NEWSFETCH – January 20, 2011

• Higher Food & Gas Costs: Consumers To Manage Food Budgets Differently
• Ascentia Wine Estates: Debonis Out Kenton in As CEO
• Farmworkers win pay increase, set agriculture precedent
• Alcohol Companies Struggle With Nutrition labels
• Wine: Two perspectives from a down economy
• Hope Family Wines Promotes Meliza Jalbert to Export Director
• Wine drinkers trending back toward pricier bottles
• Entrepreneurs target millennial wine drinkers
• Wine giant Constellation offloads Stowells and Hardy’s brands
• Value of wine investment questioned
• Wine investment boss jailed

AROUND THE STATES

• VA: Democrats to introduce McDonnell’s liquor bill
• OH: Liquor sales hit record high (Drinkers too?)
• WA: Widespread support for beer and wine tasting in farmers markets
• NC: Gov. Perdue opposes privatizing liquor sales
• TX: Research looks to match grape varieties with South Plains climate
• WA Relents on Corkage-Free Wines

EUROPE

• Remy Revenue Misses Analysts’ Estimates as Cognac Growth Slows
• Varying Options for France Vineyards for Sale
• German Winegrowers Association supports planting ban
• French Real-Estate Titan Buys Haut-Brion’s Neighbor

THE UK

• Interest in 2009 Burgundy boosts merchants
• Foreign office to reduce cellar: a boon for fine wine?

CANADA

• BC Wine Institute reports success at the Red Tape Reduction Meeting

DOWN UNDER

• OZ: Millions more in wine scam recovered
• Victorian disaster bill put at $2bn
• Foster’s chastised over ‘neglected ‘ CUB
• OZ: Raids after major wineries duped
• Australians turn away from beer as wine threatens to overtake sales
• NZ: Imported workers key to local success

ASIA & PACIFIC RIM

• Fake icewine floods Asian market
• Andrew Lloyd Webber wine auction in Hong Kong
• Moreau signs with two Chinese importers
• Chinese demand buoys Remy Cointreau sales

ONLINE, TECH & SOCIAL NETWORKING

• SMB Survey: 42% Find Social Media ‘Useful’
• 5 Wineries/Wine Retailers that ‘Get’ the Web
• Facebook Ads and the Rising Cost of User Acquisition

LIGHTER & LESS “TRADE-ONLY”

• State dinner menu with Hu Jintao: “quintessentially American”
• Snooty? Not Today’s Wine Drinkers
• Is That Case of Petrus Authentic?
• Second Generation at Ortman Brings Italy to California

WATER

• Water, Water Everywhere…Except for California’s Farms
• Expert compares Calif. Delta levees to those in New Orleans before Katrina