There are currently several ways for Swedes to buy wine, although there is supposedly a monopoly. “Direct import”, where you order wine from another country, from a winery or a wine shop, is one. Here is some information on how this works with details on how to do it. Plus some speculation on what the [...]
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5 million articles read, yes, but how should you interpret statistics on the internet?
Are the statistics true and accurate? And comparable? We recently passed the five million page views mark, but how does one interpret the numbers on visitor statistics? It is notoriously difficult, both because of what the numbers actually mean varies and because there is no “official” statistics. Per explains more about Internet statistics in this [...]
Five million articles read on BKWine… On web statistics
We have passed 5 million “page views”, but it is difficult to interpret web statistics We have recently passed the five million “page loads” mark, which roughly can be interpreted as the number of articles read on BKWine. We say thank you to all the readers! Sweden’s first wine site! (?) Five million article read, [...]
Biggest wine suppliers to Sweden: Italy and South Africa
Italian wines overtook South African in 2012 as most popular During four years South Africa has been the best selling wine supplier country to Sweden. In 2012 they had to hand over the top spot to Italy. Sales of Italian wines increased strongly in 2012. Swedes bought 20% more wine from Italy in 2012 than [...]
The importance of being structured! | Britt on Wine
To the barricades! More tannins to the people! How do you explain the difference between a “quality wine” and a “simple” wine? Try it yourself and you will see how difficult it is. Or ask people who have faced the challenge to tell the difference between a simple wine and a better wine in a [...]
Fascinating wine statistics: vineyards, wine production and wine consumption
Is there a risk of lack of wine? We know a lot of you love figures so here are a few to savour. International Organisation of Vine and Wine, based in Paris, presented end of October interesting statistics concerning wine production and wine consumption in the world (www.oiv.int). The world vineyards shrinking 2011: 7.5 million [...]
Swedish Wine Blogs
Some free help from us to wine marketing people This is our attempt to make an (as much as possible) comprehensive list of Swedish wine blogs. On BKWine Magazine (this site) you can find this list in the menu Resources > Swedish Wine Blogs. Why on earth would you be interested in a list of [...]
Murder in the vineyard? BKWine appears in a detective novel
Gute Winery’s gold medal winning grappa plays role in Swedish crime book I was sitting lazily reading a Swedish crime novel on the balcony the other day. The book was “The Alchemy’s Eternal Fire” by Anna Jansson (my translation). I read it in Swedish but I’m sure it is translated into English as most Scandinavian [...]
Wine bloggers: profile, motivation and influence
A survey of French wine bloggers Guillaume Lempérière has recently published a study on French wine bloggers. It is part of his marketing research work at the Rouen Business School. Here are some of his findings (just a selection of some of the things I found most interesting). The objective is to see how blogs [...]
European Wine Bloggers conference in Izmir, Turkey. Are you as confused as I?
My personal overview of the schedule and program for the EWBC conference, pre-, and post-trips in November Have you signed up for the European Wine Bloggers Conference in Izmir in Turkey in November? I have. I started to look at the planning for the event (prompted by the ominous message that registration for the add-on [...]
World Wine Statistics 2010
Statistics and other numbers for the world of wine in 2010: the planted vineyard acreage, the wine production, wine consumption, wine exports and imports. (A summary of previously published stats. Source for all: OIV) World vineyard acreage in 2010 Global vineyard surface area shrunk in 2010 to 7.6 million hectares, loosing around 10,000 ha. The [...]
Freshness and minerality – What does the word mineral mean?
What’s in a word? What is “minerality” in a wine? It is very fashionable nowadays to talk about the minerality of a wine. It is easy to describe a wine as having minerality but it is more difficult to explain what it really means. Wine tasters in all countries use the word. In the past, [...]
Independent Swedish internet wine merchants – a new sales channel
Internet wine shops can sell directly to Swedish consumers and bypass the monopoly The Swedish wine market is dominated by the monopoly retailer, Systembolaget (just like Alko in Finland and Vinmonopolet in Norway). Since a few years back there are a number of independent internet-based wine merchants selling directly to Swedish consumers. A interesting new [...]
Swedish Wine Importers
An extensive list of importers of wine to Sweden The Swedish wine (and alcohol) trade is split in two distinct parts: the importers and the retailer. Retail is a monopoly and it is the Systembolaget AB company who is the monopolist, operating some 400 shops around the country. Systembolaget is owned by the Swedish state. [...]
Wine tweeting 2: More useful tips on Twitter
Yesterday I wrote a quick introduction to get you started on twitter. Here are some more tips and tricks, and useful things to know, in the world of tweeting. Some basic vocabulary as well as some tips and tools that will make it easier to find what is interesting. Read the first part here: Wine [...]
Wine Tweeting 1: how to get started on Wine Twitter
Twitter has become a very popular thing among (primarily English speaking) wine aficionados and wine professionals, journalists, writers and other. At the same time it is almost impossible to understand what the point is of Twitter – unless you try it. Here’s a short introduction to wine tweeting that will get you started in this [...]
BKWine Brief reaches 100 but continues to grow
The BKWine Brief story from the start to today In December 2011 we publish the 100th issue of our newsletter, the BKWine Brief. Here is a look back on how it started and some thoughts on the future. May 2003. That was when we did the very first BKWine Brief. One hundred issues back. In [...]
An enjoyable trip to Paris – some recommendations
Someone recently asked us the question: Do you have any good recommendations for Paris? Restaurants that are good but not necessarily luxurious, nice place to visit, museums that one might not think of…? We should, shouldn’t we? So we sat down and gave it a thought. Since the people who asked the question would be [...]
Bag-in-box wines at the Swedish monopoly Systembolaget
From a wine perspective this is of moderate interest. But from an economic and business perspective it can be interesting. In Sweden more than half of all wine that is sold in the monopoly shops (“Systemboalget”) are sold in bag-in-box. In Sweden they call it box wine. Other countries have other names for it: cubitaner [...]
A Perfect 10?
Mother Nature was unkind in 2010 – an earthquake in Haiti, floods in Pakistan and an unpronounceable volcano in Iceland. There was huge financial trauma; many are still recovering. But commodities and collectibles – especially wine – have carried on regardless. The art market – or at least Damien Hirst’s reputation – wobbled before the [...]
How to dig a deeper and deeper hole
Or: “A Prima Donna shouts too loud”? – A Portuguese challenge First of all I want to apologise to all my Portuguese friends, winemakers and others. And to all other who love Portugal and its wines. I had wanted to leave this debacle with the 1º Encontro e Prova Internacional de Vinho / 1st International [...]
An experience in how not to market Portuguese wines
Comments on the 1st International Wine Meeting and Tasting (in Portugal) This post is really a comment on a blog post by Luiz Alberto over at The Wine Hub, but for some mysterious reason the full commentary refuses to publish on that blog. Last week there was the 1st International Wine Meeting and Tasting (1o [...]
Can a Swedish resident import wine for personal consumption, without having to go through the monopoly?
“Can a Swedish resident import wine for personal consumption, without having to go through the monopoly, or is it completely out of the question?” This is a question that pops up quite often, both from Swedish residents and from wine producers / wine sellers. This is a first version of the answer, perhaps not 100% [...]
France falling behind on traditional markets, but winning in Asia?
What do buyers, retailers and other trade people think about the evolution of the wine market? Wine Trade Monitor (WTM) by Sopexa tries to answer that question. Sopexa is a French marketing consultancy that has for the second year running made this ambitious survey of the wine trade. They focus on the 14 biggest markets [...]
Wine trends for 2010 – our predictions
Ten predictions for wine trends for 2010 Wine Trend 2010 #1, environmental issues #1, eco-friendly wines It’s been a trend for some time now but we think it will continue and perhaps accelerate in 2010. We consciously say “eco-friendly” and not organic wines since there is a big group of producers who work with so [...]
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