Champagne region expansion
MAGNEUX, France — Jean-Michel Petit, a third-generation beet farmer in this village, yearns to trade his earthy roots for the sparkle of Champagne.
“I’d plant the maximum amount of grapevines if I could,” Mr. Petit said, beaming at the prospect of tender pinot noir vines lining the chalky soil of his farm in northeastern France.
Mr. Petit and the roughly 200 inhabitants of Magneux are part of an eager group of outsiders pressing to join the elite growers of the $7 billion Champagne industry.
A nearly eight-decade-old rule that delineates the official Champagne zone is about to be changed to include new territory, potentially allowing farmers like Mr. Petit to sell grapes for Champagne with the French seal of approval, the “Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée,” or A.O.C.
Traditionally, Champagne could be grown only in a part of the Champagne region. But with global demand for sparkling wine soaring, putting pressure on limited supplies, the French authorities are opening what could be the largest wave of expansion of Champagne vineyards in nearly a century. Potentially, the expansion could increase annual production by 100 million bottles, to 430 million.
The major Champagne houses support the expansion plan, which is in its appeals stage until Friday. Without more vineyards, they fear customers could revolt against rising Champagne prices, edging above $35 for nonvintage bottles of Moëtand $40 for Veuve Clicquotin the United States.
Already, sales in the United States have been dropping because of an economic slowdown and the weak dollar, which makes euro-denominated French exports more expensive. Last year, shipments of Champagne to the United States dipped by more than 6 percent, to 21.7 million bottles, after steady growth dating from 2001. Sales have continued to fall this year.
“The euro is rising and the dollar is falling, and soon we’ll have a real structural problem if the cost of the grape keeps increasing every year,” said Ghislain de Montgolfier, the departing president of the Champagne maker Bollinger and leader of the Union of Champagne Houses, a trade industry group.
Within the elite world of Champagne makers, there is discreet debate about shifting strategies in the United States, including possibly reducing volumes or shipping bottles to other countries with stronger currencies.
Boizel Chanoine Champagne, for example, closed its subsidiary in New York. “The U.S. today is not our priority,” Céline Voide of Boizel said. “We prefer to concentrate on Europe and Asia.”
Customers in the United States are facing a “double whammy,” according to Juan Banaag, an international research manager for Impact Databank, which tracks the industry. He pointed to the weak dollar and price increases passed along by Champagne makers who paid higher prices for the 2007 grape harvest because of high demand and limited supply.
But in the bucolic Champagne region, where tidy rows of grapevines and windblown wheat fields mark the division between those who have the Champagne appellation and those who do not, there is little concern about ebbing demand in the United States or Britain.
New markets beckon. Prosperous middle classes have emerged in China, India and Russia, where sales rose to one million bottles in 2007, almost 43 percent more than the previous year.
Some small, high-end champagne makers are doing so well that they have stopped taking orders for their latest vintage.
Cyril Janisson, a fifth-generation Champagne maker, increased production at his family’s winery, Janisson Baradon & Fils, to 95,000 bottles last year, a 17 percent rise, but quickly sold out with standing orders. “There’s more demand than we can produce,” Mr. Janisson said, standing in the cool darkness of the family’s winery in Épernay, one of the centers of the Champagne region.
Neat rows of Champagne bottles, on reserve for major customers, are marked with the names of importers from Britain, Norway and Japan, where consumers favor a special vintage of the winery’s Vendeville Brut, labeled with a pink heart and Japanese lettering.
The Janisson family’s Champagne is aged the old-fashioned way in oak barrels, but Mr. Janisson — an indefatigable blogger — maintains ties to his major customers around the world with a click of his computer keyboard.
The current Champagne growing region encompasses a patchwork of territory sprawling over 87,000 acres, in 319 villages. In March, a team of experts appointed by the French government approved more than 40 more communes, or communities, to add to the Champagne territory, zones that are now the subject of final appeals.
In preparation, some major Champagne houses, which buy most of their grapes from independent growers, are quietly scouting for fresh land, according to people in the industry who did not want to be identified because the government experts had not finished with the appeals period. Companies do not want to discuss possible land purchases for the same reasons.
“We deliberately chose not to communicate at this stage,” said Jean Berchon, a spokesman for Moët, the leading wine grower in the Champagne region and the largest purchaser of grapes from the region’s 15,000 independent growers.
The same cannot be said for the region’s villages, especially those passed over by French authorities — like Magneux. Quiet jockeying to join the club is still taking place, even though the appeals period closes in less than a week.
Magneux, a poor hamlet of stone houses, bombed during World War II, was stunned when neighboring villages were approved but it was overlooked.
Most residents commute to Reims or Épernay to find work, according to Magneux’s new mayor, Sylvain Dukic, who himself commutes to the University of Reims, where he is a researcher.
“We’re a village of workers, and we would all like to share in the wealth that Champagne brings to other towns,” Mr. Dukic said, noting that his commune was pressing an appeal.
Magneux was one of a collection of about eight communities that joined together to hire four students to prepare a dossier exploring the history, climate, geography and soil of the area, along with records showing that pinot noir grapes were actually grown there before the last Champagne designation was imposed in 1927.
Jean-Pierre Pinon, mayor of Fismes, helped to organize Magneux and the other communities to promote their suitability for Champagne vineyards. But he is reluctant to celebrate his town’s inclusion in the new territory until the government panel issues its final conclusions.
“There’s no euphoria and no Champagne here because people are superstitious until the decision is definitive,” Mr. Pinon said as he strolled among vendors during his town’s annual festival of flowers in May. “I’ve tried to work as discreetly as possible on this.”
That is not easy, given the possible economic effect of the decision. Mr. Pinon estimated that the value of a hectare of land, about two and a half acres, designated for Champagne could jump to almost 1 million euros, from 6,000 euros, or a little under $10,000, if the Champagne market remained strong.
Some constituents are not waiting for the government’s final decision to celebrate their town’s good fortune.
“The impact will be enormous,” said José Charlier, operator of Café de l’Étoile, a bistro steps from the gothic city hall. “Have you seen the houses in the Champagne area? It’s magnificent. People have fixed up their homes, and it’s all thanks to Champagne.”
With the music of the Fismes flower festival drowning out his words, Mr. Charlier retreated into his bustling cafe. Minutes later he returned with a chilled bottle of Champagneand flutes for customers.
He smiled broadly at the satisfying pop and whoosh of a cork sailing through the air.
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Blue Label
2 parts Pisco
You all probably know that Guinness Draughtis not exclusive to your local pub anymore. It has been available in cans since 1988 and since February, 2001 in bottles (we're not talking about the Guinness Extra Stout bottles with the golden label that most people avoid). Guinness has spared no expense in trying to make your drinking experience as close as a trip to a pub in Ireland as possible.
In the bottle, the rocket shape helps keep the widget oriented correctly. When you pop the cap, most of the pressure is released from a hole in the bottom of the rocket widget which has compressed beer along with gaseous nitrogen. Then with each additional sip as you drink, a little more pressure is released, a little more agitation occurs and a tiny head is kept on the beer in the bottle.
This makes the perfectionists at the St. James Brewery cringe. This, along with the fact that they believe that when a bar patron has to wait two minutes for a Guinness that they would rather order a 10-second Budweiser, has prompted a yet another paradigm shift in serving beer. I have heard rumors of a new draught delivery system for pubs that will serve the brew as if out of a can or bottle- agitating the beer with a burst of nitrogen after it's drawn into the pint glass... ready to drink in twenty seconds. [UPDATE: This system has since been tested and abandoned; apparently people are willing to wait two minutes... I know I am].
