2006 Salon des Vins de Loire: stand of a bottle designer

Once again trying to sort out a few photos. These are from the 2006 Salon des Vins Loire and then from a tasting of vins clairs in the cellars of Langlois-Chateau.

Baumard poster

Saumur-Champigny – Esprit d'un terroir

Bernard Chéreau (Chéreau-Carré) with Annie and Aimé, who used to own the Hotel du Mail in Angers

Langlois-Chateau: Crémant de Loire rosé

Rue des Lapins – one of the galleries@Langlois-Chateau

A reminder that voting on the best of the 20 blogs selected for the Wine Blog Trophy closes on Monday 25th January. Don't miss your chance to vote for the best blog –  see here:. By last Monday (18th) 1200 votes had been cast.

Here are the blogs selected by category:

La plus belle plume :
http://www.glougueule.fr/
http://hlalau.skynetblogs.be/
http://www.leblogdolif.com/
http://www.20divin.com/
http://www.mtonvin.net/
http://rougeblancbulles.blogspot.com/
http://rivedroite.canalblog.com/

Le meilleur design :
http://www.alombredunbouchon.com/
http://www.labivin.net/
http://www.sommelier-vins.com/
http://www.glougueule.fr/
http://busurleweb.com/
http://mechantraisin.canoe.com/
http://www.blog-vinbionaturel.fr/

La meilleure intéractivité :
http://www.alombredunbouchon.com/
http://www.labivin.net/
http://www.sommelier-vins.com/
http://www.leblogdolif.com/
http://levindemesamis.blogspot.com/
http://matlebat-degustation-vins.blogspot.com/
http://blogdesgouteurs.blogspot.com/

Mention spéciale Loire :
http://passionvinsloire.canalblog.com/
http://dindonswine.canalblog.com/
http://hlalau.skynetblogs.be/
http://www.berthomeau.com/
http://vins-boissons-et-gastronomie-de-loire.over-blog.com/
http://www.lapassiondesvins.fr/
http://fgsuperfred.canalblog.com/

The results will be announced on Tuesday 26th January. (26.1.2010 – not sure this is right. Winners will be notified by email but results may well not be announced until Monday 1st February.)

François Chidaine: August 2008 at La Cave Insolite, Montlouis

In between late minute Christmas shopping I have managed to speak to François Audebert (Bourgueil) and to François Chidaine about Interloire's AGM in Nantes on Tuesday. Neither conversation was exactly festive – instead depressing with a palpable sense of the crisis and a growing schism between producers and the négoce. Of course having spoken to just two producers their views may not be fully representative but I suspect that their views would be echoed by a substantial number of Loire producers.
(Over the next few days I hope to add views from more producers and also from the négoce. I also, of course, welcome comments.)

François Audebert
I started by asking François what had happened at the AGM.

François A: Not a great deal. It was accepted with regret that Bourgueil would leaving Interloire at the end of 2010. The atmosphere are meeting was all rather morose. The négoce pushed through the single rate of cotisation (subscription) to Interloire, which will be 4€ per hectolitre. Previously there had been 24 different levels with appellations fixing the amount. 24 was clearly too much but I would have preferred three different levels.

Jim: Do you think there will be a chance a reaching an accommodation during 2010 that will allow Bourgueil to remain within Interloire?

François A: I think it will very difficult. There appears to be incomprehension of our position and concerns by the négoce and I'm not sure that it is possible to have meaningful discussions anymore. Bourgueil has voted to increase its cotisation by adding 3.50€ to the current rate of 1.70€ a hectolitre – a total of 5.20€. This increase will be used for our public relations activities. A number of other appellations, such as Chinon and Vouvray, have voted an increase to their cotisations with the extra going to the syndicat.

We then discussed the proposal to make the Salon des Vins de Loire biannual, which is a consequence of reducing Interloire's budget for the Salon. Although the Salon is run by Expo-Park, Angers, Interloire provides an important part of the budget.

François A: The Salon is very important for the producers. The proposal to reduce the budget and hold the Salon every two years is a direct attack by the négoce on us. The Salon is crucial for us both to meet international buyers but also people from our home market – wholesalers, agents, cavistes, restaurateurs etc. Many people come to the Salon to taste the latest vintage, so it needs to be held every year – not every two years.

•

François Chidaine
We talked about the AGM but also about the conflict between the producers and the négociants.

Francois C: Our level of cotisation has been cut from 5.5€ per hectolitre down to 4€. The négociants do not believe in promoting appellations. They just want to promote La Loire and to concentrate on selling low priced wine. Because of much of the former Loire négociants have been bought up by the big groups, there is no longer competition. The négociants are concerned with their margins. This means that producers supplying the négoce cannot survive commercially and some are now giving up.

Producers in Touraine do not agree with this approach – our objectives are not the same. We are in a different position in Touraine as we are not bound to the négociants as in the case for producers in Anjou and in Muscadet. Producers in Touraine are very attached to their appellations. Increasingly we will see funds from vignerons being transferred to their syndicats. The relationship between the producers and the négoce is broken.

Jim: Do you think that the relationship can be repaired?

François C: We will see but things may well have gone too far – there is a lot of bitterness. It is very unfortunate because in the current crisis we should all be working together. But for the producers to do nothing in the current situation is not an option. We have to react – we have to save viticulture for the next generation.

(NB: Other views to come.)

The near deserted stand of Castel Frères – Marcel Sautejeau and Friedrich: Salon 2009

The annual Salon des Vins de Loire may be held only every two years if cost cutting measures being considered by Interloire are approved. The first Salon des Vins de Loire was held in 1987 and the Loire is the only French wine region to hold an annual fair. Apparently it was the négoce who proposed cutting the budget for the Salon and to make it biannual. Looking at the photo of the virtually deserted Castel stand I can see why Castel may be wondering whether this is money well spent. However, in contrast, the Lacheteau stand (Grands Chais de France) was busy and many of the most popular growers stands are crowded with visitors.

I have been to the Salon every year since 1990 and find it a very well organised, professional and friendly show. Although I'm never able to get to see and taste with as many producers as I would like, I would certainly be very sad to see the Salon become biannual. I suspect also that commercially it would be a mistake. Many buyers come to the Salon to taste the latest vintage because the majority of the Loire's production is sold young. Buyers come to taste the latest vintage of Sancerre, Muscadet, Touraine Sauvignon, etc.

There is also a lot of pressure on the wine trade calendar. If the Salon des Vins de Loire stops for one year, will something else take its place and will visitors then return to the Salon the following year?

I gather from Charles Sydney, who lives in the Loire and is the leading courtier for Loire wines in the UK, that one plan is to run the Salon in the same year as Vinisud, so that they can be held in the same week and run transport connections between the two fairs. That assumes that buyers can afford to be away for a whole week and that the person who is responsible for buying Loire also buys the south of France. Another option being considered apparently is to hold the Salon in alternate years to Vinexpo and have a big communal Loire stand at Vinexpo. Being selfish that certainly wouldn't suit me as it is my firm principle to stay as far away as possible from the hell of Vinexpo.

The Press section on the 2010 Salon des Vins de Loire website is now open: www.salondesvinsdeloire.com/presse/>

The Press section is password protected so any journalist wanting to attend the 2010 Salon (1st-3rd February 2010) without the password will need to contact: Marie Gaudel, Jeanne Peron et Amélie Bluma – Agence Clair de Lune pour le Salon des Vins de Loire

Tel. 04 72 07 31 90 - contact@clairdelune.fr

I understand that there will be a presentation of the Salon to the UK press sometime in November. Perhaps this will persuade more UK wine journalists and writers to attend the 2010. Usually the entire UK press attending the Salon would be reasonably comfortable inside a Fiat 500.

Salon des Vins de Loire: the threat of having to pay to taste at professional wine events was lifted on 5 March

The French parliament appears to be inching its way to a measure of sanity over Roselyne Bachelot’s ‘Loi Hôpital, Patients, Santé, Territoire’. The proposals to ban ‘open bars’ – where ,on payment of an entry fee, you can drink as much as you want – were passed on Thursday 5th March along with a crucial amendment agreed, exempting wine-tasting for both professional and amateur events as well as tasting at the cellar door.

Still to come are proposals on limiting or banning sales of alcohol in petrol stations as well as regularising alcohol’s position on the internet.

So some good news but amazing that the world's second largest producer and the home of the greatest diversity of wine anywhere on the planet got itself into such a position!

I have just received this message from Richard Verney, who is Oddbins' French wine buyer. Richard outlines their plans for revamping their Loire range.

(Some further comments below)

Dear Jim

I have just been forwarded the link to your article on your blog in which you compare Oddbins Loire range with Waitrose's. I thought it was worth me replying to your comments and give you an idea of our plans and to explain the current paucity of availability of Loire wines on our website.

As you are no doubt aware Henry Young and Simon Baile bought Oddbins on the 1st August 2008 with the aim of putting the 'odd back into Oddbins'. I arrived as part of Simon and Henry's new management team and have been tasked with the exciting task of making this happen with our wine range. I am directly responsible for French Wine buying along with Stuart Cole, who is based out of Simon's shop Ex Cellar on the Rue des Ecoles in Paris (a former Oddbins!). This I believe offers us a unique French buying perspective, that none of our competitors can match.

In August we inherited a business which was massively over-stocked with the most appalling French Range in place. To put this in context Simon and I tasted the existing French Range of 155 lines - from which we found only a third that we wished to continue with. We found a further third were utterly undrinkable and de-listed immediately; the other third we wanted to de-list, but were determined to find a replacement for them prior to de-listing. There were no wines from the Loire in the first third. Most of which we had over half a years worth of stock.

We also have inherited some infrastructure that isn't up to our standards - the website is one of these, which we are currently trying to put in a solution for. It is currently not reflective of our full range and we are intending on moving the website into our Battersea store, so it will be able to have a fuller and more complete range, to include some of our more interesting parcels and wines, which due to their nature we push out to our stores as soon as they arrive in our warehouse (from where our website is fulfilled).

Initially our main aim was to show the estate that we were willing to buy wines that were interesting and out of the ordinary. We weren't looking at specific ranges, merely at achieving a stop gap to show what we were about. From France we listed 90 wines from small producers, mostly parcels of less than 100 cases.

Come January 2009 with this job done, successfully (we had equal like-for-like sales for the Christmas trading period as 2007 - a strong result given the economic climate) Stuart and I were concentrating on building ranges. We spent half of January in Burgundy - from where we have come back with a range of 25 'core' listings and with over 100 parcels varying from anything from 10 cases up to 1,000 cases.

In February 2009 we went down to the Angers Salon to address our Loire range and have already started changing our list as a result - obviously I am very much still in negotiations with the various wineries, but I can let you know that we wish to list wines from the likes of Henri Bourgeois, Domaine Salvert and Damien Delecheneau. The intention is to have a 'core' ranging of around 15 lines from Central Vineyards down to Muscadet. We then will look for parcels of esoteric, interesting and exciting wines to fill the rest of the range through the year - I suspect the bones of this new range will be coming into stock from the end of March onwards. Stuart will be in the Loire this week and possibly down there next week trying to source the wines where we still have gaps. If you would like to sample the initial fruits of our labours it would be great to see you at our press tasting in London on the 31st March from 11am to 5pm at our Farringdon Store.

In the meantime, do feel free to contact me at any time and I will happily give you more detail.

Kind regards
Richard Verney

Buyer
Oddbins Ltd
31-33 Weir Road
London
SW19 8UG
DD +44 (0)20 8944 4769
Fax +44 (0)20 8944 4444

•••

I'm delighted to learn of Oddbins' plans and look forward to seeing them in place. In particular it will be good to see the likes of Damien Delecheneau (Domaine la Grange Tiphaine) listed. I have been impressed by Damien's wine (both Montlouis AC Touraine) for some time and visited him last year – must write up that visit.

Damien Delecheneau (Domaine la Grange Tiphaine): old Chenin vine around 100 years old

Damien Delecheneau (Domaine la Grange Tiphaine): old Côt vine around 100 years old

It is unfortunate that Oddbins' website currently gives such a poor impression. I understand that the technology they inherited makes it very difficult to remove wines from the listing. It would be wise, however, to provide an explanation on the site otherwise it is easy to jump to the wrong conclusion, especially as there is now only one Australian Shiraz available out of 30 listed!

Neil Sommerfelt MW, buying director for the Jeroboams Group UK, makes
his final offer to Florent Baumard, Domaine Baumard

Arnaud and Yves Lambert, Domaine de Saint-Just, Saumur and Saumur-Champigny

Saumur and Saumur-Champigny producers Frédéric Filliatreau
and Patrice Retif share a joke with Bernard Sirot,
one of Belgium's most eminent wine journalists.

Antoine Sanzay, one of Saumur's rising stars, behind his stand

Saumur-Champigny: Jean-Luc Mary (Domaine de la Cune)
and Alain Duveau (Domaine des Sables Verts )

Vini-be-Good stand

Touraine

Olivier Poussier, famous sommelier and consultant,
passing through Anjou-Brissac area à grand vitesse.

The Roblin brothers from Maimbray, Sancerre and a friend modeling a rather vivid cardigan

Vouvray stand

Various caves-cooperatives inc Châteaumeillant

Neil and Florent: negotiations continue......

According to the press release issued at the end of the Salon, the 2009 edition attracted roughly the same number of visitors as last year – over 9000 spread across 585 exhibitors. Although it can be difficult to judge how busy the fair really is my impression was that it was quieter than usual particularly for much of Tuesday and that there were fewer buyers from the UK – in part due to the economic crisis but also because of the heavy snow on Monday in the UK disrupting transport and closing airports.

This was confirmed by Charles Sydney who said that he hadn't seen any buyers from ASDA, Sainsbury's, Tesco or Morrisons at the Salon this year. Normally all the major supermarkets are represented. What about the UK press you might ask? With the exception of Chris Kissack making his first visit to the Salon, it was the usual stalwarts – Sarah Ahmed, Neil Fairlamb, and myself as well Ray O'Connor who was mainly here on behalf of the International Wine Challenge.

I was pleased my initial favourable impression of 2008 was confirmed at the Salon, at the Renaissance des Appellations tasting and during visits I made before the start of the Salon. 2008 is a good to very good vintage, providing producers picked at the right moment – not too early when acidity levels were high. In the event the Loire was fortunately that the harvest was small as this allowed the fruit to ripen properly during September and October and to ripen slowly developing intense flavours. Qualitatively good news, although not for the bank manager!

The dry whites should have enough weight to match the often higher levels of acidity. The reds have much more fruit and structure than the often light 2007 and some producers look to have made some very good wines that should keep well. Only the sweet wines were caught out by the weather with almost continuous rain during November dashing hopes of making some lovely sweet that had been raised during the good October weather. Generic cuvées made in the Layon and L’Aubance from grapes picked in late October will be light and charming for drinking young. 2007 is a much better sweet wine vintage than 2008.

It was good to meet Chris Kissack (the wine doctor has already posted a preliminary report) in Angers and I look forward to seeing him on the Loire panel at the Decanter World Wine Awards held in London in late April. Chris will be joined on the panel by two other Salon attendees: Sarah Ahmed (the wine detective) and Neil Irvine (HG Wines).

I will, however, be meeting up with Sarah along with Jamie Goode (the wine anorak) in Tours for the first tasting of the Loire’s important Sauvignon Blanc project that has Sam Harrop MW as consultant.

The 24th edition of the Salon des Vins de Loire will be on the 1st-3rd February 2010. My hotel room at the Hotel du Mail is already reserved.

A possible nightmare: five Charles Sydneys for the price of one!

Now back in London having driven back up from the Loire. Plenty now to write up, especially the brief entries over the last few days. Spending the day at the Salon and then going out in the evening leaves little time for writing and posting. More pictures have been added to the Wine Bloggers trophy competition.

Time to post some photos taken at Charles and Philippa Sydney's traditional Tuesday evening event – a blend of the Loire growers, UK wine buyers and the odd journalist. Charles and Philippa are based in Chinon and have been Loire wine courtiers for over 20 years acting as a conduit between their Loire growers and the UK market.

Jérome Choblet of Domaine des Herbauges, Bouaye
– Muscadet Côtes de Grandlieu

Jean-Hubert Lebreton (Domaine des Rochelles) gave his vintage report in English

"It only rained on my neighbours' vines!" Charles is frankly

sceptical of Alexandre Monmousseau's claim

Chris Hardy, wine buyer for Majestic Wine Warehouses
"It's going to be a tough year."

I'm sure Olivier Mouraud, commercial director of Bougrier SA, would agree. In the first year of their new vendangeoir in the Pays Nantais they made just 2500 hl of Muscadet-sur-lie in a facility designed for 8000-10,000 hls. "We are close to Castel's new facility in la Chapelle Heulin," Olivier told me, "and we have benefitted as Castel have paid for all the infrastructure to be put in."

In the light of current pressure from UK buyers on French producers to lower prices to compensate for the fall of sterling against the euro, Jean-Marie Bourgeois (Henri Bourgeois) remarks that when sterling was strong UK buyers didn't press producers to put up their prices!

Marielle Henrion, Château de l'Aulée, Azay-le-Rideau

Château de l'Aulée's very good Crémant de Loire Brut Zero was served as an aperitif.

Loïc Cailbourdin (Pouilly-Fumé) and Pierre Sauvion (Château du Cléray, Muscadet)

This is always a very good opportunity to taste lots of different wines, as long as you can remember what you have poured into what glass. The growers bring along a selection to try – sometimes new wines not but often bottled wines from the last few years – often from good vintages.

Some wines I enjoyed:

Whites:

2007 Haute Culture, Muscadet de Sèvre et Maine, Château du Cléray
2008 La Grand Reserve du Moulin, Muscadet de Sèvre et Maine, Gadais Père et Fils
2007 Typique, Pouilly-Fumé, Alain Cailbourdin
From 80 year old vines on flint at Saint-Andelain. I've always found Alain's wines to be pleasant enough but not thrilling. This one caught my attention.

Florian Mollet (Saint-Satur, Sancerre)

Reds:

2005 Le K Ampelidae, VDP de la Vienne
2005 Les Varennes du Grand Clos Clos, Chinon, Charles Joguet
+ 2007 Clos de la Dioterie, Chinon, Charles Joguet
A reminder that I need to seriously review the recent vintages of this domaine after the dilute disappointments released in the late 1990s and early 200s.
2005 Quintessence, Saumur-Champigny, Château du Targe

Very concentrated and initially very impressive but I suspect one of those wines where one's enthusiasm declines rapidly because it is showy but not drinkable. of course in 5 or 6 years it may be stunning!

Sylvain Miniot (oenologist, Cave de Saint-Pourçain) Olivier Mouraud (Bougrier SA) and Sophie Merlin-Cherrier (Bué, Sancerre)

Sweet wines
2007 Les Onnis, Chaume, Domaine des Forges
2007 Chaume, Domaine Cady
Two good sweet wines from the very attractive, vibrant and well-balanced 2007 vintage. The Cady has a little more concentration. Unfortunately it looks like the Branchereaus (Domaine des Forges) have gone for a catastrophic label redesign. The new label just looks naff and cheap undermining the quality in the bottle.

Chris Hardy (Majestic Wine) and Christophe Gadais (Gadais Père et Fils, Saint-Fiacre, Muscadet)

Table including Philippe Vatan (Château de Hureau, Saumur), Nick Room (Waitrose), Jérome Choblet and Stéphane Branchereau

Stéphane Branchereau (Domaine des Forges, Saint-Aubin)

Alain Cailbourdin (Pouilly-Fumé) wonders whether Alexandre Monmousseau (Château Gaudrelle) has fallen asleep in mid-sentence

With several growers from Sancerre and Pouilly present, the lamentable state of the Clos de la Poussie (Bué, Sancerre), owned by Baron Patrick de Ladoucette came up. They expressed anger and frustration that one of the finest sites in the area is now in such as ruinous state – contrasting this with the Baron Patrick's well-groomed vines around Château du Nozet in Pouilly.

The Clos de la Poussie showing many missing vines

Detail of one of the vines in the Clos de la Poussie

More on Baron Patrick de Ladoucette's Clos de la Poussie here.

Pithon-Paillé: new producer/négociant venture launched:
Wendy Scott, Joseph Paillé, Isabelle and Jo Pithon

January 2008 saw Jo Pithon split acrimoniously from his partner industrialist Philip Fournier, who had taken a big majority stake in Domaine Pithon in 2005. Now a year later Jo and Isabelle Pithon, along with Joseph Paillé, Isabelle's son, and South African Wendy Scott, Joseph's partner, officially launched the first vintages froom Pithon-Paillé. The new company, formed in August 2008, is a combination of producer and négociant.

Jo: "We have three roughly equal sections in Pithon-Paille – one third my wine, one third Anjou Blanc produced as a négociant and one third other Loire cuvées such as Savennières, Quarts de Chaume, Bourgueil, Chinon etc. I still have the three hectare Les Treilles and two hectares in Saint-Aubin – the Clos des Bois, which includes 0.5 ha of red – Cabernet Franc., and 0.25 ha in Savennières. We would like to get to seven or eight hectares with more vines in Saint-Lambert-sur-Lattay and Savennières adnplant a bit more of Les Treilles.

"For the moment we are able to vinify and age our wines at the Château de Fresnaye (near Saint-Aubin-sur-Luigné and which dates from the 17th century). The château, owned by Philippe and Laure Baudin, is up for sale but I anticipate that any sale is is unlikely to go through for a year or two. We plan to build a new chai at Beaulieu-sur-Layon in the future.

"We would like to buy all of our grapes from organic producers but for the moment this isn't possible but 80% of the grapes that we bought in 2008 came from organic producers. Our aim this year was to produce 50,000 bottles but due to the short harvest we only made 35,000."

I ask Jo how easy it is to buy grapes especially in appellations like Savennières. "Over many years in Anjou I have built up a lot of contacts. Also in view of happened last year many producers have been happy to give me a helping hand. In particular Etienne Bonnaventure (Château de Coulaine) helped me a lot in Chinon."

I tasted a range of wines –mainly unfinished ones from 2008. There will now be two cuvées from Les Treilles – a top cuvée called Coteaux des Treilles, which will represent 25% of the harvest and a second cuvée called Belargus des Treilles – named after Belargus a blue butterfly found in the vineyard. Most of the 2008s will be available from September.

Clearly the events of this time last year were traumatic for Jo and Isabelle but they have turned over the page and Jo is postive and optimistic about the new venture. "I was happy to leave – they did not have the same conception of wine as I have. Instead I'm happy to be doing what I am doing now – it is a great opportunity to be buying grapes from terroirs that I have never worked with before."

Pithon-Paille are continuing to work with Charles Sydney. I just hope that there is someone with a hard business head in the new team that will keep the show on the road. Over the past 20 years commercially Jo has had a roller-coaster ride but over that period he has produced some stunning wines.

Pithon-Paillé, Château la Fresnaye, 49190 Saint-Aubin-de--Luigné
Tel: 02.41.78.68.74; Jo (mobile): 06.45.75.60.98; Joseph & Wendy (mobile): 06.42.62.06.70
email: contact@pithon-paillé.com
site: www.pithon-paillé.com

Jean-Pierre Robinot and his wife: L'Ange Vin.
Jean-Pierre makes a range of thought provoking wines



Castel's stand was almost empty mid-morning and with Les Grands Chais de France (LaCheteau in the Loire and whose stand was considerably busier) they are easily the largest wine companies operating in the Loire


Rosalind Delaunay of Château du Cléray (Muscadet-de-Sèvre-et-Maine)

Rosalind was one of the first people I met in the Loire when I started writing about wine back in late 1988. My first professional trip to the Loire was in February 1989 and Rosalind had just recently started working for the Vins de Nantes as their press officer. She worked for the Vin de Nantes for a number of years before moving to work for the Sauvions at Château du Cléray.

Patrick Vadé, Domaine Saint-Vincent (Saumur and Saumur-Champigny)

Hoping to make a sale!

Back to his roots?
Richard Desouche of Château de Chaintres, Saumur-Champigny

Michel Smith continues his enquiries – Christian Papin (Domaine de Haute Perche, Anjou)

More pictures and comments to follow....