Newsletters
 February, 2009
Dear Customer,
Our newsletters are unfashionably verbose, so if you prefer to go straight to a particular topic, the main headings are below.
Notes of Optimism at the start of February:
 | The exchange rate continues to improve in favour of the pound. |
| Eurotunnel returns to full service on 10th February with a shuttle every 20 minutes and a crossing time of just 35 minutes. |
| This month LD Lines start their new three times per day boat service from Dover into Boulogne. |
| The number of people looking at and ordering from the Boursot websites, despite the economic problems, is running at an all time high. |
back to top
Weddings
I understand that despite (or is that because of?) the gloom in Britain, wedding engagements are at a record high in early 2009. So with couples now planning the food and drink for their weddings, if you have had good experiences with Boursot’s, we will be really grateful if you recommend us to anyone who needs good but inexpensive wines for their wedding. If you would be kind enough to advise me the contact details of the person responsible for buying the wines, I will happily make contact.
The savings over UK prices still remain huge and as you know, the couple can enjoy a great day out in France, getting away from the pressures of the build up to their Great Day. Although our wines are guaranteed at whichever quality level they choose, couples can try the wines here quietly prior to deciding and get experienced advice on their wines so as to create the right impression within their own budget.
We can recommend and book a restaurant for them and then of course we will load the car for them. It is all so civilised and enjoyable, and the savings made can then be spent on the honeymoon or the new marital home!
During the month of February, spend more than 400€ at Boursot’s Wine Collection and you can have the cost of your day return boat crossing refunded. To take advantage, book through the Ferry Travel Club on 0870 264 2644 mentioning our code “Boursot” and then bring along a copy of your receipt and we will knock the cost of the crossing off your wine bill.
back to top
Market Conditions
In difficult times, people continue to enjoy wine but tend to trade down to lower priced bottles. Of course one easy way of cutting your spending on wine is to hop over and stock up in Ardres. Where it is possible to compare like for like, from now on we plan to show comparative prices so that you can see clearly the savings to be had here. Clearly this will take some time to research but will be put up in our shop and on our website as the data becomes available.
By the current reckoning, 44% of the price of a £4.99 bottle bought in Britain is tax and this percentage will of course rise again in the budget - I believe you’d be crazy to buy party or wedding wines in Britain. Here in France wine is virtually duty-free and at Boursot’s Wine Collection good wines still start at the equivalent of around £2.80 per bottle as you will see from our new February list. The government needs to claw back as much revenue as possible and we can expect to hear a repeat of last year’s performance, in which scare stories of enormous duty increases were circulated prior to the budget so that by the time the final tax increase was announced, people felt a sense of relief that it was “only £0.13 + VAT” per bottle – something that would have caused an outcry a few years ago.
Marketing jargon has irreversibly found its way into the minds of many people with the infamous “50% off” offers with little question as to the true value of the product. As quoted in our August 2007 newsletter, I shall always remember the words of the head of one of the drinks giants who confirmed in The Guardian that wines designed for sale at £3.99 were introduced at an artificially inflated price and then brought down on “Special Offer”. “They start at £7.99 and are discounted down to half price, which is crazy" said the Chief Executive of Pernod Ricard which owns Jacobs Creek, Campo Viejo, Montana and Mumm among its various interests. He added “Consumers know they are being misled. They get used to it.” Hmmmm...
The British government has talked rightly of outlawing such practices as loss leaders on alcohol but I feel that these would be fiercely resisted by the supermarket giants and I don’t see the government having the proverbials to fight this point. Unless of course it is forced to by Brussels, which is where the edict is really coming from.
As a result of competition from the discounter supermarkets, Tesco in particular has been going through turbulent times cutting its wine range by 25% and demanding that suppliers agree to an immediate (and probably backdated) price cut of up to 30% - a nigh impossible feat with new duty rates and increased packaging costs and transport charges, even before the difficult exchange rate. It is for such reasons that many producers all over the world feel they need to plan for their longer term futures and are deserting discounting Britain, choosing to refocus their efforts on more lucrative markets such as the Far East.
Talking of Brussels, you can expect to see allergen labelling on wine bottles from May which, on the face of it, sounds reasonable enough. However as so often is the case there is some over-caution and you may for instance see on your wine label “contains egg” when there is none actually present - the misunderstanding among the bureaucrats being based upon the fact that egg whites have been used for centuries to clarify high quality wine. But any residues have yet to be proven.
back to top
Dinners
Our Gourmet Dinner at the Hotel Le Relais last Saturday evening was really enjoyable. Apart from discussing the disparate aspects of the wine world at the moment, we enjoyed over a four course dinner a horizontal comparison (same year but different producers of Chablis: one from Domaine William Fèvre, the other from Domaine Laroche) and a vertical comparison of different years of the excellent claret: Château Liversan, Cru Bourgeois Supérieur Haut-Médoc .
Guests’ reactions were interesting and I was pleased to hear that between the Chablis, our own Saint-Martin from Domaine Laroche, the cheaper of the two wines, was preferred for its soft flavour. In comparing the two vintages 2004 and 2005 clarets over dinner, it was clear that our 2004 was currently so much more flavoursome and offered better value than the wine from the “great” year. We rounded off with our unusual but delicious new chestnut liqueur. After all that food and wine, I understand the party went on until the small hours!
back to top
Rhône Gourmet Dinner at Hotel Château Tilques
Our next Gourmet Dinner is on Saturday 7th March when Christophe Mingeaud, the producer of our ever-popular Rasteau and Châteauneuf du Pape will be coming up from the Rhône to talk about his red, white and rosé wines. This promises to be an evening of spectacular wines and the excellent cuisine of Château Tilques will be chosen to accompany these special wines.
Places are available at 92€ (about £80 at today’s rate) per person to include a minimum of 4 courses, 6 wines, coffee, water and all entertainment, which offers you extraordinary value. There will be nothing further to pay.
Accommodation with breakfast included is available at 159€ per room (substantially reduced rate for Boursot customers from 306€) at the 4 star Hotel Château Tilques (you can visit their website by clicking on those words).
back to top
February Special Offer
Château de Sours Rosé, 2007: a dry fruity Bordeaux rosé made from 60% Merlot and 40% Cabernet Sauvignon grapes. This hugely popular wine sells for £8.99 in the UK but from Boursot’s Wine Collection in Ardres, you can buy it for just 5,80€ - about a fiver at today’s rate. This delicious wine will be good to enjoy for at least another couple of years. At this price, we expect it to sell out quickly, so I recommend letting us know your requirements as soon as possible so that we can put your order to one side. This is a one-off.
back to top
Wine News
One new feature that you may find useful is our Currency Indicator which shows the current exchange guide rate on the Home Page of our website. You may wish to bookmark this page so that you can go straight there when you wish to check the current pound / euro exchange rate.
This is the time of the year when many of the French wine shows are laid on for the world’s wine trade buyers. To me these are more interesting than the major exhibitions where the rates charged for the stands deter many of the smaller producers from participating. At two of these recent shows, one in Montpelier and one in Angers, the British trade buyers were notable for their absence, only confirming to me that the UK market is going to be running very short of European and in particular French wines very shortly. Today’s rate of 1.14€/£ is certainly a welcome improvement on the rate from the beginning of January and city pundits say they expect the rate to return to 1.40€/£ as soon as early summer: we wait to see.
Many of us enjoyed the wine programme “Château Monty” on Channel 4 a few months ago. The latest programme on wine to arrive on your screen is a three part series that I understand will show off the stories and characters involved with the production and sale of wine, even though with wine’s growth so much of that production has become highly mechanised. The first episode is about my old firm, Berry Bros & Rudd where I worked for 17 happy years so as you can imagine I will be glued to it, squinting to see any familiar faces. The second episode will be on Château Margaux in Bordeaux and the third on a state of the art winery in South Africa. “Wine” starts on BBC 4 on Monday 16 February.
Trade wise, the First Quench group has been in the trade news again, with talk of further rationalisation and the possible closure of 400 of its Threshers, Wine Rack and The Local shops. Oddbins on the other hand seems to be finding its feet under its new ownership but as yet, has not found its own identity. Two major wine wholesalers to the London hotel and restaurant trade have closed down or taken over recently as casualties in the current economic turmoil and rumours abound about others. Wholesaling is a difficult market even at the bets of times.
In South Australia, growers are being forced by the heatwave to harvest earlier than they would like. Areas such as McLaren Vale, the Barossa valley and Coonawarra have been badly affected by temperatures of around 46°C. The reds in particular are reported not to have fully ripened yet and whatever happens finally, the crop is currently expected to be 30% - 70% down as so many grapes are simply shrivelling up.
back to top
Conclusion
What a world of extremes we live in! I have written about heatwaves whilst on the radio I hear that Britain is under the most snow for 17 years. Yet despite our proximity, we have had virtually no snow here.
I look forward to seeing you again in sunny Ardres very soon.
With my best wishes
Guy
Guy Boursot
Wine Consultants SARL
Boursot’s Wine Collection
9 Rue de l’Arsenal
62610 ARDRES, France
Tel: +33 321 36 81 46
back to top
| 
