue be stymied?

Published: 20 October, 2025

Once a stalwart of Bordeaux and still the dominant grape of Cahors, these days Malbec seems more at home in Argentina, where it is unequivocally the country’s flagship variety. Planted on 47,000ha, across 12 different provinces, Malbec accounts for more than 42% of red plantings and a quarter of the country’s harvest.

Decoding Champagne’s future fortunes

Published: 17 October, 2025

Over the past 15 years, Champagne’s premium swagger has been tested to the max. In key global markets – not least the UK – retail and on-trade sparkling wine lists have diversified considerably, while consumers are increasingly price sensitive amid the cost-of-living crisis. The result is a complex market evolution for Champagne: one that mixes pain with opportunity.

Uncorking the facts on the bottle weight debate

Published: 15 October, 2025

At 1.2kg, the bottle on the table was heavy enough for it to be hard to tell how much wine was in it. But as chief winemaker Ana María Cumsille explained, the biggest market for Viña Carmen Gold, the Chilean producer’s top cuvée, was China, and consumers there “associate weight with quality”. A few weeks later I related this story to a manager at Ardagh glass in Barnsley as I toured their bottle factory. He joked: “We could get three out of one of those!” – and indeed the bottles coming off the production line in front of us weighed just 400g or less.

The spectre of rogue on-trade closures

Published: 13 October, 2025

A recent string of restaurant closures associated with chef Victor Garvey has revealed the potential for improvement in the wine trade to avoid being stung by rogue actors.

The trade seeks change ahead of the November Budget

Published: 09 October, 2025

Writing about the state of the drinks trade over the past year, it can be hard not to get drawn towards a general sense of gloom. Amid the frustration at a raft of government policies that have unfairly hamstrung the sector, from off-trade to on, one thing that has become clear is the industry is willing to fight for a fairer legislative landscape. The recent revelation that duty receipts have been in decline despite the February tax hike shows that those frustrated across the wine and spirits world were lucid in their critique. Calls for change are all the more vital at present given the Budget is due to be announced on 26 November. Harpers sought the perspective of leading industry figures before the government’s next key policy announcement.

The Fladgate Partnership’s table wine turn

Published: 08 October, 2025

The growth in exports of Portuguese wines to the UK over the past 10 years has been nothing less than remarkable. According to data from Wines of Portugal, the overall volume of Portuguese wine sales to the UK almost doubled between 2015 and 2024, rising from 9.6m litres to just shy of 16.9m. Over the same period, the value growth has been even more impressive jumping from just under €21.5m (£18.8m) to well over double that figure at €48.5m (£42.3m). This growth did not go unnoticed at one of Portugal’s most well-known drinks producers – the Fladgate Partnership. In a first for a company whose flagship product Taylor’s Port dates back over 330 years, the producer added table wine to its portfolio in August 2023 after acquiring Ideal Drinks, taking ownership of estates in Bairrada, the Vinho Verde and the Dão.

LWC’s shifting focus to wine

Published: 06 October, 2025

Two quite quirky facts about LWC come as a bit of a surprise, not least given the scale and success of what has grown over 45 years to become the UK’s largest independent drinks wholesaler. The first is that the company was born in – or at least because of – a pub in Edale, Derbyshire, initially being set up to self-supply drinks to the satisfaction of The Old Nag’s Head’s new owner and others like him. The second is that LWC simply stands for Licensed Wholesale Company, with founder (and pub owner) Robin Gray clearly not overly concerned about creating a market-slick name. This, though, is a company that clearly ‘does what it says on the tin’, and from those modest origins still continues to grow.

Emergent trends from SWA 2025

Published: 01 October, 2025

The Sommelier Wine Awards (SWA) is more than just a blind wine tasting with medals. The very nature of the competition – on-trade-exclusive wines, judged solely by people who buy wine for hospitality venues – means that it’s also a great chance to get a somms’-eye view of what is happening in the on-trade supply chain.

Indies: Cost of living-induced selection streamlining

Published: 29 September, 2025

Indies thrive on diversity – the defining quality that keeps businesses one step ahead of the supermarket next door. Promoting off-grid regions, esoteric varieties and boutique labels, independents have long prided themselves on being the antidote to mass-market uniformity, selling stories as much as wine. Yet in today’s climate – inflation remained stubbornly persistent at 3.8% in July – how sustainable is maintaining this breadth of choice? Is listing a rare variety, grown in a far-flung region, still financially viable? With margins squeezed by duty changes and shoppers under financial strain, the temptation to streamline is hard to resist.

Sake’s steady but certain rise

Published: 24 September, 2025

I recently read that the UK is on the verge of a sake boom. The trade press article reported “a healthy increase in popularity”, with the St James’s wine merchant Berry Bros & Rudd noting “a 1,000% increase in sales between 2023 and 2024” and “heaps of coverage in the press”. Normally sake gets next to no coverage in the press so this was news to me. I thought then that I should check and see if there really is a breakthrough, or if, like previous claims for Riesling or Muscat, the hype outweighs the evidence.

What should bars stock amid the low & no boom?

Published: 22 September, 2025

Walk into any pub or bar in the UK and you’re likely to find at least one decent non-alcoholic beer on offer. It’s great news for those off the booze, but with a range of innovative options now available, from kombucha to adaptogenic spirits and CBD soft drinks, bars relying on beer to satisfy the growing demand for low & no may be missing out.

Chile’s premium promise

Published: 19 September, 2025

Chile needs to eschew its label as a region known for ‘cheap and cheerful’, or strictly ‘value-for-money’ wines.” So ponders Steve Daniel, head of buying at Hallgarten & Novum Wines. The widescale production of table wine in the continent-straddling nation has at times muddied the perception of Chile’s top-end offerings.

Surveying AI adoption in the drinks trade

Published: 17 September, 2025

As businesses increasingly embrace elements of AI to enhance their efficiency and performance, the Harpers team invited our trade readership to take a survey to help build a picture of uptake in the drinks world.

The Shaker Collective: Forging hospitality connections

Published: 15 September, 2025

Just a month after going live, a free online hospitality networking platform by a duo of industry veterans has attracted members from more than 100 cities in 40 countries.

Despite tariff uncertainty, Scotch battles on

Published: 10 September, 2025

Establishing a lay of the land for our new tariff world order is an unenviable task. For much of the planet the final tariff landscape is yet to take a solid form. For UK wine and spirits producers, however, there appears for now to be a clearer picture of how their drinks will be levied entering the United States.

Heroing Italy’s heritage

Published: 08 September, 2025

As Amber Beverage starts to build Zanin’s portfolio of liqueurs and spirits in the UK, Andrew Catchpole meets the teams to discuss how and why this new partnership has been launched.

Calabrian bounty: A region ripe for discovery

Published: 10 September, 2025

The reverence held by the people of Calabria for their region’s agricultural produce is plain to see as soon as you step foot in the southern Italian region. Dining tables are adorned with spicy peperoncino, the hot chilli peppers grown in the region. These same peppers are used for the region’s well-known sausage spread, ‘nduja, a Calabrian product now found in most British supermarkets.