20 under £20

While independent wine merchants remain the go - to choice for a small portion of the wine-drinking public, in the UK it’s the national high-street chains and supermarkets which continue to attract the lion’s share of wine sales. Accessibility, price and the ability to fling a few bottles into the trolley along with the weekly shop all play into the hands of the big operators. And there’s seemingly no better time than now to hit the high street and pick up some bottles of Italian wine – despite Brexit-related supply chain concerns, the global pandemic has helped to kickstart a shift in consumer behaviour to which the high street has been quick to react.

TRADING UP

A trend towards premiumisation allied with an increased appetite for experimentation was borne of the pandemic’s ‘stay-at-home’ mantra, during which time consumers increased their per-bottle spend on wine to drink at home. ‘Spend levels appear to have risen in the second half of 2020 as the initial shock of the pandemic wore off,’ notes a December 2020 report from analyst Wine Intelligence. And a market report from the UK’s Wine and Spirit Trade Association (WSTA) covering the 12 months to 27 March 2021 supports this, showing that wine sales across all price brackets from