Column: Trends

Mark Bertrand loves Italy. He loves the country, the culture, the crowds, the chaos, the hand gestures, the food and especially the wines. For him, a wine is more than the product in a bottle. For Mark, it is an experience, waiting to be opened. He goes in search of the story behind the wine and likes to take you on that journey of discovery.
Image: Unsplash

I recently visited Vinitaly, the wine fair for every Italian wine lover. Since 1967, the whole world has been invited to marvel at all the wines our favourite boot has to offer, and it seems like every winemaker is present at that fair in Verona during those days. It is huge! Even much bigger than you would have in your mind right now and I begrudge everyone such a Vinitaly moment. I tasted, walked around, chatted and observed some trends and a few of them I would like to share with you.

Winefluencers

You could spot them from a distance. Invariably with (at least) a mobile phone in their hand, they walked around taking selfies after every 2 metres and adding reels on the digital highway saying how 'amazing', 'stupenda' or 'super' it all was. The more professional influencers even had people with them who were constantly sporting halo lights and cameras. During a wine tasting at Giovanni Calò's place, a wine influencer came to ask for a collab. Giovanni rebuffed the request, saying deadpan that it was already the third one that day. My friend from Puglia is more the traditionalist winemaker who lets his wines speak for themselves and has less faith in that newfangled media. "Wine has to be tasted and understood. They don't always understand that," Calò said.

Target audience

Klaus Lentsch sees it differently. This winegrower from Alto Adige noticed that the proportion of young people buying wines from him was decreasing and took on a marketing agency aimed at young people. The result was that he was now showing a rosato at the fair with the eloquent name 'Mää' (as in a sheep barking) and with a label showing a sheep with pink fur, sunglasses and hoodie. I pause for a moment so you have some time to let this sink in. For the picture-thinkers among us, I am attaching a picture. On the left, an example of the line of labels up to that point (sleek, abstract) and on the right, the Mää. It is clearly different and I told him so. Klaus laughed and responded adamantly "but you are not the target group either. Does he have a great point, of course. Apart from my personal opinion, Klaus is trying to capitalise on developments with the Mää as a provisional result. By the way, I really have to get used to that name.

Piedmont

A visit to Alario Claudio from Piedmont is invariably part of my visit to Vinitaly. The great thing about Alario is that he turns every development into an opportunity. For instance, the trend of premiumisation is becoming more and more visible. Premiumisation is the trend of consumers increasingly choosing a higher-quality wine but generally drinking less. Smiling, he poured me one Barolo after another and honestly, I couldn't choose. Every sip was a hit! In case it wasn't already clear: Alario is prepared for the future.

So many people, so many wines, so many stories. I'm happy to share them with you. A final tip: visit Vinitaly sometime. It really is an experience!

Salute! Mark

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