Events

Sauvignon Blanc gathers congress
«Vitrina» November 2008

Sauvignon Blanc, second most popular white grape in the world, grabbed attention of the wine industry at a recent international event World Sauvignon Congress that gathered 250 participants worldwide.

The congress took place in Austrian Graz, capital of Styria province, known as one of winemaking regions where Sauvignon Blanc is grown.

The initiative of a congress belonged to the Chief Agricultural Officer for the province of Styria Johann Seitinger. “Sauvignon Blanc is one of the most fascinating grape varieties in the world. “However, this grape variety is often underestimated in the international context and seldom given the accolades accorded to Chardonnays and red wines. It is the aim of our initiative to develop strategies to improve the knowledge and raise the profile of Sauvignon Blanc”, he said. Each of the 3 days during which the congress was held, was dedicated to a certain aspect — winegrowing, winemaking and marketing. Experts from France, New Zealand, Great Britain, South Africa and other countries, including Russia, were speaking or giving presentations.

At present Sauvignon Blanc is planted on approximately 80,000 hectares. By size of plantings of white varieties, it is second only to Chardonnay, with 140,000 hectares of vineyards. The majority of Sauvignon is cultivated in France where it has about a third of the world’s vines. Among French vineyards, main production centres have traditionally been in Bordeaux and the Loire Valley, but Languedoc took over them recently. There are 6,400 hectares in Languedoc now. Along with France, main Sauvignon Blanc producing countries are New Zealand, especially Marlborough, Chile, South Africa, USA, Australia, Italy, Austria and Germany.

Sauvignon Blanc easily adapts to various natural and climatic conditions — for this reason winegrowers can successfully cultivate it in different wine zones. Vineyard location, though, affects general wine style which is evident when comparing Sauvignon from the Upper Loire in France, Constantia in South Africa, Marlborough in New Zealand, California in the US or Styria in Austria.

New Zealand wines from Marlborough have achieved a phenomenal success in the past 20 years. Their expressive, explosive bouquet, in which “green” vegetal notes combine with exotic fruit, is appreciated by a wide consumer circle. Today Sauvignon Blanc is a signature grape of New Zealand winemaking industry. Dr. Richard Smart, one of the leading international authorities on viticulture, discovered another promising zone — Australian Tasmania. Its natural conditions are almost identical to those of Marlborough. Smart believes that Tasmania has a great future in producing quality Sauvignon Blanc.

Research by Wendy Parr from New Zealand provided a scientific proof to wine profiles from various regions, already well known to specialists. Sauvignon Blanc from Marlborough, Sancerre and South Styria was compared. New Zealand wines have an equal combination of vegetal and fruity flavours, French are dominated by minerality and Austrian — by fruitiness.

Larry Lockshin, professor of wine marketing at the University of South Australia, presented curious findings on consumer behaviour. It is rare when someone prefers only one grape variety or wine style. People choose many different wines, yet better trust those which are easier to recognise. In other words, the more a certain brand or grape variety is presented on a shelf, the higher the probability that a buyer will put a bottle in his basket or make a repeat purchase. Consumers can broadly be divided in 2 groups — with low and high involvement. The former are more interested in the situation of consumption rather than wine as such, so a bottle is chosen by external parameters — text on the label, general design, etc. High involvement consumers are smaller in numbers. They are interested in wine origin, production, style and other details. Wine trade spends more efforts on working with this group of people as ultimately they buy more expensive wines.

Professor Lockshin marked that the worldwide share of purchases for Sauvignon Blanc is growing, but it is still relatively low when compared to three main leaders — Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay and Merlot. Future success directly depends on marketing programmes of producers or wine regions which specialise in the variety.

In the meantime, consumers in different markets have distinct preferences for particular wine producing zones. For example, the British value most wines from New Zealand and are prepared to pay for them more than for wines from other countries. If the average price for a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc in a shop is 4,93 pounds, a bottle from New Zealand would cost 6,44 pounds. In Russia, Sauvignon Blanc is the second most popular white variety after Chardonnay. Russian wine merchants believe that demand is adequate in a general context of quality wines consumption. We drink more Sauvignon Blanc of European origin, especially France, but also buy New World wine if the price is not too high.

Other topics, such as winegrowing and winemaking, were also discussed in detail during the congress. The event proved to be successful, and there are plans to run it in future in leading Sauvignon Blanc wine regions, such as the Loire Valley in France, Marlborough in New Zealand or Stellenbosch in South Africa.