7 minute read
Welcome to the Rosénado
FIRST CAME THE SAUVALANCHE. NOW, WE’RE DEEP IN THE GRIPS OF THE ROSÉNADO, AS ANDREW GRAHAM DISCOVERS.
Rosé is the fastest growing category in the Australian wine industry, with value rising by 60 per cent YOY to the beginning of this year (according to IRI figures). What’s more, the dollar growth was more than double that of 2016 too, a nod to how quickly the popularity of rosé has exploded. And for some retailers, this is just the start.
THE LOVE OF PINK
What sets rosé apart is that it is on as much a wine as a lifestyle choice. Rosé is a segment where, unlike the rest of the wine world, variety and production methods are less important, with branding and packaging instead the key focus.
As Simon Green of online wine store My Wine Guy notes, “rosé is as much an accessory as a drink”.
“It’s incredibly marketable; the ultimate drink for the Instagram generation. Colourful, and generally drunk outdoors, rosé as a style has its own PR department built right in,” he said.
The importance of colour can’t be overestimated with the appeal of rosé. It’s pink so it must be fun. There is even a rosé cider category now, just to emphasise the pull of pink. And the particular shade of pink is vitally important too. Once upon a time (or at least up until the early part of this decade), most Australian rosé was red in colour, typically more medium bodied (and often ripe), and off-dry. They were wines inspired by robust Rosato or sweet Portugese Rosado, where juicy, ripe fruit was the key. But, increasingly, the modern mode is towards lighter, pale pink or even orange coloured, savoury and bone-dry wines that instead take their cues from Provence.
It’s now at the point where consumers will make rosé purchasing decisions based solely on colour – with those pale coloured, delicate wines being the flavour of the year.
PIONEERS
Still, the rosé market remains a broad church, and you need only see the ongoing success of Mateus for evidence.
Here’s a wine that, for generations, has defined rosé. With a history dating back to 1942 (Jimmy Hendrix was photographed swigging from a bottle), Mateus is a wine defined by its cantil bottle and sweet red fruit.
But even Mateus is changing. Australia is one of the test markets for a brand new bottle, and backed by a new push to rosé drinkers, tapping into the brand’s rich history.
Sarah Nichols, from McWilliam’s Wines explains: “While Mateus was a wine many of us growing up in the 70s and 80s remembers with fondness, its fresh, fruity and elegant taste profile is as relevant now as it ever was.
“Mateus has consistently been one of the top performing rosé (by volume) in the Australian market for over 20 years. Consumers are showing with their shopping dollars that the fruit-driven style of rosé is not off their agenda.”
Andrew Calabria launches the Pierre D’Amour Rosé
Other prominent winemakers have proven that it isn’t just about pale wines either, like Brown Family Wine Group, which produces rosé across the flavour kaleidoscope.
As Marketing Manager Emma Brown describes, that’s a deliberate move.
“The category is experiencing this growth across colour spectrum and taste profile from dry to off-dry traditional brands to contemporary brands – there’s no one recipe for success,” she said.
Of note, however, is the inclusion of ‘dry’ on the label of the Brown Brothers 1889 Rosé, an acknowledgement that while the colour is a little darker, the style is not sweet and savoury.
By contrast, if we’re looking for a champion of the Australian pale rosé style then it is unquestionably De Bortoli. While they weren’t the first to produce this style locally, the De Bortoli team are unquestionably key drivers.
Long successful with juicier styles, it was the success of the La Bohéme Rosé in 2010 that kickstarted the interest. De Bortoli then helped fund a marketing campaign coined the ‘Rosé Revolution’ that aimed to highlight the joy of savoury, dry, Provence-inspired pale rosé.
De Bortoli clearly found a niche, with La Bohéme enjoying 40 per cent growth last year and among the market leaders, with De Bortoli rosé volumes from the expanded portfolio now up by 71.2 per cent compared to last year (IRI Market Edge figures).
Like Mateus, De Bortoli has recognised the role that packaging plays in the rosé purchasing decision too, with the trophy-winning design on the De Bortoli Rosé Rosé a perfect example of what it takes, as Leanne De Bortoli explains.
“Part of La Bohéme’s popularity in the early days was due to the interesting label on the bottle and the gorgeous pale pink colour inside,” she said.
“It doesn’t matter how good the wine is, you need to attract customers’ attention with eye-catching packaging… and at the right price point too.”
PRETTY IN PINK
‘Eye-catching’ rosé doesn’t stop with the label either. At Handpicked Wines they have released a collaborative rosé with fashion designer Romance Was Born in a prime example of how lifestyle and rosé can be intertwined.
It was hugely popular too, as Imogen Hayes describes: “(The rosé) was our first fashion collaboration and it was such a success we decided to run it again for 2018.
“Fashion is a fun alignment for a category like rosé. Having designers like Romance Was Born, who are pretty quirky and out-there and have an influential following in Australia, helped it work. Their demographic aligns perfectly with a rosé crowd.”
In that same vein, Calabria Family Wines has just released a wine called Pierre D’Amour Rosé – French for ‘the stone of love’. Here, the wine comes with a rose quartz stone attached to the bottle for an extra dimension.
As third generation Calabria family member Elizabeth Calabria-Staltare explains, this detail is aimed at a very specific demographic.
“We have designed this gorgeous packaging with millennial drinkers in mind... we wanted to add a layer of personality to our packaging.”
The push towards millennial drinkers is not new in the world of wine. Perpetually, the wine industry has attempted to woo younger drinkers with distinctive bottles, quirky labels and weird blends. It’s a constant cycle.
But many winemakers and marketers believe that a wellmade and presented rosé offering might serve to bridge the gap – something that even non-wine drinking millennials might choose to drink. An anti-wine wine, if you will.
That approach was the motivation for the new La La Land wines from the Wingara Wine Group, as Annelie Mitchell describes: “Millennials are not as interested in the traditional, somewhat conservative aspect of wine drinking but want fun and approachable wine for social occasions.
“The aim of La La Land was to build on that attitude and have fun with both making and packaging the wines – to be a little creative and challenge the sometimes-stuffy world of wine.” More than just a frivolous drink, some, such as My Wine Guy’s Green, believe that rosé could be the vinous gateway drug. “I truly believe that rosé will remain one of the greatest stepping stones for future generations to understand and enjoy wine. It’s easy to appreciate. It doesn’t take great thought, it’s naturally tied to the weather, celebration, frivolity, and even those with just a passing interest in wine can see and appreciate a good quality rosé.”
GOING UPMARKET
While Australian rosé is growing at an exponential rate, internationally the style is also booming.
IWSR-Vinexpo forecasts predict that the global rosé wine market will grow by an extra 135 million litres between 2016 and 2021, which is already on the back of sustained growth. In Provence, the rosé export market has increased sixfold over the past few decades, and shipments to Australia increased 127 per cent in 2017 alone.
What’s more, the prices of most Provence rosé lean toward the premium end of the price spectrum, with the top wines – like the Whispering Angel – weighing in at $40/bottle.
Locally, however, the lingering question remains about whether rosé, as a category, can graduate from simple fun into serious wine – and whether consumers will pay for it.
Of the top six fastest-growing varietals and categories, rosé still has the lowest price per litre (IRI data). Further, there remains a perception that rosé has a natural price ceiling, as Green describes: “The current thinking is sadly still quantity over quality.
“Rosé is a commodity to the average wine drinker, they treat it like it’s another weekly necessity like milk or bread, and oddly enough it is the one wine we see where full case/volume sales still lead the way. In fact, I would even say that rosé has more in common with the beer, spirits and RTD category than it does with wine, especially as the supermarkets still dominate the space.
“At $20 and above, it is like there is an invisible barrier that prevents anyone from spending beyond this price for a bottle. People just can’t
justify paying above and beyond this price for something that has always sold for well below $15 (or less), and our sales results show it.”
Still, some producers have demonstrated that serious rosé is not only a possibility but has a market too, such as Longview in the Adelaide Hills. Here, an uncompromised approach to rosé has delivered one of the most awarded rosé in the country, with the 2017 Longview Nebbiolo Rosé the winner of Best Rosé at the 2017 National Wine Show, and the new 2018 winning the trophy (also for Best Rosé) at the Sydney Wine Show. According to vigneron Mark Saturno, there is just one secret to success. “In a word: Nebbiolo,” he said. “The beauty of Nebbiolo for rosé is its ability to display fruit sweetness while staying dry. This is appealing to people that are transitioning from the sweeter styles – it’s a good tool to educate them on the difference between sugar-sweet and fruit-sweet. It also shows great acid and tannin for those who want something more complex. And the colour is really sophisticated. Ticks a lot of boxes.”
Indeed Nebbiolo may well prove to be the grape of choice for more premium rosé.
For De Bortoli, the 2018 Vinoque Nebbiolo Rosé recently won the Best Rosé trophy at the 2018 Alternative Variety Wine Show. Or the Domenica Nebbiolo Rosé from Beechworth, which has turned heads as a high-quality style.
It remains to be seen whether Nebbiolo is the future grape for super premium rosé. And on the back of such explosive growth it’s little wonder that rosé as a segment is still in flux. Many believe that this market is going to take time to mature (again) and whether juicy, off-dry styles can coexist with the current wave of pale and savoury wines.
But Wingara Wine Group’s Mitchell puts it well: “As Rosé is enjoyed by a wider demographic in Australia, consumers will realise it doesn’t have to be to be pale or Pinot Noir to be dry or refreshing.”
