Waverley's latest wine research shows that pubs could still be doing more to boost sales. Ben McFarland reports.
Wine in pubs may have come out of the dusty corner of the back-bar and shed its dunce cap in recent years, but the latest "school" report from Waverley has revealed that the on-trade could do better.
Waverley, the wine and spirits arm of Scottish & Newcastle, has unveiled findings from the second phase of its Face Value project, widely regarded as the most comprehensive analysis of the attitudes and habits of UK wine drinkers.
The first phase, launched in the spring of last year, introduced the trade to six key consumer types in an effort to help licensees meet the increasingly bespoke needs of wine drinkers.
These ranged from Classic Connoisseur, a mature-nosed guru of the grape, to Chardonnay Girl (pictured), a happy go-lucky pretty young thing with few responsibilities, a healthy social appetite and an even healthier disposable income.
One year on and in conjunction with research body Alcovision, Waverley has managed to delve deeper into the lives and complex psyches of these six key consumers by conducting more than 20,000 interviews asking the whos, wheres, hows and whats when it comes to drinking wine in both pubs and at home.
There was good news and there was also bad news. Firstly, on the positive side, wine in the on-trade is continuing to grow with sales up nine per cent last year.
The fact that the on-trade outperformed the take-home trade (up a less impressive seven percent) despite foot-and-mouth and September 11 is commendable.
However, the overall message from the Face Value research is that there is room for improvement in a number of key areas.
The first concerns the fact that wine in the on-trade is continuing to be hampered by its long-established affinity with food.
Despite the fact that around a third of people drinking wine at home do so while eating a meal, only 33.4 per cent of wine drunk in the on-trade is drunk without food.
If wine is to grow then it needs to make the transition from the dinner table of a gastro-pub to the back-bar of a YPV.
"It's changing, but slowly" added Dale Phillips, buying director at Waverley.
"But we need to try and grow this number. The big brewers have been designing a number of products to sit on the table and that's clearly a big challenge for us.
"For example, wine is not drunk by males watching a sporting event and we need to change that as there's a huge opportunity to get into that arena," he added.
Getting consumers to associate wine with different drinking occasions is key to wine's future growth in the on-trade, although it may be some time before we see hordes of young testosterone-fuelled men sipping an Argentinian Malbec and gawping at the big screen.
Research reveals the vast majority of drinkers switch from wine to beer as soon as they leave the house.
This widespread migration from grape to grain occurs across all consumer types and is a major head-scratcher for wine companies.
"Chardonnay Girl drinks wine at home before going out on the razzle but as soon as she leaves she automatically switches to lager," said Dale. "We're handing this volume to the beer and spirits companies on a plate."
Another grape-related gripe hampering the on-trade is the dearth of knowledge both behind and in-front of the bar.
The startling statistic that more than one in 10 wine drinkers think chardonnay is a red wine suggests there is still a lot of work to do on the education front.
Hew Dalyrimple, Waverley marketing director, said: "There are definite signs that pubs are learning some of the lessons that have been put into practice in the off-trade but there is still a lack of knowledge that needs to be addressed."
While the majority of drinkers can recollect whether it had been a red or a white wine that they last drunk in a pub, nearly two-thirds (61.2 per cent) of people asked didn't know the brand, grape, region or style of the wine.
While this alarming figure can be partly attributed to the fact that the respondant won't have necessarily been the person that ordered the wine in the pub, it still compares unfavourably with the off-trade figure of 39.9 per cent.
In a marked departure from the flowery rhetoric associated with wine, brands are looking to simplify the message on the labelling.
"The mystique is a mixed blessing," said Hew. "It's helped wine grow but now we're trying to make it much more accessible and we're getting fed-up with mystique.
"There's a huge amount of information to take in when ordering a wine and for consumers without a great deal of knowledge it can be intimidating and off-putting.
"All people need is some basic visible wine cues to reassure them."
Efforts to demystify wine for the consumer are hampered, however, by the fragmented nature of the wine category Dale added: "If brand companies can come up with a single message that can connect with the consumer, there's a prize there for us all."
Related articles:
Heard it on the grapevine? Boosting sales with the six faces of the wine drinker (6 June 2001)