CHATEAU FAUGERES HAS A NEW OWNER

Corine Guisez, the 58 year-old owner of Château Faugères, has announced that she has sold her 57 hectares of vines (30 in 
Saint Emilion and 27 in the Cotes de Castillon) declaring, 'This is due to personal reasons. My husband died in 1997 and my two daughters to not wish to take over managing the estate'. 

A Swiss-German businessman, Silvio Denz, who is in the perfume industry, is the new owner. The amount he paid was not released. He already owns a vineyard in Spain.(Source: Sud Ouest).

JAIL FOR US WINE FRAUDSTER

A Kings Park wine merchant will likely be fermenting behind bars for several years after pleading guilty in federal court yesterday to scamming customers out of $500,000. Barry Silver, 53, who owned two Suffolk County wine stores, admitted to committing mail fraud in a three-year scheme to bilk customers for wine they never received. Silver also admitted to selling off customers' private stocks from the Port Jefferson wine vault he owned. "I took money from customers for wine I never delivered," Silver told Federal court. "I sent invoices through the mail for wines that were in storage that never existed" he said. Silver, who no longer owns Silver Spirits in St. James or The Perfect Grape in East Setauket, was arrested by the Suffolk district attorney's office last summer. (Source: Daily News).

WINE CRISIS IN FRANCE: PROTESTERS TURN TO BOMBS

A Languedoc winery was bombed on Monday night in an apparent protest against the power of large companies. There was no casualty and little damage was done in this escalation of a local campaign to resist brands and modernisation.

This attitude is simply inexcusable! One may hate multinational corporations more than most, but the way to "fight" them is to boycott their products and depose via elections those politicians who support such rather than bombing wineries. (Source: Decanter Magazine)

2004 BORDEAUX PRICES SET TO FALL

Reports that Christian Moueix, owner of numerous châteaux, including Petrus, has said that his 2004 prices will definitely drop due to the predicted weakness in the American market may not be enough to lift gloom in Bordeaux as the en-primeur campaign approaches. Simon Staples, sales director at Berry Brothers & Rudd and Contributor to Winemega.com, said that any château that keeps its prices at 2003 levels is ‘insane’. ‘A lot of people bought heavily into 2003 and have had their fingers burnt,’ he explained. ‘Some renegade châteaux got their prices wrong by a mile – the market has already dropped off dramatically, by up to 20%. Unless the prices are down to 2002 levels, I can’t see a big interest this year.’ (Source: Harpers Wine)

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CLASSIFICATION REJECTED CRUS BOURGEOIS HAVE A SECOND CHANCE

The 77 Crus Bourgeois that were excluded from the latest classification (2004) are to get another chance to present their cases after the original selection was ruled unfair by the courts. The reclassification of Bordeaux's Cru Bourgeois has stunned many observers and angered hundreds of Bordeaux chateau owners. The 1932 classification ranked 99 chateaux as Cru Bourgeois. 

This time around, almost 490 chateaux applied for classification. Almost half of these chateaux were rejected - not downgraded but simply told to go away.

Needless to say, they were going to sue. The top award - Cru Bourgeois Exceptionnel - went to only the following nine chateaux: 

Chateau Chasse-Spleen, Chateau Phélan Ségur, Chateau Les Ormes de Pez, Chateau Poujeaux, Chateau Haut Marbuzet, Chateau Labegorce Zédé, Chateau de Pez, Chateau Potensac and Chateau Siran.  Superieur classification was given to 87 chateaux, and 151 chateaux were ranked in the regular Cru Bourgeois category. The rest - 243 ambitious, hopeful chateaux - were condemned. With this in mind, around 80 of the rejected 243 Bordeaux chateaux took court action, in the hope that the decisions would be reversed. (Source: Sud Ouest - The Post)

BERNARD MAGREZ SELLS SPIRITS FIRM

William Pitters, the spirits group founded by Bordeaux entrepreneur Bernard Magrez, has been sold to French drinks group Marie Brizard and he is now aiming to spend the proceeds buying a First Growth. The Bernard Magrez Company already owns a number of wines including the Graves Cru Classé Château Pape-Clément, and two other Grand Cru châteaux - Fombrauge and La La Tour-Carnet, in Saint Emilion and the Medoc respectively. 
(Source: Decanter Magazine)

70 MILLION EUROS OF STATE AID FOR FRENCH WINEMAKERS

France will give aid worth 70 million Euros to its embattled wine growers, hit by overproduction, lower consumption at home and rising competition abroad from "New World" wines. 

The plan included 40 million Euros in preferential loans for indebted farm businesses. This "will enable winemakers in financial distress to spread their financial commitments over five years, at a reduced cost," it said. There is also 15 million euros available in low interest loans for wine cooperatives, as well as other measures to help younger farmers in particular. The government said it would also spend 3.5 million euros this year promoting French wine exports. (Source: Reuters)

GRAND JURY EUROPEEN REPORTS ON 2000 BORDEAUX

Followers of the Grand Jury Européen's panel tasting approach may like to see the results of their 2000 Bordeaux tasting in Venice on the Wine Vegas
Highlights seem to be mostly at the top of the list with Pavie  averaging 93.81 points, ahead of La Mondotte, Pape-Clément, Monbousquet and Lynch-Bages which all averaged above 92 points. The top First Growth was Margaux - in 18th place with 90.06 points. The wines highlighted as outstanding value for money in the 90+ group were La Fleur de Boüard (Lalande de Pomerol), d'Aiguilhe (Cotes de Castillon) and Haut Condissas (Medoc) with the simple AC Bordeaux Reignac  just missing the cut. I'm not sure how useful this tasting will prove in the years ahead as many structured 2000 wines will presumably be in a closed phase for several years more and will have showed relatively poorly compared with the fruit bombs designed to appeal when young. The results make interesting reading though! (Source: Bordeaux Central)

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FINANCE CRISIS FORCES BIG SELL-OFF AT CORDIER
The French banking group Crédit Agricole has bought 400 hectares of vineyards from loss-making Cordier-Mestrezat, which had failed to make a success of recent purchases and has been hard-hit by the present financial crisis in Bordeaux. The properties include Grand Puy Ducasse (Pauillac), Rayne-Vigneau  (Sauternes), Meyney (Saint-Estephe), Lamothe-Bergeron, Blaignan and Plagnac (Haut-Medoc). The sale price was 95 million euros, including stocks and debts. (Source: Sud Ouest )

NEW PROMOTION EFFORTS FOR BORDEAUX WINES

Bordeaux wines are set for a new promotional blitz. The area's wine industry body, Conseil Interprofessionel du Vin de Bordeaux (CIVB), has launched a new campaign under the slogan "100 Bordeaux wines below Eur 15" (US$20), it was reported. Contrary to the widely-held view that Bordeaux wines are expensive, only 5% of them cost more than Eur 15, CIVB president, Christian Delpeuch, said. CIVB has asked five local wine guide publishers - Hachette, Bettane & Desseauve, Gerbelle & Maurange, Gault & Millau and le Guide des Sommeliers - to choose 100 Bordeaux wines at a price of below Eur 15 to be included in a brochure. The brochure will be presented at PR conferences in London, New York, Montreal, Toronto, San Francisco, Chicago, Brussels, 
Tokyo, Shanghai and Moscow.  (Source: Just-drinks)

NEW BRANDS

The French banking group Crédit Agricole has bought 400 hectares of vineyards from loss-making Cordier-Mestrezat, which had 
failed to make a success of recent purchases and has been hard-hit by the present financial crisis in Bordeaux. The properties include Grand Puy Ducasse (Pauillac), Rayne-Vigneau  (Sauternes Barsac), Meyney  (Saint-Estephe), Lamothe-Bergeron, Blaignan and Plagnac (Haut-Medoc).
The sale price was 95 million euros, including stocks and debts. (Source: Sud Ouest )

FRANCE RELAXES WINE PROMOTION RULES

The French anti-alcoholism rules - the Loi Evin - which prevented most wine advertising are to be relaxed. From now on publicity "can comprise references relating to the qualitative characteristics of the product" but these "references must be compatible with the objective of moderation in the consumption" of the product. Thus it will now be possible to promote the taste of the wine, the conditions under which it was manufactured, or the type of vine or type of vine, all of which were forbidden. (Source: Le Figaro)

TRIAGE BY MACHINE

The well-known Bordeaux château owner and winemaker André Lurton has invented a grape sorting machine that ensures levels of selection and care previously only available with the costly and time-consuming manual triage.

'It does in one hour the work that ten people can achieve in one day - and even then they would not be able to get these levels of accuracy", he says. Named 'La Tribaie', the first one is being used at Lurton's Château de Rochemorin in Pessac-Leognan Graves. It drops freshly picked fruit onto a sticky roller, which anything slightly rotten sticks to, along with the stalks, leaves and green berries. At the second level of selection the healthy fruit drops into a bag containing grape juice at a known density. The best grapes (with enough sugar in them to have good potential alcohol levels) drop to the bottom, and the remainder float. These perfect grapes are then ready for fermentation in the usual manner. I imagine that the machine to get rid of the sulphur gas will be very welcomed by chai workers. 
 (Source: Decanter Magazine)

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