Overview of Top Stories in the Russian Wine World.
Every week we identify for you the top stories in Russia about wine, spirits, restaurants, beer, cider, etc. We provide an English-language summary of each of them, as well as a link if you want to learn more.
Written by Evgeniy Kotelevsky, edited by Thomas Anthony.
Russian wine instead of Beaujolais Nouveau
Kuban-Vino was a few days ahead of the Beaujolais Nouveau festival of young wine, traditionally celebrated on the third Thursday of November, which is now presenting its 2021 harvest. There are four wines in their new release: one red (Saperavi) and three sparkling wines. This is the earliest release of the 2021 harvest from Russian winemakers. Watch the video presentation.
Photo: © Kuban-Vino
New record: the most expensive bottle of wine sold
A six-liter bottle of winery The Setting Wines “Glass Slipper Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon 2019” was sold at the Carnivale du Vin charity auction on November 6 in New Orleans for a record price of 1 million dollars! However, a 0.75-liter bottle of this wine sells for just $185 – although there were only 900 bottles of this vintage produced. Read the original in English.
The Russian Supreme Court has declined to award 11 billion rubles compensation to the former owner of the Yubileinaya winery
Aslanbiy Nagoy, the former owner of the Yubileinaya agricultural company in the Krasnodar region, was refused 10.99 billion rubles compensation in his claim for loss of profits, which he filed against the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Krasnodar region, KB Kuban Credit LLC, and the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation (represented by the Federal Treasury of the Krasnodar region). Background: “Yubileinaya” was bought by Aslanbiy in 2014, bankruptcy proceedings were launched in 2019, and in 2020 the insolvent company was bought by Abrau-Durso. Read the original news in Russian.
Abkhazia has fallen off the list of the Top-5 wine importers to Russia
Abkhazia, which for a long time held the lead thanks to its popular semi-sweet wines such as Lykhny, was overtaken by Portugal, which took fifth place in the ranking. It showed record growth, from 8.4 to 12.9 million liters, in the first nine months of 2021. In terms of the volume of wine imported, Italy took first place, followed by Spain, Georgia, and France. Read the original news in Russian.
Russian wine production has dropped significantly in 2021
This decline was reported by the National Union for the Protection of Consumer Rights. The overall drop in wine and wine-beverage production was 15.6% through the first ten months of 2021. The drop in production is explained by the withdrawal of some players from the market after restrictions on import of bulk wine. Especially significant declines were seen in production of sparkling wines (-8.7%), fruit wines (-28.5%), and fortified wine beverages (-55.9%). However, the overall decrease in sparkling wine production was ameliorated by a modest increase (17.1%) in October, apparently due to companies making up for production shortfalls and building inventory before the busy holiday period. Read the original news in Russian.
Winners of the Russian Wine Trophy 2021 competition announced
Here are the winners: first place — Vyacheslav Tkachenko, second place — Veronika Smirnova, third place — Olga Ovechkina. The event took place on November 11 at the Emerald Grand Hotel in St. Petersburg. Read the original news in Russian.
International Sherry Week from 8 to 14 November
This event, intended to popularize Sherry around the world, has been held annually since 2014. Last year's Sherry Week was nominated for Best Social Media Campaign by The Drinks Business, International Wine Challenge Spain, and Drinks International. Read this article in Russian to learn more about Sherry.
Photo: © Vinos de Jerez Sherry Wines
The first winery in the Rosa Khutor ski resort
Soon there will be wines produced at Rosa Khutor from Sauvignon Blanc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, and the autochthonous variety Krasnostop Zolotovsky. The grapes for the wines will be supplied from Anapa by Gennady Oparin, known for his Semigorye Estate project. Read the original news in Russian.
New wine regions to emerge in Russia
The state plans to subsidize ten new wine-making regions from 2022 to 2024: Adygeia, Ingushetia, Kabardino-Balkaria, Karachay-Cherkessia, Tatarstan, Chechnya, Northern Ossetia, and the Stavropol, Volgograd, and Orenburg regions. The money will be used to plant and maintain new vineyards. The total amount that the government plans to allocate through 2024 to support vineyards is 7.5 billion rubles. Read the original news in Russian.
The owner of the “Red and White” and “Bristol” alcohol chain stores postpones Moscow IPO
Mercury Retail, with over 14,000 stores across the country, decided to postpone its IPO due to "market conditions." Earlier this month, the company announced its plans to place up to 200 million GDR at a price of $6-6.50. Thus, the market capitalization of the company would have been $12-13 billion, which would have been the largest listing for a Russian company since 2014. However, some analysts felt that this valuation of the company was too high. Read the original news in English.
Cover Photo: © Sergey Ratanov.