Winemakers’ anger over Carrefour’s €1.66 bottles of Bordeaux wine

Winemakers in Bordeaux (Gironde, Nouvelle-Aquitaine) have protested and said their product is being “ransacked”, after finding bottles being sold for just €1.66 each at hypermarket chain Carrefour.

Wine industry professionals have condemned the price as “unacceptable”, and specialist website Vitisphère has even said the price is less than that of alcohol-free wines, or a 1.5 litre bottle of sangria.

Bottles at €1.66 each

Since March 19, as part of their Foire aux Vins event, some Carrefour stores have been selling bundles of six bottles of AOP (appellation origine protégée) Comte de Maignac for €9.96. This works out at €1.66 per bottle.

The chain is also selling bottles of Château Fontana at €11.82 for a bundle of six, which equates to €1.97 per bottle.

Individual bottles of each are being sold for €2.49 and €2.95 each respectively.

The brand has 60,000 of these bottles on sale at these prices, reports Sud-Ouest.

Protest stunt

"Always for less…these distributors are digging our grave,” wrote Gironde farming union FNSEA 33 on X (formerly Twitter).

Visite de la @FNSEA33 et collectif viti 33 à Carrefour Lormont ce 23/03 pour dénoncer les bas prix indécents dans les foires aux vins. pic.twitter.com/8rFD3a5wBY

— FNSEA de la Gironde (@FNSEA33) March 23, 2024

Late last week, the union organised a ‘stunt protest’ at Lormont, one of the participating Carrefour sites in Gironde. Producers replaced the bottles on shelves with uprooted vines, in a bid to symbolise the “disarray of the profession” and consequences of the low prices on the producers.

Members also presented the shop manager with an ironic certificate, which read: “2024 diploma for the best lowest price.” Writing on X, they said that “Bottles of Bordeaux at €1.66 = non-payment to the winemaker.”

Remise du diplôme du 1er prix le plus bas au directeur de Carrefour Lormont et au responsable de Johanes Boubéepar le secrétaire général de la @FNSEA33 pour de l'AOC !
1,66 € la bouteille de Bordeaux = non rémunération du viticulteur pic.twitter.com/kKGz3j5jOD

— FNSEA de la Gironde (@FNSEA33) March 23, 2024

The producers have said that these prices are “killing” their product, at a time when producers are already struggling against inflation and the trend towards lower wine consumption in France.

They have called for bottles to be sold at at least €3 each, minimum.

“Bordeaux does not deserve to be ransacked like this,” said Bastien Mercier, winemaker and vice president of the Viti33 campaigning committee, told BFM Business. “We can’t reduce our prices to the level of lesser wines.”

He said that producers in the region had made “huge efforts” to improve their quality, and that “80% of our vineyard lands are of high environmental value…but these prices aren’t”.

Mr Mercier also denied that consumers are “obsessed with price” when it comes to good wine, and that there was no need to sell good vintages at these low levels.

“These prices devalue the [Bordeaux] brand,” added Stéphane Gabard, president of the Vins de Bordeaux union. “When the price is too low, consumers believe that the quality isn’t there. This abnormally-low price, from the point of view of costs of production, is not possible.”

‘Clumsy situation’ but ‘payments not affected’

In its defence, Carrefour said that the prices “do not affect the winemakers’ payments at all”.

The head of Carrefour’s wine subsidiary merchant (which buys the wine wholesale and bottles it) Maison Johanès Boubée, Laurent Julian, was present at the unions’ visit to the Lormont supermarket.

He admitted that the situation was “clumsy”, given the economic situation in the industry. He said that prices for this year’s Foire aux Vins had been prepared (along with the wine prices) many months ago, and was “fully financed by Maison Johanès Boubée”.

The event “in no way affects the remuneration of the winegrowers”, Carrefour said in a statement. It said that the funding of the event came out of its marketing budget.

Mr Julian added that the event was also designed to “halt the fall in wine sales”, which would - overall - help winegrowers in the long-term. The group also said that “our average purchase price for the year is higher than the price demanded by the trade”.

But unions and producers dispute these claims.

Maison Johanès Boubée has said it has set up a meeting with producers to discuss prices this week.

Mr Gabard said that Carrefour was not the only supermarket selling Bordeaux wine at bargain-basement prices, and added that Lidl has also had a Bordeaux variety on offer for €1.89 per bottle.

Read more: Lidl’s €1.89 bottles of Bordeaux spark protests in south-west France

He said that if an agreement could not be reached in the sector, producers would need to take stronger action.

"It's a race to the bottom between distributors,” he said. “Between producers and wholesalers, it's not working. We’ll have to resort to the law, because goodwill is not enough,” he said.

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