The month of July saw German Riesling sales soar across the country as more than 160 wine merchants, bars and restaurants in over 60 towns and cities across the UK took part in the 10th edition of Wines of Germany’s annual 31 Days of German Riesling campaign.
Despite ongoing Covid restrictions at the start of the year and into July, this year’s campaign saw participants grow from 107 to 168 as more businesses across the UK took part in celebrating 31 Days of German Riesling. This year, participants reported an average volume sales increase of over 400% for German Riesling in July in comparison to the previous month and over 250% in comparison to July 2020. In preparation for the promotion, participants also reported listing on average over eight different German Rieslings and collectively taking on over 130 new German Rieslings to showcase the diversity and range of Germany’s star varietal.
As well as increasing, or in some cases beginning, their range of German wine, participants put their heart and soul into events and activities in order to drive consumer awareness of German Riesling.
Online tastings again took centre stage for many businesses, but others were thrilled to finally be able to welcome customers back through their doors for a good old fashioned in-store tasting, Riesling flight or Riesling-paired dinner. This year saw German Riesling enomatic machine takeovers, mixed cases of every style imaginable, Sekt and oyster tastings, an abundance of jeroboams and magnums and even a pop-up dinner at The Remedy in London for a Swedish cuisine and German Riesling evening, courtesy of the chef of the Swedish Embassy.
Each year, cash prizes are awarded to the businesses which promote German Riesling with the most enthusiasm and creativity and the winners are…….
OFF TRADE CATEGORY:
Winner
Luvians Bottle Shop, St Andrews
Runner up
Amps Wine Merchant, Oundle
Highly Commended
Philglas & Swiggot, London
ON TRADE CATEGORY:
Winner
BOX-E, Bristol
Runner up
The Kings Arms, Mevagissey
DIGITAL CAMPAIGN CATEGORY:
Winner:
Tring Winey / The Online Wine Tasting Club
Tessa Lidstone of BOX-E commented: “We included four different Rieslings by the glass throughout the whole month. This was so popular by both people who know and like Riesling and people who had no idea what it is! We had lots of guests work their way through them all; one couple tried ten different Rieslings they loved them so much! A guest commented on Instagram that Riesling was now their favourite wine having first tried it with us.”
Luvians Bottle Shop found online tastings most useful during the campaign as Archie McDiarmid noted: “as well as attracting a captive audience, they were very helpful in generating orders, which greatly helped us boost sales during the month. […] At the tastings, there are always some customers who maintain that they dislike sweeter wines, but then are blown away by the quality of the Ausleses & Beerenausleses!” And confident customers led to an impressive sales increase, “one enthusiastic customer purchased nearly £470 of Riesling in one transaction!”
Nicky Forrest, MD of Wines of Germany UK commented: ‘This year has evidently had its challenges, for hospitality in particular, but it has been inspiring to see the trade join together again for 31 Days of German Riesling. I don’t think we dreamt 10 years ago that it would have quite the following that it does today, but with an increasing number of German Rieslings on offer in the UK, it’s wonderful to see so many participants putting their all into it.’
