THE WINE MERCHANT. An independent magazine for independent retailers
Issue 91, May 2020
Dog of the Month: Poco Last Drop Wines, London
One of the independent trade’s most popular promotions, 31 Days of German Riesling, returns this July. Participants will receive a pack including digital as well as physical promotional material and have the chance to win £1,000 towards wine listings. For more information on how to get involved, see pages 28 and 29.
Better than we dared hope The picture still looks bleak for the on-trade, but for many indies the past eight weeks have triggered a sales boom
A
s the UK gradually starts plotting
We speak to 16 indies in this month’s
its route out of lockdown,
issue of The Wine Merchant, and find that,
from the early days of Covid-19 not
sales increase is as high as 60% and there
independent wine merchants are
breathing a sign of relief after emerging merely unscathed – but perhaps in a
better position than they were before the pandemic disrupted life for everybody in the country.
despite the challenges they all face, the
mood is broadly upbeat. In many cases, the are hopes that merchants will be able to hang on to their new customers.
Tensions still exist, with retailers uneasy
about suppliers going direct to consumers
to make up for lost on-trade business, and suppliers nervous that many indies have
shifted their focus of late to wines selling for £10 and under.
For indies reliant on drink-in sales, the
picture looks gloomy until July 4 at the earliest – and landlords have not been showing much sympathy.
Our coverage starts on page 4.