Champagne embraces Tate Modern for return to London tasting circuit

By Andrew Catchpole

Published: 20 February, 2025

France’s most celebrated fizz is returning in force to the London stage in the shape of The Definitive Champagne Tasting.

This follows a hiatus of six or so years since the annual CIVC tastings, during which time Tyson Stelzer's Taste Champagne event twice brought around 60 Champagne houses to the capital in 2019 and 2022 to help satiate the UK taste for the wines.

Organised by the Champagne Agents Association (CAA), a UK affiliation of importers that traces its origins back almost 120 years, the new event is to take place on 1 April at Tate Modern, with some 50-plus producers confirmed to be in attendance.

As such – and given that this spread will fold in all from big houses to smaller grower-producers and cooperatives – The Definitive Champagne Tasting looks set to match or even exceed the breadth of the old CIVC (Comité Interprofessionnel du Vin de Champagne)-organised annual tastings.

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Pol Roger Portfolio MD and current CAA chair, James Simpson MW, told Harpers that while it was a risk, he and his fellow Champagne shippers felt the time was right to re-introduce a sizeable focus on the fizz.

“Basically we all decided to get together and see if we could make this work, to do the right thing, and thank goodness it looks like it is working,” said Simpson.

“We all remember the good old days of the CIVC tastings… but for whatever commercial reasons, and the pandemic, they decided to move away from that and a bunch of UK shippers decided to band together and see if we could do this and get our act together to keep Champagne on track.”

With Simpson currently inhabiting the rotating role of CAA chair, he and his rival Champagne importers decided on a modern venue, to complement the “something for everyone, rather than just the posh houses” approach to the tasting.

“We chose the Blavatnik Building (pictured) at Tate Modern, which is all concrete, steel and glass [inside], but with beautiful views over St Paul’s and The City, and we’re hopeful we can get trade buyers to come over the river [Thames]. But basically, we are just trying to do the simplest trade tasting ever, not trying to reinvent anything,” he added.

The timing, though, is possibly astute as early indications show that Champagne’s bumpy ride through Covid and beyond is evening out this year. The UK market is likely to have overtaken the depressed US market in volume terms – although with annual UK sales possibly panning out at 5-10% below the pre-Covid heydays (final annual 2023-2024 figures will be out in March), but still pressing home the importance of Britain to the Champenoise.

The format, said Simpson, is folding in long tables featuring, respectively, non-vintage and vintage wines, to allow for ease of comparative tasting, with all of the attending producers than having their own dedicated table with other interesting picks from their portfolio.

“The aim, as we’re doing this in the first year, is to try and get it right,” said Simpson.

Of the UK market more generally, he added: “Champagne has been strong in the UK for 150 years; it was pretty much the first export market and, given the size of the population, if we can overtake the States again in terms of volume, that’s pretty good going.

“Looking at individual figures, month-on-month, the first half of last year was pretty depressing, with price increase that went through slowing it down again, but actually the last six months seem pretty decent and Christmas like-for-like were pretty much the same, so it looks as if the worst of the ‘going down’ has happened.”

As Simpson concluded, it looks as if the consumers “are still bothered” with France’s premier sparkling wine.

For more details of The Definitive Champagne Tasting, or to register for one of the two tasting sessions at 10am-2pm or 2pm-5pm, click here.

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