Perhaps I spoke too soon. I was in the Jenny Lou’s up by Chaoyang Park West Gate and, in light of yesterday’s rant about NZ wine in China, thought I’d have a wee look around their wine department. I found a few bottles of NZ wine mixed in with the Aussies and thought, typical, then looked a bit further and saw a section devoted to NZ wine. Not a huge section, a fraction of the size of the space dedicated to Australia and South Africa, either side of the NZ section. There was actually a selection of NZ wines. I would guesstimate a dozen-odd brands, some of which had 2 to 3 wines on the shelves, so not a huge selection, but more than the lonely 1 or 2 I’m used to seeing on the rare occasions I’ve found them in the past. And some of them were going for almost reasonable prices.
I still think NZ’s wine industry is doing far from enough to market their product in China. Compare with dairy – everybody claiming to source their milk powder from NZ plays that up loud in their advertising, and NZ cheese and butter is easy to find. Or kiwifruit – I’ve seen plenty of large, prominent displays of Zespri kiwifruit in the fruit sections of supermarkets. But still, what I saw in Jenny Lou’s today is a vast improvement on any previous sighting of NZ wine in China.
