South Africa’s wine industry has a great fan in American wine economist Mike Veseth, who has visited our country twice in the past two years. In his latest article, the third about his trip earlier this year, he praises the wine industry for dealing with the ‘bottlenecks‘ it faces in selling its wines in the USA. According to him, the design of the South African flag can be seen to reflect a bottleneck too!
Veseth visited in 2012, as the guest of Nederburg, addressing the Auction as guest speaker. He observed the wine industry then and compared it with his observations of his visit this year. He writes that it can be easier to make good wines than it is to sell and market them, and this applies to selling in the USA in particular. He noted the increased confidence of our winemakers, and their ‘concrete plans‘ to tackle the marketing challenges, comparing his last two visits. His observations of our wine industry over two visits are as follows:
1. The leadership of the Winelands in Wine Tourism globally, a fantastic accolade. Continue reading →
