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Record Smashed, Wine Auction Proves a Hit |
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Tuesday, 03 June 2008 |
HONG KONG: A press scrum waited for the mystery man in the gray shirt to exit the room. They chased him down the hallway, surrounded him, and peppered him with flashbulbs and questions, until hotel staff intervened and he managed to slip into the men's toilets.
Singgih Gunawan of Singapore finally emerged to address the media briefly in Mandarin. His claim to fame was spending 1.89 million Hong Kong dollars, or $242,000, on 12 bottles of 1990 Domaine de la Romanee-Conti at what proved to be the biggest lot at the biggest wine auction in Asian history.
This free-market city's latest move - dropping its wine tax to zero percent from 40 percent - was done in hopes that business in the form of red, white and bubbly would soon be pouring in. Judging from the past week, which included both the auction and Vinexpo Asia- Pacific, the biggest wine exposition in the region, it is working.
On Saturday, Acker Merrall & Condit, a wine auction company based in New York, sold $8.2 million worth of wine in its first Asian event.
The event at the Island Shangri-La Hotel was expected to last six hours. But long after potential buyers had finished their lunch of beef tenderloin and goose liver ravioli, it became clear that frantic bidding for the 922 lots would last into the evening. In a rare move, the entire auction was moved to another room, where glasses of 1995 Dom Perignon were handed out the way most places hand out water. The crowd roared with applause when the top lot was sold, and again when it was announced that the 21 percent buyer's premium would be donated to earthquake aid in Sichuan Province.
Earlier, a similar media frenzy ensued when Cecilia Piacitelli of Italy - of the Morgassi Superiore vineyards, and buying on behalf of a European investment fund - paid $3.6 million for two lots: 12 bottles and 6 magnums of Chteau Mouton Rothschild dating from the end of World War II.
"We're ecstatic," said John Kapon, Acker's president, while taking a break from conducting almost nine hours of auctioneering. "This is the biggest turnout I've seen in almost 10 years."
He called the city's levy cut "great," though he added that the auction was planned before it was announced in February. "The cake was already in the oven, and the tax cut was just the frosting," he said. His company was already planning another auction here on Nov. 22, with at least another two a year to follow.
In a separate event last week, 7,500 wine and spirits professionals packed into the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center for Vinexpo Asia-Pacific, which attracted almost 700 exhibitors from 32 countries. While it was not as big as the London International Wine Fair, the ProWein in Germany or the main Vinexpo in Bordeaux - which can draw thousands of exhibitors - it was the largest in the region.
Dominique Heriard Dubreuil, president of Vinexpo Overseas, said her event was also planned before the tax announcement, although industry leaders had been lobbying for the move months in advance.
"The tax drop has been very positive for the new prospects of Hong Kong as a wine hub; but we had decided to come even before that," she said. "What goes with the cut is a full platform for wine, involving trading, storage, classes, wine fairs, tourism and the food industry. We all have confidence in the growth and potential of the Asian market. There are many interested countries in Asia, not just mainland China."
Locally, Hong Kong commentators criticized the levy cut as being irrelevant in a 2008-2009 budget intended to help the city's needy, but nobody was discussing those issues on the trade show floor.
"If Hong Kong can reduce a tax to boost an industry to create employment, and also bring something very enjoyable to the city, then everyone will be happy," said Heriard Dubreuil, who is also chairman of Remy Cointreau.
According to a Vinexpo statement, market studies done in conjunction with International Wine and Spirit Record, a firm that supplies data on wine and spirit consumption, predict that wine consumption from 2002 to 2011 in Asia will grow by almost 80 percent, with China as the top consumer. Asia is already drinking 47 percent of the world's spirits.
At Vinexpo, the target audience was somewhat lower-brow than at the Acker auction. While all the big-name brands were present, many of the exhibitors were smaller wine producers. Their goal was to introduce their products to the hotels, restaurants, bars and supermarkets in Asia's growing, but underdeveloped, markets.
Vinexpo Overseas moves location every other year, though it was just in Hong Kong in 2006.
Christine Molines, an exhibitor who handles exports for Les AOC du Languedoc, began her sales pitch very simply. "This is an area of the south of France near Spain," she said, pointing to a map. "It has a very good climate for wine. A Mediterranean climate." She pointed to Languedoc, and then to the sea.
She has seen a change in Hong Kong since her last visit in 2006. "I visit the shops in Hong Kong," she said. "The range is wider, in restaurants as well."
Like many exhibitors interviewed, she noticed a shift in tastes. Before, Asian drinkers preferred wines that were easy, fruity, heavy on the sugar and light on the tannins. Now, consumers are considering more sophisticated wines that could be drier, rounder and fuller bodied. Consumers were also not just automatically ordering reds, but were trying whites, roses and sparkling wines.
The floor at the Vinexpo auction was divided geographically, with most of the real estate taken up by France, Spain and Italy, followed by Chile and California. Argentina had blown-up photographs of tango dancers. Romania made a good showing with a spacious and modern display.
Then, there were the Moldovans, with their flowery labels and small plates of golden raisins and nuts.
Serj Montreniuc, the Mandarin-speaking Asia representative of Lion-Gri, said his company was the only one from Moldova to attend the Hong Kong Vinexpo in 2006.
"It was tough," he said. "Nobody even knew what country we were from."
At this Vinexpo event, there were representatives from five companies, which had banded to form the Moldovan Wine Guide. Montreniuc, meanwhile, had organized Moldovan wine festivals around China, where they had been selling for a year and a half.
Montreniuc was full of hope. "In China, when people hear 'This is French wine,' the first thing they think is 'It's fake.' Because there's a lot of fake wine made in China. But there's no fake Moldovan wine, because nobody even knows what it is yet. We see a big opportunity."
Tom-H. Rappe of Bear Creek Winery in Lodi, California, was sharing a stall with a sister company, Ironstone, whose name would be familiar with anyone who buys midpriced bottles in Hong Kong.
They were displaying their Dog Tail brand, whose cartoonish rainbow-hued labels advertised wines like Fire Hydrant Red and Watchdog White. (Varietals are called "Purebred," while blends are called "Mutts.")
Rappe attended the first Vinexpo event in Hong Kong in 1998.
"This traffic is quality traffic, compared to past years," he said. "There are more potential customers, and more mainland Chinese along with the Hong Kong Chinese. But there are others, too, from the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam. So far, it's exceeded expectations."
He said the Acker auction had little to do with ordinary consumers, or ordinary vendors like himself, but that high-profile events could have a "halo effect" on a city.
Heriard Dubreuil, of Vinexpo, would not comment directly on reports that Hong Kong's speculative young bankers were shipping in more crates of expensive vintages than they could drink.
"You can't buy something without knowing what you're doing," she said. "You may have the money, but you also have to become a connoisseur with time."
She said Hong Kong had to concentrate on education and culture to grow into its role as a wine hub. She compared it to a fine vintage: "You don't age something for two generations if it wasn't any good to start with."
(C) 2008 International Herald Tribune. via ProQuest Information and Learning Company; All Rights Reserved
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