Champagne propels French wine exports to record in 2015
New figures show that French wine exports reached record value last year, mainly thanks to Champagne.
Overall French wine sales abroad in 2015 reached nearly €7.93bn, show statistics released by the French federation of wine and spirits exporters (FEVS). Accounting for inflation, that means exports were 0.8% higher than the previous record, in 2012.
Champagne sales, worth nearly €2.7bn outside of France, drove wine sales to their record, said FEVS’ director general, Pierre Genest. Champagne exports grew by nearly 5% in volume and by 12.1% in value.
Exports of French still wines fell in volume for the third straight year, by 5.2% compared to 2014.
But, FEVS highlighted success in value terms. Bordeaux exported around 22.6m cases of wine in 2015, down 2.8% versus 2014, but the value of exports rosé by nearly 3%.
Similarly, Burgundy exported about 6.17m cases of wine, a drop in volume by 2.3%, but the value of the exported wine rose by over 5% compared to last year.
Several factors explain the overall success of French wine exports, including a weakened euro compared to the US dollar as well as a ‘rebound’ in China for French wine buying, said Genest.
The US was the number one market for French wines last year, with nearly a 25% increase in value of French wines purchased.
Germany was still the top market for French wines by volume, even though volumes imported dropped by nearly 19%, and value fell by more than 11.5%.
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