Champagne Guru
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Giles Fallowfield is an award-winning journalist and a Champagne specialist who has been writing about the region for over two decades.
Champagne Guru
2y ago
The Tin House in a suburban street in Shepherd’s Bush might not seem like the most salubrious venue for the launch of a leading prestige cuvée champagne from a vintage that many have already marked down as ‘great’ – although only time will show if that epithet is truly applicable. But as we are told ..read more
Champagne Guru
2y ago
As I’m travelling out to Champagne, just a few days since picking began in some parts of the appellation, I’m reviewing what different people have been saying so far about prospects for the 2021 harvest. Tomorrow, I will see for myself with visits to a press house in Verzenay in the Montagne de Reims and ..read more
Champagne Guru
3y ago
My article on how Champagne is starting to adapt to meet the challenges of climate change is published this week in the Champagne Report, sent out with the November issue of The Drinks Business. It’s a long, 10-page feature, but then it’s a huge subject. The work going on looking at developing potentially suitable new ..read more
Champagne Guru
3y ago
On Friday 30 October I received a note from Hervé Deschamps, the ever-smiling chef de cave at Perrier-Jouët, saying it was last day at this famous house. Only the seventh cellarmaster since 1811, he’s worked at Perrier-Jouët for 37 years, the last 27 as the chef de cave. He joined in a great year for ..read more
Champagne Guru
3y ago
Champagne sales in 2020 “may go back to where they were 30 years ago,” says Pol Roger CEO Laurent d’Harcourt. He made his comments on the current state of the champagne market during last weeks’ zoom tasting for the launch of Pol Roger 2013. A launch which, according to Pol’s UK MD James Simpson ..read more
Champagne Guru
3y ago
File Edit View Insert Format Tools Table Paragraph I’ve been updating the Trade News page of this website where I have detailed harvest reports going back until 2006 and looking at the original assessments – done with the winemakers’ feedback in the autumn just after picking is completed — of the best vintages of recent years in Champagne. I had to give ..read more
Champagne Guru
3y ago
The CIVC has released its own, short report about the 2020 harvest just completed in Champagne. It describes it as a “splendid harvest” beginning on 17 August in the most forward vineyards, the earliest official start ever (though in fact some producers started picking even earlier in the Côte des Bar on 13 August, as ..read more
Champagne Guru
3y ago
The June figures for Champagne shipments show a slight improvement on the poor results in April and May 2020, as sales picked up in some markets. But the monthly shipment figure of 15.8m bottles, was still down 17.1% compared to June 2019, dropping 3.26m bottles from 19.01m. In the first half of 2020, total shipments ..read more
Champagne Guru
3y ago
The Champagne harvest began yesterday (13 August) in the Côte des Bars village of Buxeuil, which is one of the southernmost villages in the whole Champagne appellation, close to Les Riceys, Champagne’s largest single cru. This is the sixth harvest since the Millennium that has started in August and beats the record for the earliest ..read more
Champagne Guru
3y ago
By Giles Fallowfield, Published by Harpers online: 24 July, 2020https://bit.ly/340BmIb The Champenois are in disarray as efforts to reach agreement on the level of yield for the 2020 harvest failed at a recent meeting of the Comité Interprofessionnel du Vin de Champagne (CIVC) in Epernay. The two sides of the business, the négociant merchants on the one ..read more