The UK wine trade is facing a “perfect storm” in the first half of 2009. A formidable array of negative factors have conspired to make life far from easy in the market traditionally touted as the most open and dynamic place to do wine business on the globe. This is the rather gloomy backdrop to just-drinks’ third UK off-trade wine industry survey, in which once again we canvassed the views of the key players on the scene – including major suppliers, retail buyers, UK importers, wine producers and generic associations. Normally published for release at the London International Wine Fair, we thought it would make good reading as a management briefing too.
